PROBUS WARRAWEE

Our October 2025 Guest Speaker will be one of our old favourites, Noel Phelan.

Noel has been a volunteer guide at the National Maritime Museum for 15 years and is also a volunteer at the Naval Historic Society.

Noel’s talk is entitled “The Miracle of D-Day”

The presentation will cover the following:

The decisions by Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin.
The strategies by both Eisenhower and Rommel.
The complex and detailed planning involving hundreds of thousands         of men and their equipment.
The disastrous raid at Dieppe.
The myriad of German defences.
The deception and confusion of the Germans involving Patton.
The clever design of lots of military equipment.
The huge number and variety of landing craft.
The use of paratroopers and gliders to land soldiers and equipment            behind enemy lines. 
The construction of an artificial harbour.
The scuttling of 70 ships to form a breakwater.
The towing and sinking of 210 Phoenix caissons to also form a 

       breakwater.
The logistics to land the men and their equipment.
The aerial support of 1,000 heavy bombers and fighters.
The Naval support of 28 battleships and 56 destroyers.
The laying of a pipeline under the channel to provide fuel.
Why it was a miracle.
The industrial might of America to build 1,700 Liberty ships and lots

        of other military equipment.