St Nazaire Lorient and a bit in the middle (Pictures)

[Kapitan]

So the other weekend i went in an off the cuff trip to well to get away, myself and my friend Jo ended up in St Nazaire although not completely by accident i must admit it was some what planned.

St Nazaire is home to one of the largest dry docks in Europe and it was the scene in 1942 for "The greatest raid of all" where HMS Cambletown a 4 pipe DD was rammed into the dock gate to ensure Tirpitz could never use it indeed the mission was a success and it also holds one smaller fact more VC's were won here than any other battle since the VC inception.

A great documentary about it here presented by top gear's Jeremy Clarkson:



Now St Nazaire is home to the submarine pens built by the Germans but one pen caught our eye this pen contains the French submarine Espandon.

here what wikepedia says about the submarine:

Espadon was commissioned in 1960.

In 1961, as she served as a target for mock torpedo exercises, Espadon was hit by two inert torpedoes, damaging her propeller. She nevertheless managed to surface, but had to be towed to Toulon.

In September of the same year, while cruising underwater, Espadon collided with the submarine Laubie, sustaining extensive damage to her bow and to the front of her sail.


Torpedo room of Espadon
On 13 August 1963 a fire in the torpedo room wounded and intoxicated four sailors, one of whom later died of his wounds.

In May 1964, Espadon and Marsouin steamed under sea ice in the Norwegian Sea as far as 70° north.

Espadon undertook significant modifications from 1966 to 1968, notably upgrading her sonar, sail and rudders.

Espadon has been a museum ship at the "ville-port" of Saint-Nazaire in the German-built submarine base since 1987.

And here is some pictures of what she looks like today (Be advised taking pictures inside the submarine is forbidden you can be removed from the submarine please don't ask how I did it):

FNS Espandon S637 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

FNS Espandon S637 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

FNS Espandon S637 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

FNS Espandon S637 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

This picture is on top of the pen that holds Espandon showing the Pens that used to contain U Boats

St Nazaire by Blair shaw, on Flickr


While in St Nazaire we also came across two mistral class LPH these two are destined for Egypt and are named after two presidents:

1010 Gamel Abder Nasser
1020 Anwar Al-Sadat

These vessels were Built firstly for the Russian navy the Vessels have come on quite a bit and are almost ready for delivery.


St Nazaire by Blair shaw, on Flickr

St Nazaire by Blair shaw, on Flickr

St Nazaire by Blair shaw, on Flickr

St Nazaire by Blair shaw, on Flickr


Ok so after we left St Nazaire we headed off to Lorient home of the Type IX Uboats and also BDU.
One interesting fact is that the Chateau Kurneval is still used by the French navy to this day

At Lorient the Daphne class submarine sits inbetween the submarine Pens on a sledge which was used to move submarines between pens.

DSCN1840 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

The two bulbs make the submarine look strikingly odd dont you think?

DSCN1943 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

Another oddity the propeller ive never seen one like this before!

DSCN1918 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

Aft to Forward looking down the length of the submarine

DSCN1881 by Blair shaw, on Flickr

The control room

Bare in mind these submarines served from 1964 to 2010 ! they were quite well used however suffered many problems and two sank one of which has never been found.

This post will have another bit added when i charge my phone it feature a little de tour on our return back to England.

All pictures can be found by clicking the link in my signature and selecting the album you wish to view

To Be Continued....

[Schroeder]

Thanks for sharing.

[Jimbuna]

Great shots

Are those ships still going to be handed over to Russia?

[Kapitan]

Nope the mistrals are off to Egypt

[Jimbuna]

At a knockdown price no doubt.

[Kapitan]

not too sure they seem to be fitted with french equipment not russian as the russians took out all thier stuff.
I think this maybe just a ploy egypt doesnt have the funds to keep these operational for extremely long time i think personally the russians have agreed with france and egypt that if the egyptians buy the units through russian funds once the political situation calms down we may see these ships end up in russian hands anyway so the egyptians are just being the guardians of them.

lets face it egypt is still using Romeo class SSK's and only recently entered into talks to purchase type 209's and the mistrals have no strategic value to the egyptians either, unless they intend to invade israel from the sea

[Jimbuna]

Apologies but I just noticed this.

Originally Posted by Kapitan

it also holds one smaller fact more VC's were won here than any other battle since the VC inception.

Afraid not.....5 were awarded for the SAINT NAZAIRE RAID, making it the largest number awarded for any single action during World War 2.

http://www.jamesgdorrian.com/vcs.html

The most awarded for any single action since the VC inception was the 11 awarded for the action at Rorke's Drift.

http://www.rorkesdriftvc.com/

[Kapitan]

Dont apologise if i have put something up thats incorrect please put me right i was just quoting clarkson in a piece from the documentary

[Sailor Steve]

Very nice shots! Thanks for sharing them with us. I doubt I'll ever see one in real life, so posts like this are always cool.

[Commander Wallace]

These are fantastic pictures. Thanks for taking and sharing them here.

Thanks as well for the youtube link to the St Nazaire raid.

[Aktungbby]

[QUOTE=Kapitan;2401252] The two bulbs make the submarine look strikingly odd dont you think?






[QUOTE] Not 'strikingly odd'...just 'bulbous'!

(Be advised taking pictures inside the submarine is forbidden you can be removed from the submarine please don't ask how I did it):

Very kool shots! U R a good spy! http://www.dictionary.com/browse/bulbous

[Kapitan]

thanks although not quite upto KGB standards just yet