Italian Bomber plane losses June 1940

[Gianandrea Bussi]

Robert,
I may give you the following details:

- seven S.79 of the 32° Stormo (out of a total of 21 taiking part to that action) were slightly damaged by splitters of AAA during the bombing of Biserta harbour on 12 june 1940.

- The S.79 damaged by a MS.406 on 21 june 1940 during a recce mission over Biserta belonged to 259a Sq. BT (first pilot Ten. Atti). Four crewmembers wounded.

- CZ.501 146-2 ditched 30 nautical miles south of Capo Spartivento in the afternoon of 17 june 1940.

Sources: Cesare Gori, Il Savoia Marchetti S.M. 79 nel secondo conflitto mondiale, Aeronautica Militare Ufficio Storico, 2004

Alessandro Ragatzu, Cagliari-Elmas vol. 2 1940-1944, Alisea Edizioni, 2007.

Best regards

Gianandrea

[robert]

Hi,

thank you very much for your precious information`s.

Regards

Robert

[Ludovico Slongo]

Dear Robert,
a French and apparently very precise source (Le Fiat BR 20 par Yves Domange avec Juan Arrez Cerda and Kazuhiko Osuo , LELA PRESSE collection profils Avions n°7 April 2004) reported the action of De Michelis as happened betwen 16.05 and 20.10. It sems that he had to crash-land at the end of the return trip, far from his airfield so "technically" he was shot-down, and this was due to the action of "twelve enemy fighters" .
French researcher Arnaud Gillet in his "Les victories de l'aviation de chasse Francaise 16 may -4 juin 1940" written with the help of Peter Taghon reports that no air action is officialy recorded by the French Air Force during the day in that sector and this is perhaps due to an error in recording the dates of some missions. Gillet tries also to give an identity to the victor of De Michelis and guesses that he could had been Lt. Robert Martin of GC III/6 that the day after was credited of two victories against BR 20s even if he didn't shot a single round of ammunition. So perhaps his mission had been recorded on a wrong date.
From my side I can only add that Hakan discovered some years ago a French fighter pilot -Sgt Roger Grosjean- that according with his livret matricule (whose information were told to Hakan by the son of the pilot) had been shot down in the Var region by Italian fighters on June 1940. Nothing else emerged from this pilot but in my opinion this fact gives a perhaps small clue, that French fighters whose actions were not recorded, were active in the sector in that period. Perhaps the attack on De Michelis was carried out by some of them.
Ciao

Ludovico

[robert]

Hi Ludovico,

thanks for you answer.
I have the book of Gillet but I was not sure with his deduction unless Lt.Martin claimed two bombers not one - I assumed that he had attacked a formation of bombers and not a single flying bomber.

Regards

Robert