Coconut Bunker Introduction
After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Japan's bombing prompted the United States to retaliate by targeting important military factories, power plants, railroads, and key offices in Taiwan. The Zhuoshui River Office was located between two mountains at the entrance of the Zhuoshui River, serving as a forward position for bombings on the Jiji Railway and Sun Moon Lake Reservoir. When the "air raid alarm" sounded, employees of the district office and local Japanese civilians would frantically run to seek shelter in the air raid shelters. The air raid shelter at the back of the district office, surrounded by dense trees, provided cover from American aircraft. The current site of the air raid shelter has lost its function and is abandoned, now featuring six tall royal palm trees and phoenix trees, which have become dirt caves where children play hide and seek. Adjacent to the shelter are the old dormitories from the Japanese occupation period and the current police station's duty old dormitory. The design of the entrance to the air raid shelter is a pull door rather than a push door because, during regular times, the shelter door opens outward. When the alarm sounded, people rushed inside, and it was uncertain how many individuals were hiding within. If overcrowding occurred, there was a risk of suffocation. The design of a pull door also allowed those inside a chance to be pushed out of the shelter for survival. Experience indicated that deaths from suffocation were more likely than those from bombing. Another theory suggests that when bombs exploded outside the shelter, the pressure generated could be blocked by a pull door, protecting against the blast and debris.
