GREECE - Rhodes Kalathos

[Dave Smith]

Known to the Italians as Calato during their occupation of the Dodecanese. I presume this is an example of their 1930s or 40s tower architecture? This airfield, between Rhodes Town and Lindos, had workshops and possibly hangars built into the high ground to the west. They are closed up now.

[David Thompson]

The island and airfield feature in the latest edition of the Britain At War Magazine , October 2010 , £4.10 , with photographs and a plan . I visited back in the 90's and thanks to Dave Smith who provided some details managed to find many of the remains shown in the article . Much better than lying on a beach sunbathing !

[Dave Smith]

Thanks David, must get myself to WH Smith!

[Kentish man]

Visited Lindos about 1994 and tried to visit the old airfields following reading a book about the SAS raids there during WW2. The Greek Navy where carrying out maneuvers in the area and we could not get near the airfield. It also sounded like there was a firing range in use on the airfield. The Greeks had at least 2 vehicle carrying landing craft (LCV's), landing troops and material at the airfield (there's also a old LCV beached there for military training). During the day spent on the beach at Lindos, Hueys were seen transiting in and out from the area and a C130 made a couple of low passes. At the time the new main road had been built which would have made any landing impossible. Later when driving in the hills, I sneaked a trip past the old International Airport at Maritsa which is now the military airfield. There where also Hueys flying non-stop around Maritsa and M48 tanks parked in the woods. While I would have liked to take some photo's, this was illegal and we had been warned that authorities were very tight on that sort of thing. There was a third airfield which I could not find and I think we drove through it without realising. This was a German base which was abandoned after the war and nothing remained standing. The directions given were not that good, but I was led to understand that the area was still covered with bomb holes and small bits of wreckage and shrapnel could still be found (sorry but I don't know the name of the place).

[REF]

A friend of mine has just come back from holiday at Rhodes and sent me these photos with the comments to accompany them, to go on the forum.

1 - Google Aerial:


2 - This shows a section of runway at the SE end plus some storage tanks about 300 yds to the N. I think they are fairly new and have no idea what they contain. Bulk retsina for paint-stripping? However the Italians or Germans may have had fuel storage in this area too.


3 - Tower


4 - As you can see the hut think in the centre is just to the left (west) of the tower. The one to the left of that with a yellow bit on the top is a modern bit of gravel processing kit. One of the reasons the area is a mess is that just to the N is the “estuary” of a large winter river. Clearly this brings down tons of gravel and rocks along with the runoff from heavy rains.


5 - This one is even further to the left (NW). You can just make out other bits of concrete here and there. To the right of the big block is what looks like something rusty. Blow the photo up and you can see it’s a camouflaged object.


6 - And this one is a little more to the left / NW. Most of these shots were taken while I was parked on the runway.


7 - This one was taken looking well to the NW, along the S side of the runway.


8 - This was taken from our villa. It shows where most of the buildings are. The rwy runs across the pic in the middle. I think the nearest building with the red roof is a relatively recent (or just tarted up) guardhouse.


9 - Also taken from the villa. This is a load of bulldozed shingle in front of which targets would have been placed. I have no idea why the tyres are there. Maybe the Army race jeeps when not being watched. To the left of that lot is more bulldozed shingle with a lot of broken-up reinforced concrete mixed in. This could either have been from buildings or hardstandings or both. Most likely buildings.


10 - This was taken looking straight up the runway to the NW. You can see the road at the end. By this time the light was fading fast. Ni idea what the building just left of centre is. As you can see, the runway is pretty ratty.

[REF]

Last photo.

11 - This bunker was very close to what I believe is / was a guardhouse and just past a sign that said No Photography. In fact if you enlarge photo 8 above enough and work rightwards from the guardhouse you can just see that sign, above the olive trees.

[hunter]

This looks very much like one of the bunkers built by the Greeks to defend against a possible Turkish invasion. There are a number of them on nearby Kos. They are massively constructed and buried deep in the ground, though only designed to take a heavy machine gun. There are a couple on Kos that have been exposed by erosion and they are huge. They also have an extremely flimsy entance door, that wouldn't look out of place on an office storage cabinet, which would have been something of a weakness I guess.

Last photo.

11 - This bunker was very close to what I believe is / was a guardhouse and just past a sign that said No Photography. In fact if you enlarge photo 8 above enough and work rightwards from the guardhouse you can just see that sign, above the olive trees.