SHUT IN STEEL

Hokitika Guardian, 28 September 1931, Page 8

SHUT IN STEEL

BANK’S UNDERGROUND FORT. More than half of France’s enormous gold reserves, amounting in all to more than 50,000,000,000 francs (about £400,000,000), is hidden away far below the busy streets of Paris in the new vault of the Bank of France, writes 'Rex Miller in the Christian Science Monitor. This vast accumulation of precious mttal is second only to the gold stock of the Federal Reserve banks of the United States The subterranean fortress “which houses this great wealth has been constructed to withstand not only the most ingenious and efficient safe-crackers, but also the onslaught of invading armies, revolutionary battalions, or the most destructive aeroplanes bombs wjrtich have yet been devised. In case of need, 2000 workers can take refuge in these vaults and live there in comfort and safety for six months. There is a large kitchen which would do credit to t any up-to-date hotel, completely equipped with steam pans, ranges, dish-washing machines, and various labour-saving devices. A six months’ supply of canned and preserved foods is kept on hand, and there is a huge refrigerator. The vaults have their own electric lighting plant. An anes.an well provides an independent water supply.

Proper ventilation is assured by an ingenious device which would defeat a gas attack by blowing any dangerous gases back through the ventilating chambers into which they might have been introduced. There is even a phonograph and records to make a protracted stay underground more enjoyable.

Construction of these vaults, which lie beneath the Bank of France Building not far from .the Opera, was comm.need not long after the war. It took about three years for workmen employed in shift's of 24 hours each day to hew out of the solid rock the main treasure chamber and its approaches. The principal vault. 80 feet underground, has* an area of 10,000 square metres, or about two and a half acres. The rocky ceiling is supported by 750 reinforced concrete pillars. The walls are of reinforced concrete 15 feet thick, with a layer of asphalt waterprool material to prevent the' intrusion of moisture. The approach to the main vault is through a series of corridors and gigantic steel doors. The first door nuirle of steel, weighs eight tons, and is opened and closed by secret machinery known only to a few bank officials. Beyond this Is a second door weighing more than 14 tons, which is opened and closed by an electric engine operating on rails. At the very entrance to the main vault are other doors designed to be closed only in emergencies. They camot be opened from outside, but only, from within.

The treasure chamber/ is brilliantly lighted. Ingots of gold are piled one upon another in row after row and enclosed in steel cupboards fronted with screens of woven wire. Other cupboards contain countless bundles of new banknotes fresh from the presses. This enormous ‘ treasure, which so far exceeds in value all the fabled riches of the Arabian Nights reposes amid the most modern of surroundings at the hub of a great European capital, and is handled with an everyday air of complacent efficiency which makes its presence here appear to be the most natural thing in the world. But even this “business as usual” attitude cannot deprive the great hoard of precious metal of its romantic glamour.