Blockhaus d'Éperlecques

The Éperlecques blockhaus, rue du Sart, is an immense reinforced-concrete structure built by the German occupier in 1943 and 1944 under the name Kraftwerk Nord West. It was to serve as a V2 missile launch base, with a storage capacity of more than a hundred missiles and up to thirty-six launches a day. Allied bombings interrupted the work: on 19 June 1944, seventeen Tallboy bombs were dropped, one of which dug a crater thirty metres in diameter, and the impact of another bomb, dropped on 25 July, is still visible on the north crest.

Open to the public since 1973 and listed as a historic monument, the site is visited in a wooded park. The route explains the construction of the structure, the V1 and V2 weapons, the bombings and the abandonment of the project. An audiovisual projection is shown inside the blockhaus. Outside are a V1 launch ramp and a V2 replica.

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