BROUGHT DOWN

Wairarapa Times-Age, 28 February 1940, Page 5

BROUGHT DOWN

TWO GERMAN AIR RAIDERS CREW OF ONE MACHINE ESCAPES. SEEN TAKING TO RUBBER BOAT. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day. 9.50 a.m.) RUGBY. February 27. The Air Ministry annonneod: “A German ITeinkel raider was engaged and shot down by an R.A.F. Fighter Command patrol oft' the month of the Firth of Forth shortly before 1. p.m. today. Early this afteinoon fighter .aircraft of the R.A.F. shot down a second ITeinkel off the coast of Northumberland. Three members of - the crew of the ITeinkel wore seen taking to a rubber boat.’’

ACTIVE NIGHT FLIGHTS OVER BERLIN. INEFFECTIVE ENEMY FIRE. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. LONDON. February 27. Behind the Air Ministry’s communique on the latest air activity lies a story of possibly the most dramatic and certainly the most active night for the R.A.F. since the beginning of the war. It is believed the communique covers several separate adventures carried out in darkness by many machines operating in independent groups. It 1 is noted that the Baltic is mentioned for the first time in any official air bulletin. A direct flight from a bomber base in Britain would have taken the pilots over the narrow, heavily fortified neck of land north of Hamburg which is cut by the Kiel Canal. The R.A.F.’s visit to Berlin is the third of those Berlin trips and probably was the most thrilling and most exacting of the R.A.F.’s exploits. The pilots more than once courted German searchlights in order to bring back the maximum amount of information and also to judge the enemy’s efforts to improve his night defences by means of coloured searchlights operated with a view to discovering which colour is the most penetrating. Our pilots say that these lights are “very pretty.” It was reported a fortnight ago that Berlin’s defence organisation was badly shaken when a British reconnaissance machine flew over the city. The British pilot said that every available anti-aircraft gun was in action but not a single shot went near him.