COLOSSAL R.A.F. RAID

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 78, 24 November 1943, Page 5

COLOSSAL R.A.F. RAID

BERLIN A SEA OF FLAMES Crews Confident of Great Victory Night Fighters and A.A. Defences Beaten (Rec. 10.5 a.m.) Rugby, Nov. 23. Berlin had the heaviest air attack last night when a great bomber force dropped over 2300 tons of high explosives and incendiaries. This time there was no second target. Lancasters, Stirlings and Halifaxes all went to Berlin.

After the raid all the crews were confident of results and none had any doubt that they had won a great victory. They had beaten flight fighter squadrons and also massed batteries of antiaircraft guns which served as Berlin s second line of defence and their casualties were well below the average even for attacks on much easier targets.

Mosquitoes attacked targets in western Germany and mines were laid in enemy waters. Twenty-six bombers are missing.

It was another cloud cover attack like four nights ago. On both the outward and homeward journeys the bombers flew hundreds of miles bver an unbroken sea of cloud. Over Berlin there was an occasional gap through which crews caught a glimpse of the ground—vivid coloured lights of marked bombs, a rising pillar of black smoke and a patch of fire. But the bombaimers were not looking for gaps. Pathfinders were out in force and dropped in a dense concentration an unbroken succession of target indicators and pyrotechnic flares from start to finish.

Enemy guns were shooting at flares as they fell but nothing stopped the pathfinders from building up an unmistakable target of coloured lights and keeping it thick throughout the attack for just over half an hour from 8 o'clock. Soon the clouds began to reflect the glow of fires below and even through cloud several thousand feet thick the light was so bright that crews saw each others bombs as they fell. VIOLENT EXPLOSION SEEN Twenty minutes after the first bombs were dropped hundreds of crews saw one of the most violent explosions ever reported from a German target. A navigator said: ‘‘Everything suddenly went all white. The brilliance stayed in the sky a long time and then coloured to a reddish glow which went on as long as we were over the target. It was like a terrific sunset. The attack was so well concentrated that while we were over Berlin we saw only one flash of a 4000-pounder outside the main target area fires. We saw about 50 blockbusters go off in that time.” Very few night fighters were over Berlin and the Germans were forced to let loose a great barrage, which had once been the main defence of the capital before modern tactics forced the enemy to use so great a part of his air force to protect the cities. Searchlights were blocked by clouds and without any hope of the bombers being coned gunners could only blaze away at all the sky above Berlin. There was enough heavy flak, however, to bring shells near many bombers. Single night fighters which were over Berlin while the attack was on had to face their own barrage. As during last week's attack on Berlin most of the A-A batteries on the route were in action. • TERROR ATTACK,” SAYS BERLIN Berlin radio reports a heavy R.A.F. raid on Berlin late last night when heavy damage and loss of life was caused in many parts of the city, mainly working class districts. Describing the raid as a terror attack the German news agency states it was carried out in spite of dense clouds and complete lack of visibility. Irreplaceable historic and cultural buildings were destroyed and others damaged, including several belonging to diplomatic missions of neutral states.

Router comments that the German public was told about the raid in the first news bulletins to-day. It is quite unusual for the German radio to give raid news in the first bulletins. The departure from the normal practice seems t • indicate that damage was on an unusually heavy scale.

Berlin is being “Hamburged.” That is the meaning of German reports on the heaviness of the R.A.F.’s raid last night, says the British United Press aviation correspondent. If the R.A.F. is able to maintain the rate of attack during the winter using as large a number of planes as at present available, Berlin should be wiped out as an administrative and industrial centre by the spring. It will not be an easy task.'but another 20 or 25 raids on the magnitude of last night’s should do the job. COLOGNE ANILINE FACTORIES London, Nov. 22. The R.A.F. attacks against the Leverkusen and Zadische aniline dye factories at Cologne were a great blow, according to messages received in Zurich from Berlin. The factories were busy developing liquid incendiary bombs which are believed to play a most important part m “secret weapon” plans. The German Press says that the Leverkusen anti aircraft defences are the strongest in Germany.