Flame fougasse
Encyclopedia
A flame fougasse is a weapon. It is a type of mine
which uses an explosive charge to project burning liquid onto a target. The flame fougasse was developed by the Petroleum Warfare Department in Britain as an anti-tank weapon during the invasion crisis of 1940
. During that period, about 50,000 flame fougasse barrels were deployed in some 7,000 batteries, mostly in southern England and a little later at 2,000 sites in Scotland
. Although never used in Britain, the design was later used in Greece
.
Later in World War II, Germany and Russia developed flame throwing mines that worked on a slightly different principle.
After World War II, flame fougasses similar to the original British design have been used in a number of conflicts including the Korean
and Vietnam War
s where it was improvised from easily available parts. The flame fougasse remains in army field manuals as a battlefield expedient to the present day.
oil since supplies intended for Europe were filling British storage facilities.
Maurice Hankey
then a cabinet minister without portfolio, joined the Ministerial Committee on Civil Defence (CDC) chaired by Sir John Anderson, the Secretary of State for the Home Office
and Home Security. Among many ideas, Hankey "brought out of his stable a hobby horse which he had ridden very hard in the 1914-18 war – namely the use of burning oil for defensive purposes." Hankey believed that oil should not just be denied to an invader, but used to impede him. Towards the end of June Hankey brought his scheme up at a meeting of the Oil Control Board and produced for Commander-in-Chief Home Forces Edmund Ironside
extracts of his paper on experiments with oil in the First World War. On 5 June, Churchill authorised Geoffrey Lloyd, the Secretary for Petroleum to press ahead with experiments with Hankey taking the matter under his general supervision. To this end, the Petroleum Warfare Department (PWD) was created and it was made responsible for developing weapons and tactics. Sir Donald Banks
was put in charge of the department.
The PWD soon received the assistance of William Howard Livens
. Livens was well known for his First World War invention: the "Livens Gas And Oil Bomb Projector", known more simply as the Livens Projector
. The Livens Projector was a large, simple mortar
that could throw a projectile containing about 30 pounds (13.6 kg) of explosives, incendiary oil or, most commonly, poisonous phosgene gas
. The great advantage of the Livens Projector was that it was cheap, this allowed hundreds, and on occasions thousands, to be set up and then fired simultaneously catching the enemy by surprise.
One of Livens' PWD demonstrations, probably first seen about mid-July at Dumpton Gap, was particularly promising. A barrel of oil was blown up on the beach; Lloyd was said to have been particularly impressed when he observed a party of high-ranking officers witnessing a test from the top of a cliff making a "an instantaneous and precipitate movement to the rear". The work was dangerous, Livens and Banks were experimenting with five-gallon drums in the shingle at Hythe
when a short circuit
triggered several weapons. By good fortune, the battery of drums where the party was standing failed to go off.
The experiments led to a particularly promising arrangement: a forty-gallon steel drum
buried in an earthen bank with just the round front end exposed. At the back of the drum was an explosive which when triggered ruptures the drum and shoots a jet of flame about 10 feet (3 m) wide and 30 yards (27.4 m) long. The design was reminiscent of a weapon dating from late medieval times called a fougasse
: a hollow in which was placed a barrel of gunpowder covered by rocks, the explosives to be detonated by a fuse at an opportune moment. Livens' new weapon was duly dubbed the flame fougasse. The flame fougasse was demonstrated to Clement Attlee
, Maurice Hankey
and General Liardet
on 20 July 1940.
Experiments with the flame fougasse continued apace and it rapidly evolved. The fuel mixture was at first 40% petrol and 60% gas-oil
, a mixture calculated to be useless as a vehicle fuel. A concoction of tar
, lime, and petrol gel known as 5B was also developed. "5B was dark coloured, sticky, smooth paste which burned fiercely for many minutes, stuck easily to anything with which it came in contact and did not flow on burning." Early flame fougasse designs had a complex arrangement of explosive charges: a small one at the front to ignite the fuel and a main charge at the back to throw the fuel forward. An important discovery was that including magnesium alloy turnings (the waste product of machining with a lathe) with the main charge at the rear of the barrel would give reliable ignition without the necessity of a separate ignition charge and its associated wiring. The alloy of about 90% magnesium
and 10% aluminium
was, at the time, known under the Trade name
Elektron
.
used for the propelling charge.
The main charge was prepared with an electrically triggered detonator
in a primer bound with insulating tape to three or four cartridges of ammonal
explosive. This assembly was placed in a rubber sponge bag that was, in turn, inside a used cocoa
tin; four ounces (100 g) of magnesium alloy turnings were added, the electrical wires were passed through a small hole in the lid of the tin which was then tightly fitted. The main charges were kept in storage, only to be deployed when enemy action was imminent. Then the cocoa tin was lowered down the pipe at the back of fougasse and tamped down with dry soil before being connected to a firing point about 100 yards (91.4 m) away. Firing simply required the current delivered by a 120 V battery.
Private Harold Wimshurst later recalled:
The safety fougasse design had the advantage that without the main charge, the fougasse was sufficiently safe that it did not require a guard.
Banks
records that installing the charge only when the danger was relatively close at hand was a safety feature to protect the public from accidents. The ammonal
used for the main propellant charge is a cheap industrial explosive that is notoriously hygroscopic becoming dangerous when it absorbs moisture. Even though the charge was packed into a rubber bag in a tin and sealed with insulating tape, it would not have been a good idea to store it for long in the damp conditions of a flame fougasse installation.
Flame fougasses were camouflaged with a covering of light material such as netting – anything heavier would significantly affect the range. They could easily be merged into hedgerows or the banks of a sunken lane
within view of a well-hidden firing point. They were placed where a vehicle would be obliged to stop, or at least slow down. The flame fougasse would offer instant and horrific wounds to any unprotected men caught in its fiery maw and would cause a vehicle engine to stop within seven seconds simply because it is deprived of oxygen
.
British soldier Fred Lord Hilton MM later recalled:
Home Guard member William Leslie Frost, later recalled seeing a hedge hopper in action.
A further variant of the hedge hopper idea was devised for St Margaret's Bay
where the barrels would be sent rolling over the cliff edge.
. Some barrels were held in reserve while others were deployed at storage sites to destroy petrol depots at short notice. The size of a battery varied from just one drum to as many as fourteen; a four barrel battery was the most common installation and the recommended minimum. Where possible, half the barrels in a battery were to contain the 40/60 mixture and half the sticky 5B mixture.
A battery would be placed at a location such as a corner, steep incline or roadblock where vehicles would be obliged to slow.
by a couple of PWD officers when, in 1941, German invasion threatened
. They were reported to have a powerful effect on enemy units.
By 1942, there were proposals for completely buried flame fougasses to be used as oil mines but by then the emergency was over. Almost all flame fougasses were removed before the end of the war and in most instances even the slightest traces of their original locations have disappeared. A few instances were missed, and their remains have been found. For example, the rusty remnants of a four-barrel battery, one of which still contained an oily residue, were discovered in 2010 in West Sussex
.
Both the Russians and the Germans later used weapons described as fougasse flame throwers or flame thrower mines. They worked on a different principle to the flame fougasse. Fougasse flame throwers comprised a cylinder containing a few gallons of gasoline and oil; this would be hidden, typically by being buried. On being triggered electrically, either by an operator or by a booby trap
mechanism, a gas generator
is ignited. The pressure ruptures a thin metal seal and the liquid is forced up a central pipe and out through one or more nozzles. A squib
is automatically fired to ignite the fuel. The range of the flame varied considerably, generally just a few tens of yards and lasted only one to two seconds. The German weapons, the Abwehrflammenwerfer 42
, had an 8 gallons (36.4 l) fuel tank and were wired back to a control point from where they could be fired individually or together.
The flame fougasse has remained in army field manuals as a battlefield expedient to the present day. Such weapons are improvised from available fuel containers combined with standard explosive charges or hand grenades and are triggered electrically or by lengths of detonating cord
. In some designs, detonating cord is used to rupture the container immediately before triggering the propelling charge. In order to guarantee ignition, the improvised devices frequently feature two explosive charges, one to throw and the other to ignite the fuel. Weapons of this sort were widely used in the Korean
and Vietnam War
s as well as other conflicts.
Land mine
A land mine is usually a weight-triggered explosive device which is intended to damage a target—either human or inanimate—by means of a blast and/or fragment impact....
which uses an explosive charge to project burning liquid onto a target. The flame fougasse was developed by the Petroleum Warfare Department in Britain as an anti-tank weapon during the invasion crisis of 1940
British anti-invasion preparations of World War II
British anti-invasion preparations of the Second World War entailed a large-scale division of military and civilian mobilisation in response to the threat of invasion by German armed forces in 1940 and 1941. The British army needed to recover from the defeat of the British Expeditionary Force in...
. During that period, about 50,000 flame fougasse barrels were deployed in some 7,000 batteries, mostly in southern England and a little later at 2,000 sites in Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
. Although never used in Britain, the design was later used in Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
.
Later in World War II, Germany and Russia developed flame throwing mines that worked on a slightly different principle.
After World War II, flame fougasses similar to the original British design have been used in a number of conflicts including the Korean
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
and Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
s where it was improvised from easily available parts. The flame fougasse remains in army field manuals as a battlefield expedient to the present day.
Inception
Following the Dunkirk evacuation in 1940, Britain faced a critical shortage of weapons. In particular, there was a severe scarcity of anti-tank weapons, many of which had to be left behind in France. Nevertheless, one of the few resources not in short supply was petroleumPetroleum
Petroleum or crude oil is a naturally occurring, flammable liquid consisting of a complex mixture of hydrocarbons of various molecular weights and other liquid organic compounds, that are found in geologic formations beneath the Earth's surface. Petroleum is recovered mostly through oil drilling...
oil since supplies intended for Europe were filling British storage facilities.
Maurice Hankey
Maurice Hankey, 1st Baron Hankey
Maurice Pascal Alers Hankey, 1st Baron Hankey, GCB, GCMG, GCVO, PC was a British civil servant who gained prominence as the first Cabinet Secretary and who later made the rare transition from the civil service to ministerial office.-Life and career:The third son of R. A...
then a cabinet minister without portfolio, joined the Ministerial Committee on Civil Defence (CDC) chaired by Sir John Anderson, the Secretary of State for the Home Office
Home Office
The Home Office is the United Kingdom government department responsible for immigration control, security, and order. As such it is responsible for the police, UK Border Agency, and the Security Service . It is also in charge of government policy on security-related issues such as drugs,...
and Home Security. Among many ideas, Hankey "brought out of his stable a hobby horse which he had ridden very hard in the 1914-18 war – namely the use of burning oil for defensive purposes." Hankey believed that oil should not just be denied to an invader, but used to impede him. Towards the end of June Hankey brought his scheme up at a meeting of the Oil Control Board and produced for Commander-in-Chief Home Forces Edmund Ironside
Edmund Ironside, 1st Baron Ironside
Field Marshal William Edmund Ironside, 1st Baron Ironside GCB, CMG, CBE, DSO, was a British Army officer who served as Chief of the Imperial General Staff during the first year of the Second World War....
extracts of his paper on experiments with oil in the First World War. On 5 June, Churchill authorised Geoffrey Lloyd, the Secretary for Petroleum to press ahead with experiments with Hankey taking the matter under his general supervision. To this end, the Petroleum Warfare Department (PWD) was created and it was made responsible for developing weapons and tactics. Sir Donald Banks
Donald Banks
Major-General Sir Thomas MacDonald "Donald" Banks KCB DSO MC TD was distinguished soldier, senior civil servant and a founder member and first Chairman of the Guernsey Society.-Family:...
was put in charge of the department.
The PWD soon received the assistance of William Howard Livens
William Howard Livens
William Howard Livens DSO MC was an engineer, a soldier in the British Army and an inventor particularly known for the design of chemical warfare and flame warfare weapons. Resourceful and clever, Livens’ successful creations were characterised by being very practical and easy to produce in large...
. Livens was well known for his First World War invention: the "Livens Gas And Oil Bomb Projector", known more simply as the Livens Projector
Livens Projector
The Livens Projector was a simple mortar-like weapon that could throw large drums filled with flammable or toxic chemicals. In the First World War, the Livens Projector became the standard means of delivering gas attacks and it remained in the arsenal of the British Army until the early years of...
. The Livens Projector was a large, simple mortar
Mortar (weapon)
A mortar is an indirect fire weapon that fires explosive projectiles known as bombs at low velocities, short ranges, and high-arcing ballistic trajectories. It is typically muzzle-loading and has a barrel length less than 15 times its caliber....
that could throw a projectile containing about 30 pounds (13.6 kg) of explosives, incendiary oil or, most commonly, poisonous phosgene gas
Phosgene
Phosgene is the chemical compound with the formula COCl2. This colorless gas gained infamy as a chemical weapon during World War I. It is also a valued industrial reagent and building block in synthesis of pharmaceuticals and other organic compounds. In low concentrations, its odor resembles...
. The great advantage of the Livens Projector was that it was cheap, this allowed hundreds, and on occasions thousands, to be set up and then fired simultaneously catching the enemy by surprise.
One of Livens' PWD demonstrations, probably first seen about mid-July at Dumpton Gap, was particularly promising. A barrel of oil was blown up on the beach; Lloyd was said to have been particularly impressed when he observed a party of high-ranking officers witnessing a test from the top of a cliff making a "an instantaneous and precipitate movement to the rear". The work was dangerous, Livens and Banks were experimenting with five-gallon drums in the shingle at Hythe
Hythe, Kent
Hythe , is a small coastal market town on the edge of Romney Marsh, in the District of Shepway on the south coast of Kent. The word Hythe or Hithe is an Old English word meaning Haven or Landing Place....
when a short circuit
Short circuit
A short circuit in an electrical circuit that allows a current to travel along an unintended path, often where essentially no electrical impedance is encountered....
triggered several weapons. By good fortune, the battery of drums where the party was standing failed to go off.
The experiments led to a particularly promising arrangement: a forty-gallon steel drum
Drum (container)
A drum is a cylindrical container used for shipping bulk cargo. Drums can be made of steel, dense paperboard , or plastics, and are generally used for the transportation and storage of liquids and powders. Drums are often certified for shipment of dangerous goods...
buried in an earthen bank with just the round front end exposed. At the back of the drum was an explosive which when triggered ruptures the drum and shoots a jet of flame about 10 feet (3 m) wide and 30 yards (27.4 m) long. The design was reminiscent of a weapon dating from late medieval times called a fougasse
Fougasse (weapon)
A fougasse is an improvised mine constructed by making a hollow in the ground or rock and filling it with explosives and projectiles. Fougasse was well known to military engineers by the mid-eighteenth century but was also referred to by Vauban in the seventeenth century and was used by Zimmerman...
: a hollow in which was placed a barrel of gunpowder covered by rocks, the explosives to be detonated by a fuse at an opportune moment. Livens' new weapon was duly dubbed the flame fougasse. The flame fougasse was demonstrated to Clement Attlee
Clement Attlee
Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee, KG, OM, CH, PC, FRS was a British Labour politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951, and as the Leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955...
, Maurice Hankey
Maurice Hankey, 1st Baron Hankey
Maurice Pascal Alers Hankey, 1st Baron Hankey, GCB, GCMG, GCVO, PC was a British civil servant who gained prominence as the first Cabinet Secretary and who later made the rare transition from the civil service to ministerial office.-Life and career:The third son of R. A...
and General Liardet
Claude Liardet
Major-General Sir Claude Francis Liardet KBE CB DSO DL was a British Army artillery officer during World War I. During World War II, he commanded the 1st London Division which was re-designated the 56th Infantry Division in 1940....
on 20 July 1940.
Experiments with the flame fougasse continued apace and it rapidly evolved. The fuel mixture was at first 40% petrol and 60% gas-oil
Fuel oil
Fuel oil is a fraction obtained from petroleum distillation, either as a distillate or a residue. Broadly speaking, fuel oil is any liquid petroleum product that is burned in a furnace or boiler for the generation of heat or used in an engine for the generation of power, except oils having a flash...
, a mixture calculated to be useless as a vehicle fuel. A concoction of tar
Tar
Tar is modified pitch produced primarily from the wood and roots of pine by destructive distillation under pyrolysis. Production and trade in tar was a major contributor in the economies of Northern Europe and Colonial America. Its main use was in preserving wooden vessels against rot. The largest...
, lime, and petrol gel known as 5B was also developed. "5B was dark coloured, sticky, smooth paste which burned fiercely for many minutes, stuck easily to anything with which it came in contact and did not flow on burning." Early flame fougasse designs had a complex arrangement of explosive charges: a small one at the front to ignite the fuel and a main charge at the back to throw the fuel forward. An important discovery was that including magnesium alloy turnings (the waste product of machining with a lathe) with the main charge at the rear of the barrel would give reliable ignition without the necessity of a separate ignition charge and its associated wiring. The alloy of about 90% magnesium
Magnesium
Magnesium is a chemical element with the symbol Mg, atomic number 12, and common oxidation number +2. It is an alkaline earth metal and the eighth most abundant element in the Earth's crust and ninth in the known universe as a whole...
and 10% aluminium
Aluminium
Aluminium or aluminum is a silvery white member of the boron group of chemical elements. It has the symbol Al, and its atomic number is 13. It is not soluble in water under normal circumstances....
was, at the time, known under the Trade name
Trade name
A trade name, also known as a trading name or a business name, is the name which a business trades under for commercial purposes, although its registered, legal name, used for contracts and other formal situations, may be another....
Elektron
Elektron (alloy)
Elektron was a magnesium alloy developed in Germany during the First World War between 1914-18 as a substitute for aluminium alloy. Elektron is unusually light and has a specific gravity of about 1.8 compared with the 2.8 of aluminium alloy. Elektron was used to make incendiary bombs: the B-1E...
.
Design variations
Of the original British flame fougasse designs, there were three main variants: the safety fougasse, the demigasse and the hedge hopper. They all used the same barrels and similar pre-prepared explosive charges. They varied in the details of construction and the amount of ammonalAmmonal
Ammonal is an explosive made up of ammonium nitrate, trinitrotoluene , and aluminium powder.The ammonium nitrate functions as an oxidizer and aluminium as a power enhancer. To some extent the aluminium makes it more sensitive to detonation...
used for the propelling charge.
Safety fougasse
The most common form of the flame fougasse was the safety fougasse which was constructed as follows: a barrel of incendiary mixture was placed horizontally in a low position with one round face pointing towards the target. At the back, a section of stove or drain pipe that was blocked off at one end with a thin cover was placed vertically against the rear face of the barrel with the blocked off end a few inches above the bottom. Soil was then built up over the weapon until all that can be seen are the front disk of the barrel and the top of the pipe, which was fitted with a loose cap to keep water out.The main charge was prepared with an electrically triggered detonator
Detonator
A detonator is a device used to trigger an explosive device. Detonators can be chemically, mechanically, or electrically initiated, the latter two being the most common....
in a primer bound with insulating tape to three or four cartridges of ammonal
Ammonal
Ammonal is an explosive made up of ammonium nitrate, trinitrotoluene , and aluminium powder.The ammonium nitrate functions as an oxidizer and aluminium as a power enhancer. To some extent the aluminium makes it more sensitive to detonation...
explosive. This assembly was placed in a rubber sponge bag that was, in turn, inside a used cocoa
Hot chocolate
Hot chocolate is a heated beverage typically consisting of shaved chocolate, melted chocolate or cocoa powder, heated milk or water, and sugar...
tin; four ounces (100 g) of magnesium alloy turnings were added, the electrical wires were passed through a small hole in the lid of the tin which was then tightly fitted. The main charges were kept in storage, only to be deployed when enemy action was imminent. Then the cocoa tin was lowered down the pipe at the back of fougasse and tamped down with dry soil before being connected to a firing point about 100 yards (91.4 m) away. Firing simply required the current delivered by a 120 V battery.
Private Harold Wimshurst later recalled:
The safety fougasse design had the advantage that without the main charge, the fougasse was sufficiently safe that it did not require a guard.
Banks
Donald Banks
Major-General Sir Thomas MacDonald "Donald" Banks KCB DSO MC TD was distinguished soldier, senior civil servant and a founder member and first Chairman of the Guernsey Society.-Family:...
records that installing the charge only when the danger was relatively close at hand was a safety feature to protect the public from accidents. The ammonal
Ammonal
Ammonal is an explosive made up of ammonium nitrate, trinitrotoluene , and aluminium powder.The ammonium nitrate functions as an oxidizer and aluminium as a power enhancer. To some extent the aluminium makes it more sensitive to detonation...
used for the main propellant charge is a cheap industrial explosive that is notoriously hygroscopic becoming dangerous when it absorbs moisture. Even though the charge was packed into a rubber bag in a tin and sealed with insulating tape, it would not have been a good idea to store it for long in the damp conditions of a flame fougasse installation.
Flame fougasses were camouflaged with a covering of light material such as netting – anything heavier would significantly affect the range. They could easily be merged into hedgerows or the banks of a sunken lane
Sunken lane
A sunken lane is a road which has over time fallen significantly lower than the land on either side. They are created incrementally by erosion, by water and traffic...
within view of a well-hidden firing point. They were placed where a vehicle would be obliged to stop, or at least slow down. The flame fougasse would offer instant and horrific wounds to any unprotected men caught in its fiery maw and would cause a vehicle engine to stop within seven seconds simply because it is deprived of oxygen
Oxygen
Oxygen is the element with atomic number 8 and represented by the symbol O. Its name derives from the Greek roots ὀξύς and -γενής , because at the time of naming, it was mistakenly thought that all acids required oxygen in their composition...
.
British soldier Fred Lord Hilton MM later recalled:
Demigasse
The demigasse was a simpler variant of the flame fougasse. It was a barrel of petroleum mixture laid on its side with a cocoa tin charge in a shallow pit just below one of the barrel's ridges. On detonation, the barrel would rupture and flip over spilling its contents over an area of about 36 square yards (30.1 m²). Left on its own at a roadside, in the open and with no attempt at disguise other than to hide the firing wires, it was indistinguishable from the barrels of tar commonly used in road repair. It was hoped that in addition to the damage done by the weapon itself, experience would cause the enemy to treat every innocent roadside barrel with the greatest caution.Hedge hopper
Another variant of the flame fougasse was the hedge hopper. This was a barrel of petroleum mixture placed upright with a cocoa tin charge containing two primers and just one ammonal cartridge buried in an eight-inch (200 mm) deep pit placed underneath and slightly off centre, but carefully aligned with the seam of the barrel. On firing, the barrel would be projected 10 feet (3 m) into the air and 10 yards (9 m) forwards, bounding over a hedge or wall behind which it had been hidden. It was difficult to get the hedge hopper's propelling charge right, but it had the great advantage of being quick to install and easy to conceal.Home Guard member William Leslie Frost, later recalled seeing a hedge hopper in action.
A further variant of the hedge hopper idea was devised for St Margaret's Bay
St Margaret-at-Cliffe
St Margaret-at-Cliffe is a three part village situated just off the coast road between Deal and Dover in Kent, England. The heart of the village is about two miles from the sea with the residential area of Nelson Park further inland and St Margaret's Bay situated along and below the cliffs north...
where the barrels would be sent rolling over the cliff edge.
Deployment
In all some 50,000 flame fougasse barrels were distributed of which the great majority were installed in 7,000 batteries, mostly in southern England and a little later at 2,000 sites in ScotlandScotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
. Some barrels were held in reserve while others were deployed at storage sites to destroy petrol depots at short notice. The size of a battery varied from just one drum to as many as fourteen; a four barrel battery was the most common installation and the recommended minimum. Where possible, half the barrels in a battery were to contain the 40/60 mixture and half the sticky 5B mixture.
A battery would be placed at a location such as a corner, steep incline or roadblock where vehicles would be obliged to slow.
Later development
Although the flame fougasse was never used in Britain, the idea was exported to GreeceGreece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
by a couple of PWD officers when, in 1941, German invasion threatened
Battle of Greece
The Battle of Greece is the common name for the invasion and conquest of Greece by Nazi Germany in April 1941. Greece was supported by British Commonwealth forces, while the Germans' Axis allies Italy and Bulgaria played secondary roles...
. They were reported to have a powerful effect on enemy units.
By 1942, there were proposals for completely buried flame fougasses to be used as oil mines but by then the emergency was over. Almost all flame fougasses were removed before the end of the war and in most instances even the slightest traces of their original locations have disappeared. A few instances were missed, and their remains have been found. For example, the rusty remnants of a four-barrel battery, one of which still contained an oily residue, were discovered in 2010 in West Sussex
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in the south of England, bordering onto East Sussex , Hampshire and Surrey. The county of Sussex has been divided into East and West since the 12th century, and obtained separate county councils in 1888, but it remained a single ceremonial county until 1974 and the coming...
.
Both the Russians and the Germans later used weapons described as fougasse flame throwers or flame thrower mines. They worked on a different principle to the flame fougasse. Fougasse flame throwers comprised a cylinder containing a few gallons of gasoline and oil; this would be hidden, typically by being buried. On being triggered electrically, either by an operator or by a booby trap
Booby trap
A booby trap is a device designed to harm or surprise a person, unknowingly triggered by the presence or actions of the victim. As the word trap implies, they often have some form of bait designed to lure the victim towards it. However, in other cases the device is placed on busy roads or is...
mechanism, a gas generator
Gas generator
A gas generator usually refers to a device, often similar to a solid rocket or a liquid rocket that burns to produce large volumes of relatively cool gas, instead of maximizing the temperature and specific impulse. The low temperature allows the gas to be put to use more easily in many...
is ignited. The pressure ruptures a thin metal seal and the liquid is forced up a central pipe and out through one or more nozzles. A squib
Squib (explosive)
A squib is a miniature explosive device used in a wide range of industries, from special effects to military applications. It resembles a tiny stick of dynamite, both in appearance and construction, although with considerably less explosive power...
is automatically fired to ignite the fuel. The range of the flame varied considerably, generally just a few tens of yards and lasted only one to two seconds. The German weapons, the Abwehrflammenwerfer 42
Abwehrflammenwerfer 42
The Abwehrflammenwerfer 42 was a German static defensive flamethrower, flame fougasse or flame mine used during the Second World War. The design was copied from Russian FOG-1 mines that were encountered in 1941 during Operation Barbarossa. These were usually buried at intervals of covering road...
, had an 8 gallons (36.4 l) fuel tank and were wired back to a control point from where they could be fired individually or together.
The flame fougasse has remained in army field manuals as a battlefield expedient to the present day. Such weapons are improvised from available fuel containers combined with standard explosive charges or hand grenades and are triggered electrically or by lengths of detonating cord
Detonating cord
Detonating cord is a thin, flexible plastic tube filled with PETN . With the PETN exploding at a rate of approximately 4 miles per second, any common length of det cord appears to explode instantaneously...
. In some designs, detonating cord is used to rupture the container immediately before triggering the propelling charge. In order to guarantee ignition, the improvised devices frequently feature two explosive charges, one to throw and the other to ignite the fuel. Weapons of this sort were widely used in the Korean
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
and Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
s as well as other conflicts.
See also
- British anti-invasion preparations of World War IIBritish anti-invasion preparations of World War IIBritish anti-invasion preparations of the Second World War entailed a large-scale division of military and civilian mobilisation in response to the threat of invasion by German armed forces in 1940 and 1941. The British army needed to recover from the defeat of the British Expeditionary Force in...
- British hardened field defences of World War IIBritish hardened field defences of World War IIBritish hardened field defences of World War II were small fortified structures constructed as a part of British anti-invasion preparations. They were popularly known as pillboxes by reference to their shape.-Design and development:...
- Lagonda flamethrowerLagonda flamethrowerThe Lagonda company produced a number of flamethrowers during the Second World War.Initial developments were for defence against expected German attacks. It was believed that it would act as a deterrent to Luftwaffe dive-bombers targeting the lightly defended Merchant Navy ships and coastal bases...
- List of flamethrowers
- Molotov cocktailMolotov cocktailThe Molotov cocktail, also known as the petrol bomb, gasoline bomb, Molotov bomb, fire bottle, fire bomb, or simply Molotov, is a generic name used for a variety of improvised incendiary weapons...