Malta's Hand-Hewn Bomb Shelter Tunnels
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 21 ต.ค. 2024
- / forgottenweapons
Cool Forgotten Weapons merch! shop.bbtv.com/c...
During World War Two, the Grand Harbor in Malta was the most-bombed place in the world, under aerial bombardment for two full years because of its position as a central Mediterranean base for British air and sea forces. While these attacks were focused on the harbor facilities, most of the island's population lived right in the same area, and civilian casualties during the war were substantial. In an effort to safeguard the population, a vast number of underground bomb shelter tunnels were dug.
The island of Malta is mostly relatively soft limestone, and the Maltese are quite experienced in working it, after millenia of quarrying limestone to build structures and digging it out to make cisterns and wells. This allowed an otherwise enormous project to be successful - using mostly hand tools, enough shelters were dug to safely house the entire at-risk population. Many of these shelters and shelter complexes are open to the public today, including the system under the Malta At War Museum, which we are visiting today...
I am grateful for the Malta Tourism Authority's assistance in helping to make this visit and video possible!
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
6281 N Oracle #36270
Tucson, AZ 85704
![[UNCUT] บอสพอล แผลงฤทธิ์ บอสพระ-นักร้อง ก. โดนแฉยับ! I คนดังนั่งเคลียร์ I 21 ต.ค. 67](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/XKf6HeftoPI/mqdefault.jpg)
Hi Ian, I know it's only a tiny footnote in the history of the war and the Island, but are you aware of the story of the Mosta Dome during the Second World War?
For anyone unaware, the Mosta Dome (or Basilica of the Assumption of Our Lady, more officially) is in, as you'd expect, Mosta, a town just to the center North West of the island. Due to it's proximity to the nearby airbase RAF Ta Kali, the town was unfortunately prone to getting stray Luftwaffe strikes. On April 9th, 1942, three 500kg bombs were dropped on the church at about 5PM, when around 300 people were inside awaiting evening mass. Two deflected without exploding, and one actually pierced the dome, landing inside the church. Amazingly, it didn't go off, and Royal Engineers defused it and dumped it in the sea off the West coast. It's claimed by the local inhabitants to be a miracle unsurprisingly, and either a replica or a deactivated bomb of a similar type is on display in the church to this day with a plaque reading "The Bomb Miracle, 9th April 1942"
I remember visiting the island as a 9 year old, and seeing the dome, on the inside, you can still see a bit in the roof where the finish on the brickwork is not as worn as the rest, from where the hole caused by the bomb was patched up later on. Like I said, it's only a tiny piece of the war, especially on Malta, but it's an interesting thing nonetheless!
J45ON96 in the Mosta Dome is a bomb down on the roof inside
My Grandmother is Maltese and lives in Mosta!
Honeslty, I don't blame anyone for believing that was a miracle. I'd probably convert if that happened to me.
Its also full of Caravaggio paintings.
J45ON96 Been there myself, while on holiday lovely building.
The survival of Malta is a testament to the resilience of the Maltese people in the face of what must have seemed to be an overwhelming situation.
My Mother worked in Malta just after WW2. She worked for the man who had been Minister of Health at the time. Malta is extremely hot in summer so being packed down those tunnels , lit by oil lamps or candles, the oxygen supply got very short. Two main problems were depleted oxygen and heat stroke. American and British merchant ships attempted to re supply the island, which at one point in 1942 was two weeks from surrender. The Royal Navy launched Operation Pedestal to relive the Island. Including one of the mostt famous merchant ship of all time the American tanker SS Ohio.
i've seen some picture of this tanker in the port, it's quite impressive
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Ohio
"But, she's not a ship of war, sir." "Isn't she?" th-cam.com/video/iMVn_3HfSRI/w-d-xo.html That scene is still affecting, more than six decades after it was filmed.
Every time I saw the tool marks on the stone I wondered about the story of each individual who made them
Jim Forehand I get that! Or like in the maternity ward, how many were actually born underground? Who were they? How did they develop, with their first experience of the world being underground in a dim room during an air raid? Did it affect them growing up at all? Kind of creepy to me actually, the idea of being born in a tunnel. Kind of like in the post-apocalyptic book/game series Metro (2033) where there are generations being born to survivors in the Moscow Metro who have no experience of what life was like on the surface. At least on Malta they could go back up when the air raids and war ended!
Great video again Ian, a physical testament to the horrors of war and the tenacity and ingenuity of the Maltese people.
Really enjoy these extra's from forgotten weapons. Covers my hobby, which is visiting Historic battle sites, and reading about Military history.
Malta is an absolutely lovely island. My grandfather was stationed there when he did his national service in the 1950s.
Well done Ian! A very good clip on the importance of shelters during WWII in Malta. It is enlightening, informative and very clear. The fact that they were all hand made is amazing!
My ship pulled in there waaaaay back in 2007. My first port visit, and I have always wanted to go back. We were tied up to the pier juuuust out of frame from Ian's left shoulder.
This was really cool to see, there are still so many things I don't know about the war and I have to thank you for putting out such great informative videos. It's really cool to see stuff like this showing off how people can come together to accomplish truly amazing things when in times of need.
I love the video's you've put up about Malta. I'm half Maltese and its probably the closest I'll ever get to seeing Malta. It looks like a really beautiful country!
I’m going to Malta in October, I’ll be sure to check these out.
“Churchill and Malta’s War” by Douglas Austin does a great job of illustrating the strategic importance of Malta and how heavily it weighed on the minds of the British Navy and Churchill himself.
Thanks man, its nice to see that someone has an interest in Malta, i’ve never been there but i still feel very connected to Malta, as im a Maltese myself in genetics. Chit-chat aside though, i think that Malta didn’t deserve what oppression it has been through.
Fascinating! Thanks for sharing these pieces of WW1 & WW2 history with us as you tour Europe and the Med!
Thanks Ian. I have seen pictures of these shelters, but this is the best viewing I've been able to find of them.
A few years ago we spent a night in one of those while vacationing there. Not sure that was complety allowed but it was fun.
Great video, It is good to see the Maltese are opening some up to visitors, in all my time on the Island you had to know someone that had access to visit a shelter as most had been sealed. It was interesting then with out all displays. Well done.
Thank you Malta Tourism Board.
Oh man, I lived there from 1997-1999, and ALL THOSE CRANES were there back then too! Our landlord had a mushroom farm in some of those tunnels. Including the grounding strips from the old hospitals way back then. You poke around long enough, you can- or could- find rusting chunks of bomb splinters.
Well done, this really adds to your programs!
Oooh my country is featured here!
Matthew Aq are you grandayy
No mention of pastizzi though :(
Matthew Aq ...greetings from the U.S. 😀 Incredible resilience of your people during WWII. !
I went down years ago to Malta, and visited the churchil secret room, where the generals and high command planned and and that place is amazing, with tons of history and would be so nice if you had a video done there.
How did they solve the ventilation?
I got chills simply from you entering the tunnels with the air raid sound because I could imagine seeking shelter from the raid...10/10 immersive gameplay!
10/10 IGN
Since you are from Arizona, have you considered a video on the Titan II silo south of Tuscon?
Haha.. "entertainment" for British sailors... Yeah, I see what you did there... ; )
The Gut.
a sailor is a sailor... He'll find his own trouble... ;)
Great stuff, really adds to the depth of your site, so many interesting structures to explore, more please!
Gotta love the Forgotten History series!
Thanks for the awesome content
Good video! Malta is on my list aswell. So much history on such alittle island.
well done Sir ,not many people know about "fortress" Malta ,thank you .
Dam I really enjoy these guys videos
Love the history content.
Possibly more than the gun content.
Another amazing video thank you so much and I am deftly going to be visiting Malta
Thomas Rice
I Would Love To Visit Malta For Their History & Culture!!
Another interesting and informative video Ian! I appreciate and share your passion of history!
This is so cool. These travel videos are fascinating
Being a American living in Malta for ten years. I call it fortress Malta. It's a mentally. My wife's grandmother's house was 500 years old. And had walls a yard thick. Solid iron bars that made the front door impossible to knock down. There is no knocking down of doors here. Mom and dads door has 4 main bolts at lock and bars that lock all four corners of door to stone. Modern construction uses concrete blocks. When my wife came to the U.S. she was amazed we had a glass door.
thank you for this, and huge props for your dedication
Great sunnies Ian, very slick.
I really enjoy your work Ian.
I'm claustrophobic just watching this.
Boreas74 And the air raid siren really makes it even more uncomfortable.
Cool video, I had no idea such structures existed, gives a vivid look into the hell that was WWII for the folks in Europe. Thanks for the tour, something I could never do, because of lack of funding and one nasty case of claustrophobia, watching this video was almost enough for me to begin to sweat and breath heavily whilst looking for a way out that I could run for.
That was genuinely fascinating!
One of my grandmother's was a child in Malta tbh it's not the bombing but the starvation stories she tells that are the most disturbing
Ian is clearly having a great summer travelling around Europe.
Nice to hear you say Royal Navy not British Navy.
Because of the capital expense it was a Royal enterprise. As opposed to the British Army, which is part of the British People.
“Entertaining sailors on shore leave.”
So brothels.
The whole city was brothels...
TacticalLumberjack brothels and tunnels
Brothels in tunnels
ggerely tunnels that took you to brothels
... and pubs (with brothels). Just sayin'...
TacticalLumberjack And tunnels you`d only find in brothels
Wow that's really a cool piece of history. Thank you for bringing it to us.
Love the Forgotten History stuff! Definitely keep it up, you make everything interesting.
James Holland did a great book on Malta in ww2. It's interesting reading the early chapters where the people of the island knew Italy would get involved. And yet many knew Italians and there were lots of Italian sympathisers on the island... Not shocking given the Italian coast was so close. It was a hellish place a lot of the time, Malta dog being a vivid example of how hard life was there.
One cannot really get a full picture of the war in North Africa without fully understanding the struggle for Malta 🇲🇹 and what a tremendous thorn in the side of the Italians & Germans it was as well as what a huge obligation it was for the British.
I would highly recommend “Churchill and Malta’s War” by Douglas Austin
Nice tour, thank you
Did anyone else see the face staring out of that section he showcased as to how they dug out the tunnels? Spooky. My worry would be the collapse of soft rock tunnels during heavy bombing. I once got jammed in a tight spot in a cave, with help I was able to out but I never went caving again and 35+ years later I can still feel the terror and panic. I got slightly anxious just watching how tight those corridors were.
I need a Forgotten Battles Channel with onsite tours presented by Ian M.
That seams an incredible place to spend hours wandering, also, I read the title as "hand held" lol
Me and my partner whent tp malta earlier on this year and really enjoyed it, population is very friendly and there is a lot of history, melilla is a very nice place to stay with some great ww2 bunkers
oh my god, im stayin in meliha. can gou tell me.where to search for bunkers and some interesting stuff
@@stefanristic8180 as you come from the north along the bus route, at the top hill you will see a some steps to the right of you, up those steps is an air raid shelter, its a little hidden away but easy to find, hope that helps
Absolutely fascinating. Thanks, Ian
Great historical episode from FW.
How did they prevent the entrance being blocked by collapsing buildings ? or where there multiple entrances ?
likely
They would probably mine their way out since the buildings were mostly made of limestone.
Ben Sutcliffe - will take a while but so did the bombardments i understood
I am guessing that there were multiple entrances if they were large enough to warrant them anyway.
So many people go in my area (North area of Ontario, Canada) go for Holiday in Florida, or Dominica, or of course Cuba .. so boring! .. I'd love to go to places like Malta and see things like this!
Well done, very interesting. Thank you
Many houses in Malta also have their own private shelters. Most have been sealed and forgotten after the war but are now being found while renovating. Multiple houses may also share a large shelter between them. My hometown Senglea most probably would look like swiss cheese if a they were to scan it lol.
Thank you for these sorts of vids.
For the Americans who are watching and are curious to know more, watch the 1953 movie "The Malta Story". Obi Wan Kenobi is the main character and it features news reel footage in it of the attacks as well as citizens in the shelters. And a little bit of searching turned up where you can watch it in your browser.
archive.org/details/MaltaStory
it's amazing what we can do when people work together.
Ian please do more Forgotten History!
Wow, this is a remarkable WWII story I had not heard. In accounts of the bombing of Malta all most histories I have read is, "and the people went into the bomb shelters."
"Tufa" I believe it's called is like a dense clay, soft until it's exposed to air it then hardens to stone.
Very impressive. I now want tunnels under my house (more for fun than shelter) but I fear our geography might be a little trickier to tunnel in.
Watching this on my honeymoon in Malta. Fascinating stuff! This island was probably had the best submarine bases ever for the Royal navy, a lot of their submarine aces sailed from here to attack axis supply and troop ships.
I love how new videos for all the different gun channels I'm subd to don't appear for almost 24hrs after they come out. Also lots of gun channels are being unsubed randomly without my knowledge.
I went through all of Ian's Mlata videos to get destination tips
My great uncle was telling me that you would have to essentially purchase your space in the rock for your personal or family's shelter. They handed you tools if you didnt have any and they would then point to where you were to dig
Thank you for doing this video. I'm Maltese on my mother's side and very few people realize or recognize the historical significance of Malta in WW2. It's a beautiful island with a lot of history to it and it's refreshing to see someone such as yourself do a video on it
Malta was the key to the Mediterranean which would have unlocked Africa to the Germans. History would have been quite different and probably not as freedom loving as it is today had Malta fell.
Great video, really love your "slightly offtopic" videos.
One thing I'm asking myself is, how did they get sufficient supply of air down there? In my experience especially in overcrowded places, illuminated by fire, this is a huge problem.
the lord of content! "we're not worthy! we're not worthy!"
I read somewhere that Malta was in shortwave radio contact with Corrogidor in the Philippines, at the time the two most bombed places on Earth.
Knights Hospitaller! The knights of Malta rule!!! Thanks for your history. Your rule!!!
Great video. You should do something on the SS Ohio while you are there. It’s the best story from WW2 Malta, and there are artifacts at the national museum there.
I do hope so! The story of SS Ohio and the rest of the men US and British in Operation Pedestal is awe inspiring.
Not to ignore the huge contributions of the US to the war, but Pedestal was a British operation, even the Ohio had a British crew.
It's a story so amazing that even if they stuck purely to the facts people would think it was Hollywood BS .
Pat G
Oh absolutely. It was 99% British, though there were three American manned merchantmen in the convoy. Two crewman from the SS Santa Elisa, picked up after their ship was sunk, ended up earning the Merchant Marine equivalent of the Medal of Honor by manning the Ohio's AA guns during the final two days of the voyage. Frederick August Larsen Jr. and Francis A. Dales.
It would be good to have an American star or two in the cast to boost box office?
Edit: some of the merchant ships were Australian, so the crews likely were too?
I dont know that he is still there; he has a back log of videos that he pulls from for daily uploads. This could have easily been filmed 6 months ago
Damn is that place claustrophobic... but still an incredibly cool piece of history!
Another (unintended) advantage to the olive oil lamps, would be that they'd make the whole place smell like warm olive oil...which would probably be preferable to the smell of a large number of people who've been confined to a small space for many hours.
I guess the smell of BURNED (sorry for high caps, i don't know how to underscore) olive oil were more likely dominant :D
Malta defened by bunkers, as well as Faith, Hope, and Charity.
Plus Spitfires, Fulmars and Beufighters flown in by RAF from RN carriers. There is a film The Malta Story made in 1953, .
One crazy bastard.
Und der USS Hornet....
Hmmmmm....considering Buzz didn't arrive until June 1942; the Spits didn't arrive until the (EDIT: NOT HORNET-eh one bug sounds much like another) THE WASP brought in a batch of 47 in April 20 1942.
OK Lemmie flesh things out HMS Eagle (she was the only ship available that could manage the spits) brought in 15 on March 7 1942. On March 21st, Eagle brought in another 9 spits then on March 29, She brought in 7 more-but it wasn't enough. The Hornet brought in the 47 on April 20, then on May 9, 1942, Hornet & Eagle together sent 64 spits to Malta;--and THAT really helped. Later on in a series of missions thru June thru August 1942 Eagle & HMS Furious ferried over 250 spits to Malta.
Right...it was the OTHER stinging insect.
Love this side series!
Eisenhower spent some in them and hated being there.
What about sanitation issues? Did the rely on chamber pots, central relief stations, etc? I can only imagine that sanitation concerns were a major issue for these prolonged stays due to relentless bombardments.
My beloved late grandfather served there during the siege
Makes me want to visit.
Note to would be conquerors- Malta is nearly impossible to take. The entire island is a centuries old fortress, and has withstood worse that what you can throw at it
I misread the title as Hand-Strewn. I was morbidly curious to see why there were severed hands littering the shelters until I had a closer look.
What about the... rest rooms? If confined underground for as long as 12 hours, some relief was surely required.
Interesting...would love to have a home there! You could store a lot of items in those cellars (wine, food, some water you want to remain cool etc., hell even an emergency generator (as long as you get the exhaust gasses out of therse...poisoning yourself isn't a great idea!), a battery-bank etc. :) )
One of the biggest Axis mistakes is dropping the ball on taking Malta. It wouldn't have taken much more effort from the Italians to break it, and it's value to the Allies was incalculable.
There is a good film *The Malta Story* (1953) some of it shot in the actual tunnels and shelters.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malta_Story
Hi Ian. Always love your documentaries. Lockdown gave me plenty of time to expand my knowledge base. I am an artist and sculptor. I have always wanted to do a series of sculptors of belly buttons by the sea. If anyone asked i would tell them its a naval installation.
My grandmother used to live in a bunker that was carved into the cliffs nothing glamorous just 2 to 3 Room
Crackatowa.
Heard around the world 3x.
Atlantis time line reset with stolen Abomb.
- no sun for 2 weeks - dirt in upper atmosphere.
Was the death core from the trinity project.
Very interesting film.
I am probably horrible for this thought, but this is basically a real life version of Dwarf Fortress.
Thanks for sharing .
A 6x6x6 dugout room for you and your family. Not exactly roomy but probably a welcome change.
Veri interesting place and history.