GIFT SQUADRON

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 284, 26 August 1940, Page 7

GIFT SQUADRON

Successful Activities

(British Official Wireless.) LONDON, August 23

Details of recent successful activities of the Nizam of Hyderabad t> squadron, which, within the past ten davs has destroyed more than -4 Junkers and Messerschmitts, is now disclosed. On August 18, which proved their most successful day, 11 ot the squadron’s Spitfires caught 30 Junkets dive-bombers and ten escorting fighters off the Isle of Wight. The squadron immediately dived to the attack, circling down at more than JOO miles an hour. One pilot brought down t l iree _-the first two single-handed, and the third shared with fellow-pilots. This was the day when over 150 enemy aircraft were destroyed. In the whole week there were onlytwo days when the squadron did not go up and come back with one or more of the enemy to its credit. Yesterday, when the Nazis went back to their old tip and run tactics, the Nizam's squadron was again successful. Three of (lie Spitfires on control off the south coast sighted a solitary Junkers 8S ail'd attacked in turn. The enemy dived almost to sea level. Thirty seconds later it had disappeared beneath the waves.

Since this squadron .shot down its first: enemy aircraft in February, at least 34 more German planes have been destroyed by its pilots.