R.A.F. RAID ON STUTTGART

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23803, 24 November 1942, Page 5

R.A.F. RAID ON STUTTGART

TEN PLANES MISSING FROM STRONG FORCE (Rec. 11 p.m.) LONDON, Nov. 23. A strong force of Royal Air Force bombers last night attacked targets in Germany for the first time in a fortnight. Their objective was Stuttgart, the centre of a key industrial district, where aircraft and U-boat engines are made. The headquarters of the Bosch and Daimler-Benz firms, making engines for Messerschmitts and Heinkels, are in Stuttgart, which is also an important rail junction. Ten British bombers are missing from the raid. An Air Ministry communique says: “On Sunday night Fighter Command aircraft attacked railways and other targets in the course of offensive patrols over northern France and Belgium. None of our aircraft is missing. Five trains were attacked with bombs or machine-gun and cannon fire. "The West Riding squadron was among the forces which took part in these operations, the squadron commander himself making two sorties. He destroyed a locomotive in the Abbeville yards on his second patrol and shot up a long goods train. A Hurricane pilot came down to roof level to bomb two trains standing at the Hazebrouck station. In spite of the stream of flak which was coming up at him he made two further attacks with his machineguns and observed a serious outbreak of fire, and also damage to one of the engines. Other pilots who bombed two factories reported clouds of white smoke following their attacks.” "The burnt and destroyed areas in Genoa are so large and so many that it is useless to attempt to give details of the damage,” reports a correspondent. describing the effects of the recent Royal Air Force raids. “Seen from a height, one has the impression that half the town has been destroyed, and in the port almost everything seems destroyed, burnt, or damaged.” Genoa has been raided six times by the Royal Air Force since the opening of the Allied offensive in the Mediterranean. The total duration of these raids was only two hours and a half, but the damage has been enormous. The six raids have cost the Royal Air Force only 12 aircraft. For a time, at least, Genoa has been knocked out as an effective Axis supply port. The damage in the port is believed to include hits on the liners Augustus and Roma, both of which are more than 30,000 tons. .There are large areas in the city devastated by fire. Pilot Officer N. S. Black ( (Christchurch), Pilot Officer R. H. Brookhants, and Sergeant A. W. Washbourne (Auckland) participated in the big raid on Turin on Friday night. Flying Officer C. K. Silcock, D.F.C. (Nelson) and Flight Sergeant J. A. Shephard (Christchurch) participated in the raid on Turin last Wednesday.