I was watching a documentary about Aerojet Dade Rocket Facility last night
Long since abandoned in the Everglades. I could not believe what had been left behind. Fascinating buildings, very derelict and badly damaged. There is a manmade canal alongside the buildings that would have transported the rockets to the Atlantic on barges then up to Cape Canaveral.
They had developed solid rocket fuel powered rockes for the Saturn 5, tested it and got everything ready only for NASA to pull the plug on them and change to liquid fuel instead.
So you now have all these buildings left to fall to bits, stripped of every piece of equipment....and this very large slab of concrete.
When they cleared out the premises in the late 1960's, they left the solid fuel rocket behind. Unusually...and so it didn't go walkies when tested...they had the rocket placed upside down in a very deep silo, so when testing it, the flames from the exhaust shot upwards into the sky and the rocket itself was contained and if by chance it exploded, it would not do too much damage or fly off anywhere uncommanded.
The rocket is still there, hidden under the concrete slab. The silo is 75% full of Everglades water now...it had pumps to keep it dry when in use, but those pumps have not run for almost 50 years.
So you have this full size, solid fuel rocket, upside down in a silo filling with water and a manmade canal close by that goes to the Atlantic.
If water gets into the silo, pollution must be getting out......and solid fuel rockets (like those used on the Shuttle at takeoff) are not small and they don't do well in water....
This rocket facility located in the Everglades was built by Aerojet General in the 60s to construct a rocket which would go to the moon.
www.abandonedfl.com
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