The second wave of bombing had barely passed when the third arrived. By now, the Italians could not even be bothered to come out and fight the fires, each one hiding beneath whatever shelter he thought was safe.
Italy's unlucky naval duty rear admiral, Giorgio Messe, was unfortunately caught up in the second wave while directing the firefighting efforts. Yet he was fortunate as well—he suffered only a few scrapes before blissfully passing out.
With no highest-ranking commander on the scene, the Italians naturally took no action.
Of course, Taranto could not have had only Giorgio Messe as a commander. In fact, there were quite a few naval generals in Taranto at this time, but sadly, no one was willing to come forward and shoulder responsibility!
Turning the tide? That depended on being able to succeed. Now the naval warships, shipyards, supply depots, and gun batteries had all received a visit from the Bulgarian Air Force. They could not shoot down the planes in the sky, nor could they restore their ruined assets. What could they do?
The wait was agonizingly long. From the first bombing wave to the end of the third, the Bulgarian Air Force had taken only three or four short hours, but for the Italians below, every day had felt like a year!
With their bombing mission successfully completed, the Bulgarian Air Force happily flew home, leaving utter devastation behind. Blazing fires still raged, battered warships continued to sink, and everyone knew Taranto was finished!
After a morning of bombing and over two hundred tons of bombs raining down in a mad barrage, the average came to three or four kilograms of bombs per square meter across the harbor. Without ten or twenty years, it would never recover its vitality.
More than two hours after the