AERIAL OFFENSIVE

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 November 1944, Page 6

AERIAL OFFENSIVE

COBLENZ CHIEF TARGET

LONDON, November 7. The air offensive against Western Germany was kept up after dark last night, when Royal Air Force Lancasters attacked Coblenz and Gelsenkirchen. The Air Ministry says that the attack on Coblenz was a swift saturation one, all over in about 10 minutes.

Allied fighters, roeket-firers, and bombers opened an intensified attack against German road and rail communications, from Arnhem to Cologne. Marshalling yards at Utrecht and railway systems south-west of Bremen were also bombed. Altogether, railway lines were cut in 38 places. Factories, fuel and ammunition dumps were also bombed. FLYING BOMBS. LONDON, November 7.More flying bombs were over Southern England on Monday night. Some were shot down. One scattered propaganda leaflets when it exploded over a village. repairing’ ARMY. (N.Z.P.A. Special Correspondent) * LONDON, November 7. 1 German leaflets are being scattered over parts of Southern England in addition to ■ the continued arrival of flying bombs.' One lot fluttered down "after a vivid flash in the sky.” The leaflets are of four pages with the beading: "The Other side—Berlin number one.” They include extracts of speeches made in the Commons and elsewhere, in which Commoners are said to be “Jubilating over the coming end of the war.” London now has a bomb repair army of 132,000. They include 36,000 men transferred from the provinces, 5,800 from the services, and 1400 national fire service members from the provinces. In one district, 600 naval ratings, all former building tradesmen, are helping with repairs. Sir Frederick Pile, who is anti-aircraft commander-in-chief, has stated that an army of nearly” 100.000 was.employed to defeat the flyjng bomb. It cost two million sterling to house them. TRANS-ATLANTIC RECORD. RUGBY, November 7. Captain d. B. Lothian, in an R.A.F. Lancaster bomber, set up a new trans-Atlantic record by flying from Montreal to Britain on Monday in 10 hours 13 minutes, one hour one minute less than the previous record last January. The plane carried mail for the Canadian forces and priority goods, but no passengers.