:''See also Blizna, Podlaskie Voivodeship. For the Polish film of this name see

The Scar (1976 film) ''The Scar'' ( pl, Blizna) is a 1976 Polish film written and directed by Krzysztof Kieślowski and starring Franciszek Pieczka. Filmed on location in Olechów, Poland, the film is about a man put in charge of the construction of a large chemical ...

.'' Blizna is a

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred ...

in the administrative district of Gmina Ostrów, within

Ropczyce-Sędziszów County __NOTOC__ Ropczyce-Sędziszów County ( pl, powiat ropczycko-sędziszowski) is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Subcarpathian Voivodeship, south-eastern Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result ...

Subcarpathian Voivodeship Subcarpathian Voivodeship or Subcarpathia Province (in pl, Województwo podkarpackie ) is a voivodeship, or province, in the southeastern corner of Poland. Its administrative capital and largest city is Rzeszów. Along with the Marshall, it i ...

, in south-eastern Poland. It lies approximately north of Ostrów, north of

Ropczyce Ropczyce ( yi, ראָפּשיץ) is a town in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship in south-eastern Poland, situated in the valley of the Wielopolka River (a tributary of the Wisłoka River). The town has a population of 15,098 (). and is the seat of ...

, and north-west of the regional capital

Rzeszów Rzeszów ( , ; la, Resovia; yi, ריישא ''Raisha'')) is the largest city in southeastern Poland. It is located on both sides of the Wisłok River in the heartland of the Sandomierz Basin. Rzeszów has been the capital of the Subcarpathian ...

. It has a population of about 250.

History

World War II

From 5 November 1943 to early July 1944 there was an SS

military base A military base is a facility directly owned and operated by or for the military or one of its branches that shelters military equipment and personnel, and facilitates training and operations. A military base always provides accommodations for ...

near Blizna, from which 139 A4 (also known as V-2) rockets were launched for experimental purposes and for training. Zak, Anatoly: RussianSpaceWeb.Com: 2009 Jena1806.Com: 2009 After the air raid on

Peenemünde Peenemünde (, en, " Peene iverMouth") is a municipality on the Baltic Sea island of Usedom in the Vorpommern-Greifswald district in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. It is part of the ''Amt'' (collective municipality) of Usedom-Nord. The commu ...

on 17 August 1943 it was decided that the training and testing should be done in southeast Poland outside of the range of the Allied bombers. However test launches also continued at Peenemuende until 21 February 1945. Because the rockets launched from Blizna - in contrast to the rockets launched from

- flew over a populated area, there was also some destruction of buildings.

Wernher von Braun Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun ( , ; 23 March 191216 June 1977) was a German and American aerospace engineer and space architect. He was a member of the Nazi Party and Allgemeine SS, as well as the leading figure in the develop ...

, a central figure in Germany's pre-war rocket development program, and post-war director of

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

's Marshall Space Flight Center, worked at the Blizna test site and personally visited the test missile impact areas to troubleshoot any problems discovered during trials. Gatland, Kenneth William: Project Satellite: 1958 p82 Blizna031

The missile testing ground at Blizna was quickly located by the Polish resistance movement, the Armia Krajowa thanks to reports from local farmers. Armia Krajowa field agents even managed to obtain pieces of the fired rockets, by arriving on the scene before German patrols. In early March 1944, British Intelligence Headquarters received a report of an Armia Krajowa agent (code name: ''‘Makary’'') who had covertly surveyed the Blizna

railway line Rail terminology is a form of technical terminology. The difference between the American term ''railroad'' and the international term ''railway'' (used by the International Union of Railways and English-speaking countries outside the United Sta ...

and observed a

freight car A railroad car, railcar (American and Canadian English), railway wagon, railway carriage, railway truck, railwagon, railcarriage or railtruck (British English and UIC), also called a train car, train wagon, train carriage or train truck, is a ...

heavily guarded by SS troops containing ''‘an object which, though covered by a tarpaulin, bore every resemblance to a monstrous torpedo’''. Subsequently, a plan was formed to make an attempt to capture a whole unexploded

V-2 rocket The V-2 (german: Vergeltungswaffe 2, lit=Retaliation Weapon 2), with the technical name ''Aggregat 4'' (A-4), was the world’s first long-range guided ballistic missile. The missile, powered by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, was develop ...

and transport it to Britain. Around 20 May 1944, a relatively undamaged V-2 rocket fell on the swampy bank of the

Bug River uk, Західний Буг be, Захо́дні Буг , name_etymology = , image = Wyszkow_Bug.jpg , image_size = 250 , image_caption = Bug River in the vicinity of Wyszków, Poland , map = Vi ...

near the village of Sarnaki and local Poles managed to hide it before German arrival. The rocket was then dismantled and smuggled across Poland. In late July 1944, the Polish resistance (

Home Army and V1 and V2 Military intelligence on the V-1 and V-2 weapons developed by the Germans for attacks on the United Kingdom during the Second World War was important to countering them. Intelligence came from a number of sources and the Anglo-American intellige ...

) secretly transported parts of the rocket out of Poland in

Operation Most III Operation Most III ( Polish for ''Bridge III'') or Operation Wildhorn III (in British documents) was a World War II operation in which Poland's ''Armia Krajowa'' provided the Allies with crucial intelligence on the German V-2 rocket. Ba ...

(Bridge III), for analysis by

British intelligence The Government of the United Kingdom maintains intelligence agencies within three government departments, the Foreign Office, the Home Office and the Ministry of Defence. These agencies are responsible for collecting and analysing foreign and d ...

In July 1944 the advance of Soviet troops forced the base at Blizna to be evacuated and launch activities were moved to the

Tuchola Forest The Tuchola Forest, also known as Tuchola Pinewoods or Tuchola Conifer Woods, (the latter a literal translation of pl, Bory Tucholskie; csb, Tëchòlsczé Bòrë; german: Tuchler or Tucheler Heide) is a large forest complex near the town of Tuch ...

References

* *

Bibliography

* * * Władysław Góra, Wojna i okupacja ziemiach na Polskich 1939-1945, Wydawnictwo Książka i Wiedza, Warszawa 1984,

Notes

External links

* https://web.archive.org/web/20060614113829/http://astronautix.com/sites/heilager.htm {{coord, 50, 11, N, 21, 36, E, region:PL_type:city, display=title Villages in Ropczyce-Sędziszów County Spaceports in Europe V-2 missile launch sites