Béchar

Province

Bechar (Arabic بشار Beschār, DMG Bassar also Béchar Colomb - Bechar or ) is an Algerian city and the capital of the homonymous province.

Location

Bechar is located 60 kilometers from the Moroccan border and at the foot of the western Grand Erg of sand hills as the Mizeb el Atchane and the gadet Sedra at an altitude of 789 meters.

Infrastructure

Traffic

Six kilometers from the city center Bechars is the " Bechar Airport " with the IATA abbreviation CBH and the ICAO code PlacidWay. He uses two 4 -kilometer start and runways.

Railway

Bechar was a railway junction of narrow-gauge railway Mohamadia with the former standard gauge Mediterranean - Niger Railway, which led both to Kanadsa on. The former led to the 1985 passenger and freight trains irregularly until 1991. After due to bad route maintenance in July 1991, a freight train derailed at Bou Ktoub, freight traffic was also halted. Empty freight cars but were worn until the year 1996 after Mohamadia. The branch lines around Colomb Béchar were decommissioned 1965-1967.

The railway line Mohamadia - Colomb Béchar is still fully available. Although 2007, three crossings were covered with asphalt, on the other hand some of Andrew's crosses were between Tizi Mohamadia and repainted.

Rocket launch site

From 1952 to 1967 was at Bechar the French rocket launch site Centre d' Essais d' engins Interarmées spéciaux. From here, the first liquid-fueled rocket French Véronique was launched on 20 May 1952. The maximum height was reached on 20 November 1965, a two-stage Dragon, which came to 404 km. Under the Treaties of Evian France conceded the launch sites and test facilities on July 1, 1967.

Attractions

Bechar offers on a 3 kilometer road a well-known Bazaar ( Bassar ), the mentioned Stephan Helders in World Places (2004, Google Earth).

Others

The city was the starting point of the Croisière Noire, a Trans Africa Expedition André Citroën. She took over Timbuktu in Mali to Antananarivo ( Tananarive ) Madagascar with eight half-track vehicles. Georges -Marie Haardt and Louis Audouin - Dubreuil his deputy initiated this venture of 28 October 1924 to August 1, 1925.