Police raid finds cannabis farm worth £1m in nuclear bunker
SIX people have been arrested after police discovered an “enormous” cannabis farm worth more than £1 million in a nuclear bunker.
Police carried out a midnight raid on RGHQ Chilmark, a bunker constructed in Wiltshire in the 1980s to house and protect government officials and dignitaries in the event of a nuclear attack.
The site is no longer owned by the Ministry of Defence but the bunker is still intact and the nuclear blast doors are in place, making it almost impossible to gain access without a special key.
Wiltshire Police attended the site on Wednesday night, after gathering intelligence. A spokesman said officers knew the bunker was “almost completely impenetrable” so they waited outside for three people to leave.
The three men, aged 27, 30 and 45, from Somerset, were detained and officers used their keys to enter the bunker. Once inside, they found three more males, aged 15, 19 and 37, all of no fixed address, believed to be working as “gardeners”.
Yesterday, officers described the farm as one of the largest crops ever discovered in the county. Photographs showed several thousand cannabis plants at various stages of growth. Detective Inspector Paul Franklin said: “There are approximately 20 rooms in the building, split over two floors, each 200ft long and 70ft wide.
“Almost every single room had been converted for the wholesale production of cannabis plants, and there was a large amount of evidence of previous crops. This was an enormous set-up.
“At this early stage of the investigation it is almost impossible to work out how many plants are inside, but we are talking thousands rather than hundreds, and we would estimate the value of the crop at over £1 million.”
He added: “I am delighted that we have been able to take such a large amount of illicit drugs off the streets of Wiltshire before they are able to reach vulnerable people in our communities.”
The three men found in the bunker were arrested on suspicion of cannabis production. The three men detained outside the bunker were arrested on suspicion of cannabis production and human trafficking.