Everglades National Park opens historic missile base for tours

January 14, 1:56 PMMiami Travel ExaminerGeorge Leposky

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Aerial view of missile base in Everglades
National Park. Credit: National Park Service
 

The National Park Service has opened the historic Nike Hercules Missile Base HM-69 in Everglades National Park to the public for the first time since it was turned over to the park in 1979.

The park is offering guided tours of the base at 2 PM each Saturday through March 28.

The base, a well-preserved relic of the Cold War in Florida, is the best remaining example of the U.S. missile defense system close to Cuba. It remains virtually the same as it was when official use of the site ended.
 
Located just 160 miles from the Cuban coast, the base was built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in 1963, at a time when national security against Soviet attack was America’s main priority after the Cuban Missile Crisis of October, 1962. The base was listed as a Historic District on the U. S. Department of the Interior’s National Register of Historic Places on July 27, 2004.  

The area comprises 22 buildings and structures, including three missile barns built to contain 41-foot missiles (some with nuclear warheads), a missile assembly building, a guard-dog kennel, barracks, and control centers within berms that served as blast protection.

Missiles on launching pads at the base
Credit: National Park Service

Historic images

The accompanying photos show the base in operation. In the aerial view, the complex in the foreground – now Everglades National Park’s Daniel Beard Research Center – is where the base offices, armory, mess hall, and barracks were located. Visible in the background, about a mile away, are the missile barns that held the Nike Hercules missiles.

The other photo shows three missiles on their platforms, ready for launching. They were pushed from within the barns at left and set on the launch pads. The soldiers in the photo were called "rail apes" because they were constantly pushing these missiles around on a rail system.

Three other, similar bases also were built in South Florida: in north Key Largo (now Key Largo Hammocks State Park), in Miramar (now a Publix shopping center), and west of Miami (now the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Krome Detention Center).

The base tours are free, after participants pay park entrance fees. Reservations are required and will be taken up to 30 minutes before each tour. To reserve, call 305-242-7700 or sign up at the Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center nine miles southwest of Homestead, FL, on State Road 9336. Participants must arrive in the park by 1:30 PM and be prepared to drive in a car caravan for the 14-mile round trip from the visitor center. 

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