Operations
Within three days of the start of operations and regular patrol flights, the first submarine was successfully bombed. On 11 October 1918, the day after RMS Leinster was sunk in the Irish Sea off Dublin, one of the US planes sighted and bombed an enemy submarine in the area.
This submarine showed signs of serious distress, and had trouble submerging. Thick, dark oil was seen on the surface for about a week after the bombing. On 13 October, a submarine was bombed by a plane from NAS Wexford. On 16 October, a plane on patrol from Queenstown bound for Wexford manoeuvred for 30 minutes over a porpoising periscope; the first bomb failed to explode, but the second exploded very close to the periscope. On other flights, bombs were dropped and by the end of October, submarines were scarce in the Wexford area.
On 16 October 1918, a patrol out of Wexford crewed by Lt John F. McNamara, Lt George Shaw and Ensign James Roy Biggs dropped bombs on a submarine which disappeared under water leaving debris and oil, but the Admiralty assessed it as only "probably seriously damaged".
Although operations at NAS Wexford ceased after only 8 weeks due to the Armistice, the planes of this station made 98 patrol flights with a total of 312 hours in the air. The flights consisted of patrol and convoy with a few instruction flights; most of the second pilots qualified as first pilots from instruction received on regular patrol. The Intelligence Department assisted, by having complete courses mapped out, already corrected for compass error and wind deflection; this, together with reliable information from the Meteorological Department, enabled aircraft to fly on days that would otherwise have been lost.
Read more about this topic: NAS Wexford
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