I worked in that bunker in the mid eighties mixing dry cement for Halliburton. The inside is massive and impressive. I still remember seeing all the large craters from the allied bombs trying to destroy it. The walls were incredibly thick.
If you are ever in Alkmaar in August, I can show you around an old German fighter base. There are many bunkers surrounding it and other interesting features. Last year my son and I found a bomb fragment.
great video, and a very good explanation of the bunker. I should have been visiting this area again this year, but ill have to await next year. Thankyou
That wasn’t a near miss by the Grand Slam. It should not have hit the bunker at all. The Grand Slam was designed as an earthquake bomb. It could detonate up to 30 minutes after penetration of the ground. It’s aim was to achieve maximum penetration of the surrounding ground then explode causing an earthquake effect thus destroying the foundations and from within. If it hit the bunker itself the bomb aimer was slightly off. The Disney bomb used Young’s equation that stated the deepest penetration was achieved by a projectile that was dense, long and thin. It was also designed by a Royal Navy Lt. Commander but only used by the USAAC.
Even if it was completed, it still would have been halfway useless. The bombing might not have caused major damage to the building, but any ancillary structures, roads, rail lines, docks, would have made the building pretty useless.
@@visionist7 No such thing as a self-contained assembly plant. Parts come in, completed boats go out. If the rail lines and roads are bombed, no parts get in, no boats go out.
@@BTFOOMNY in that case, know that bombing roads, railways etc, was tried often by both sides, but it was always a case of bomb it today, bomb it again tomorrow when it's been repaired, bomb it again the day after that. Meanwhile the important targets aren't being bombed. Unless you can take out bridges and tunnels - very tricky in those days unless you were willing to risk the AA at low level - you couldn't shut down roads and railways for more than a few hours. The only other way would have been to reduce the whole city to rubble to block the roads. Doubtless this would have excited Butcher Harris and the Fat Controller, but saner heads prevailed.
@@visionist7 You're right. Bombing missions were planned based on the need for the particular target to be hit. Building the equivalent of a PT-boat is a lower value than an aircraft or submarine factory. However, any bombing that diverts labor and materials to repairing bomb damage is still a success. Missing the road completely and bombing some farmer's field is a complete waste, but "precision" bombing did not have 21st century precision in 1943 and 1944.
They never dropped a grand slam and it wasnt 5000kg it was 10 thousand kg the disney bomb was 5000kg which was used along with the tall boy so it's actually not really great at all its incorrect
The Valentin Bunker at Bremen is twice the size and was destroyed in a single raid by 20 Lancasters from 615 squadron. The US attacked a week later with 60 flying Fortresses and only secured one hit on the already destroyed structure. The Grand Slam bomb was 10,000 kg. The Tallboy bomb was 5,400kg.
@@richardmarshall4322 The Grand Slam on display at the Kelham Island Museum [Sheffield] weighs 10 TONNES [10,000 kg]. Some 30 to 40 Grand Slams were produced by were produced by Vickers & Co, Sheffield, at their River Don Works.
Close by, there's also another bunker that still survives,: the torpedo workshop. Today it is a practice place for music bands. between the S-boat bunker and the torpedo bunker there was a railway track.
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer Its located at the Kromhoutstraat, just past the Baco army goods store. If I remember correctly, you can stil see the tracks for the torpedo trolly's at the entrance of the bunker.
@@captaintrips2980 I am informed by a cement expert that dam walls never stop cutting and are always curing, albeit very slowly. They benefit from the wet state.
Tall Boy & Grand Slam are ‘earthquake bombs’ they are not really intended to penetrate the buildings but the surrounding ground and shake the structure down, it is likely that a lot of the cracking may be due to that ‘earthquake effect’!
"The Gigantic Bunker That No Allied Bombs Could Destroy". Not true. The German submarine pens at Farge, north of Bremen, Germany, were attacked on the 27th of March 1945. The force consisted of twenty Avro Lancaster heavy bombers of 617 Squadron which had, after the "Dambusters" raid, developed precision bombing method. Two 'Grand Slam' bombs hit the target and penetrated about half-way through the 4.6 m thick ferrous concrete roof before exploding. The explosions blew large holes in the remaining thickness of the roof and brought down around 1,000 tons of debris into the chamber below. The Schnellbootbunker in the port of IJmuiden, by contrast, had a roof only 3 m thick So the Grand Slam bomb would have easily made large holes in its roof, causing the fall of thousands of tonnes of concrete into the space below.
They would not have used Grand Slam against this bunker but the smaller Tallboy which weighed 6 tons. Grand Slam would have destroyed this bunker or rendered it totally unusable without question. Grand Slam wasn't used until 14th March 1945, by which time the war was almost over.
It remains another kind of bunker in a carry near RINXENT Pas de Calais department in north of France It was used to shelter a German long range Railway cannon, one of these cannons, " Leopold " is visible near the former TODT Battery near AUDIGHEN village, now war museum I enclose a link to find this bunker, you can clearly see it at the bottom of the photo, just above the two lane railway storage track goo.gl/maps/v7Kqz6vXdKzmoegH7 Jean Michel
They can say what they want to about such bunkers, my answer is to this bunker is that Tallboy was never used on such a target and so is the question still open what damage would happen. For example in France v2 launch site could give the answer
Never seen or heard of this bunker before. Just shows the importance the Germans put into protecting those boats... they certainly were a scourge of the North Sea. I'm wondering though, perhaps the British didn't consider the bunker worth dropping a Grand slam on it....they were used sparingly on very selective targets, same goes for the tallboy..interesting piece of WW2 history
i doubt it very much. concrete gets harder as it gets older. even with todays bombs, dropped in the smae manner of yesteryear, i still doubt they'd get penetration right through. please remember that at this stage of the war, the Germans knew how to build concrete structures that would "cushion" explosives with layered roofs and walls. it absorbed the explosive forces with great effect.
It wouldn't be necessary. The Iraqi army discovered that lots of dirt and concrete still isn't safe. One of the more effective housings, the GBU-28 used its large mass (2,130 kg or 4,700 lb) and casing (constructed from barrels of surplus 203 mm howitzers) to penetrate 6 meters (20 feet) of concrete, and more than 30 metres (98 feet) of earth..... and THEN it blew up.
@@BTFOOMNY Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia etc. all discovered that refusing to bend over for america isn't safe. America has upgraded it's mini-nukes with better guidance systems and scrapped the INF so mere dirt and concrete never stops them killing again. I used to think Hitler was the most evil, but today america is the clear winner.
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer Wow, that makes me envious - I will look forward to seeing your footage. The building pops up from time-to-time on discovery/history/natgeo channels on foxtel, but your footage is much better. Thanks again.
It may have proven more effective to have dropped a series of air deployed ''Depth & Dam Buster Charges'' into the suspected ingress & egresses doors for the submarines. But what would I know? -Former U.S. Paratrooper 82nd Abn. 1/504 Inf. '71---'74
Stinkiestbrainever... yes, a lumbering Lancaster would have proved successful, but I’m sure that the anti-aircraft defenses would have shot her up good before she got close...
@@rabee2040 Only them 3 yrs. Only 10 yrs. Bricklaying Only 3 yrs. Passenger elevator constructor. Only 20 yrs. Txdot Inspector of bridges & roadway. Only 12 yrs. since retirement. That & about all them campfire stories I know. Whatta' you got?
Russia stopped Germany, if God was involved then the international bankers wouldn't have been allowed to finance the war machine. Today they finance the america war machine instead: we gained no peace at all.
@@G-ra-ha-m without God the allied forces wouldn't have won the war. No matter who is tormenting and treating mankind, the person will be disgraced eventually, no matter who that person or that country is. God is supreme
Interesting video. And good English, i can barely hear any Dutch accent. Too bad that the bunker is owned by companies, all those typical company objects like those gates, containers and camera poles smudge the historical object.
Time and again some people will born to instigate violence and bring with it the miseries of thousands of people. The wave must died down, but painful memories remains for centuries. I still cherished the memory of Anne Frank, the lovely little girl, and tears welled up in my eyes ! what a meaningless cruelty !
@@PatricioGarcia1973 FDR and Churchill were Not only Traitors to their Countries and People, but Traitors to ALL Western Civilization. Germany was trying to Save the West from the Bolshevik Zionists and "Their" Communists. The Real Winners of WW 2 were the Zionists and "Their" Communists, Western Civilization was the Actual Loser and you only need to look at Our Countries today to see that!
I worked in that bunker in the mid eighties mixing dry cement for Halliburton. The inside is massive and impressive. I still remember seeing all the large craters from the allied bombs trying to destroy it. The walls were incredibly thick.
German engineers who Built this was Genius .
Update: The Grand Slam was not used on this bunker, it was attacked with Tallboys multiple times.
The Battlefield Explorer cool to know what happened here, because i live in IJmuiden.
If you are ever in Alkmaar in August, I can show you around an old German fighter base. There are many bunkers surrounding it and other interesting features. Last year my son and I found a bomb fragment.
Very solid and wonderful bunker you share thanks
Glad you enjoyed it
Speaking of Brutalist architecture . . .
great video, and a very good explanation of the bunker. I should have been visiting this area again this year, but ill have to await next year. Thankyou
Yeah we all have to sit on our hands and wait for better times...
That wasn’t a near miss by the Grand Slam. It should not have hit the bunker at all. The Grand Slam was designed as an earthquake bomb. It could detonate up to 30 minutes after penetration of the ground. It’s aim was to achieve maximum penetration of the surrounding ground then explode causing an earthquake effect thus destroying the foundations and from within. If it hit the bunker itself the bomb aimer was slightly off. The Disney bomb used Young’s equation that stated the deepest penetration was achieved by a projectile that was dense, long and thin. It was also designed by a Royal Navy Lt. Commander but only used by the USAAC.
Very well researched video. Thank you.
Glad it was helpful!
Great videos! Thanks
Glad you like them!
Even if it was completed, it still would have been halfway useless. The bombing might not have caused major damage to the building, but any ancillary structures, roads, rail lines, docks, would have made the building pretty useless.
True
Pretty sure it was meant to be self contained for that same reason
@@visionist7 No such thing as a self-contained assembly plant. Parts come in, completed boats go out. If the rail lines and roads are bombed, no parts get in, no boats go out.
@@BTFOOMNY in that case, know that bombing roads, railways etc, was tried often by both sides, but it was always a case of bomb it today, bomb it again tomorrow when it's been repaired, bomb it again the day after that.
Meanwhile the important targets aren't being bombed.
Unless you can take out bridges and tunnels - very tricky in those days unless you were willing to risk the AA at low level - you couldn't shut down roads and railways for more than a few hours. The only other way would have been to reduce the whole city to rubble to block the roads. Doubtless this would have excited Butcher Harris and the Fat Controller, but saner heads prevailed.
@@visionist7 You're right. Bombing missions were planned based on the need for the particular target to be hit. Building the equivalent of a PT-boat is a lower value than an aircraft or submarine factory. However, any bombing that diverts labor and materials to repairing bomb damage is still a success. Missing the road completely and bombing some farmer's field is a complete waste, but "precision" bombing did not have 21st century precision in 1943 and 1944.
Great video, would love to visit it one day
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ You are wrong I can absolutely split that bunker into pieces⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
excellent information and footage . Thankyou
They never dropped a grand slam and it wasnt 5000kg it was 10 thousand kg the disney bomb was 5000kg which was used along with the tall boy so it's actually not really great at all its incorrect
Would be awesome to see this bunker from the inside !
Absolutely, whenever it opens again for a day then I'll head over and create another video.
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer I am waiting
جيد جدا...أحسنت...
Very good..welldone
I'm waiting . Part 2
Ik ben er in 2019 in geweest met bunkerdag. Was een leuke bezichtiging!
The Valentin Bunker at Bremen is twice the size and was destroyed in a single raid by 20 Lancasters from 615 squadron. The US attacked a week later with 60 flying Fortresses and only secured one hit on the already destroyed structure.
The Grand Slam bomb was 10,000 kg. The Tallboy bomb was 5,400kg.
You mean 617 Squadron. Grand Slam was 22400 pounds. Tallboy 12000 pounds.
@@richardmarshall4322 The Grand Slam on display at the Kelham Island Museum [Sheffield] weighs 10 TONNES [10,000 kg].
Some 30 to 40 Grand Slams were produced by were produced by Vickers & Co, Sheffield, at their River Don Works.
hi, what an amazing structure, have you tried contacting the land owner to gain access to the bunker. that would make another excellent video.
Not yet but I'll do that!
Would be interesting to see the Bunker from the top, to see the damage of the Bombs.
I hope to do that in the future.
Perhaps you can see it on Google Satellite view.
b8e71fcbe2e195c67d8d16734013d20f
Only a few cracks...
Close by, there's also another bunker that still survives,: the torpedo workshop. Today it is a practice place for music bands. between the S-boat bunker and the torpedo bunker there was a railway track.
Thanks!
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer Its located at the Kromhoutstraat, just past the Baco army goods store. If I remember correctly, you can stil see the tracks for the torpedo trolly's at the entrance of the bunker.
... en aan je accent te horen ben je Nederlander, net als ik : ) Ik kwam vroeger vaak naar IJmuiden voor de bunkers, o.a. Batterie Heerenduin.
Thanks
The grand slam bomb was a 9072 kg bomb (20000 lbs)
Correct and I've now learned it wasn't used on this bunker
You should try to get the owners permission for a look inside! 😄
I have been inside the bunker as i was delivering to a company that operates inside they have cut doors in the sides to access inside
I wonder how many decades it took for the cement to fully cure. Maybe it still is curing.
I guess they have special methods for such thick concrete... Arch dams like Hoover Dam don’t need to cure a decade either.
@@Engineer9736 They don't NEED to, yes. I just know that cement in the Hoover Dam was still curing years after it was built.🇺🇲
@@captaintrips2980 I am informed by a cement expert that dam walls never stop cutting and are always curing, albeit very slowly. They benefit from the wet state.
Tall Boy & Grand Slam are ‘earthquake bombs’ they are not really intended to penetrate the buildings but the surrounding ground and shake the structure down, it is likely that a lot of the cracking may be due to that ‘earthquake effect’!
It would be nice to have a video from inside the bunker!!
It absolutely would, it opens at best once a year and I wasn't able to go last time it opened. When it does, I'll post a follow up video!
"The Gigantic Bunker That No Allied Bombs Could Destroy". Not true. The German submarine pens at Farge, north of Bremen, Germany, were attacked on the 27th of March 1945. The force consisted of twenty Avro Lancaster heavy bombers of 617 Squadron which had, after the "Dambusters" raid, developed precision bombing method. Two 'Grand Slam' bombs hit the target and penetrated about half-way through the 4.6 m thick ferrous concrete roof before exploding. The explosions blew large holes in the remaining thickness of the roof and brought down around 1,000 tons of debris into the chamber below. The Schnellbootbunker in the port of IJmuiden, by contrast, had a roof only 3 m thick So the Grand Slam bomb would have easily made large holes in its roof, causing the fall of thousands of tonnes of concrete into the space below.
They would not have used Grand Slam against this bunker but the smaller Tallboy which weighed 6 tons. Grand Slam would have destroyed this bunker or rendered it totally unusable without question. Grand Slam wasn't used until 14th March 1945, by which time the war was almost over.
Thank you for the feedback, I will look into it some more and if you are correct, as can very well be the case, I will post a notice!
The might of GERMANS!! made the world think of it !! great minds, great machines. great race
It remains another kind of bunker in a carry near RINXENT Pas de Calais department in north of France
It was used to shelter a German long range Railway cannon, one of these cannons, " Leopold " is visible near the former TODT Battery near AUDIGHEN village, now war museum
I enclose a link to find this bunker, you can clearly see it at the bottom of the photo, just above the two lane railway storage track
goo.gl/maps/v7Kqz6vXdKzmoegH7
Jean Michel
They can say what they want to about such bunkers, my answer is to this bunker is that Tallboy was never used on such a target and so is the question still open what damage would happen. For example in France v2 launch site could give the answer
The evidence says Tallboys were used....
Never seen or heard of this bunker before. Just shows the importance the Germans put into protecting those boats... they certainly were a scourge of the North Sea. I'm wondering though, perhaps the British didn't consider the bunker worth dropping a Grand slam on it....they were used sparingly on very selective targets, same goes for the tallboy..interesting piece of WW2 history
Ill bet they could get through it today.
Of course.. They can wipe whole countries with the right bomb.
i doubt it very much. concrete gets harder as it gets older. even with todays bombs, dropped in the smae manner of yesteryear, i still doubt they'd get penetration right through. please remember that at this stage of the war, the Germans knew how to build concrete structures that would "cushion" explosives with layered roofs and walls. it absorbed the explosive forces with great effect.
JDAM bombs are pinpoint-accurate. 4-5 of them dropped in the same spot in rapid succession would probably end up 50 feet under the structure.
At least the Germans had tenacity, and zeal, even now they are the richest country in Europe.!
5:17 Grand Slam Bomb has 10.000 kg not 5.000 kg !
fantastic
Thank you! Cheers!
New sub here.
Thanks for subbing
That thing would probably survive a nuclear explosion
Let us hope we never have to find out!
It wouldn't be necessary. The Iraqi army discovered that lots of dirt and concrete still isn't safe.
One of the more effective housings, the GBU-28 used its large mass (2,130 kg or 4,700 lb) and casing (constructed from barrels of surplus 203 mm howitzers) to penetrate 6 meters (20 feet) of concrete, and more than 30 metres (98 feet) of earth..... and THEN it blew up.
Also for sure human self-extinction.
BTFOOMNY isn’t it beautiful what human intelligence can achieve? Just because we can’t accept what is?
@@BTFOOMNY Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Somalia etc. all discovered that refusing to bend over for america isn't safe. America has upgraded it's mini-nukes with better guidance systems and scrapped the INF so mere dirt and concrete never stops them killing again.
I used to think Hitler was the most evil, but today america is the clear winner.
Glad I wasn't living under the sacrificial roof!
Just wondering if the companies that own the bunker use it for any commercial purpose or is it just empty?
They use it for storage of the materials they use in production
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer Thanks very much!
the reason for the two roofus is to get it as a tunnel type of chanel after which the gases from the explosion of bomb will come out like bazuka
Correct, blast through the first one and then there is another roof to deal with.
Did you hear someone knocking ?
This would be good for gold reserve
Duim omhoog....thump up....👍
Bedankt!
Really interesting - could you get inside it? That would be interesting, too. Thanks!
Normally it's closed but they open it once a year, I hope to be able to visit it one day!
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer Wow, that makes me envious - I will look forward to seeing your footage. The building pops up from time-to-time on discovery/history/natgeo channels on foxtel, but your footage is much better. Thanks again.
Would any of the companies that own it allow you to see inside?? Even just from a doorway
Not when I visted, maybe it'll change in the future?
Greetings from 🇩🇰, we have some German bunkers here as well, some are falling into the North Sea these days.
What humans can't destroy, nature will take back for free.
Inside view?
The Grand Slam weighed 22,000 lbs (10,000kg)
Should have shown inside the bunker. What is in it?
Indeed but is closed to the public, a company uses it.
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer for what?.... Water boarding???
Thought it was 200m long? Has the rest been destroyed?
Have you watched the video?
Did they a try a grand slam?
It may have proven more effective to have dropped a series of air deployed ''Depth & Dam Buster Charges'' into the suspected ingress & egresses doors for the submarines. But what would I know?
-Former U.S. Paratrooper 82nd Abn. 1/504 Inf. '71---'74
Send a lumbering Lancaster at extreme low level towards a heavily defended port. What could go wrong?
Stinkiestbrainever... yes, a lumbering Lancaster would have proved successful, but I’m sure that the anti-aircraft defenses would have shot her up good before she got close...
"36 months barely enough to finish training and hear few campfire stories so ya "what would you know"!!!!!
@@rabee2040
Only them 3 yrs.
Only 10 yrs. Bricklaying
Only 3 yrs. Passenger elevator constructor.
Only 20 yrs. Txdot Inspector of bridges & roadway.
Only 12 yrs. since retirement.
That & about all them campfire stories I know. Whatta' you got?
Why didn't they make a museum from it?
Good question, don't know actually
If they though it would make more money that way, I am sure they would have.
what is inside ?
Multiple things, including a cement factory
All the jellybeans and dildos for all the fruitcakes of the world.
@@TheBattlefieldExplorer any videos of the inside ?
@@blingbling574 You must be a weird cook with an even weirder sex life.
U Boot Bunker Valentin in Bremen-Rekum 600 Meters Long. Thisvis a Bunker!
Só faltou mostrar o bunker por dentro.
What is the name of this bunker thx
S-Boat bunker IJmuiden, I don't think it has a name?
Ik vroeg me al eens af ...wat is dit toch....maar nu word het duidelijk
Germany was pursuing unnecessary and fruitless ambitions at the end God Almighty disgraced her.
Russia stopped Germany, if God was involved then the international bankers wouldn't have been allowed to finance the war machine.
Today they finance the america war machine instead: we gained no peace at all.
@@G-ra-ha-m without God the allied forces wouldn't have won the war.
No matter who is tormenting and treating mankind, the person will be disgraced eventually, no matter who that person or that country is. God is supreme
@@olusabaolukayode9191 Lets hope so.
Men killed and died.
Not god
@@olusabaolukayode9191 What "God"? There are over 3000 of them.
Grand Slam would have destroyed it had 617 returned. No point in attacking an adandoned project
Verry interessant.
😂😂 Deed je dat expres? 1 woord in het Engels fout geschreven en dan maar opgeven en in het Nederlands verder 😂
still 💪💪💪💪💪💪in 2020
Interesting video. And good English, i can barely hear any Dutch accent. Too bad that the bunker is owned by companies, all those typical company objects like those gates, containers and camera poles smudge the historical object.
Thanks!
Imagine living in a house built like that
Bob Biggley... best hide n seek everrrrrr!!
That would be amazing, total silence inside :-) I guess you won’t even be able to hear a thunderstorm inside.
Time and again some people will born to instigate violence and bring with it the miseries of thousands of people. The wave must died down, but painful memories remains for centuries. I still cherished the memory of Anne Frank, the lovely little girl, and tears welled up in my eyes ! what a meaningless cruelty !
Yes !! The fascist Tangerine?!
Should have seen it from the seaside!!!
True but not accessible for me
Did they drop a grand slam on it if they didn't then that's what will do the job XD
Why the "allies" bombed it ? Shouldn't they be helping ? Shouldn't the enemies attack it ?
Δημήτρης Πρίμπας allies were the enemy. Axis was the German/Italian/Japanese side.
@@PatricioGarcia1973 FDR and Churchill were Not only Traitors to their Countries and People, but Traitors to ALL Western Civilization. Germany was trying to Save the West from the Bolshevik Zionists and "Their" Communists. The Real Winners of WW 2 were the Zionists and "Their" Communists, Western Civilization was the Actual Loser and you only need to look at Our Countries today to see that!
Hold my beer :)
The Chinese versions are on their way watch out !!
I think US MOAB will go through that bunker
Almost a relic from a Richard Wagner production
The Home of the Valkyries
That company owning the bunker might be owned by Hydra😆😆
What about the Disney bombs?
I bet we could make sure nobody wanted to work in it. RAF.
Judging by the looks of it I don’t think a single bomb ever landed on it....
A Rod From God would cut through that bunker like buttah. Hammer time! Powder.