DOVER BATTLE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 30 July 1940, Page 6

DOVER BATTLE

HEAVY ENEMY BOMBING MET BY OVERWHELMING FIRE. DESTRUCTION OF ATTACKING PLANES. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) (Received This Day. 10.45 a.m.) LONDON, July 29. An eyewitness, describing the air battle over Dover, said each German plane dropped a salvo of one big and four smaller bombs. There were terrific concussions and the bombs shook houses along the seafront and shattered windows everywhere. Waterspouts a hundred feet high showered spray over ships that bobbed like corks. The anti-aircraft gunfire was so intense that the last wave of bombers was forced to break off its dives and fly back out of range. Another source estimates that a hundred planes, including between 50 and 60 dive-bombers, participated in the attack. In addition to the successes by one squadron of Spitfires and one squadron of Hurricanes, five R.A.F. pilots reported that German planes fell in the sea in flames after attacks. The Air Ministry has now established that twenty enemy aircraft were brought down today. TWO DIVE=BOMBERS BROUGHT DOWN BY GUNS. IN ADDITION TO VICTIMS OF FIGHTERS. (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 11.40 a.m.) RUGBY, July 29. Tonights Air Ministry communique states: "R.A.F. fighters this afternoon shot down an enemy bomber over the Channel coast and another in the Thames Estuary. "It is now confirmed that in the morning engagement at Dover two enemy bombers were shot down by antiaircraft fire in addition to those shot down by fighters, making today's total twen iy.