![]() ![]() Jones, a stalwart believer in civil defense programs, was completely sincere when he said, “If there are enough shovels to go around, everybody’s going to make it.” Micciche, L.A.’s civil defense director, “is the only means of survival in the event of nuclear attack.” As late as 1982, President Reagan’s deputy undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, Thomas K. “The home fallout shelter,” opined Joseph J. From the end of sizzling World War II through the Cuban Missile Crisis and until almost the defrosting of the Cold War, federal and local governments, along with any number of doomsday entrepreneurs, promoted the bomb/fallout shelters as something no family should be without. As a Los Angeles musician of note once noted, “no one here gets out alive,” or at least unscathed.Īnyhoo, matters seemed simultaneously scarier and more chipper in the ’50s and ’60s when it came to nuclear survivability-think. ![]() Nicola Squillaci, head of Geneva's civil protection and military affairs division, said the shelters were conceived to provide protection ", especially in the case of a bombing and a nuclear attack".ĭucking into a private shelter for around 150 people, underneath a brand new residential building in the Geneva suburb of Meyrin, Squillaci pointed out how, in peacetime, it was equipped with basement storage units for the apartment dwellers above.īut unlike most storage facilities, this one comes with composting toilets, kits for quickly assembling beds, and a ventilation system that filters the air coming in from the outside.Today, as the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists sets the hands of its doomsday clock to an ominous 100 seconds to a nuclear midnight, maybe those hidey-holes are starting to look pretty good, although truth to tell, they were probably a bit more performative Cold War theatrics than actual protection. Geneva is worst off, with only enough places for 75 per cent of its population. The country of 8.6 million people counts nearly nine million spaces across 365,000 private and public shelters.īut while there are more than enough spots at a national level, there are vast regional differences. ![]() The wealthy Alpine country has pledged that each and every resident will have a shelter space if needed. Ukraine war: Explosions heard in Odesa as Russia appears to shift focus south and east. ![]()
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