WW II Hero Bill Lucas Says: Hitler’s War Prevented Me From Going to the Olympics - I Bombed Him and His Nazis
Bill Lucas, 99, flew 81 bombing missions and was part of the contentious 1,000-bomber raids on Germany. On one mission, he nearly had a direct hit on the Cologne Cathedral.
Many thought that the bombing of the German city of Cologne by the Allies during World War II was a crime against the human race. But Bill Lucas, a former RAF pilot, is proud of his role in the May 30, 1942 attack.
Mr. Lucas, a former long-distance runner, provided one of the many highlights of the Daily Mirror’s Pride of Britain awards, in partnership with TSB of London. Britain’s oldest Olympian was on stage at the Grosvenor House hotel to celebrate with award winners from Olympic Team GB and Paralympics Team GB after their triumphant summer in Rio. And he told them, because of the war, I missed the 1940 and 1944 Olympic Games. Hitler robbed me of my best athletic years, so what did I do? I went out and bombed the h--l out of him. He got a big laugh from the crowd, but in actuality Bill’s war was no laughing matter. He flew 81 dangerous bombing missions and was part of the controversial 1,000-bomber raids on Nazi Germany.
Sir Arthur “Bomber” Harris, Chief of the Bomber Command, ordered the attack on Cologne.
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The assignment took us past the city of Kiel where we were fired at and must have taken a hit in our fuel tanks. I didn’t know we were hit at the time. It wasn’t until we were on our way across the North Sea that my plane showed I had no fuel. I just barely managed to make an emergency landing and survived safe and sound. Strangely though, I never thought about not surviving; despite the fact that command didn’t want you flying more than the threshold limit of thirty missions because the odds then turned against you coming home. So, I guess by flying more than 80 missions I was living on borrowed time. And at my age, I guess I still