Why did the Luftwaffe bomb... mud?

[Bombphoon]

Looking through my local county ARP records, time and again, reports show that Luftwaffe bombers dropped vast quantities of HE and incendiaries on empty fields, often miles from anywhere. It certainly seemed to puzzle the local ARP authorities.

In fact, in my home county, more bombs were dropped over empty rural areas than the main city and county towns. Often ARP reports record whole incendiary containers dropped in a field or a stick of HEs falling across several fields. More often than not, farm animals were the unfortunate casualties: getting badly mutilated, with sheep and cows often having to be put down by vets - forgotten victims also.

I was always told it was the crews 'just trying to dump their bombs' to get away - but is it that simple?
I have also heard the following reasons:
-'Beam-bending' by 80 Wing misled the crews
-They were lost
-Moral scruples about bombing civilians
-damaged aircraft lightening the load
-lost aircraft
-being chased by nightfighters so dump their bombloads
-avoiding having to drop their loads on cities which were defended by AA guns, so offload their bombs early.

I have a feeling some of these reasons are probably correct, but they also have a whiff of guesswork about them - or is it really that simple?

So why did the Luftwaffe bomb empty fields?

Thanks

[RT]

The reports from brit. authorities on the bombing of Malta reveal also that bombs where fallen a bit everywhere nd with some application over no possible targets, the Baby-blitz also is regarded as spoiling bombs campaign, to add that the role of bombing nd is utility, seems to has been vastly exagerated, not to speak of the money spent on the brit. 4.mots Bomberfleet... nd is poor results , to defeat foes seems the german-beg.-of-the-war-tactic , to known-down first lines of defence, hv is advantages.

Rémi

[Brian Bines]

British decoy sites (starfish?)may have played a part for some raids. When flares were used for air marking getting the wind direction forecast wrong could lead to inaccurate bombing, this is mentioned in the 'K' report for the raid 18/19th April 1944.

[Nick Beale]

Because it was strategically important mud?

[Bombphoon]

Originally Posted by Nick Beale

Because it was strategically important mud?

Any sensible and helpful answers would be appreciated. Thanks.

[Khorat]

hm maybe the same reasons like the Bomber Command placed there bombs in germany sometimes, for example (out of my mind sorry no exact date), target was the city of Cologne, around 60 planes attacked, bombs of 1 plane in the target area, the rest of the bombs fell till 200 km to the south of cologne.
that happend every time, a lot of bombs fell around the target due differnet reasons, damaged plane, miss interpreted the target, what ever else.

khorat

[Laurent Rizzotti]

I think the most common reason was the lack of efficient navigation devices. The other reasons listed by Bombphoon were involved in a number of cases, or course, except maybe the last one: I doubt that the fear of British AA defences would be enough to repulse a German crew. Nightfighters and accidents were far more dangerous than British AA.

[Graham Boak]

Originally Posted by Laurent Rizzotti

I think the most common reason was the lack of efficient navigation devices. The other reasons listed by Bombphoon were involved in a number of cases, or course, except maybe the last one: I doubt that the fear of British AA defences would be enough to repulse a German crew. Nightfighters and accidents were far more dangerous than British AA.

Can you confirm that last sentence with numbers? I suspect that it simply isn't true, or at best an exaggeration. Quite a lot of German bombers were shot down by AA. Also, if less measurable, AA does have a considerable deterent effect on less experienced crews, and on bombing accuracy in general.

I know we are an aircraft site, and inclined to favour the flying side over those with feet firmly planted in mud, but I do think you are doing them a disservice.

[Laurent Rizzotti]

I agree with you Graham that such a statement should be backed up by numbers, that I have not at hand now.

My opinion is based on the main period of Luftwaffe bomber activity in 1940-1941. It seems to me that during the Blitz, hundred of German bombers flew at night over GB and that the losses due to AA very less than 1% of the number. Actually the losses suffered at night by Luftwaffe rose only in spring 1941 when the British nightfighter arm became more and more efficient.

[Kryten]

put simply the bombers missed, I can give you an example of a bombing attack that took place in my locality, the LW were attacking the rail yard at Pontyclun which was where coal from the Rhondda was marshalled before transport round the country, some of the bombs landed at Measyfelyn Farm a mile south of the target and others destroyed houses in Talbot Green two miles North!

Bomber command also managed to drop huge amounts of ordinance on open land too, I think these days we underestimate how difficult navigation and bomb aiming was in anything but clear conditions in 1940 - 43