The Secret History of Area 51
Area 51 does not exist. That is, it does not exist under that specific designation, as it’s formally known as the Groom Lake and Homey Airport, part of the Nevada Test and Training Range. And even that information only became public knowledge after nearly 60 years of government denial of clandestine military activity taking place at the base, which is hidden some 85 miles north of Las Vegas in the Mojave Desert.
According to official records, Area 51 has served as the base of operations for the development of aircraft and other technology designed to enhance the capabilities of the U.S. military. And yet, the place has also carved out a distinct identity in popular culture as a hotbed for alien research and communications, as evidenced by the 26% of Americans who believe that crashed alien spaceships are housed there.
The long-standing tradition of secrecy only bolsters the conspiracy theories surrounding the purposes of Area 51. But while it can be difficult to separate truth from myth, enough details have been unearthed to allow inquiring minds to put together some basic facts about this mysterious site.
Area 51 Began as a Training Ground for a New Spy Plane
The story of Area 51 began in 1955 with the CIA’s attempts to find a training ground for the Lockheed Corporation’s U-2 spy plane. A suitable spot was found at Groom Lake, a salt flat located near the northeast corner of the Atomic Energy Commission’s (AEC) Nevada Proving Ground. Upon being incorporated into AEC territory, the site became known by its map designation of Area 51.
In its infancy, Area 51 was a meagerly populated facility consisting of a 5,000-foot-long runway, three aircraft hangars, a few administration buildings, and trailers for employee housing. The sparse accommodations led to the base being sarcastically known by such nicknames as “Paradise Ranch” and “Dreamland.”
With the development of the high-altitude, supersonic A-12 aircraft in the early 1960s, Area 51 underwent major renovations to expand its infrastructure and tighten security. This included the addition of an 8,500-foot-long concrete runway with a 6,000-foot extension onto the lake bed, along with the construction of three new hangars. Additionally, a 60-foot-tall pylon was installed to test the radar-deflecting abilities of a mounted A-12 prototype.
In the late 1960s, the base became a site to analyze a Soviet MiG-21 fighter jet that had wound up in Israeli possession. By evaluating the capabilities of the MiG-21 and training American pilots to counter them, the U.S. military was able to overcome the problems posed by these speedy and highly maneuverable jets during the Vietnam War.
After Area 51 oversight passed from the CIA to the Air Force in 1978, engineers continued to develop stealth technology for the next generation of U.S. fighter jets. The fruit of their labor was the revolutionary F-117A Nighthawk, which proved nearly undetectable to radars upon achieving operating capability in 1983.
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A Man Claimed To Have Seen Alien Ships There
For the first three decades of its existence, Area 51 drew little attention save for the occasional local report of unusual lights and aircraft spotted in its vicinity. But everything changed in 1989, when a man named Bob Lazar delivered a series of interviews to KLAS-TV that introduced this secretive facility to the rest of the world.
Claiming to be a physicist who previously worked in the S-4 section of the base, Lazar insisted that there were nine alien spaceships being stored at the facility as scientists attempted to reverse engineer these technological oddities. He also described the existence of "element 115," which at the time was too heavy to be synthesized on Earth, that was used to power the ships' antigravity propulsion systems.
Lazar's claims were largely discredited (although he still has his believers) after reports surfaced of him seemingly lying about his employment and education history. Nevertheless, the association between Area 51 and extraterrestrial phenomena only grew from there, eventually becoming so widespread that the subject was a plot point for fictional fare such as the 1996 big-screen blockbuster Independence Day and the popular sci-fi TV show The X-Files.
Although the U.S. government continued to officially deny the existence of Area 51, those efforts were offset by lawsuits from former employees alleging health problems stemming from exposure to hazardous waste at the site. In 1995, Bill Clinton introduced a presidential determination that precluded the release of classified information regarding "the United States Air Force's operating location near Groom Lake, Nevada," an action that was annually reapplied through his remaining years in office before being continued by his successor, George W. Bush.
The Base Was Finally Acknowledged With the Declassification of CIA Documents
In August 2013, following a Freedom of Information Act request filed in 2005, the government finally acknowledged the existence of Area 51 by declassifying a series of CIA documents that detailed the history of the U-2 and A-12 programs developed at the Nevada base. During the annual Kennedy Center Honors that December, Barack Obama became the first U.S. president to use the term "Area 51" in a public setting.
The base returned to headlines in summer 2019, when college student Matty Roberts launched the "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us" Facebook event. Although some 2 million people confirmed they would attend, prompting local authorities to plan extra security measures, only a few thousand participants arrived at the nearby town of Rachel for the three-day event in September.
Although its cloak of invisibility has been lifted, Area 51 continues to function in much the same manner as before, with only a privileged few employees privy to the technological breakthroughs underway within its heavily guarded perimeter. And while reports of government investigations of unidentified aircraft occasionally push into the crowded news cycle, it may be decades — if ever — before any legitimate connections between this secretive facility and little green men from other worlds are revealed.
