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Belfast Blitz
| Belfast Blitz | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of the Strategic bombing campaign of World War II | |||||
 Rescue workers searching through rubble after an air raid on Belfast | |||||
| |||||
| Belligerents | |||||
 United Kingdom |
 Germany | ||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||
|
~1,000 killed ~1,500 injured 30–50,000 houses damaged | |||||
The Belfast Blitz consisted of four German air raids on strategic targets in the city of Belfast in Northern Ireland, in April and May 1941 during World War II, causing high casualties. The first was on the night of 7–8 April 1941, a small attack which probably took place only to test Belfast's defences. The next took place on Easter Tuesday, 15 April 1941, when 200 Luftwaffe bombers attacked military and manufacturing targets in the city of Belfast. Some 900 people died as a result of the bombing and 1,500 were injured. High explosive bombs predominated in this raid. Apart from those on London, this was the greatest loss of life in any night raid during the Blitz.[1][2]
The third raid on Belfast took place over the evening and morning of 4–5 May 1941; 150 were killed. Incendiary bombs predominated in this raid. The fourth and final Belfast raid took place on the following night, 5–6 May. In total over 1,300 houses were demolished, some 5,000 badly damaged, nearly 30,000 slightly damaged while 20,000 required "first aid repairs".[3]
- ^ BBC (11 April 2001). "The Belfast blitz is remembered". BBC News. Retrieved 19 January 2015.
On 16 April 1941 Belfast was devastated as it bore the worst air raid of any city outside London […] It was one of the largest German strike forces used to date in the war and the Luftwaffe was heading for a city later described as the most poorly defended in the United Kingdom.
- ^ Belfast Central Library. "Memories of the Belfast Blitz". WW2 People's War. BBC. Retrieved 19 January 2015.
No city, save London, suffered more loss of life in one night's raid on the United Kingdom.
- ^ Barton, Brian, The Belfast Blitz: The City in the War Years (2015) p. 397.
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