RAIDERS OFF SCOTLAND.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 137, 10 May 1940, Page 7

RAIDERS OFF SCOTLAND.

R.A.F. TAKE TOLL. (British Official Wireless.) Received May 10, 11.55 a.in. R'lfGßSf, May 9. . After shooting down in flames a German Hornier “flying pencil" raider off the north-east coast of Scotland to-day, Royal Air Force Fighter Command pilots tried to save one of the crew who jumped by parachute. The Nazi airman fell into the sea about fourteen miles from land. British pilots circling above him in Hurricanes saw him remove his parachute and begin to swim. They reported by radio-telephone to their hare and a launch was immediately sent out. Flying to and fro between the launch and the swimming German, they directed the rescue, hut when the launch reached him lie was dead. The patrolling Hurricane pilots had chased the Hornier shortly before from a point just inland. As they came in to attack the German rear gunner opened fire first. Waiting until they came within close range, the fighters fired, one after another. The raider was hit immediately, the first burst from one fighter causing clouds of black smoke to pour from the starboard engine. He flow into a cloud, closely pursued. When the fighters canio out of the cloud they found themselves at point-blank range. Oil from the crippled Hornier covered their windscreens as they made two more attacks on the raider, which dodged in and out. Before the aircraft dived into the sea one. of the Nazi airmen had taken to his parachute. As the Hornier struck the water there was an exclusion and tlie fighter oilots saw white and orange flames shoot into the air. (From Daventry.) Two more German raiders have been brought down off the coast of Scotland. Watchers at an cast coast town saw one Hornier brought down, amt another which made for the sea was later reported to have crashed. Altogether 70 German machines have been brought down over or near the British Isles since the outbreak of the war.