Unsure if this might help round it down but it appears to be the early style of cross on the upper surface of the wing and if behind that I’m correct in saying that it’s the other wing but showing the underside? That also appears to have the early style of cross peeking out from the bottom. So Both upper and lower wing crosses are of the early style? Possibly an early Ju88A-1 which is why I asked why you thought it might be 1941. 🙂

Nice pic Andy, thanks for posting. I don’t fancy our chances with this one but seeing these photos is always very interesting. What was it that made you suspect it was 1941. 🙂

Thank you Andy. Appreciated. 🙂

No pics, although some nice very ones relating to another loss that night a bit further south and over The Thames.

Lets have a peek then.. 😀

Due to my specific area of interest my database only includes axis aircraft that crashed on UK soil so there could be many others that were damaged and didn’t make it back. The numbers were quickly gathered by typing anti-aircraft fire as the cause and the year into the database and noting the number of incidents. I agree it doesn’t look good but perhaps it highlights the difficulties of trying to shoot at something up in the sky at night without the help of radar. 🙂

as I understand it the Germans changed to night bombing in 40/41 due to losses, now how many were due to AA fire I’ve no idea but when they changed to night bombing there was a lot of guns around London together with search lights but defensive gunnery was in it’s infancy it was all a learning curve,they had nothing to base a plan on and I don’t think until the V1 offensive that we had a AA system that worked,

I do not quite understand. Unless at that time there was a possibility for radar guided surface to air missiles (which there wasn’t) how would one go about shooting down a bomber at night. You would have to visually spot it, hold it in the search lights and then concentrate the AA onto that target. Which from what I have read was pretty effective once they were spotted and held. As I understand it once a bomber was caught and held by a few search lights it was up ____ street without a paddle so to speak and it really did have to take some pretty evasive maneuvers to break out of it. So it all comes down to being able to see in the dark to be able to accurately plant some AA right on the nose of a bomber. Otherwise your just shooting and hoping that you hit something.

did any aircraft actually hit any Barrage balloons during combat?

Yes. Not sure specifically during the BOB because they would be easy to see during the day but at night they brought a few down. 🙂