DALLAS — The owner of Atlas Survival Shelters, Ron Hubbard, said his business is skyrocketing due to the COVID-19 pandemic and political disagreements between people. When he first started his business in 2011, only one or two doomsday bunkers were sold every month or so, but now Hubbard's revenue is near the million-dollar mark on the daily. 

From celebrities to retirees, people with extra cash on hand are looking for a great escape from potential future chaos. Hubbard said COVID-19 along with America's political divide has been driving customers to his manufacturing warehouse in Sulphur Springs, Texas. 

"It's all day long," said Hubbard. "We live in a time of people buying bunkers. It's a panic buy right now."

Since mid-2020 Hubbard said his business has boomed far beyond his expectations. More than two dozen survival shelters are manufactured at any given time at his warehouse, and it's still not giving slack to a backlog of orders extending through 2023.

"Yeah, I book that much work, it's very sad," said Hubbard. "It's like, 'Aren't you excited?' And I'm like, 'No, I'm glad we have business, but I'm not excited that it's coming at the cost of my country.'"

The underground bunkers are designed to withstand nuclear, biological or chemical attacks. Hubbard's military grade steel housing units are equipped with a generator, a water storage tank and an emergency air filter system to keep people alive if they have to live underground. The units range in all sorts and sizes, and Hubbard said his business is booming at a faster rate than the housing market. 

"The odds of us needing this in our lifetime is a lot greater than it was 10 years ago," said Hubbard. 

The doomsday survival shelters are often installed in the vast wilderness or underneath a home. Hubbard said the vast majority of his clients keep a low profile and are even unknown to him. 

"People don't want other people to know they have a shelter because if things get really bad everyone is going to try and get in their bunker," said Hubbard. "We're living in historic times and people want a Plan B."