Shownotes Transcript
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Welcome, legendary listeners. Thanks for tuning in to From the Vault, a second look at some of our classic episodes. Look for a new episode every week. Now, can you go back and listen on your own at OurNewEnglandLegends.com? You bet. But you won't get the added bonus of an After the Legends segment featuring new commentary about that episode from your old pals Jeff and Ray. So let's open up the New England Legends Vault and revisit another legendary episode.
Welcome to the vault. We are back in the vault, a scary place, possibly full of radiation this time. Yeah. The Nuclear Secrets of Vampire House. First aired August 20th, 2020. Enjoy. The Aristic National Wildlife Refuge is a gorgeous area, Jeff. Yeah, it is. You got the trees, the birds, that pretty pond right over there. Yep. We're the only two people that I can see in this remote park today. But I feel a little silly dressed like this.
Don't you think we're taking COVID-19 precautions a little too far? Well, of course we wear masks when we're out among the public, right? But the reason we're wearing hazmat suits today isn't because of COVID. Then what should I be worried about? We're worried about something even more deadly if you get too close. I'm
I'm talking about radioactivity. Wait, radioactivity? We're in Limestone, Maine, less than five miles from the Canadian border, searching for a building with some deep, dark secrets. 1.2 megatons of secrets, as a matter of fact. This is a building that may hold monsters, which is why locals for decades have called this place the Vampire House.
Hi, I'm Jeff Belanger. And I'm Ray Ogier. Welcome to episode 157 of the New England Legends podcast. If you give us about 10 minutes, we'll give you something strange to talk about today. Though I think we're going to need at least 20 minutes for this one. Forgive us. Thank you for joining us on our mission to chronicle every legend in New England, one story at a time. We do that through this weekly podcast, of course, through the New England Legends television series that you can watch right now on Amazon Prime, through our website, and now...
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The app is the latest tool in uniting our community of legend seekers. Not only does it give you access to the latest episodes of our podcast, but it's got this super cool interactive map of New England with pins to every story we've covered so far. Love it. Now, the map is updated each week, so as we continue to chronicle new tales, you get the map and it shows you the new pins.
And wherever you are, you open it up and it'll show you the closest stories to wherever you are right now. And you can even get directions to them. So if you're looking to get out of the house in a safe way, there's plenty of remote locations and weird tales to check out while you listen to our podcast. Plus, and this is our favorite part. Yep. It allows you to contact us and report your local legends, which may end up on a future episode. Mm-hmm. Which means more pins in the map and more places for you to visit. Right.
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All right, Jeff. So we're looking for a vampire house in the Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge. That we are. But keep in mind, this refuge only dates back to 1998. Oh, wow. Before this was a wildlife sanctuary, this land all belonged to Loring Air Force Base, a base with secrets. Though Vampire House is more of a nickname, in reality, the building we're looking for is a Cold War artifact with some dark history and a frightening legend.
This lead came to us through a mysterious email from one of our listeners. This is one of those cases when a person's credentials made it so we just couldn't resist digging deeper on a story. So, we got this mysterious emailer on Skype. Hi, my name's David Hammond.
And in the 1980s, I served as a security policeman at the 42nd SPF in Loring Air Force Base, Maine. Whoa. All right. So this guy is in the know. Absolutely. All right. So what's the story? The story that they would either use to scare everyone or, you know, this is what happened, was that in the vamp house, whatever was going on in there, there was an accident. No one could tell you what kind of accident. No one could tell you what was happening.
what substances may or may not have been involved in the accident, but there was an accident and they sealed it up. They concreted the whole thing. They welded the door shut. Just avoid the building because it was at this point contaminated. And of course, there's the stories of the monsters inside, or maybe victims would be a better way to describe them. That was the big legend. There was a huge accident, a couple of radiated bodies. They basically died instantly and they were so contaminated they died.
The military just sealed him in there because it was too dangerous to deal with. Man, oh man, I have so many questions. Me too. We have a lot to cover on this trip, Jeff. All right, first, a little more background. David Hammond enlisted in the Air Force right out of high school. After his training, luring was his first assignment.
And it's pretty critical that we all understand that the main function of Loring Air Force Base was to store and deploy nuclear weapons. So, David, when you get to Loring in 1987, were there still nukes there? I suppose it's OK to say yes, since it's not a huge secret. Yes. Part of my...
Duties as a security policeman was to provide security for those assets, what we would call class or class A assets. Most of them were, of course, stored in the weapons storage area.
Which is where the Vamp House makes its appearance. And the Vamp House is why we're here. We should point out that this structure has been unofficially called the Vamp House for decades, but it's locals and urban explorers who have assumed the name was short for Vampire House.
We have a lot to unpack. The big story was that it all linked back to the Manhattan Project during World War II and the development of nuclear weapons. If we head deeper into the park here at the Aroostook National Wildlife Refuge, we should be able to see some of the old bunkers and buildings in this clearing right up ahead.
Oh, man, look, it's kind of hard to miss, right? Yeah, it sure is. Besides the obvious mounds of earth that once covered the bunkers, there's a two-story cement house right across the field, and that must be the vampire house. All right. Well, that's just airy looking out there on its own like that. Yeah. Let's head back in time to 1942 and set this up. ♪
It's 1942 and we're 2,111 miles southwest of Limestone, Maine in the tiny town of Los Alamos, New Mexico. A town that just sits right outside of Santa Fe.
This is a town with its own secrets. We're going into arguably the most top secret operation in American history, a secret codenamed the Manhattan Project. Major General Leslie Groves of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is working with nuclear physicist Robert Oppenheimer and his team to develop a super weapon for the U.S. military. A weapon so large, so destructive...
It could theoretically put an end to all wars. All right, from here we jump ahead just three years to July 16th, 1945, to witness the fruits of Oppenheimer's labor. It's almost 5.30 in the morning here at the codename Trinity Test Site. It's an obscure and remote New Mexico desert area called Hernada del Miarto, which translates to Journey of the Dead Man. That's when the clock strikes 5.29 a.m.
And just like that, the world has changed forever. Less than one month later, on August 6, 1945, in Hiroshima, Japan, the United States becomes the first country to drop a nuclear weapon on people. Three days later, it happens again on Nagasaki. The United States is a superpower with a superweapon. World War II is over less than a month after Hiroshima. But no one is naive enough to think other countries aren't hard at work developing the same thing.
Though World War II is over, the arms race has just begun. And race is the critical word here. Nuclear weapons are dropped from airplanes. That's the delivery system. So for the United States to defend itself against any kind of attack, the country needs ways to quickly deploy these weapons.
It's 1947 when ground is broken for a new military base in Limestone, Maine. Limestone Army Field opens in 1950 with a capacity of over 100 B-36 Peacemaker strategic bombers. The B-36 is the largest piston-engined aircraft ever built. This plane is huge, with a range of 10,000 miles.
And it can carry over 87,000 pounds of payload. So to give you some perspective, it's about 4,000 miles to Moscow, Russia from Linestone, Maine. Add in a refuel in an allied country, and basically the United States now has the ability to deliver a nuke just about anywhere in Europe and most of the Soviet Union.
1950 also marks the official start of the Cold War, an arms race for superiority and technology. And of course the word "race" makes it obvious that speed is the most important thing here.
This base in Limestone, Maine is going to play a key role. Remember, we have over 100 giant aircraft just sitting here. And those aircraft need weapons. And you sure don't want to store nukes too close to all the moving parts of an airplane and all the people working on the base. Well, of course not. That's an accident waiting to happen. Right. So you need to store the weapons close enough to get to them quickly, but not too close in case there's an accident or an attack.
So on the eastern border of the property, they build the weapon storage area. Originally named Site Easy, it would become officially known as Caribou Air Force Station. A top secret maximum security facility all on its own, but integral to the main base just two miles away. Most of the construction at Caribou Air Force Station is underground. The bunkers that hold nuclear weapons have to be able to withstand an attack, earthquakes, or anything else that can fall from above.
There are tunnels connecting these various structures, too, because you may need to move in secret to service or arm these weapons. Now, there's some obvious above-ground structures here as well. There's concrete sniper towers for added security. There's other buildings that serve as offices and security facilities. But there's a couple of other strange structures, like this one, officially named Building 260 Storage Area A.
This building is both ugly and scary looking. It is. But not that large. Yeah. It's about the size of a three-bedroom house. It's two stories of solid concrete. There's concrete rectangles on each side that do look like windows from a distance, but up close, it's obviously they're mainly just frames. Right. And on the southeastern side of the building, there's a small porch and what looks like a bank vault door. Right.
As far as I can tell, that's the only way inside. From a distance, this whole area could kind of look like a neighborhood, which is the point. A bit of a suburban camouflage. Now, back to Building 260. The structure has walls 10 feet thick on the sides, 10 feet thick on the bottom, and 20 feet thick on the top.
Inside, there are four rooms or vaults, each with their own doors. And inside those vaults are racks made to hold nuclear capsules. These capsules contain the fissionable material the weapons need. They're like the heart of the nuclear bomb. And Building 260 can hold 60 of these capsules. All right, I got it. So all the actual bombs in all of the bunkers around this facility aren't much good without these capsules. Exactly. That's right.
That also explains why these concrete sniper towers are so close to Building 260. This is a key piece. Right. If it's go time for nuclear war, someone has to come to Building 260, grab these capsules, then bring them to the bunkers, get the bombs fully loaded or armed, then get those bombs onto the planes at the airbase two miles away. Well, that sounds like a lot that has to happen. It also sounds damn scary and time consuming, especially if you're doing that in an emergency. But that's...
That's how it goes in an arms race. All right, so in 1954, the base is renamed Loring Air Force Base in honor of Medal of Honor recipient Major Charles J. Loring, Jr. Then time passes, and the base grows.
Jet engines replace piston engines. The aircraft get even bigger, with the ability to carry more payload even greater distances. Then Loring is designated a strategic air command base, meaning the country views this base as a key component in its nuclear capacities. It's a heavy responsibility for everyone stationed here. During the 1950s, nuclear technology is evolving fast. The thing about races is that it's about speed, not accuracy.
But as the weapons and capabilities start to pile up, the United States government can now focus its time and effort into building bigger, better, and hopefully safer bombs and missiles. And pretty soon, the technology evolves to the point where you no longer need to store the fissionable material outside of the weapon. And that makes Building 260 kind of obsolete.
Though there's a lot we don't know here, here's what we do know. At some point in the late 1950s or very early 1960s, Building 260 is sealed shut. I mean, sealed shut in a way that they don't want anyone ever going inside again. I mean, it's closed. Right. And the people who know what may or may not have happened inside, they're not talking. In 1962, Caribou Air Force Station is officially shut down and ownership is transferred to Loring Air Force Base.
Many of the buildings are no longer needed, however, the nukes are still stored in the bunkers, so security's tight. It's just that not so many people are required to service the station like before because this former base is now strictly a weapons storage area. But that building, 260, those in charge of security can't stop looking at it. It's all on its own. It's sealed up. There's rumors of an accident, but no one can really say what happened.
Add in some years and pretty soon security and other personnel authorized to be in the area don't call it Building 260 anymore. They call it the vamp house. And we're not sure why it's called the vamp house. No. But I did look up the dictionary definition of vamp. Okay. It's a noun and it's technically the upper front part of a boot or a shoe. Okay. It's basically the critical part of the shoe or boot where you might tie your shoelaces. Okay. And, you know, right where you tie the bow. Right. Okay.
That's the vamp. Which kind of makes some sense in a weird way, right? I mean, these fissionable capsules would have been the critical part of the weapon. Maybe. Or maybe folks who work on the base heard stories about a monster inside. From here, we jump ahead to 1987. ♪
A fresh-faced kid named David Hammond has been assigned security for the weapons storage area at Loring Air Force Base. He's heard the stories about the vamp house. He's asked around, but no one seems to know anything about it. It's been sealed up for years, and no one really knows why. And then, on one security detail, David sees something he'll never forget. I was riding a security patrol with a staff sergeant, and he and I were sitting in our truck,
doing what security guys do, just kind of gabbing. And another team, and they weren't security, and another environmental services team, military, came into the weapons storage area, and they came to the vamp house. And these two guys kind of walked around with what we sort of assumed were Geiger counters. We never got a close look at their tool. We never got a close look at what they were doing.
We monitored them to make sure they weren't getting close to any of the actual bunkers. So the staff sergeant drives up to them afterwards and he says, hey, what's going on? What's up with the vampire? I'll remember this forever. He just shakes his head and he goes, you know, it's best just to stay away. All right. Loring Air Force Base is scheduled for shutdown by the U.S. government in the early 1990s. And all of those assets. Read nukes. Right. Nukes.
are moved out. But this isn't the end of the story for the vamp house. Because sometimes where there's smoke, there's also fire. And that brings us back to today.
So we dug into this story. And dug. And dug until we found out some alarming information that makes us believe there may be a lot of truth to the Vampire House legend. While it's not unusual for a team to inspect old buildings for any sign of contaminants before a base is shut down, what is highly unusual is the amount of manpower, effort, and resources that would go into building 260, or the Vamp House.
and the amount of controversy that would get stirred up. And what's even more unusual than that is when elected public officials like U.S. Senator William Cohen, Senator George Mitchell, and at the time U.S. Representative Olympia Snowe get involved in an otherwise nondescript concrete building at Loring Air Force Base. This is where the legend of an accident, contamination, and maybe even some people still locked inside start to echo in our heads.
And that's when we uncovered some documents and newspaper articles related to the vamp house. Ray, we don't typically do this, but I think we need to travel back in time once again to figure this out. All right, I'm ready. This time we're heading back to the winter of 1992. ♪
All right, picture this. It's January 9th, 1992. It's already understood that this base is closing and the lands are going to be turned over to, well, someone. We don't know if it's a state, the county, or someone else. But we do know the buildings and structures need to be thoroughly checked out before that happens. Which makes sense. So on January 9th, 12 workers are assigned to check out Building 260, better known as the Vamp House now.
There used to be a pipe that allowed air inside above the vault door, but that pipe had rusted and crumbled shut decades ago. So these workers are tasked with getting inside. The team is drilling a golf ball-sized hole through the many inches of steel-reinforced doors when they finally break through. As soon as the hole opens to the inside of the building, the Geiger counters start buzzing. And now it's an emergency.
The dozen men who had just been exposed to radiation are immediately taken away for decontamination procedures. All this from one little hole in the building? One little hole. And part of the problem is that six of the twelve workers are civilians. Civilians not beholden to any kind of secret oath, I'm guessing. No, they didn't sign up for radiation exposure. So the following day, a radiation response team from Brooks Air Force Base in Texas arrives at the site.
The thing about radioactivity is that there are tools that can tell you exactly what kind of particles are in the environment. Not only that, radiation gives off a kind of signature that can even tell you the origins. So with the right tools, the folks at Brooks Air Force Base should know exactly what they're dealing with.
Then, on January 12th, the Loring Air Force Base Public Affairs Office issues a statement that radon gas was reported outside of Building 260. Radon. Radon. Quick lesson on radon. It's naturally occurring. If you're a homeowner, you may have had your home tested for radon before you moved in. Radon gas is odorless and colorless and quickly dissipates when there's ventilation.
So you're not buying it? No, I don't think I am. Neither were some of the workers exposed because pretty soon those elected officials we mentioned earlier? Yeah, Senators Cohen, Mitchell, and Representative Olympia Snowe. Right. They start calling for an investigation because they want to know, are neighboring communities in danger? Is drinking water in danger?
And we have to remember it's 1992. Right. Chernobyl was just six years ago. Sure. No one wants an event like that in northern Maine, close enough to the Canadian border to make this an international incident. So the state of Maine gets involved. Now, they do find some radon gas in and around the building, which is a surprise to no one. I mean, you've had this building locked up for 30 years. It's to be expected. Yeah.
But now the newspapers have gotten their hands on this story, and the public is concerned. By late January, the Air Force agrees to wait until warmer weather to crack this building open and...
They agree to allow civilian state officials to observe. Some of the questions these elected officials are asking are questions like, was radioactive material ever stored inside this building? To which the Air Force can't officially say. I mean, there's no longer a record of it. So they claim. Which, I mean, could actually be true. Yeah, if you look into the history, it's pretty obvious storing the fissionable material is exactly what you'd use this building for. Whistle
It's now the spring, and it's decided on May 21st that Building 260 will be pried open, examined, and then turned over to the base disposal agency. The team involved in this have to go through extra training for everything they might encounter inside. From a radioactive nuclear material spill to... To decades-old radioactive corpses who may have turned into mutant zombie vampires by now. Right, something like that.
So the team cuts through the heavy outer door, and they take their first look inside. They see a small hallway that leads to four more metal doors covering two rooms on each side of the hallway. They have to cut through each of those doors as well. They get the first door open and peek inside. Nothing. They get to the second door, open and shine a light inside. It's also empty. The third door reveals the same, but the fourth door gives them a little more trouble. Still...
They get it open and find some empty shelves inside. They claim all radioactivity and environmental levels are what they expected to find. And that brings us back to today. Again.
Okay, empty shelves in the last room. Yeah, that struck me too. Is it possible way back around 1962, when they're emptying Building 260 of all those fissionable capsules, that one leaked? Or maybe spilled? Hmm. And that's why they sealed the place up in a hurry? Just to get far away from it? Well, it's possible. All right. Could this be a cover-up? It could be. But if there was a spill and people died, that's definitely something the military would have kept out of the public.
But the fact remains that someone back in the mid-1990s determined this building to be safe enough to turn it over into a wildlife refuge because the internet is filling up with pictures of people exploring all over this building. A wildlife refuge officially owned by the U.S. government. Yeah, good point. It is run by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
Then there were those tunnels underneath the complex. David Hammond explains. When you're kind of a bored security guy, you go explore these things. And yeah, my squad and I, we've opened a couple of these and looked inside, flashlights around. And they just, I mean, some of them are extremely decayed. Some of them are full of, you know, melt water from the snow. And I mean, they go on all over. And that was one thing other than, you know, it's part of the Manhattan Project.
No one could ever truly explain why all the tunnels are under there. And here we are chasing a Cold War legend that's still hanging around because a building that looks as strange as the vamp house is going to beg a few questions. Questions we either can't answer or we're not allowed to answer, which only adds to the mystery. We'll give David Hammond the last word on this one. Just stay out of the vamp house.
We love it when, like David, you reach out to us with some strange tale you heard in New England, and we get to investigate to find out sometimes there's a lot more to the story.
Feel free to reach out to us through our website, through our super secret Facebook group, or through our fancy new smartphone app. And if you'd like to see all kinds of pictures of the Van Pals of Loring Air Force Base, just head to our website and click on episode 157. We'd like to thank David Hammond for not only tipping us off on the story, but for taking us through this one. And of course, our theme music is by John Judd.
Hi, this is Lauren Middleton from Forest City Marketing. You know, the person who developed the New England Legends app. Until next time, remember, the bazaar is closer than you think. In fact, it can be as close as your smartphone. All right, we'll break it down right after a word from our sponsor.
So this seems like a really bad B-movie, sci-fi channel movie type thing. Or a really interesting documentary. Yeah, but radiation and witches and vampires. So this was the height of COVID. We said it, right? We're like, not only are we wearing masks, but we were in hazmat suits because we were...
near a nuclear facility well place potentially with nuclear materials this was the longest episode we'd ever done yeah what did it clock in at 25 minutes or so and that's without a um an extra or not an extra but after the legend but we had david hammond we had the guy who was the security guard back then yeah who was a first person witness to so much stuff who could tell us about it so that was so cool this was one of those i remember working on it um this
this was one of those very busy weeks because I was traveling and because I remember I did, we had interviewed him when I was on the road. So like we got the audio while I was on the road and then the more, but then at some point I was like, this is too important. It needs more research. Yeah. Right. I need to know more. And then I started uncovering newspaper articles and senators and elected officials were talking about this nondescript cement building with no windows. And, and you realized it was a story of like the cold war. It was a story of, of,
nuclear arsenal and nuclear accidents and governments potentially lying to us. Right. Which we know. They lie to us. But what a significant story compared to how you started, which is something that was interesting. And then it became really significant. Right. This story happened because David Hammond emailed us and said, hey, I don't know if you've heard of Vampire House, but I was actually work security there. And I was like, oh. Yeah.
You know, and I hadn't. So I started to look up a little bit on it. And then I emailed him. I said, would you be willing to be interviewed for it? And he even said it. He said it right on the interview. He goes, well, I guess enough time has passed that, like, yeah, I can confirm. There were nukes there. Like, it was one of those secrets that, you know, not really a secret. Have you talked to him since the episode aired? No, but I'll say this. This was the most commented episode we've had.
Yeah. This was the one that gets us the most emails and comments where people are just like, oh my gosh. And also this was like a real audio documentary. Yeah. You know, like we went into the whole story. Oh, yeah. And we can't confirm that there's people in there or not. I mean, allegedly they opened it up and there was nothing in there. But my favorite, to me, the smoking gun, that there's absolutely some serious radiation problems here.
is when they said, yeah, we got in there and can confirm there's radon. And I'm like, my parents' house had radon, right? Like that's normal. That's normal radiation. You get a vent, pipes it out, you're fine. You can live there, it's okay. Radon, like, of course it has radon. I'm sure it has radon. It's a closed building that hasn't been opened in years and years. But I imagine...
you know, something in there went wrong. This is where they kept like the, not necessarily the warheads, but the fissionable material that would go into the warhead. Yeah. And I was thinking about this, right? So the, the, the warheads were, this was back. Keep it. Okay.
transport your mind back to like post-World War II. Oh, I remember it well. Yes. Go ahead. Yeah. We were just kids like rolling a hoop down the street, right? Sticks and hoops. Playing stickball or whatever. And so this was when nukes had to go on airplanes to be dropped, if that's what you were going to do. We didn't have ICBMs yet. Right. So the bad part of the bomb was kept in this bunker two miles from the airstrip. So let's say it's
Oh my gosh, we got to launch now. You got to drive two miles to the thing, to where that part of the missile is. I imagine you can drive there as fast as you like. Right. Oh, you have to be careful going back though. That's right. So you get the warhead-y stuff, right? And now you got to go two miles back. I'm not sure you want to do 80 going back. I'm sure the roads weren't paved well. Right. You're like, yeah, we can do 80 on the way there. Right.
We're going to do about 30, maybe 25 on the way back. Yeah. And I'm sure there's people waiting with the missiles saying, give me, okay, give me that piece. This goes in here. You can't just throw it at them either. Here. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So you're just like, okay, this goes in here. That right lock. Okay. Did you turn the nuts three times? And yep. Did you plug in the red wire and the blue wire?
I think I did the red wire. Make sure, right? And then they go on the planes and the planes scramble and take off and then go kill hundreds of thousands of people. That's time consuming right there. I don't know how fast... I'm sure they rehearse it, right, in an emergency, but how fast could all that happen? 10 minutes? 15? Yeah, I don't know. I don't know. I mean, I don't know how fast you can drive two miles and get this highly dangerous thing. And what you had to do to connect it to the actual warhead. I don't know. So...
Could there have been a mistake that happened? Could something have broken during a test or a drill? Sure. Would the government lie about it? Absolutely.
Right? That's why I'm worried about this guy, if he's still around. I don't know if the government heard this and maybe paid him a visit the next day. He was after the fact, right? So he was, oh, right, since he talked, right? Yeah, yeah. Oh, right. I didn't think of that. He said, well, enough time has passed. Well, I don't think enough time ever passes before the government will allow secrets to get out. Right. David, call us. Let us know you're okay. Just blink twice if you need help. Yeah. So would the government lie about that? And I was thinking about it. I'm like,
Yeah, and 100 out of 100 times they're going to lie about it. Because let's say that Air Force base that had these nukes that we don't even know were there back then. You didn't know for sure. Some people probably knew. And maybe it sort of leaked out. But if you heard three miles from your house, there's a
a warhead leak. Oh yeah. Is that in my drinking water? Right. Am I breathing that right now? Yeah. What's with the tail that just grew on my back? Yeah. Is my kid like getting that at drinking it in school or whatever, like the school he goes to or she goes to, you know? So, so,
Yeah. That would bother you to no end. Right? And so, yes, of course they would lie about it. They would tell you, yeah, we contained it. It's fine. Sure. And I'm sure they did contain it as best they could. They have to. Yeah. But, you know, still, they sealed up the building. Yeah. Yeah.
And here we are still talking about it. And now you... But the thing about this place is you can go... It's a refuge, so you can sort of drive around it. But as David Hammond's closing line, you know, it was so perfect, right? Stay away from the vampire house. Like, and we don't mean...
beware, there's monsters inside. We mean you could glow. Right. Which isn't as cool as it sounds. No, I don't think you want to get up and touch that thing and be sterile, impudent. Who knows, right? Admire that one from afar. Do you think the government would ever...
come out and say or tell us the secrets because I feel like they won't only because They'd have to admit that they were lying in the first place. You know what I mean? And they probably don't want to do that. I thought about this documentary I watched on Netflix I forget the name of it, but there was a nuclear missile facility I say like middle of the country Kansas or something like right in the middle where they have to go in and they have to maintain the Rockets obviously and
And it was one of those things where it's a silo. So they were up near the warhead and the missile obviously goes way down. And they were removing this big hexagonal nut. And something happened.
That couldn't possibly happen if I gave you a thousand tries. The nut dropped, ricocheted off the wall, hit a rubber thing on the bottom, bounced up, and a round nut was able to puncture the side of the missile because it hit it just right. Dented it, and now rocket fuel is leaking into the silo. And they're going, uh-oh.
oh, rocket fuel is a big problem. Yeah, get the duct tape. So now they got to evacuate the silo. Now there's a nuclear warhead on the top of that missile with rockets leaking rocket fuel. So they get everything evacuated to do all this stuff. Well, guess what? It blows up. The missile explodes and the warhead lands, whatever, half a mile away and doesn't go off. This happened. This absolutely did happen. The government saying...
The warhead had to be armed. It was never going to go off. Right. Unless unless we tell it, no, this we're live. That's not going off. Yeah.
But people in the know were just kind of like, oh no, I can't tell you why it didn't go off. Yeah. Right. Like it should have, it, I mean, it exploded. Right. Like the fact that it didn't go off. Had to have leaked something. Well, not even a leak, but like it should have done what it, what it's designed to do. Yeah. I mean, the thing exploded, why it didn't sit off the triggering mechanism is just the miracle of all miracles. Right. That, that this, this town isn't like a nuclear crater now. Right. Right.
So they more or less, they were like, we dodged a bullet like you would never believe. And so, yes, we know there have been problems. And there's so many missiles and stuff out there. And they're old. Yeah. Like, you forget. Oh, sure. During the Cold War, we built as many as we could get off the assembly line. Yeah.
And I mean, what are these? They're all rusty. 30, 40, 50, 60 years old. Yeah. Missiles, you know, with nukes on them. Yep. I know they're maintained. I know people's jobs are like to take care of these things and probably buff and wax them from time to time. Decommission some, I hope, right? Like take this one down. We'll put another one up, whatever. But at the same time, you know,
the fact that we haven't had some huge catastrophe is Chernobyl, right? Yeah. No, that's not even, those weren't even weapons. Right. That was just a, that was a plant. A plant, right. Yeah. Power facility.
So, um, so the fact that we haven't had some colossal thing is, is really a miracle, but I, but I, but then the thing I wonder about is how many other vampire houses are out there, right? This is just our one little story for Maine. Yeah. How many more? Yeah. Like, just like the, and we dropped them. We're showing, I'm showing them. I could juggle. I could three of them. Oh no, I dropped one. Uh,
we're leaving and you're staying. Yeah. Cause you're going to mutate. Yeah. And, uh, and suddenly these, uh, these stories are born. So anyway, that was ours, the vampire house, perfect time to visit it during the height of quarantine. Cause you know, you couldn't be near anything anyway. So we, uh, we made the most of it.
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