HEAVY R.A.F. RAID

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 64, 12 September 1942, Page 7

HEAVY R.A.F. RAID

FIRE BLINDS BOMBER PILOTS

LONDON, September 11. A powerful force of R.A.F. bombers attacked Western Germany last night. Their main target was Dusseldorf, chief centre of the German steel and engineering industry. It was the heaviest raid which the Bomber Command has yet made on a moonless night, but flares and the v flames from the fires did the work of the moon. The Germans admit widespread damage. The planes dropped over 100,000 incendiaries and created such an inferno of flame that it was not until the pilots were over the sea 120 miles away that they lost sight of the glare. The whole attack was concentrated into an hour. The barrage was heavy, but the intensity of the attack confused the defenders. Some of the 1 heaviest bombers, Lancasters and' Halifaxes, went towards making up the powerful raiding force, which included Canadian bomber squadrons. HAVOC OF PREVIOUS RAID. The last attack on Dusseldorf was in July, and daylight photographs have confirmed the havoc which the,bombers did on that occasion to main war I factories. From last night's attack 31 bombers did not return. A German broadcaster, commenting on the Dusseldorf raid, says that the R.A.F attack was a fierce one and the task which the people had to face was hard. "The faces of the Rhinelanders," he said, "have lost something of their accustomed cheerfulness."