Karlsruhe: 637 aircraft - 369 Lancasters, 259 Halifaxes, 9 Mosquitos - of all groups except No 5 Group. 19 aircraft - 11 Lancasters, 8 Halifaxes - lost, 3.0 per cent of the force. Cloud over the target and a strong wind which pushed the Pathfinders too far north spoiled this attack. Only the northern part of Karlsruhe was seriously damaged and most of the bombs fell outside the city. Mannheim, 30 miles to the north, recorded a raid by approximately 100 aircraft on this night and Darmstadt, Ludwigshafen and Heidelberg were also hit by aircraft which failed to find the main target.
Munich: 234 Lancasters and 16 Mosquitos of No 5 Group and 10 Lancasters of No 1 Group in another No 5 Group method raid on a major German target. 9 Lancasters were lost, 3.5 per cent of the force. The marking and controlling plan worked well and accurate bombing fell in the centre of the city. The intense flak and searchlight defences did not prevent the low-flying Mosquito markers from carrying out their task properly and none was seriously damaged.
165 OTU aircraft carried out a diversionary sweep over the North Sea to a point 75 miles off the German coast. 23 Mosquitos bombed Düsseldorf; 6 Lancasters of No 617 Squadron dropped flares and target indicators over Milan as a diversion for the Munich raid; No 100 Group flew 11 RCM, 21 Serrate and 8 Intruder sorties. 2 Wellingtons were lost from the OTU sweep.
4 G-H Stirlings to Chambly railway depot, 18 Halifaxes minelaying off Channel ports and in the Frisians, 7 aircraft on Resistance operations. No aircraft lost.
Total effort for the night: 1,160 sorties, 30 aircraft (2.6 per cent) lost.
edit: Thanks to AW for spotting my error
-- Edited by alieneyes on Saturday 21st of January 2012 08:05:30 AM
Chorley shows them taking off for Munich in LM445, coded WS-Z at 21:07 and crashing in the western suburbs of Munich at Birkenhof between Pasing and Grosshaden at 01:57 after being hit by flak.
