Four Minute Warning
After the Second World War, as the Iron Curtain descended across Europe, a chain of nuclear
bunkers was built around the coast of Britain. They were a response to the growing nuclear threat
from the Soviet Union and were intended to act as ‘Ground Control Interception’ early warning radar stations, and as centres of regional government and administration in the event of nuclear war. Our building, an imposing concrete lump hidden away in the downs above the pretty Cornish fishing village of Coverack, looked out to the Atlantic approaches – waiting to give the dreaded ‘four minute warning’ of an impending Soviet attack.