Memorial

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The primary target was the aviation industry at Brunswick. This target as well as the secondary were obscured by a smoke screen, so a target of opportunity, Langenhagen/Hannover Aerodrome, was bombed instead.

Statement of one of the surviving crew members: "Our plane was hit with cannon shells in the main gas lines across the front of the wing above the flight deck, as well as on the deck above the wing over the bomb bay where all of the oxygen supply bottles were secured. Fire erupted immediately, fed by the fuel, the oxygen, and the wind blowing in the open bomb bay. It quickly spread back to the waist positions and forward into the flight deck area. Lt Sprinkle sounded the bailout alarm very soon after the hits, and everyone hurried to get set to abandon ship. We, in the waist area, prepared to leave through the bottom camera hatch, as the heat from the fire soon was igniting the ammo in the waist gun belts."