National Solar Observatory, USPS office in Sunspot, NM evacuated for 'safety reasons'

originally posted by: SheilaD
a reply to: SheilaD

I checked this out more and found APO is in financial problems. Still open and running, chummy with the sheriff, and ready to cash in on the chaos. They have a much much bigger telescope, open at night, and they even seem to run the fire station in Sunspot. Seems they had people live there until they were all evicted. Are we all being hoodwinked>

Been wondering that myself. REALLY been wondering as of late. It is starting to smell like some sort of viral marketing crapola, ain't it?

originally posted by: askbaby
a reply to: ToasterBorst

It's more than interesting - this whole story is just weird.... and note in this article:

"A tent belonging to an employee and resident of the observatory was set up near the gate. The employee is allowed to enter the facility to do routine maintenance but can't stay in his home, Escalante said."

What! They won't allow the maintenance guy to stay in in his house - instead they setup a tent!

Haha

I'm wondering now if they had everyone vacate in order to perform searches on every building and home.

Bedbugs!!
Makes as much sense as anything else

People are filming themselves wandering what was up till recently, an utterly abandoned facility- wandering around, looking in windows, rattling doorknobs. Literally.

If there's all of these 'eyes' on this place, how come people are (were) wandering it freely, and now, all there is is a couple rent a cops on site for security?

a reply to: wylekat



Not only that, what about the "maintenance" man who is allowed to camp outside the grounds yet still able to work inside the facility daily. BUT....he isn't allowed to go into his own house....on the same grounds!? This is the looniest thing I've heard in a while.


He's allowed in every area besides his own home...so "they" can't be alarmed about someone taking or hiding evidence as he is seemingly wandering from building to building doing whatever. There's no one searching these homes, so that rules out some sort of foul play angle or any type of felony goings-on.


So why then, can't this guy go back to his house? This is like some sort of chicken vs egg thing that has no real answer.

The only thing that would make even a little sense is that the guy is a plant. There to keep an eye on things in case the perp returns to the crime scene?? But even so, there's security there now so the odds of any "perp" doing anything seems slim.

Gah! Never has a story gotten me so bad before. Visiting this thread is the last thing I do before I go to sleep, and the first thing I do when I wake up.

a reply to: MrBuddy

Well, White Sands said there's no testing or anything going on at the missile range to warrant closing the facility and we know the other observatory a half mile away is still open.

All we know from the newest Washington Post article is that the FBI told a firefighter that there was a "credible threat".

Because this happened on September 6th, I'm back to wondering if this was a terrorist threat that hasn't been squashed yet.

I think it's interesting that Anwar al-Awlaki was born in New Mexico while his Yemen father was attending New Mexico State University.

Besides the most recent bust of a terrorist "compound" in the southern part of the state, I wonder if there are any other sleeper cells or radicals laying low in New Mexico.

a reply to: MrBuddy

But even so, there's security there now so the odds of any "perp" doing anything seems slim.

Keep in mind- Rent a Cops. A real sneaky spy or whatever would be able to almost saunter past your basic mall security, and they'd never know. If the guy in the tent is a plant, he'd be the one doing the dirty work, not the security.

I think he's a plant, but I'm starting to think he's there to help build hype for their grand , mysterious re opening.

a reply to: riiver

This seems very odd to me too. Why not just throw some BS story out there? Although, what would it be? Given that there is footage showing that they are not on site, not cleaning up some sort of spill, not actively investigating a crime, AND not letting people back in - what would the story be? Maybe they're still trying to work that out.

Also, I'm just curious - does anyone know who would have jurisdiction if this were an alien thing? Not thinking that's what this is, but just wondering who you'd call to come to the scene if we had a visitor land in a national park.

originally posted by: mikell
Bedbugs!!
Makes as much sense as anything else

Outer space bed bugs with laser beams attached to their heads?

Bed bugs, lead paint mentioned earlier plausible if not damn near likely however why call it a security issue and why not inform the local sheriff, and why the backtracking saying scheduled move. To avoid lawsuits maybe? especially with the lead paint angle

a reply to: wylekat


Idk about the "grand re-opening" angle. Kids are in school so families aren't really travelling right now and there's a hurricane on the East Coast as well as wild fires on the West Coast. If it is a publicity stunt, their PR person that planned it in the midst of all the above should be fired.

As I noted previously, this is all just one great big giant ruse.

Nothing to see here folks! Just one massive orgy of an Interwebz...

LARP!!

a reply to: Fiscal

Hey I just got back on, thanks for the link Fiscal. I'm starting to see a bit of panic in the general masses, of course it doesnt help when people make videos claiming we are all going to die.

Not gonna lie, I'm going to be pretty busy today so I might not show up again until the end of the day. Best of luck everyone, I'll pop in when I can to see what you've all found.

Here's something interesting. I found an article a moment ago where AURA made a statement that they were going to use this down time to go through their data logs over the last two months. Then I came across another article where someone in the comment section had this to say...

It’s an accidental breach of SIGINT security, the sensors this facility uses accidentally intercepted US military signals without knowing it and someone found out. The FBI was sent in to scrub the data and find out how it was done so either the signals or equipment can be modified. The government does not want the data in the open for intercept and analysts by enemy states.

The official story will be that a rival state was trying to steal science and technical secrets by hacking into research facilities. One of those hacks was traced to this facility and the FBI showed up to investigate. In a few days there will be an all clear with a stipulation that the FBI is able to leave software or a computer to scan network traffic to see if it happens again. Its a front to keep tabs.

gizmodo.com...

a reply to: SheilaD

Does the APO mean associated press office? If so they could be pushing him for answers.

a reply to: threeeyesopen

I think it means Apachie Point Observatory

a reply to: Deetermined

That makes a lot of sense..would something like that be enough of a provocation to go to war ? Catching your enemy red handed trying to steal your secrets.

a reply to: threeeyesopen

Apache Point Observatory?

a reply to: 898929

Oh yes that makes sense thank you.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Still hung up on the continued closure of post office w/ the publicity stunt angle, federal employees cannot just transfer locations on a whim; not to mention the potential implications of a scandal. To add to that, we now have paid private security and know that AURA offered to put up the 12 to 15 evacuees in hotels. The publicity stunt angle would actually be a conspiracy, implicating federal employees and AURA--that's a bit hardcore imo.

originally posted by: threeeyesopen
a reply to: Deetermined

That makes a lot of sense..would something like that be enough of a provocation to go to war ? Catching your enemy red handed trying to steal your secrets.

I would say no because the Chinese have already been caught doing it for decades. No one has quite figured out the best way to handle these types of situations yet. Until someone actually uses our stolen technology or secrets against us, I doubt we do anything.