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I was born in the 1980s in Ukraine, so I have both an experience to share and questions to ask. Questions first: how common was it to build your own shelter in

I was born in the 1980s in Ukraine, so I have both an experience to share and questions to ask. Questions first: how common was it to build your own shelter in the US? Was it something that most people did? Most people talked about? Were the people who built them considered as irrational as people who build "zombie apocalypse" shelters today? Were they stocked with guns the same way that today's shelters are? Experience: I grew up in Kharkiv, a city with roughly a 1m population, and the second largest city in Ukraine. Most people lived in large apartment complexes that were organized into planned neighborhoods. Imagine four buildings surrounding a common area that was laid out as a small park. Inside this common area that my building was surrounding were three bomb shelters. We called them "old", "weird", and "new" based on their outside appearance. The entrances were fairly small: just a triangle structure with a door and a staircase going down. We never went too deep into them when they were open (the authorities would periodically close them up), but at one point I remember using an iron bar to break the chain on one of them and leading a few of my friends down into it. I really wish we had good flashlights, rope, etc. (we were all around 11 or 12). We went down two levels and looked at these huge rooms. Some of them looked to be set up for bunk beds and it looked like the beds were at some point taken out. I did wander into a random room without a flashlight and almost took a step into a darker area before realizing that it was an opening with a step ladder down to the lower level. I would have been badly hurt had I taken the step before checking. This naturally scared me enough to get out of there in a hurry. The next week this particular shelter was closed up with a better chain so we didn't get to go in again. Edit: I tried to find some pictures of what it looked like. Surely someone has taken some photos at one point, but sadly I cannot find anything that resembled the bomb shelters I explored as a child. I do have a strange fascination with the Cold War, so now I really wish I could go back and take some pictures/explore things as an adult.

wglb 12y ago
In the rural area where I grew up, I would guess that one household in twenty built a shelter. I wasn't aware of any community-based shelters in the area.
Ueland 12y ago
Norwegian here: While building their house, my grandparents had (by law) to build the basement solid enough to be used as a bomb shelter, this was in the fifties i believe. I now live in an apartment block from early sixties and every block here (with around 24 apartments) has their own bomb shelter in the basement. Even some of our subway stations are (rather large) bomb shelters. In my home village, both some of the schools and sport facilities all had their own bomb shelters which also had facilities for keeping gas out. I do believe that is no longer required to build new bomb shelters but all existing ones has to be maintained and be ready to be used within a specified timeframe.
derekp7 12y ago
I'm in my early 40's, live in the US (northern midwest area), and also have family in the southern states (Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas), and have never seen a bomb shelter at any family or their friends places -- never even heard anyone talk about them either. However, almost everyone had a storm shelter -- typically a cellar dug in the side of a hill (they get a lot of powerful thunderstorms and tornadoes). I could see them doubling as a bomb shelter back in the day, but I never heard them referred to as anything but a storm cellar.
PhantomGremlin 12y ago
> how common was it to build your own shelter in the US? I think this was something that peaked in the '50s. Certainly not at all popular afterward. And the practical problems are colossal. E.g. take New York City. A few buildings had fallout shelters. But, realistically, how do you provide food, water, and sanitation for 8 million people? It's laughable to think that a handful of shelters can accomplish that. And the population of the NYC metropolitan area is much greater, 20 million people, and it would probably be targeted by multiple nuclear warheads. How many could survive, and for how long? Overall, shelters might be a feasible idea for rural "flyover country". They are absurd for the big cities where the majority of the US population lives.

wglb 12y ago

In the rural area where I grew up, I would guess that one household in twenty built a shelter. I wasn't aware of any community-based shelters in the area.

Ueland 12y ago

Norwegian here: While building their house, my grandparents had (by law) to build the basement solid enough to be used as a bomb shelter, this was in the fifties i believe. I now live in an apartment block from early sixties and every block here (with around 24 apartments) has their own bomb shelter in the basement. Even some of our subway stations are (rather large) bomb shelters. In my home village, both some of the schools and sport facilities all had their own bomb shelters which also had facilities for keeping gas out. I do believe that is no longer required to build new bomb shelters but all existing ones has to be maintained and be ready to be used within a specified timeframe.

derekp7 12y ago

I'm in my early 40's, live in the US (northern midwest area), and also have family in the southern states (Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas), and have never seen a bomb shelter at any family or their friends places -- never even heard anyone talk about them either. However, almost everyone had a storm shelter -- typically a cellar dug in the side of a hill (they get a lot of powerful thunderstorms and tornadoes). I could see them doubling as a bomb shelter back in the day, but I never heard them referred to as anything but a storm cellar.

PhantomGremlin 12y ago

> how common was it to build your own shelter in the US? I think this was something that peaked in the '50s. Certainly not at all popular afterward. And the practical problems are colossal. E.g. take New York City. A few buildings had fallout shelters. But, realistically, how do you provide food, water, and sanitation for 8 million people? It's laughable to think that a handful of shelters can accomplish that. And the population of the NYC metropolitan area is much greater, 20 million people, and it would probably be targeted by multiple nuclear warheads. How many could survive, and for how long? Overall, shelters might be a feasible idea for rural "flyover country". They are absurd for the big cities where the majority of the US population lives.