For decades after World War Two the superpowers stood poised on the cusp of potential nuclear war. Britain was like piggy in the middle, and going about the daily grind with the “four minute warning” (the approximate time for Soviet missiles to hit the UK) looming in the background must have been a surreal experience. But have you ever wondered where the missiles would have come from, or what became of them? Here are two old missile silos from both sides of the divide.
Titan Missile Silo, Colorado, United States
These incredible images show a Titan I missile silo in Colorado – abandoned but otherwise relatively intact. Thankfully the intercontinental ballistic missile that was once housed beneath the domed roof (above) has long gone.
There’s no disguising the eerie chill these pictures conjure up. Had things taken a different turn, this decaying subterranean chamber could have contributed to the end of the world as we know it, and the pleasant Colorado plains outside could have taken on a decidedly post-apocalyptic feel! But thankfully that didn’t happen, and quiet has once again returned to this pleasant little corner of the world.
Plokštinė nuclear missile silo, Lithuania
(Image licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0)
And here’s the other side of the divide – an underground R-12U nuclear missile launch site in Lithuania, part of the Soviet’s vast war machine during the Cold War. Unlike the Titan site above, the door appears firmly padlocked from the outside to keep unwanted explorers out, and the domed silo looks strangely serene under the Lithuanian sky. The top image clearly shows how the roof would have slid along metal tracks prior to launch. Thankfully though, like the Titan above, here’s one old missile silo that’s seemingly beyond repair…
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