BUSTING DAMS

The Ladybower Reservoir in the Peak District National Park in the UK is the site of the Ladybower Dam. A nice looking dam with TWO incredible spillways. You can see one of them in the photos below. THAT is not what I came up this way for.

I was interested in the Dam Busters. This was a group of the Royal Air Force that practiced in this area for bombing dams in WWII. Destroying a dam with WWII is not an easy task. They are very difficult to destroy, even if you can get your bombs to target. Dams were critical to the German war effort in areas due to the water and electricity they supplied, and they were heavily defended. The Dam Busters were created to defeat these targets, using Lancaster Bombers and special bombs that hung under the aircraft and spun for stabilization. If they were dropped at a precise altitude (VERY LOW) at a precise speed, they would skip across the water similar to a skipping stone. If done correctly, they would skip to very close to the dam, then sink. Once at a low enough depth the charges would go off, hopefully destroying the dam. The raids were very successful.

The Ladybower Dam

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This spillway, one of two on this dam, sometimes has water rushing in. I would love to see that happening, the photos I have seen look awesome.

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I found the Ladybower dam, but I had no idea where exactly the aviators practiced their bombing runs.

I stopped at the Ladybower Cafe where these lovely ladies gave me a ton of information about the dams and the area. I had already been behind my original plans by a few hours..... remember me and plans ..... and talking to for well over an hour, and having more places to go than planned really changed my days plans. Of course, this ended up changing my plans for the next few days.

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The Ladybower Cafe. Good coffee and food. Prime location on one of the favorite roads for area bikers. Go to their facebook site and see what is happening today.

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A message that really resonates.

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The signatures of the dam buster crews, from the 1980's This was at the Cafe

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Ladybower Cafe on Facebook

Derwent Reservoir Dam

This was one of two places I am aware of that the Dam Busters practiced for their secret mission. I believe the other is a beach somewhere. That is deep in my trip research notes.

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THE Dam

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When the dam was built, there was a town that was flooded. For a long time, every time the reservoir got low you could see the church steeple. They eventually tore that down for safety reasons, but when the reservoir gets very low you can still walk out and see a few remains from the flooded town.

LINKS

Some Links to information about the Dam Busters.

There was a pretty good movie made about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dam_Busters_(film)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Chastise

https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/the-incredible-story-of-the-dambusters-raid

http://turnock.com/index.php/2015/12/14/lost-villages-of-derwent-and-ashopton/