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Under Soviet Satellites, How Area 51 Hid (And Invented) Secret Craft
An anonymous reader writes "No word yet on alien starships, but now that many Cold War-era Area 51 documents have been declassified, veterans of the secret US base are revealing some of the clever — and surprisingly low-tech — ways they hid futuristic prototypes from prying eyes."
Roofs?
Why was it called Area 51?
Because calling it "CIA Secret Aircraft Research Area" might have given the wrong idea to the Soviets?
John
Its part of the Nevada Test Range, the NTS area next to it is 15, the block commonly called Area 51 is more properly known as Groom Lake (for the dry lakebed there) and on some maps, CIA documents and in corporate literature that block is Area 51.
The Presidential Determination that keeps Federal Courts from touching operations there refers to it as "The Air Force's Operating Location Near Groom Lake, Nevada:.
If you think about it, it makes perfect sense that you would get a black hole from reading too much about Area51.
Those alien defense systems are pretty good.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Poisoned rotating ads, Lester, chill. Not everyone will get hit. Turn on the NoScript and AdBlock and you're all set.
Perhaps hiring Sony's IT dept wasn't such a good idea after all...
I've got better things to do tonight than die.
Nobody besides the government denies the existence of Area 51. The base exists, and is well proven for decades.
What is denied is that there are aliens there, or really much of anything. Hell, the government even admitted its existence to the russians a couple of decades ago, and by treaty they were allowed to do flyovers of it. During a period of the 1980's to 1990's, it was all but abandoned. There was a lawsuit in the 1990's by workers who worked there about exposure to toxic fumes and chemicals.
So no, the base does exist and has publicly existed to far more than just "conspiracy nuts" for decades. It was just very secretive and few knew what went on there.
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Noscript, and Adblock Plus, and I saw nothing but a National Geographic story. Pretty boring stuff. If you've ever known anyone in military intelligence, they'll tell you the same kind of story. Fake vehicles (like cardboard cutouts), scrambling to move anything "interesting" inside, or cover it with a tarp. The idea was to make every base look like it was deserted, even if there was a full complement there.
Area 51 still does a fine job of it. I check Google Maps there once in a while to see what's changed. Some of the underground bunkers, that had taxiways from the runways, which had an obvious opening, now look like they're just the side of a mountain. So you have an empty taxiway to nowhere? Yup, I'm falling for that.
I still have yet to see interesting aircraft, but of course they are the gov't, and can tell Google to remove any unpopular images before they're published. Most likely, they still do their privacy covers. What's the difference between a dirty colored tarp, and the side of a mountain? Absolutely nothing without very high resolution and/or infrared imaging.
For reference, this is one of those spots.
If you browse around, they only have 4 aircraft. Two airliners, two helicopters, and one fighter jet. Hmmm, that doesn't seem quite right, now does it? :)
This is my favorite feature of the area.
Oops, I rambled again, didn't I? Oh well.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
IT'S A TARP!
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
People who believe in UFOs are only loons because they are a small minority. Lots of people believe in God, despite there being no compelling evidence in the same way that there isn't for extra-terrestrials, but because that is a commonly held delusion it is considered normal. Sanity is defined as the norm, not what is rational.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
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Another interesting thing about Groom Lake is its status as restricted airspace. If you find R-4808N on the FAA's Las Vegas sectional map (e.g., at http://skyvector.com/ ), you'll see that it covers two things: a large area over the old Nevada Testing Site, where the Department of Energy used to test nuclear weapons, and a big conspicuously square area with a large dry lake bed called Groom Lake smack dab in the center. The fairly large airport that's been built next to and extending onto the lake bed is also not labeled on those maps, despite the fact that various other land features and manmade structures just a few miles away (including in the Nevada Testing Site) are labeled to serve as landmarks to pilots.
Restricted airspace listings (the text versions, to be used in conjunction with various airspace maps, e.g., http://www.faa.gov/documentLibrary/media/Order/SUA.pdf ) tell you a few things that provide a mechanism for legally accessing them. For instance, they tell you what hours they are restricted (such as a fixed pattern of hours each week, or by specifically issued FAA notice, etc.), what elevations are restricted, the using agency (the agency for the benefit of which the airspace is restricted), and the controlling agency (whom you would contact to try to get clearance to enter the airspace) in the case of "joint use" airspace.
If you look up R-4808N in the restricted airspace listings, it tells you (a) that the restricted airspace is in continuous operation, i.e., it's restricted 24 hours a day every day; (b) it's restricted at all elevations from the ground up; (c) there is no "controlling agency" listed, meaning the airspace is not joint use; and (d) the using agency is the Department of Energy, meaning that the block of restricted airspace is lumped in with the Nevada Test Site even though the Air Force actually runs the Groom Lake facility. All of these characteristics are fairly unusual as restricted airspace goes, and I've only found one other bit of restricted airspace in the listings that doesn't list a controlling facility (a tiny bit of airspace at the Tooele Army Depot in Utah).
Nellis AFB near Las Vegas manages almost all of the restricted and military operation airspace in that area, and they're the ones who will angrily contact you via radio if you even approach the restricted airspace in that area. The restricted airspace is more of a legal mechanism to deal with pilots who encroach on the airspace after they land, and Nellis AFB will send fighters out to strongly dissuade anyone who comes too close to the airspace even if they don't enter it.
One other thing to note is that the runways at Groom Lake are actually quite busy. There is a restricted access terminal at McCarran (Las Vegas) Airport where some thousand or so people board planes that make trips to and from Groom Lake throughout the day. The flights use the name "Janet" when talking to the tower at McCarran (similar to how a United Airlines flight would be referred to as, e.g., "United 123").
It's hard to hide secret airbases in downtown Manhattan.
Not according to that documentary I saw several years ago. You know, the one with Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.
Any insufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from technology.