In 2002, neighbors near Number One Observatory Circle heard loud blasts and construction noise and reported rumors of a secure bunker after Sept. 11, 2001. A US Navy spokesperson said the work was only an infrastructure and utility upgrade, while a later back-
For years, the story around Number One Observatory Circle has sounded like a thriller: loud blasts, construction noise in 2002, and neighbors who worried something far more drastic than routine repairs was going on.
After those sounds began. neighbors complained and received letters that said. “Due to its sensitive nature in support of national security and homeland defense. project-specific information is classified and cannot be released.” The language was enough to spark rumors that a secure bunker was being built after the attacks of September 11. 2001.
When the noise and the uncertainty were still fresh, a spokesperson for the US Navy told the BBC in 2002 that the construction was “an infrastructure and utility upgrade.” That description offered a simpler explanation—but it didn’t fully settle what neighbors feared.
By 2009, the debate moved from the street to a dinner room. Newsweek’s Eleanor Clift reported that Biden revealed the existence of the bunker at an annual Gridiron Club dinner. That claim immediately ran into a direct response. Biden’s spokeswoman told Fox News that his comments were not reported accurately. saying: “What the vice president described in his comments was not — as some press reports have suggested — an underground facility. but rather. an upstairs workspace in the residence. which he understood was frequently used by Vice President Cheney and his aides.”.
In the spokeswoman’s account, the story’s core details shift. She added: “That workspace was converted into an upstairs guestroom when the Bidens moved into the residence. There was no disclosure of classified information.”
Taken together. the sequence of letters. construction explanations. and competing versions of what was described creates a story with two very different visuals: one fueled by classified language and neighbors’ alarms about a possible bunker. and another insisted upon later by the Biden team as an upstairs workspace turned guestroom—without an underground facility and without classified disclosures.
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