The US tech billionaire is reportedly constructing a Hawaii compound that includes a 5,000-square-foot underground shelter
Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, attend a November 2019 event in Mountain View, California. © Getty Images / Ian Tuttle
Facebook billionaire Mark Zuckerberg has reportedly started work on a $100 million family compound in Hawaii that will include a 5,000-square-foot underground bunker featuring an escape hatch and a tunnel leading to two connecting mansions.
The project is located on the Hawaiian island of Kauai and is so secretive that carpenters, electricians and other contractors are muzzled by nondisclosure agreements, according to a report this week by US media outlet Wired. “It’s fight club, we don’t talk about fight club,” one former employee told Wired. “Anything posted from here, they get wind of it right away.”
The compound stretches across about 1,400 acres, on land that Zuckerberg began buying in August 2014. A spokeswoman for the billionaire told Wired that he and his wife, Priscilla Chan, spent $170 million to purchase the property, which they view as their family home.
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Known as Koolau Ranch, the compound reportedly produces its own energy and water supplies, and onsite ranching and farming can provide the food. The property will include more than a dozen buildings with at least 30 bedrooms and 30 bathrooms combined, said Wired, citing property records and interviews with unidentified contractors.
Two mansions at the center of the compound will total about 57,000 square feet of living space, and 11 disk-shaped treehouses will be connected by rope bridges. The property will be dotted with guest houses and will include a large building with a gym, pools, sauna, hot tub and tennis court.
The bunker will have living space, a mechanical room and a metal door filled with concrete. Many of the compound’s doors will be soundproofed and operated by keypads. Some of the passages, such as a “blind” door in the library, will be designed to resemble walls. Dozens of cameras will be stationed around the property. Just one small operations building will have more than 20 cameras.
Wired based its $100 million cost estimate on building permits, saying the actual figure will likely be higher. “The cost rivals that of the largest private, personal construction projects in human history,” the outlet said.
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A six-foot wall reportedly blocks views of the property, as well as the ocean, from a road fronting the compound. Security guards are stationed at the entrance gate and patrol the nearby beaches on all-terrain vehicles.
