A multi-billion pound, multi-national defence company, on the cutting edge of technology and innovation across its multiple domains, BAE Systems is one of the world's foremost businesses in the maritime, air, land and space sectors. If, like me, you grew up in Barrow-in-Furness, then you will be intimately aware that BAE Systems dominates the town both geographically and socially. It's massive hangars, warehouses and office areas are based primarily along the coastline of Barrow Island, but their sheer size and scale means that pretty much wherever you are in the town you almost only need to jump to see the tip of one of its buildings poking up over the horizon. Practically every child in school has a parent that works for BAE Systems in the Barrow Shipyard, and practically every child that stays in Barrow after leaving secondary school ends up working there. It's almost a tradition, or a rite of passage.
To give some sort of perspective to back up the claims made above, the population of Barrow-in-Furness is around 55,000 people. In 2023 the Barrow Shipyard employed more than 12000 people and, following on from the AUKUS deal (among other things), they are in the process of adding another 5000 jobs, for a total of 17,000. Therefore, around 20-25% of people in the area work for BAE Systems.
The death of the high street is a reality throughout the country, but this death can be seen in particularly vivid detail on the streets of Barrow. Despite the fact that BAE is a responsible employer, and pays their employees a relatively good wage compared to similar businesses, the area is still generally pretty deprived. This is the main road literally directly outside Barrow Town Hall:
Yep - it's a shithole.
During Covid-19, BAE Systems employees, like employees from practically every other company in the UK (outside of healthcare) were legally required to work from home. Lockdown essentially killed the struggling masses of Barrow, many of whom were either already in a precarious financial position or in the process of becoming destitute. BAE Systems, however, is too big to fail. Their employees were able to return to work, and this brought some life back into the local economy. After seeing the accelerated devolution of the town centre, BAE has pledged to inject large sums of money into the local economy via the purchasing of derelict high street buildings, among other things. Their intent is to develop a state of the art knowledge and training hub for the youth of Barrow in order to provide high quality apprenticeship and business training etc.
However, that is the new... And on this website we like to talk about the old...
Unlike the high streets of the UK, I am actively positive about the death of a printing office. Why have a separate building to print things? It's pointless. Unless of course we're talking 3D printers, of course. But, as I'm always a sucker for a nice abandoned building, I'm not going to complain.
In terms of the history of this particular building, not much can be found; at least according to my (not insignificant) efforts. From what I could find, the building has changed hands multiple times over the years, with sales being made in both 2020 and 2024. In 2020, there was a plan to turn the site into 18 units different residential apartments, but in its most recent sale, the buyer has expressed a desire to develop up to 30... Can't imagine they'd be particularly spacious! It remains to be seen whether this plan will come to fruition, as the site was evaluated and assessed as requiring refurbishment costs totalling around £1 million. However, as you'll see with the pictures in this report, the real number is probably significantly higher due to the extent of serious foundational structural decay and insecurity. There were times in this building where floors would literally sink where you put your feet.
Here are a few pics of the BAE Systems Printing Office exterior from all angles:
North:
South:
East:
West:
Some absolute mad bastard ripped off the security fencing from the walls, allowing for sunlight to flood through for the first time in what must be nearing a decade at least. Given the fact it's literally in view of the main BAE Systems office buildings, opposite a nursery and in an area with a huge and immediate MoD Police presence, it's not a risk I'd have taken, personally. But, thankfully, someone was stupid enough to do so. I've been past this building numerous times when visiting family over the years and I've never seen an opening. Needless to say, despite the fact this was in broad daylight (at least, the outside was - the inside was pitch black on the second and third floors), I couldn't pass up the opportunity. I don't really have much more to say in between the pics, really, so I'll mainly just post pictures from here unless there was something particularly interesting.
One thing I will say, however, is that I don't think you'll ever have seen as many dead birds in a single report as this one. It literally put me off fried chicken until almost the weekend. I will buy whoever guesses closest to the correct number (I did count them all) a drink at the Bristol meetup this year (but not an Old Speckled Hen!)
Entrance to the building:
The view immediately entering the building:
And another angle:
Inside the first small area:
This picture was a particular favourite of mine, but also could have led to one of my worst experiences ever. Thankfully I was very conscious of the collapsing floor and so managed to jump back onto more solid ground before the floor collapsed further. No idea how much it would have collapsed but there was no obvious way back up other than to scramble over indescribable heights and combinations of bird shit, mould, rotten wood and flies. The area at the back of the image was a hole in the floor that was... not meant to be there, I don't think. But it had collapsed. It goes without saying that this entire building smelt like absolute fucking death. As this was spur of the moment I didn't have a mask on me so had to use some shitty face covering balaclava thing which did NOT work to stop the smell or general particulates.
I naturally wanted to see what was under the collapsed floor at the top of the above photo so went over to stand over by the wall to try and lean over and take a picture underneath it. I managed to get one pic but that's when I felt the ground shifting I immediately jumped back to relative safety.
Directly above me, there was the skeleton of the building where both floors had clearly fallen down at some point.
After seeing so much bird shit and decay I felt like I should do what I love to do and visit the abandoned toilets to see what state they're in.
Not that great, you probably won't be surprised to find out:
Someone had been doing coke in the toilet:
General view of the first half of the ground floor:
Absolute pitch black in this creepy place filled with dead birds and the smell of death / piss, but you gotta move forwards through the scary doors.
Follow the directions for a fire escape and this is what I'm met with, smh my head:
View of the kitchen. As you can see, these floors are literally sinking into the ground. Almost wherever you stepped your feet would feel some sort of bounce / lack of stability:
Onwards and upwards. Towards the second floor. This staircase was not trustworthy. I almost turned around and left because the wood was rotten and collapsed in places. It was also similarly bouncy. 3/10 experience would not recommend climbing:
State of the floor in the first little area on the second floor did not fill me with confidence as to my safety in this area / on the floor above:
Ceiling above, in a different area on the second floor. This is what I was walking on when on the top floor... Looking back on it, this was mad sketchy.
Random second floor room:
Now for the part you've all been waiting for. Dead birds! At least, a photo explicitly focusing on dead birds. There have been around 15 up to this point. Apparently pigeons clump together in the corners of their 'nests' when they're about to die in order to avoid the spreading of disease and parasites to other members of the flock. Pretty standard animal behaviour, but cool to find out it's applicable to pigeons too. Either that, or some dude likes to kill and collect pigeons. Their bodies had clearly decayed ages ago and now just their feathers / skeletons remained.
Pic of the mid floor hallway:
Know how much you guys love a selfie so had to get one for you. Forgive my hairy face - I hadn't shaved in a couple of weeks:
Right, let's ascend one final set of stairs. At this point I was hearing significant creaking sounds on the stairs and was genuinely getting really concerned for my safety. I didn't tell anyone I was in here and if the floor collapsed I'd be buried under piles of shit and not even in a findable place like the central area of the bottom floor. But put that out of my mind until I got to the top.
But first, some more dead birds:
Up on the top floor, my head was absolutely pounding. The lack of proper ventilation / breathing equipment (and general lack of any openings within the building making air flow pretty poor), not to mention the years of death and rotting birds and piss and shit and everything else... Did not make for a nice smell. I genuinely couldn't take much more as I don't really get headaches and was taking it as a sign I was doing myself some actual harm. I told myself I'd quickly do the top floor then leave.
But first, anyone for KFC?
How about a bargain bucket?
Report is basically done now. Pretty sure the next 2 photos that I really want to show will bring me to the 31 file limit.
I need your help identifying what the hell this massive lump is on the next 2 photos... I was unfortunately not able to walk up to it as the open top floor area was absolutely unstable. Up to this point I'd ignored the instability of the flooring but the sounds it was making as I tried to get near the lump were beyond even my ability to ignore.
Anyway, the lump. It kind of looked like a Christmas tree on its side. Anyone got any ideas? It was so out of place, it was super strange:
Closer view of the lump. Potentially a supermassive pile of dead birds waiting to reform and take over the town? I don't know... I'm just asking questions...
Thanks for reading, if you got this far to the end! Super creepy place as it was absolutely pitch black in 90% of the areas, and the smell of death and decay was overwhelming. Gave me a massive headache I didn't shake until the morning, and the journey back down the stairs was even worse than going up them. 5/10, cool place, wouldn't recommend without proper filtration mask.
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