It’s larger than the door to my underground blogging bunker here at the ol’ BMB, and since it’s in a decomissioned missile facility it has fewer loaded weapons behind it. But it sure is funnier than anything I’ve got, since my wife won’t let me paint our doors! This is the door to the underground Minuteman II launch facility at the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site in lovely Cactus Flat, South Dakota. I made a trip there last week after encountering the site by chance en route to a video shoot much earlier. The door you see here goes to the hardened “capsule” that missileers would inhabit 24/7, ready to launch the missiles under their control. Not only does it weigh 8 tons, it also is lined by very large steel pins that lock into place when the door is secured.

If you have ever watched the movie War Games, and/or you don’t live in North Dakota, you may have the impression that nuclear missile launch facilities were hidden. Wrong. Travel central North Dakota and you’ll discover that neither are hidden or secret, there are signs pointing to them, and that people in the area find them rather commonplace. Even so, taking a tour of this park corrected a lot of misconceptions I had about life in the missile wing.

North Dakota has recently opened a state park Minuteman site, which I haven’t had the opportunity to visit. You can find out more about it by visiting the websites for it at either OscarZero.com or the State Historical Society’s page. Even cooler: our state site is called the Ronald Reagan Minuteman Missile State Historic Site. Chalk one up for the Gipper!