Urbexing Albania: Porto Palermo Submarine Base

Albania is a beautiful, mountainous country located along the shores of the Adriatic and Ionian Seas. The people of this land want to graze goats, make tasty cheese and drink good wine. But the communists herded them underground and ordered them to make weapons.

Well, what a joy it is to sit in a bunker! After Albanian dictator Enver Hoxha died, the country’s enormous militarization began to come to light. It ranged from more than 70,000 simple bunkers to super-massive underground aircraft bases, military plants and so on. We even found an underground submarine base.

Next to the small town of Porto Palermo, a huge service and repair shelter for submarines and torpedo boats was built inside the rock.

The view of Albania’s beautiful rocky coast.

The giant blast-resistant gate seals the north entrance to the main tunnel.

The sheer size of this gate is impressive — an iron frame filled with concrete.

The tunnel runs deep into the rock. Both sides are walkable, and the left one has a narrow-gauge railway.

Here the tunnel widens to allow boats to head in different directions. In this photo you can see that the main part of the canal is deeper.

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A flimsy iron walkway runs along the wall. The structure is far too rusty and dangerous to walk on.

There are lots of additional tunnels and recesses.

A gantry crane for repairs or loading ammunition.

 

We decided to stay overnight inside the base, because the temperature there was much warmer than the cold winter wind outside.

The blast-resistant gate of the southern entrance. You can see a warship behind it, so it seems the military area outside is not completely abandoned. We also saw some guys with AK-47s.

The footing for one more southern gate, which was never completed.

This frame seems to be a crane mount for lifting boats out of the water for underbody repairs.

The colour of the water is amazing!

This two-storey building was a locksmith’s workshop. Inside you can find the remains of tables and equipment.

 

This is where the tunnel to the arches for torpedoes and rockets begins.

The doors are built the same way everywhere — filled with concrete.

The ceiling of the torpedo arsenal is covered with plastic.

Colourful! It looks more like a shopping mall than a military base.

The tunnel between the arsenals is fitted with a narrow-gauge railway and has the same concrete-filled doors.

Overall, the underground base shelter has a fairly simple layout.

1. Torpedo and rocket arsenals.

2. Administrative and command block with rooms.

3. Locksmith workshops in a two-storey building.