An Cosantóir

www.military.ie the defence forces magazine | 29 turn west and then south, taking readings at various heights for transmission to their base, before taking an easterly heading back to Brest. The Luftwaffe's meteorologists based their weather forecasts on the informa- tion amassed by these flights. On the night of 30/31 May 97 German aircraft set off from bases in Northern France to carry out attacks on Liverpool, Belfast and the Bristol Channel area. These bombers would normally take a course off the south west coast of England and into the Irish Sea. However, strong easterly winds, not previously in- dicated, drifted the bombers off course to varying degrees. Some aircraft were reported by the authorities as crossing the coast at Waterford and flying north as far as Mullingar before realis- ing they were way off course. Dublin experienced many aircraft overhead and offshore heading north. The army operated its searchlights and opened fire on the raiders but claimed no hits. It was two separate aircraft that were responsible for the destruc- tion in Dublin that night. The first incident occurred when an aircraft circled the area of Swords and Collinstown Aerodrome (Dublin Airport) before turning south-east and dropping two bombs on North Richmond Street and one on the Phoenix Park before flying towards Stepa- side and then heading back to base. A second aircraft was tracked flying over north Dublin, Col- linstown Aerodrome, and then over Kilcock before returning to- wards Dublin and releasing a parachute land mine over the North Strand that caused death and destruction on a scale not seen previously in neutral Ireland, leaving 28 dead and scores injured. For many years after the war it was claimed that Britain had interfered with German radio navigating signals by 'bending the beams', but this is not a sustainable argument, despite Churchill making reference to it in his memoirs, as the navigating beams in question, known as X Gerat and Y Gerat, operated on a VHF signal of limited range, meaning that targets such as Liverpool, Manches- ter, Belfast and Glasgow were beyond the range of this system. Some years ago Gay Byrne had a guest on his radio show who claimed to have met a German pilot who had taken part in the bombing of Dublin. The German claimed that he was a pathfinder (the Luftwaffe used the term 'firelighter') flying a Junkers Ju88 bomber. He was reported as having apologised for the unfortu- nate bombing and the loss of life. However, this claim doesn't stand up to scrutiny. There were three designated firelighter units in the Luft- waffe at that time, whose mission was to fly ahead of the main bombing group and mark the target, usually with incendiary type bombs. One was Kampfgruppe 100 (Bomber Wing 100), or Kgr100, who used the X Gerat system. Another was 3 Group of Kampfgeschwader 26 (Bomber Group 26), or III./KG2, who used the Y Gerat. The third unit was 2 Group of Kampfgeschwader 55, or II./KG55, composed of highly trained, specialist navigators that didn't use either system. The important point is that all three units operated the Heinkel 111 aircraft and not the Junkers 88 as claimed by the anonymous German mentioned on the Gay Byrne show. Additionally, Kgr100 could not have been involved in opera- tions that night as it had been heavily committed to the Atlantic to provide assistance to the battleship Bismarck as it attempted to evade the Royal Navy vessels pursuing it. Reports from coastwatchers during the night told of German aircraft jettisoning their bomb loads in the Irish Sea to facilitate their ability to return to their bases in France as the strong winds made attempts to reach their intended targets impossible and their options for returning were fast diminishing. Many German aircraft were also monitored by the British Y Service requesting fixes from their bases in order to set a course back to base. I suggest that we forget about the claims of the 'former Ger- man pilot', bending beams, or retaliation for providing assistance during the Belfast bombing, and look instead at the planning, evaluating and weather briefing of the aircraft involved in this unfortunate incident.

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