Borkum Maid Most Daring In Air History

Northern Advocate, 1 December 1939, Page 2

Borkum Maid Most Daring In Air History

(Received 12.30 p.m.) RUGBY, November 30,

The air raid on Tuesday on the seaplane base at Borkum, on the East Freisland Islands by the R.A.F., is declared by reports to have been one of the most audacious raids in the history of war flying. A German communique, which ungrudgingly describes the raid as a daring exploit, admits that it caught them unawares.

The full story of the raid, which is now being pieced together, does not bear out the German claim that no damage was done.

On the contrary, the result of the “straffing” were that five German seaplanes were machinegunned, two of them, it is believed, being seriously damaged.

Valuable Information,

Three out of the four machine-gun posts on the Borkum mole were probably put out of action, German coastal patrol boats were riddled with bullets and valuable information of the enemy's fortifications was collected.

Later, the fighter patrol which carried out the raid landed safely in the darkness on their home aerodrome. They returned as they went, a complete squadron of 12 twin-engined fighters, piloted by six R.A.F. regulars and six members of the Auxiliary Air Force.

Not one of the pilots or any of the members cf the crew had been under fire before.

They covered 500 miles in carrying out a highly successful attack on the fortified German seaplane base and, in spile of the intense anti-air-craft fire, no members of the crews, numbering 36 .all told, 'received a scratch, and not a single machine bore any trace of the gunfire to which it had been subjected.

Five Seaplanes on Spillways,

The patrol had been sent out to reconnoitre the German base and attack the seaplanes in the air or at their base.

The machines emerged from the clouds, after flying through a rainstorm. at a short distance from their target. Before the main attack, the pilots spotted five seaplanes on the slipways, together with coastal patrol boats.

The patrol was flying- in four sections of three aircraft each, and immediately dived for various objectives, spraying machine-gun bullets from heights of sometimes well below 100 ft. Pandemonium. The Germans were taken completely by surprise. The fighter crews could see men running in all directions, while some gunners occupying a post on top of the hangar fell to the ground. For a while there was pandemonium.

Then, the anti-aircraft guns of the coastal patrol boats got into action, but the standard of firing was not very high. Undisturbed by the enemy’s pompoms and machine-guns, the British fighters pressed heme their low-fiying attacks.

As one member of the crew said, afterwards, “The Germans probably never thought they would have to hit anything so low in the air.”

Their task completed, the fighters reformed and flew hack to England, 200 miles of the journey being covered in darkness.

They were not intercepted by German aircraft during any part of the flight.