Canal crossing
Canal crossing is an undertaking in which the English Channel is crossed on the Strait of Dover between Calais in France and Dover in England , where it is only 36 km wide when it crosses into the North Sea .
balloon
On January 7, 1785, the French balloonist Jean-Pierre Blanchard and the American doctor John Jeffries were the first to cross the English Channel from Dover to Calais in a balloon.
In the opposite direction, the attempt by Pilâtre de Rozier and Pierre Romain failed on June 15, 1785 , both of whom had a fatal accident.
swim
- See main article canal swimming
On August 24th and 25th, 1875, the Englishman Matthew Webb swam the English Channel from Dover to Calais. It took him 21 hours and 45 minutes and covered 73 kilometers (because of the downforce from the currents).
The first female canal swimmer to reach her destination was the American Gertrude Ederle in 1926 . It took 14 hours and 39 minutes. A year later she was followed by the Englishwoman Mercedes Gleitze . Today around 100 people try their hand at canal swimming every year, but only a few are successful. A distinction is made as to whether or not they wear a heat protection suit. The time record has been held by the Bulgarian Petar Stojtschew with 06: 57.50 since 2007.
The British Susan Taylor raised several thousand euros for a children's hospice and the British Diabetes Association via a website. In mid-July 2013 she swam accompanied by a CS&PF boat, suffered heart problems in the canal, was picked up by a helicopter and died within two hours in the Boulogne-sur-Mer hospital. "Less than 1000 people have swum the English Channel, only one in ten people who train for the channel actually makes it," she described the canal as a greater challenge than climbing Mount Everest .
The English Channel is a stretch of the Ocean's Seven , the equivalent of the Seven Summits (highest peaks on every continent) in mountaineering.
plane
In 1909, the Frenchman Louis Blériot (1872–1936) flew across the canal with his Blériot XI monoplane . His flight from Calais to Dover took 37 minutes at an average altitude of 100 meters. Blériot was thus able to accept the prize ("Cross Channel Prize") of £ 1,000 offered by the British newspaper Daily Mail for the first channel crossing.
In 1912, Harriet Quimby became the first woman to fly across the Channel. It took off from Dover on April 16 at 5:30 a.m. under a cloudy sky and landed 59 minutes later on a beach about 40 kilometers from Calais. She flew a 50-horsepower Bleriot XI - monoplane , which she had borrowed from Blériot.
In 1979 a person managed to cross the canal in a pedal-powered airplane .
In 1981 a solar powered aircraft (a light aircraft ) crossed the English Channel from Paris for the first time.
In 2009, Gerard Thevenot was the first to fly over the canal in an airplane powered by hydrogen.
helicopter
On September 6, 1945, the German test pilot Hans-Helmut Gerstenhauer flew over the canal together with the mechanics F. Will and H. Zelewsky in a helicopter of the type Fa 223 V 14 on a transfer flight from France to Beaulieu / Hants in southern England.
Amphibious vehicle
In 1959 three British people crossed the English Channel between Calais and Dover with a "flying saucer".
The first hovercraft to create a compressed air cushion beneath it, on which it glides over the water, took 123 minutes for the 35 km route.
1968 began a new era for ferry traffic on the English Channel . British Railways began operations with two hovercraft . After a renovation in 1976, up to 418 passengers and 60 cars could be transported from Dover to Calais in just 30 minutes . Another connection from Ramsgate to Calais was discontinued after a short time. On September 14, 1995, the Princess Anne hovercraft crossed the English Channel in just 22 minutes. This record has not yet been broken.
In 2004 Richard Branson crossed the English Channel in an amphibious vehicle in the record time of one hour and 40 minutes.
Tunnel and railroad
The French mining engineer Albert Mathieu-Favier developed the first concrete design for the construction of a canal tunnel in 1798.
In 1878 concrete work began according to the plans of William Low . By 1882 approx. 1,800 m of tunnels were built on both sides. Because England feared a later invasion by the French, the work was stopped in 1883.
In 1957 the plans were taken up again, but due to the high costs, the work came to a standstill again in 1973 due to British efforts.
In 1994 the historic dream could finally be realized with the Eurotunnel between Fréthun and Folkestone .
wing
On July 31, 2003, the Austrian extreme skydiver Felix Baumgartner managed to cross the English Channel with a jump from 9,000 meters. After jumping over Dover , he glided 35 kilometers with a specially constructed carbon wing to Calais, where he opened the parachute and landed safely.
On September 25, 2008, the former Swiss fighter pilot and today's airline pilot of Swiss Air, Yves Rossy , flew over the English Channel with a wing strapped to his back with a wingspan of 2.5 meters and powered by four small nozzles . The flight took place from Calais (France) to Dover (England) at a speed of about 200 km / h. For his flight, he jumped from a plane at 2:06 p.m. over Calais from an altitude of 2,500 meters. First it fell in free fall and then launched the jets to begin the flight. After 10:30 minutes of forward flight he reached Dover and flew locally before turning off the jets and parachuting . Yves Rossy designed and manufactured his aircraft himself from carbon material. The flight was documented by a helmet camera and an accompanying helicopter .
Sailing and rowing
On August 27, 1972, Wolfram Neufert, Karl Kleine-Brockhoff, Karsten Neuheuser, Jochen Rudloff and Rainer Budweg from the rowing club at Baldeneysee in Essen rowed in five and a half hours with a brick four-man with a helmsman from Dover to Calais.
On May 25, 1975 Manfred and Jürgen Charchulla were the first surfers to cross the canal from Calais to Dover on a tandem.
On August 23, 2005, the English sailor Hilary Lister, who, due to paraplegia, can only move her head and moves the sail and tiller of her boat by blowing or sucking on two straws, crossed the canal between Dover and Calais without assistance. It took 6 hours and 13 minutes.
Military companies
- 55 and 54 BC Chr .: Caesar's campaigns in Britain (Rome)
- from 1066: Norman conquest of England
- 1213: Failed French invasion attempt (sea battle near Damme)
- 1347: After a year-long siege , the English King Edward III conquered. the city of Calais in the Hundred Years War .
- 1415: Henry V's war against France (begins with invasion)
- May / June 1692: The naval battles of Barfleur and La Hougue in the Palatinate War of Succession put an end to the French attempts to invade England.
- October 21, 1805: Battle of Trafalgar to prevent Napoleon from invading England
- May / June 1940: During the Second World War, the Royal Navy was able to rescue most of the French and British troops who had fled to Dunkirk for England in Operation Dynamo .
- June 1944: Operation Overlord of the Western Allies to land the invading army in France with around 6,000 ships, 12,000 aircraft involved, 1,100,000 soldiers and the temporary establishment of two artificial cargo ports off the French coast
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ KleineZeitung.at, print edition of July 16, 2013, p. 10
- ↑ THE NEW DAILY MAIL PRIZES . In: The Royal Aero Club of the United Kingdom - official notices to members . April 5, 1913, p. 393 ( Flight Global Archive ).
- ↑ Website for the Berblinger Prize 2011 with information about this flight
- ↑ Excerpt from the Nordsee-Zeitung Bremerhaven, March 20, 1976