10
This involved flying over the targets at about 9,000 feet, so the
Mosquitos
were
flown across the Channel at 25,000 feet and dived down from that height onto
their target. This was felt to be a hazardous undertaking in the unarmed and
highly vulnerable
Mosquito
as many
Fw 190
's and
ME 109
's were based in the target
area, but the task was completed in less than two months in spite of very poor
weather, and on most of the sorties several sites were covered before the pilot
deemed it time to make for home. On some occasions pilots took their aircraft
down to 9,000 feet and covered two or three sites and then climbed again to
25,000 feet, whilst still over France, to repeat the dive on another group of
sites.
Ralph Mottram
and
Val Riley
held the record by covering 14 sites on one
sortie on 15th February. Planning of these sorties had to be most carefully
done in order to outwit the Hun and it is gratifying to recollect that no aircraft
were lost on this task.
A new form of Night Photography had been developed at Farnborough, where a
Wellington
had been equipped with the necessary gear and an Army Exercise called
"EAGLE" was held in February to test the efficiency of this method and to examine
the results of night visual reconnaissance from the Army point of view. The
Wellington
was flown by
Richard Bowen
, and 140 took this chance of testing their
own technique for which purpose they sent a
Ventura
and a
Mosquito
to Yorkshire
where the exercise was held. The results, in spite of poor weather, were
extremely good and the Army pressed for night photography and visual reconnaissance
to be made available for the forthcoming operation.
Another successful dance was held by the officers on 25th March to say
farewell to
Hartford Bridge
and, on April 7th, we
moved to
Northolt
and estab-
-
+
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