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Abomb shelter is a structure designed to provide protection against the effects of abomb.
Different kinds of bombshelters are configured to protect against different kinds of attack and strengths of hostile explosives.
An air raid shelter is a structure built to protect against bomber planes dropping bombs over a large area. These were commonly seen duringWorld War II, such as the "Anderson shelters" of the United Kingdom.
A fallout shelter is a shelter designed specifically for anuclear war, with thick walls made from materials intended to block the radiation fromfallout resulting from anuclear explosion. Many such shelters[1] were constructed as civil defense measures during theCold War. Ablast shelter protects against more conventional bomb blasts. Its main purpose is to protect fromshock waves andoverpressure and also fromearthquake.
While these forms of bomb shelters are equally amenable to civilians and military use, a bunker is more commonly associated with military use. A bunker may be hastily assembled as part of an ongoing military advance, or to hold a line. Bunkers have also been popular with thesurvivalism subculture.
While military units have long built defensive structures to protect against various kinds of hostile bombardment, the use of the phrase "bomb shelter" can be traced at least as far back as 1833. A dictionary from that year defines a "casement" as "a bomb-proof shelter for soldiers in garrison".[2] In 1881, theUnited States War Department issued a report in which it indicated that the defenses ofCharleston, South Carolina included construction atFort Moultrie of:
...eleven permanent gun-platforms and breast-height walls, bonnets on the traverses, a portion of the masonry and all the earth covering of the bomb-proof shelter, the postern gallery, a part of the earth covering of the magazines, and an earthen cover face on the channel front.[3]
The shortening of this phrase to the conventional "bomb shelter" appears in print at least as early as 1895.[4]
