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National Park Mystery Photo 11 Revealed: We Deliver Anywhere in the World in 30 Minutes or Less, Or the Next One is Free

Submitted by Kurt Repanshek on July 17, 2009 - 3:00am

An heirloom of the Cold War, Minuteman Missile National Historic Park is a place that both amazes and chills you. It's amazing in the sheer size of the underground missile silos. It chills you with the sheer thought of what those silos were poised to do.

As the National Park Service puts it:

The Cold War lives on at Minuteman Missile NHS! Minuteman missiles held the power to destroy civilization. Yet the same destructive force acted as a nuclear deterrent which kept the peace for three decades. At Minuteman Missile it is possible to learn how nuclear war came to haunt the world.

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Did You Know?
Minuteman Missiles were considered technological wonders because they were the United States first solid fueled intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) which allowed for: a) hair-trigger launch response b) precise accuracy c) remotely controlled and d) could be mass-produced.

The Mystery Photo that was so quickly revealed Thursday was indeed a shot of Launch Control Center Delta-01. We thought of using the "We deliver in 30 minutes or less" photo for this week's photo, but it would have been much too easily figured out. As for the shot of Launch Control Center Delta-01, if you're wondering why the chairs are on tracks, that's to enable the missileers to quickly move back and forth across their control panels.

Cold War trivia: For missiles to be launched, the two officers in the launch centers needed to turn their launch keys simultaneously. The chairs were positioned just far enough apart so a renegade missileer couldn't incapacitate his colleague and launch an ICBM by himself.