The story of this place
On the morning of 6 June 1944 the US 1st and 29th Infantry Divisions assaulted a five-mile crescent of sand codenamed Omaha, the most heavily defended of the five D-Day beaches. Rough seas swamped landing craft and DD tanks; German gunners in bluff-top bunkers cut down the first waves as ramps dropped. By nightfall Americans had suffered some 2,400 casualties here—more than on any other beach—yet clawed inland to secure the shore. 'Bloody Omaha' became the epitome of D-Day's cost. The wide tidal flats, still marked by remnants of the Mulberry and bunkers, stretch quietly below the American cemetery at Colleville.