AIR SUPREMACY
ALLIED LOSSES NEGLIGIBLE STAGGERING TOTAL OF SORTIES (Rec. 11 a.m.) RUGBY, July 11. About 158,000 sorties were flown by Allied aircraft in the first month after the landings in Prance. This is the total figure for aircraft despatched on operational missions of all types—in support of the immediate battle in Normandy, strategic operations against indsutrial occupied Europe, defensive patrols, and reconnaissance. During this period 1,067 enemy aircraft were destroyed in tho air. No estimate has been made of the total of enemy planes destroyed or damaged in Allied attacks on airfields, aircraft factories, or assembly plants. The total Allied aircraft losses were 1,284 planes. This figure again includes all types of operational missions, both tactical and strategical. The percentage of Allied aircraft losses was 1 slightly more than 1 per cent, during the initial phase, but gradually decreased to just over .8 per cent, for the first month. Two large explosions followed when Flying-officer W. J. Runciman, D.F.C. (Auckland), of the New Zealand Mosquito Bomber Squadron, attacked an ammunition train in a railway yard near La Fertre.
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Bibliographic details
Evening Star, Issue 25225, 12 July 1944, Page 5
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179AIR SUPREMACY Evening Star, Issue 25225, 12 July 1944, Page 5
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