大象传媒

The night was still dark and stormy at 4.30am. The wind and rain lashed the tent as I climbed, steel-helmeted, out of my canvas bed, donned my battledress and proceeded to the met briefing with 30 other pilots. The previous evening the mess had bristled with expectation, but a storm had raged unabated for the past 24 hours. The forecast was still bad and I was sceptical as to whether or not we would go this time.

The wind was howling and the rain beat down as two squadrons of Typhoon fighter bombers, fully armed, taxied out for take-off. At 6.15am I was airborne. We formed up in tight formation and coasted out at 900 feet in poor weather conditions, heading for our target at Bayeux, a small town just inside the Normandy coast.

Immediately the wheels of my aircraft left the ground I was confronted by an almost unbelievable panorama of ships of all shapes and sizes, grouped closely together as far as the eye could see. The armada-like stream of naval traffic in the Solent and across the Channel was maintained over the whole hundred miles to the French coast. The Isle of Wight was surrounded and appeared as if it was being towed out to sea. What a spectacle it was! Flying low over this continuous stream of ships, the sea looked bad to us and I spared a thought for those on board.

Approaching the French coast we saw the morning sky alight with rocket salvos, a bombardment from the mightiest naval armada ever assembled in the history of warfare. We could feel the drama that was unfolding that day.

The long-awaited invasion of the continent had begun. The Allies had set sail to storm the Nazi fortress of Europe. The great day of decision had arrived. 'You are about to embark upon a great crusade,' said General Eisenhower. It was D-Day, 6 June 1944, a date that will be remembered for countless years.

The massive number of shells exploding on the blazing beaches seemed remote and unreal as we crossed inbound at 6.40am, at about 500 feet, the maximum cloud base and visibility would allow. We cruised quickly up to the target, a German High Command headquarters. Buzzing around at 300mph, bombing and strafing at will, the Chateau was soon a place of ruins. There was little opposition and only a small amount of concentrated light flak was noticeable.

We departed after 20 minutes, our mission for that morning successfully completed. The Chateau was a smouldering waste.

But action was not yet over. On coasting out homeward at 1,500 feet, due to the vagaries of the weather the cloud base lifted a little. I was astonished and annoyed to witness more flak whizzing past me in all directions, especially as it appeared to be arriving from our own troops on the beachhead. Having stormed the beaches, they had managed to get some guns ashore and as we did look like a German FW-190 fighter aircraft in the gloom of the morning, maybe excuses can be made for trigger-happy soldiers. But it was cold comfort for us being fired upon, even under those circumstances. Fortunately not one of our aircraft was hit. No-one became a victim of our own forces in this instance, but certain misunderstandings did occur later.

Once again we headed north in loose battle formation, feeling relaxed and confident, viewing the vast array of ships still sailing onward towards the beachhead. Thinking about and imagining the thoughts of the men aboard, I wondered how and when it would all end.

All our wing aircraft landed safely back at our tented base, quickly refuelled and were again available for the next assault on the beachhead wherever it might be. It wasn't long before the squadron was airborne again, and that time they weren't so fortunate. Luckily I wasn't with them.

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