FINAL WARNING: Ready to Spring the Trap
Interpretive Design Center.There is an abandoned bunker, code-named “Cannonball,” on top of
Cross Mountain in Franklin County, near the town of Shimpstown, PA
(south of Mercersburg), that served as a FEMA V.I.P. Evacuation and
Support Center. It is a 103 foot high cylindrical tower, that is 25 foot in
diameter, with reinforced concrete walls 15 inches thick. The tower,
accessed through a blast door on its side at ground level, contained
microwave communications equipment, and served as a microwave
relay station. It is believed to have one underground level, which is
now flooded. The site also contains an 8,000 gallon fuel tank.A similar looking facility, part of the same network of facilities, known
as a V.I.P. Evacuation and Support facility (code-named “Corkscrew”),
is located at Boonesboro, Maryland, between Middletown and
Rohersville, on the spine of South Mountain, called Lambs Knoll. On
Reno Mountain Road, near the monument of the Civil War officer
(Reno), there is an unmarked black-topped service road (marked
“Private”) that leads to the gate of this installation and around to the
back of a silo-like structure, where, a short distance away, is a metal
door below ground level. There are no other visible surface structures,
which makes it obvious that its facilities are underground. It is fenced
in, not marked with any signs, and has an unmanned electric gate. On
the grounds there are a couple of collapsible antenna masts and fire
tower, and an AT&T relay tower. On the USGS map it is referred to as a
fire tower and helipad; while local people refer to it as a missile site,
missile silo, weather station, radar site or atmospheric test facility. It is
not only a microwave relay station; it is also a complete Presidential
Emergency Facility (PEF) which contains a 2-level underground
circular bunker (it is divided into wedge-shaped rooms like a pie) about
100 feet in diameter.Another underground FEMA V.I.P. Evacuation and Support Facility has
been identified at Hearthstone Mountain, west of Hagerstown, MD. One
of 60 (20 are underground ‘hardened’ installations) built around the
country, it housed an AUTOVON (Automatic Voice Network) center,
terrestrial microwave links and troposcatter radio equipment. They
were typically large, multi-level installations built to withstand a
nuclear attack, with walls 1-1/2 feet thick, and shielded with copper to
repel electromagnetic pulse. There is a decontamination chamber and