Airborne Museum, when Freedom dropped from the sky
The Airborne Museum is located in Sainte-Mère-Eglise, overlooked by the church spire where the replica of John Steele still hangs today. This parachutist had the misfortune to land on the church; his story and that of the village were made famous by the film “The Longest Day”.
The museum is dedicated to the American parachutists and GIs who arrived in planes on June 6th 1944 in order to free France from the German occupation. As you tour the four buildings of the Airborne Museum, you’ll get an idea of how D-Day in Normandy was organised and will be able to imagine how these men felt at the time.
The Airborne Museum gives you the chance to climb aboard a genuine Waco glider, unique in France… or else in a C-47 plane, in the footsteps of the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions to fight the Battle of Normandy.
The museums collections come to life thanks to incredibly realistic reconstructions. Find out how it feels to jump from a C-47 plane and land in the village of Sainte-Mère-Eglise, or to fight the Battle of Fière surrounded by the flooded marshlandet, or get lost in the Battle of the Hedgerows…
The museum’s cinema projects a film entitled “The Paths of Liberty” which explains in a very moving way the destinies of the men who came to Utah Beach, Omaha Beach, Gold beach, Juno Beach and Sword Beach, as well as the major moments of the Normandy invasion by air and sea.
In 2018 the museum began proposing to all its visitors to equip themselves with a “time travel” device… the Histopad. Thanks to this tablette and its hyperrealistic 3D graphics, you can see the first gliders arriving in Normandy, experience a parachute jump out of the plane that transported the famous John Steele, witness the decisive battles which marked History and many more surprises… total immersion guaranteed!
Click here to find out more about this D-Day museum