“Lei’s Wreck ’Em!”

Manawatu Times, Volume 66, Issue 102, 1 May 1941, Page 7

“Lei’s Wreck ’Em!”

RECONNAISSANCE PLANE DESTROYS TROOP-CARRIERS

(British Official Wireless.) Received Wednesday, 9.20 p.m. RUGBY, April 29. Details of the announcement appearing in an R.A.F. Middle East communique relating to the destruction of a number of troop-carrying German planes is given by the Canadian captain of an R.A.F. reconnaissance aircraft which carried out the attack. “We had. completed ‘xecko’ and were coming back over Benina when we were confronted by the sight of what looked like a hundred JCT 52’s lined up wingtip to wingtip. “It was too good to ani3s but it was not our job to attack so I called up the crew and asked what they thought about it. “ ‘Let’s wreck ’em,’ they said, so from about two and a-half miles up in the air I pointed nose down into a steep dive. It looked as if the enemy planes had just landed for there were groups of soldiers gathered about on the landing ground. We gave them all we had. One of the aircraft burst into flames immediately and smoke poured from others. The soldiers were too startled apparently to raise their rifles. They just closed up like penknives and toppled to tho ground."