In January 2011, curious job adverts appeared for "Weapons Systems Analysts" working for GCHQ "in Lincolnshire". The adverts asked, "Would you like to play a role in preventing our aircraft being shot down or our ships being sunk, or help to keep Government departments informed about global weapons development? GCHQ is looking for motivated people to work in a team of specialists, based in Lincolnshire, whose role is to provide this kind of information to decision makers in Whitehall and elsewhere." The job adverts mentioned additional payments for shift work and an intriguing "Voice Working Allowance".

Lincolnshire is a long way from the Doughnut in Cheltenham and that must have confused many people. But RAF Digby is indeed where those successful new recruits will be based ... at the end of Cuckoo Lane.

In a suspicious perfectly round clearing in Chicksands Wood labelled "The Hill", there seems to be a prehistoric stone circle rivalling Stonehenge. Are the folks at English Heritage aware of this hidden gem? No! It turns out to be an FLR-9 high frequency signals interception antenna array which, at the height of the Cold War, was used to intercept Soviet and Warsaw Pact communications as well as non-US Diplomatic messages. During WWII, Chicksands' earlier antennae were used to capture the German Enigma transmissions, which were then passed to the GCHQ code breakers at Bletchley Park.

The "Elephant Cage" , as it was nicknamed by the US personnel, was erected in 1964 and finally dismantled in 1996 when the US Air Force turned the Chicksands base over to the UK MoD Joint Services. It can be seen below at high resolution in July 1990, just six years before finally being taken out of service, my specialist aerial photography contributor with the handy pilot's licence!

The OS 1:25000 map of the antenna site labels the area just to the south east of it as a "Danger Area". The detail of this "Danger Area" as seen on the aerial photo below reveals a rifle range. Perhaps this is so that all serving military officers based at Chicksands can "keep their hand in" and ensure that their combatant training is up to date.

It was suspicious that the "Danger Area" at Chicksands was simply missing from the 1:10000 OS map from the Government's MAGIC website, until the data was helpfully revised in early 2006 with the full details and labelled "Firing Range" - perhaps prompted by its mention here and appearance on Google Earth! The "Danger Area" was also a vehicle exclusion zone, when the antenna array was active, because it was where the crucial underground cables between the FLR-9 and the control room lay! All that remains now are the tell-tale plinths on the ground on which the antennae were mounted.

In 2006, in stark contrast to the ultra-secretive Cold War activities at Chicksands, Rowney Warren Wood – just to the north east of the former FLR-9 site – played host to the National Points Series Four Cross (NPS 4X) mountain bike racing competition. Also in Bedfordshire, RAF Henlow is another of those "disused airfields". Granted, the runways are grass covered, as shown on the aerial photo, but Henlow is home to another signals analysis centre, of the utmost importance.

Incidentally, up in Scotland, the site of another Circular Disposed Antenna Array (CDAA) from the Cold War years can be found at the old "disused airfield" at RAF Edzell , just off the main A90 Dundee to Aberdeen road north of Brechin. Take a closer look using the 1:25000 map and you can see the original site, in between the runways, which once housed the antenna array used by America's National Security Agency (NSA) and the US Navy. As revealed in new imagery from Getmapping further below, the site is now used by local company Carnegie Fuels for oil storage and manufacturing purposes.

Croughton has a transmitter annexe at RAF Barford St. John near Banbury in Oxfordshire. This "disused airfield" is said to provide secure communications facilities for CIA agents and US Diplomatic personnel. The 1:25000 OS map reveals another good old "Wireless Station" label.

In 2007, an upgrade was made to the Station Personnel Alerting Systems at Croughton and Barford St. John in the form of new tannoys nicknamed "Giant Voice". These high power speakers on top of tall poles are used to broadcast tones and messages to muster base personnel at times of national emergency such as natural disasters or terrorist attacks. The system was first introduced following the 9/11 attacks in America.

After an embarrassing complete system failure in July 2005 – at the time of the London tube and bus bombings – the Giant Voice system was overhauled at key US military bases throughout the UK. As revealed in amazingly detailed architect plans submitted to the local council in a planning permission application, the tannoy pole at Barford St. John is located immediately north of the microwave tower adjacent to Building 85, within the secure compound in the middle of the "airfield".

The map data sources do not indicate any MoD activity with tell-tale aerial symbols. It is left to Getmapping's aerial photography data to finally reveal all. It is the location for a key NATO Ground Terminal for military communications satellites! It is designated Satellite Ground Station (SGS) Oakhanger. Note that an additional ground terminal is set away from this main site in an annexe, just a little further south west, but connected via a track through the woodland. It is NATO's Satellite Ground Terminal designated SGT-F4.

Skynet 5A – the first stage of three military communications satellite platforms – was finally successfully launched into space on board an Ariane 5-ECA rocket from Arianespace's European Spaceport at Kourou in French Guiana at 10pm (UK GMT) on Sunday 11th March 2007. Skynet 5A was accompanied on Ariane's payload by an Indian TV satellite, the Insat 4B. The launch had been delayed from the previous day because of technical problems with sensors on the Spaceport's ELA-3 launch pad water deluge system, which provides acoustic damping during ignition and lift-off.

Skynet 5B had a provisional date set for 9th November 2007, but was delayed due to "an anomaly in the launch vehicle". Another launch window was arranged for Monday 12th November, but this was cancelled too when a fault was found during fuelling. The Ariane rocket finally lifted-off exactly 48 hours later at 10pm (UK GMT) on Wednesday 14th November and the 5B satellite was deployed 30 minutes into the mission. The other payload was a Thales Alenia Space satellite, which will be used by Brazilian operator Star One for communications, multimedia and broadband Internet services over South America.

Skynet 5C – an in-orbit spare back-up – was due to go into space on Friday 30th May 2008, but the launch was postponed after a software test showed a "non-nominal result". It was eventually successfully deployed on June 12th.

As revealed fully elsewhere in Secret Bases, Paradigm has other key Skynet 5 sites at Hawthorn , in the middle of a field in Corsham, Wiltshire and within RAF Colerne nearby, again sometimes referred to as a "disused airfield", but which is now Azimghur Barracks. The newly upgraded facility at Hawthorn is now known as Paradigm's Network and Spacecraft Operations Centre. In 2008, SGS Colerne was upgraded with additional dish antennae as revealed in architect drawings!

As well as using various Police Force HQ conference facilities, the new regional SOCA offices are used by the Agency to train officers in the handling of serious crime investigations using HYDRA simulation techniques. The HYDRA system was developed by Professor Jonathan Crego at the Centre for Critical Incident Research (CCIR) within Liverpool University's School of Psychology, who has also designed MINERVA simulations for more common everyday scenarios. He is now a consultant with the Metropolitan Police Service.

The official SOCA website has posted adverts for the recruitment of Hydra Training Managers and specified a "secretive" job location somewhere in Harlow, Essex. The location was given away by a property developer who boasted of a newly refurbished building being leased to the "Home Office" for 20 years. It is Templefields House in River Way, Harlow - immediately adjacent to the Wincanton and Excel Logistics distribution hub for Comet.

The SOCA facility in Harlow was previously a sales HQ for the giant Diageo corporation (owners of famous drinks manufacturing names including Guinness). The address is now confusingly listed on databases as "SOCO" though! Rather plush offices for mere Scene of Crime Officers dusting for fingerprints!

Yet more SOCA recruitment adverts have revealed a new forensic analysis laboratory in Staffordshire. To complement existing labs run by LGC Forensics (formerly the Laboratory of the Government Chemist), the new SOCA Biometric Lab at Unit 3, Drayton Manor Business Park in Tamworth is now open for business next door to the famous family amusement park of the same name.

Other laboratories (the addresses of which are curiously not revealed on the official LGC website) are located at Darwin House at Birchwood Park, Risley near Warrington, Cheshire and at Building F5 within Culham Science Park near Abingdon, Oxfordshire. LGC have also set up a SOCA forensic lab at the new National Firearms Centre within the Royal Armouries in Leeds.

Out of all the UK's major Police HQs hosting HYDRA sessions, the brand new purpose built Portishead Down HQ of Avon and Somerset Police Force is most probably concealing another SOCA regional office too.

Up in Manchester, another SOCA base can be found hiding in the middle of an industrial estate behind the famous Trafford Centre shopping mall. In early 2008, the address databases were helpfully listing "SOCA" at Units 3/4, Unison Business Park on Robson Avenue, Trafford Park. A tall lattice telecoms tower sticking out of the rear compound is also a giveaway.

In 2008 I discovered a covert operations base for SOCA operating out of new offices built in 2000 on the site of an old haulage truck depot on an industrial estate in a town near Wakefield, West Yorkshire. It had originally been built for the Regional Crime Squad and National Crime Squad – the pre-cursors to SOCA. It is adjacent to a motorway junction with rapid access to both the M1 and M62. I even obtained the architect's plans for the SOCA Wakefield base by serving a Freedom of Information request on the local council, but I am not revealing its precise location.

Likewise, I shall merely "mention" a similar covert operations base for SOCA on an industrial estate in a West Sussex town close to Gatwick Airport. But amazingly, in a mind-boggling lapse of judgement, SOCA flagged-up the location themselves by placing their address on a business directory, yet using a fake Limited Company name made up of letters from their supposedly secret cover codename! Naturally, I checked with Companies House but the name is not currently registered. Furthermore, it has never been used by anyone else before and then dissolved. Sloppy!

Meanwhile, in Scotland, SOCA isn't so coy and freely declares its home on the official website of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency (SCDEA). SOCA is colocated with SCDEA at Osprey House (built in 2002) on Inchinnan Road at the old Paisley Harbour near Glasgow International Airport.

While Metropolitan Police vehicle compounds are obviously used for the storage of recovered stolen cars, they also contain forensic laboratories for SOCA analysis. The existing facility at the Angerstein Centre on Bramshot Avenue in Charlton, south east London has been joined by a brand new one at the Bilton Centre , off Walmgate Road in Perivale, Middlesex. It has been built on the site of a 1960s Ministry of Labour Government Training Centre.

Think back to the new Airwave secure communications system for the emergency services described at the beginning of this page. In April 2008, SOCA placed another job advert [PDF] on their website to recruit an Airwave System Supervisor [profile, PDF] based at a new purpose built Regional Control Centre (RCC) "somewhere in the East Midlands".

In previous years, much had already been written about the consolidation of more than 40 national Fire Brigade control centres down into just 9 brand new regional centres. Whilst their use has been described as being merely part of the Fire and Resilience "FiReControl" Project, the SOCA advert hints at an even more significant role for the nine new buildings. The successful candidate will oversee "the first national covert Airwave communications system".

Ostensibly, each new building location has been chosen on the basis of low risks from flooding and other disasters. They have also been sited at major transport hubs – apparently for the convenience of the staff who will have to relocate or be recruited. What a nice employer!

But consider another more pressing need for all of them (except the Greater London one) to be located right next to motorway junctions and you'll soon get the bigger picture. Perhaps a "multi-agency" network of rapid response teams reacting to "incidents" which threaten the Critical National Infrastructure (CNI). Take a look at all the detailed architect drawings of the RCCs on the local councils' websites.

Incidentally, how apt it is that the London RCC is being built on the site of a demolished warehouse next door to the Thames Television studios where ITV's long-running police drama "The Bill" is filmed! In contrast, the Warrington RCC has been built on the site of the famous WWII USAF base RAF Burtonwood.

Brave students in riot gear are taught how to deal with petrol bombs being thrown at them. Weapons training is provided on indoor laser ranges and outdoors on the Army's old Milton Range further east. The MPSTC includes a mock-up of a mini town including a bank, shops, night club and even a football stadium. Also featured are train and underground stations with full size carriages and a section from a passenger jet – utilised to great effect by specialist firearms officers from Scotland Yard's elite CO19 (formerly SO19) branch.

In early 2009, the Gravesend facility played a crucial role in the Met's training to deal with the possibility of rioting protestors at the G20 Summit of world political leaders, as part of the massive police and counter-terrorism security plan codenamed Operation Glencoe.

The previous facility, which the Gravesend base replaces, was at the north east corner of Hounslow Heath near Heathrow Airport. This could be seen at hi-res on Google Earth until Autumn 2006 and showed the scorched mock-up streets and many of the features now incorporated into the new Gravesend facility.

The latest Google Earth imagery for London shows that the whole MPSTC Hounslow Heath facility has now been bulldozed and replaced with a new housing estate.

Meanwhile, down in South East London, tucked into the residential suburbs between Sydenham and Penge East train stations, you'll find the Metropolitan Police's Operational Technical / Technology Support Unit (OTSU) at Newlands Park (pictured further below in a Bird's Eye aerial view), based in an old factory.

In December 2005, Thames Valley Police officially opened a new £5 million indoor firearms training range within the grounds of its Sulhamstead House training centre near Reading in Berkshire. It was built on the site of some older mock houses that had been used for various tactical training scenarios. Study the aerial imagery further below showing the before, during and after phases of the construction project.

Up at the other end of the country, another brand new Tactical Firearms Training Centre has been built for joint use by Cleveland and Durham Police Authorities. It can be found at Urlay Nook in Eaglescliffe, at the old rail hub entrance to a former Royal Naval Supply Depot, opposite a huge chemical plant and also near Teesside International (now Durham Tees Valley) Airport.

Up in Scotland, not to be outdone, Strathclyde Police have opened a brand new training base at Jackton , East Kilbride on the outskirts of Glasgow. It comes complete with weapons ranges, driver training and public order mock-up facilities.

Astonishingly, the gate is just a standard one you'd find on a farm track and the security is low key to say the least. But the sign warns that 24 hour emergency access is required and that trespass is prohibited under the Explosives Act! Why would explosives be stored at a disused quarry? They wouldn't be stored there when it was active – a remote store would be used. Why is there no permanent guarding?

I had heard persistent rumours that whenever there is an incident threatening national security, the local police are sent up to this site to guard it for the duration of the state of high alert. There has been so much speculation regarding its purpose, from avid readers of Secret Bases, that I decided to settle the matter by performing a Freedom of Information Act request to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Within just a matter of days, they very kindly responded with the full details!

After all the excitement, disappointingly there's no mysterious MoD bunker concealing covert military operations. However, my FOI request to HSE revealed the owner of the site as a very interesting local business, using it since 1978.

It turns out to be Edgar Brothers located on Macclesfield's Lyme Green Business Park in Unit 3 on Heather Close. Originally founded in 1947, they are one of the UK's oldest, well-established importers and wholesale dealers in firearms, ammunition and associated products. As well as the obvious sporting and leisure clients, through their Police and Military Division (PMD) they are official suppliers of guns, knives, high power torches, weapon lights, clothing and footwear to all UK Police Forces and MoD. A major US Government and DoD supplier Blackhawk is pushed too, with a link to their video promotions website.

Small wonder that earlier in 2008, the then Chief Constable of Cheshire Police (Peter Fahy – since moved to Greater Manchester Police) declined to respond to my repeated formal requests for comments on security at the site. With the UK's gun and knife crime epidemic, one can only hope that things have now improved substantially. But then again, remember that not all surveillance is obvious nowadays!

Various other fascinating locations for Thor missile launch pads from the 1960s can still be seen on aerial photos of old WWII airfields. There were originally 20 Thor launch sites (including Feltwell) organised into four groups of five sites (one main, plus four support sites). Each Thor site comprised a cluster of three missile launch pads, making a total of 60 Thor missiles deployed.

Of those 20 original sites, only the following ten can still be made out on aerial photos:-

The remaining nine Thor sites, apart from Feltwell, were at the old wartime RAF airfields at Driffield , Full Sutton , Carnaby , Tuddenham , Mepal , North Pickenham , Coleby Grange , Bardney and Hemswell .

On August 25th 2009, more than 75 firefighters struggled to contain a huge blaze in one of the old hangars at RAF Hemswell, which had been used as part of the ECO Plastics Hemswell Cliff recycling plant.

If you thought RAF North Luffenham's Thor missile launch pads were interesting, read on throughout Secret Bases to find out what else lurks alongside the old runways!

The Thor site at Bardney, on the other side of Market Rasen to the Caistor and Ludford sites, is marked on the OS 1:25000 map , in the middle of poultry farm buildings! However, the remains of the launch pads are barely visible on Getmapping's aerial photos, but can be just spotted on Google Earth.

Likewise, south of Lincoln, another old Thor site was located near to the village of Boothby Graffoe. In more recent times, the village achieved a more innocent form of fame. It was adopted as a stage name by an award winning comedian whose showbusiness career rocketed (!) following an appearance on the Opportunity Knocks TV talent show in the late 1980s!

The Thor launch pads at Boothby Graffoe's old WWII airfield at RAF Coleby Grange have been covered by outbuildings on what is now Boothby Heath Farm, but the classic three-pad Thor layout can still be seen on the 1:25000 map .

The nuclear warheads for the Thor missiles were stored at a special secure area within RAF Faldingworth , just south of a large conventional munitions storage area.

The airfield was "airbrushed" from OS maps for over 20 years, before finally making an appearance in the 1980s. It is now detailed fully at 1:25000 and even 1:10000 scales. The nuclear warhead stores at Faldingworth were also used by RAF Scampton close by.

A similar nuclear warhead storage area, used for other projects in the 1950s, can be found on Thetford Heath at Barnham in Suffolk. Note on the 1:25000 map of the site, the unmistakable - dare I say it - Pentagon shape! In modern times, the site has long been used as the very mundane sounding Gorse Industrial Estate.

The Barnham nuclear store had previously been used for storing chemical weapons. Another old mustard gas storage area can be seen further south, at the former Little Heath Forward Filling Depot (FFD) . Note that it was once connected into the adjoining dismantled train line.

While you're studying the old secure depot at Barnham, take a look at another nuclear weapons storage area from the 1950s, on the north side of RAF Honington nearby. Amusingly, the old bunker area - ringed with three security fences - was still "airbrushed" from even the 1:10000 map until it was finally revealed in 2010!

In recent years, the bunkers there have been used to provide temporary accommodation for nuclear warheads travelling between AWE Burghfield, AWE Aldermaston and RNAD Coulport in Scotland.

Nowadays, RAF Honington provides a base for the tri-service Joint Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) Regiment, previously known as the Joint Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC) Regiment.

All this finally changed in 2010 when it was revealed for the first time in full glorious detail at 1:10000 scale . However, the 1:25000 scale map still shows a blank (for now, anyway). Meanwhile, the 1:50000 map was updated in 2010 to provide the most subtle of hints. Can you spot the difference? See below!

Those 1:10000 maps do reveal, however, that the enclave is afforded a bit more privacy by strategically placed bushes lining RAF Feltwell's main perimeter fence. The enclave has been a vital part of the global US Space Command (USSPACECOM) network which is headquartered at Peterson Air Force Base at Colorado Springs. From 1989 until 2003 it was home to the 5th Space Surveillance Squadron of the 21st Space Wing and referred to as a Near Space Tracking Facility.

The Space Wing then moved to RAF Fylingdales, in readiness for the latest major US instigated expansion programme there and also at Menwith Hill (of which much more later). The plan for the Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) Programme is to resurrect the controversial US Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI) or "Son of Star Wars" Project - whereby the next generation of warfare is carried out in space.

Throughout the 1950s, at the height of the Cold War, the airfield was known as RAF Pershore and it was one of over 30 dispersal sites for the UK's strategic nuclear deterrent, the Vulcan V-Bomber force, carrying the Blue Danube atomic weapon.

Rather than a "Secret Base", Throckmorton's village residents are all too familiar with the site. In 2001, one end of the old airfield was used as a mass burial ground for animal carcasses during the UK's Foot and Mouth Disease disaster. In 2002, the other end of the airfield was considered by the Government as a possible location for a new "processing centre" for asylum seekers, until villagers waged a very successful campaign against it.

Many former members of the SAS, the UK's Special Forces, have left to set-up their own specialist operations known as PMCs – Private Military Companies or Contractors. One such leading worldwide PMC, ArmorGroup, has based its new close protection (CP) and defensive driving training facility at Throckmorton Airfield. Since 2008, ArmorGroup has been part of the G4S Group (formerly known as Group 4 Securicor).

Another PMC made up of ex-SAS members (now part of ArmorGroup) - Phoenix CP  [info pack, PDF] - has used a close protection, counter-surveillance and communications training base at Longworth Hall in the village of Lugwardine just east of Hereford. Due to the handgun ban, specialist live firearms training by the PMCs is held outside the UK in places like Switzerland and obviously America.

During 2007, Phoenix CP announced they were vacating Longworth Hall and moving to a new training facility "by the end of summer". Curiously, in February 2008 the Phoenix CP website suddenly went dead and the parent company ArmorGroup announced that the courses had been suspended  [press release, PDF].

Yet another PMC, the AKE Group - spearheaded by former SAS member Andrew Kain - started off with its admin HQ at Mortimer House, within an industrial estate in the Holmer suburb of Hereford. In 2005, AKE received the Queen's Award for Enterprise, in the International Trade category, for "risk mitigation".

In 2006, AKE moved its HQ into the historic centre of Hereford, near the cathedral, to an office within St. Owen's Chambers , on the street bearing the same name. A presence was also established in Albyn Terrace in the heart of Aberdeen in Scotland, at the office of a marine logistics company which provides expert solutions in offshore personnel transfers. In late 2007, AKE was acquired by the Cerberus Group, run by yet another SAS privateer, Will Scully.

The ex-SAS officers have based their own private operations close to their former homes at the original Bradbury Lines barracks in Hereford's Lower Bullingham district and the new Stirling Lines depot, which since 1999 has been based at the much bigger former RAF training centre at Credenhill.

Note at the far southern end of the Credenhill base the remains of a dismantled antenna array similar in layout to the famous Chicksands aerial system also featured in Secret Bases. It can be seen in extreme close-up on Windows Live Local. Following a major UK imagery update in June 2007, it can also be seen in high resolution on Google Earth.

The AKE Group holds regular instructional seminars further afield, at a hotel and conference centre deep inside SAS training country among the Black Mountains and Brecon Beacons, at the village of Allt-Yr-Ynys on the Wales / Herefordshire border.

Less than ten miles to the north east, you can find the Pontrilas SAS counter-terrorism trainer unit and its infamous mock-up jet hidden in a forest clearing, featured elsewhere in Secret Bases. But do the PMCs have access to this?

The amphibious SAS sister organisation, the Special Boat Service (SBS), have their HQ within the Royal Navy's shore establishment HMS Excellent on Portsmouth's Whale Island, just north of the main Naval Base.

However, the SBS training base is at at the huge Royal Marines depot at Hamworthy near Poole, Dorset. It sits next door to the popular holiday resort's very public Rockley Sands caravan park and is surrounded by all the exclusive multi-million pound real estate around Poole Harbour. Just a little further south, next to all the boat yards at Lake Marina, you'll find the SBS harbour depot where all the equipment is kept.

In March 2010 it appeared on Google Street View even showing the perimeter sign that reads "This is a prohibited place within the meaning of the Official Secrets Act – no loitering, sketching or photography". The Street View imagery was removed just a week later!

By checking the aerial photos below, note how the tell-tale geometric building layouts for both of the Malvern sites are identical to not only the old parts of the GCHQ bases in Benhall and Oakley in Cheltenham, but also the Defence Logistics Organisation (DLO) sites at Ensleigh and Fox Hill in Bath (since April 2007, DE&S – Defence Equipment and Support).

Furthermore, compare those aerial shots with another old GCHQ site at the end of Lime Grove in Eastcote , West London near Ruislip, Middlesex. This site was used temporarily by the Government Codes and Ciphers School (GC&CS) after leaving "Station X" at Bletchley Park in the late 1940s, but before moving to the permanent Cheltenham base - by then renamed GCHQ - in the early 1950s. Later, the old GCHQ Eastcote "Government Buildings" were occupied by civil servants from the Department for the Environment and the Department of Transport.

The US Navy had a significant presence there during the Cold War and they still keep a US Embassy liaison unit for the DoD's naval recruitment team.

It has also provided barracks for the US Marine Corps Security Force (MCSF), whose members protect the US Navy establishment at 7 North Audley Street, Grosvenor Square, London, in the ever important counter-terrorism role. Meanwhile, the US Embassy nearby is protected by the Marine Corps Embassy Security Command (MCESC) – the new name for the Marine Security Guard Battalion (MSGB) since April 2007.

Even more intriguingly, one of the buildings at Eastcote provides the "London, UK" office for the US Navy's NCISRA - the Naval Criminal Investigative Service's Resident Agent. Worldwide, the facilities are also referred to as Resident Units (NCISRU) and Regional Offices (NCISRO). NCIS agents are tasked with countering and investigating terrorism, espionage, computer intrusion, fraud and other serious crimes against people and property.

Since 2003, there's even been a hit TV drama called NCIS shown in the US in primetime on the CBS Network and also in many other countries around the world. In Summer 2006, the UK's Channel 5 also showed it on Saturday nights.

• www.ncis.navy.mil
• www.cbs.com/primetime/ncis/

Britain's very early signals and radar research work first started on England's south coast at Steamer Point , on top of Friars Cliff, close to Mudeford near Christchurch, Dorset.

I remember spending many childhood summers at the neighbouring Sandhills Holiday Centre at Mudeford. I was fascinated by the huge white golf ball radomes further along the beach at the Signals Research and Development Establishment (SRDE). This site hosted the UK's first military communications satellite ground terminal. The SRDE's main base was a little further inland at what is now BAe Systems at Somerford, Christchurch.

In 1980, the SRDE finally pulled out of the Christchurch location and the activities were merged with those of the RRE at Malvern. Today, a commemorative plaque at the old Steamer Point radome site remembers the signals and radar experts who worked there.

Now, let's consider two classic examples of Britain's "top secret" sites which just didn't feature on maps ... until January 2005!

The UK Government's key atomic weapons sites are located at Burghfield and Aldermaston, both in Berkshire. But by studying the OS maps, you'd have thought they might be hidden underground! The Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) at Burghfield was last included on an OS map way back in 1974 and had never been seen since. Rather comically, AWE Aldermaston (which is actually the size of a small town) kept appearing and disappearing, depending on which issue of the OS map you were looking at and which scale. It reminded me of the legend of Brigadoon!

Until December 2004, the older OS map data through the Multimap website just showed AWE Aldermaston as plain woodland and AWE Burghfield as a completely empty field! Ordnance Survey's Get-a-map site, which obviously has all the latest definitive data, correctly showed the Aldermaston site (innocently labelled "Depot") at 1:50000 . But when you viewed the same area at 1:25000 , the site suddenly reverted to Burnham's Copse!

However, all this changed suddenly in January 2005, when OS updated their online 1:25000 map data to show both AWE Aldermaston and AWE Burghfield in full detail, but the 1:50000 scale data for Burghfield was to take another 18 months before being updated.

The Royal Mail address database correctly lists AWE Aldermaston (with the post code "RG7 4PR"). However, AWE Burghfield is hidden away masquerading under the innocuously sounding address, "1 The Mearings, Burghfield, Reading, RG30 3RR", which turns out to be the main high security gate! Try plugging those post codes into Multimap and Getmapping and see what happens!

Before January 2005, even on Get-a-map, AWE Burghfield was conspicuous by its absence at both 1:50000 and 1:25000 scales. It is actually situated in the space between Burghfield Place, Burnthouse Bridge and Grazeley Green. It wasn't until July 2006 that the Burghfield atomic weapons site finally made it back onto OS maps at 1:50000 scale after 32 years in the secrecy wilderness!

Just to the north east of Burnthouse Bridge, you can make out the remains of a disused train branch line . This line once connected into the nearby main line which, further south, goes right past the former munitions depot at Bramley (mentioned earlier). The maps and photos of the Bramley munitions depot show that it, too, was once connected into the same main line. During WWII, the AWE Burghfield site was a conventional munitions factory.

For the residents living next to these sites, they are all too real. Especially when they have been forced to use bottled water because of suspicions that the local supply had been contaminated by toxic chemicals.

The AWE sites and all other sensitive UK military and Government sites, such as Faslane nuclear submarine base, are patrolled by Ministry of Defence Police (MDP). Their main training centre and MDP HQ is contained within a deserted WWII USAF airbase at RAF Wethersfield , a few miles north west of Braintree in Essex.

There are two Operational Support Units (OSU), for rapid emergency deployment of MDP Officers. The southern OSU is at Wethersfield HQ, while the northern OSU is within RAF Dishforth , between Ripon and Thirsk in North Yorkshire. The unit is strategically situated alongside the A1(M), with good access to all major routes.

AWE have another small site at AWE Blacknest at Brimpton Common, just a couple of miles to the west of AWE Aldermaston. This site, within an old country house, contains large computer systems and is staffed by scientists researching seismological activity, in order to verify nuclear test bans.

A former top secret remote AWE facility, involved in testing nuclear weapon triggers, can be seen at Orford Ness on the coast of Suffolk. The derelict remains of strange buildings resembling pagodas can be spotted on the beach. Further north up the coast, the remains of the 1960s Cobra Mist over-the-horizon radar project can be found. All these Orford Ness features are pictured further below in exclusive Pilot's Eye Views.

On the images of AWE Aldermaston and AWE Burghfield below, hover over each image with your mouse pointer to compare each aerial photo with the corresponding OS map. Click on each image to switch the map between the different scales and data revisions!

AWE Aldermaston's "Burning Ground" annexe

Using the latest hi-res imagery on Google Earth and Google Maps, next to AWE Aldermaston itself, you can spot a mysterious secure depot , hidden in a clearing in a wood called The Birches. Furthermore, the depot is clearly connected directly into AWE Aldermaston using an underpass beneath Red Lane, a minor public road which runs alongside the complex's eastern boundary.

In June 2006, I made a formal application to the MoD under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act. The official response revealed that the depot is used by AWE Aldermaston as a "burning ground" to incinerate non-nuclear explosive waste material.

In my special implementation of Google Maps further below, look out for some other Secret Bases in the area clustered closely together, the purposes of which are revealed later in this page. Keep on reading!

Incidentally, all of the UK's non-nuclear Royal Ordnance factories were acquired by BAe Systems (formerly British Aerospace) some time ago. One of these can be spotted near Kidderminster in the West Midlands, at Summerfield .

This old ordnance factory was used by BAe Systems to research and develop motors and fuels for rocket propulsion on missile systems. The fuels were stored in huge underground silos and the Summerfield site was patrolled by armed guards - hopefully non-smokers!

Any mention of the Summerfield site was dropped from the BAe Systems website in early 2005. This was simply because the site has been taken over by the Roxel Group - a merger between BAe Systems Rocket Motors Division and the French defence company Celerg.

Planning permission documents at Bridgnorth District Council, published on the Internet in Summer 2005, revealed that the Roxel Group - new incumbents at Summerfield - test their rocket engines at the Wyre Forest Test Range .

The site is hidden in a forest clearing at Postensplain between the villages of Buttonoak and Buttonbridge, close to Bewdley, Worcestershire. Right up until a data revision in 2010, only the huge rectangular perimeter fence surrounding the site was shown on 1:25000 and 1:10000 scale - but no buildings. Still nothing at all is shown at 1:50000 scale.

In Summer 2007, Google Earth finally revealed both the Wyre Forest range and Roxel's French test facility south of Paris. It is within the Bois du Palais forest near the village of Le Subdray, just south west of Bourges.

Hold on a minute! Does that clearing in Wyre Forest remind you of something else? Something quite sinister in fact. Take another look below!

Another test range hidden in a clearing can be found in mid-Wales, close to the sources of the Rivers Severn and Wye. Take a very close look at Hafren Forest near Llanidloes. The clearing is an old disused quarry which during the 1980s was used by the ubiquitous BAe Systems for very high voltage research experiments – leading to many "UFO" reports in the area!

It is thought that BAe's missiles and satellites division at Stevenage, Hertfordshire (now EADS Astrium) was working on a "Star Wars" contract for the US Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI) programme. Modern incarnations of the project – referred to as "Son of Star Wars" – are known as Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) and National Missile Defence (NMD).

More recently, the test range has been used by the University of Wales, Aberystwyth's Centre for Explosion Studies and the Shock and Detonation Physics Research Group (known as Shockwaves). That actually closed in 2004, but the key personnel and facilities were acquired in 2005 and incorporated into a new specialist company based at a technology park in Aberystwyth. HazRes (Hazard Research and Risk Consultants Limited) assists clients in the gas, oil and petrochemical industries in recognising, quantifying and managing hazards relating to flammable and explosive materials.

Presumably the fuels at Roxel's Summerfield plant were also transported for use by the Rocket Propulsion Establishment (RPE), formerly run by BAe Systems, at Westcott in Buckinghamshire. The majority of the site is now given over to the Westcott Venture Park, hosting dozens of industrial companies. However, BAe Systems still have a key office there. It specialises in advising worldwide clients on the environmental issues involved in decommissioning and converting old MoD related sites, once associated with the storage and testing of ordnance and dangerous chemicals, to "normal" use. How apt!

As soon as the hi-res aerial photography of RPE Westcott became available on Google Earth, many enthusiastic readers of "Secret Bases" contacted me, excited at spotting an apparent SIGINT enclave just to the north. They were convinced that the remote depot - in the middle of farmers' fields, ringed by fortress-like security and with an obvious communications tower - was in covert use by SIS or GCHQ. My correspondents were surprised that I'd overlooked it! However, reality is rather more mundane! A bit of research revealed that it is actually Transco's Aylesbury Gas Compressor Station , utilising huge Rolls-Royce turbines and connected into a major underground pipeline. Other similar stations are sometimes marked cryptically on OS maps as "GVC" - Gas Valve Compounds. They are known in the gas transportation industry as AGIs - Above Ground Installations.

One can be spotted at Steppingley in Bedfordshire, alongside the M1 motorway, hidden in a clearing in Flitwick Plantation. Another one is at Willington , to the north east. It doesn't appear on most maps but a tantalising hint is present at 1:10000 scale . You can even use Google Earth to "fly" along the 20km excavation trench connecting these two locations, which is the Transco gas pipeline upgrade project from 2001 / 2002.

Another good example can be seen near Huntingdon in Cambridgeshire, next to the old RAF Kimbolton wartime airfield. Here, you get a Gas Compressor Station and a Gas Valve Compound next to each other, both of which are clearly labelled on the 1:10000 map . Yet another impressive example can be found concealed within Pitchers Wood near Woldingham in Surrey. It is alongside the M25 motorway's Clacket Lane services and close to Biggin Hill's old wartime airfield over the border in Kent.

Perhaps the most impressive example of all is at the most logical location – where North Sea Gas comes into the UK off the north east coast of Scotland. Consider a suspicious clearing in woodland near the town of Westhill on the western edge of the city of Aberdeen. Take a close look at Swailend Wood near the rural crossroads village of Echt. The massive Aberdeen Gas Compressor Station is on the site of what was once just a tiny farmstead known as North Finnercy. Whilst not yet available on Google Earth, it is revealed in full detail in close-up aerial photography from Getmapping through the Windows Live Local site.

The old RPE Westcott site is quite close to the MoD's massive Defence Storage and Distribution Agency (DSDA) depots at Upper Arncott and Ambrosden near Bicester in Oxfordshire, both of which are served by extensive train line systems. The DSDA Ambrosden site at Graven Hill is pictured above, my contributor with a private pilot's licence!

Other large DSDA sites of interest can be found at Ashchurch , near Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire and Donnington , near Telford, Shropshire. There are no less than six DSDA depots dotted around RAF Stafford's Beaconside base, which is actually due to close in 2007.

Many of the DSDA depots also provide facilities for the Army Base Repair Organisation (ABRO). The ABRO Donnington site was seriously affected by severe defence cuts announced by the MoD in November 2005.

Two other BAe Systems sites worthy of note - both former WWII munitions facilities - can be spotted at Puriton near Bridgwater in Somerset alongside the M5 motorway and at Radway Green near Crewe in Cheshire, beside the M6. Notice that both sites are, or were, served by train branch lines and are just labelled as "Factory" and "Works" respectively, even on 1:10000 scale OS maps.

Thinking of rockets, take a look at the Spadeadam Forest close to the English/Scottish border, in Hadrian's Wall country. RAF Spadeadam , just north of the village of Gilsland in Cumbria, is nowadays a massive warfare tactics testing range for electronic counter measures.

In the 1950s and 1960s, clearings in the forest were used for the development and testing of missiles and rocket engines, most notably the Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile (IRBM) project "Blue Streak". The old engine test area is at Priorlancy (or Prior Lancy) and the rocket & missile test area can be spotted at Greymare Hill .

Further evidence of military activity is indicated by some other very interesting clearings in the forest at Green Hill , Low King Hill , Kingturn Rigg and the Range Control Unit at Berry Hill .

Another mysterious clearing can be found north east of the Berry Hill control unit, at Trowyshaw Rigg but it doesn't show up until viewed on MAGIC's 1:10000 map .

The close-up hi-res aerial view of Getmapping's imagery from the Live Local service reveals an apparent military airfield with two runways, hidden in Spadeadam Forest! There are even numerous jet aircraft on the ground ready to launch!

Hold on! The clearing at Trowyshaw Rigg is just a dummy airfield layout for the aircrew practising on the Warfare Tactics Range. The planes are radar targets to deal with. Other dummy radar targets are dotted around the Spadeadam range, including vehicle convoys and weapons systems. Take another look at the Priorlancy clearing, this time in extreme close-up using Live Local. You'll see a jet parked on a ramp ready to be used as a target for the low flying training runs. It is an old Sukhoi SU-22 Fitter, acquired by the RAF from the East German Air Force following German reunification. Take an even closer look with a ground photo.

Surely the award for most picturesque - but long since abandoned - rocket test facility must go to the High Down site on the south west tip of the Isle of Wight next to the Needles Lighthouse.

Here in the 1950s and 1960s, the Saunders Roe company, based at Cowes at the north end of the island, conducted test launches of the Black Knight, Black Arrow and Black Prince systems. Early experiments were carried out here to evaluate a possible re-entry vehicle for the Blue Streak missile project.