AERIAL VIEW OF INFANTRY LANDING FROM ASSAULT BOATS north of Casablanca. Note heavy surf. Many of the landing craft were damaged on the beaches for lack of facilities to remove craft from the surf line and to repair or salvage them when stranded. At Fedala, for instance, more than half of the boats were unusable after the first landings. This slowed the follow-up unloading and was a contributory cause of the torpedoing of the transports waiting offshore to be discharged.
FRENCH MOROCCO
INFANTRY LANDING ON THE BEACH NEAR FEDALA. The landing itself was unopposed, but fighting developed just off the beach. (Left, landing craft, vehicle, LCV.)
FRENCH MOROCCO
DIRECTING LANDING-CRAFT TRAFFIC OFF FEDALA by means of semaphore flags. The port was captured and put into operation on D Day, but because of its limited capacity, freighters had to stand offshore awaiting their turns to discharge cargo. In the meantime unloading of ships went on with remaining assault craft. On the evening of 11 November a transport was torpedoed and sunk by submarine; a destroyer and tanker were damaged. The next day three additional transports were torpedoed and sunk. (Landing craft in picture: top center, LCV; middle left, landing craft, mechanized, LCM(3); middle right and bottom, landing craft, personnel (Ramp), LCP(R).)
FRENCH MOROCCO
