Eastchester

Eastchester was an area of England where the "Inferno Project", a secret British science project to drill deep below the Earth's surface to gain access to a potential new energy source known as Stahlman's gas, was being conducted.

The project took place at the same location both on the regular Earth timeline and in a parallel universe.

History

On the normal Earth, the Third Doctor attended the facility to use the Inferno Project's nuclear reactor in an attempt to reactivate his TARDIS control console and escape his exile on Earth. (TV: Inferno)

David Staines had been an MP for Eastchester West prior to becoming Home Secretary. (PROSE: The Dying Days)

Behind the scenes

• The name Eastchester is only used once on-screen — and this was in a scene on the parallel world cut from the UK transmission of episode five but retained for overseas screening, and which also appeared on the 1994 BBC Video release of the story. Eastchester is also referred to by name in the prose stories The Face of the Enemy, Still Lives and Who Killed Kennedy.
• In Terrance Dicks's novelisation of the story, the area where the Inferno Project takes place becomes East Manchester.