Curious about marks on ground from imagery 1945 - Google

[headwest]

Hi Everyone

I have found a lot of these, what look like trenches? in the aerial photo's google earth has for the timeline - march 21 1945. In many places in Berlin, and Warsaw as well etc
these appear all over the place, and seemingly at random.

Are these trenches? and if so for what? this picture is in the tiergarten, sort of in the woods by the building. I see them in courtyards and all over, and was just curious if they are indeed trenches and if so were they for a AA piece or part of the defense setup for the comin battle for the city?

thanks!

[Max]

Can you indicate which features you are referring to?
I see roads , footpaths [ light] and perhaps a water course [dark meandering line}

[VanillaNuns]

I don't really see anything either apart from possible bomb craters from the air raids.

[GregSingh]

Don't use smartphones for your research!
Clearly, these are trenches. But I can't really tell if they were defense ones or used as air raid shelters.

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[headwest]

Sorry, yes GREGSINGH, you blew it up nicely! those are what I mean. they are all over the place, and I was pretty sure they were trenches but even zooming in on a lot of them i dont see any AA guns and they seem so random.

when you go to the 1953 google earth shots they are all gone so they aren't just natural landscape

[headwest]

Some others

[ManfredV]

Seem to be "Splittergraben" (slit trenches). Thats why they are non-linear.

[headwest]

Thanks Manfred, so were these being built for the cities defense? some do look like they made lead to AA gun emplacements, but most are so random and just everywhere. was there some kind of coherent plan in march 45 in berlin?

[headwest]

I wanted to add, I am fascinated by Google Earth remnants of the war. at Seelow, even today with the current Google Earth you can see the remains of trenches and gun emplacements all up and down the ridge for miles. so going back to 45 and seeing them in march 45 in berlin was interesting to me as well. however the seelow ones make sense in that they interconnect, go from ridge top to ridge top and extend back. the berlin ones are just sort of dropped here and there

[OpanaPointer]

The trenches are away from buildings, but not so far from buildings insofar as I can tell. That would make them air raid shelters.

[Geoff Walden]

They were trenches provided as protection from bomb shrapnel ("Splitter"). They were not meant to keep one safe from a direct bomb hit, but from shrapnel whizzing all over the place. The classic type was a zig-zag pattern so that there was no straight line presented for shrapnel or explosive concussion to travel all the way down the trench at once. These were really common around anti-aircraft and minor industrial sites, also worker housing areas, that did not have traditional bomb shelter bunkers or tunnels. This zig-zag trench could also be useful for a last-ditch defense against ground attackers (if located in the right place/orientation).

[Xavier]

trenches and mortar/mg positions

[headwest]

Thanks Geoff! very cool to learn that.