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UER Forum > US: Great Lakes > Nike Missile Site MS-70 (Viewed 1239 times)
tublo 


Location: Minneapolis - St. Paul
Gender: Male
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Nike Missile Site MS-70
< on 7/12/2021 5:48 PM >
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Originally commissioned in October of 1959, the Nike missile program stood as the United States' last line of defense of American cities in the event that Soviet nuclear weapons had their crosshairs on our homes.

Minnesota's defense had four sites, arranged radially in each cardinal direction 30 miles away from the twin cities. All four sites were decommissioned in June of 1971.

This was my chance to explore the western site, MS-70.

Once inside the now cleared missile launch site, I made my way to where the massive elevators were, where they carried missiles up to the surface to be launched. I descended into the storage facilities below, and sadly there were no more missiles


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Although the above-ground section of the base lay completely leveled, the underground facilities still were a beautiful space of their own.

Overall, a very nice trip -- except for the massive wasp that chased me down a ladder.




https://www.instagram.com/tublo.msp/
Aran 


Location: Kansas City
Gender: Male
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Huh. I guess covid made me a trendsetter.

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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 1 on 7/13/2021 1:10 PM >
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Good to see at least one Nike site in the Midwest is still accessible. Pretty much all of the sites in the Chicago-Gary and Milwaukee Defense Areas are either demolished or flooded, since they're pretty much inland coastal cities with a high water table to match.




"Sorry, I didn't know I'm not supposed to be here," he said, knowing full well he wasn't supposed to be there.

fr00tCake 


Location: 0.506953, 73.450199
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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 2 on 7/13/2021 1:16 PM >
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Posted by Aran
Good to see at least one Nike site in the Midwest is still accessible.


Ditto. I've been to a bunch in WI, IL, IN, etc., that still exist, but the underground is not accessible due to flooding. Cool to see a dry one!




tublo 


Location: Minneapolis - St. Paul
Gender: Male
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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 3 on 7/13/2021 1:31 PM >
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Posted by fr00tCake
Cool to see a dry one!

Honestly I'm surprised to see that two of the chambers were dry, the eastern-most of the three was flooded but the other two only had a little bit of water below the elevators.

Also, I forgot to mention this in the post but of the two accessible chambers, one had it's elevator flush with the floor while the other had it in its lowest state. Very cool to be able to see what each looked like in these different states.





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BoredFun27 


Location: Boston
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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 4 on 7/14/2021 10:54 PM >
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As the other two hit on, very nice to see a bike site with minimal flooding. Neat spot.




Howie Dunnet 


Location: DMV
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Avoid attention and get lost in plain sight.

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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 5 on 7/17/2021 2:51 PM >
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There is something fascinating to me about missile silos and bunkers. Great find.

Nike Hercules were pretty large missiles. The US used to ring the USSR with them located in NATO or satellite nations even as late as the 80s. There used to be several in Southern Greece that were technically owned by the Greek Air Force, but the nuclear warheads were owned and secured by the US army soldiers. These missiles were not in silos but rack mounted and located strategically around Athens.

Don't ask me how I know this.



[last edit 7/17/2021 2:52 PM by Howie Dunnet - edited 2 times]

CivalDiscoveries 


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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 6 on 9/25/2022 9:45 PM >
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Very cool I'm hoping t get to explore one of these Nike Bases I went to a Semi abandoned )Part of it was leased to a wildlife refuge place) Ordinace Testing ground in IN last year and that was pretty cool funny thing was is that I had walked around about all day taking pictures and it wasn't until about 5pm Est before someone in a white truck came up to me and asked what I was doing, I told them I was walking/training my dog and all they said was this is Private property so I Coudn't be there but thought it was cool I was training my dog there so got lucky on that one


I suppose that if someone Really wanted and needed to see one of the underground Nike magazines that are flooded one could get one of those gas powered "Trash Pumps" and get the water out but from what I read on one site that's being restored just to get down a couple of steps in the access stairwell if its up almost to ground level takes about seven days of pumping so it'd take awhile

only thing down there that could really be damaged by the water would be the hydraulic pumps and holding tank for the magazine doors as all the lights were sealed in glass fixtures Very cool to see a part of our nations history until least year never knew about these so glad I found them will wear my ACU there when I go to pay good homage to the base and its past and ones who served there:)

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emptymouthfulofthoughts 


Location: Michigan, USA
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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 7 on 9/27/2022 7:47 PM >
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I assumed these were mostly limited to the western US, I've seen and heard of a lot out there. awesome find cool it wasn't flooded. Makes me want to find something similar!




/-/ooligan 


Location: Las Vegas area
Gender: Male
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When in danger, when in doubt, RUN IN CIRCLES, SCREAM AND SHOUT!

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Re: Nike Missile Site MS-70
< Reply # 8 on 9/29/2022 8:14 AM >
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Posted by CivalDiscoveries

I suppose that if someone Really wanted and needed to see one of the underground Nike magazines that are flooded one could get one of those gas powered "Trash Pumps" and get the water out


Just FYI, the water in a long-flooded flooded Nike magazine is likely to contain a lot of contaminants -- hydraulic fluid residue, kerosine/gasoline, and lead from any old lead-based paint, etc. and you could probably get a pretty ugly fine if you were caught pumping it out onto the surface, or otherwise improperly disposing of it. The Nike-Ajax liquid-fuel was extremely nasty stuff, so any leakage of it in a magazine was a big deal, and would have had to have been properly cleaned up quickly, though some may have made it into various drains, cracks, etc.

Certainly it could be worth doing it (legally) for anyone that owned an old Launch Battery, but if someone wanted to just satisfy some curiosity, there are enough dry magazines scattered around the country that'd be cheaper to check-out, plus the restored SF-88L just N of San Francisco: https://www.nps.go...e-missile-site.htm

/-/ooligan



[last edit 9/29/2022 8:15 AM by /-/ooligan - edited 1 times]

There are no stupid questions, just stupid people.
UER Forum > US: Great Lakes > Nike Missile Site MS-70 (Viewed 1239 times)


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