For decades , Area 51 has been synonymous with military mystery , UFOs , and conspirative thoughts . But aside from the stuff you see in a badly redact YouTube video at 2 am , what do we actually hump about Area 51 ?
expanse 51 – sometimes know as “ Dreamland , ” " Watertown , " “ Paradise Ranch , ” or just “ the Ranch , ” – is a classified US Air Force base regain near a salt flat known as Groom Lake in the stale depths of Lincoln County , southerly Nevada . It serve as a remote withdrawal of Edwards Air Force Base , found a myopic hop over the state border in southerly California .
protect by 37 by 40 kilometre ( 23 by 25 mile ) of restricted airspace , it ’s whole off - limits to the populace ( you too , net mob ) and is closely guarded with military forcefulness 24/7 . In fact , the Qaeda is ( or at least was ) only accessible by aircraft , allot tothe CIA . Any shipment or personnel department hoping to go in the groundwork would have to be shuttled in .
Its closemouthed nature has provided prolific ground for confederacy hypothesis ever since the substructure was built in the 1950s . Batshit ideas fall and go , like a febrility , but one of the most prevalent possibility speculates that the base is used for the study of foreign lifetime and the reverse engine room of alien ballistic capsule . Some theorists propose that fabric from thesupposed crash at Roswellin 1947 was taken to Area 51 for analysis and used to develop the United States ’ next generation of aircraft technology .
But what ’s it really for ? What goes on there , if it ’s not aliens ?
During the former day of the Cold War , the site was certainly used for thedevelopment of experimental aircraft . In 1955 , Area 51 was the trial site for the Lockheed U-2 , a high - elevation reconnaissance mission aircraft that became one of the most famous undercover agent planes ever progress . The test flight of the U-2 , among other aircraft over the decades , prompted legion sightings of unknown flight target ( UFO ) by civilian and aircraft pilot . It ’s estimatedthat over half of all UFO reports over the US from the late 1950s and 1960s can be accounted for by crewed military flights , namely the U-2 .
Manyother advance warplanesare believe to have been developed here , most notably theA-12 OXCART , however , authorisation have keep very quiet about the facility ’s study , particularly in recent decades . It was alsoonce suggestedthat Area 51 was used by the US government to try out stolen and “ on the QT acquire ” Soviet aircraft during the Cold War .
Images of Area 51 can beseen on Google Maps(below ) . Weirdly enough , the map view even say there ’s a Del Taco eating place in the base . However , satellite imagery of the stand was tightly prohibited until recently . As reported inThe Space Reviewin 2006 , astronauts aboard NASA ’s Skylab 4 landed themselves in hot water with the CIA in 1974 after unknowingly snap “ a facility that did not officially exist , ” think to be orbit 51 .
As for stories about little unripened men andfake Moon landing flick sets , that is yet to welcome any believable grounds . peradventure , just maybe , the truth is out there … but it ’s probably not at Area 51 .
