Area 51 is a chunk of the Nevada-California desert, and is fedrally-owned land. The UFO nuts claim that it is a secret US Military base where alien corpses are dissected. Others claim it is a base for secret aircraft development. It is fenced off-people report that sightseers have been “roughed up” by the security guards abnd told to never come back.
Anyway, my interest was piqued by something I saw on TV.supposedly, hundreds of people who worked at Area 51 are suffering from sever chemical burns…and that the US Govt. will not allow them to sue for damages.
Anybody know the truth? 
A brief summary, from memory:
- The area popularly known as “Area 51” is a USAF base built on the floor of Groom Dry Lake, part of the Nellis Test Range, where, among other things, nuclear wepaons were tested for many years. The location was first developed in the early post-war years and has long served as a test facility for experimental aircraft, notably the U-2 and SR-71 spy planes, and for flight testing of an array of Soviet aircraft secretly acquired during the Cold War years. The facility has been gradually expanded over the years and now has one of the world’s longest runways; close to 20,000 feet long IIRC. At least part of the facility is used for aeronautical engineering, possibly by Lockeed as extention of its Palmdale, CA assembly plant, and, probably, for construction of prototype airframes or other equipment using unconventional materials. Up to 2500 people may work at the facility, many ‘commuting’ via unmarked civil airliners (call sign ‘Janet’) flying out of McCarran airport in Las Vegas. The facility apparently is still in full use, although little or no flight testing may have taken place there since the early 1990s.
Despite popular belief, the Air Force has begrudgingly acknowledged the existence of the Groom Lake facility, although there was a period of some years where the USAF denied that it had such a site, despite its being clearly visible from public land on nearby mountains.
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The notoriety of the facility mainly stems from the claims of a techncian named Robert Lazar who worked there briefly in the mid-1980s. Lazar claimed that the US government was in possession of up to nine alien spacecraft, some intact and operable, and other damaged by weapons fire, at a hidden location within the Groom Lake complex. Mr. Lazar’s claims are generally considered fabrications today, even within the community of those interested in the UFO phenomenon.
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Some years back, a group of employees at the Groom Lake site filed suit against the government, claiming that they had suffered ill effects while working with and illegally disposing of certain exotic (and highly toxic) materials. The suit went nowhere, apparently due to an inability to obtain evidentiary documentation held by the Air Force. President Clinton at least twice signed Executive Orders ordering the information to remain sealed for ‘security reasons’.
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The USAF, for reasons probably related to being able to deny that the facility was in fact a USAF base, chose to employ civilian perimeter guards employed by the Wackenhut Corporation, and wearing military-style but non-official camoflage uniforms. Despite the presence of signs warning “Deadly Force Authorized”, no suspected trespasser has ever been shot or “disappeared” by them; so far as I know, all trespassers taken into custody by the “cammo dudes” were handed over to the local sheriff’s department and charged with normal trespassing offenses.
A Nevada-based researcher named Glenn Campbell once had a massive web site containing detailed, factual info about the various Area 51 myths, but in recent years he lost all interest in the subject and most of the site has disappeared. A Google search under his name may turn up further information.
Cheers.
Some people do know the truth, but they ain’t talking. People do or did work at Groom Lake Test Facility, they flew in on a commercial style jet from Nellis AFB proper near Las Vegas. The most believable story is that GLTF (Area 51) was used for test flight for such experimental aircraft as the Have Blue (later to become the F-117). It is remote, and there are devices in that area to test for detectability with various sensors. As for the burns, as a secret area, they probably didn’t keep up with modern standards for chemicals, and may have disposed of things improperly over the years. The people who do/did work there have signed strict confidentiality agreements and quite possibly waivers, since a lawsuit would expose what as happening there (secret stealth technology, possible test propulsion systems, yadda, yadda) that we do not want our “enemies” to know about.
I did some military training just north of Groom Lake, in the Tonapah Ranges of Nellis, and I had to sign all sorts of confidentialy agreements on what I may or may not have seen in THAT area.
“They” do have sensors that detect folks who cross the line, and they respond quickly.
Besides, when Cecil needs to get out of Chicago for a break, the last thing he needs is a bunch of UFO nuts hanging out in his back yard! 
Cecil does of course.
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4_040.html
If I can throw my hat in the ring…it sounds no more secretive than plenty of places in Britain. Obviously, being in a desert makes it possible to have a much larger perimiter. But what is sinister about being turned back, or being told that if you encroach you’ll be met with deadly force? If I drive through the gates of the nearest RAF base at full speed, shouldn’t I expect to be dealt with?
Anyway, thanks to the people providing decent information 
Well, the main thing that gives it such an alure is that for such a long time The Gummint steadfastly refused to admit that the place even existed. This became ridiculous right around the time when people started operating tour buses to the surrounding mountains.
MI6 never officially existed in Britain until the 90s, IIRC, but that didn’t give the idea that it was busy studying spaceships.
One of the things that helped area 51’s popularity among the UFO nuts is that the government itself was pushing the UFO stories. Then a few years back the government was like “ha ha we were just kidding to fool the Russians, you don’t need to watch our base like a hawk any more” (because apparently area 51 started becoming “too” popular), and the UFO nuts were like “yeah right, you lie anyway so this lie about lying is just another lie.”
Or something like that.
The site was frozen in 01/2000 but is still accessible, though with a lot of dead links.
What’s really there? I have it on good authority that what you saw is a wheather balloon. Seriously.
There is no doubt the U.S. Government, and the U.S. Air Force is up to some sneaky stuff. If they are not, I want a portion of my income taxes returned. It is the military’s job to do sneaky stuff.
That being said, there is no obvious way to tell what the Air Force is up to, or where they are up to it at. The possibility that Area 51 is a huge multi-million dollar decoy for example cannot be excluded.
Many smart people have tried to noodle it out. None have come up with a really good lock on what is going on. One technique is to look at past black projects and figuring out in retrospect how we could have detected them at the time. Techniques like looking at the annual reports of DOD expenditures, or contractor revenue, fail. So does accounting for all the USAF hot shot pilots. All seem to have legit assignments, as they did during the F-117 development.
Another way we might figure out what is going on it to look at known USAF weaknesses. All we can say is that this points to the development of improved surveillance platforms. It would seem some new technique for detecting submarines might be in the works.
This is very unsatisfactory.
Looking back we see that the F-117 was about to reach operational status when a number of them crashed. ‘Men in Black’ sealed off the crash sites quickly. This old everyone who pays attention something odd was up.
We have seen no similar crashes yet. This would seem to indicate that what ever the Air Force is hatching, it is not yet ready. Or maybe it indicates it is not yet crashing. Or maybe it indicates the USAF has learned from the past and is handling the news of crashes better.
Anyway, even very smart guys admit that although something is afoot, there is no way to tell with certainty what it is.
I mean, in this ear of satellite photos, why would the USAF risk disclosure of something top secret, by having it in a well-known place like Area 51? Can you get the SPOT satellite (French) to give you high-resolution photos of Area 51? Plus, the area is redily acessible from las Vegas…how long would it take some really serious nuts to get inside the base, take pictures, etc.?
I’d be willing to bet the Airforce is using Area 51 for a cheap toxic waste dump, and has all the warning signs up jsut to keep people from getting poisoned. If there were really anything top secret , I’m sure it would be tested at some remote spot (like Johnson Atoll), where NOBODY could stael a peek at it!
Firstly, by the simple expedient of flight testing mainly at night, as was done with the F-117. Satellites take predictable paths, so it is a relatively simple matter to make sure whatever you are testing is in the hangar when a satellite may be overhead. Publicly-available satellite images of Groom Lake and other parts of the Nellis range do exist, but all such images I know of are 3 meters resolution or lower, and thus not very useful for identifying details. The Soviets almost certainly imaged the area with higher-resolution military equipment, but AFAIK none of these have been made available to the public.
It is well-documented in the aviation literature that Groom was the primary flight test facility for the U-2 and SR-71, and at least some of the testing programs for the F-117 and B-2 were based there as well. The amazing story of the USAF’s large fleet of captured, stolen and otherwise secretly acquired Soviet aircraft, and based at Groom, has also been fairly well documented in the aviation press in recent years. With that said, there is considerable speculation that at least some of Groom Lake’s test operations have moved elsewhere, most likely to Tonopah, NV, where the operational F-117 squadrons were originally based in near-total secrecy.
Nevertheless, there are strong arguments that Groom Lake is still active. Despite it having become well-known, the facility still has the benefits of being 1) many miles from practical public access, 2) in the continental US a relatively short flight time from both major military bases (Nellis, Edwards) and military contractors such as Lockheed and Northrop; 3) adjacent to thousands of square miles of closed military test range. On these three points alone I find it highly unlikely that Groom Lake is merely a ‘Potemkin’ test site and no longer active, even if activity there is not as high as it was in the '70s and '80s.
Apparently, the nearest point that any unauthorized person can get to the Groom Lake facility is more than twenty miles away; this is sufficient to prevent clear imaging of any testing that may go on outdoors there, even with high-powered lenses, especially so if the bulk of the testing is done at night. Also, as someone mentioned, the area is seeded with motion and vibration detectors so the “cammo dudes” can quickly run down anyone who enters the perimeter. If anyone unauthorized were suspected to be in the area, most likely that day’s (night’s) testing would be delayed or scrubbed.
Sorry to go on at such length, but it’s a subject of great interest to me. I’ll give others the floor now.
That’s because thanks to the BBC’s documentaries on the subject everybody knows UNIT is studying alien spaceships.
The fact that people know about it almost guarantees that there’s nothing there. If there ever was anything, it’s moved. I wouldn’t be surprised if there are super-top secret military bases, but they are almost certainly unknown to the public.
If there’s anything there, it’s probably some spy planes, nothing more.
FWIW, the adjacent and restricted Nevada Test Range is of interest to the “degree confluence” project[sup]1[/sup] because 37 N, 116 W is inside the restricted area, SW of the actual Groom Lake facility. They publish what purports to be a picture taken at that point, although they won’t say who TOOK it:
http://www.confluence.org/confluence.php?id=679
[sup]1[/sup] - You may, if you like, view this project as yet another bunch of people with way too much time on their hands, but there’s sillier things they could be doing. And the results are kind of interesting.
[ol]
[li]The National Chupacabra Refuge[/li][li]A nice little subdivision with the homes of B.D. Wyatt, Judge Crater, Amelia Earhart, and others[/li][li]The missing eighteen minutes of Watergate tape[/li][li]U.S. Customs Service port of entry for extraterrestrials[/li][li]The National Missing Sock Depository[/li][/ol]
Ichiro Suzuki.
You forgot:
[ul]
[li]James Hoffa’s body[/li][li]The orignal prints of the first three Star Wars movies. [/li][li]The set where the Moon Landing was Filmed[/li][li]The lost contients of Atlantis, Mu and Lumeria[/li][li]The missing 9/11 plane[/li][li]The Holy Grail[/li][li]A bunch of cool Knights Templar/Freeman stuff[/li][li]Elvis’s condo[/li][li]The list of names of those who killed JFK[/li][li]The Body of Christ[/li][/ul]