Billingshurst Royal Observer Corps Bunker

Description

This is a short film showing the old Royal Observer Corps on the outskirts of Billingshurst as it appeared in July 2007.

A lunatic plunge down a 3 or 4 metre square vertical shaft into a flooded underground bunker with a video camera and a 5,000,000 candle power torch. It is a surprise that in these health and safety conscious times that this place has not been locked up or filled in. Happily, at this point in time, it was still accessible, so your humble cameraman could dive in and have a look.

See the cramped conditions that people would have had to exist in, should the bomb have been dropped. This particular bunker, that was designed to sleep two people, still has their beds in place ! See the holes where the probes to measure blast and radioactivity in the outside world were housed. See the original timber doors remarkably intact despite all the moisture over the years.

Originally opened in June 1958 at the height of the Cold War, it was decommissioned in October 1968.

A really claustrophobic, underground experience. We get dirty so you don’t have to ! Feel the fear.