Merville Battery Museum (Batterie de Merville)

The parachute drop was catastrophic. Of 750 men and their equipment, only 150 reached the assembly point. The rest were scattered across Rommel's flooded marshes - some soldiers drowned in the darkness, unable to escape their tangled parachutes and heavy gear. The attack force lost 4 out of 5 gliders, their jeeps, mortars, anti-tank guns, and nearly all demolition equipment. They attacked with just 6 Bangalore torpedoes instead of the planned 60.

The SNAFU Special C-47 aircraft on display has a remarkable history. After surviving D-Day, it was discovered in Bosnia in 2007, riddled with bullet holes from the Balkan War. Bosnia's president gifted it to France, and it was dismantled into three semi-trailers for transport to Normandy. SNAFU stands for 'Situation Normal: All F***ed Up' - military slang painted on its nose by the American crew.

Building just one of the Type H611 casemates required 1,400 cubic meters of concrete, 800 cubic meters of excavation, and 70 tonnes of steel reinforcement. The Todt Organisation used a local firm from nearby Houlgate that employed forced labor. After construction, the entire structure was covered with soil for camouflage - from the air, it looked like a natural hill.