The French commemorate D-Day landings

Northern France is preparing to celebrate the 70-year commemoration of the D-Day landings during World War II.

Merville, situated in Normandy, was one of the first place to be attacked by Allied paratroopers during that fateful day of June 5, 1944.

On the night of 4 to 5 June, the British 6th Airborne division was deployed over Merville in order to take out German machine guns which stopped Allied forces coming from the sea.

The mission soon turned into pure suicide as Olivier Paz, Mayor of Merville, explains: 'Half of the paratroopers landed too far east in the marshes that Rommel had purposely flooded. Many of them drowned. Out of 700, only 150 made it to the rendezvous point. There the 150 armed with only machine guns, put their knives between their teeth so to speak and launched an assault on the battery.'

No more than 75 British paratroopers survived the dreadful night and 22 German soldiers were taken prisoner.

Today, a museum in Merville opens to the public with a re-enactment of the nightmare paratroopers went through during the night of June 5 and the morning after.