Mount Weather

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Mount Weather Emergency Operations Center
Photo courtesy FEMA

The Mount Weather Emergency Operations Center is a U.S. government facility located off Virginia Highway 601 near Bluemont, Virginia. The U.S. government has revealed little about Mount Weather to date, although it has acknowledged its basic existence and stated purpose. It houses operations and training facilities above ground for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and contains an underground facility designed to house key components of the American government in the case of nuclear warfare or other calamity.

Mount Weather is a central part of the American Continuity of Operations Plan. During the September 11, 2001 attacks a line of government cars and limousines with police escort was seen heading from Washington D.C. to Mount Weather.

The site gained wider public recognition when The Washington Post mentioned the government facility while reporting on the December 1, 1974 crash into Mount Weather of Flight 514, a TWA Boeing 727 [1].

It has been suggested that Vice President Dick Cheney has been at Mount Weather from time to time since the September 11, 2001 attacks, as it is the quintessential "secure undisclosed location," [2] though he was known to have taken shelter at the Site R (Raven Rock) installation in the days immediately following the attacks. Since September 11, 2001 Mount Weather has seen a dramatic increase in staffing and support.

As of 2006, FEMA has 673 civilian employees assigned to Mount Weather, most of them in the Operations and Maintenance, Emergency Services, or Information Technology departments.[citation needed] The Department of Homeland Security even operates a fire department at the Mt. Weather site, Mount Weather Fire & Rescue Company 21. Their first due area is Mount Weather itself but they also respond to areas of both Clarke and Loudoun Counties as Company 21 under mutual aid agreements.

A similar facility was long maintained at Greenbrier Resort. It is believed that Mount Weather has largely assumed the functions of the facility at the Greenbrier since that shelter was decommissioned.

Contents

[edit] Mount Weather in the media

  • Both Mount Weather and Greenbrier Resort were featured in the A&E documentary "Bunkers". The documentary, which first aired on October 23, 2001 features extensive interviews with engineers, as well as political and intelligence analysts providing rare insights into these super-secret installation while making a comparison of the Greenbrier and Mount Weather to Saddam Hussein's French-built control bunker buried beneath Baghdad, Iraq. The documentary features interior video of the Greenbrier as well as the Baghdad bunker, which survived direct hits from seven Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) bombs during the early stages of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
  • Mt. Weather was the inspiration for the "Mount Thunder" command post in the best-selling 1962 spy thriller Seven Days In May.
  • A facility similar to Mount Weather is featured in the beginning of the movie "The Sum of All Fears", based on the Tom Clancy novel of the same name. The fictional U.S. president is taken to the facility located inside Sugarloaf Mountain in Maryland after the movie's opening sequence to rehearse emergency operation plans after a Russian nuclear attack.

[edit] See also

[edit] Sources

  • A&E Productions "Modern Marvels-Bunkers" http://store.aetv.com/html/product/index.jhtml?id=75147
  • Emerson, Steven, "America's Doomsday Project," US News and World Report, 7 August 1989, pages 26-31.
  • Gup, Ted, "Doomsday Hideaway," Time, 9 December 1991, pages 26-29.
  • Gup, Ted, "The Doomsday Blueprints," Time, 10 August 1992, pages 32-39.

[edit] External links

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