WORLD WAR ONE VIENNA RAID
They headed for the city centre in
line astern, passing over the tree-
lined circular boulevard known
as ‘The Ring’ at little more than
1,640ft (500m) height.
With their eyes skyward, the
amazed Viennese watched as
thousands of leaflets were dropped
from aircraft that had cruised over
the city completely undisturbed for
nearly 20 minutes. Having captureda series of clear photographic
images, the SVAs regrouped and
headed for Italy with a tailwind
and on a different track from the
inbound leg. They were pursued by
a few Austrian aircraft, but the chase
was in vain.Joyful message
The seven SVAs headed towards
Graz and later turned towards
Trieste, passing over Ljubljana.
Close to Trieste, a pair of Austro-
Hungarian seaplane fighters
attempted an interception, also
without success.
Safely over the sea, the pilots
descended to overfly Italian
destroyers cruising in the northern
Adriatic. The formation passed
over Venice, where D’Annunzio
dropped a joyful message reporting
the mission had been completed. At
1240hrs precisely, the heroes
of the epic flight landed at San
Pelagio after having flown – in“Tenente Sarti suffered engine failure close to Wiener-Neustadt airfield.
He was forced to land in enemy territory but managed to set
fire to his SVA prior to capture”
Above right
An SVA at Padova. A
bomb rack is fi tted to
the fuselage side,
just below the
cockpit coaming.Above
Capitano Masprone,
commander of 87°
Squadriglia.Right
SVAs of 87°
Squadriglia at Padova
in September 1918,
on the day the
participating pilots
were decorated.Right
D’Annunzio and the
raid pilots during a
celebration dinner
at the Abano Hotel,
Orologio.84 FLYPAST September 2018