Editing Channel Dash (section)

===Night, 11/12 February===
[[File:Bundesarchiv DVM 10 Bild-23-63-46, Schlachtschiff "Scharnhorst".jpg|thumb|''Scharnhorst'' in 1939]]
The ships at Brest were scheduled to depart at {{nowrap|8:30 p.m.}} on 11 February but an air raid by 18 Wellington bombers delayed the departure. The all clear sounded at {{nowrap|10:15 p.m.}} and ''Scharnhorst'', ''Gneisenau'' and ''Prinz Eugen'', accompanied by six destroyers sailed thirty minutes later.{{sfnm|1a1=Middlebrook|1a2=Everitt|1y=2014|1p=234|2a1=Richards|2y=1974|2p=365}} A British agent in Brest was unable to signal that the Brest Group was departing because of German wireless jamming; ''Sealion'', patrolling outside the harbour, had withdrawn to recharge its batteries.{{sfn|Hendrie|2010|pp=166–167}}{{efn|[[Reginald Victor Jones|Reginald Jones]] wrote that the signal from Brest had been received on the night of 11/12 February but that the duty officer neglected to pass this information on because he claimed he had already read it in a London evening paper and assumed that the Admiralty already knew of it.{{sfn|Jones|1998|p=235}}}}<!--[[Heinkel He 111]]s dropped {{lang|de|[[Chaff (countermeasure)|Düppel]]}} to jam British radar, ship-borne [[Arado Ar 196]] floatplanes reconnoitred and [[Junkers Ju 88]] bombers made low-level raids on Plymouth and nearby airfields.{{cn|date=October 2016}} blanked for lack of citation-->

Patrol ''Stopper'', near Brest, was being flown by an ASV Hudson from [[No. 224 Squadron RAF|224 Squadron]] when the Brest Group began assembling outside the port. At the patrol height of {{cvt|1000|-|2000|ft|m}} the ASV had a range of about {{cvt|13|nmi|mi+km}} but the Hudson was flying south-west as the ships turned towards Ushant and received no contact. The last eight minutes of the next ''Stopper'' sortie came within about {{cvt|9|nmi|mi+km}} of the ships but received no contact on the radar.{{sfn|Richards|1974|pp=365–366}}

''Line South East'' ran past Ushant to the vicinity of [[Jersey]], to find a sortie from Brest which had turned up the Channel. The Brest Group crossed ''Line South East'' at {{nowrap|0:50am}} on 12 February, but the Hudson patrol was not there, having been ordered to return when its ASV failed. Joubert was short of aircraft and sent no replacement, also because ''Stopper'' had reported nothing untoward and if the Brest Group had sailed before ''Stopper'' began, it would already have passed ''Line South East''. ''Habo'', the third patrol line, from [[Cherbourg-en-Cotentin|Cherbourg]] to [[Boulogne-sur-Mer|Boulogne]] was conducted as usual, until a dawn fog was forecast over British airfields and the aircraft was called back at {{nowrap|6:30am,}} when the Brest Group was still west of the line.{{sfn|Richards|1974|pp=365–366}}{{efn|''Stopper'' was usually conducted by four consecutive flights but this night, the ASV on the first Hudson broke down and the crew flew back to change to a spare, putting back the {{nowrap|7:30 p.m.}} start until {{nowrap|10:38 p.m.}} The Board of Enquiry found that the German ships had sailed through the ''Stopper'' patrol line before it was re-established but this was later found to be untrue, the delayed patrol had begun before the Brest Group sailed.{{sfn|Richards|1974|p=366}}}}