Word: cuxhaven
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...when the townspeople of the north German port of Cuxhaven were startled from their sleep by an eerie echo of the past: the wail of air-raid sirens. The howling horns, however, did not signal an air attack but the breeching of the town's dikes by one of the worst storms of the century...
Hardest hit was the north German coast. Between Cuxhaven and Bremerhaven, the water quickly rose to rooftop level. As the dikes of Bremerhaven crumbled, water flooded the city's zoo, drowning all the caged animals. Hamburg lost both its light and power for two days, and in its modern underground garages, scores of automobiles disappeared beneath the oily waves. Driven from their holes by the floods, packs of rats fed on the carcasses of dead animals. Fearing the pollution of the water supply, authorities flew water in by helicopter to combat the threat of typhoid and cholera...
Nevertheless, honks of protest went up all over West Germany. Not only is Knechtsand a wild goose sanctuary near the fishing and resort town of Cuxhaven; it is also regularly visited by a game warden and a band of volunteer bird lovers, aged 10 to 68, who are helping build up the dunes to save the sandbar from the gnawing surf. Had they been on Knechtsand that day, they might have been killed or wounded...
Nothing But the Rats. The students hired a fishing boat in the port of Cuxhaven, sailed off to occupy the island until the British stopped the bombings and returned it to its former inhabitants. Equipped with the flags of West Germany, Helgoland and the United Europe movement, they landed on the rubbled shore. "It looked to us," said one of the invaders later, "like the world on the morning after the next war." The island's vegetation had been wiped out; except for rats, few living things had survived. The two students huddled in a flak tower, the only...
...more than doubled its strength (mostly in heavy bombers for the strategic bombing of Germany), is now increasing at the rate of 15 to 30% each month. The day after General Eaker spoke, the lull ended. More than 200 U.S. heavy bombers soared out over Germany to attack Cuxhaven and Wilhelmshaven. That same night the R.A.F. sent out its greatest force of four-motored bombers to blast Dusseldorf and Munster with four-ton blockbusters and incendiaries...