Broke From United States of America, joined Apr 2002, 1322 posts, RR: 4 Posted (8 years 10 months 2 weeks 2 days 1 hour ago) and read 1635 times:
While surfing through Peter Steehouwer's excellent photographic aviation web site, I came across a link to an incident that occurred at Boscombe Down in 1994.
JetMechMD80 From United States of America, joined Jul 2004, 380 posts, RR: 8 Reply 2, posted (8 years 10 months 2 weeks 22 hours ago) and read 1384 times:
Complete and utter bollocks, pretty much like the Lazar hoax about the USAF secretly imprisoning aliens at "Area 51" which is no base at all.
Huh???? No base at all? Groom Lake (Area 51,"the Ranch", Watertown Strip) or whatever you want to call it, most certainly does have a base. Check out the sat photos. That 27,000 ft runway is not just some clearing in the desert. Are there aliens there? I don't think so, but the base does exsist.
Duce50boom From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 3, posted (8 years 10 months 2 weeks 22 hours ago) and read 1379 times:
I think he meant it isn't an "official" air force base. Last time I saw the popular science cover page w/area 51 on the cover page I couldn't spot a golf course. Dead giveaway it's not a normal AFB
Jwenting From Netherlands, joined Apr 2001, 10213 posts, RR: 21 Reply 4, posted (8 years 10 months 2 weeks 7 hours ago) and read 1322 times:
no. "Area 51" is no base. It is a part of the Nellis ranges which contains among other things Groom Lake dry lakebed on and around which sits a small airbase (which is officially closed).
Duce50boom From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 5, posted (8 years 10 months 2 weeks 7 hours ago) and read 1324 times:
I had no idea we had a high level US government employee on this site. Apparently we do.
Apart from the fact that the base is still open and still testing cool sh*t. Calling it area 51 is like people calling the Prez's 747 AF1, we all know that's not the official title, but that's what it's best known as. So what's the big deal here?
On another note, I can think of many words for that base, but small is not one of them. It's only got the largest runway in the world and a huge complex of hangars, fuel pits, and other assorted buildings on it to rival any normal AFB
Bsergonomics From United Kingdom, joined Jan 2002, 462 posts, RR: 0 Reply 6, posted (8 years 10 months 2 weeks 2 hours ago) and read 1310 times:
"Complete and utter bollocks..."
I'll second that...
Boscombe Down is a very picturesque airfield in the middle of Wiltshire that trains test pilots and experiments with new equipment, including black projects. However, those black projects are simply black boxes on board existing aircraft. Do you really think that they are stupid enough to take-off and land black aircraft in full view of the second busiest road into the south-west of England, right next to a small town? You can't take off and land without flying straight over large numbers of inhabitants and/or flying through the approach corridors for Heathrow, Southampton, Bristol or Birmingham (let alone lesser but still active airfields)!
Aircrew killed following an undercarriage collapse? Is the author in the real world?
One minor detail that the author forgot was that the main Lockheed Martin site in the UK is just outside Portsmouth. Since Portsmouth doesn't have an active airfield anymore, the nearest one of any size is Southampton (see the comment about the ISVR - Institute of Sound and Vibration Research - at Southampton University).
So, an equally compelling theory is this: a Lockheed aircraft (for example, the SR-71, even though it was 'officially' retired at that point - note than none of the 'observers' were close enough to give an accurate estimate of size) suffers a serious hydraulic failure and needs to make an emergency landing at a secure airfield. The only one in range is Boscombe. So, it lands on the downhill slope of the runway and, in the process, the nose undercarriage collapses. The Janet flight comes from Ramestein with engineers to assess the damage but they conclude that it can't be fixed in situ. The USAF sends a C-5 to recover the damaged aircraft. Some of the 'boys' drop by to visit the Lockheed offices and ship the pilots home.
This is all crap and nothing to get worked up about. Conspiracy Theories are great, but when it's just the military not wanting to be too candid about their operations and co-operation with other nations, they are a waste of time. A bit like reading that article.
The definition of a 'Pessimist': an Optimist with experience...
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