Category Archives: On the Road

It’ll always be the tallest manmade object in my heart

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While on the notorious Cold War Mancation™ we made a brief stop at one of North Dakota’s largest landmarks: the KVLY TV tower near Blanchard. If you know what you are looking for, you can actually see this tower from Interstate 94. You can also see its counterpart, the KXJB TV tower, which is relatively nearby and only three feet shorter.

I am no longer employed by the company that owns and/or operates these towers, but I do get to work with them from time to time. It’s been years since I’ve been inside the big reinforced building that houses the transmitter for this beast. In fact, I had to find a new way to get here since the old gravel road is currently flooded. The last time I was here, there was a crew working hard to make some adjustments or repairs to the main transmitter and get it back online. At least they didn’t have to climb the tower!

This beast stands 2,063 feet tall. It has been the tallest manmade object in the world for years. At one time I believe a tower in Europe took the title, but sadly it was unable to bear the load and collapsed. The title then reverted to KVLY’s tower until the recent construction of the “Burj Khalifa” in Dubai. One could be nitpicky and point out that it’s the tallest manmade object in North America, or even in the free world.

By the way, there’s a tiny elevator about the size of a phone booth that goes up the center of this tower’s triangular structure…but not all the way. At some point, you’ve got to get out and climb. No thanks, I’ll just enjoy the view from below!

I could give you all kinds of amazing stats about the miles of supporting guy wires or million pounds of steel, but I think KVLY’s own website does a great job of that. While this tower gets all the glory, it is noteworthy to point out that the second tower, built by former rival and current sister station in the Valley News Live family, is merely three feet shorter. Not only does North Dakota hve the tallest manmade object outside of the oppressive Middle East, it’s got two of ’em.

It’ll always be the tallest manmade object in my heart

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I had the luxury of a photo walk with my beloved wife this Saturday, and of course our choice was the Lewis & Clark walking trail on the Mandan side of the river. There is a trailhead at either end, and we chose to begin from the one in the Captain Leach area.

This end of the trail goes under the historic Northern Pacific and Grant Marsh bridges as it dips toward the bank of the river. There’s a good variety of foliage to be found along each of the trail’s two forks.

Of course, there are plenty of routes along the river that will provide scenic vistas. One can head north or south on 1804 or 1806, for instance. A nice drive up River Road and back around by Papa’s Pumpkin Patch could provide some breathtaking scenery and colors. Whatever your route, you’d better take it soon! It’ll be over before you anticipate.

Oh yeah…watch out for wildlife. This little guy was really mad at me. Some creatures just really don’t want to have their photo taken, I guess! He struck at me a couple of times, but thanks to the wonder of telephoto lenses I wasn’t close enough to hurt him. Nevertheless he felt cornered, and nobody likes that.

Cold War Mancation, Part Five: Minot

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No, I didn’t find myself on the tarmac looking at the flight line on our Cold War Mancation™…this photo is from another time. We did, however, wrap up the Mancation with a stop in Minot. I wanted to make it to the vicinity of MAFB and gaze over/through the fence, but it was getting late. There is, however, one place along the highway en route to the Air Force base that was worth visiting.

This is a view from inside the Dakota Territory Air Museum just north of Minot, appropriately adjacent to the airport. On our trip we ended up arriving a little too late to get in, so I brought my toddlers up later. What you’re looking at is one of the few flying Japanese “Zero” aircraft, named “The Last Samurai.” Read more about it by clicking here. This thing is an amazing work of art and detail. It’s a carrier model, with wing tips that fold up to allow greater aircraft capacity on the carrier.

Facing off against the Zero is this brilliant restoration, a P-51 Mustang. On the day when we arrived, the engine and other tasty bits were exposed for all to see. It’s interesting how a tool of warfare can be so striking and beautiful. I’m not the kind of guy who gets all wound up about old cars and stuff, but this machine is just downright breathtaking.

Also breathtaking are the dual .50 caliber Browning wing guns! We were lucky in that the panels covering the aircraft’s armament were open as well. I’m pretty sure there are plenty of problems whose best solution is a belt-fed .50 cal!

This is where we wrapped up the Cold War Mancation™. We put our noses to the glass a little bit and pointed the truck back toward Bismarck-Mandan. These pics aren’t from that exact visit, but hopefully you get the idea. There are plenty of other really cool photos from this road trip, including some other striking landmarks, that I’ll be trickling out as time allows.

By the way, you really need to visit the Dakota Territory Air Museum. It’s not just a hangar full of planes; it’s three buildings of history and more! I’ve got lots of pics that I took with my toddlers that I’ll post down the road as well.

One other thing: I believe the Minot Air Force Base is hosting their biennial Northern Neighbors Day air show & more this summer! Stay tuned for more…

Fall colors begin to appear in the Badlands

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If you’re looking for leaves in an array of colors from summer green to autumn gold, now’s the time. I was roamin’ with the cameras this weekend and got a very brief window of sunlight in which to nab some photos of those fall colors which have started to highlight areas of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park!

The window of opportunity for North Dakotans to enjoy fall colors can be very narrow. Last year the leaves fell pretty much without changing color at all! It looks like we’re going to be more fortunate this year, but don’t let it pass you by. Sadly those leaves are going to be on the ground sooner than we think.

Makin’ fine feathered friends at the rest area

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On my way to Fargo for a couple of days working at Microsoft’s beautiful high-tech headquarters, I made a quick stop at one of our state’s handy rest areas. On my way back out to the truck I noticed this little Yellow Warbler fluttering by the window next to the door. He quickly dropped down to and perched on the sill.

He looked a little scared and disoriented so I, as a bird whisperer, decided to befriend him. I grabbed a little stick and put it by his feet so he had a better place to perch. After all, a little bird’s feet are not meant to sit on a flat metal surface; they need something around which to curl. He seemed pretty content with that, although a little out of sorts.

I talked to him a little bit and showed him to the other guys on the crew. He hung out with us for a minute or so, even hopping on a friend’s shoulder for a second, before regaining his composure and flying away. I figure he must have bonked into the window and rung his bell a little bit. In any case, it was nice to hang out with him briefly until he was ready to get back to being a bird.

Cold War Mancation Part Four: Cavalier Air Station

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Heading east on highway 5, you can see this giant concrete cube (with a slanted north side) from the road long before you’re near it. Then the road drops down a hill and you can’t see this thing at all, since the Cavalier Air Station (at times named Cavalier Air Force Station) is surrounded by trees. I found out the hard way that this site is very much active and there’s a young man with a firearm at the front gate. I wasn’t getting in for pictures here. That’s okay…as you can tell by the awful light in this shot, sunlight was scarce anyway and it was time to set up the campsite.

After a beautiful stay in lovely Icelandic State Park overnight, we managed to get some really nice light in order to feature the PAR array. I’m told that this thing can spot an object the size of a basketball coming over the North Pole! Wild.

This PAR system is also part of the larger Stanley Mickelson Safeguard Complex, which included the now abandoned Nekoma facility I posted about earlier. It had its missiles removed long ago, but this giant array still watches the northern skies. I could tell you more about this site, but probably not without ripping off David Novak’s site, www.srmsc.org. He’s got all kinds of links and photos of these facilities and how they served. Please visit this site!

I haven’t exhausted the Cold War Mancation photo series yet…stay tuned.

Cold War Mancation, Part Three: the tower formerly known as OMEGA

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Actually the second stop on what we later termed “the Cold War Mancation™” was here: NCTAMS LANT DET LaMoure. Leave it to the military to throw more acronyms at something than you can shake a 1,200 foot stick at. This is that 1,200 foot stick, by the way.

As this sign indicates, the alphabet soup above stands for Naval Computer and Telecommunications Area, Master Station Atlantic…DETachment LaMoure. This is as close as you’ll probably ever get to it, too. It’s surrounded by signage typical of a national security site, and a guy on duty here assured me that civilians are definitely NOT allowed access.

This tower used to be part of the OMEGA Radionavigation system. This was a worldwide navigation system for aircraft which was begun in the 1960s and 1970s. It operated at a very low frequency, around 14kHz. Compare that with the beginning of your AM radio dial, which starts at 530kHz, and you’ll see how low that is. One of the first things you may notice about this tower is the odd attachments on the guy wires. They look like insulators, and I think I know why…more on that in a second.

One other feature is the “top hat” of guy wires attached to the top of the tower. I believe some of the guy wires on this “umbrella type” tower become part of the array. I think that has a lot to do with the additional care to insulate the wires. If they’re not insulated, they can affect the capacitative load of the tower, making it very hard to tune. This may be even more difficult with VLF (very low frequency) signals, I’m not sure.

Depending on who you ask, there were only eight or nine OMEGA towers functioning around the world when GPS stuck a fork in it. The only other one in the USA was/is in Hawaii. These towers were no longer needed for navigation, since GPS assumed that responsibility. Instead of the Coast Guard operating this facility, the Navy now runs operations here.

So what does this tower do now? It still sends VLF frequencies, but it’s used to guide submarines now at I think 150kHz. Some of the other former Omega towers were destroyed when we started switching to GPS, this one was fortunate enough to survive and serve our nation’s submarine fleet.

In a way, it’s sad that this facility has been retasked. The Omega Inn in LaMoure? Renamed. Omega Cafe? Couldn’t find it. There is an Omega Cinema in the mall, however, and a listing for an “Omega room” on the mall directory board. Since the term “Omega” no longer applies, I suppose that’s to be expected.

Here’s some background information about NCTAMS. (Link)

I’ve also added this place to my Google Maps, too. Click here for an aerial view. (This has been fixed.)

Never fear, there’s more Cold War Mancation™ coming soon!

Cold War Mancation Part Two: Nekoma Missile Base (UPDATED)

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This giant pyramid is about the last thing you’d expect to find out in the middle of the North Dakota prairie… yet here it sits. It’s part of the defunct Stanley R Mickelsen Complex, part of the Safeguard anti-ballistic missle program.

The pyramid is the most striking feature of this complex, which operated for about four months before being closed. It housed the Missile Site Radar (MSR) with circular antennae on all four sides of the pyramid. This phased-array radar allowed tracking of incoming ballistic missiles as well as control of the ABMs.

Sadly, this structure has seen better days. The inside is flooded and the equipment has been removed. The outside is beginning to show its age as well. Can you imagine the power needed to operate these huge arrays?

That’s what these giant structures are for. Among the more confusing of the site’s many protuberances, these are actually the intakes and exhausts for six absolutely monstrous engines, used to spin generators capable of powering the facility.

Without an aircraft I can’t give you a photo of this that does it justice. It’s the missile field, which at one time contained both Spartan and Sprint anti-ballistic missiles. The Spartans were designed for long-range interception, and in case of failure the Sprints would be deployed. Both used nuclear blasts to knock out an incoming warhead, which due to EMP concerns really isn’t practical. One cool thing is that the Sprint missiles went from zero to Mach TEN in five seconds. How do I strap one of those to my Suzuki?

This base was built in the 1970s, operated for a matter of weeks, and was then shut down. The town was all set for the boom of having a military base next door, and then suddenly it all evaporated on them. Here’s a must-read article about the impact of this base’s construction and subsequent closure on the little town of Nekoma.

The Library of Congress has a small collection of photos from the site’s construction available online. A really nice aerial photo of the facility is available on Wikipedia and I think may come from the LoC collection.

Here’s a link to a Google Map I’m working on with various photo sites marked for your enjoyment. This link will allow you to view the site from above via satellite. This gives a good idea of what the missile fields look like.

Many more mundane buildings still inhabit this facility, although the base housing has been moved away. Various shops, administrative buildings, the security station, the chapel, and other such buildings are still maintained on site in case the Army chooses to return.

WARNING * (Don’t say you haven’t been warned) * WARNING

This base, while abandoned for purposes of the Safeguard program, is still a US Army facility and protected government property. YOU MAY NOT ENTER THIS PROPERTY WITHOUT PERMISSION. PERIOD. I don’t know what the punishment is for trespassing on a site like this, but I don’t recommend it. You can get really great views from the road on the south side. While doing so you’ll see signs indicating that this still belongs to the Army. Take them at their word.

I wish I’d taken photos of some of the other buildings in the area, including the chapel with the Christmas decorations still hanging in the window. If I find myself in the area again, I’ll be more thorough.

(UPDATE) I came across this website today, srmsc.org. It’s got a ton of information about the entire Mickelsen Complex and its function. Check it out!

Friday geometry

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There are a lot of places in North Dakota which, sadly, I’ve never visited. One objective of my recent photo vacation, since dubbed the Cold War Vacation, was to rectify that. So here we are, at the Valley City railroad trestle bridge. If memory serves me correctly, this is North Dakota’s longest bridge. Since I’m sure it’s been photographed to death, I thought I’d try for some unique angles to show off its geometry.

 

 

Not a lot of words today, just some fun shapes and lines compliments of one of North Dakota’s many interesting sights. I’m still just scratching the surface of the Cold War Vacation photos, but more are on the way very shortly. Have a great weekend!

Cold War Mancation, Part One (updated)

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As I mentinoed before, I took a little photo vacation last weekend with one of my closest friends. It was a trip dubbed the “Cold War Vacation” due to the nature of many of our stops. One of them was to the Ronald Reagan Minuteman Missile Historic Site, north of Cooperstown. I’d been there before, he had not. This was a great opportunity for both of us, as I have a new camera this time.

You can see more about the topside part of this historic site by reading my previous post about this facility. This time I’m just going to focus on the two capsules down below. This is the doorway to the hardened equipment building, a capsule-shaped bunker with a blast door weighing around twelve tons if I recall correctly. One guy can move it.

Generators, pumps, filters, the works. Everything required to keep things functioning down below…all hung on a suspended platform stabilized by giant gas shock absorbers.

Next we have the launch control capsule, with its own puny little 8 ton door. The doors on these capsules are only as large as is required to get equipment in and out. Unlike the front door of the capsule at the Minuteman I national historic site in South Dakota, this one is not painted with anything witty. I got to peek behind here and check this time, a luxury I didn’t have during my first trip.

The last crew to serve down here marked the occasion on their way out. My understanding of the Latin at the bottom is something along the lines of “in the care of eagles.” Those holes are where the giant pins of the blast door interface to secure the capsule.

Inside the capsule are the facilities to accommodate the crew, communicate with topside and command, and of course launch the missiles. There’s a potty even smaller than the one in your average camper as well as a single bunk.

One of two stations manned by the missileers during a shift. Notice that the chair is secured to the floor on rails, as well as the five point harness used to keep the operator in his seat in case of an anticipated attack. The men and women serving in these capsules need to be able to launch their missiles, and being knocked out of their chair would impede that.

Here’s where the shift commander would sit. I appreciate the scenery adorning the wall on the upper right, I bet it broke up the monotony a little bit. Obviously there’s no window seat!

Here’s where the serious stuff happens. Each station has one of these, where the infamous “keys” would be inserted and turned simultaneously. Funny thing about those keys…

“DO NOT DUPLICATE.” Seriously. I found this so hilarious, that a key capable of launching a nuclear weapon would have the same stamping as the key to my dorm room! Even though it should go without saying, these keys bear the warning. If you look at the toothed head of the key as well as the really interesting shape of the end and cut grooves, it’s obvious that Ace Hardware probably isn’t going to have a blank for this anyway.

On the way out of the capsule you get a look at what I’m told is dubbed “the Norwegian snowflake.” The list on the right is from the crews as they each served their last shift with this missile wing before decommission.

This site is amazing. You can get more information and listen to some relevant podcasts by clicking here for the State Historical Society’s page. If you visit, tell them you heard about the site here. I got to hang out for a while and chat with some of the staff and the site director (a former missileer and narrator of one of the SHS podcasts). It was a real treat. There’s plenty more I haven’t even described here, so you’ve got plenty of surprises awaiting.

Update: Announced yesterday was the news that this site has won an award: click here for more information.