BOMBING A GOTHA NEST.

Taranaki Daily News, 6 May 1918, Page 7

BOMBING A GOTHA NEST.

—■ THRILLING NARRATIVE OF A BRITISH PILOT.

How the largest Gotha aerodrome in Belgium, where the night raids on England are engineered, was recently bombed by British aviators forms the subject of a thrilling narrative by "Night Hawk" in the "Daily Mail." "We had gone to bed," he writes. "At midnight the sky was filled >vith stormclouds, and we all thought a 'show' was out of the question. But at three in the morning whistles were blowing, Hares were being put out, sleepy men were opening the hangars, and orderlies were running round the camp warning pilots and observers to prepare for a 'stunt.' The sky had cleared, and thero was practically no wind. At half-past 3 12 machines took the air. My pilot and I were second off the ground. Our engine was running perfectly, we climbed rapidly, and in less than 20 minutes we had passed the last lighthouse and crossed the lines. Our operation orders were for one of the most distant Gotha aerodromes in Belgium. We got very little 'bate' going over the lines. An 'onion' battery had a burst at us, and about a dozen tracer-machine-gun bullets whizzed past us. Visibility was perfect, and it was possible to make out at one and the same moment the towns of X——, Y , Z -, A , and B . X was lighted up in places. We are not allowed to bomb it. We passed over Y and B-—-, and at both places were violently liated.' At B 11 searchlights picked us up at once, and we had to dive and side-slip several times in order to get out of their beams. Just beyond B we ran into a bank of dense black mist, through which one could see nothing. My pilot brought the machine down in a spiral, and at about 500 feet above the ground we came suddenly out of the cloud. In the meantime I had lost my bearings, but was able fortunately (o pick up a railway line with a double set of rails running due east, along which a train was steaming. I

POINTED THIS PRICELESS TARGET OUT

to my pilot and we dived for it. We got ahead, of it, and I dropped a bomb plump on to the metals. There was a tremendous explosion, the engine ran into the bomb-hole, and the rest of the train piled itself into the engine and caught fire. It was one of the weirdest scenes I have ever witnessed. \ie were flying at about 100 ft above the telegraph poles at this time, and I could see the Roche soldiers, in the flickering glare of the burning wreck, running along the, Vine, dodging here and there in their frantic efforts to get out of tfva hail of Lewis gun bullets which I was pouring into them. I imagine that a couple of hundred German soldiers went 'west' that night. An hour later, at nearly 5 in the morning, we reached our objective, the largest Gotha aerodrome in Belgium. Everything was quiet. We throttled our engines down and glided on to our target. At 50|)ft [ released the remainder, of the bombs on a group of hangars. Immediately the first bomb had burst the German anti-air-craft defences opened up. Archies, flaming onions, rifle and machinegun bullets were hurled at us, and the whole sky was brilliant with searchlights. I fired at two of the latter, and they went out. Having done our work, we turned the nose of our machine once more west and beetled off for home. Over B at (i o'clock that morning we got another packet of "hate,' a chunk of 'Archie' taking away one of the struts of our tail-booms. The whole machine rocked and quivered violently for 20 seconds, and then 'carried on.' At half-past six we crossed the lines. Wo landed in perfect style just after daybreak, and on reporting at the squadron, office we discovered that of the 12 machines which had started the night before ours was the only one to reach the objective, and others having turned back on encountering a black bank of clouds."