Secret Government Facilities

It would be great to stay in the Groom Lake area for an extended time. I may put together a trip just for the area, and do others in a tour type. I would like to drive to Groom so I can carry much more gear and have my 4x4.

reply to post by SilntShdw


Tikaboo photos

There are a few Tikaboo photos at this link. The one with the red vehicle is where I park. [Maybe I recovered this guys Leatherman. Too late bud, I gave it away.] The false summit photo looks like the first false summit to me. You can't see the base from that summit. Once you make it to the first false summit, things get substantially easier. You have finished with the #$(&%#@ loose shale, though that shale will be a bigger ()($ on the way back down. From the first false summit, you start to head downward to one of the camp grounds. This camp ground could marginally work if you don't want to camp at altitude but rather head up in the early AM. It is far better to go to the next false summit. From their to TIkaboo is maybe 15 minutes. Some people claim you can stay at that camp site just past the first false summit and surprise the base, but I doubt it. I've had the security chopper fly over me at stupid O clock to insure I don't get any rest, then head over the ridge to check for parked cars. There is no evidence of road sensors on the way to Tikaboo and it is claimed that Badger Mountain has no spy gear for TIkaboo. I never climbed it, so I don't know that for sure. It was also claimed Badger Mountain gear wasn't active, but I can say first hand that a rental chopper dropped off crew to work there. The Sundance choppers out of Vegas do contract work for the DoD. I've caught them out at Tonopah.

The CLUI database is one of the really old "sites" databases.

clui military database

reply to post by SilntShdw


I'll probably stay a week or two there, and Roswell,

JUSSS SO YOU KNOW... THE CRASH SITE AT ROSWELL ISNT THE REAL ONE,.. THE REAL ONE IS 13 MILES FROM THE FAKE PUBLICISED LOCATION, ITS ON PRIVATE PROPERTY, AND THE LAND OWNER DOESNT LIKE COMPANY....

reply to post by SilntShdw


OH..AND UNDER THE PATRIOT ACT, PHOTOGRAPHING SECURED INTSTALLATIONS WILL GET YOU ARRESTED, INTERRORAGTED, AND PROBABLY SMACKED AROUND SOME..

JUST A FYI....

reply to post by ZOMBIEMASTER


Hardly true. I photograph installations all the time. No smacking around. At the Groom Lake border, they will do nothing other than log your license plate.

Actually zombiemaster is correct they CAN. But what they CAN do and what they actually do are different. And its not just because of the patriot act they have always had the right to legally, at least at Groom because of its top secret status. I once had my camera taken and had all the pictures deleted off it when I was stationed on a base in the Navy, because of the nature of the work. They deleted all my pictures even though I hadn't taken any of the base.

If it's on your list, it's no secret.

Originally posted by CanadianDream420
If it's on your list, it's no secret.

It has a secret status by the government meaning it gets some special privileges. Up until 1993 or 94 the government wouldn't acknowledge its existence. Then due to enviormental problems they had to but still maintain that its closed down.

PEOPLE HAVE BEEN PHOTOING AREA 51 FOR 60 YEARS... THEY PRETTY MUCH KNOW ITS HARMLESS AT THIS POINT, ... WHY DONT YOU TRY..SAY... ONE OF THE LOCAL FEDERAL BUILDINGS
DOWNTOWN IN YOUR NEAREST CITY.... MAKE SURE THEY SEE YOU... THEN SEND US AN EMAIL FROM THE DUNGEON AND WE'LL TRY TO GET YOU OUT....LOL

reply to post by SilntShdw


Taking photos ON base is quite different from taking photos OFF base. Those no photography signs really only apply to people on base. It is tough to legally enforce photography bans from public property.

I ran into a photographer who used to work for NASA. He was taking some photos at Edwards and when he pointed his camera towards some AF asset and security came down on him like a ton of bricks.

The bay area used to have a flea market in the Lockheed parking lot behind the old NRO Blue Cube. The instructions to attend the flea market was no photography of the cube. Well big deal, you can shoot it from plenty of public locations. I've even flown over it and photographed it. You could get a view similar to what could be seen from the parking lot from a number of office buildings. So I figured nobody would bother to piss off Lockheed security. Wrong! Some fool took a few shots then got in in car to leave. Security headed him off at the pass .

TTR camera policy

While it's not exactly a facility, used to be you could photograph the guys that were undergoing some of the selection exercises for CAG if you were in the right place at the right time. They hold the landnav torture test off-base certain times of the year. The selectees are generally pretty oblivious and you could likely get a nice pic of a sweaty desperate lost guy with blistered feet trying to figure out how to climb over a fence while keeping both hands on a rifle.

But they're followed around by CAG old-timers who are skulking just out of sight.

There are a couple of USAPs in the southeast that used to be active, I haven't been by either of them for a while but I can't imagine they've shut up shop given the amount of money they put into them. Does the secret gubmint facility lore talk about southeastern sites? I'm not sure they're out in the public yet.

Oh, yeah, I guess there's three in Tampa, too. Make that five in the southeast, I suppose. I guess it sort of depends on how bad a beatdown you want and how much tramping through the woods you'd like before your drubbing. One in Tampa will net you immediate response if you try to overtly photograph the guys coming and going, although it's out in the open without a fence. The bad part is, the guys that will take offense are active duty SF in civilian drag based out of MacDill.

reply to post by Bedlam


If you have any doubts about a facility, you have the PAO office number in your phone and photograph during business hours. If you get a visit, pull your phone and say "Let me call the PAO." Bye bye security. The base does not want an incident.

I challenge anyone to document they have been beater by military police for photography while off base. Not that some military police wouldn't want to beat the snot out of annoying photographers, but rather they understand where they have jurisdiction, plus JAG probably taught them not to be idiots.

Nellis for a while was sending Metro to harass photographers. This could still happen IF you park on their side of Las Vegas Blvd because they view that as a direct threat to base security. [The car could be a bomb.] If you park by the Speedway, you might be investigated overtly or covertly, but not harmed in any manner. Complaints to the PAO and Harry Reid must have put the fear of Jesus into AFOSI since I haven't heard on any harassment in a long time. Now your local cop is another story. They have jurisdiction outside the base, hence sending LV Metro back in the day.

Cops (real and rental) in general have been abusing photographers and submissive courts have been allowing it. This website is the most prolific in documenting such abuse:
Photography is not a crime

While it varies from state to state, there are two basic principles that security tries to use against photographers. The first is "expectation of privacy." For example and without going into detail, if the car be a rockin', don't point your camera at the back seat. Expectation of privacy is a very fundamental unwritten legal concept. The other is "use of technology" to get the photo/video. This isn't quite a strong legally. Basically the idea is if you are viewing something that can't normally be seen by the naked eye, then you are invading the privacy of that space. [Example of technology would be a telephoto lens.] This is meant to go after photographers trying to get that photo of a starlet in the back yard sunbathing. While individuals have a right to privacy, it gets murky if companies or government entities have the same right.

I've had plenty of security threaten to call the cops on me. I say "go right ahead, I can use the lawsuit." Needless to say, the cops never arrive. A goon from the junkyard at El Mirage tried to pull this crap General Atomics tried the same thing. Basically the are BSIng and hope you fall for it.

Originally posted by gariac
reply to post by Bedlam

 

If you have any doubts about a facility, you have the PAO office number in your phone and photograph during business hours. If you get a visit, pull your phone and say "Let me call the PAO." Bye bye security. The base does not want an incident.

I challenge anyone to document they have been beater by military police for photography while off base. Not that some military police wouldn't want to beat the snot out of annoying photographers, but rather they understand where they have jurisdiction, plus JAG probably taught them not to be idiots.

The guys in Tampa tend to get bitchy because they're still on active duty for the most part, they just get rotated through the assignment. Thus when you take a photo of them, it's a possible exposure later. It's the same reason you see the opaque fencing around the SF compounds on Benning et al, and why they leave at 2AM, and if they can't they have a lockdown on their route out so the other guys can't see who's on the job and what crap they're taking with them. It's mostly echos and foxtrots at this place in Tampa. The fun thing is it's a USAP right out on the city street - one of the Able series data mining programs that supposedly wasn't funded. Very nondescript.

The same sort of thing applies with the landnav test guys - if they pass all the way through selection they'll end up CAG, and photos are sort of a negative thing, although I notice that more and more they tend to post photos they shouldn't on places where it works its way onto the net. Bad form, IMO.

One of the non-Tampa southeastern installations is a nuclear facility assault trainer, where they train operators to take, "destabilize" or defend a nuke plant. It's one of the better uses of your tax dollars, IMO, and I'm pretty sure they did something impressive off-base to deter some pesky guys from further intrusion years ago. It was a "hit" on ATS for a while back when it happened, although it was obscure enough to not be obvious what had happened. I was sort of suspicious when I heard the interview of the deterree on the news, and one of the guys there confirmed it without being prompted.

Ascension Island.
en.wikipedia.org...

eyeball-series.org...

Ascension Island UK -- One of the Echelon Global Surveillance Stations

reply to post by JBA2848


You'll find another anywhere there's an INMARSAT downlink. Look around the INMARSAT earth stations - every one's got a post nearby. Some of them are cleverly disguised but some are blatant.

reply to post by Bedlam


Nellis does training at Area II where the nukes are/were real. They simply talk to people hanging around the base during training. For all we know, talking to people around the base IS part of the training. [There are claims all the nukes at Nellis Area II are history. Well they haven't exactly trashed the bunkers.]

Seriously, the military doesn't do stupid stuff like beat up/down people poking around the perimeter. I have been asked to leave on occasion, and I do leave, then bitch at the PAO if I'm in the mood.

Talk about beat downs will discourage "investigators". We need more people poking around, not less. Assault is a simple as touching someone. Do you honestly think OSI needs that kind of grief for absolutely no benefit to security?

Originally posted by gariac
Seriously, the military doesn't do stupid stuff like beat up/down people poking around the perimeter. I have been asked to leave on occasion, and I do leave, then bitch at the PAO if I'm in the mood.

Poking around the perimeter of a base is one thing, cutting into the fence of an active USAP and letting yourself in can get you in trouble.

In this case, they did something technically dramatic off-installation. It was unexpected, yet straightforward, but the deterree got in his head that it was "an energy death beam" or the like. Actually that played into the rumors they were starting in the area anyway, so it was all good. However, during one interview he made the comment that he'd seen the local power company trucks up and down the street working a couple of hours before. These guys like doing crap like that, and the description of the effects of the "death beam" seemed too much like a trick we'd been taught in breaking people's infrastructure school.

Never assume that the guys in ambulances, utility trucks, Fedex, UPS etc are the actual people you expect them to be...for some reason, that's a big blind spot for most people, and they'll ignore you if you're in a PG&E or UPS truck with the right uniform.

The "PROOF that the government is using satellite DEATH BEAMS!!" threads were all over ATS for a week or two.

Originally posted by gariac
They simply talk to people hanging around the base during training. For all we know, talking to people around the base IS part of the training.

It can be. There are some classes that train you to spot "bad guys" in crowds and tail them, for example. You train to read body language, spot atypical behavior, do casual interviews pretending to be a civilian, and do covert team pursuit of suspects in happy unsuspecting crowds.

They used to run terrorist spot/pursuit drills in the Birmingham and Montgomery airports - there's a SAP almost dead between them that's a temperate environment rotation training area, lots of lakes, rivers, small rocky hills and the like they use to run around in and practice. They also use MAFB near by for a staging area at times. At some point in their rotation you'd see a crop of grimly casual guys with handlebar mustaches following people around the airport. Very amusing.

reply to post by Bedlam


I recall that story. Total unsubstantiated bovine fecal matter. Seriously, death rays? Bunk.

Like I said, poke around the base perimeters all you want. Nothing bad is going to happen. Been there, done it hundreds of times. I've even had the USSS yell at me. Big deal. I get the shot.

Base Camp security will make an arse out of themselves, but they won't do anything physical. There isn't a whole lot they can do when a public road runs right through their base.

To get this photo, I had to deal with two guys getting in my face. They were stupid enough to drive a trunk with civilian plates. However, there is no way I'm going to let a Ghost Squadron chopper on the ground go un-photographed. They have been photographed in the air, but never on the ground:



I only had to deal with one security guard to get the C-130 with fake tail number photograph.



Trust me, I have no projectile created orifices. I repeat again, these people are not stupid. They will not risk their careers by committing crimes on domestic soil.