Is there a lab equivalent of Area 51

We've all seen those second rate movies with titles like "Boa" and "King Cobra" where government laboraties buried deep in the jungles of Panama create hybrid monsters which always:

1. Break loose
2. Munch on the heavily armed guards and white lab coat wearing technicians; and
3. Finally, get blown to pieces by some McGuyver type with a jury rigged bomb which he usually throws in its mouth as it launches its final attack.

Sorry, got carried away there for a second

Question is, do we have any suspicion of such labs existing, either deep in the jungle or elsewhere.

In my minds eye I see a concrete reinforced entrance leading underground to a large and well equipped genetics laboratory - you know the kind of thing.

Alot of people will be able to help you out with this subject. I always thought some where in Alaska would be a great place to test stuff out, but the only problem would be the weather while takin off with aircraft. I heard some people say Colorado may have one, just depends. Watch the History Channel or Discovery Channel, they always have shows on this.

i truly beleive that this is indeed possible. its a scary thought though aint it to think somthing as big as that roaming aound.
i have no facts to back it up just what i believe, science can do many things why not creat huge boas and king cobras, imagine the potencey of the venom they could extract and use.

Puerto Rico has a few US labs in it. Infact when this whole Chupacabra thing started some people thought it was monkeys that escaped from the lab at first. Some Puerto Ricans still believe Chupacabra was infact a escaped US genetic experiment.

A Island nation outside the US might not be a bad place to conduct such questionable experiments.

Myriad Genetics Laboratories is one such lab I believe.

[edit on 9-6-2006 by ShadowXIX]

Originally posted by ShadowXIXMyriad Genetics Laboratories is one such lab I believe.

[edit on 9-6-2006 by ShadowXIX]

Thanks, Googling it as I type.

Google Plum Island New York

the factors weighing against the probabilities of such a " secret jungle base " are :

logic , security and logistics

LOGIC : why does the base HAVE to be in the jungle ? only anthropologists and animal behaviorists like goodall and fossey HAVE to travel to the natural habitat of their target study . And these people ` go native ` and blend into the environment – with minimal ecological impact

Real life genetics research into the viability of endangered species is conducted in England , Germany and the USA – with only one junior research assistant actually “ in country “ collecting samples and maintaining tracking equipment which can be monitored via internet connection

SECURITY :

Having a secret jungle base may seem cool – but its really a security nightmare – your base has to have a security force and defensive works – that raise profile and cost

Having virgin jungle 5m from your perimeter means you have no idea whether you are under surveillance , or an attack force is being assembled

Everything you move in and out is seen by any one who wants to wonder what goes on there .

LOGISTICS :

A remote facility that is not self sustaining , requires that every piece of equipment and and every ton of stores / supplies it needs to be shipped out to it

That includes staff – you cannot isolate a cutting edge scientific team in secret for long periods and expect them to come up with breakthroughs in secret

This may sound obvious , but think about how your life would be if you lived 100km from anywhere else ? you have to develop a self sustaining life style or plan to bring everything in in bulk – and store it –

Just imagine having to buy EVERYTHING for a 6 month stay , You cannot just “ dash out to the store “ for anything – everything has to be bunkered , or you do without .

And how do you know what your science team will ACTUALLY need ?? they may start a project on one track – but shift abruptly – and need to develop an entire new focus – how are you going to deal with that , stuck in the middle of no where ?

Every re-supply convoy which visits your “ secret “ base increases its profile

Self sustainability increases your footprint , and you can only support a limited population – Now try to conduct cutting edge scientific research in your basement
its also labour intensive – if you want scientists to actually do research – they cannot be growing their own food too

You will find that for every dollar you send on your " secret jungle base " only 5 cents is actually spent on science – the rest is swallowed up in vastly over inflated operations budgets , a prime real life example is Antarctic climate research – a base on the Ross ice shelf to study climate changes in the Weddell sea will have an operations budget many times that a lab in the Boston suburbs , conducting studiers of weather patterns in new England of a similar scope

all these factors conspire to make the " secret jungle base " a plot device only worthy of bad movies . maybe I just avoid bad movies , but the nearest thing I can think of to a " secret jungle base " of the type you imply was the base in " deep blue sea "

poll.imdb.com..." target="_blank" class="postlink" rel="nofollow">deep_blue_sea

and that broke every " rule " I have described – there was absolutely zero reason for it to be guilt in the location and configuration it was , other than to advance the dire plot – everything that occurred there could have been conducted in a secure wing at a shore based oceanographic lab , and a shore based lab would have contained the situation in short order

IMHO the only reason " secret jungle bases " occur in bad movies is because if the action was not at a secret jungle base -- the film could be wound up in 5 minutes , with all threat averted , and only one token death

That ladies and gentlemen is why there are “ secret jungle bases “ , besides . Real secret research , already occurs on a massive scale at facilities like the LLNL , Los Alamos , the CDC-P , LM ` skunk works ` , Porton down , Aldermaston etc etc the closest thing you will find to the kind of secret base you want would be the soviet era bioperat facilities and weapons development ` military towns ` - built miles from anywhere .

The big difference is they had at least the benefit of economies of scale – the staff, of 10s of thousands in many cases NEVER left the support city and you had a viable economy curtsey of all the ancillary staff – providing catering , service industries etc to the “ secret “ plant – few who knew exactly what went on in the huge industrial parks that dominated their city . and supplies etc could be shipped in by rail in BULK and more important – the city itself was semi self sustaining – it had its own light industry etc .

A more frightening example is / was the primate research lab located in the DC belt way , according to Richard Preston the facility was just a faceless grey building , but in the mid 90s they had an outbreak of hemorrhagic fever in the monkeys which was barely contained [ all within 50m of day to day Washington life ]


Still think you need a secret jungle base ?

Dugway Proving Grounds.


home.comcast.net...

This wasn't a top secret lab or anything, but it shows how an experiment can go very wrong when the subject of that experiment gets loose. More than 600 people have died from the accidental release of some queens, and the problem is still getting worse.

In December 1956 Professor Warrik Kerr of Brazil succeeded in bringing 54 living queen bees from Africa to Sal Palo Brazil in hopes of increasing the honey production of Brazil (Brazil was 27th in the world for honey production). When it was found that the African bees were too fierce to be handled safely he began a breeding program with European bees to hopefully bread out the fierce aggressiveness but keep the large honey production.

During the program a number of African queens were mistakenly released in October 1957. The African bees began to take over in Brazil. In 1967 an attack in Rio brought the bees to the attention of the world. Over the next twenty years the bees spread over Southern and Central America and reached the United States by the late eighties.

These Africanized or 'Killer' bees are most famous for the ferocity with which they protect their hives. When they sting they leave a sent on the victim which causes the rest of a swarm to begin stinging. In the worst attack the victim received about 8000 stings. In an attack the bees can deliver enough venom to kill a horse.
www.distant.ca...

An experiment in Australia in 1935 brought 102 cane toads into the country to combat cane beatles, but they have now grown into an infestation that is out of control and killing native species and pets.
Again, this wasn't a secret lab, but when the experiment failed nobody thought to eradicate the toads before they got out of control and started killing other species.

Originally posted by ShadowXIX
Puerto Rico has a few US labs in it. Infact when this whole Chupacabra thing started some people thought it was monkeys that escaped from the lab at first. Some Puerto Ricans still believe Chupacabra was infact a escaped US genetic experiment.

A Island nation outside the US might not be a bad place to conduct such questionable experiments.

Myriad Genetics Laboratories is one such lab I believe.

[edit on 9-6-2006 by ShadowXIX]

Yep, there are tons of labs in Puerto Rico. When we were driving down the road there was a another long dirt road that led up a mountain with a sign next to it, I'll try and get pictures next time I see it.

[edit on 18-6-2006 by Quix]

Got to agree with Changeling, There are tons of creepy storys about the things that go on at Dugway floating about.

Although the logistics mentioned above for it would be more than a little difficult, when people mention stuff like this the first thing that always springs to my mind is Antarctica.

Out of the way of public eyes and exempt from International Laws (?). With todays technology would it really be that much of a pain to have something like that down there? Obviously if you work there you can't have an everyday life with a familiy...

Oh and then there's that treaty about how no one is allowed to go there....

It's a big world, so there probably are some labs that are doing some weird experiments. But they don't necessarily have to be american.

I e-mailed Myriad Genetics from one of my spare e-mail accounts, and asked politely if they had any research labs in Puerto Rico.

So far no response, but all my neighbor's friends now seem to be driving black SUVs with tinted windows