Flight Lieutenant John Dundas of No. 609 squadron shot down Major Helmut Wick in air combat over the English channel, south of the Isle of Wight. Wick, the Geschwaderkommodore of JG 2, was Germany's current highest scoring ace of the war at the time with 56 kills to his credit. Major Wick was seen to parachute from his Messerschmitt and drift towards the water but his body was never recovered. By a cruel twist of fate, on the day that he died, Major Wick was pictured standing with Hermann Göring on the front cover of the Berlin magazine Illustrirte Zeitung.
