There’s a much, much larger feature to his house – the 185 foot-deep missile silo. The tour of Townsley’s home base doesn’t end here. Also tucked into this lower level is a Bowflex machine. Here, Townsley has installed a bathroom that could be showcased on the Home and Garden Network. But there was a time when I had to keep a fan on all day just to have some noise.” Another set of stairs leads down to a second floor identical in size and shape to the main room. “It’s intensely quiet,” he says, “and I’m a quiet freak. “But I have a TV monitor an aboveground video camera.” Another thing he didn’t expect was the noise, or lack thereof. “You have to get used to living without windows,” he says. Townsley says he also took some time adjusting to the subterranean lifestyle. “The hardest part, says Townsley, “was learning how to drywall on a curve.” The kitchen counter, for example, reflects the contour of the wall. He has designed every detail in the room to fit its circular shape. While Townsley had a lot of home remodeling experience in Chicago, nothing in the windy city prepared him for the demands of such a space. Now Townsley has replaced some of the springs with poles so the room can only sway side to side. This let the room move both up and down and side to side, which would absorb a bomb blast in the event that the Russians managed to get a shot off. When the site was an active missile base, this room “floated” on massive springs. The room is essentially a concrete bubble suspended from the large column in its center. Townsley’s living space is about 1,100 square feet and completely round. They are impressive in their size and precision, taking little more than a gentle shove to swing open. Having the functioning doors was a big selling point for Bruce. The doors curve inward to offset the vacuum effect of a blast – keeping everything inside from being sucked out.Īs an added safety feature, the white “latticed” debris door is hung to keep whatever an explosion carries into the tunnels from making it to the control room.Īll four of the doors are still fully functional – a small miracle, considering that a number of blast doors from other Atlas F sites have since buckled under their weight. The stairway ends at a set of 6,000-pound blast doors designed to keep occupants safe during a nuclear attack. Townsley takes this stairwell down to the first level of his house, which is where the old crew quarters (now his subterranean living space) is located. While Ed Peden’s more horizontal Atlas E silo home requires hundreds of feet of tunnels to get to the living space, Townsley’s vertical Atlas F site means lots and lots of stairs. They also contain a much more extensive underground bunker – a feature too daunting for Townsley. When it was time to fire, the roofs would open and the missiles would be raised vertically. They're named for the type of missiles that they housed – Atlas E, Atlas F, Titan I, Titan II and Minuteman – and they vary widely in scope and function.įor example, Ed Peden's base is an Atlas E site, which means the missiles were stored horizontally in giant garages with retractable roofs. Hundreds of missile facilities built by the military between 19 were quickly deactivated due to the changing political climate. When purchasing an abandoned missile base, one must first realize that not all silos are created equal. At the end of the driveway, an American flag and array of solar panels provide the only evidence of habitation. The instructions to Townsley’s place are simple: Head south of Abilene, nearly smack-dab in the middle of Texas, cross a couple of intersections, look for a small lump in the road with mailboxes sprouting out of the ground, and you’re there.
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