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TotallyInOverMyHead t1_iwkw9oz wrote

Reply to comment by mage_irl in German Cold War Nuclear Fallout Bunker For Sale On eBay For EUR 1.6 Million by ananovanews

There are quite a bunch of nuclear bomb shelters from the cold war area in Germany. Up until as late as 1989 you could get a tax credit if you included one in your homes build. Some even got straight up subsidized.

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I know from the top of my head 12 houses that have these shelters. And i don't mean U.S. Survivalist types of shelters. We are talking meters and meters upon steel/concrete walls with lead inserts. Own power, fresh water and waste systems and storage and living facilities with capabilities to support >30 people for years on end.

GIANT thick Vault-Like Doors. Sometimes multiple layers as to form an airlock.

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Bikelangelo t1_iwky3q2 wrote

Fascinating. Do you have more info or any links?

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TotallyInOverMyHead t1_iwkzi0j wrote

No, I just like to visit my 600 inhabitant birthplace in bumfuck-nowhere (Germany) every now and then and visit the old neighbours, you get asked to help carry up some cases of beer or whine and then you ask, "hey, whats that giant vault, are you storing ww2-gold or something ?" " nope thats just my nuclear bunker" you shrug and the conversation moves on.

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But a quick google search provided the number of 2k public bunkers and 9k private ones (see: https://www.thelocal.de/20220304/how-prepared-is-germany-in-the-event-of-a-military-attack/)

However, from experience, ALOT of bunkers are NOT publicly known. Case in point, when we bought our home in the mid 90's and were doing some digging in the garden, we found a giant concrete slab 2 meters below ground. At first we thought it was a typical country-side underground conrete sewage silo.

Nope, a bunker that can comfortably hold 10 people - stocked with food from the mid 80's and looked unused. sealed it back up, still is there for when it is needed, don't even think the new owners know about it. It defnitely is not on the public plans or the semi-public ones that list power, water and gaslines.

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WilliamMorris420 t1_iwlg8t3 wrote

You don't want to list your bunker publicly. As when you go to use it, you'll find the neighbors already in it

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TotallyInOverMyHead t1_iwlhs3g wrote

just because you don't wan't to, doesn't mean it doesn't HAVE TO be listed in Germany. Remember, we are talking about GERMANY, where you need a licence + permission + Bureaucracy for EVERYTHING.

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MNGirlinKY t1_iwltgdh wrote

Exactly as William Lawrence said. I’ve learned from the hundreds of terrible post apocalyptic books that I’ve read from Amazon you never tell anybody about your preparation for the big one.

It’s also why you’re not supposed to show people your hidden panic rooms and that type of thing. If shit goes down people come for your stuff.

Seems like common sense to me but people list it on Zillow.

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CaptainTripps82 t1_iwnduw5 wrote

This is why Bill Burr doesn't want a generator. You don't want to advertise that your the only house with power after the end.

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Attack_Of_The_ t1_iwl8hre wrote

I live in Australia, and I was a cleaner for few years. One of our clients homes was over 100 years old and they had a bunker in their backyard that was accessed by lifting one of the large patio tiles. You then had a three key system to actually enter it. It was tiny, more a bomb shelter if anything, but it was one of the first instances of a bunker that I've ever seen here.

Also, the bunker was mostly flooded, and the owners hadn't decided to clean it out/restore it. It was mostly just a fun conversational point.

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Bikelangelo t1_iwkzn9g wrote

Ha, that's awesome. I'd love a secret bunker.

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TotallyInOverMyHead t1_iwl0b93 wrote

Pretty sure there are tons like those on both private and public land, from ww2 to the cold war all long forgotten, or kept secret on purpose.

On the other hand, the ruins of a castle can reasonably work as a bunker as long as you manage to dig out their basements without them caving in on you.

Germany has afaik some 20k castles still in existance with countless more ruins.

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Jeheh t1_iwmawe6 wrote

Can it really be secret if its listed for sale on the internet? S/

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YaMamSucksMeToes t1_iwlzgj0 wrote

Wait, they're not using their nuclear bunker? Isn't that a waste of real estate!

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TotallyInOverMyHead t1_iwlzxk3 wrote

real estate (or rather the ground its on) is still cheap in ALOT of the parts of the country. That might change tho when the next law regarding real estate taxes actually gets executed, and you don't just pay by the square meter of ground, but also the type of building that is build ontop of it.

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Edit: nvm, just realized there is a "!" at the end of the sentence instead of the "?" i thought there was.

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NonnoBomba t1_iwmouwq wrote

It may also interest you the fact that Switzerland in the '60s made it mandatory to add a bunker in large homes and residential buildings, up until a few years ago. Oh, and they kept all their bridges mined (possibly road and railway tunnels too, IIRC), in case they needed them gone in case of an invasion. The plan was for the entire population to seek refuge in the bunkers and to basically cut off the country from the rest of the world, in case the Cold War suddenly became Hot.

They also have a lot of bunkers and installations inside mountains. I know of at least one been re-purposed as a highly secure datacenter, privately owned.

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divDevGuy t1_iwl00ex wrote

> Up until as late as 1989 you could get a tax credit if you included one in your homes build. Some even got straight up subsidized.

With climate change, building underground may still have a financial benefit even without a tax credit or subsidies. It'll cost more to build, but operational costs would be lower if build properly.

You don't have to go that deep to get fairly consistent year round temperatures. Where I'm at, a horizontal geothermal HVAC loop gets installed around 6-8 feet deep and stays at about 50-55°F degrees year round.

Then again, with walls 3 meters (10 feet) thick, it's already got a fairly heafty thermal mass to moderate temperatures even if it was entirely above ground.

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TotallyInOverMyHead t1_iwlcac6 wrote

one is a bunker, to hide in during a nuklear exchange - the other is a home to use most of life.

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Dry_Damp t1_iwlfcj5 wrote

3m thick walls for a geothermal HVAC loop??

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atomicwrites t1_iwlukf1 wrote

No, for a nuclear bunker.

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Dry_Damp t1_iwlv6jv wrote

Oh okay, then I misread the other comment. Thanks. We just got a geothermal HVAC installed and it definitely doesn’t have 3m thick walls. Thought we might have been ripped off for a split second.

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MNGirlinKY t1_ix3akl4 wrote

My aunts home was built underground way up north and it was very efficient

I don’t know if they ever finished it ( their plan) I was 7 when I saw it last

It’s not for me as am adult but thought it was cool as a kid

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BDMountainDragon t1_iwmzm3b wrote

My dad served in the Börfink Bunker. At the time in the mid-late 60s it served as the NATO command center for Europe. Essentially the spear tip of our response to any Russian threats. There’s a good, easy-read book about it…no connection to my dad or me but I’ve read it. Linky: https://www.amazon.com/Two-Years-Watch-Learned-Secret-ebook/dp/B079KVBQCM

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typeyou t1_iwoevny wrote

I often wondered about how bad things would have to be in the world to live in a bunker. If things are so bad aren't you just prolonging the inevitable?

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BDMountainDragon t1_iwpzrv6 wrote

Well this was a bunker to survive a nuclear attack so we'd still have military command...so I imagine pretty F'ing bad. There's was an AF base where he was based out of not that far away. Where he would have slept if he didn't have an apt off base. He only worked in the bunker. You'd enter and leave by cover of darkness. A few hundred service people from USA/NATO worked there. That book is actually a good glimpse of what it was like.

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kalesaji t1_iwmlthu wrote

The house I'm currently living in is build from steel reinforced concrete. The ceiling is 40 cm thick, as are the basement walls. It's quite an interesting place to live, if you turn off the heating it will be 16°C. Regardless of the season. Also you can make lots of noise in the basement as no one will hear anything.

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