A teenage boy was hoisted out of an abandoned Cold War-era missile silo near Denver on New Year’s Day, marking the second such incident in less than a year.
Twenty-five crew members from Bennet-Watkins Fire Rescue, South Metro Fire Rescue, and Sable Altura Fire Rescue responded to the call at 3:45 p.m. on private property near the Colorado Air and Spaceport on Jan. 1.
Acting South Metro Fire Rescue incident PIO Brian Willie said a caller reported that a boy was trapped inside the missile silo. Upon arrival, crew members found that he had fallen roughly 30 feet underground, landing in four feet of water.
“Through a rope pulley system, two firefighters were lowered into the silo to assess and rescue the juvenile,” Willie told CPR News in an emailed statement.
Crew members attached a harness to the teen and returned him to the surface where he was taken to a local hospital for non-life threatening injuries. The entire rescue took about an hour and fifteen minutes.
The Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Department is investigating one adult and two juveniles, including the person who fell, in connection with the incident. Charges are currently pending in the case.
What are the silos anyway? And what’s drawing people to try to explore them?
The Colorado Department of Public Health & Environment has six such missile silos listed on its website. Four of them are east of Aurora, one is in Deer Trail, and another lies in Elizabeth.
Publicly searchable information available in the Library of Congress shows just how massive these underground facilities are, and it’s catching would-be explorers’ attention.
Each of the six Titan 1 missile silos housed 98-foot-long intercontinental ballistic missiles designed to deliver nuclear warheads to their targets. But, according to online records, the silo where the rescue was performed Wednesday is anything but a big hole in the ground.
Maps show the layout as a full-blown military operation in use from 1962 to 1965 when they were decommissioned. The underground facility has long tunnels, a control room and a launch complex.
Throw in the mix that they were in operation just decades ago, and you have fodder for curious minds leading dangerous expeditions into pitch-black darkness without safety equipment.
First rescue
The most recent rescue took place in May 2024 when an 18-year-old man fell into an elevator-like shaft in the Deer Trail silo, which is also on private property. He and a group of friends had snuck inside in the middle of the night to explore.
In a Facebook post, the Sable Altura Fire Department said the facility is “an extremely hazardous underground maze with confined space, dangerous elements and collapsed areas.” A crew member at the time told media outlets that there was “death around every corner” inside the silo.
According to the state’s website, it worked with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to ensure the decommissioned missile silos were environmentally safe, but since many are now on private property, there’s no further requirement for upkeep.
Some property owners have shown interest in closing their silos, but that is costly and difficult.
