I've roughed out our itinerary with 7 maps. The flight plan is to visit old airfields either still extant, or that were significant to the Somme Offensive and it's closing days. The reason the Somme Offensive was important to aviation history was that a lot of drastic evolution in aircraft design and weaponry were forged in the crucible of that bloodbath. Make no mistake, it was among the worst battle for loss of life and waste of material for gain of the whole war. But aircraft designs which entered the war as rickety, and flimsy kites with engines that were very unreliable, gave way to designs and technology of drastic improvement. It was not just the plane's tech that changed for the better, but the introduction of operations and squad tactics that focused on the inherent strengths of numbers and co-operation with ground forces through radio technology and improvement in offensive and defensive tactics that gave an edge to the Allied air forces after the shock of the Fokker Scourge.
First off we should chose fighter planes that can a comfortable cruise at over 80~85 knots, this will be a rather longish trip but we'll have few stops.
We start at Calais LFAC. I'll let the maps show the route.
The route follow the North Sea coast which had a number of airfields both Entente and German, the area of no-man's land abruptly started at about Neiuwpoort and ended at Westende-Bad. Oestende was a submarine port for Germany and was a target of the Entente forces, it also had a couple of elite German fighter squads stationed nearby at Mariakerke and Ghistel. At Oestende we tun more South easterly and then turn at Brugges to the South-SouthEast and arrive at Ghent were the giant Zeppelins, their enormous hangars and two observation and bombing squads were stationed.
From Ghent we head WSW to Roselaare, which was home to another elite fighter squadron and the first airfield of the Schlasta two-seater fighter-light bombers like the Roland C.II. From Roselaare to Lille, home of the Eindekker KEK which Max Immelmann and Oswald Boelke both flew from before being re-stationed to the Verdun area.
From Lille it's now South through the heart of the Somme valley and the most heavily fought over sections of the front to Douai, Bapaume, Perrone and Ham, both of the later two changed hands a couple times over the entire length of the war.
From Ham the flight heads SE to Fismes, another German fighter squadron airfield, and then we take a break at Reims to refuel and rest, which has a really large present day airfield, and was used extensively during the pre-WWI pioneering era and as a staging depot for pilots and planes being flown to Alsace, Lorraine, Verdun, the Marne, Somme and Nord Pas de Calais.
To be continued..
... if you don't mind.
