Dorset war enthusiast builds authentic WWII bomb shelter by hand

  • ITV News Meridian's Richard Slee went underground to experience the wartime lifestyle

A man from Dorset has built an authentic bomb shelter in his back garden in his latest World War Two project.

Trad Casey's house in Weymouth is littered with war paraphernalia from the 1940s.

Six years ago, he decided to build an Anderson shelter by hand.

Trad Casey said: "I thought it would be fun to have something like this in the garden, so I literally dug a big hole and it's all clay so hard digging and I did it all by hand.

"You dig everything out and put it all to one side and then everything goes back on top."

Trad reading a Dorset Daily Echo newspaper from D-Day. Credit: ITV News Meridian

As war took over Europe in 1938, the Anderson shelter was designed and built in more than three million British gardens to protect people from the threat of the Luftwaffe, with information films produced with advice about how to use them during an air attack.

The Anderson shelter is named after Sir John Anderson, the man responsible for preparing air raid precautions in the UK before World War II.

It is made of two corrugated steel sheets bolted together, then buried three feet into the ground and covered with 18 inches of dirt.

Also in the garden is a replica 1940s kitchen and on the drive is a 1932 Standard Little Nine car, traditionally used by the Home Guard.

When Trad isn't polishing his car or reading his 1944 newspapers, he spends time in his bomb shelter, regardless of the weather or temperature.

Trad Casey said: "Now and again, especially in the winter when it's cold, put the fire on, have a beer, have some spam, cook it on the fire. It's very nice.

"There really isn't much room in this Anderson Shelter, but of course during the war they saved many lives and they were given free to people who weren't very well off but of course they then had to build it in their back garden.

"It is a man cave, just an old fashioned man cave; I like learning about the life on the home front that civilians had to go through and this is one thing that a lot of them had to do so I started looking into it and thought it would be a fun thing to have an Anderson Shelter in my back garden."

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