Éperlecques log cabin
The Blockhaus von Éperlecques ( French Blockhaus d'Éperlecques ) is a German bunker from the Second World War in northern France in the Pas-de-Calais department . The bunker in the Éperlecques forest is about ten kilometers northwest of Saint-Omer .
The bunker system with the code name "Kraftwerk Nord West" (KNW) was intended to be used for the production and launching of V2 rockets . The construction goes back to an initiative of Walter Dornberger , who requested such a facility near the Channel coast from Armaments Minister Albert Speer in December 1942 . In the last days of December, officers and engineers from Peenemünde examined possible locations and decided on the forest near Éperlecques. The Todt organization, commissioned with the construction in March 1943, was unable to complete the facility (despite the use of slave labor) because the construction site was badly damaged by air raids on June 19, 1944 as part of Operation Crossbow : Royal Air Force bombers threw Tallboy- Bombs . Only the facility for the production of liquid oxygen was further expanded and put into operation; it survived another Tallboy attack on July 27, 1944 undamaged. In view of the approaching Allied invasion troops, this facility was also dismantled and transported to Germany.
The facility houses an open-air museum that shows the history and function of the facility. A tallboy bomb crater can be seen next to the bunker. The crater has a diameter of around 42 meters and a depth of around 18 meters. The facility was registered as a Monument historique by the French Ministry of Culture in 1986 .
literature
- Steven J Zaloga: German V-weapon sites 1943-45 . Osprey Publ., Oxford; New York, NY 2008, ISBN 978-1-84603-247-9 (English, (68 pages online PDF) - p. 10 ff.).
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Joachim Engelmann: Secret armory Peenemünde. V2, waterfall, butterfly. Nebel, Eggolsheim 2006, ISBN 3-89555-370-0 .
- ↑ Éperlecques log cabin in the Base Mérimée of the French Ministry of Culture (French)
Coordinates: 50 ° 49 ′ 43.2 " N , 2 ° 11 ′ 1.2" E