La Coupole: Centre d’Histoire et Planétarium 3D

The La Couple: Centre d’Histoire et Planétarium 3D (‘La Coupole’ Historic Centre and 3D Planetarium) site is a museum housed within a former German bunker complex and V2 Rocket Base. Designed by the German Organisation Todt and constructed from 1943 to 1944, the site was intended as a major launching point for V2 Rockets against targets in England. While construction continued for ten months, Allied air raids on the site (part of the larger Operation Crossbow) and the German retreat from France following the Normandy Landings ensured that the complex never entered service; it remained partially destroyed and in disuse for decades until its conversion into a public museum centered on the German occupation of France, German rocketry, and subsequent space exploration. The La Coupole: Centre d’Histoire et Planétarium 3D, named for the distinctive concrete cupola atop a section of bunker, opened in 1997.

The Historic Centre section of the museum presents the history of German occupation and deportation in France and particularly in the surrounding Nord-Pas-de-Calais region, the history of German rocketry including the V2, and the history of the ‘La Couple’ complex itself.

In addition to an exhibition on local occupation, resistance, and deportation, including a departmental Memorial to Deportees, specific sections on wartime rocketry and ‘La Coupole’ discuss key ideas:

• The development of German rocketry, ground-breaking research and rocketry testing at Peenemünde Army Research Centre, and the first uses of rocket-bombs on civilian targets.
• The construction of the ‘La Couple’ complex, designed by German engineers of Organisation Todt and built largely by Soviet prisoners of war.
• The distinctive concrete cupola, designed to accommodate rockets and shield the rest of the complex from rocket ignition.
• The numerous Allied bombing raids on the site, part of the larger ‘Operation Crossbow’ targeting multiple suspected launch sites for German rockets, which delayed construction but were unable to ever pierce the cupola itself.
• The unique role of ‘La Couple’ complex as the world’s first purpose-built strategic missile base or missile silo, albeit one that was never used, and the idea of ‘La Couple’ as an “incarnation of Nazi folly” which might now serve a new, historical purpose in a peaceful Europe.

In addition to this historic focus, the museum features exhibitions on postwar rocketry, the development of the atomic bomb, and contemporary space exploration. A 3D planetarium shows commentated spatial tours and films, and is an educational resource for local schools.