B Flight comprised of F/Lt 'Riksen' Richards as flight lead and myself as wingman, took off towards Nijmegen from B-78 with the callsign 'BUMPER'. When we were a few miles out from the city F/Lt 'Riksen' Richards noticed some AA shooting at an A/C. As soon as I got eyes-on-target, F/Lt 'Riksen' Richards called me up on the R/T and ordered me to pursue the bandit. I noticed that it was an Me 110 and raced towards his low-6. I got in several bursts of 20mm and I believe at one point I shot a 5 second burst! It was billowing smoke but wasn't on fire yet, and once I took some hits from it's tail-gunner I broke off and tried to follow it from a distance, parallel to it's course. He wasn't appearing to be going down just yet, and so I got the 'O.K' from F/Lt 'Riksen' Richards to go in for another pass. As I got almost in firing range from it we both noticed that it was going in and we broke, making sure that it crashed to the earth before moving off. A short time after Riksen spotted a large A/C and we made for it. I was again ordered to 'engage at will' and so I raced in for the He 111's low-6. I fired some bursts of 20mm and quickly ran out of it. I still had a full load of .50 Cal so I started up with that. I got hit hard by the tail-gunner and got into a spin - I couldn't get out of it and fell about 8,000 feet when I finally got control of the plane! When I got back up I saw it smoking heavily and headed towards the ground. When I regrouped with F/Lt 'Riksen' Richards he had immediately spotted another He 111. We both went in for it and I got a few hits with .50 Cal. I saw Riksen score some 20mm (red tracer) hits on it shortly after I had broken off. I took some severe hits from the tail gunner on my second pass and I broke off and started limping for home. F/Lt 'Riksen' Richards caught up with me and was able to cover me and lead me in to the nearest airbase. I managed to land wheel/flaps down at our original airfield and we were both safe. F/O 'Zach' Z. Lamothe |
