Area 51: Declassified
"Until Thursday, the U.S. government had never publicly acknowledged the existence of Area 51—a remote spot in the Nevada desert that has long been associated with conspiracy theories, alien sightings, and talk of tiny spaceships.
But a newly declassified CIA document—which was written in 1992—shows a map labeled with the name of the remote land parcel, 75 miles from Las Vegas, used to test and develop top-secret U.S. military projects, including the U-2 spy plane."
Here is an interview, directly from the article, with Annie Jacobsen, an investigative journalist and the author of Area 51: An Uncensored History of America's Top Secret Military Base.
National Geographic said:Why did people think that Area 51 housed alien spaceships?
A lot of it was because of the U-2 planes program that started out of Area 51 in 1955. The U-2 planes were used extensively by the U.S. during the Cold War for reconnaissance missions. They flew at an altitude of 60,000 feet (18 meters)—considerably higher than any other plane in existence at the time.
As soon as test flights began, people wrote letters to their congressmen and to their local mayors saying, "I saw a UFO." But what they saw was the U-2 spy plane.
Why did they mistake the U-2 plane for a UFO?
Two reasons. One, it had an almost vertical takeoff. Anyone who happened to see it gaining altitude would have thought it was very unusual.
The second reason is that it flew so high. At the time, no one believed that airlines could fly that high. Commercial flights were flying 20,000 feet (6 kilometers) in the air. If you saw [a U-2 plane], you were going to think it was a UFO.
Why are we so fascinated with Area 51?
I call it the grassy knoll of Nevada. So many stories surrounded it. People clamor to read about it. It makes it exciting to report on.
Discuss!