The Great Escape
Ignoring the sense of dread that quickly arose from the pit of his stomach, John descended into the cold and damp darkness. His breath quickened as he imagined the desperate state someone would have had to be in to build this.
The hand-crank fan on the wall was enough to convince him this was a bomb shelter. He started to relax but then he saw the ceiling and ran towards the exit.
John Sims
John Sims, a family man from Arizona, was looking into remodeling his house when he stumbled upon something startling on the house’s original plans.
With a flair for adventure and a willingness to do the unthinkable, John risked everything to uncover the deep-routed secrets that lay just beneath his property’s surface.
A Mystery
When John looked at the original plans for his house, he saw something surprising mapped out in his backyard. It appeared to be some kind of structure where his grass was.
But as far as John could see, it was just an empty space, unless of course, this apparent structure kept hidden beneath the surface. John’s intrigue peaked. There was only one way to find out.
Bingo!
John had always been a curious man who loved solving mysteries and simplifying the complicated. John looked at the old plans of his yard and thought it was just another mystery to have fun with.
He didn’t expect much at first. But when he started to dig, his attitude went from light to dark when his shovel hit a huge metal dome lid.
Confusion
John hurriedly cleared its surface from dirt and managed to lift the heavy lid open. His heart pounded as he realized he was discovering something special.
But when he looked into the hole, he saw something that looked like fan blades. He scratched his head in complete confusion until it suddenly dawned on him and he knew exactly what he was looking at.
Doomsday Danger
The metal blades weren’t a fan at all. It was a rusty old descending spiral staircase. John’s mind began to race as he began to form an idea of what this structure actually might be.
He wondered if he was looking at a doomsday or nuclear shelter but he had no idea what it was doing here or what might be inside if he continued to explore it. The mystery grew as John’s curiosity led him towards the jaws of danger.
Needing Help
John began shoveling out the dirt that filled the staircase. But it wasn’t long before he realized that this wasn’t a one-person job.
John carefully reached the bottom of the rusty staircase and was convinced that something magnificent was hiding behind all the rubble and dirt in the shelter. He had no idea how big the space was or what it was hiding but he knew it would be worth it to find out.
Determination
Because the structure was so old and rusted, it was too dangerous to work on underneath the ground without making sure that its infrastructure was safe and wouldn’t collapse on him.
John was determined to do everything he could do to solve this mystery so he called on friends to help him replace the loose steps and ventilate the air below. But another danger lay hiding in plain view.
The Last Descent
Unbeknownst to John, the outside structure was also a huge threat to his safety so they used concrete, wood, and epoxy to strengthen the area around the opening.
Once everything was in place, there was only one thing left for John to do; discover what on earth was down there and why this shelter was here. He descended, hoping he’d find the answers.
Stepping Into The Unknown
John surveyed the structure one last time before he got ready to jump into the mysterious underground space. He had no idea what to expect but he certainly felt like it would be something big.
He took a deep breath and signaled to his friends that he was going in. He took a step forward.
A Dark Feeling
John ignored the sense of dread that quickly arose from the pit of his stomach. He imagined the desperate state someone would have to be in to build this as he looked around the ominous and spooky dark rooms.
Looking around, it was obvious this was a bomb shelter. The hand-crank fan was the first sign that this was designed to keep someone here for a very long time. Then he saw the ceiling.
The Answer Appears
He walked around the empty bomb shelter astonished at its good condition but then he looked up at the ceiling and he froze.
Fiberglass was peeling away from the ceiling which meant that the place was still harmful. Quickly, he brought another ventilator down and removed the toxic material. But as he was working, he realized that he was scraping away the answer to all of his questions.
The Cold War
Fiberglass was a popular material used during the Cold War. It was now impossible to ignore the evidence that he was in fact dealing with a nuclear shelter that was built at the height of the Cold War when tensions were high between America and the Soviet Union.
John was standing in the result of the mass paranoia that unfolded after the war. But that’s not all.
Responsible Act
John later discovered that in the Tucson area where he lived, these nuclear shelters aren’t all too uncommon.
Apparently, back then, a man who commissioned a bomb shelter to be installed in their backyard was considered to be a responsible man, looking out for his loved ones as the threat of nuclear war between superpowers was very real. But what did John do with it?
Back To Life
John took to GoFundMe to gather funds to completely restore the nuclear shelter and make it a safe structure that is now used as a Civil Defense Museum. But he also uses it as his man cave and HAM shack…
He filled the shelter with Cold War memorabilia, bringing the dying secret beneath his feet back to life!