The bomber crews were concerned about hitting incoming waves of Allied troops, and were hindered by the heavy cloud cover. As General Bradley later recalled in his autobiography, 'the 2.5 million pounds of bombs fell inland…killing some French civilians and many cattle, but few Germans.' Moreover, the naval gunfire proved largely ineffective thanks to the dust thrown up by the bombardment and the low clouds.

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Major Pluskat's bunker above Omaha Beach survived repeated near misses during the naval and air bombardment. His eardrums throbbing from the din, he somehow managed to find the telephone in the dust and debris. Amazingly, the phone lines were undamaged, and he was able to report the situation to division headquarters. More surprising was that none of Pluskat's guns or their crews were put out of action. Most of the artillery struck positions on the bluffs and petered out before reaching the German batteries three miles inland, but the impact of so many shells set off several concentrations of German land mines on Omaha Beach.

The landing craft were tossed about in the heavy swells, 10 of the boats sinking during their dash to the shore. Worse, 27 out of 32 canvas-enclosed DD (duplex drive) Sherman tanks, which had been specially modified to swim to the beach, foundered before reaching the shore. Three others were unable to get off their barge and had to be landed much later. The Big Red One would have to make do with only two tanks–both of which were waterlogged.

When the assault craft were 400 yards from the beach, German shells began exploding around them. At 6:36 a.m. Company A, 116th RCT, was the first to land. Three landing craft slammed into offshore sandbars. One boat took a direct hit and sank, and another simply disappeared. The water was waist-deep or deeper, and the soldiers came under a murderous cross-fire. Within 10 minutes, Company A lost all its officers and NCOs, and its overall casualties exceeded 75 percent. Company E suffered almost the same fate, largely because the German defenses were concentrated on the area where the first troops landed–above two draws, or ravines, leading inland toward Colleville-sur-Mer and Vierville.

Allied planners were aware that there were a total of five ravines, which they labeled 'exits,' leading from Omaha inland. It seemed likely that these exits–dotted with summer houses and roads or trails that led farther inland–would provide the easiest access to the interior of the Cotentin Peninsula. The Germans had evacuated civilians from the buildings along those routes and used the structures to house troops and create defenses. The exits were further fortified with sea walls and in some cases boasted anti-tank ditches as well.

While troops that landed near the Colleville-sur-Mer and Vierville exits drew heavy fire, the soldiers who landed in front of the St. Laurent exit suffered only two casualties and faced an unoccupied German strongpoint. Smoke from burning buildings and grass along the shore helped screen the invading troops. That weak spot in the German defenses, however, was not immediately exploited by the drenched and exhausted Americans.

Fire from alert German troops compounded the chaos reigning just offshore. Most of the landing craft had dropped their ramps too early, and the equipment-laden troops disappeared in the water as soon as they leaped from the boats. Some bobbed back to the surface, but many others did not. Rifles, helmets, packs and other heavy equipment–as well as the bodies of dead soldiers–settled on the sandy bottom as the Big Red One doggedly continued its assault. Countless pieces of engineering equipment and explosives, meant for use in clearing beach obstacles, sank or scattered.

Units of the 16th RCT crisscrossed each other and landed on beaches assigned to other units because of heavy currents that pushed the entire flotilla eastward. The first wave suffered close to 50 percent casualties. By midmorning, more than 1,000 Americans lay dead or wounded on the sands of Omaha. On Augusta, General Bradley agonized over the chaotic situation: 'Our communications with the forces assaulting Omaha Beach were thin to nonexistent. From the few radio messages that we overheard and the firsthand reports of observers in small craft reconnoitering close to shore, I gained the impression that our forces had suffered an irreversible catastrophe, that there was little hope we could force the beach. Privately, I considered evacuating the beachhead and directing the follow-up troops to Utah Beach or the British beaches.'

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