A hidden “city” buried almost 100ft under ice has been revealed for the first time in fascinating declassified documents.
According to the published documents, the military base from the Cold War era, Camp Century, was created beneath a glacier in Greenland in 1959. Built by the US Army Corps of Engineers, the “City Under the Ice, featured 21 interconnected tunnels over 9,800ft.
Despite being billed as a scientific research station, the real reason behind the military base remained a closely kept secret for decades – until now. The idea behind Camp Century was to serve as a cover for Project Iceworm, a plan to stockpile nuclear missiles in the ice, which were capable of hitting the former Soviet Union.
The camp, which was powered by a portable nuclear reactor – the PM-2A-, was due to house nearly 600 nuclear missiles in case of an emergency. It was also able to supply electricity and head in the bitterly cold conditions. However, over time, the melting ice meant Project Iceworm was deemed to hard to contain, and the base was scrapped in 1966 by the US. The nuclear reactor was removed from the camp but hazardous waste was left behind.
It wasn’t until a NASA scientist accidentally stumbled upon the base during a rescue mission that officials were reminded of the failed camp. Chad Greene’s plane had detected the last remaining bits of Camp Century during a trip to Greeland. Alex Gardner, a cryospheric scientist at NASA’s jet propulsion laboratory said: “We were looking for the bed of the ice and out pops Camp Century. We didn’t know what it was at first. In the new data, individual structures in the secret city are visible in a way that they’ve never been before.”
It wasn’t until radar data revealed the structures within the camp’s layout that the team recognised what they had just discovered. Mr Greene added: “Our goal was to calibrate, validate, and understand the capabilities and limitations of UAVSAR for mapping the ice sheet’s internal layers and the ice-bed interface.”
Back in the UK, it was recently revealed how a tunnel network running deep into the Worcestershire forest was originally bought by the BBC during World War 2 in case of a crisis in London. With only a small radio mast and a security barrier in sight, Wood Norton is actually the gateway to a huge network of tunnels running deep in the Worcestershire forest. The bunker was originally bought by the BBC at the start of World War II, to serve as a hidden base for the broadcaster if London was subjected to a major crisis.
These days, Wood Norton is used as a training base for sound engineers and technical staff at the broadcasting company, report Gloucestershire Live. The bunker also has a mast which would continue broadcasting messages from the BBC if the UK were ever to go into crisis mode.
Also referred to as PAWN, Protected Area Wood Norton, the site is hidden deep in the Worcestershire hillside, boasting several storeys of architecture underground. And the facility is reportedly able to house up 90 BBC staff and also boasts a ping-pong table.
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