LINE OF FIRE

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21228, 26 September 1940, Page 7

LINE OF FIRE

DAMAGE ON CONTINENT RAIDS LAST HOURS SERIES OF ATTACKS (Omclal Wireless) (Received Sept. 26, 1 p.m.) RUGBY, Sept. 25 In extensive Royal Air Force operations against the enemy on Tuesday night, which included a long raid on Berlin, details of which are already known, as well as a continuation of the systematic attacks of recent nights on enemy invasion ports, only two of the aircraft employed were lost. Finkenheer’s electric power station, near Frankfurt, on the Oder, more than 300 miles from Germany’s western frontier, was located half-an-hour before midnight and twice attacked with sticks of high explosive bombs, which were seen to burst in and around the target. The main railway line near Madgeburg and the rail depot and distributing centre at Hamm were also attacked, and a number of explosions on the main sidings and sheds at Hamm were followed by a line of fires. The goods yards at Brussels were also attacked, the Hanover aerodrome was bombed from a high level, and at The Hague to the north of Emden, where night flying by the enemy is in progress, a British raider came down to 2000 feet to drop his bombs on a hangar and runway. A flare revealed the wreckage of a hangar destroyed in a previous attack. While the long distance raids on Germany were in progress other strong forces of bombers, operating at short range, kept up their nightly hammering of the enemy’s invasion ports from Hamburg to Le Havre. Fires were started at the Hamburg docks. Bombs straddled the shipping bases at Cherbourg and at the Dutch port of Delfzil. Attacks Lasted Seven Hours At Ostend repeated hits were scored on basins and on the harbour jetties. The Calais docks, the target for one of the night’s heaviest bombardments, were subjected to a series of attacks lasting nearly seven hours. Barges lying alongside the quays were hit, and fires and explosions were seen in many parts of the harbour. Before four o’clock on Wednesday morning more than thirty fires were counted, burning within the docks. At Le Havre the raids began at 10 p.m. and continued at intervals until 5 o’clock on Wednesday. Lock gates were hit, warehouses set alight, and many other fires started. A violent explosion marked a direct hit on what appeared to be a harbour power station. Strong oposition from the ground defences was encountered at Boulogne. Direct hits were claimed here on the wall of one dock and on jetties between the basins and in many parts of the outer harbour. A big explosion, followed by a fire, was seen to occur in No. 7 dock. The German long-range gun positions at Cap Gris Nez were also attacked shortly before dawn and numbers of hits were registered on new emplacements under construction.