August 16
Well, Jerry must have realized that they would never win the war with these high-altitude raids. Shortly before lunch a large raid (the biggest of the battle yet) was detected 10,000 feet over the Channel heading towards Manston. This time Fighter Command was ready and vectored in the fighters that were already up on patrol. The Spitfire intercepted the Germans directly over the airfield. Unfortunately, the radar was off a little and the Germans were actually at 5,000 feet. Since the RAF plane had climbed to 15,000 in order to be able to dive onto the Luftwaffe planes, it was too far up to spot the raid and broke off contact and headed for home. However, the Hurricane maintained it's original altitude of 10,000 feet and dove out of the sun onto an unsuspecting Me 109. Three bursts from the Hurricane's machine guns tore the wings off of the Messerschitt and it corkscrewed into the ground. However, two more Me 109's engaged the Hawker and its ace pilot, riddling the fuselage, engine, and cockpit with machine gun and cannon fire. Incredibly the plane held up under the fire, and was able to break off and limp home. Upon landing the ground crew pulls Kowalski from the damaged aircraft. He had a pieces of the shattered canopy in his face and a machine gun round lodged in his thigh, but otherwise he was ok. He vowed to take to the skies again to fight the hated Germans.
Unfortunately Manston didn't get off so easy. The Do 17, He 111, and Ju 88 had turned the airfield into a moonscape of bomb craters. Even after working through the night the field was still a scene of devastation the next morning.
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