Doomsday Castle: Good Luck With That...

In this modern age, how safe would you feel living here?

In the US, I would imagine many of you have been able to catch at least one episode of National Geographic's Doomsday Castle. As as pinoff series of the popular Doomsday Preppers, Doomsday Castle centers around a man known only as "Brent Sr." (easier to stay off the grid, as it were) gathers five of his grown children to help him complete his "castle."

I watched an episode or two of this show, trying to make my mind up as to whether this guy was truly serious about building a strong refuge for his family. As you can see from the photo at the left, the fortress has an attractive profile but could never stand up to a serious siege by determined attackers--especially if they had an RPG, explosives, or even a bulldozer. Clearly the window openings are far too large, the concrete block construction is suspect, and the fields of observation and fire are far too short, since it's position on a wooded hilltop would allow attackers to come right up to the perimeter without being observed.

I suspect the show producers have a lot to do with all of this, along with the "casting" of this single father, his two sons, and his three very attractive daughters--who he is determined to train in survival and shooting skills.  As I watched one episode where they tested a rather suspect drawbridge (not really a 'bridge' - since there was no moat) I relished the thought of taking a large chunk of the castle out by simply backing a school bus into it. The father had a plan to stave off attacking vehicles approaching up the road with a catapult, but how that could be achieved when they couldn't even see down the road was rather laughable.

Of course, here is a real castle (see photo at left). If the show is not a total fabrication, then I'm sure the family patriarch never picked up a book about the construction and development of castles and fortresses.  If the man was really serious, he'd buy himself a bulldozer, pile up some dirt and start thinking about something more along the lines of a Vauban fort.