Remember, on Saturday February 5, 1944 at 2:01 pm the American air force bombed the La Martinerie base occupied, at that time, by the German Air Force.
In less than 3 minutes, according to witnesses, 588 fr 500 lbs (227 kg) bombs, some of which where equipped with delay detonator, were dropped by fourty nine B-17b, B-17f and B-17g bombers of the 351st and 401st "Bombardment group".
The purpose of this bombardment: to make the runway and the hangars unusable.
Nearly 80 years later, during a depollution procedure, preliminary to setting up the new photovoltaic park, one of the bombs was discovered by the Déminétec company responsible for the pyrotechnic mapping of the area. (see attached map for location)
The explosive device, likely to still be operational, was neutralized by the civil security mine clearance service based in La Rochelle on Thursday February 16, 2023 and then taken away for destruction.
It should be noted that during this depollution phase many objects were found in the area.
Similar to what happened in 2021 when the first photovoltaic park was created, the managers of the BayWa r.e. company, in charge of creating the park, requested the company in charge of the depollution to hand over to “les Amis de la Martinerie” all the items discovered on the site.
Frédéric will restore some of them and they will be presented to you in future news.
Articles in La NR newspaper of 17 February 2023
The article in La NR newspaper of 18 February 2023
Click on images to enlarge
Documentary credits and sources: Didier Dubant – Dominique Roosens – Indre prefecture Facebook
