A student has filmed a behind-the-scenes tour of the former munitions depot near Broughton Moor.

Great Broughton film student Lee Rielly made the video after spending a day on the Derwent Forest site with a camera and drone.

Lee, 21, who is studying film-making at Manchester Metropolitan University, said: “I have lived next to the site all my life and have always been fascinated by what was there but have never been in. It’s such a big piece of land with over a hundred buildings.

“Someone told me how I could get access.”

In the film, Lee walks around much of the three-mile site and explores a former factory, tower and some of the many redundant buildings. Most of them are empty shells.

He said: “I have had some good feedback, lots of people have wondered what is on there and loved seeing the film.”

Lee has made a series of films about derelict places, including a former RAF base in Silloth and a Lillyhall factory.

He said: “I want to make them because these places used to be so full – of workers, people and life but will eventually be taken down.”

The Broughton site was a colliery from 1873 to 1932. The Royal Naval Armaments Depot then opened in 1938, six years later there was a large explosion which killed 11 people and injured 70.

Between 1977 and 1981 the US Airforce used the site to store munitions. The depot has been closed since 1992.

The site is now owned by Derwent Forest Development Consortium, which has plans to transform it into Utropia, an example of eco-friendly living and working.

Once developed it could feature housing, an eco hotel and a festival site.

Planning permission to develop an area of self-build housing plots is now in place and work to remove newts from that area is expected to begin in the spring.

Consortium chairman Nigel Catterson advised people to stay off the site for safety.

He said: “The site is still very hazardous. There’s a lot of asbestos on the site. There are 79 mine shafts. To the best of our knowledge they are all capped but we don’t know until we have done the full survey.

“If someone were to go onto the site and twist their ankle or break a leg it would be almost impossible to locate them. The perimeter fence is seven miles long and there’s so much wilderness.

“From a personal safety point of view we’d discourage people from going on there, aside from the fact it’s private property.

“I certainly wouldn’t go on there on my own.”