BOLD EXPLOITS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 April 1943, Page 4

BOLD EXPLOITS

- ■» IN ATTACKS ON JAPANESE SHIPS AMERICAN AIRMEN GIVE SOME DETAILS. HEAVY CRUISER SEEN TO BLOW UP. (Special Australian Correspondent.) (Received This Day, 12.30 p.m.) SYDNEY, This Day. Captain Fred Wesche, of Nev/ Jersey, who sank a destroyer in a lone attack off Finschhafen a few days ago, got home the first direct hit which started a fire on a heavy cruiser in the attack on Kavieng, New Ireland. Japanese sailors were seen scurrying along the decks, making frantic efforts to put out the flames. But succeeding attackers scored other direct hits. One of the 5001 b. bombs must have penetrated to the powder magazine, because the ship blew up with a terrific explosion. A light cruiser sank within a few minutes of receiving four direct hits by “skip” bombing. Lieutenant William Humriehouse, who -sank a heavy destroyer with two direct hits, flew so low that his plane nearly collided with a mast as the warship zigzagged wildly Ito escape the bombs, which were throwing up huge waterspouts around it. “I made a head-on attack, and at one stage it' appeared as if a collision were inevitable,” the pilot said. “The Jap must have got a fright. He twisted away when I was almost on top of him. There were only a few feet between me and the masthead when I dropped my bombs.”