Stp Dannes Plage
Beach front gun casemates protecting inland assets
Dannes Plage site overview
What to see
There are two Widerstandsnests here - Wn03 Dannes to the south of the beach exit road and Wn02 to the north.
Wn03 features a standard-build R612 casemate for an assault gun and covers the beach facing north while less than 200m away is a second R612 which faces south, creating a deadly crossfire with its neighbour.
Wn02, to the north is made up of a smaller R667 type which was a common construction for housing a 5cm KwK anti-tank gun. This one would direct its fire south along the beach too.
Behind the beach-front casemates are a series of personnel shelters, ammunition stores and rear defensive Tobruks, one of which still has a brick-built trench system attached with the remains of hardened sandbags on top. In the dunes there's evidence of a lot of barbed wire and Eisenpfahl spiked fence posts which surrounded the site.
The strongpoints along this long stretch of beach were the first line of defences to protect several radar stations and the huge sea mine and torpedo storage facility known as Stp Hasso just a few miles inland.