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Have a look at the area just to the south of the village of
Feltwell in Norfolk, near to the town of Thetford and the major USAF airbases at
Mildenhall and
Lakenheath.
The site at Feltwell is an old airfield that even pre-dates WWII. The Feltwell Golf Course was built on top of one part of the old aerodrome and Feltwell's Thor Avenue, which runs north-east / south-west through the Golf Club from Wilton Road, now leads eventually to some
industrial units which make use of some old airfield hangars and outbuildings.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the golf course area was the site of the Thor missile launch base - hence the name "Thor Avenue".
Amazingly, until the data was eventually revised in March 2006, Ordnance Survey's
1:25000 scale map of the golf course still showed the positions of the Thor launch pads (below) even though no trace of them can be seen on the aerial photo!
Various other fascinating locations for Thor missile launch pads from the 1960s can still be seen on aerial photos of old WWII airfields. There were originally 20 Thor launch sites (including Feltwell) organised into four groups of five sites (one main, plus four support sites). Each Thor site comprised a cluster of three missile launch pads, making a total of 60 Thor missiles deployed.
Of those 20 original sites, only the following ten can still be made out on aerial photos:-
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Breighton near Selby, North Yorkshire
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Catfoss near Hull, Humberside | |
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Caistor near Market Rasen, Lincolnshire |
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Folkingham near Sleaford, Lincolnshire | |
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Ludford near Market Rasen, Lincolnshire |
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North Luffenham near Rutland, Leicestershire | |
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Harrington near Northampton |
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Polebrook near Peterborough, Cambridgeshire | |
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Shepherd's Grove near Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk |
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Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire |
The remaining nine Thor sites, apart from Feltwell, were at the old wartime RAF airfields at
Driffield,
Full Sutton,
Carnaby,
Tuddenham,
Mepal,
North Pickenham,
Coleby Grange,
Bardney and
Hemswell.
If you thought RAF North Luffenham's Thor missile launch pads were interesting, read on throughout this Secret Bases Part 2 to find out what else lurks alongside the old runways!
The Thor site at Bardney, on the other side of Market Rasen to the Caistor and Ludford sites, is marked on the
OS 1:25000 map, in the middle of poultry farm buildings! However, the remains of the launch pads are barely visible on Getmapping's aerial photos, but can be just spotted on Google Earth.
Likewise, south of Lincoln, another old Thor site was located near to the village of Boothby Graffoe. In more recent times, the village achieved a more innocent form of fame. It was adopted as a stage name by an award winning comedian whose showbusiness career rocketed (!) following an appearance on the Opportunity Knocks TV talent show in the late 1980s!
The Thor launch pads at Boothby Graffoe's old WWII airfield at
RAF Coleby Grange have been covered by outbuildings on what is now Boothby Heath Farm, but the classic three-pad Thor layout can still be seen on the
1:25000 map.
The nuclear warheads for the Thor missiles were stored at a special secure area within
RAF Faldingworth, just south of a large conventional munitions storage area.
The airfield was "airbrushed" from OS maps for over 20 years, before finally making an appearance in the 1980s. It is now detailed fully at
1:25000 and even
1:10000 scales. The nuclear warhead stores at Faldingworth were also used by
RAF Scampton close by.
A similar nuclear warhead storage area, used for other projects in the 1950s, can be found on Thetford Heath at
Barnham in Suffolk.
Note on the
1:25000 map of the site, the unmistakable - dare I say it - Pentagon shape! In modern times, the site has long been used as the very mundane sounding Gorse Industrial Estate.
The Barnham nuclear store had previously been used for storing chemical weapons. Another old mustard gas storage area can be seen further south, at the former
Little Heath Forward Filling Depot (FFD). Note that it was once connected into the adjoining dismantled train line.
While you're studying the old secure depot at Barnham, take a look at another nuclear weapons storage area from the 1950s, on the north side of
RAF Honington nearby. Amusingly, the old bunker area - ringed with three security fences - is still "airbrushed" from even the
1:10000 map!
In recent years, the bunkers there (below) have been used to provide temporary accommodation for nuclear warheads travelling between AWE Burghfield, AWE Aldermaston (discussed further below) and RNAD Coulport in Scotland (in Secret Bases Part 3).
Nowadays, RAF Honington provides a base for the tri-service Joint Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) Regiment, previously known as the Joint Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC) Regiment.
Former nuclear weapons storage area at RAF Honington
at high resolution courtesy of Google Maps!
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The remains of the Thor missile launch pads at Polebrook |
Now you're used to spotting Thor launch pads, try looking for the sites of other missile systems from the 1960s! An excellent example can be found on the windy Lincolnshire coast near Cleethorpes, at the old airfield at
RAF North Coates.
The high security compound shows a large matrix of launch pads for the low-range Bloodhound surface-to-air missiles pointing east, intended for anti-aircraft defence at the height of the Cold War.
Additionally, in a secure enclave to the north of
RAF Barkston Heath, alongside the Roman road Ermine Street near Grantham, Lincolnshire, you can make out the old Bloodhound launch pads there too. More old Bloodhound missile pads can be seen over on the east side of the
Breighton Thor site mentioned previously.
Two further good examples can still be seen at the old
RAF Bawdsey coastal radar site near Felixstowe and Ipswich in Suffolk and at the remains of
RAF Woolfox Lodge right by the A1 near Clipsham in Rutland, Leicestershire and close to the major airbase at RAF Cottesmore.
The Bloodhound pads at Bawdsey were photographed by my specialist Pilot's Eye contributor in October 2007, further below! RAF Bawdsey has another fascinating secret to give up – make sure you continue through to Secret Bases Part 4 to find out what!
More Bloodhound launch pad remnants can be found at
RAF Wattisham in Suffolk,
RAF West Raynham in Norfolk and
RAF Wyton in Cambridgeshire. Back in Suffolk, all that remains of
RAF Rattlesden's Bloodhound pads, is faint scarring in a field on old Getmapping imagery from 1999. There is no trace left at all on more modern Google Earth imagery.
Take a look over on the east side of Robin Hood Airport near Doncaster, formerly RAF Finningley. You can spot yet more old Bloodhound launch pads on the remains of the Finningley air defence station,
RAF Misson. Nowadays, the pads are used for storage by L. Jackson and Company – specialists in the refurbishment and disposal of ex-MoD and NATO vehicles and equipment. The location is even helpfully marked on OS maps with the label, "Rocket Site"!
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Aerial views of old Bloodhound missile launch pads
Top to bottom, left to right:
Rattlesden,
Wattisham, West Raynham, Wyton,
North Coates, Barkston Heath, Bawdsey,
Finningley (Misson), Breighton, Woolfox Lodge
Aerial photo data courtesy of www.getmapping.com
COPYRIGHT © Getmapping plc |
NEWS EXCLUSIVE – March 2008
Aside from the old Thor launch pads discussed above, what is even more interesting at RAF Feltwell is the
high security enclave in the middle of the old airfield. Try experimenting with my Map Options and swap between the various map sources. Even if you try your own search of the Government's own MAGIC interactive mapping website, to consult the
1:10000 scale
OS maps, you'll still see nothing!
Those 1:10000 maps do reveal, however, that the enclave is afforded a bit more privacy by strategically placed bushes lining RAF Feltwell's main perimeter fence. The enclave has been a vital part of the global US Space Command (USSPACECOM) network which is headquartered at Peterson Air Force Base at Colorado Springs. From 1989 until 2003 it was home to the 5th Space Surveillance Squadron of the 21st Space Wing and referred to as a Near Space Tracking Facility.
The Space Wing then moved to RAF Fylingdales, in readiness for the latest major US instigated expansion programme there and also at Menwith Hill (of which much more later). The plan for the Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) Programme is to resurrect the controversial US Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI) or "Son of Star Wars" Project - whereby the next generation of warfare is carried out in space.
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New sports pitch or
military satellite
calibration test pattern? |  | Alien Smiley Face? No!
Two baseball pitches and
Independence Day funfair! |  |
Note that on the aerial photos of the Feltwell base, just to the west of the secure enclave, there are two baseball pitches to provide a "home from home". Indeed, in a Google Earth imagery update in February 2008 the Feltwell base's Independence Day funfair from July 2007 was shown.
But take an even closer look at the different versions of imagery below. Firstly, you'll note how one of the two smaller radomes has disappeared. You'll also notice how the newly planted perimeter foliage is coming along nicely and apparently, another sports pitch has been added (left).
But wait, what sort of sports do you know that need those strange markings?
The June 2007 Technical Manual [PDF] for the Air Force Metrology and Calibration (AFMETCAL) programme reveals that RAF Feltwell is currently home to USAFE's (US Air Force Europe) Precision Measurement Equipment Laboratory (PMEL).
I was thinking the "sports pitch" is most likely a
test pattern for the calibration of military satellites utilising Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) – a special technique for remote sensing and mapping applications. Sounds daft, far-fetched? Curiously, the rectangle is precisely 80m long by 46m – the width of a standard RAF runway! Consider a 2006 research paper [PDF] – with photos of experiments carried out on the land around the Feltwell base itself!
The inner dimensions (between the corner markings) are 68m by 37m – very interesting numbers too. The Missile Defence Agency (MDA) website describes the proposed European interceptor missile silo bases in Poland. They are to be smaller than the ones already in place at Fort Greely in Alaska and at Vandenberg AFB in California.
An MDA diagram [in large PDF] – using graphics superimposed onto an aerial photo of the Alaska site (left) – indicates the European interceptor sites are to be roughly 137m long by 37m wide. So the strange new object at RAF Feltwell could represent two Poland interceptor bases side by side! It's an enigma for sure. Not the Bermuda Triangle – but the Feltwell Rectangle!
Either it's a devilishly complex American game that we Brits just can't fathom, or it's a calibration test pattern for military satellites in readiness for Son of Star Wars!
The fact that my website log revealed officials from the US Missile Defence Agency visiting it within hours of me publishing my findings, speaks volumes. Perhaps RAF Feltwell is gearing up to make a significant contribution to the programme – equal to that of the much better known Fylingdales and Menwith Hill!
The national free Metro morning newspaper – that all commuters on trains, buses and the London tubes read – picked up my story on Tuesday 18th March 2008. They quoted an MoD spokesperson as suggesting it's a range for motorcycle safety training.
Hmm. Now you mention it, the US Motorcycle Safety Foundation's very detailed diagrams [PDF] (further below) do seem remarkably similar. Motorcycle News (MCN) seemed to agree in their coverage of my story the same day. The MCN journalist seemed to prefer MY original explanation though! The following day, the story went global when the hugely popular Googlesightseeing.com did a special feature.
Top secret plans for a military satellite calibration test pattern?
© MSF |
... or a motorcycle safety training range?
© MSF |
Going back to the Defford former SIGINT base, discussed in Secret Bases Part 1: on the other side of the nearby town of Pershore, you'll find
Throckmorton Airfield. Both of the Defford and Throckmorton sites are yet more "Disused Airfields" on OS maps, which of course can only mean they're of great MoD significance!
Throckmorton was home to the old DERA Pershore base (which itself grew out of the Royal Radar Establishment) and in recent years, just like Defford, it was operated by QinetiQ.
Throughout the 1950s, at the height of the Cold War, the airfield was known as RAF Pershore and it was one of over 30 dispersal sites for the UK's strategic nuclear deterrent, the Vulcan V-Bomber force, carrying the Blue Danube atomic weapon.
Rather than a "Secret Base", Throckmorton's village residents are all too familiar with the site. In 2001, one end of the old airfield was used as a mass burial ground for animal carcasses during the UK's Foot and Mouth Disease disaster. In 2002, the other end of the airfield was considered by the Government as a possible location for a new "processing centre" for asylum seekers, until villagers waged a very successful campaign against it.
Many former members of the SAS, the UK's Special Forces, have left to set-up their own specialist operations known as PMCs – Private Military Companies or Contractors. One such leading worldwide PMC, ArmorGroup, has based its new close protection (CP) and defensive driving training facility at Throckmorton Airfield.
Another PMC made up of ex-SAS members (now part of ArmorGroup) - Phoenix CP [info pack, PDF] - has used a close protection, counter-surveillance and communications training base at
Longworth Hall in the village of Lugwardine just east of Hereford. Due to the handgun ban, specialist live firearms training by the PMCs is held outside the UK in places like Switzerland and obviously America.
During 2007, Phoenix CP announced they were vacating Longworth Hall and moving to a new training facility "by the end of summer". Curiously, in February 2008 the Phoenix CP website suddenly went dead and the parent company ArmorGroup announced that the courses had been suspended [press release, PDF].
Yet another PMC, the AKE Group - spearheaded by former SAS member Andrew Kain - started off with its
admin HQ at Mortimer House, within an industrial estate in the Holmer suburb of Hereford. In 2005, AKE received the Queen's Award for Enterprise, in the International Trade category, for "risk mitigation".
In 2006, AKE moved its HQ into the historic centre of Hereford, near the cathedral, to an office within
St. Owen's Chambers, on the street bearing the same name. A presence was also established in
Albyn Terrace in the heart of Aberdeen in Scotland, at the office of a marine logistics company which provides expert solutions in offshore personnel transfers.
The ex-SAS officers have based their own private operations close to their former homes at the original
Bradbury Lines barracks in Hereford's Lower Bullingham district and the new
Stirling Lines depot, which since 1999 has been based at the much bigger former RAF training centre at Credenhill (below).
Note at the far southern end of the Credenhill base the remains of a dismantled antenna array similar in layout to the famous Chicksands aerial system featured in Secret Bases Part 1. It can be seen in
extreme close-up on Windows Live Local. Following a major UK imagery update in June 2007, it can also be seen in high resolution on Google Earth.
The AKE Group holds regular instructional seminars further afield, at a hotel and conference centre deep inside SAS training country among the Black Mountains and Brecon Beacons, at the village of
Allt-Yr-Ynys on the Wales / Herefordshire border.
Less than ten miles to the north east, you can find the Pontrilas SAS counter-terrorism trainer unit and its infamous mock-up jet hidden in a forest clearing, featured in Secret Bases Part 1. But do the PMCs have access to this?
The amphibious SAS sister organisation, the Special Boat Service (SBS), have their HQ within the Royal Navy's shore establishment
HMS Excellent on Portsmouth's Whale Island, just north of the main Naval Base.
However, the SBS training base is at at the huge
Royal Marines depot at Hamworthy near Poole, Dorset. It sits next door to the popular holiday resort's very public Rockley Sands caravan park and is surrounded by all the exclusive multi-million pound real estate around Poole Harbour. Just a little further south, next to all the boat yards at Lake Marina, you'll find the
SBS harbour depot where all the equipment is kept.
Phoenix CP close protection training at Longworth Hall, Lugwardine, Hereford
COPYRIGHT © ArmorGroup International plc |
Listeners to the UK's BBC Radio 4 on the morning of Monday 4th September 2006 were spluttering over their eleven o'clock cup of tea!
A new series of "Lives in a Landscape" – a gentle documentary series in the style of "Down your Way" – kicked off with an episode called "Under Throckmorton", devoted to this tiny village in the heart of the English countryside. It could almost be the location for Radio 4's old favourite long-running soap "The Archers". Writer and presenter James Maw had approached me to act as research consultant on the programme!
 |  | | © ArmorGroup |
The BBC blurb teased listeners with the question, "What is a group of former soldiers doing speeding around the runway?"
James Maw interviewed an ex-SAS soldier, referred to discreetly as just "Yorkie" because of his broad Yorkshire accent, but whose true identity and role as ArmorGroup's Director of UK Training is revealed on their promotional video (top right and further below)!
In the Radio 4 documentary, he hinted at his past SAS operations including a hostage release negotiation in West Africa and the destruction of radar installations and communications equipment in Iraq.
"Yorkie" then explained that in his new role at Throckmorton he now trains people like TV news crews, working in hostile regions around the world such as Iraq and Afghanistan, how to survive (bottom right).
In Radio 4's Lives in a Landscape, the presenter was given a roller coaster ride around the Throckmorton runways at high speed, in a special off-road vehicle which also had an attachment for machine guns!
Ex-SAS soldier "Yorkie" – now ArmorGroup's Director of UK Training
presents the corporate promotional video filmed at Throckmorton Airfield
COPYRIGHT © ArmorGroup International plc |
Over on the other side of the M5 motorway from their Throckmorton Airfield location, QinetiQ have significant presence in the Worcestershire town of Great Malvern. One site at the south of the town is at the old
Royal Radar Establishment (RRE). Research work here involves everything from stealth and radar jamming to computer hacking.
Another QinetiQ base in Malvern can be found to the north of the town next to an old DERA location, referred to by locals as
MoD North Site, which is due for redevelopment by the council.
By checking the aerial photos below, note how the tell-tale geometric building layouts for both of the Malvern sites are identical to not only the old parts of the GCHQ bases in Benhall and Oakley in Cheltenham, but also the Defence Logistics Organisation (DLO) sites at Ensleigh and Fox Hill in Bath (since April 2007, DE&S – Defence Equipment and Support).
Furthermore, compare those aerial shots with another old GCHQ site at the end of Lime Grove in
Eastcote, West London near Ruislip, Middlesex.
This site was used temporarily by the Government Codes and Ciphers School (GC&CS) after leaving "Station X" at Bletchley Park in the late 1940s, but before moving to the permanent Cheltenham base - by then renamed GCHQ - in the early 1950s. Later, the old GCHQ Eastcote "Government Buildings" were occupied by civil servants from the Department for the Environment and the Department of Transport.
The US Navy had a significant presence there during the Cold War and they still keep a US Embassy liaison unit for the DoD's naval recruitment team.
It has also provided barracks for the US Marine Corps Security Force (MCSF), whose members protect the US Navy establishment at 7 North Audley Street, Grosvenor Square, London, in the ever important counter-terrorism role. Meanwhile, the US Embassy nearby is protected by the Marine Corps Embassy Security Command (MCESC) – the new name for the Marine Security Guard Battalion (MSGB) since April 2007.
Even more intriguingly, one of the buildings at Eastcote provides the "London, UK" office for the US Navy's NCISRA - the Naval Criminal Investigative Service's Resident Agent. Worldwide, the facilities are also referred to as Resident Units (NCISRU) and Regional Offices (NCISRO). NCIS agents are tasked with countering and investigating terrorism, espionage, computer intrusion, fraud and other serious crimes against people and property.
Since 2003, there's even been a hit TV drama called NCIS shown in the US in primetime on the CBS Network and also in many other countries around the world. In Summer 2006, the UK's Channel 5 also showed it on Saturday nights.
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Britain's very early signals and radar research work first started on England's south coast at
Steamer Point, on top of Friars Cliff, close to Mudeford near Christchurch, Dorset.
I remember spending many childhood summers at the neighbouring Sandhills Holiday Centre at Mudeford. I was fascinated by the huge white golf ball radomes further along the beach at the Signals Research and Development Establishment (SRDE). This site hosted the UK's first military communications satellite ground terminal. The
SRDE's main base (pictured below) was a little further inland at what is now BAe Systems at Somerford, Christchurch.
In 1980, the SRDE finally pulled out of the Christchurch location and the activities were merged with those of the RRE at Malvern. Today, a commemorative plaque at the old Steamer Point radome site remembers the signals and radar experts who worked there.
Atomic Weapons Establishments (AWE) UPDATED December 2007
Now, let's consider two classic examples of Britain's "top secret" sites which just didn't feature on maps ... until January 2005!
The UK Government's key atomic weapons sites are located at Burghfield and Aldermaston, both in Berkshire. But by studying the OS maps, you'd have thought they might be hidden underground! The Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) at Burghfield was last included on an OS map way back in 1974 and had never been seen since. Rather comically, AWE Aldermaston (which is actually the size of a small town) kept appearing and disappearing, depending on which issue of the OS map you were looking at and which scale. It reminded me of the legend of Brigadoon!
Until December 2004, the older OS map data through the Multimap website just showed
AWE Aldermaston (pictured below) as plain woodland and
AWE Burghfield (pictured further below) as a completely empty field! Ordnance Survey's Get-a-map site, which obviously has all the latest definitive data, correctly showed the Aldermaston site (innocently labelled "Depot") at
1:50000. But when you viewed the same area at
1:25000, the site suddenly reverted to Burnham's Copse!
However, all this changed suddenly in January 2005, when OS updated their online 1:25000 map data to show both AWE Aldermaston and AWE Burghfield in full detail, but the 1:50000 scale data for Burghfield was to take another 18 months before being updated.
The Royal Mail address database correctly lists AWE Aldermaston (with the post code "RG7 4PR"). However, AWE Burghfield is hidden away masquerading under the innocuously sounding address, "1 The Mearings, Burghfield, Reading, RG30 3RR", which turns out to be the main high security gate! Try plugging those post codes into Multimap and Getmapping and see what happens!
Before January 2005, even on Get-a-map, AWE Burghfield was conspicuous by its absence at both
1:50000 and
1:25000 scales. It is actually situated in the space between Burghfield Place, Burnthouse Bridge and Grazeley Green. It wasn't until July 2006 that the Burghfield atomic weapons site finally made it back onto OS maps at 1:50000 scale after 32 years in the secrecy wilderness!
Consider AWE Burghfield again but this time, view the aerial photograph on Multimap's site and overlay the map, which has now caught up and also features the new data! Try the same with AWE Aldermaston's aerial photo and the map overlay.
Indeed, this hilarious "now you see it - now you don't" trick (below), showing glaring discrepancies between OS maps and Getmapping's aerial photos, was the original inspiration for this whole website back in 2003!
In December 2007, Burghfield was featured in full Bird's Eye detail (also below), revealing the nuclear warhead assembly and disassembly area for the UK's Trident Missiles.
The double-fenced compound comprises special mounds known as "Gravel Gerties", after a character in the Dick Tracy comic strip. They are designed to contain any plutonium release in the event of an accidental detonation of the conventional explosives in the warheads. Note the numerous lightning conductor towers!
The storage depot for the nuclear-armed fully-assembled Trident Missiles is up in the mountains of Scotland, as featured in Secret Bases Part 3. Check out new high resolution aerial photography of the Trident bunkers and submarine arming jetty on my special implementation of Microsoft Virtual Earth (right).
The original inspiration for this "Secret Bases" website!
Getmapping's aerial photo with an OS map overlay on Multimap
AWE Burghfield – Now you see it, now you don't DO!
Courtesy of www.multimap.com |
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Just to the north east of Burnthouse Bridge, you can make out the remains of a
disused train branch line. This line once connected into the nearby main line which, further south, goes right past the former munitions depot at Bramley (mentioned earlier). The maps and photos of the Bramley munitions depot show that it, too, was once connected into the same main line. During WWII, the AWE Burghfield site was a conventional munitions factory.
For the residents living next to these sites, they are all too real. Especially when they have been forced to use bottled water because of suspicions that the local supply had been contaminated by toxic chemicals.
The AWE sites and all other sensitive UK military and Government sites, such as Faslane nuclear submarine base, are patrolled by Ministry of Defence Police (MDP). Their main training centre and MDP HQ is contained within a deserted WWII USAF airbase at
RAF Wethersfield, a few miles north west of Braintree in Essex.
There are two Operational Support Units (OSU), for rapid emergency deployment of MDP Officers. The southern OSU is at Wethersfield HQ, while the northern OSU is within
RAF Dishforth, between Ripon and Thirsk in North Yorkshire. The unit is strategically situated alongside the A1(M), with good access to all major routes. Dishforth Airfield is also home to the Army Air Corps and their fleet of Apache Attack and Puma helicopters.
AWE have another small site at
AWE Blacknest at Brimpton Common, just a couple of miles to the west of AWE Aldermaston. This site, within an old country house, contains large computer systems and is staffed by scientists researching seismological activity, in order to verify nuclear test bans.
A former top secret remote AWE facility, involved in testing nuclear weapon triggers, can be seen at
Orford Ness on the coast of Suffolk. The derelict remains of strange buildings resembling pagodas can be spotted on the beach. Further north up the coast, the remains of the 1960s
Cobra Mist over-the-horizon radar project can be found. All these Orford Ness features are pictured further below in exclusive Pilot's Eye Views.
On the images of AWE Aldermaston and AWE Burghfield below, hover over each image with your mouse pointer to compare each aerial photo with the corresponding OS map. Click on each image to switch the map between the different scales and data revisions!
Using the latest hi-res imagery on Google Earth and Google Maps, next to AWE Aldermaston itself, you can spot a mysterious
secure depot, hidden in a
clearing in a wood called The Birches. Furthermore, the depot is clearly connected directly into AWE Aldermaston using an underpass beneath Red Lane, a minor public road which runs alongside the complex's eastern boundary.
In June 2006, I made a formal application to the MoD under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act. The official response revealed that the depot is used by AWE Aldermaston as a "burning ground" to incinerate non-nuclear explosive waste material.
In my special implementation of Google Maps further below, look out for some other Secret Bases in the area clustered closely together, the purposes of which are revealed later in this page. Keep on reading!
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"The Truth Is Out There" ... finally!
AWE Burghfield (top) and AWE Aldermaston (bottom) suddenly emerge
from farmers' fields after a record breaking mysterious absence of 30 years!
Ordnance Survey's 1:25000 scale map data from 2004 (left) and 2005 (right)
Map images generated from the Ordnance Survey Get-a-map service
Reproduced with permission of Ordnance Survey and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland |
Incidentally, all of the UK's non-nuclear Royal Ordnance factories were acquired by BAe Systems (formerly British Aerospace) some time ago. One of these can be spotted near Kidderminster in the West Midlands, at
Summerfield.
This old ordnance factory was used by BAe Systems to research and develop motors and fuels for rocket propulsion on missile systems. The fuels were stored in huge underground silos and the Summerfield site was patrolled by armed guards - hopefully non-smokers!
Any mention of the Summerfield site was dropped from the BAe Systems website in early 2005. This was simply because the site has been taken over by the Roxel Group - a merger between BAe Systems Rocket Motors Division and the French defence company Celerg.
Planning permission documents at Bridgnorth District Council, published on the Internet in Summer 2005, revealed that the Roxel Group - new incumbents at Summerfield - test their rocket engines at the
Wyre Forest Test Range (pictured below).
The site is hidden in a forest clearing at Postensplain between the villages of Buttonoak and Buttonbridge, close to Bewdley, Worcestershire. Only the huge rectangular perimeter fence surrounding the site is shown on 1:25000 and 1:10000 OS data - but no buildings. Nothing at all is shown at 1:50000 scale.
In Summer 2007, Google Earth finally revealed both the Wyre Forest range and Roxel's French test facility south of Paris. It is within the Bois du Palais forest near the village of Le Subdray, just south west of Bourges.
Hold on a minute! Does that clearing in Wyre Forest remind you of something else? Something quite sinister in fact. Take another look below!
Another test range hidden in a clearing can be found in mid-Wales, close to the sources of the Rivers Severn and Wye. Take a very close look at Hafren Forest near Llanidloes. The
clearing is an old disused quarry which during the 1980s was used by the ubiquitous BAe Systems for very high voltage research experiments – leading to many "UFO" reports in the area!
It is thought that BAe's missiles and satellites division at Stevenage, Hertfordshire (now EADS Astrium) was working on a "Star Wars" contract for the US Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI) programme. Modern incarnations of the project – referred to as "Son of Star Wars" – are known as Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) and National Missile Defence (NMD).
More recently, the test range has been used by the University of Wales, Aberystwyth's Centre for Explosion Studies and the Shock and Detonation Physics Research Group (known as Shockwaves). That actually closed in 2004, but the key personnel and facilities were acquired in 2005 and incorporated into a new specialist company based at a technology park in Aberystwyth. HazRes (Hazard Research and Risk Consultants Limited) assists clients in the gas, oil and petrochemical industries in recognising, quantifying and managing hazards relating to flammable and explosive materials.
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