Writer explores Athens’ pre-war bomb shelters

General Ioannis Metaxas' regime (1936-41) built some 400 bomb shelters in Athens, while it imposed by law the creation of a shelter in every new building, raising the number to 5,500 from 1936 to 1940, author and researcher Konstantinos Kyrimis, who has been recording them for over a decade, tells Kathimerini, citing an official Hellenic Army report. Kyrimis, who has visited at least 150 shelters, says there were also existing underground spaces (basements, caves etc) that were structurally strengthened and turned into shelters. When WWII began, Athens had about 12,000 shelters, he said.