A little known, but influential site in Utah Cold War history, is the Buckhorn Wash Underground Explosive Test Site #8. Also know today as simply the MK tunnel system. I'm not sure how I initially found out about them, but for this article I'm using the Cold War Tourist site as a source, which has excellent write ups on the program and it's sites. Go give it a look see, it's an excellent site with details on a lot of other places of note.
Morrison Knudsen was a company contracted by the US Army in 1948-1952 to set off controlled detonations on the naturally occurring rock in the San Rafael Swell area in Utah as a part of the Underground Explosion Test Program. The purpose of these tests was test the suitability of the rock and to refine the design of underground structures to defend against aerial explosive attacks of various sizes and in various locations across western states.
The site is Utah has three sandstone tunnels of various sizes, in which 19 explosions were set off at various depths above the tunnels with payloads ranging from 320 lbs. of explosives to a whopping 320,000 lbs. of explosives!
Being a very soft rock, the sandstone there was likely deemed unsuitable, and then another phase of the UET program later began testing in the granite cliffs of Unaweep Canyon, Colorado. These tests likely directly contributed to the eventual development of the famous Cheyanne Mountain Complex later. Although I don't have any sources or info to back it up, I did hear somewhere that the info from these tests also contributed to the development of the underground facilities built for the Titan II missile launch complexes.
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