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HAARP Holds Open House To Dispel Rumors Of Mind Control (adn.com)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the skeptical-in-Alaska dept.

An anonymous Slashdot reader writes: HAARP -- the former Air Force/Navy/DARPA research program in Alaska -- will host an open house Saturday where "We hope to show people that it is not capable of mind control and not capable of weather control and all the other things it's been accused of..." said Sue Mitchell, spokesperson for the geophysical institute at the University of Alaska. "We hope that people will be able to see the actual science of it." HAARP, which was turned over to The University of Alaska last August, has been blamed for poor crop yields in Russia, with conspiracy theorists also warning of "a super weapon capable of mind control or weather control, with enough juice to trigger hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes."

The facility's 180 high-frequency antennas -- spread across 33 acres -- will be made available for public tours, and there will also be interactive displays and an unmanned aircraft 'petting zoo'. The Alaska Dispatch News describes it as "one of the world's few centers for high-power and high-frequency study of the ionosphere... important because radio waves used for communication and navigation reflect back to Earth, allowing long-distance, short-wave broadcasting."

3 of 148 comments (clear)

  1. It's research... by beheaderaswp · · Score: 3, Informative

    I can confirm as an amateur radio operator- it's a research project. We've heard it's signals on the air, and frankly it;s the only thing it could be doing. No encoding, transmit response pattern- it was trying to map the propagation patterns in the ionosphere.

    But there is a punchline: WSPRnet does the same thing for free. Really.

    http://wsprnet.org/drupal/

    --
    Another consultant who stuck it out.

    "We are the Priests, of the Temples of Syrinx..."
    1. Re:It's research... by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 3, Informative

      WSPR tells you when communication paths are open between two points at a specific frequency and S/N ratio. This is useful but does not span the extent of research that HAARP is directed to. One of the most interesting things about HAARP is that it can incite the formation of radio-reflective regions in the ionosphere. That takes a lot of power.

      --
      Bruce Perens.
  2. Re:Very sad by PopeRatzo · · Score: 1, Informative

    Actually, all of the conspiracy-theorists I know are all extremely left-leaning.

    Ahem...

    http://www.infowars.com/

    http://www.breitbart.com/big-g...

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...

    http://www.dcclothesline.com/2...

    http://www.usatoday.com/story/...

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.