GOING UNDERGROUND
Inside underground city built to survive nuke apocalypse with maze of secret tunnels – and it could be under your feet
AN eerie underground city built to survive a nuclear apocalypse is still deep below the British countryside.
The bunker - with its winding maze of passages - is big enough to house 4,000 people for up to three months.
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Accessed through secret tunnels, the site - which was codenamed Burlington - lies 100 feet beneath Corsham, Wiltshire.
It was made for Government officials in the late 1950s amid fears of a nuclear attack during the Cold War.
Planned to house then-Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, the government and the Royal Family, it took over a 240-acre abandoned quarry.
What would have been the war headquarters, the bunker is supplied with hospitals, canteens, kitchens, offices and accommodation.
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The hide-out has electric buggies for transport and its own telephone switchboard.
An underground lake would also provide drinking water.
Meanwhile 12 fuel tanks would keep four generators running for up to three months - keeping the site temperature around 20 degrees.
As tensions rose between the West and the Soviet Union, nuclear war became a reality.
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And in 1955, plans were put in place for if the UK was hit by 132 atomic bombs.
Is is thought the bombs would have killed around 1.7 million people and injured a further million.
In 2004 a statement on the Ministry of Defence's website acknowledged the existence of the site and stated it had been declassified.
It said: "A formerly secret Government underground site near Corsham in Wiltshire, which was a potential relocation site for the Government in the event of a nuclear war, was declassified at the end of 2004."
The site was maintained until 1991 until the upkeep became too expensive.
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