Easter Sunday Raid The Easter Sunday Raid ( or Battle of Ceylon ) was an air attack by carrier - based aircraft of the Imperial Japanese Navy against Colombo , Ceylon ( now Sri Lanka ) , on Easter Sunday , 5 April 1942 , during World War II . This attack was part of the Indian Ocean Raid , and was followed a few days later by a similar attack on Trincomalee . The targets were British warships , harbour installations , and air bases ; the object was to disrupt the war effort of British Commonwealth nations and force the British Eastern Fleet to leave Asian waters . Background . The British had been in occupation of the coastal areas of Ceylon since 1796 , but the colony had not had a regular garrison of British troops since 1917 . The Ceylon Defence Force and Ceylon Navy Volunteer Reserve were mobilized and expanded . The Royal Navy maintained naval installations in Trincomalee and the Royal Air Force ( RAF ) had established an aerodrome in China Bay , Trincomalee long before the war . With Japan ' s entry into the war , and especially after the fall of Singapore , Ceylon became a front - line British base . The Royal Navy ' s East Indies Station was moved to Colombo and then to Trincomalee . Admiral Sir Geoffrey Layton was appointed Commander - in - Chief , Ceylon with Air Vice Marshal John D ' Albiac as Air Officer Commanding and Admiral Sir James Somerville appointed commander of the British Eastern Fleet . The fixed land defences consisted of four coastal batteries at Colombo and five at Trincomalee ; these were established just before the war . Air defences were expanded in 1941 with the RAF occupying the civil airfield at Ratmalana near Colombo with its station headquarters set up at Kandawala . Another airbase was rapidly built at Koggala near Galle and several temporary airstrips were built across the country with the largest at Colombo Racecourse grounds . Several RAF squadrons were sent to Ceylon . The attack on Colombo . Somerville retreated with the main body of the Eastern Fleet to Addu Atoll in the Maldives . He left at Ceylon the aircraft carrier ( under repair at Trincomalee ) , heavy cruiser s and , and the Royal Australian Navy destroyer . After the sinking of " Prince of Wales " and " Repulse " and the fall of Singapore , British morale on the island dropped . The sinking of these two capital ships shocked much of the world ; the awareness of the superiority of aircraft carriers over battleships increased dramatically . On Ceylon , there was understandably much anxiety that a Japanese attack appeared to be inevitable . A large sea turtle which came ashore was reported by an Australian unit as a number of Japanese amphibious vehicle s . However , actual preparations for defence were lackadaisical , apart from the deployment of an RAF squadron at the Colombo race course . Anti - British sentiment increased accordingly within some portions of the indigenous population and their hopes ran high for liberation by the Japanese . The Japanese fleet comprised five aircraft carriers plus supporting ships under the command of Admiral Chuichi Nagumo . On 4 April 1942 , the Japanese fleet was located by a PBY Catalina aircraft flown by Squadron Leader Leonard Birchall out of Koggala . Birchall ' s Catalina was shot down by six A6M2 Zero fighters from the carrier . He managed to radio in the position of the Japanese fleet and alert Colombo about the impending attack . However , Nagumo ' s air strike on Colombo the next day achieved near - complete surprise . ( Pearl Harbor also was attacked on a weekend . ) The British radar s were not operating because it was Sunday — they were shut down for routine maintenance . But the greatest shock of the day probably was felt by the Japanese high command , who had expected to catch the remnants of the British fleet at anchor . They had planned the bombing of Colombo very much like the Pearl Harbor operation ( many of the same planes and pilots participated in both strikes ) . But most of the British Eastern Fleet was at Addu Atoll , so when the Japanese attacked at Colombo there were only three ships there . The survival of the British Eastern Fleet ( which included some Royal Netherlands Navy warships ) prevented the Japanese from attempting a major troop landing in Ceylon . The Hawker Hurricane s of the RAF ' s No . 30 Squadron were on the ground at Ratmalana Airport when the Japanese aircraft passed overhead . The auxiliary cruiser and the old destroyer were sunk in the harbour . The RAF and the Fleet Air Arm ( FAA ) lost at least 27 aircraft ; the Japanese only five . The Japanese also bombed the lunatic asylum at Angoda , mistaking it for the fuel tanks at nearby Kolonnawa . The first attack wave of Japanese planes took off in pre - dawn darkness ( 30 minutes before sunrise ) from the aircraft carriers " Akagi " , " Hiryu " , and " Soryu " , moving about 200 miles south of Sri Lanka . The first attack wave of 36 fighters , 54 dive bombers , and 90 level bombers was led by Captain Mitsuo Fuchida , the same officer who led the air attack on in Pearl Harbor . After Fuchida and his aircrews returned to the flagship " Akagi " , a second - wave of dive bombers led by Lieutenant Commander Egusa took off to attack the two British cruisers " Dorsetshire " and " Cornwall " , southwest of Ceylon , and sank the two ships . British losses were 424 men killed ; 1 , 120 survivors spent hours in the water . The Japanese dive bombers scored hits with close upon 90 % of their bombs — an enviable rate of accuracy when considering the windless conditions , according to Mitsuo Fuchida in " Midway : The Battle That Doomed Japan " . The Japanese attack began at 07 : 30 on Easter Sunday morning . Air defense of Colombo fort and harbor was provided by the 3rd Searchlight / Light Anti - Aircraft Regiment , Ceylon Garrison Artillery with two batteries based at Galle Face green and Mutwal . Colonel R . M . White and his Operations Staff Officer , Major J . O . Widdows , DSO command ground units from ground forces headquarters at Echelon Barracks . St Luke ' s Church , Borella was packed for Easter services with both locals and military personnel . According to parishioners , the vicar , Reverend Canon Ivan Corea , was preaching when the RAF Hurricanes engaged the Japanese Zero aircraft high above the church . The Sri Lankan writer Ariyadasa Ratnasinghe recalled the Easter Sunday Japanese raid : " Japanese aircraft flew in close formation over Colombo and dropped bombs at different places . The air battle lasted for nearly half an hour . The Allied forces , warned of the danger , were able to shoot down some of the enemy aircraft which fell on land and sea . " Among those shot down , one fell near Saint Thomas ' College , one closer to the Bellanwila paddy fields , one near Pita Kotte , one on the race - course in Colombo , one near Horana and one on the Galle Face Green . A bomb fell off the target and damaged the Mulleriyawa Mental Hospital , killing some inmates . It appears that the pilot had mistaken the buildings to be Echelon Barracks . One fell near the Maradana railway station , partly damaging it . There were many deaths and more casualties and most of them were civilians . To prevent bombs falling on hospitals , it was decided to have a large red cross painted on the roofs for the guidance of the pilots . " In the late afternoon on 5 April 1942 , just before sunset , at 16 : 55 and again at 18 : 00 , two RN Albacores operating from the RN aircraft carriers " Formidable " and " Indomitable " made contact with the IJN carriers . One Albacore was shot down and the other damaged before an accurate sighting report could be made , frustrating Admiral Somerville ' s plans for a retaliatory night strike by his ASV radar - equipped Albacore strike bombers . Somerville continued to probe for the IJN carriers on the night of 5 April 1942 , but they failed to find the IJN ships , and the RN ' s only opportunity to launch a strike against enemy aircraft carriers faded away . H . G . P . Jayasekera , President of the Ceylon War Veterans Association of World War II , wrote : " The April raids in Colombo were led by Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo and Commander Mitsuo Fuchida , the two men who inflicted the biggest damage on the mighty American Pacific Fleet . The Ceylon R . A . F . had only 20 planes as against that of 120 planes of Mitsuo Fuchida . These 20 fighter planes got off from the Race Course grounds and there was an air battle over Colombo on the Easter Sunday morning 5 / 4 / 1942 . Ceylon Garrison Artillery and Boys of Royal Artillery managed to shoot down many of the Japanese planes . " The Ceylon " Daily News " reported the raid on Monday , 6 April 1942 : " Colombo and the suburbs were attacked yesterday at 8 o ' clock in the morning by 75 enemy aircraft which came in waves from the sea . Twenty - five of the raiders were shot down , while 25 more were damaged . Dive - bombing and low - flying machine - gun attacks were made in the Harbour and Ratmalana areas . A medical establishment in the suburbs was also bombed . " The attack on Trincomalee Harbour . On 9 April , the Japanese attacked the harbour at Trincomalee and the British ships off Batticaloa . , HMAS " Vampire " and the Flower - class corvette were sunk . The RAF lost at least eight Hurricanes and the FAA one Fairey Fulmar . The Japanese lost five bombers and six fighters , one in a suicide attack on the Trincomalee fuel tanks . Seven hundred people lost their lives in the attack on Trincomalee . According to eye witness Michael Tomlinson ( author of " The Most Dangerous Moment " and RAF Station Intelligence Officer at Ratmalana and later at China Bay in Trincomalee ) , one Japanese pilot deliberately crashed his plane into one of the giant fuel tanks just north of China Bay aerodrome . Inside the aircraft were three Japanese — Shigenori Watanabe , Tokya Goto , and Sutomu Toshira . After carefully circling the area they plunged unerringly into the tank igniting their own funeral pyre . The resulting fire lasted seven days . Parts of the aircraft ' s engine and the flattened remains of the fuel storage tank have been placed in a barbed wire enclosure 1 ½ km from the turn off at the 4th mile post on the Trincomalee - Habarana Road . HMS " Hermes " was undergoing repairs in Trincomalee harbour in April 1942 . As a result of the advanced warning of the impending attack by the Japanese , " Hermes " left Trincomalee , minus the 12 Fairey Swordfish Mk Is of 814 Naval Air Squadron , disembarked in Ceylon . A Japanese reconnaissance plane spotted " Hermes " off Batticaloa , and 70 Japanese bombers attacked the defenceless " Hermes " forty times . The carrier sank with the loss of 307 sailors . The sortie demonstrated Japanese superiority in carrier operations . Good luck favoured Somerville when the Japanese did not find his fast carriers and ; these ships were saved to fight another day . But British prestige was brought even lower than it had been after the fall of Singapore . Winston Churchill quote on the Battle of Ceylon . Prime Minister Winston Churchill said : " The most dangerous moment of the War , and the one which caused me the greatest alarm , was when the Japanese Fleet was heading for Ceylon and the naval base there . The capture of Ceylon , the consequent control of the Indian Ocean , and the possibility at the same time of a German conquest of Egypt would have closed the ring and the future would have been black . "