THE DESTRUCTION OF A FOKKER : our mobile anti-aircraft guns in action

Anti-aircraft artillery in action.

Appreciate the film is staged managed, so I wonder if AA Artillery did actually chase along the road after aircraft. With everyone in the detachment hanging onto the lorry as it gives chase I could not help thinking it looked like the keystone cops, though 30 seconds from stopping to first round fired is certainly not a comedy routine.

Rousing cheer at the end when they get the Fokker !!!!!

http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/1060022938

Catalogue number

• IWM 470
  

Production date 1916-06-19 Place made GB Object description

British 13-pounder anti-aircraft mobile batteries shoot down a German aircraft, Western Front, January 1916.

Full description

The film includes some fakes and a large number of stockshots. It concerns a battery of two 13-pounder Mark III anti-aircraft guns mounted on Thorneycroft lorries by Mark I lorry mounts, together with their fire control. The captain in charge sights an enemy aircraft (never actually seen) through his telescope, the details are set out on the ranging board and the men of the battery called out. The guns open fire, and as the target aircraft moves past them the lorries drive in pursuit to a new site where they again deploy and open fire. Fire control keeps track with telescopes and rangefinders. A second battery, with 13-pounder 9cwt anti-aircraft guns, joins in. The men cheer as the enemy aircraft plunges out of the sky. It is seen falling, burning while balancing on its nose, then burning on the ground (this last sequence is clearly a fake, and not recognisably a Fokker aircraft).