AIR WARFARE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 August 1940, Page 5

AIR WARFARE

IN AFRICAN TERRITORIES FIFTEEN ITALIAN PLANES DESTROYED. AT COST OF TWO BRITISH MACHINES. A machine of the Fleet Air Arm from the Australian cruiser Hobart bombed the Italian military headquarters set up at Zeila, in British Somaliland, a Daventry broadcast reports. It returned undamaged.

Italian aircraft, flying at a great height, dropped bombs on British warships in the Gulf of Aden without causing either casualties or damage.

Fifteen Italian planes were shot down over Libya for the loss of two British fighters.

ATTACK ON ZEILA NEW ENEMY HEADQUARTERS DAMAGED. EFFECTIVE WORK BY PLANE FROM HOBART. (Received This Day. 9.40 a.m.) LONDON, August 9. The Admiralty announces that a Walrus plane of the fleet air arm, operating from H.M.A.S. cruiser Hobart, on August 8, dive-bombed the Italian military headquarters which were recently established at Zeila. in British Somaliland. They damaged the headquarters and also machine-gunned military targets, damaging lorries and staff cars, causing casualties among the Italian military personnel. The Walrus machine returned undamaged to the ship. Italian planes on August 8 bombed our warships in the Gulf of Aden, flying high, and causing no damage and no casualties. ITALIAN REPORT LOSS OF FIFTEEN REDUCED TO TWO. (Received This Day, 9.40 a.m.) ROME, August 9. A communique states: “Italian forces from Somaliland took Hargeisa, in British Somaliland. “Italy has scored the most important air battle against the British since Italy entered the war. Over the EgyptianCyrenaican frontier sixteen Italian pursuit planes, fighting 27 British chasers, sent five British down. Two Italian planes are missing.”