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Kite Balloons That Beat The Dive Bombers

Discussion in 'Merchant Navy During WWII' started by Jim, Sep 5, 2010.

  1. Jim

    Jim Active Member

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    Seen from beside the guns in the stem of a British destroyer, a convoy of Allied merchantmen stream away to the horizon and beyond. Perchance the ships are carrying men and tanks and guns to one of the Allied armies overseas. Or they may be bound for the Arctic, and their safe arrival meant yet another link in the chain of Anglo-Russian comradeship.

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    As the sun comes up on a new day the ships are revealed in line ahead (1), flags flying from the masthead and smoke pouring from the regiment of funnels. The convoy presses on (3). The “umbrella” of kite balloons was raised into the sky (2) as a precaution against enemy aircraft which may had been tempted into making a mast-high bomb-dive.

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    The kite balloons were the little sisters of the barrage balloons which floated above Britain's cities and vital dockyards and munitions centres can be seen taken out to sea in a depot barge (4) where they were transferred to a naval drifter which hauled them to the ships of the convoy (5). Hundreds of dive-bombing attacks had been frustrated by these balloons.

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