As part of driving across the southern states back to CA, we drove by Tucson, and on my list of things to do, was the Tucson Titan Missile Museum which I found out later is, I believe, the only (former) genuine 9 megaton class ICBM site in the world, that you can visit (the newer ICBMs are much smaller).
Titan missiles were back when the US ICBM arsenal was only 54 missiles with very high yield (9 megaton). They were, for the times, very precise missiles that were guided at takeoff and then fully ballistic once their takeoff fuel ran out. They have since then been replaced by hundreds of smaller minuteman missiles of 150 kilotons each.
All the titans sites were destroyed except for this one, and the ICBMs were mostly re-used as rockets to launch other payloads. This makes this site and one remaining display rocket, very unique, and it was very cool that we were able to visit them (they also had just re-opened after a lengthy covid closure).
To learn more about those weapons, and how things could have gone very wrong with them, watch comand and control
It was great that we were able to visit after arriving in Tucson:
this is the actual size of the warhead
they also have a very nice short RF antenna
Outside is unassuming:
but if you look through the right window, you see the titan missile, impressive view
a few side displays
But after a set of stairs, we got down, and it was really cool:
the whole room is kept completely level
I won mission commander
the launch key was actually pretty simple
ready to launch
missile launched
From there, we had a look at the missile launch room across the corridor:
Definitely a special experience, really happy we got to see this.
