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The Red Ball Express was a famed truck convoy system that supplied Allied forces moving quickly through Europe after breaking out from the D-Day beaches in Normandy in 1944. [1] To expedite cargo shipment to the front, trucks emblazoned with red balls followed a similarly marked route that was closed to civilian traffic.
Red Ball Express Convoy passes a broken-down vehicle. On 10 August, two companies of 45-ton tank transporters were converted to cargo carriers. A few days later, the 55 truck companies equipped with 2½-ton 6×6 trucks were each given ten additional trucks, and three British truck companies were borrowed from the 21st Army Group.
The first was codenamed the "Red Ball Express". Starting on D plus 3 (three days after D-Day), 100 measurement tons (110 m 3 ) per day were set aside for emergency requests. Such shipments would be expedited.
Red Ball Express is a 1952 American World War II war film directed by Budd Boetticher and starring Jeff Chandler and Alex Nicol, featuring early screen appearances by Sidney Poitier and Hugh O'Brian. The film is based on the Red Ball Express convoys that took place after the D-Day landings in Normandy in June 1944.
[6] [7] Between 25 August and 12 September, the Allied armies advanced from the D plus 90 phase line, the position the Operation Overlord plan expected to be reached 90 days after D-Day, to the D plus 350 one, moving through 260 phase lines in 19 days.
On an average day the Red Ball Express dispatched 8,209 long tons (8,341 t) in 1,542 trucks carrying an average load of 5.3 long tons (5.4 t) per truck per round trip that averaged 714 miles (1,149 km). [107] Fortunately, the road network in northern France and Belgium had not been badly damaged, and required little maintenance effort.
See also Hastings Overlord: D-Day and the Battle for Normandy. Independent and GHQ brigades included 30th Armoured; 1st Tank Brigade; 4th Armoured; 1st Assault Brigade Royal Engineers; 31st Tank; 34th Tank; 6th Guards Tank Brigade; 27th Armoured (to 9.1944); 33rd Armoured; 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade; the headquarters of 74th, 76th, 80th, 100th, 101st, 105th, 106th and 107th Anti-Aircraft ...
On D-Day, 6 June 1944, the western Allies of World War II launched Operation Overlord, the invasion of Normandy. They achieved tactical and operational surprise, and established a lodgement . In the weeks that followed, the Germans made skillful use of the difficult and defensible terrain of the bocage country, and the initial Allied advance ...