Xlendi Emergency Flour Mill

The islands of Malta and Gozo suffered badly from a long siege during the Second World War. As part of Cold War defences, the British Government built seven underground corn mills on the islands in 1955 to store wheat and make flour in an emergency. Since 2001, the mill on Gozo has been restored with all its equipment and can be visited by contacting Munxar local council. It is located behind Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in the village at Xlendi. An audio guide is available. A stone embankment leads to a gate in the cliff and a 30-m entrance tunnel. A generator room near the entrance houses a diesel engine and there are further engines inside. At the end of the tunnel are a fuel store and a three-storey chamber. Two silos at the upper level could be loaded with grain through hatches from the road above and store 500 tons each. Archimedes screws extracted the grain to be sorted and washed. It was then milled on five roller mills, sifted and bagged.