Explore Inverurie’s former top-secret Cold War bunker, located beneath Gordon House, before its demolition.
I often visited Gordon House in the past when I attended area committees. I remembered passing a metal door at the bottom of stairs, thinking it was just a boring basement. I was wrong about that metal door.
Ann Overton, Joan Bruce, and Carol Robertson greeted me, joined by Graham Ritchie and Mike Hebenton. Armed with tools and a long tube, Ann led us down long hallways until we reached an ordinary-looking door. It hid Inverurie’s history.
We descended two sets of stairs and walked through thick steel doors, entering the once top-secret bunker. Graham stated, “This is the bunker…never used thankfully.” Graham worked for UKWMO, which was part of the Home Office. As the chief warning officer covering the North of Scotland, Graham knew the bunker’s purpose. He also taught at Inverurie Academy.
“It would be locked for two months,” he said, describing what would happen during a nuclear event. After those two months, people took their chances outside, though radiation decreases quite fast. The bunker isn’t fully underground; it’s semi-sunken, offering high protection. “A blast close by would destroy the building above,” Graham said. “But this would stay intact.”
The bunker was used until recently for tasks like election team work and council team training. It also stored election kit, and staff counted postal votes above. Staff even found an old computer from the 80s.
The old computer will be a museum display piece. Before Covid-19, Gordon House was full and all space was utilized. Council staff contacted a heritage group to take bunker items, driven by a desire to preserve local history.
Graham and Mike dismantled maps that covered the walls, using the tube to move them. Gordon House was built in 1982, with a deal including a bunker to act as a local command center.
The Home Office paid for the bunker and foundations. The prior center was at Tertowie House. “It wasn’t custom-built,” Graham said of that underground but unprotected bunker. Bunkers existed every ten miles.
Green triangles showed bunkers, marking Royal Observer Corps bunkers across the north-east area. Observers tracked bomb locations and sent radiation levels to Aberdeen.
The bunker held 27 people, including scientific advisors and council officers. “The education director handled food,” Graham said. Council roles included wartime duties back then.
The public was not allowed inside. People with responsibilities would be called before war. The bunker would be manned prior to the blast, and then the blast doors would shut.
Though not actively used, regular drills were performed to practice for a nuclear war. Graham and his team met with local authorities yearly. “We practiced more often here, it was technical,” he said. “But in reality, this one was never manned.”
Graham said that Gordon House bunker had links to Fife’s secret bunker, which is now a tourist attraction. To give a better understanding, Graham gave a tour. The main room was the control room, circled with tables and telephones.
These phones connected to posts. The control room also held shelves, desks, and old chairs that I recognized these items from the council chamber upstairs. The electrical switchgear was in another room, along with a message switch.
A telephone cabinet managed information, but the message switch is now gone. Units for outside communication sat behind a blast door. A normal looking room held shelves and boxes. Shelves hid an escape hatch.
Graham asked, “If rubble blocked the doors, how do you escape?” People tunneled out of this hatch. Next to this room was a dormitory that once had bunk beds. The bunker included toilets, a kitchen, and an office.
The chief executive oversaw everything in their office. The final stop was decontamination. I pictured computers and showers; like a sci-fi movie, but I overestimated what the staff had, only a small shower sat on the wall.
Maybe I watched too many films. The bunker entrance was quite humble, and this area had contained sandbags. Graham explained why staff used sandbags. “Once blast doors closed, no one else got in,” he said.
“If you arrived late, you needed decontamination.” They used Fuller’s earth to pat down people, as this substance absorbed radiation. The generator room sat nearby, providing the bunker with its own power.
The Berlin Wall fell in 1989, ending the need for a bunker. “Everything closed from then,” Graham said. He felt glad it was never used. Before leaving, Graham shared one more fact.
“They put a sign saying ‘The Bunker’,” he laughed. “It was meant to be secret.” The blast doors shut as my visit ended. Walking back, I thought of the game, Fallout and felt like a vault dweller.
I imagined needing a Pip-Boy. Thankfully, Inverurie was normal outside. Gordon House is mostly empty now, and they will demolish it soon.