site.btaJanuary 10, 1944: Sofia Hit by Worst Allied Air Raid in WWII

January 10 marks the 80th anniversary of the worst air strike on Sofia by the Allies during World War II. On this day in 1944, 200 B-17 and B-24 bombers and 80 Wellington bombers dropped some 1,400 bombs on the city centre in a 1.5-2 km carpet by 280 planes in five waves of 27-30 bombers each, killing some 750 people and wounding 1,100-plus, starting 37 major fires, and completely destroying 3,304 buildings and rendering another 472 uninhabitable. The Allies lost six of their B-17 Flying Fortress and B-24 Liberator bombers, and six Bulgarian aircraft were shot down. 

The air offensive responded to Bulgaria's accession to the Tripartite Pact (Germany, Italy and Japan) on March 1, 1941 and followed Bulgaria's declaration of war on the US and Britain on December 13, 1941. The air raids were intended basically to force the Bulgarian Government to sever its military-political alliance with the Third Reich and withdraw its troops from Yugoslav and Greek territory.

By April 17, 1944, a total of 2,000 RAF and USAF planes carried out seven day-time and five night-time air strikes on the capital with 8,800 fuse and several thousand incendiary bombs. Hitting mostly civilian targets, they killed about 900 and wounded more than 1,000 Sofianites. Some 12,567 residential, industrial and public buildings were partially or completely destroyed and burned down, including the Sofia Library with its 40,000 books. The buildings of the Council of Ministers, the National Assembly, the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, the Holy Synod of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, the Archaeological Museum, the State Printing House, the St Joseph Catholic Cathedral and the National Theatre, among others, were affected as well.

A total of 20,000 public and private buildings - one in five - were destroyed (of which 2,670 razed to the ground) and 1,828 lives lost in thirteen Allied air raids on Sofia in 1943 and 1944 by the US 15th Air Army and the 205th RAF in Operation Point Blank. As many as 2,477 Sofianites were injured. The bombs dropped on the city totalled 435 tonnes. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill defined the razing of Sofia from the map as a most important strategic task of the spring of 1944.

In the first massive strike, on November 14/15, 1943, around 150 RAF bombers and fighters dropped 190 demolition bombs, killing 56 persons and destroying 24 buildings. The next heavy bombardment came on November 24, in which the USAF lost 4 planes before the attack and 12 on their way back to base in Southern Italy.

The Allied bombers came yet again in December 1943, when more than 200 people were killed and 345 were injured in the three raids during that month. In the worst air strike, on January 10, 1944, 200 B-17 and B-24 bombers and 80 Wellington bombers dropped some 1,400 bombs on the city centre in a 1.5-2 km carpet by 280 planes in five waves of 27-30 bombers each, killing some 750 people and wounding 1,100-plus, starting 37 major fires, and completely destroying 3,304 buildings and rendering another 472 uninhabitable. The Allies lost six of their B-17 Flying Fortress and B-24 Liberator bombers, and six Bulgarian aircraft were shot down. Over 300,000 people left the city in panic, and the government administration was paralyzed. On the night of March 29 and the day of March 30, more than 450 B-17, B-24, Mitchel and Halifax bombers dropped 3,000-plus demolition and incendiary bombs on the city, killing 139 people and wounding an unknown number of Sofianites, destroying 3,675 residential and office buildings and starting more than 2,000 fires. In that raid, four Allied bombers and three fighters were shot down and another 10 bombers and 3 fighters were damaged. The air campaign culminated on Easter Sunday, April 17, when 350-plus B-17 bombers attacked with 2,500 demolition bombs.

In the raids, the Allies lost an aggregate 147 aircraft, of which 65 were shot down by Bulgarian fighters, and Bulgaria lost 22 aircraft. A total of 141 USAF and RAF servicemen were killed in the air campaign, and 329 were taken prisoner.