The Strategic Air Command facility of Little Rock Air Force Base was one of eighteen silos in the command of the 308th Strategic Missile Wing (308th SMW), specifically one of the nine silos within its 374th Strategic Missile Squadron (374th SMS), at the time of the explosion. Shannon Seidler, a mechanic near Garrison, North Dakota, has lived on family land housing a nuclear missile silo for his entire life. It's time for your real estate portfolio to go ballistic! The military continued to use Titan rockets as part of its intercontinental ballistic missile program through the 1980s, and this was not the only dramatic incident involving them. The blast completely destroyed the silo and sent the 750-ton silo door . A piece of Cold War history is now available as an Airbnb property.. Titan Ranch, located at 23 Missile Base Road in Vilonia, Arkansas, offers renters the chance to spend a night underground in a converted intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) facility.The facility was one of 18 underground Titan II missile silos in Arkansas that helped form the backbone of the United States' nuclear . Two airmen were performing maintenance at Missile Complex 374-7, located 3 miles north of Damascus, the evening of September 18th. Slumbering just beneath the earth, a silent army of nuclear warheads waited for the outbreak of armageddon during the Cold War. His weekly column won the H. L. Mencken Award in 1985. Within a couple hours, there was a crowd of about 25 to 30 journalists and law enforcement personnel gathered just outside the gate. There do remain some active missile silos, in Montana, North Dakota, and at Warren Air Force Base, which is in both Colorado and Wyoming. From Level 2, visitors may climb a spiral staircase to Level 1which previously served as the crew's sleeping quarters and kitchen or descend to Level 3, which housed the communication equipment that kept the facility connected to the larger world. The remaining half, the author David K. Stumpf writes in Titan II: A History of the Cold War Missile Program, had launched into the air and spun 180 degrees before landing back on the ground. The missile not only survived the explosion in 1965, it was the same missile which exploded in 1980 near Damascus. The silos launch door was propelled over 600 feet from the launch complex. Little Rock, Conway, Searcy, Benton, Heber Springs, Fayetteville, Bentonville, Springdale, Fort Smith, Jonesboro, West Memphis, Batesville, Mountain View, Hot Springs, Pine Bluff, Texarkana, Arkadelphia. What you may not know is that at one time, there were 18 ICBM (intercontinental nuclear missile) silos surrounding the Little Rock area. Kimberly S. Mitchell loves journeys, real or imagined. The missiles were housed in 54 launch sites located in three states; Arkansas had 18 launch complexes located in Faulkner, Conway, White, Van Buren, and Cleburne counties. [2], At daybreak, the Air Force retrieved the warhead,[9][10] which was returned to the Pantex weapons assembly plant. "You could dump dynamite in the bottom, light it off, and these doors would just keep on going," Hill said. We drove past these remnants of the cold war toward Brush, Colorado where we intended to stop at a small lake near Brush just off of the highway and have our picnic. One of the workers, Airman David P. Powell, had brought a ratchet wrench 3ft (0.9m) long weighing 25lb (11kg) into the silo instead of a torque wrench, the latter having been newly mandated by Air Force regulations. The last of the Titan launch sites in Arkansas, located near Quitman in Cleburne County, was demolished on Nov. 19, 1986. The Air Force also chose two other states to site Titan II missiles: Arizona and Kansas. After nearly being run over by the sheriff, King and Phillips jumped in their car and took off. Visitors to Titan Ranch stay inside the former ICBM facility's launch control center (LCC), located 50 feet underground. Neither these AP materials nor any portion thereof may be stored in a computer except for personal and noncommercial use. Soviet Ukraine held around one-third of the U.S.S.R.'s nuclear arsenal, most of . In 1981, President Ronald Reagan announced the retirement of the Titan II program. I heard somebody yelling "Help me! The space has been turned into a luxury master bedroom, complete with an open concept walk-in shower, soaking tub, and enclosed toilet room. Find out more at KSMitchell.com. The AirBnB listing even drew the attention of a couple central Arkansas musicians, who filmed three music videos inside the facility. Our stay at Titan Ranch began with driving down the gravel road, leading between cow pastures, the reason for the name ranch. Cows looked back at us, munching away, while we wondered if we were headed to the right place. In 1965, dozens of people died after a fire started in a Titan II silo in Arkansas. Jimmy Roberts and Donald Green saw the explosion. In Arkansas, three launch sites remain with both launch pads and control centers. The team was then ordered to reenter the silo to turn on an exhaust fan. In April 2018, Atlas Obscura told the stories of five nuclear accidents that burst into public view. If you need to flag this entry as abusive. It was time-consuming and costly, but thanks to GTs determination to recover and preserve some history, you can experience it firsthand by touring or staying the night at Titan Ranch. Air Force crews reacted quickly to the disaster, putting out fires and searching for survivors. The Titan missile silo disasters. AddThis Utility Frame. If you would like to republish please give the photographer appropriate credit. Email him at Arktopia.td@gmail.com. Like us on Facebook to get the latest on the world's hidden wonders. Many of these locations hold warheads awaiting dismantlement. More than half of the potential arsenal is in Amarillo, Texas, at the Pantex plant, which will dismantle them. The demon core that killed two scientists, the underground test that didnt stay that way, One man died and more than 20 others were injured. She believes magic can be found in life and books, loves to watch the stars appear, and still dreams of backpacking the world. A concussion of wind hit me like a truck, and I slid 60 feet, and every foot, it felt like I was going faster. The other B-52 wing at Barksdale AFB in Louisiana has more than 900 warheads, and White-man AFB in Missouri has more than 130 bombs for its B-2 bombers. The aerozine 50 fuel immediately began leaking into the launch duct. The weapons here in Montana are intercontinental ballistic missiles or ICBMs. I was living out of state at the time, but the disaster was covered in depth by the national press. There was a lot of white smoke, Ayala tells Popular Mechanics, but it was hydrazine.. Winner will be selected at random on 04/01/2023. Investigators later discovered that a welder working on level 3 had "hit a hydraulic line with his welding rod, rupturing the hose and causing the spray of hydraulic fuel to catch fire." The only thought I had at that point was, I know Im a dead man. Christ explained that the deaths were not caused by the explosion itself, but by the rapid loss of oxygen. All missiles in the silos are currently Minuteman III (LGM-30G). A civilian crew was working throughout all nine floors of the missile silo, which plunged 150 into the ground. A missile took 15 minutes to launch and had to be fueled with a highly flammable mix of kerosene and liquid oxygen. Titan Ranch began hosting conferences and meetings in 2019, and added its AirBnB listing in November 2020. A look inside Level 2 of the Titan Ranch in Vilonia, a decommissioned Titan II nuclear missile facility, featuring two-queen sized beds and a spiral staircase. These sites in Springhill in Faulkner County, Southside in Van Buren County and Center Hill in White County are now on the National Register of Historic Places. The facility was one of 18 underground Titan II missile silos in Arkansas that helped formthe backbone of the United States' nuclear arsenal from the 1960s until the 1980s. The incident occurred on September 18-19, 1980, at Missile Complex 374-7 in rural Arkansas when a U.S. Air Force LGM-25C Titan II ICBM loaded with a 9-megaton W-53 nuclear warhead experienced a liquid fuel explosion . Created with Sketch. "It's a little weird," Hill said. It was forecast as a beautiful day so we decided to pack a lunch, find a nice spot along the highway and enjoy our lunch. silo: [noun] a trench, pit, or especially a tall cylinder (as of wood or concrete) usually sealed to exclude air and used for making and storing silage. By 1986 these sites were all decommissioned and destroyed. Two years earlier, a trailer at Damascus leaked oxidizer, the component that mixes with rocket fuel to propel a rocket into space or toward a strategic target. "It's all illuminated. The Air Force decided to take measures to improve security within the launch complexes. There still wasnt any official word about what was going on, but they all put on rocket fuel handlers coverall outfits (RFHCO)rubberized protective gear that resembled space suitsand walked to the silo, which had been filling with corrosive and potentially explosive vapor for hours. We may earn commission if you buy from a link. Once through the blast doors, visitors enter Level 2, which is the former operations center where the officers would initiate the order to launch the ICBM. This document may not be reprinted without the express written permission of Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Inc. Material from the Associated Press is Copyright 2023, Associated Press and may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. A total of 54 Titan II missiles, capable of going from launch to a target 8,000 miles away in about half an hour, were installed in Arizona, Kansas, and Arkansas. While researching what was going to be a book about warfare in space, journalist Eric Schlosser heard the story of the Damascus explosion. Follow us on social media to add even more wonder to your day. 6. They told of groping around in total darkness, hearing the screams of co-workers: "Men were screaming and crying. And the origin of those dates back to the height of the Cold War in the 1950s and '60s, specifically the Soviet launch of the Sputnik satellite in 1957. I can recall vividly the September 1980 explosion which destroyed a missile in its silo located near Damascus on the Faulkner-Van Buren County line. Devlin, now retired in Florida and a childrens book author, says he has osteoporosis and believes the hydrazine he inhaled caused it. Its safety features prevented any loss of radioactive material or nuclear detonation. He can be reached at editor@nsweekly.com. 2010 Native Sun News. Airmen Jeffrey Plumb and David Powell were in the silo working on the missile. Here are some maps showing the locations of U.S. Minuteman III ICBM silo's along with coordinates. The entire process of the opening, cleaning, renovation and updating is documented on his largely followed Titan Ranch YouTube channel, and I highly recommend checking it out. A WWII Bomb Has Been Found at the Fukushima Nuclear Site, Dozens of Previously Hidden Nuclear Test Videos Declassified, Uploaded to YouTube, In the 1960s, Telegraph Poles Were Equipped With Nuclear Bomb Alarms, Decades Ago, the U.S. Military Set Off a Nuke Underwater, And It Went Very Badly. Theyd heard on the scanner there was something going on at Missile Complex 374-7, the Titan II Missile installation in nearby Damascus. If we hadnt been ordered off, we would have stayed, Ayala says. USS Cyclops Is the Navys Last Missing Big Ship, Russias New Warhead Is an Engine of Destruction, How Drones and Sats Have Given Ukraine a Chance. Arkansas' missiles were manned and operated by airmen from the Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville, Arkansas, with air bases near Tucson, Arizona, and Wichita, Kansas, maintaining nearby Titan II silos there. Construction on the Minuteman II structures began in 1946. The Titan II ICBM Missile Silo 374-7 Site, located west of U.S. 65, 1.7 miles north of intersection with Arkansas Highway 124 near Southside in Van Buren County, is nationally significant by virtue of its unique and exceptionally important history within the Titan II program: it was the site of a September 1980 accident that severely damaged . This left the powerful nuclear warheads exposed to attack. Missile Guidance Speed Image AIM-7 Sparrow: Semi-active radar homing: Mach 4: AIM-9 Sidewinder: Infrared homing: Unverified (Mach 2.7) AIM-120 AMRAAM: Active radar homing: Both areas were then filled in with concrete, scrap iron, gravel and dirt, and the property wasreturned to the previous landowners. The first was for Jackie to have her annual Multiple Sclerosis checkup at the University of New Mexico's Pete Dominici Medical Building and the second was to have dinner with one set of friends and lunch with another. Offer subject to change without notice. It is eerie to see military vehicles and military personnel going to and from these scary silos in the middle of wheat country. Along with bombers and sea-launched ballistic missiles, the Titan II missile program was a bulwark in the nation's three pronged-response to threats posed by the Soviet Union's large nuclear warfare capacity. How far is it from Rockyford to Limon? [13], Season 4, episode 4 (ep. The 308th SMW was the last active titan wing, but after 23 years of continuous service, the ICBM mission at Little Rock AFB was over. For a minute, it was the same deal as an A-bomb. But Peters realized it wasnt a nuclear explosion, because he had time to think. But not before my kids donned their Star Wars Mandalorian costumes for a little photo shoot. Missile nosecones from Titan IIs in Arkansas are dismantled. Titan II was developed as much for use in space flight as it was for an ICBM, Stumpf says. Arkansas was home to 18 Titan II ICBMs in a missile field located north of Conway. The last active duty Titan II silo, she went off alert 5/5/87: 373-9 This site is currently for sale for $85K according to www.missilebases.com: 373-7 "The Four Side" Sid King had just sat down to dinner on September 18, 1980 when he got the call. [14], In September 2013, Eric Schlosser published a book titled Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety. The air turned white and chunks of steel-reinforced concrete fell out of the sky after the fuel ignited.