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Belgium - HFB/Blast Furnace B - June 2018 | Oblivion State Urban Exploration

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Belgium HFB/Blast Furnace B - June 2018

Miber

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Hi, my name is Michael and this is my first post on these forums. I've been lurking here for awhile as the quality of the photos and write-ups here are consistently some of the best, and I figured it was about time I signed up as well. The following post is somewhat of a copy/paste from one I shared on a North American urbex forum, but I do plan on getting some original posts up here soon! I know HFB is probably one of the locations you see a lot of around here and isn't particularly exciting, but as an American this place was absolutely mind-blowing. We had our share of huge abandoned steel mills back in the day but by the time I had gotten into the hobby there wasn't much left that was explorable, at least not at this scale. Therefore, this was a must see location on my friend Bryan and I's tour of abandoned Europe. Anyway, on with the post:

We had just gotten out of one of the most difficult locations we've ever done- an enormous steel mill surrounded by razor wire and patrolled by a crew of security. The process of getting in, exploring and climbing all around the massive halls, and getting out lasted from morning to around 5pm. So how did we decide to spend our evening? By checking out another insanely large steel mill of course!

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Fortunately this steel mill was significantly less secure than the last one. It also contained a blast furnace, something that has been at the top of my urbex bucket list since I had first become interested in the hobby.

We approached through some vegetation and got closely acquainted with a plant known as stinging nettle. Then we scampered down some active railroad tracks, and after some more climbing and navigating a few bits of razor wire, we were in.

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We decided seeing the blast furnace should be our first objective, and conveniently our entry placed us right near the base of it. After a few minutes of figuring out which staircase would get us to where we wanted to be, we ended up here:

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Amazing, it's everything I hoped it would be. Seeing the complexity and scale in person is mind-blowing. Unfortunately, it wasn't exactly in perfect shape due to metal scrappers, but it was more than enough to satisfy my blast furnace craving. Sometime shortly after our visit, I found out that the roof of this building had disappeared. I was told the wind had blown it off, but I haven't seen any of the debris in anyone's pics so I think it was probably scrapped.

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Next we wanted to gain some altitude. As we did, it became apparent that coming here in the evening was a really good call.

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As we continued up, the stairs started to get a little bit sketchy. Nothing too insane, but I recall a few loose steps here and there.

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This conveyor would have lifted iron ore and coke up to the top of the furnace and dumped it in. By the way, we also explored an iron ore mine, a cokery, and a giant coal excavator on this trip. Felt like we were on a steel industry themed trip half the time. But it really was a learning experience, you pick up things that you would have never figured out or paid attention to otherwise.

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This was the view from what was nearly the top. Years of staring at a google maps satellite image of this place just could not compare to seeing it with my own eyes. I remember getting goosebumps right here, which actually has never happened to me before while exploring. I just couldn't believe I finally made it here. I thought about the past few years of my life and everything leading up to this moment. Not too long ago the idea of flying all the way to Europe just to check out some rusty old factories sounded absurd and impossible to justify, but there I was doing just that. It was definitely a moment I'll remember.

We actually didn't go to the tippy-top since the combination of rusty stairs and swarming wasps was a bit off-putting. If it was just one or the other I probably would have went for it, but eh whatever. No real regrets about that one.

By this time it was starting to get dark so we headed out. We both agreed though that we definitely needed to come back another day of the trip to see the rest.

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On our second day there we tried a different route to get in thinking it would be faster but it ended up not working out. We had to re-trace our steps and ended up wasting a good chunk of time. The railroad tracks pictured here are active and run right through the factory, which I thought was really cool. We'd hear trains pass through about once every 30 minutes.

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So many conveyor belts. They really made the place feel like a multi-level labyrinth, which just added to the fun of exploring it.

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Eventually we found our way to a rolling mill. It was probably the single largest enclosed building on the property.

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Bye HFB, thanks for the awesome time. I hope your demolition doesn't come too soon...

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Video is actually my friend Bryan and I's main focus. We created a documentary of our exploration as well, featuring some footage of when the steel mill was operational:

Next I'll try to put together a post from an American location, since all of my European photos are from places that you've probably already seen on here.
-Michael
 

obscureserenity

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Fantastic write up with some really nice pictures and a video to accompany it. Great report overall, cheers for posting!
 

AndyK!

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Welcome to Oblivion State, and what a fantastic first post to start off with! The write-up is spot on and the pictures are some the best I've seen from here. You guys are amongst the few who's video I'm happy to see included in the report too, as they are always top quality.

We are gradually seeing more posts from America on the forum, which is great, we like inclusions from all around the world, so I'm very much looking forward to your next posts :)
 
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Really like your photos :cool: I somehow got to the top of this on a freezing winter morning, it’s an impressive view of the site isn’t it! I’d like to go back for more as we just did the blast furnace.
 

BikinGlynn

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Brilliant that, cant beat a bit of industrial!
 

The_Raw

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Such a huge place I didn't even see the rolling mill when I visited. Nicely done
 
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