h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

When I was very young, I used to scare myself daft by reading the Protect and Survive booklet at my local library. This article gave me the same sense of disquiet. It's hard to remember just how pre-occupied everybody was with the threat of nuclear war in the early eighties.

Good article, though.

It's interesting to see how much things change in a short time. I was bon in 1970, and I remember reading books about nuclear war when I was little. I remember watching the movies War Games and The Day After.

Now instead of Armageddon, we're worried about rogue powers.

Things sure do change. Of course, my view may be skewed by going from being a ten year old to being a 30 year old who's been through real training about how do deal with radiation.

I saw soem of the protect and survive adverts somewhere once. It was scary stuff.

I visited a "Secret Bunker" site in Scotland a few miles away from, St Andrews, apparantly although mainly for use by government ministers in the event of a nuclear war it would also have been used to protect said ministers in the event of a major civil disturbance, whilst they issued instructions to the armed forces.

A really scary thing they did was play a recording of what the noise may be like if a nuclear device exploded nearby, very loud, almost deafening and the room shook. VERY SCARY.

I saw a show once about a facility we had where Congress would go in the event of war. It was an underground shelter that was burried under a luxury hotel.

It masqueraded as a television repair shop, and it was kept secret for years.

I think I've been to that scottish one. It was disconcerting, and all it looked like on the surface was a farmhouse.

Yeah that's the one, had a few field guns and other armaments outside as I recall, it's been a couple of years since i've been there. My lad loved the armoury with all the guns on the wall.