Saturday 17 April 2010

the best of both.................its all 'starfish'

about 10 years ago i went towards great manshead hill for a barn owl,which turned out to be an escape! i always wondered what the bunker was for.................................

................This was the operations bunker for a 'Starfish' decoy intended to draw German bombers away from their intended target, in this case the railway station and yard at Greetland. The decoy consisted of a double line of about a dozen flash pans, where oil would be burned to simulate incendiary bombs. There would also have been decoy lights and shadow buildings, possibly constructed using walling stone from alongside some of the enclosure period tracks in the area. The bunker consists of two rooms either side of a central entrance passage, defended by a high blast screen. The room on the right housed the generators. The control room was on the left, with a escape / observation hatch in the roof. The decoy itself was located to the south west in the area leading towards Great Manshead Hill.
the blast wall
bunker
the decoy is the obvious pale grass


3 comments:

Brian Sumner . said...

Interesting stuff Darrell

Warren Baker said...

............But did it work ...?

darrell j prest said...

dont think it was ever used warren