AIR BATTLE OVER THE SOMME

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 2928, 14 November 1916, Page 7

AIR BATTLE OVER THE SOMME

NEARLY 7ft MACHINES IN WHIRLING ■ CONFLICT AWE-INSPIRING FIGHT Australian-New Zealand Cabin Agsociatl6B. Paris, November 12. Thousands oE British and French troops watched near Bapaumo the first real aerial battle, at a height of two miles, mentioned in Sir Douglas Haig's dispatch, between 38 German machines and thrco.. British squadrons, each of Ifj aeroplanes. The British delivered battlo before the Germans were able to cross their lines. At one moment seventy machines were engaged in the fisht: first a Fokker fell in flames, then a British aeroplane landed in its own lines badly damaged. Meanwhile the soldiers lieard incessant machine-gun aud revolver fire overhead, and saw the last of four German machines drop after half an hour's fighting. The enemy flew back in disorder, the British pursuing. "BREATHLESS AND RECKLESS DUELS" TWENTY MINUTES' BOUT WITH DEATH. (Tteuter's Telegram.) (Roc. November 13, 6.55 p.m.) London, November 12. Reuter's correspondent at. Headquarters says': "The old leisurely air combats are bow gone. There are now swifter, more breathless, reckless duels. The Germans are exactly copying our methods, formations, and tactics: Tha last engagement raged for twenty minutes, five thousand feet up among the clouds, and presented the spectacle of an inextricable tangle of darting, whirling machines; The roar of seventy propellers' and the clatter of the guns filled the air. A strong wind drifted the battle deeply into the enemy's country." •