As a citizen of Saint-Nazaire, lemme explain further what happenned during the Chariot Operation...
The target:
(very-very-very old pic of the dock)
(A) Sub base / (B) Forme Joubert (Picture by the RAF)
The dock is named "Forme Joubert" after the name of the old director of the trade officies, that died in the 30s.
Length: 350 metres (1,150 ft)
Width: 50 metres (160 ft)
Basically it is gigantic,
The gates were "floating doors", meaning that instead of opening like a sluice, the doors were filled of water. When you need to move them, you remove the water, and the gigantic doors starts to float like a boat. They can be then pushed away.
Saint-Nazaire was also a critical port, because it housed the 29th U-flotilla. This caused the city to be intensively bombed.... 85 to 90% of the city was wiped out, while the submarine base remained... intact (this thing was so armoured... thank you very much my british and american lads for this total waste of human lives that lead to no result at all :/ well, that was war I guess)
The attack:Somewhat disguised, the ship fooled the german for a few moments, and it managed to pass throught the main gun batteries, located right asside the beach of la Courance. But the fool fell-off when after checking the data, it was clearly stated that none of these ships were expected that night, and also because of the lack of response by radio.
In any case, the little floating bomb that the HMS Campbeltown was made it's way at full speed through the shallow water of the only channel to acces the port.
The impact was so strong that the destroyer actually already blocked the floating gate. But when the destroyer exploded, the floating gate was "sunk" in place, meaning that it was impossible to move it by emptying it from water. Plus, the destroyer was sunk over it!
(those clever brits crashed the boat when the tide was very high... so when the water went off, the ship got definitively stuck there! see picture bellow)
The valliant british soldiers already knew their fate, and except 5 lucky ones, they were all killed or made prisonners.
The dock was never repaired by the German.
It is admitted that the destruction of this dock changed slightly the behavior of the kreigsmarine, because they were no longer able to repair their main battleships anymore on the Atlantic ocean front.
Today :
Even today, the dock is still active, and some of today's largest ships are passing through it after being built there (Saint-Nazaire is producing today's largest passenger boats as the Queen Mary II or MSC Divina for example).
The U-Booten base ? She remains in the city, some shops and resorts were built inside. Above it, there is a garden (this is modern art), a concert hall, and some informtaions about the history of the city.
Every alveola was able to contain up to 2 submarines, and also to be closed by huge doors, this thing is awesome to see ! It was fully painted in green at the epoch.
About the subs do not get it wrong, submarines were using an armored sluice, located inside a huge bunker to protect it. So the destruction of the Forme Joubert was not a big problem for them.<- picture of MSC divina behind the armored sluice that german U-Booten were taking. It is now a museum on submarines, and you can visit the French "éspadon" sub inside.
_________________________________________________________________________________Thanks to WG for this article, and my best regards to Tanatoy and Rhaya, you guys are the best ;)Kind regards,"Uncle" Shadow
