![]() īy 1947 the word was familiar enough in English that Hugh Trevor-Roper in The Last Days of Hitler was describing Hitler's underground complex near the Reich Chancellery as "Hitler's own bunker" without quotes around the word bunker. However, in the Far East the term was also applied to the earth and log positions built by the Japanese, the term appearing in a 1943 instruction manual issued by the British Indian Army and quickly gaining wide currency. ![]() All the early references to its usage in the Oxford English Dictionary are to German fortifications. The military sense of the word was imported into English during World War II, at first in reference to specifically German dug-outs according to the Oxford English Dictionary, the sense of "military dug-out a reinforced concrete shelter" is first recorded on 13 October 1939, in "A Nazi field gun hidden in a cemented 'bunker' on the Western front". By the Second World War the term came to be used by the Germans to describe permanent structures both large: blockhouse, and small: pillbox, and to bombproof shelters both above ground (as in Hochbunker) and below ground (such as the Führerbunker). ![]() In the First World War the belligerents built underground shelters, called dugouts in English, while the Germans used the term Bunker. ![]() It was also used for a sand-filled depression installed on a golf course as a hazard. In the 19th century the word came to describe a coal store in a house, or below decks in a ship. The word possibly has a Scandinavian origin: Old Swedish bunke means "boards used to protect the cargo of a ship". The word bunker originates as a Scots word for "bench, seat" recorded 1758, alongside shortened bunk "sleeping berth". Bunkers can be destroyed with powerful explosives and bunker-busting warheads. In bunkers inhabited for prolonged periods, large amounts of ventilation or air conditioning must be provided. Nuclear bunkers must also cope with the underpressure that lasts for several seconds after the shock wave passes, and block radiation.Ī bunker's door must be at least as strong as the walls. Bunkers deflect the blast wave from nearby explosions to prevent ear and internal injuries to people sheltering in the bunker. When a house is purpose-built with a bunker, the normal location is a reinforced below-ground bathroom with fiber-reinforced plastic shells. Typical industrial bunkers include mining sites, food storage areas, dumps for materials, data storage, and sometimes living quarters. Many artillery installations, especially for coastal artillery, have historically been protected by extensive bunker systems. Trench bunkers are small concrete structures, partly dug into the ground. Bunkers can also be used as protection from tornadoes. They were used extensively in World War I, World War II, and the Cold War for weapons facilities, command and control centers, and storage facilities. Bunkers are almost always underground, in contrast to blockhouses which are mostly above ground. The north entrance to the Cheyenne Mountain Complex in Colorado, United StatesĪ bunker is a defensive military fortification designed to protect people and valued materials from falling bombs, artillery, or other attacks.
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