Bunker 42 under the streets of Moscow

Stalin's bunker or Bunker 42 was designed and built after an initial series of nuclear tests, these tests revealed that the optimal depth for the site should not exceed 165 feet underground in order to survive a nuclear attack.

The task for the builders was enormous: to build a gigantic structure under the streets of the city without damaging the existing infrastructure in the capital, as well as roads and communication routes. To do so they would have had to warn the population and indirectly countless unknown spies about the existence of the underground bunker, thus making the whole matter initially declared "top secret" useless.

It is strategically located within a hill in the Tagansky neighborhood due to its proximity to the Kremlin, it allowed Stalin and top-level government officials quick access.

Bunker 42 was not completed until 1956 and was fortunately never put into use in its full capacity. Rather, it spent the next three decades as an "airstrike" command base, communicating with strategic bombers, which carried nuclear weapons, until 1986 when the political climate began to change somewhat.

Up to 3,000 people could have lived and worked at the complex for 90 days without assistance from the outside world thanks to supplies of food and medicine, an air recycling system and diesel generators. The workers would reach the facility via the Taganskaya metro station, via special trains that operated only at night.

Taganka is just one of over 40 bunkers scattered under the Russian capital, never open to the public. Bunker 42 was opened to the public recently, precisely in 2006, becoming a "cold war museum", a pilgrimage destination for many tourists visiting Moscow. The only objects left unchanged are a massive steel door and steel panels of the bunker itself.

From April 2007, it is possible to book excursions along the 600 meter long tunnel network.