STOP PRESS

Evening Star, Issue 23832, 12 March 1941, Page 12

STOP PRESS

k EIGHT NIGHT BOMBERS 1 DESTROYED. RUGBY, March XL—Enemy activity on Tuesday was slight. No reports have been received of any bombs being dropped on land. One enemy aircraft was shot down by our lighters oil the so nth coast on Tuesday afternoon.. T£ is now known .that four enemy bombers were destroyed by antiaircraft gunfire in the Portsmouth area on Monday night by our defences. The enemy aircraft shot down by the destroyer Holderness makes Monday night’s total eight. , All the bombers shot down in the Portsmouth area were seen to crash or explode' in midair by many witnesses, states . the Air Ministry News Service. Tho first of these raiders was caught by a. searchlight over tho town, and a direct hit was made by antiaircraft guns. The bomber burst into flames and dived into the sea. Another raider met the same fate soon afterwards. The next enemy machine was destroyed in mid-air, and the fourth crashed into tho mud on the Isle of Wight seashore atfer a direct hit. LOCAL BODY ELECTIONS. The Hon. W. E. Parry said legislation wimld be introduced this session providing for the local body elections to be held on a Saturday, bringing tho polling day into lino with that of the General Election. This means that the elections will take place on Saturday, May 17, instead of Wednesday, May 11. —Wellington Press Association. OUTRAGE IN ISTANBUL. Tho 8.8. C. announced that bombs in a suitcase caused an explosion in an hotel in Istanbul at which the British Legation staff was staying on its arrival from Sofia (Bulgaria). The British Minister, Air G. Rendel, was uninjured, but 15 other people in the hotel were killed. It was also stated that an attempt had been made to wreck the train between Sofia and Istanbul. A former New Zealand Rhodes scholar (Mr Norman Davis, of Dunedin), is a member of the Sofia Legation. FREE SERVICES. Tho Hon. A. H. Nordmoyer said it was anticipated that the X-ray out-patient service, laboratory service and free pharmaceutical benefits would he available to the public from April I.—Wellington Press Association.