AMARGOSA VALLEY, Nev. — The hottest event of September isn't the return of pumpkin spice lattes, but a proposed raid on Area 51 to "see them aliens."
More than 300,000 people have clicked "going" to the Sept. 20 Facebook event, "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us." The event's description is simple:
We will all meet up at the Area 51 Alien Center tourist attraction and coordinate our entry. If we Naruto run, we can move faster than their bullets. Let's seem them aliens.
Newsweek said the joke event at Area 51, also known as Homey Airport, was set up by a page called "s***posting cause I'm in shambles" and "SmyleeKun," who streams himself playing video games on Twitch.
Live Science said the event is, of course, a joke. Raiding this or any other military base is not advised. Newsweek said Edwards Air Force based in California administers Homey Airport, which is now a flight testing facility for new aircraft.
The area in the Nevada desert is most famous for alien conspiracy theories that have been around since the 1950s. It also supposedly stored what was found at the reported Roswell UFO incident in the late 1940s.
The CIA released documents and a brief history related to Area 51. It was the first confirmation of its existence. The Air Force has been there since 1955, and Area 51 has hosted nuclear weapons tests and served as a training area for super secret aircraft technology.
Politico revealed last year that the Pentagon had quietly set up a multimillion-dollar program to investigate UFOs. The program was set up to look into possible UFO sightings by pilots and other military members.
The Advance Aviation Threat Idenficiation Program was established after these "unidentified aerial phenomena" seen by pilots appeared "vastly more advanced that hose in American or foreign arsenals."
This program is a 21st-century effort to continue and replicate some of the work done with Project Bluebook. That effort ran from 1947 to 1969 and attempted to explain the thousands of reported sightings of UFOs by military members and citizens.
As for the joke Facebook event, those in the group appear to be enjoying posting memes related to aliens, Area 51 and UFOs alongside ones about cartoon Naruto, Monster energy drink, HALO and "Mad Max: Fury Road."
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