I first saw this on a video from Bob Thissen (Exploring the unbeaten Path) and it looked epic.
So I was deffo on board a few months later when I received a phonecall off my mate Howlin “Yo, flights to Malta are dirt cheap, fancy that power plant next weekend with me and @Sheard ?
And that was that.
Visited with @Sheard and Howlin, with a huge thanks to @The_Raw for helping us out, much appreciated fella! Great few days spent in Malta, I’d never been here before but it’s a place that has always interested me. My Grandparents used to regularly visit here for holidays, and I’m pretty sure my Grandad was based out here on National Service too. So yeah, we landed in Malta, hired a car, had a scran, couple of beers and headed to our Air BnB to get ready to send the plant the first night, with the idea that if we fail, or anything has changed we have a day or two to come up with a new plan. Anyway as it seems we got lucky nothing had changed from the info we had and it was relatively straight forward.
Armed with our massive sun maker floodlights we all bought specifically for this trip we made our way down into station. It was, as you can imagine pitch black, with the odd bit of light poking through near to the live dockyard, but we stayed away, as to not give the game away.
We had a quick wander around to gain our bearings and then proceeded to photograph the place. The colours in this place and the amount of rust, just eat light, but I don’t think we did such a bad job. It truly is quite a special place, to see all this old British equipment, just sat here rotting away is quite something. It’s really not faring too well though, everything is so rotten. There’s one part under the Parson units where the floor is probably the sketchiest flooring I’ve ever walked over. It’s a death trap in parts.
We Didn’t see as much as @The_Raw as we didn’t fancy wading so missed out on the storage tunnels. But looking at some maps of the tunnel network here, I think with some perseverance it could throw up some more goodies. We only saw a tiny part of the tunnel network, and there is also another underground station nearby, Marsa B which has been demo’d quite recently but parts of the underground A Station remain, and I believe parts are currently used as a data centre. So who knows.
History
There really isn’t much information about this place online so I’ve copied it from @The_Raw in his excellent report here:
www.28dayslater.co.uk
This power plant has been described as one of the most interesting industrial archaeological sites of Malta. The plant's diesel engines are unique, as there are only 12 of this kind left in the world and six of them are in here. The facility was built by British forces in the 1930s before World war II and remained in use until they left the island in 1979. It was built underground to protect it from being bombed, so it could continue to provide power in the event of a war. In 1979 it was handed over to Enemalta (the leading energy services provider in the Malta) who kept it operational until 1992. It has been abandoned ever since, although it was used for storing 1,200 cubic metres of asbestos in the meantime. The asbestos was removed in a massive clear up operation in 2012.
Pics
I’ll start off with an outline of the underground network we explored
As you can see the underground network is quite vast. The area in green is what you see in the pictures below, Blue is the overall site in @The_Raw 's report, including storage tunnels. North of the plant is where Marsa A (underground) and Marsa B were.
A picture of one of the units at Marsa A
What looks to be the same unit in 2017
What’s left down there, who knows.
Anyway moving on.
A look over the live dock
I particularly like the Giraffe painted crane in the background
Ventilation shafts up top
One of the first rooms we came across with some switch gear in
A very manky circuit diagram
The same panel in 2005
Map of Malta
And again in 2005
So after this control/switchroom, the first “Hall” we came across had 3 of the 6 English Electric Fullagar Heavy Oil engines in.
Breif description of how they work
I heard ya like rust? Still, some sight though eh.
Climbing up here was a lot sketchier than it seems. Handrails, pipes, wires, pretty much anything you touched just disintegrated as soon as you put any sort of weight on them. I think I leant on one just to get something out of my bag and it fell off the wall. So fair play to anyone who’s climbed the crane or owt.
Moving onto the next hall which was pretty much identical, linked via a tunnel at the end
Off these two main halls there were various rooms used for storage etc
So I was deffo on board a few months later when I received a phonecall off my mate Howlin “Yo, flights to Malta are dirt cheap, fancy that power plant next weekend with me and @Sheard ?
And that was that.
Visited with @Sheard and Howlin, with a huge thanks to @The_Raw for helping us out, much appreciated fella! Great few days spent in Malta, I’d never been here before but it’s a place that has always interested me. My Grandparents used to regularly visit here for holidays, and I’m pretty sure my Grandad was based out here on National Service too. So yeah, we landed in Malta, hired a car, had a scran, couple of beers and headed to our Air BnB to get ready to send the plant the first night, with the idea that if we fail, or anything has changed we have a day or two to come up with a new plan. Anyway as it seems we got lucky nothing had changed from the info we had and it was relatively straight forward.
Armed with our massive sun maker floodlights we all bought specifically for this trip we made our way down into station. It was, as you can imagine pitch black, with the odd bit of light poking through near to the live dockyard, but we stayed away, as to not give the game away.
We had a quick wander around to gain our bearings and then proceeded to photograph the place. The colours in this place and the amount of rust, just eat light, but I don’t think we did such a bad job. It truly is quite a special place, to see all this old British equipment, just sat here rotting away is quite something. It’s really not faring too well though, everything is so rotten. There’s one part under the Parson units where the floor is probably the sketchiest flooring I’ve ever walked over. It’s a death trap in parts.
We Didn’t see as much as @The_Raw as we didn’t fancy wading so missed out on the storage tunnels. But looking at some maps of the tunnel network here, I think with some perseverance it could throw up some more goodies. We only saw a tiny part of the tunnel network, and there is also another underground station nearby, Marsa B which has been demo’d quite recently but parts of the underground A Station remain, and I believe parts are currently used as a data centre. So who knows.
History
There really isn’t much information about this place online so I’ve copied it from @The_Raw in his excellent report here:
Report - - Underground Power Plant, Malta - November 2022 | European and International Sites
This underground power plant has been described as one of the most interesting industrial archaeological sites of Malta. The plant's diesel engines are unique, as there are only 12 of this kind left in the world and six of them are in here. The facility was built by British forces in the 1930s...
www.28dayslater.co.uk
This power plant has been described as one of the most interesting industrial archaeological sites of Malta. The plant's diesel engines are unique, as there are only 12 of this kind left in the world and six of them are in here. The facility was built by British forces in the 1930s before World war II and remained in use until they left the island in 1979. It was built underground to protect it from being bombed, so it could continue to provide power in the event of a war. In 1979 it was handed over to Enemalta (the leading energy services provider in the Malta) who kept it operational until 1992. It has been abandoned ever since, although it was used for storing 1,200 cubic metres of asbestos in the meantime. The asbestos was removed in a massive clear up operation in 2012.
Pics
I’ll start off with an outline of the underground network we explored
As you can see the underground network is quite vast. The area in green is what you see in the pictures below, Blue is the overall site in @The_Raw 's report, including storage tunnels. North of the plant is where Marsa A (underground) and Marsa B were.
A picture of one of the units at Marsa A
What looks to be the same unit in 2017
What’s left down there, who knows.
Anyway moving on.
A look over the live dock
I particularly like the Giraffe painted crane in the background
Ventilation shafts up top
One of the first rooms we came across with some switch gear in
A very manky circuit diagram
The same panel in 2005
Map of Malta
And again in 2005
So after this control/switchroom, the first “Hall” we came across had 3 of the 6 English Electric Fullagar Heavy Oil engines in.
Breif description of how they work
I heard ya like rust? Still, some sight though eh.
Climbing up here was a lot sketchier than it seems. Handrails, pipes, wires, pretty much anything you touched just disintegrated as soon as you put any sort of weight on them. I think I leant on one just to get something out of my bag and it fell off the wall. So fair play to anyone who’s climbed the crane or owt.
Moving onto the next hall which was pretty much identical, linked via a tunnel at the end
Off these two main halls there were various rooms used for storage etc
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