Building the SD.Net Bunker (RAR)

[Mr Bean]

Brought on by this thread here

Tomorrow as is traditional, Q will show up an announce that there will be a "great disaster" that takes place on January 11th 2016 and there will be years of chaos, darkness and doom and possibly zombies. You are put in charge of preparing a bunker that can host and keep safe at least 1000 members of SD.Net (IE members with 100 posts or more are the only ones worth saving ).

You do not know what kind of disaster it is, you do know it is survivable but you must take into account it could be everything from large scale nuclear exchange between superpowers targeting major cities, to new ice age to global storms of terrific strength to zombie apocalypse. You must only survive said great disaster for ten years but if you manage to do so you will have "won" and be given a small statuette stating that fact and the abilitty to hit the undo button and let humanity dodge this great disaster. Fail and well... sucks to be you.

You are under three restrictions
1. Your under conventional rules, if you want a hole in the ground you going to have to dig it with a shovel or a power tool equivalent yourself or hire someone to do it.
2. The place of safety must be constructed within the borders of the United States lower 48 states. No building it in Siberia.
3. In o

To aid you
1. You will be given a good deal of US money in bank accounts you can access remotely each year starting with an instant grant of five million dollars every three months until the disaster itself occurs.

2. The other 1000 members you need to save will be informed of this upcoming disaster and you only need save them, any family/friends are taken out of play for the time being so we don't have 9000 people on our hands.

3. Licenses and zoning rights can be ignore having already been bribed ahead of time to look the other way if you decide to build your doom bunker in a suburb or Doom Tower in a small town somewhere. You still have to acquire the land and have whatever bunker your making ready to go by December 1st 2015 so you can get ready for the upcoming apocalypse in 2016.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I know that bunker thing from the original thread was probably a scam, but it strikes me as making a good deal of sense building it in somewhere like Nebraska. No fault lines, no major known nuclear targets. All good.

More specifically, the location should be on fairly soft rock (to make it easier to excavate) with the water table being quite far below ground, so as to avoid flooding problems that require pumps.

I get the feeling that with the (in relative terms) limited budget rules out the possiblity of a nuclear reactor providing power for this bunker.

And only memebers over 100 posts? Hah. That rulesout that darthy idiot then.

[Coyote]

Take over Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico. It has water in it already, although some purification may be needed, and can hold a lot of people. Create a wildlife refuge political action committee and declare the area an important habitat for some animals that in danger of going extinct. Link it to the decimation of bat populations that has been spreading recently. Pay off the Park Service to say that the Caverns will be a closed wildlife habit for study, etc, for the next 5-6 years.

Stock it full of food, ammo, comfort items, etc.

1000 posters from SDN with post counts of 100+? Don't we want more than, say, a half-dozen females? Either that or on January 10th 2016 there's going to be a run on fleshlights and RealDolls.

How about 1000 people, of which at least 10% should be from the board and the rest can be whoever.

Bring in lots of motorcycles, ATVs, stuff like that, and drone aircraft to survey the area around the Caverns post-disaster to get an idea of what we face. Hide some rugged, off-road Mad Max style vehicles nearby, maybe even buy a couple military vehicles if possible.

Hunker down.

[Dave]

I get the feeling that with the (in relative terms) limited budget rules out the possiblity of a nuclear reactor providing power for this bunker.

Nah, we got this.
News Link
Product Link
$25m USD, provides 25MW electric for 8 - 10 years. (probably not including associated electrical generation equipment.)
Maybe we could get them to scale it differently so we get less power over a longer time...

[Eternal_Freedom]

That is possibly the msot awesome product link I have ever seen.

25 Mw electric for 8-10 years? Is that gonna be enough for all the big shit we're gonna back into the bunker?

[Broomstick]

1000 posters from SDN with post counts of 100+? Don't we want more than, say, a half-dozen females? Either that or on January 10th 2016 there's going to be a run on fleshlights and RealDolls.

Not to mention quite of few of the few women we do have here are either married or not interested in sex with male humans.

Nope, my original idea even mentioned bringing family. So there.

How about 1000 people, of which at least 10% should be from the board and the rest can be whoever.

How about 1k people mostly SD.net?

[Big Phil]

If I have to bring SDNet I'm building a giant gas chamber

[Zaune]

Thank you so much for that wonderful mental picture, Coyote. Anyway...

First of all, I strongly advise we take the promise of access to the Reset Button with a grain of salt. After all, wasn't it mentioned in passing during his sole appearance on DS9 that Q is worshipped as the God of Lies by at least one primitive culture? At any rate, with a budget of three hundred million total we might as well err on the side of caution, not to mention leave ourselves the option of not pressing it if we don't want to.

One problem with Nebraska is that it's somewhat short on timber, or mineral resources for that matter; it would be better to have the raw materials to support at least a basic metalwork industry within reasonable travelling distance, because for all we know we're going to be the last outpost of technological civilisation or even human life... in which case we really had better make provision for spouses and children, because putting in all this effort only to go extinct from inbreeding would be just embarrassing. To that end, provision for a breeding stock of horses would be a good idea, because even if we include a biofuel plant we're eventually going to run out of spare parts. The need for a reasonable supply of seeds, tools and livestock goes without saying.

Also, whilst it's theoretically possible to build exclusively underground, it'll probably create more problems than it solves. Ventilation and drainage are going to be major technical and logistical issues, and going for prolonged periods without natural daylight is physically and psychologically unhealthy.* I'm not sure whether the best way to do this would be to build individual dwellings with their own separate disaster shelters, or go with a single large bunker and store prefabricated buildings to be assembled as soon as it's safe to go outside again, but the sooner we're out of the vault the better.

---

* I'm sure I don't have to point this out, but if at any point our circumstances begin to resemble a Dwarf Fortress succession game then something has gone horribly wrong.

[Mr Bean]

Since someone asked, yes you are allowed to cheat the loan system, I'm going to put an informal cap at 100 million at the number of loans you can acquire to get extra equipment during time to get extra money counting on the fact the world is going to hell the amount of loans you can acquire from banks soon to be craters. One time hundred million in loans let say for equipment if you set up some kind of shell company.

[Broomstick]

FOOD

I found a food storage calculator from the Mormons (who elevate food storage to an art form). It's not perfect, but it's a start. All I can say is, we'll need a LOT of storage space.

If we assume we only need enough for one year, for 1,000 people that works out to:

150,000 pounds of wheat (do we have a grinding mill? Might be a good idea...)
2,5000 pounds of flour
2,5000 pounds of corn meal
2,5000 oats
2,5000 rice
2,5000 pasta (but a couple pasta machines might be a good idea, gotta do something with all that wheat...)

4,000 pounds “shortening”
2,000 pounds vegetable oil
2,000 quarts mayonnaise
1,000 quarts salad dressing
4,000 pounds peanut butter

30,000 pounds dry beans
5,0000 pounds lima beans
10,000 pounds soy beans
5,000 split pea
5,000 lentil
5,000 dry soup mix

OK, it goes on like this (and is disturbingly deficient in vegetables – they need to include vitamins and laxatives, methinks....) I'm not bothering to translate this into metric, as the number of digits left of the decimal point shows this is a lot of food no matter how you reckon it. The LDS aren't the only folks who've come up with an annual food list, either. There are more out there.

This is a shitload of food. And it's just for one year. And some of it won't keep for a decade. We'll need some forklifts to move that stuff around en masse.

MY proposal is, rather than something like dry pasta, or ground flour, we have some milling capacity installed, and some really well-equipped industrial kitchen type areas where we could make large batches of pasta and so forth. It would allow more flexibility, for one thing. And some of our dry goods will need either refrigeration and/or deep freeze to last us 10 years.

Assuming we have the power and capacity I'm all for adding variety to the above with deep-frozen vegetables, more and different grains, and lots of things like herbs and spices. As this is a stationary facility we don't have to worry about weight issues. We have a stable water supply, correct? We can make use of freeze-dried foods and canned foods as well. And meat and fish.

I'm thinking that if we arrange living units in “pods” of sorts – sort of like quasi-self-sufficient apartment blocks for people – we can have a couple week's worth of food in each, readily accessible. Once or twice a month we crank up the industrial kitchens, get stuff out of deep storage, and basically “go shopping” in the store rooms. And with the "pods" we can disperse a little, create redundancies, and basically avoid putting all eggs into one basket. We'd basically have a village.

I would also suggest some redundancy – not just one pasta machine, have several. Several grain mills. And so forth, so if one breaks down we're not screwed, we can cannibalize for spare parts if needed, and so on. Likewise, we'll want more than the minimum food as stuff happens. We also, in the course of 10 years, might wind up adding to our population one way or another (I sincerely hope we won't be decreasing in number)

Don't know if we'll be able to farm/hunt/scavenge during the emergency, but it would be nice and it would also give us something to do in the meanwhile. Not that we won't be busy with maintaining the place, but I do like to go outside once in awhile, if it's not Certain Death to do so.

[Broomstick]

Also, whilst it's theoretically possible to build exclusively underground, it'll probably create more problems than it solves.

If we're building in Nebraska we'll at least want underground storm shelters - that's part of tornado alley, after all, and prone to not only tornadoes but major thunderstorms, blizzards, etc. Site for a low water table and above flood plains.

Ventilation and drainage are going to be major technical and logistical issues, and going for prolonged periods without natural daylight is physically and psychologically unhealthy.* I'm not sure whether the best way to do this would be to build individual dwellings with their own separate disaster shelters, or go with a single large bunker and store prefabricated buildings to be assembled as soon as it's safe to go outside again, but the sooner we're out of the vault the better.

You'd want secure underground quarters for power, water, storage, and yes, living space for when it gets bad up above. This may be pretty damn cramped on a certain level, but it beats dying. Above ground build sturdy structures so when conditions allow you can expand your living quarters to ground level and get fresh air and sunshine.

I'm getting ideas for living units - anyone have a preference for single rooms or doubling up?

[HMS Sophia]

Hey look, I finally have enough posts to be involved...
Redundancy is probably for the best. Several reactors, with back up generators run on... well not internal combustion I guess. Can we locate it near a river that would survive? What back-ups would be possible really?

You can get all sort of vegetables in tins, and they'll keep for much longer than a decade. A grinding process would be good, so we can make bread. How about waterless farms (I can't remember the actual name) inside, to grow fresh vegetables and similar things?
How about a massive stock of MRE's, just in case. They're shitty, but they'll keep you alive

But we're going too need massive industrial construction too build this thing. I don't know if anyone on the board is in mining or construction, but we need them, because otherwise there is no chance we can make a space for 1000 people in a mountain.

Can I bring my wife? please?
If not, I prefer doubling up. I can't sleep on my own in a room anymore (that sounds really odd now I say it...)

[Eternal_Freedom]

If we can bring family then I dont mind doubling up

[Solauren]

Why not take over some pre-existing nuclear missile silos? I've heard the US government has/had taken to decommissioning them, and were trying to rent them out as office space and stuff.

You have to do your own reno. With $5,000,000 a month, that's not hard.

Get a few of them, one of those 8 - 10 year reactors installed in one, cables to the others, install Fridge equipment out the ass end, stalk up on food, connect it all with tunnels (obviously, they'd have to be in the same area), and instant doomsday vault.

[MKSheppard]

How many people get this offer made to them by Q?

I figure we can get ten-fifteen other sane SDNers, who got the same offer, and then work together to informally pool the resources we have to build a dispersed disaster system.

For example, I could work with Lonestar to sort of set up a VAULT 101 for the Washington DC area, while Fgalkin, Stravo, and Dalton set up VAULT 201 for the NYC area, etc.

Putting all of our eggs into a single basket is a bad idea, as it's not specified what type of disaster we'd be dealing with.

[Coyote]

Missiles silos are a good alternative. It would be cramped, again, but the same advantages of living underground would apply.

One thing to bear in mind about natural caves is that we can store perishables fairly easily if we have the right cave. It is a constant... 54 F underground, IIRC, and some caves have ice formations in them at the right levels.

[MKSheppard]

It would suck if the "great disaster" turns out to be Lindsay Lohan winning an academy award; and we all go to jail for wire and bank fraud.

So don't go overboard and make business plans for recycling the place if the event doesn't happen. Be very inquistitive of where you're getting the money, too.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Many others here are btter at the "math" and planning part than I, so my advice is more on "location location location"

My personal wish is to do something high up in the mountains, as digging into hard stone, like the Colorado Rockies, is really the way to go for protection. However we ARE on a budget, and such a place isn't just hard to get to, but would be hugely expensive for digging into sheer rock.

As for picking pre-existing locations, like a cave or an existing nuke silo. As others have mentioned it confines our locations quite a bit, if we picked a cave it would have to be in a good stable area. If we picked a silo, it would need a lot of work.

So building in a place like Nebraska is the best bet in terms of being cost effective. But I don't know if we want to go IN Nebraska. Keep in mind we want several things for a good location, chief among them a large abundance of water. Both for drinking, sewage, and for the offsite Nuclear Reactor.

I would like to recomend Rathbun Lake in Iowa. It is about the same northren location as much of Nebraska. Same over all land makeup and ground stability, but the Lake provides good resources, It was created by a damming the Chariton river. Another nice thing is while it coveres over 17.2 square miles, it's deepest point is only 50ft deep, so easy to work with.

Something else, someone mentioned the psychologically effects of being underground for prolonged periods of time. Might I suggest "Sun Windows" the silohouse used something similar to these. Basically a Sun Window is a light cut in the wall and made to look like a Window that gives of light and a small bit of UV light like the sun. They are also linked to the solar cycle, so they grow brighter from morning to afternoon, then dim going into the evening. Thus mimicking a natural solar cycle while underground.

As an aside, on the topic of building underground, might I suggest a peak at a recent thread of mine concerning Depth-scapers which basically explored building large buildings fully underground.

[aerius]

If I have to bring SDNet I'm building a giant gas chamber

Actually you save them for zombie bait, bear food, or sacrificial victims to test radiation and food safety. You take a look at the people and see who had useful skills, frankly that's not going to be too many of us, everyone else is either expendable or slave labour.

[Coyote]

How about unconventional wisdom! A fleet of super-Zeppelins, powered by small nuclear reactors, to live in as a survival armada in the skies-- casually cruising above the chaos, destruction, and zombies as we seek shelter!

We can even call one of the Zepps "Galactica".

[Broomstick]

How about waterless farms (I can't remember the actual name) inside, to grow fresh vegetables and similar things?

If you mean "soil-less farms" it's called hydroponics. I have a set up running in the apartment above me right now. Should be getting a half kilo of chard out of it by the end of the month.

You can't grow stuff without water, silly

No reason we can't have multiple hydroponics set ups - multiples would be best, at some distance from each other as one fungus infection can ruin your whole crop in just a couple days. Yay! I could finally afford a really modern set up with precise nutrient mixes and computer controlled flows.

If we get really ambitious we can do aquaponics, which brings fish into the mix. We have at least one SD.netter who has done that.

How about a massive stock of MRE's, just in case. They're shitty, but they'll keep you alive

Excellent as emergency food backup, but if we're in this for 10 years our morale will require better/more appetizing choices.

But we're going too need massive industrial construction too build this thing. I don't know if anyone on the board is in mining or construction, but we need them, because otherwise there is no chance we can make a space for 1000 people in a mountain.

We have some construction types. Don't know about mining.

Can I bring my wife? please?

Fine by me

If not, I prefer doubling up. I can't sleep on my own in a room anymore (that sounds really odd now I say it...)

Naw - after 20 years of marriage I have trouble sleeping if I'm the only person in the room, too. Unless the Other Half is snoring like a cement mixer. Admittedly, I can snore pretty good, too, on occassion.

Next question - are we going to allow pets? Livestock?

[Eternal_Freedom]

That is an awesome, if impractical idea.

If it were a nuclear disaster type of thing, what if we built our bunker on a lake-bed somewhere? I can't help but think all that water would be great radiation shielding, as well as a source of water for drinking/cooking/cleaning whatever. Obviously we need some kind of tunnel to the surface, but thats a minor detail.

[MKSheppard]

As for VAULT 101, I will investigate repurposing an old mine in Maryland/Virginia. I'm sure we can find one of the appropriate size that can be opened up with additional "mining" by a dummy corporation.

Best part is, the dummy corporation might not be a dummy after all. We could actually turn a marginal profit on the mining that opens up larger rooms for our use in the run up to 2016.

[Broomstick]

Actually you save them for zombie bait, bear food, or sacrificial victims to test radiation and food safety. You take a look at the people and see who had useful skills, frankly that's not going to be too many of us, everyone else is either expendable or slave labour.

Untrue.

First of all, some grunt labor will be necessary – who do you think will cook, clean, haul stuff out of storage, perform maintenance, etc?

Reasonably intelligent people can be trained as back up to those with essential skills.

We'll need some human “raw material” for a variety of purposes, many of them non-destructive.

How about unconventional wisdom! A fleet of super-Zeppelins, powered by small nuclear reactors, to live in as a survival armada in the skies-- casually cruising above the chaos, destruction, and zombies as we seek shelter!

We can even call one of the Zepps "Galactica".

Hey, I'm a pilot and I think that's crazy. Well, not totally, a few aircraft would be useful to have, but zepps are terrible in bad weather (it's how most of those that have crashed have come to an end). For reconnaissance and transport in good weather they're fine, but for riding out the apocalypse? Not so much. Well, maybe the zombie apocalypse, since they won't be able to reach you, but not anything that stirs up the atmosphere.

I do recommend a couple of lightweight aircraft. They're darn handy. Emphasis on bush planes. You can get engines for these these days that run on either diesel or ethanol, as well as standard ground vehicle gasoline which will cut down on the require varieties of fuel stocks needed.

Include Microsoft Flight Simulator in the software inventory – it's good enough for simulation purposes and I could use it to train other folks to pilot in a pinch while we're waiting out the Bad Stuff. When things improve we can get them some real airtime so they'll be adequate pilots, if they have the sense to avoid bad weather. Not that we don't have other pilots in SD.net, but maximum cross-training in skills is desirable, and will keep us busy while locked down.

[aerius]

How about unconventional wisdom! A fleet of super-Zeppelins, powered by small nuclear reactors, to live in as a survival armada in the skies-- casually cruising above the chaos, destruction, and zombies as we seek shelter!

Nah, I say we lease a few large ships and become pirates. One of them should be a cruise ship so we can live in luxury.