August 13, 1940

On This Day in History

Date: 13 August 1940

Weather: Mainly fair. Early morning mist and slight drizzle in places and some cloud in the Channel.

Day: Opening of 'Eagle Day' misfires. Heavy raid on Eastchurch followed by afternoon raids on Portland, Southampton and airfields in Kent and Hampshire. 1,485 German sorties.

Night: Light attacks on Midlands, Wales and the West Country.
'Adler Tag' ('Eagle Day') - the original date set by Hitler for the invasion of Britain.

Daily audio broadcasts, taken from the official Fighter Command Daily Summaries, giving the news highlights of each days action in the Battle of Britain are now available FREE and streamed direct to your PC every day. Find out more information on Radio1940, download the software and hear daily the Battle of Britain news as it happened 60 years ago to the day.


Source: http://www.raf.mod.uk/bob1940/august13.html

On August 13 1940 12 Blenheims of RAF 82 Sqn were detailed for an attack on Aalborg West airfield. One of the aircrafts had to turn back due to fuel problems while the remaining eleven aircrafts pressed on. When crossing the Danish west coast near Søndervig flying at 8000 feet in a clear blue sky they were spotted by a German observation post and the flak at Aalborg was alerted.
Eight Bf 109E fighters of 5/JG 77 based on Aalborg East airfield were scrambled at 12:05 hours. The attack on the airfield started at approx. 12:15 and all eleven Blenheims were lost to flak and fighters within 20 minutes.

Source: http://www.flensted.eu.com/194014.shtml

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