COLOGNE AGAIN

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVI, Issue 9, 10 July 1943, Page 5

COLOGNE AGAIN

HEAVY R.A.F. ATTACK

OVER 1000 TONS OF BOMBS

(U.P.A. and 8.0. W.) Rec. 11 a.m. LONDON, July 9. More than 1000 tons of bombs fell on Cologne last night, when the great Ruhr industrial centre had its third attack within a fortnight. It was not such a heavy attack as the raids of June 28 and July 3, but the bomb-load was big enough to do great damage to the industrial district attacked, in which many factories were either previously undamaged or were reconstructed after the 1000-bomber raid last summer. There was much cloud, with bad I icing and electrical storms along the I route. It wag difficult to prevent the guns getting iced up, and many of the crews spoke of intense cold. Reports from experienced reconnaissance pilots who made special flights over the target indicate that the bombing soon became effectively concentrated. Nearly all the crews had a quiet ; journey to and from the target, but I they were hotly engaged over Cologne, ! where the searchlights were hampered iby cloud, but the barrage was intense. ! Enemy fighters made repeated attacks when their pilots had a good chance of spotting bombers silhouetted against the «red glow of fires or the diffused light of the searchlights on cloud. One fighter was reported to have attacked a bomber in the midst of heavy antiaircraft fire. One Lancaster destroyed I two fighters. OTHER OPERATIONS. The Air Ministry communiqe which announces the raid says that planes of the Bomber Command also mined enemy waters. Fighters attacked airfields and railway targets in France and north-west Germany. Fleet Air Arm planes, operating with the Fighter Command, damaged three mine-sweep-ers off the French coast. Eight of our bombers are missing from all these operations. Berlin radio says that in a renewed | terror raid last night against residenI tial quarters of the Rhineland, particularly Cologne, British bombers dropped bombs at random from a completely clouded sky. It was Cologne's third raid in the last eleven nights and the 119 th since the war began.