Bari (page 2)

Attack

According to Air Commodore Kenneth Cross of No. 242 Group, the first warning was received at 19.07 hours when two aircraft were picked up by 8010 AMES, a GCI (Ground Controlled Interception) station near Bari. These contacts “rapidly developed into a mass of confused plotting” with a radius of around 40 km and centred about 48 km NNE Bari. Other stations now started making similar reports. Later evaluation pointed to a group of three pathfinders approaching low over the Adriatic before climbing to 3,000 m and dropping Window (Düppel to the Germans) to screen the main force running in at low altitude. According to one source,”GCI’s concerned [were] completely neutralised” although at 19.12 hrs the Mobile Operations Room Unit reported one plot of 30-plus heading SE off Vieste (about 100 km, 20–25 minutes flying time, from Bari). Window dropping continued right through the withdrawal phase.

A German-language account reproduced several times in online forums describes the pathfinders’ role; it is attributed to a Leutnant M. Ziegler whose unit is not given:

Late in the afternoon we were flying with two other machines as pathfinders. Our Ju 88 was fully loaded with Düppel jamming strips and flares for target-marking. It was already dark as we crossed the coast south of Ravenna. We were to approach our target from over the Adriatic. At the latitude of Cape Rossa [?] we climbed to 7000 metres and from there we established that the harbour of Bari was brightly lit-up as if in peacetime. We began dropping the tinfoil strips and, since the harbour was brightly illuminated, we could forgo dropping the flares.

Naval Officer in Command (NOIC) Bari wrote that the raid itself began without warning at 19.30 with bombs and mines being dropped. The harbour was fully lit to speed unloading operations; the explosion of one ammunition ship set four more vessels ablaze. The fire which then broke out in the harbour became completely beyond control with the fracturing of a bulk petrol pipeline. The attackers were also thought to have used oil bombs and C-in-C Mediterranean was asked for advice on how to deal with them.

The launches of the RAF’s 253 Air/Sea Rescue Marine Craft Unit were commended by the Navy for the number of lives they saved and this unit’s CO gave the following description of “a very heavy and successful enemy attack”:

The raid lasted approximately 40 minutes. The first attacking planes appeared to come from the land and bombs were dropped before the Air Raid Warning had sounded. Flares—both groups of white and also single green—were dropped. The circumstances made it difficult for me to give an estimate of the number of planes used in the raid. In my opinion the number would be from 20 to 30 … It is pointed out that this Unit volunteered to visit scene of fires for rescue work.

The log of HSL (High Speed Launch) 2581 gives a vivid picture of unfolding events (all times are approximate):

	19.30	Plane apparently swooped over harbour from landwards and dropped bombs.
	19.33	Air raid warning. Crew standing to. Heavy bombing attack on harbour. After cabin doors blown in by blast and bridge bulkheads strained and cracked.
	20.15	All clear sounded.
	20.25	Ammunition ship in harbour exploded. Terrific blast effect. No casualties amongst base personnel.
	20.30	Military Police and dock authorities ordered clearance of docks owing to danger of further ammunition ships exploding.
	20.35	Rescue call to area of fire in harbour. HSL 2581 [with a composite crew] cleared berth and proceeded to area of fire, searched line of fire, burning ammunition ships and rescued 4 men in Carley float. Went alongside vessel (later identified as Crista) which was anchored approximately100 yds. [from] conflagration of fires and rescued 24 officers and men [four of them injured].
	21.00	Left Crista.
	21.05	Returned to harbour berth. Landed survivors.
	21.20	Engines started. Left berth … Many ships burning fiercely on Eastern Mole — estimated at least 10. Heavy explosions continuing.

HSL 2581 was at work until 01.50, searching for casualties both within and outside the harbour.

A brief eyewitness account from the German side was later given by an Obergefreiter, air–gunner aboard a Ju 88 of 3./KG 76, taken prisoner on 21 January 1944:

… some machines have Triolin [sic] bombs on board, those are the things we used to give Bari hell … Friend, when they fall in the water right alongside a tub — what a column [of water], what a firework! We had 17 ships there … ammunition ships, how they went up! We were at 2000 m but I looked back from my ventral position [and] the flame was so high we passed just above it.

NOTE: A directive was issued in September 1944 that Trialen bombs were to be used exclusively against shipping as land targets was seen as a waste of the weapons’ potential.

Signals Intelligence identified participating aircraft from I. and II./KG 30; I. and II./KG 54; and I. and II./KG 76. A ground station provided the returning bombers with weather reports from 20.00–22.45 but the aircraft themselves upheld tight W/T security. There was evidence that on account of the distance to the target, the force had landed at aerodromes including Viterbo, Perugia and Ravenna before returning next morning to their bases in the North of the country. For example, from KG 54 B3+HM, OM, BN, GM, KM, KH and CK landed from operations between 20.20 and 20.30 hours; from 20.30–21.10, B3+KH (this code was reported twice), GK, PP, PL, GK, HK, GB and LK touched down. On the morning of the 3rd traffic was picked up from seven Ju 88s of II./KG 54 and six of the I. Gruppe returning to Bergamo and Cameri respectively.

continued on next page …

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PART TWO OF SIX