Omaha Beach Click XXX to hear song Operation Neptune, the naval component of Operation Overlord, began in the early hours of 6 June 1944. The beaches earmarked for invasion included five beaches designated Sword, Gold, Juno, Omaha, and Utah. At Omaha Beach, 16 teams were to clear 16 gaps of approximately 50 yards each. Everything that could go wrong quickly went wrong on Omaha, as the assault force entered a veritable hell of pre-sighted artillery, intersecting machine-gun fire, and obstacles topped with plate-like Teller anti-tank mines. The heavy enemy fire caused soldiers to bunch up and scramble for any available cover, often behind the obstacles the NCDU teams were attempting to detonate. The quickly rising tide also worked against the assault units, rising one foot every ten minutes XXL Among the obstacles encountered on the beaches were wooden poles resembling telegraph poles, most of which had Teller mines affixed to them. Another type of obstacle were the tetrahedrons, consisting of three steel beams welded together, looking like an enormous toy jack. The Belgian Gates, or “Element C,” were obstacles standing nearly six feet high and thick enough to stop and smash a landing craft. Despite the volume of fire, the gap assault teams on Omaha managed to clear five of the 16 gaps assigned them. XXX The success of the invasion seemed most dubious at Omaha Beach, where the American GIs remained pinned down, unable to move forward onto the bluffs from where German troops poured murderous fire. “What saved the day for the Allies was a handful of British and American destroyers,” as historian Craig Symonds asserts.10 Officially, the destroyers were only to screen the invasion fleet from U-boats and the smaller, faster E-boats. Yet, with the crisis on Omaha reaching a critical point, they were ordered to provide close-in fire support for the troops stuck on the beach. XXP Under orders not to fire more than half the ammunition they carried in case it was needed for an emergency situation, the destroyer captains decided unanimously that chaotic Omaha Beach was such a situation. Beginning around 0800, destroyers such as Emmons (DD-457), Carmick (DD-493), McCook (DD-496), Doyle (DD-494), Baldwin (DD-624), Harding (DD-625), Frankford (DD-497), and Thompson (DD- 627) began engaging German positions. XXC For over 90 minutes, U.S. destroyers pounded the enemy gun positions. Some of the ships were so close in to shore that they received German rifle and machine-gun bullets to their hulls and superstructures. Still, the LSTs (landing ship, tank) and LCIs (landing craft, infantry), were able to steer into the beach to unload their cargo, even if haphazardly launching men and machines into deep water. The Allies put nearly 132,500 men ashore on D-Day. After the beachheads were firmly established, the “primary naval responsibility [was] the landing of men and supplies.”16 XXV The successful invasion of northern France on D-Day became one of the major events in U.S. naval history. Some 11 weeks later, Allied troops advancing from Normandy and Brittany liberated Paris, almost two months ahead of schedule.