SWIFT & DEADLY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 14 May 1943, Page 4

SWIFT & DEADLY

THE RAID ON DUISBURG FIRES BURN ALL DAY. NUMBER OF VIOLENT EXPLOSIONS (British Official Wireless.) (Received This Day, 11.5 a.m.) RUGBY, May 13. The Duisburg raid was timed to start at 2 a.m. and did so to the minute. By 2.45 the whole area was covered by dense smoke and lit by immense fires. Reconnaissance early this afternoon proved that fires were still burning. There were a number of violent explosions during the raid, one being seen 40 miles away. - It lit up all Duisburg and the country around. Similar explosions during a previous raid have been discovered to be due to the firing of ammunition dumps or supplied of incendiaries. Pilots reported that the anti-aircraft fire was moderate for the Ruhr and that searchlights were baffled by the weight of the attack. A number of German fighters were seen, one bomber being attacked five times near the target. The number of aircraft despatched to Duisburg was not much above the avI erage of the heavy raids of the last three- months, but the gradual substitution of four-engined for- two-engined bombers has made the normal striking force more powerful than that which devastated 600 acres of Cologne in an Hour and a half. Greater concentration is now possible and last night’s raid was planned to take half the time taken by the Cologne raid.