7 ABANDONED MILITARY Sites Around The World

"From massive communication arrays, to deserted airplanes, these are 7 ABANDONED Military Sites Around The World.

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7.Fort Carroll | Maryland

Let's kick off our journey with the smallest abandoned military site that I can remember. Fort Carroll. Its not an optical illusion, this 3.4 acre artificial island slash bunker was built in 1847. Mainly to protect the city of Baltimore, from…. I don’t even know. It was part of the military defense of important ports on the east coast. That was a rough sentence.

In 1853 a lighthouse was added to the fort, then in 1898, it was replaced with the lighthouse you see in this picture.
By the time of the Spanish- American War, the fort’s weapons were obsolete and had to be replaced, by the time the upgrades were done, the war was over.

By 1920 all guns had been removed from the fort, and by 1921, the Army officially abandoned it.
In 1958, a Baltimore attorney purchased the island with the intent to build a casino on it. Sadly, or not, depending on your views of gambling, the development plans never materialized.

Nowadays, the fort is a habitat for wild animals and urban explorers who can swim.

6.Savanna Army Depot | Illinois
https://www.flickr.com/photos/tabor-roeder/15547026852
This installation located on the eastern bank of the Mississippi river is by no means small. This 13,000 acre depot was opened in 1917 and developed over decades. By 1962, it was designated to become one of the largest weapons depots in the country. In this aerial photo from 1997 you can see the hundreds of bunkers scattered across the land.

After its closure, around 9000 acres were transferred to the Upper Mississippi River national Wildlife and Fish Refuge, the remaining 3000 acres will be transferred over after the environmental clean up is complete. Which might take a long long time.

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5. Chanute Air Force Base | Illinois

If you ever find yourself about 130 miles south of Chicago and adjacent to Rantoul, Illinois, you might be standing on the grounds of the decommissioned Chanute Air Force Base.

This is what the base looked like in 1939, it was originally built in 1917 as one of 32 air service training camps after the United States entered World War I.

In April of 1917, the United States possessed only one fully manned and equipped Aero squadron and about 250 aircraft in total. To meet the demand for pilots and aircraft, Congress appropriated $640 million dollars to the cause, which in turn, led to the creation of Chanute Air Field and many others like it.

The 640 million is about $12 billion in today’s money. Which is still a pretty small amount, considering the budget of the US Military for 2020 is $721.5 billion dollars.

Immediately after the war, the thousands of pilots that had trained here went their separate ways and about 30 people were tasked with maintaining the base, which was nothing more than a storage depot for spare parts at this point in time.

4. 20th Guards Bomber Aviation Regiment | Russia

3. NATO Troposcatter Monte Giogo | Italy

Let's stick around Europe a little while longer, located in the mountains of Northern Italy, the ACE HIGH Station Livorno Monte Giogo was built during the 50s, as part of the Allied Command Europe System. Yep, these giant antennas were used for better long range communications and nothing more.

Abbreviated to ACE HIGH, the fixed service NATO radio communication system had 82 stations in 9 countries all over Europe. There was 18 stations in Italy alone.

By 1980, the program was completely shut down due to the advent of satellite communication, and for the most part, each ACE HIGH site was abandoned without a care in the world.

I wonder what the total cost of this project was ? I can’t find any numbers on it, but for comparison, there was a similar system built in Alaska.

Called the White Alice Communications System, the network was built and operated by the U.S. Air Force and it consisted of 80 radio stations. Not all of them were built, and not all of them were big, but for only 31 sites, the costs ballooned to over $300 million.

2.Fort Point | California

1.DUGA Radar Array | UKRAINE

Nicknamed by shortwave radio “enthusiasts” as the “Russian Woodpecker” because of the repetitive tapping noise it created, the DUGA Radar Array System was the USSR’s way of protecting the motherland, it was probably powerful enough to detect a missile flying over the Atlantic.

A little while ago I did an in depth video of NUMBERS STATIONS, it's really fascinating stuff and I am sure you will like to learn more about it. Don’t miss it !"