{"id":47703,"date":"2022-06-13T23:19:21","date_gmt":"2022-06-13T21:19:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/?p=47703"},"modified":"2022-06-22T21:31:35","modified_gmt":"2022-06-22T19:31:35","slug":"an-abandoned-air-base-and-a-large-submarine-base-in-a-small-country-in-europe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/06\/13\/an-abandoned-air-base-and-a-large-submarine-base-in-a-small-country-in-europe\/","title":{"rendered":"An abandoned air base and a large submarine base in a small country in Europe"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Albania is one of the smallest and poorest countries in Europe, and is also a magnet for urban explorers fond of military themes.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/06\/12\/an-impressive-tour-of-gibraltars-massive-underground-military-depots\/\">An impressive tour of Gibraltar's massive underground military depots<\/a><\/rel><br \/>\n<rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/05\/30\/visiting-the-last-silo-of-a-titan-ii-nuclear-missile-where-you-can-still-see-this-icbm\/\">Visiting the last silo of a Titan II nuclear missile where you can still see this ICBM<\/a><\/rel><\/p>\n<p>During the communist dictatorship of Enver Hoxha, <strong>Albania became a practically hermetic country.<\/strong> Because the dictator remained faithful to Stalinism, he considered the de-Stalinization initiated by Khrushchev in the USSR a betrayal, so in 1961 the Soviet dictatorship and the other members of the Warsaw Pact broke off relations with Albania, isolating that country, which aligned with Mao's China. <strong>Hoxha became obsessed with militarizing the country<\/strong>, fearing a possible attack from both NATO and the Warsaw Pact. <strong>The country was filled with small bunkers (approximately 173,000)<\/strong> and armed far beyond its means (in 1960 it had only 1.6 million inhabitants).<\/p>\n<p>Yesterday, the YouTube channel <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/c\/ExploringtheUnbeatenPath\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Exploring the Unbeaten Path<\/a> published <strong>an interesting video in which a group of urban explorers visit two vestiges of that Albanian communist past:<\/strong> an old air base and an abandoned submarine base.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"665\" height=\"374\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/r6GOEZQSxHA\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>The air base featured in the video is Ku\u00e7ov\u00eb<\/strong>, in central Albania. It is very famous (it has even appeared on the BBC's \"Top Gear\" programme). It was built in 1952 and <strong>still belongs to the Albanian Air Force, so it is still under surveillance.<\/strong> In the video you can see the old MiG-15, MiG-19 and Shenyang F-5 and F-6 fighters that are stacked on the base:<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52143198827_babc4cf49a_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Without a doubt, one of the most impressive moments in the video is an exploration of<strong> an old submarine base, with huge armored doors.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52144219261_0e6a4c12ce_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>This is the so-called Porto Palermo Tunnel<\/strong>, built in 1969 on the southern coast of Albania and used to house the <strong>four Soviet-made Whiskey-class submarines<\/strong> that the Albanian Navy had during the communist era.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52144240878_75f3a61190_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>The dimensions of the base are enormous<\/strong>, as seen in these two video captures, and it must be said that it is still a military zone (but it is seen that it is not closely guarded).<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52144702875_11f4f93410_b.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>The base was abandoned in 1998.<\/strong> The four submarines are still at the Pashaliman naval base.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Albania is one of the smallest and poorest countries in Europe, and is also a magnet for urban explorers fond of military themes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[12876,16877],"tags":[5069,16802,16803,13921,10444,12683,16804,13141,6444,16805,6448,6447],"class_list":["post-47703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-excluir-de-anotaciones-eng","category-ruins","tag-albania","tag-albanian-air-force","tag-albanian-navy","tag-cold-war","tag-communism","tag-enver-hoxha","tag-kucove-air-base","tag-mikoyan-gurevich-mig-15","tag-mikoyan-gurevich-mig-19","tag-porto-palermo-tunnel","tag-shenyang-f-5","tag-shenyang-f-6"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47703"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47703"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47703\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}