FROM SINGAPORE TO ENGLAND

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 249, 18 July 1942, Page 8

FROM SINGAPORE TO ENGLAND

N.Z Fighter Force REFORMING FOR NIGHT OPERATIONS (By Telegraph.—Press Assn. —Copyright.) ' • (Special Correspondent.) LONDON, July 16. The squadron of the Royal New Zealand Air Force which fought at Singapore is now reforming in .England. It will fly Beaufighters, and will be a night-fighter squadron. There will now be four R.N.Z.A.F. squadrons in Britain—the Spitfire, Hurricane, Hampden and Beaufighter squadrons—and in addition the No. 75 Wellington Bomber Squadron. Hie Aucklander, Squadron Leader R. 51. Trousdale, D.F.C. with bar, will be the commanding officer of the Beaufighter squadron. He is an exceptionally skilful, keen fighter-pilot and has destroyed eight enemy planes, five of them at night. He has recently been attached to a Royal Canadian Air Force night-fighter squadron, in which he commanded a flight. He has the distinction of having made the first attack for the squadron when he damaged a Dornier 217 last November, but he had to break off the combat when he ran out of ammunition. He shot down two Huns in one flight in August, 1941, and he was awarded the D.F.C. in February, 1941 and the bar in May, 1942. The Beaufighter is a mid-winged twin-engined aircraft with four cannons and six machineguns. Beaufighters are flying with the Coastal Command and also over Libya in addition to being night-fighters. Their nominal top speed is 330 miles an hour at 14,000 feet, and their range 1500 miles.