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Lochnagar
- 2.
- 3. The Somme •1st July 1916 • La Boisselle • Grimsby Chums Pals Battalion • Royal Devonshire's
- 4. The biggest manmade crater • 179th Company Tunneling, Royal Engineers • 67m wide • 91m deep • Heard in London • 4000ft high debris field
- 5.
- 6. The aftermath •Trenches above the mine destroyed • Germans well entrenched • Heavy machine gun fire followed • Many losses • Secured 3rd July
- 7.
- 8. Lochnagar Crator •Somme, France • 1st July 1916 • Biggest man made crater/sound • Destroyed many German positions but not all • Finally taken on 3rd July 1916
Editor's Notes
- #4 Summer offensice planned from 1915 to be a joint offensive with the French but a German attack on Verdun ment that it would be mostly British and Commonwealth forces carrying out the assault. Grimsby Pals were to attack up the sausage valley in order to assault the position which was targetted by the mine
- #5 IIMAGE IS NOT LOCHNAGAR JUST AN EXAMPLE Tunnel dug by 179. Dimensions of the crater Consider to not only be the largest man made crater but also the loudest ever man made sound with the combination of the two charges 36,000 and 24,000 pounds being heard as far away as London. As descriubed on the next slide
- #6 At Boisselle the earth heaved and flashed, a tremendous and magnificent column rose up in the sky. There was an ear-splitting roar drowning all the guns, flinging the machine sideways in the repercussing air. The earth column rose higher and higher to almost 4,000 feet (1,200 m). There it hung, or seemed to hang, for a moment in the air, like the silhouette of some great cypress tree, then fell away in a widening cone of dust and debris. A moment later came the second mine. Again the roar, the upflung machine, the strange gaunt silhouette invading the sky. Then the dust cleared and we saw the two white eyes of the craters. The barrage had lifted to the second-line trenches, the infantry were over the top, the attack had begun.
- #7 German positions above the min obliterated with all of the defenders. Positions either side were fine and the germnas came out and deployed machine guns to a horrifying effect not only killing the troop slowly advancing (walking towards them) but also those in reserve trenches further back, forcing the advacne to slow as people dove into shell craters for cover. Tynesiders also tried to attack and failed. Finally taken by the Worcesters two days later after some had lost there lives in the crater from British shelling.
- #9 IMAGE IS NOT LOCHNAGAR< JUST AN EXAMPLE