Horsea Island Second World War Landing Craft Slipways
Author(s): Fiona Small
The Horsea Island landing craft slipways are surviving remains of the infrastructure created to support D-Day on 6th June 1944, arguably the start of the final phase of the Second World War. D-Day was the culmination of two to three years of preparations for the assault phase of Operation Overlord. Codenamed Neptune, this landed over 850,000 men, 150,000 vehicles and 570,000 tons of supplies on the beachheads of Normandy. In the build-up to the offensive a number of sites were established for the building, repair and maintenance of landing craft and ships for the fleet to deliver Winston Churchill’s ‘great plan’. One such site, believed to be the largest, was constructed on Horsea Island, Portsmouth. This report summarises the results of the analysis of aerial photographs and airborne laser scanning data (lidar) images focused on D-Day landing slips. Contextual information is provided from maps and aerial photographs on the history of Horsea Island, the Admiralty installations and other Second World War features.
- Report Number:
- 177/2020
- Series:
- Research Report
- Pages:
- 26
- Keywords:
- Modern Second World War
