Maastricht is the largest city and the capital of the province of Limburg in the Southeast part of the Netherlands. On 18 August, the United States Army Airforce attempted to bomb a railway bridge, but it went horribly wrong.
Friday, 18 August 1944, was a warm sunny day that started nicely but ended in a drama when at the beginning of the evening, a group of American bombers attacked the railway bridge over the Maas [Meuse].
The aim was to make the retreat of the German troops more difficult because the Allies had the wind at their back in France and were doing everything they could to make the escape of the Germans more difficult and to prevent them from bringing in supplies. The fact that this required bombing in populated areas, with a real chance of civilian casualties, was an acceptable risk.
Instead of hitting the bridges, the bombs wreaked havoc on neighbouring residential areas. 26 American B-17s dropped about 160 thousand pounds on the railway bridge, but it was almost entirely unscathed. It was different in the surrounding neighbourhoods where the population paid a heavy toll: 129 deaths, countless seriously injured, and hundreds of houses on both banks of the Maas had been wiped off the map.
Due to the anti-aircraft fire near the city, most bombers continued to fly at high altitudes. They found it was virtually impossible to pinpoint the precision attack on the bridge. Many of the 156 bombs ended up in the perimeter of the bridge, with only one direct hit accounted for on the target.
Many residents of Maastricht were concerned about the approaching violence of war. Some had decided to take shelter in the caves of the Sint-Pietersberg for the time being.
Trees Dubois was aged 12 when the bombing happened. In an interview she gave for a local newspaper, she recalled the following:
“I was very scared—my father sent me to the bomb shelter. I went out with the neighbour. She returned halfway through to get something. She didn’t survive.”
sources
https://www.gld.nl/nieuws/2139953/het-bombardement-op-maastricht-dat-fout-ging-zwarte-vrijdag
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