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[Page 16]
machine. In the first we took the aviators were killed and their dead bodies brought in as were both the machines, the latter one being more or less intact.
This was not the end of the raid for again at 6.0 o'clock five more planes blew along, and for a third time the crash of the barrage broke out afresh. These last five having got rid of their bombs sailed quite low down over the harbour. It was soon now broad daylight, and they were evidently wishful of obtaining photographs. Enemies though they were, it was hard not to admire the courage of these men who with myriads of shells bursting round them, came down coolly to within two thousand feet. One came, and appeared to hover right over our trot. One gazed up facinated much in the same way perhaps as a bird will gaze at a snake slowly crawling towards it intent on making it its victim. Through my glasses I could make out quite plainly the figures of the two occupants. Had they any bombs left it seemd quite impossible that they should miss. The Engr. Lieutennant-Commander who was standing behind me - both of us being clad only in our pyjamas - said "Cripes! if they drop one now we are in for a re-fit alright!" Fortunately they had got rid of all their bombs, anyway none dropped and a minute or two after they had all sped seawards. Our own flying people now took a hand in the game, and although we could not actually see the melee, which must have taken place, it was with no small satisfaction that by 3.0 p.m. that afternoon we saw three more very much damaged enemy planes being brought in by Italian T.B's.
The damage done during this raid was negligible. Fifteen killed and forty-five wounded, nearly all of them Italian airmen or mechanics. It was unfortunate for us that our own air people were, at the moment of the first raid, getting their machines ready to set out on a similar excursion to Durazzo and about the aerodrome were clustered the best part of one hundred pilots, observers and mechanics. One of the first bombs dropped right in the middle of a crowd of these people and naturally made some mess.
The "Blenheim" our parent ship was very neatly straddled, a bunch bomb on either side hitting the water and but doing no damage. Another bomb fell just ahead of the flagship of the 8th Light Cruiser Squadron H.M.S. "Gloucester" with the same result. Four bombs which dropped on shore were all duds and failed to explode. This was a common complaint