As an X-Files junkie and conspiracy freak, I was watching the blockbuster Independence Day, and I got to the part where everybody goes to Area 51 and there’s a big spaceship and Brent Spiner says they’ve been studying aliens there since Roswell. I thought, what’s the deal? Area 51 was on an episode of the X-Files, it’s got a video game, a band–what the hell do they have in there? Biological weapons? Plutonium? Cold fusion? The body of Jimmy Hoffa? Or the bodies of hundreds of dead aliens? I’m starved for info.
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In fact, what we’ve got here is a showcase example of the American genius for hype. Officially at least there’s no such place as “Area 51.” The name refers to a six-by-ten-mile section numbered 51 on an old grid-type map of the Nevada A-bomb test site.
Now part of the Nellis Air Force Range, Area 51 is the home of a used-to-be-secret-but-everybody-and-his-dentist-knew-about-it airfield at Groom (dry) Lake. The Pentagon reportedly has used the airfield to test spy planes and more recently the F-117A Stealth fighter.
Yeah, I know: presidential material. But even a lot of people in the UFO community now think Lazar’s a flake.
But why wait? You want to see beings from another planet, go out to the black mailbox. There are bunches of ’em, looking up.
