‘Death around every corner’: inside Arapahoe County's missile silo rescue mission

Fear was the only thing running through Deer Trail Fire Chief Rich Loveless’ mind when he lost connection with 16 of his rescue team members, which included his own son, during a rescue mission inside an abandoned missile silo on Sunday a week ago.

First responders were called to the urgent aid of an 18-year-old man who sustained serious injuries after falling 30 feet into a shaft while trespassing deep inside what rescuers describe as a dark, dangerous and prohibited missile silo in eastern Arapahoe County.

It was a mission that Arapahoe County Sheriff officials, firefighters and rescuers are calling a one-of-a-kind rescue — one so treacherous they hope is a once-in-a-career.

In total, eight teenagers trespassed into the silo around 3:30 a.m. Sunday.

It wasn’t until a half mile into the silo where the 18-year-old, who remains unidentified, fell into an “elevator-like” shaft, Tyler Loveless, a Sable Altura Fire Department firefighter who went inside the silo tunnels, said.

“I’ve never done anything like this before in my life,” he said. “You train for the unexpected.”

'Death around every corner'

Upon arrival around 6:30 a.m., rescue teams were approached by five teens outside of the silo — two boys and three girls. They told first responders that a boy and the 18-year-old man were trapped inside of the abandoned bunker, according to an Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office news release.

After a two-hour search, Tyler Loveless said rescuers heard the screams of multiple teenagers. One of them was escorted out of the silo, while another teen stood by the side of his seriously hurt friend. They were located down under a pitch black shaft, which was inaccessible without a ladder or ropes, according to the Sable Altura firefighter.

The silo complex 2B DO45 is a Cold War leftover, one of six Titan 1 missile complexes in Colorado which are no longer functional.

The hall inside the silo, which starts at its entrance with graffiti reading “welcome to paradise,” consists of “a maze of tunnels and loose metal and wires,” said Tyler Loveless. “Literally death around every corner down there.”

The path, he said, was filled with potholes, obstacles and different tunnels to where “we had to essentially build a bridge to cross one of the multiple water hazards down in one of the tunnels.”

“Thankfully,” the firefighter said, “there was enough scrap metal we were able to piece together a bridge to cut across.”

"When we finally did make contact, we did finally hear them yelling, and we were yelling back for them," said Travis Daniels, the other rescuer from Altura. Daniels, who used a body board to rescue the injured man, said he followed the screams of a teen who was trying to help his injured friend, adding the injured man couldn't scream for himself.

Rescuers carried the 18-year-old out of the silo, onto a helicopter and to the hospital where they expect the teenager to survive — but he's being treated for severe injuries, according to Arapahoe County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson Ginger Delgado.

She called it a “dangerous” and a first-of-its-kind “incredible rescue."

“All those who went down there are very lucky to be alive,” said Tyler Loveless. “Not just the one who fell, but every single one of them because of one wrong turn and who knows.”

At one point, the rescue team inside the tunnels lost connection for 30 minutes with field commanders outside. During that time, the lead commander, Deer Trail Fire Chief Rich Loveless, waited outside in “fear,” he said.

“Fear was the only thing going through my mind.”

“Your mind just starts racing through all of the what ifs for the 16 team members inside there. One of them being my son,” the fire chief said, who added there was also a two-brother team and a husband-and-wife team inside the silo during the rescue mission.

“It was a total team effort,” he said.

Firefighters from Sable Altura, Deer Trail, Agate and Bennett-Watkins fire departments were present at the scene.

The father and son firefighter duo insisted trespassers not visit the silo.

“The dangers are more real than most people probably understand,” said Chief Rich Loveless. “There's not only the danger of the noxious gases that can kill you in there — from when the military had nitrogen, kerosene — but there's the dangers of all of the rusty jagged metal.”

The Titan silo

The silo the teens entered was among a cluster of shelters built by the government in the late 1950's and 1960's amid fears of the Cold War, including the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. It was operational from 1961 through 1965. 

The Deer Trail Titan 1 missile silo, tucked into a rural farm and ranch area, was one of the first of its kind in the country. It was shut down almost 60 years ago because it was considered obsolete. 

At the time, the Colorado Department of Health and Environment assessed the site and found that inside of the silo there was contamination from polychlorinated biphenols (PCBs) in the lagoon wastes. 

Since then, Titan Missile Complex 2B has been a dangerous playground which, through the years, lured hundreds of spelunkers and served as a creepy hangout for curious teenagers.

A small group of YouTubers videotaped a twenty-minute tour of the inside in Nov. 2015. The footage, done by Meeker Extreme, started at a thinly worn trail in a large expanse of Colorado plains south of Deer Trail which led down to a cement opening built into the earth.

A hand-painted sign at the entrance read “Death Awaits,” the footage showed.

Meeker Extreme's Mark Odette said that the beams inside have been shaved off to expose sharp edges, which would slow down even the most veteran of search teams.

"It’s pretty cool in there. But it’s dangerous. The scariest part is the silo looking down because you can’t see the bottom. You can tell there is water and unknown debris down there," said Odette.

An unfun house

Once inside, Odette's video revealed a dark, walled cave which wound through tunnels through the cement bunker. A flashlight beamed on reams of metal hanging from the ceilings including huge broken shock absorbers, giant tanks, dangling wires, rusty pipes, ladders and generator wheels. Makeshift metal bridges cover deep holes in the ground.

Throughout the underground silo are spray painted messages from dozens of visitors who made it out.

“This ladder is currently out of service,” says one message scrawled in black with an arrow pointing to a hole which led to an upper level. "Sorry.” A message underneath read: “MOM?”

Left on the ground was an intact Walmart receipt for spray paint and jersey gloves and snack almonds, the video showed.

Colorado's six former Titan 1 missile complexes, including the one in Deer Trail where the teen fell early Sunday morning, are scattered around the Front Range. Four are in the Former Lowry Bombing and Gunnery Range east of Aurora and another is located south of Elizabeth according to the Colorado Department of Health and Environment. The CDPHE worked with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to evaluate and clean up the complexes.