LIMITED EFFECTS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 30 August 1940, Page 5

LIMITED EFFECTS

OF ENEMY AIR ATTACKS

LONDONERS GO CHEERFULLY TO WORK.

AFTER PROLONGED DOSE OF BOMBING.

(By Telegraph—Press Association —Copyright) (Received This-Day. 9 a.m.) LONDON, August 29. Londoners cheerfully went to work this morning after the most severe and most prolonged dose of bombing the capital has yet received. Their Majesties the King and Queen set an example of imperturbality on Tuesday night, when they refused tc allow an air raid warning to interfere with an all-night journey to the northern command. Sirens were sounding as they drove from the Palace, but the Royal car continued on its way to the railway station at a snail’s pace. Several London areas received their first experience of bombs, but the Germans’ haphazard methods minimised the material damage and the public's use of shelters kept casualties low.

Eighten hundred civil defence workers were on duty in one district where, over 60 incendiary bombs fell and “stirrup pumps’’ were so effective that there was no fire and no casualties. One incendiary bomb almost burnt out a well-known emporium in one district before the fire was controlled. High explosive bombs, about a mile away, demolished several workingclass houses. One bomb landed on top of a shelter and the four occupants, all members of one family, were killed. Several houses were demolished and a church was extensively damaged. A mansion, a garage and a sports pavilion were gutted by fire as the result of attacks on a north-west town in the early morning. Incendiary bombs and many high-explosive bombs were dropped. The Midlands also received prolonged attention from the raiders, who were over one town for several hours. Incendiary and high-explosive bombs fell over a wide area and many houses were wrecked and gas and electricity services were affected. Bombs also fell on small Midlands towns. Two persons were killed and several were injured when a raider dived over a Midlands town and drop- | ped five bombs in a residential quarter.

A German plane, it is believed, was brought down in a south-eastern area, after being caught in a maze of searchlight beams. Anti-aircraft fire in South Wales was the heaviest and the most prolonged thus far.

During the London raids many incendiary bombs fell in the grounds of an institution, damaging a hospital and other buildings by fire.