Kind's Retirement Travels: Titan II Missile Museum

Yesterday Kirk and I visited the last Titan II Missile site which is about 20 miles south of Tucson. It is the only site remaining of the 54 that used to be in the US in the 60's (18 in this area, 18 in Little Rock, AR and 18 in Kansas). The missile is still there but of course it is not active. (there is a clear cover over half of the silo cover so that the "enemy" can see from the air that it is not armed). We took the tour which included a very good movie describing the 104 foot tall nuclear missile and the safety precautions that were taken while it was "ready to launch". Very interesting! Kirk was the volunteer crew member- he became "Major" Kirk and got to simulate turning the key that started the launch. It would take two officers with different keys (that open the padlocks on the red box that contains two more keys) and when the order came to launch they got a code that had to be decoded before they could use the keys. Four people were in the command center at a time, on 24 hour shifts. Since the door to the underground center was left open they had to make sure to clear out any rattlesnakes that may have found their way down the first set of steps before they could descend to the next door! If a Titan II ICBM was launched it would go 6000 miles in 21 minutes. The whole thing was very humbling. If you want to know more, visit titanmissilemuseum.org.