Titan I 725-A Missile Silo Lowry AFB Colorado

Overview

Titan I Missile Complex 725-A was one of six hardened missile installations built around Lowry Air Force Base and one of three assigned to the 725th Strategic Missile Squadron. The complex occupied open high plains about ten miles south of Bennett, Colorado, on the eastern edge of the former Lowry Bombing and Gunnery Range. Beneath a deliberately sparse surface compound were three missile silos, three equipment terminals, three propellant terminals, a shared launch control center, a powerhouse, an antenna terminal, two guidance-antenna silos, utility rooms, protected entrances, and a web of connecting tunnels. Three HGM-25A Titan I missiles could be maintained on strategic alert, raised from their silos, and launched from the surface.

The installation is exceptionally important because federal documentation is directly site-specific. Historic American Engineering Record survey CO-89 includes 24 photographs, three measured drawings, and 101 data pages devoted to Complex 2A. Those records capture both the standardized Lowry Titan I design and the distinctive experience of this complex. They document difficult subsurface conditions, construction changes, operational procedures, crew life, a March 15, 1962 test launch, the use of Launcher 3 as the 451st Strategic Missile Wing training center, deactivation, salvage, Army National Guard reuse, and the condition of surviving features in 2005 and 2006.

The complex had a short nuclear-alert life but a long institutional afterlife. The 725th received the site on May 4, 1962 and became operational six days later. Its first missile came off alert on February 17, 1965, its last on April 1, and the final missile departed on April 8. The federal government retained the property after missile removal. The Colorado Army National Guard obtained a right of entry in 1975 and used the surface for helicopter drop training and field exercises. The 242-acre Bennett facility later entered the 1988 Base Realignment and Closure process, underwent investigation and cleanup, and passed to private ownership in July 2006.

Installation Identity, Location, And Boundaries

Several names identify the same physical complex. Strategic Air Command used 725-A, meaning the A complex of the 725th Strategic Missile Squadron. Engineering and property records used Site 2A, Complex 2A, Lowry Missile Site 2A, Lowry Titan Site 2A, or FMR Lowry Titan Site 1 Complex 2A. After Air Force disposal actions, Army and environmental records called the property Bennett Army National Guard Facility. These labels represent successive missions and administrative systems at one site. They do not describe Lowry Air Force Base proper, the entire former bombing range, the neighboring 725-B or 725-C complexes, or any single missile silo.

The best supported acreage found for the later Army property is 242 acres. The Interstate Technology and Regulatory Council used that figure in a federal-facility redevelopment case study prepared with Department of Defense environmental-restoration participation. Acreage requires scope discipline. The 242 acres describe the former Bennett Army National Guard Facility considered in the BRAC process. They may include roads, buffers, easements, or training ground beyond the tightly fenced missile plant and should not be used as a current parcel total without title research. The consulted sources do not establish the exact 2026 boundary or owner.

The Landscape Before 725-A

Complex 725-A was built within the broad military landscape of the Lowry Bombing and Gunnery Range. The range originated as a World War II training property serving Lowry Field and other military organizations. Bombing, gunnery, and related activity produced targets, roads, impact areas, and possible unexploded ordnance across a very large tract. By the late 1950s, the range offered the Air Force something increasingly scarce near a growing city: controlled, sparsely populated land within support distance of Lowry and the Martin missile plant.

Four of the six Lowry Titan I complexes, including 725-A, were located on government-controlled range land. Before heavy construction, crews swept the selected areas for residual munitions. The HAER history states that approximately three tons of scrap were removed from the four range sites. This work was more than housekeeping. Deep excavation, well drilling, trenching, and road construction would disturb ground previously used for weapons training, so ordnance clearance was an early safety requirement. The missile installation therefore did not replace an empty landscape; it added a new strategic mission to an existing defense property.

The site's position on the eastern border of the range influenced both construction and later history. Existing federal control reduced the land-acquisition problem faced at 725-B and 725-C, while the open terrain permitted the dispersal demanded by nuclear-survivability planning. After Titan I operations ended, the same remoteness and retained federal ownership made the property useful for National Guard field exercises. The earlier range, the Air Force missile installation, and the later Army facility are historically connected but remain distinct records with separate missions and administrative identities.

Strategic Origins Of Titan I

Titan I emerged from the American effort to place a dependable intercontinental ballistic missile force on alert before the Soviet Union could gain a decisive strategic advantage. The Air Force developed Titan alongside Atlas so that a major failure in one program would not leave the country without an ICBM. Titan used a rigid, load-bearing airframe and two liquid-propellant stages. Its long range, nuclear payload, and rapid flight time changed strategic planning by allowing distant targets to be threatened within about half an hour, but the first version still required substantial ground machinery and preparation before launch.

Survivability drove the move underground. A surface launch pad, exposed control building, and visible fuel plant were vulnerable to attack, sabotage, and weather. The Titan I complex placed its missiles, crew, communications, power, guidance, and propellant-support equipment in reinforced structures linked by flexible tunnels and isolated with blast doors. Dispersing three complexes across each squadron field further reduced the chance that one enemy weapon could disable all nine launchers. This architecture made 725-A a hardened combat installation rather than a simple storage site.

Titan I nevertheless retained major first-generation limitations. RP-1 kerosene could be stored, but cryogenic liquid oxygen could not remain indefinitely aboard the missile. Before launch, crews had to load oxidizer, complete system checks, open the silo doors, elevate the fueled missile above ground, and raise a guidance antenna. The missile then depended on ground radio guidance during early flight. Titan II and Minuteman eliminated much of this vulnerability through storable propellants or solid fuel, launch-from-silo operation, and improved guidance. Complex 725-A is valuable precisely because it preserves the transition between exposed launch pads and later self-contained silos.

Site Selection And The Lowry Network

The Air Force selected Lowry for the first operational Titan I deployment in January 1958. Proximity to the Glenn L. Martin Company's Denver-area plant was a major advantage because the manufacturer could support installation, modification, testing, and troubleshooting. Lowry Air Force Base already supplied technical training, administration, housing, maintenance, transportation, and logistical infrastructure. The nearby range provided space for dispersed launch sites without requiring the Air Force to create an entirely new support base.

Initial planning expanded quickly. Within about two months of the first squadron decision, the Air Force added a second Lowry Titan squadron. The 724th Strategic Missile Squadron controlled complexes 1A, 1B, and 1C, while the 725th controlled 2A, 2B, and 2C. Each complex supported three missiles. The two squadrons therefore gave the 451st Strategic Missile Wing eighteen operational launchers, plus a spare or maintenance missile within squadron support arrangements. Their broad geographic separation made the field harder to destroy and placed unusual demands on roads, secure communications, maintenance dispatch, weather response, and crew transportation.

Lowry Air Force Base remained the parent organization and logistical hub, but 725-A had to function independently during alert. Wing headquarters coordinated target assignments, readiness, personnel, maintenance priorities, security policy, and higher-command communications. Missile maintenance and technical specialists traveled between Lowry and the remote complexes. Inside 725-A, redundant electrical generation, water, ventilation, communications, food, sanitation, and protected workspaces allowed the crew to remain underground if outside conditions became dangerous. The site was simultaneously a dependent satellite of Lowry and a self-contained nuclear command post.

Design, Contracting, And Construction

Preliminary work began during 1959 with roads, drainage, wells, surveys, utility preparation, and ordnance clearance. The ceremonial groundbreaking for the Lowry Titan field occurred on May 5, 1959, while the main construction program continued through 1961. Morrison-Knudsen and associated contractors built the complexes under Army Corps of Engineers administration. Martin and specialized subcontractors then installed missile-support and guidance equipment. The sequence matters because excavation, structural completion, equipment installation, technical acceptance, turnover, and operational status were separate milestones.

Costs rose sharply as Titan I design changes accumulated. The contract for the three second-squadron complexes, 2A, 2B, and 2C, began at approximately $26.9 million. The HAER study records about 210 modifications adding roughly $17.1 million, bringing the total to about $44.0 million, a 63 percent increase. Across all six Lowry complexes, the combined contracts grew from about $72.5 million to $115.3 million. These overruns reflected a weapon system being designed, tested, and built at the same time, not simply careless duplication of a settled plan.

The national steel strike of 1959, labor disputes, equipment delays, winter weather, and continuing engineering changes affected the work. Massive quantities of earth and rock had to be removed in open excavations before reinforced structures could be placed and backfilled. Shafts, chambers, tunnels, utilities, drainage, missile elevators, blast doors, propellant equipment, antennas, and electrical systems had to align within tight tolerances. Work continued while Titan tests at Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg revealed problems that required field modifications. Every design change could affect concrete, wiring, piping, clearances, or machinery already under construction.

Complex 725-A presented distinctive geological trouble. Excavation encountered sand, water seepage, and low-grade coal. The underground network experienced settlement, with some tunnel movements reported as great as ten inches. Floors, seals, joints, and equipment interfaces required correction. These problems demonstrate why apparently standardized complexes could have very different construction histories. A design drawn for six Lowry sites still had to survive the particular soil, groundwater, and subsurface conditions found at each location.

The Lowry Site Activation Task Force coordinated the transition from construction project to weapon system. Civil works had to connect reliably with Martin-installed ground equipment, communications, launch machinery, guidance electronics, safety interlocks, and missiles. Contractor demonstrations were followed by Strategic Air Command technical acceptance exercises that simulated the complete countdown. Major structural work was largely complete by fall 1961, but the complex required months of installation, correction, testing, and crew training before the Air Force could accept it for operational duty.

Underground Design And Surface Layout

The HAER measured drawings document 725-A itself, eliminating the need to borrow a neighboring complex as a visual surrogate. The compound was organized around a central underground junction reached through a surface portal and elevator, with a separate personnel-access route for emergency use. Blast locks and flexible tunnel connections isolated the principal chambers. The arrangement was intended to absorb movement from a nearby nuclear detonation and prevent damage in one compartment from automatically disabling the entire complex.

The shared core included a two-level control center, a two-level powerhouse, an antenna terminal, two antenna silos, water and utility spaces, and the tunnel junctions leading to the launchers. The control center held message and communications equipment, launch controls, status displays, and crew workstations. The powerhouse contained diesel generators, switchgear, cooling and ventilation machinery, compressed-air systems, and other equipment needed to sustain operations if commercial service failed. Protected water, sanitary, food, and environmental systems made extended underground occupancy possible.

Three launcher branches radiated from the central system. Each passed through an equipment terminal and propellant terminal before reaching a missile silo. The equipment terminal supported the launcher elevator, doors, and missile servicing equipment. The propellant terminal contained insulated liquid-oxygen equipment, RP-1 fuel service, pumps, valves, piping, and controls. The silo was a reinforced vertical shaft with a massive paired-door system at the surface and a missile elevator within. The missile was protected below grade during alert but had to rise to the surface before ignition.

The antenna terminal connected the ground guidance electronics to two retractable antenna systems. Redundancy mattered because radio guidance was essential to the missile's flight. During a launch, a selected antenna rose through its surface doors so the complex could track the missile and transmit steering corrections. Two antenna silos reduced the chance that a single equipment failure or damaged door would prevent guidance. The surviving antenna doors, bases, and shock-mounted equipment recorded by HAER are therefore important parts of the weapon system, not secondary communications features.

At ground level the completed site appeared far less imposing than the construction excavation. Roads, parking, fencing, gate controls, vents, hatches, utility structures, launcher doors, antenna doors, and orientation targets crossed an otherwise open prairie compound. Surface buildings and equipment were deliberately limited. HAER photographs from 2005 show how concrete launcher and antenna features continued to define the landscape after lighter structures disappeared. The visual restraint was strategic: most combat functions were below ground, protected from blast and observation.

Missile, Propulsion, Guidance, And Launch

The HGM-25A Titan I was a two-stage liquid-propellant missile approximately 98 feet long. Both stages burned RP-1 kerosene and liquid oxygen. A nuclear reentry vehicle gave the missile its strategic effect, while engines, airframe, inertial components, radio guidance, communications, and launch equipment came from a national contractor network. At 725-A, these elements operated as one system. The missile could not fulfill its mission without the site's power, oxidizer plant, elevators, doors, antennas, crew, and authenticated command link.

Liquid oxygen governed readiness. Its extremely low temperature and continual boil-off prevented long-term storage aboard the missile, so the launch sequence included oxidizer loading. Crews treated oxygen equipment as surgically clean because oil, dirt, or incompatible material could cause fire or explosion. HAER interviews describe cleanliness standards below 150 microns, pressurized clean rooms, vapor degreasing, caustic cleaning, black-light inspection, and repeated checks. Liquid nitrogen, high-pressure nitrogen and helium, diesel fuel, hydraulic fluid, lubricants, batteries, and other industrial materials added more hazards.

Propellant Loading Exercises tested every missile on a roughly 90-day cycle, which meant approximately one exercise each month at a three-launcher complex. The procedure forced operations and maintenance personnel to verify tanks, pumps, lines, valves, sensors, timing, and emergency actions under conditions approaching a real countdown. These exercises were essential because Titan I's deterrent value depended on machinery that normally remained idle. They also placed sustained demands on the environmental, safety, and waste-handling systems later examined during cleanup.

A launch order required authenticated messages and controlled cooperation by trained crew members. Once the sequence began, the system loaded liquid oxygen, checked missile and site status, opened the selected silo doors, raised the missile on its elevator, deployed a guidance antenna, and completed ignition preparations. The three missiles could be launched in sequence. Titan I was dramatically faster than an aircraft-delivered weapon, but the fueling and elevation process left it more exposed and slower to respond than the later Titan II and Minuteman systems that launched directly from closed, fueled or solid-propellant silos.

Organization, Personnel, And Training

The 703rd Strategic Missile Wing activated in September 1958 to organize the developing Lowry force and was redesignated the 451st Strategic Missile Wing in 1961. The 725th Strategic Missile Squadron activated on August 1, 1961 and operated complexes 725-A, 725-B, and 725-C. The wing also included the 724th Strategic Missile Squadron and the missile-maintenance and headquarters organizations needed to support eighteen launchers. On April 30, 1962, the wing reportedly had 170 officers and 1,107 airmen; the 725th accounted for 43 officers and 73 airmen.

Strategic Air Command maintained enough combat-ready crews to rotate alert duty, training, leave, and evaluation. The Lowry wing generally required 26 to 30 crews, with approximately three crews available for each complex position. The operational crew was reduced to six members before activation. Its members controlled communications, launch authorization, system status, and emergency actions while maintenance specialists and security personnel supported the site. Two-person control, personnel-reliability requirements, strict checklists, and recurring evaluations governed work around nuclear weapons and classified launch systems.

Complex 725-A carried an additional responsibility as the wing training center. HAER documentation identifies Launcher 3 as the principal training location while the complex continued to support strategic alert. New crews and specialists used the site to practice equipment operation, propellant procedures, fault response, and complete countdowns in a real operational environment. This role increased activity at 725-A and made it a bridge between formal classroom instruction, contractor technical knowledge, and the procedures crews would perform at all six Lowry complexes.

Training at a live alert installation required careful scheduling and configuration control. Exercises could not compromise the readiness of the other launchers or create ambiguity about an actual command message. Training equipment, maintenance conditions, and operational circuits had to be clearly separated. The arrangement also gave the wing immediate feedback: problems discovered by a trainee or evaluator at Launcher 3 could inform maintenance and procedures across the field. The complex therefore contributed to readiness far beyond its three assigned missiles.

Daily life combined high consequence with long routine. Crew members monitored panels, completed inspections, maintained logs, studied procedures, and waited for messages they hoped would never order a launch. HAER interview material describes television, cards, chess, reading, and occasional surface walks, while at least two people remained awake at the consoles. Machinery noise, artificial light, restricted movement, and the knowledge of the mission shaped every alert tour. The underground plant was both workplace and temporary living space.

Activation, Test Launch, And Strategic Alert

The activation period culminated in a remarkable site-specific event. On March 15, 1962, a Titan I was launched from Complex 725-A during the final testing and acceptance program. The HAER history identifies this as a test launch from Site 2A. It demonstrated that the installed elevators, doors, propellant system, guidance equipment, communications, and crew procedures could function as an integrated launch system. The event distinguishes 725-A from histories based only on squadron-wide dates.

The Air Force placed all eighteen Lowry missiles in their silos by May 1, 1962. The 725th received turnover of its sites on May 4 and became operational on May 10. These dates should not be treated as interchangeable. Missile emplacement, technical acceptance, site transfer, unit declaration, and placement of individual weapons on alert followed related but different processes. The 725th's operational date confirms that its three complexes were ready to assume the mission, but surviving sources do not provide a complete day-by-day alert record for each 725-A launcher.

Once operational, 725-A became part of Strategic Air Command's continuous nuclear-alert force. Readiness required far more than keeping a missile in a hole. Crews verified command channels, launch circuits, power, environmental systems, guidance, elevators, doors, propellant equipment, and safety devices. Maintenance teams responded to discrepancies while wing controllers balanced repair with alert requirements across eighteen launchers. Each missile had a target assignment and supported the national deterrent whether or not it ever left the silo.

The Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962 gave that deterrent a concrete human dimension. HAER records an account by crew member Wesley Nelson, who was at Site 2A when the complex went to yellow alert. His crew remained underground for approximately 72 hours. The episode demonstrates how strategic warning changed local conditions: access tightened, readiness increased, relief was delayed, and the abstract possibility of nuclear war became immediate for the people at the consoles.

Phaseout, Deactivation, And Salvage

Titan I became obsolete quickly because Titan II and Minuteman offered faster response, reduced surface exposure, simpler alert maintenance, and launch-from-silo capability. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara announced the Titan I phaseout on November 19, 1964. The decision did not instantly close 725-A. Strategic Air Command had to remove missiles from alert in a controlled sequence, protect nuclear material, drain and make systems safe, remove classified equipment, and preserve readiness elsewhere while the transition proceeded.

The 725th's first Titan I came off alert on February 17, 1965. Its last alert missile was removed on April 1, and the final missile left the squadron on April 8. The 725th Strategic Missile Squadron inactivated on June 25. Those dates distinguish combat termination, physical missile shipment, and organizational inactivation. They also correct the simplified March 26 closure date previously carried in the inventory. A single closure date cannot express the staged end of a nuclear weapon system.

Deactivation proceeded in phases. Phase I removed reentry vehicles, missiles, classified items, propellants, and gases. Missiles traveled through Lowry before shipment to Norton Air Force Base. Phase II opened the site to salvage operations. Mid-Continent Manufacturing received a dismantling contract, although company bankruptcy left equipment that might otherwise have been removed. NASA retained some liquid-oxygen tanks for possible reuse. Phase III placed the property in the federal disposal process under the General Services Administration.

The proposed reuse of 725-A as a space-tracking station did not occur. Federal retention instead preserved the property while agencies considered other needs. The 2005 HAER photographs and 2006 description show the consequence of that incomplete dismantling: surface buildings and removable systems largely disappeared, but major reinforced underground structures, concrete doors and hatches, antenna bases, shock mounts, RP-1 lines, and scattered equipment remained. The complex survived as a stripped industrial ruin rather than a fully demolished site.

Bennett Army National Guard Facility

The Air Force phase was followed by a distinct Army identity. The property was formally reported excess on December 17, 1974, and the Colorado Army National Guard received a right of entry on September 25, 1975. HAER describes an Army lease beginning January 1, 1978. Other summaries use 1977 for the transfer period, so the safest chronology separates right of entry, lease, and later Army control rather than forcing them into one date. The National Guard facility retained the physical site but did not resume the missile mission.

Guard use focused on the surface. Units conducted routine field exercises and helicopter drop or maneuver training on the open property. HAER found no official underground training use. This distinction matters because later recollections of abandoned missile sites can blur exploration, informal entry, and authorized activity. The surviving underground complex remained hazardous and was not a normal troop-training plant. The Army mission used the land and surface setting created by Air Force retention, not the Titan launch machinery as an operational system.

The Bennett facility entered the first Base Realignment and Closure round in 1988. The commission concluded that it no longer supported a military mission and had no assigned personnel, recommending closure. A 2006 ITRC case study described the 242-acre property as a former Titan I complex used for helicopter maneuver and troop training. Its remote rural location and specialized underground structures offered little obvious civilian redevelopment potential. BRAC therefore involved not only closing a small Guard site but resolving the legacy of a hardened nuclear installation.

Environmental Investigation, BRAC, And Transfer

Environmental work addressed the site's successive military uses and disposal requirements. EPA catalogs Titan Complex 2A under ID CO0010104246 as a non-National Priorities List federal facility with federal-facility-led cleanup. EPA separately catalogs the Bennett Army National Guard Facility under ID CO4211808015 and records a No Further Remedial Action Planned screening status. The two profiles reflect different program histories at the same broader location. Neither status is a declaration that underground structures are safe, accessible, dry, or free of every hazard.

Potential concerns at former Titan sites include petroleum products, solvents, electrical equipment, batteries, paints, wastewater systems, fuel tanks, propellant-support residues, and materials introduced during salvage or later use. The surrounding former bombing range also has a separate munitions history. Public sources must therefore be read by property and project. A cleanup result for the Guard facility should not be generalized to the entire former Lowry range, and a range-wide ordnance issue should not be presented as proof of contamination at a specific launcher.

The Mile High chapter of the Restoration Advisory Board reports that Complex 2A closed its environmental program in July 2006 following investigations and surface-soil cleanup, after which the property transferred to private ownership. The same source states that the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment had no evidence of radioactive contamination at the Titan sites. That carefully bounded statement does not mean that the site is harmless. Nuclear warheads were removed under controlled procedures, but structural collapse, deep water, confined spaces, residual industrial materials, and ordinary property restrictions remain separate safety questions.

Federal Register notices and BRAC documentation show that Bennett remained within the formal federal-facility environmental process during disposal. The 2013 federal-agency hazardous-waste docket deleted Complex 2A from the docket, an administrative status change rather than proof of current condition. The strongest supported conclusion is that required investigation and surface cleanup were completed for transfer in 2006. Exact 2026 ownership, land use, underground water level, structure condition, and any continuing land-use controls require current agency and title verification.

Surviving Features And Documented Condition

HAER survey teams recorded the property before transfer. By 2005 and 2006, the complex occupied flat, open scrubland sloping east toward Kiowa Creek. Original roads and parking areas remained identifiable but were overgrown. Most conventional surface buildings and removable equipment had disappeared. A tornado in the mid-1980s reportedly damaged fencing and transformers, while later utility lines crossed the property. A depressed area near the powerhouse marked removal of an underground fuel tank.

Concrete features continued to reveal the military plan. Launcher doors and slabs, portal and personnel hatches, ventilation structures, antenna doors and bases, and orientation targets survived at ground level. Entrances had been sealed with concrete. Below ground, the essential reinforced shells of the silos, terminals, control center, powerhouse, antenna spaces, and tunnels remained. HAER recorded launch-crib components, antenna shock mounts, RP-1 lines, desks, cases, and other equipment left after salvage.

Conditions varied underground. The antenna terminal held approximately six inches of water during documentation, while the control center and powerhouse were comparatively dry. Such observations are historical snapshots, not current inspection reports. Water levels, corrosion, air quality, collapse risk, seals, and unauthorized disturbance can change rapidly in abandoned underground structures. The HAER survey enables architectural interpretation but must never be used as a guide for entry.

Detailed Chronology

• 1940s The Lowry Bombing and Gunnery Range develops as a large military training landscape southeast of Denver.
• January 1958 The Air Force selects Lowry for Titan I deployment, aided by the nearby Martin plant and controlled range land.
• Early 1958 A second Lowry Titan squadron is added to the deployment plan.
• 1959 Preliminary roads, wells, drainage, surveys, and ordnance-clearance work begins across the Lowry field.
• May 1, 1959 Principal construction activity begins for the Lowry Titan program.
• May 5, 1959 Ceremonial groundbreaking marks the Lowry Titan construction effort.
• 1959 The national steel strike, labor difficulties, winter conditions, and continuing design changes disrupt construction.
• 1959-1961 Complex 725-A is excavated and built on the eastern edge of the former range.
• 1959-1961 Sand, seepage, low-grade coal, and settlement complicate Site 2A work; some tunnel movement reaches approximately ten inches.
• September 25, 1958 The 703rd Strategic Missile Wing activates to organize the Lowry Titan mission.
• 1960 The Lowry Site Activation Task Force coordinates construction, equipment installation, testing, training, and acceptance.
• 1961 The operational organization transitions to the 451st Strategic Missile Wing designation.
• August 1, 1961 The 725th Strategic Missile Squadron activates.
• Fall 1961 Main construction is substantially complete, followed by equipment installation, correction, testing, and acceptance.
• March 15, 1962 A Titan I test launch is conducted from Site 2A during the acceptance program.
• April 30, 1962 The 451st Wing reports 1,277 assigned personnel, including 116 in the 725th Squadron.
• May 1, 1962 All eighteen Lowry Titan I missiles are reported installed in their silos.
• May 4, 1962 The 725th Squadron receives turnover of its launch complexes.
• May 10, 1962 The 725th Strategic Missile Squadron becomes operational.
• 1962-1965 Complex 725-A maintains strategic alert with three launchers and serves as the wing training center, principally through Launcher 3.
• October 1962 During the Cuban Missile Crisis, a Site 2A crew goes to yellow alert and remains underground for approximately 72 hours.
• November 19, 1964 Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara announces the Titan I phaseout.
• February 17, 1965 The first 725th Squadron Titan I is removed from alert.
• April 1, 1965 The last 725th Squadron Titan I comes off alert.
• April 8, 1965 The final missile is shipped from the 725th Squadron.
• June 25, 1965 The 725th Strategic Missile Squadron inactivates.
• 1965-1966 Reentry vehicles, missiles, classified equipment, propellants, and gases are removed; salvage follows.
• Late 1960s Mid-Continent salvage operations end incompletely after company bankruptcy; some equipment remains.
• December 17, 1974 The property is formally reported excess.
• September 25, 1975 The Colorado Army National Guard receives a right of entry.
• January 1, 1978 HAER records the start of an Army lease for Colorado Army National Guard use.
• Late 1970s-1980s Guard units use the surface for helicopter drop or maneuver training and routine field exercises.
• Mid-1980s A tornado reportedly damages fencing and transformers.
• 1988 The first BRAC round recommends closure of Bennett Army National Guard Facility because it has no continuing mission or assigned personnel.
• 1990s-2000s Federal environmental investigations and disposal work address the former Guard and Titan property.
• 2005 HAER photographer Harry Weddington documents surviving surface and underground features.
• 2006 HAER completes measured drawings and a detailed engineering history for Complex 2A.
• January 2006 The ITRC BRAC case study describes the 242-acre Bennett property and its redevelopment challenges.
• July 2006 Environmental work and surface-soil cleanup are reported complete for transfer; the property passes to private ownership.
• 2013 Complex 2A is deleted from the federal-agency hazardous-waste compliance docket, an administrative action not equivalent to a structural-safety finding.