One of the most common questions that you hear from someone you have just met is, "What are your hobbies?" Some reply saying they like reading, gardening, traveling, painting, singing, and things like these.
During our childhood days, even collecting stamps or coins was a hobby that some people enjoyed. But have you ever heard of someone collecting school buses as their hobby?
An 85 year-old-man in Canada collected 42 school buses for himself, but not merely as a hobby. He has a plan, and the outcome is something that is beyond our imagination.
Bruce Beach was born in the city of Winfield, Kansas and had lived in the city until his young age years. Born in 1939, Bruce had spent his childhood and young years in the city and was deeply attached to it.
But the conditions changed and Bruce started to feel uncomfortable in his hometown. No place in the whole of the United States felt like home to anyone. The danger was all around and there was a constant uncertainty of life.
The Vietnam War started on the 1st of November in 1955 and the citizens were deeply disturbed by what was happening around them. But the Vietnam War was just the starting. The worse was yet to come.
The threatening environment was too much for Bruce and he did not want to live in such jeopardy. In 1970, he relocated to a rural area in Canada. From here on, Bruce started his life-changing journey.
The Vietnam War ended on the 30th of April in 1975, but before it could end, the Cold-War had already begun in 1974. This was the time Beach started to think about how times were only going to get worse.
Between the years 1980 and 1985, Bruce started collecting school buses from all over Canada and had them delivered to his home. Was it some kind of distraction? Or was he up to some plan which he had been thinking about?
When Bruce crossed the border to start living in Canada, he did not choose some random place to set in. He, along with his family, relocated to a place known as Horning's Mills in hopes of some peace.
Horning's Mill was a planned place that Bruce and his wife had chosen by choice. It was Bruce's wife Jean's hometown, a small village in the rural part of Ontario. Will the place have something to do with Bruce's epic plan?
Within the five years span, Bruce purchased 42 school buses. Any bus that was old and retired and came in Bruce's sight was bought by him immediately. He paid approximately $300 for each bus!
The 42 buses had all arrived at Bruce's house, just as he had wanted them to. But where would he park 42 school buses? And what was he possibly even going to do with them? What was in his mind?
Bruce got a huge underground pit dug, and he dropped all of the 42 buses in the pit. He arranged them with precision, each very proportionately on side of the other and he had a proper plan for each bus.
Spread across 12.5 acres of land, the massive pit that Bruce dug was no less than 14 feet underground. The huge hole was dug by him and a little help that he borrowed from a few people. But why?
People who lived near Bruce's house and the ones who helped him in digging and dropping the buses in the pit were all confused as to what he was up to. They asked him several times, but there were no answers from his side.
As if collecting 42 school buses and digging a pit to put them in was not weird enough for everyone to witness, that Bruce went on with his next step which made things even more out of the scope of a normal human's imagination.
With his next step, Bruce covered the buses completely. All 42 buses were hidden 14 feet deep inside the earth. And when you will find out the purpose behind all of Bruce's planning, you will be dumbstruck.
Usually, people collect valuables or antiques because they enjoy doing so or they want to show it off to other people. But Bruce's case was very different. He did not want to show his planning off to anyone, he had a much greater purpose.
The buses had been covered with two feet of solid concrete and sunlight would never enter the windows of those buses again. After that, Bruce opened up each bus and started connecting each one with the other. What was he going to do next?
When all the buses were opened from sides, they connected with each other and formed a huge maze. It was so huge that it turned out to be North America's most massive underground structure.
After completing the first part of his idea, Bruce decided to name his plan. He named the underground place Ark Two and what it would store inside is something no one must've ever thought of.
Inside his very own Ark Two, Bruce claimed that he could fit in 500 people. But for what? 500 people, under one roof, where there was no scope of any kind of sunlight or other natural resources? What was going on in Bruce's mind?
Cold War had been ongoing in 1974 and it was then that Bruce had been scared for his life yet again. Bruce had been a tower control operator at Dobbins Air Force Base in Georgia. He had seen the landing of big bombers from there.
Bruce said, "It was one of the five bases in the US where you had to have a top-secret security clearance. I saw very unusual types of aircraft there—black birds, flying wings, planes that I’ve never seen since." And because of this, he had been afraid of the possibility of an attack at any time.
Bruce had taken so much pain and had put in unimaginable levels of efforts to make a Nuclear Fallout Shelter, which he now named the Ark Two. It has become North America's largest functioning nuclear fallout shelter.
The buses were framed in such a way that they made honeycomb kind of a structure, which is one of the strongest natural forms. Bruce has made the Ark Two so strong that it can withstand a blast from as far as a mile.
Bruce believes that a nuclear attack is very near. "That’s where I’m at. You’re talking to the fellow who’s got probably the largest private survival complex in North America. You’ve gotta be motivated, y’know? I travel in a circle where everybody believes this is going to happen", he said.
Bruce had spent 50 years of his life in planning and building the Ark Two. And all of it not for himself but for the society, so that the human race could carry on and society would be able to reconstruct itself after the nuclear war.
It is a very common occurrence that whenever someone tries to do something by himself, the whole society stands against him to criticize him/her. The case was similar to Bruce's, even though he had done everything for others.
Everybody started calling Bruce 'nuts' for he had spent countless years and a huge amount of his money in building something the use of which was never even assured. But he smiles back at them all for he knows when an emergency will occur, he will have the solution.
The underground orphanage that Bruce has built is not just a structure. It has all the facilities that are required in a home. Bruce claims that around 500 people would be able to enjoy the comfort of home in this bunker of his'.
The Ark Two has a dentist chair, cubbyholes for firearms, and even a brig if the need occurs. There is also a decontamination room, and all things never even thought of in an emergency. Any person staying inside the Ark Two would be able to survive an apocalypse.
Bruce has been so considerate and thoughtful that he has even built small play areas with tricycles, toys and chess sets. There's even a nursery and a classroom because he does not want any child to not be able to continue learning.
Though the entry into the Art Two would not be an easy task. Bruce says that you would have to prove yourself to be a part of his big construction. Every person entering the bunker would have to pass through the decontamination room as well so that no germs are spread inside.
Che Bodhi, an event organizer for the Ontario Prepper Survival Network (OPSN), commented on the Ark Two: "When you go inside the bunker for the first time, it is a different planet, it’s like you’re on Mars. When you hear about this concept of 42 school buses underground, to fathom it is nothing compared to going in and actually seeing it…It’s crazy in there."
Since Bruce has done something out of goodwill, the political parties are after him. Each government party is against the bunker and wants to destroy it altogether. They say that the bunker has been built without proper permits, because of which Bruce has even been to the court 30 times till now.
The political, the bureaucratic, all have together tried to shut the Ark Two down several times. The fire department of Shelburne has sealed the Ark Two twice blaming it on the safety concerns, but Bruce wins his way out.
Even though Bruce feels it is his duty to help his fellow mates during the time of a worldwide emergency, he admits that building and maintaining such a huge shelter has taken a toll on him. There's a lot he has to deal with.
The generous man has been filling and storing food containers for so many years and has to throw away a lot of expired food items after intervals of time. Rats also enter the area and destroy the wheat bags, further increasing the problems.
Even Bruce's children are not supportive of his idea and work anymore. They say they have been tired of hearing about "doom and gloom" since their childhood and want to grow away from that negativity.
In the end, the man and his wife remain together. Bruce's wife Jean is 90 years old but still does all that she can to support her husband. She has never questioned his work and thinks that he has been a selfless man.
The Ark Two community website reads: “The Ark Two SAFE (Safe America For Everyone) Community is the largest pluralistic survival community in North America without any political, religious, or cultural bias. Its purpose is to ameliorate the catastrophe of a nuclear war or other world-wide cataclysmic catastrophe and to help restore civilization.”