1942

Indian Springs Air Force Auxiliary Field opens with two, unpaved, 5,000 foot runways.

1948

Project Sign

Project Sign (also known as Project Saucer) was code for an official study by the U.S. government active for the majority of 1948. The study aimed to dig deeper into claims of unidentified flying objects and was completed by the U.S. Air Force, under Air Force General Nathan Farragut Twining (pictured right).

1949 - 1951

Project Grudge

Project Grudge, a brief USAF project, succeeded Project Sign and began investigating UFOs in February 1949.

The project officially ended in December of that year, lasting just 11 months, but continued in a nominal capacity until late 1951.

1950s

The base was named "Paradise Ranch" to attract employees to relocate to the secretive military base. 

The Nevada National Security Site (N2S2) is the government's name for Area 51. It was known as the Nevada Test Site (NTS) until 2010, and is used by the U.S. Department of Energy.

The site was established to test nuclear devices in 1951; testing because with a 1-kiloton-of-TNT bomb dropped on January 27, 1951. Over the next 40 years the U.S. would test over 1,000 nuclear devices at the site, and the mushroom clouds from atmospheric tests could be seen from nearly 100 miles away.

Westerly winds carried the fallout of nuclear testing over southern Utah, which resulted in a massive increase in cancer cases from the mid-1950s onward.

536 anti-nuclear protests involving more than 37,000 participants and almost 16,000 arrests were held at the site from 1986 through 1994.

Mission Support and Test Services is the current civilian contractor for the site's management and supervises overall operations and operates the site for the National Nuclear Security Administration.

1955

Clarence “Kelly” Johnson

Johnson led a team at Lockheed to develop multiple classified aircraft, including the U-2 and SR-71 Blackbird.

Johnson led a team at Lockheed to develop multiple classified aircraft, including the U-2 and SR-71 Blackbird.

Witness of UFO activity

Wednesday December 16, 1953:

Johnson and his wife were visiting their ranch close to Agoura, California and Point Mugu Naval Air Station, an aircraft and missile test facility.

Around 5 PM Johnson was looking out a window at the sunset, when he saw a dark, elliptical shape in the sky in the direction of Point Mugu Cape.

He originally thought it was a cloud or maybe an aircraft smoke trail, but after it was stationary for a few minutes and didn't change, he called for his wife to bring him binoculars.

By this time the shape had started to move and accelerated away from him, in the opposite direction of the other clouds of the sky, and at a shallow climb. It looked like it was very large, moving fast, and far away, but he had no way of confirming its real size, speed, or distance.

June 17, 1959

“More Flying Objects Seen In Clark Sky”

In Reno, Nevada, north of Area 51, the Reno Evening Gazette published a story with this headline.

The article described how Sergeant Wayne Anderson of the local sheriff's office and several other locals reported seeing an object that was "bright green in color and descending toward the earth at a speed too great to be an airplane."

October 1962 - 1971

D-21 Tagboard

Designed to be launched from the back of an M-21 aircraft carrier and created as a variation of the A-12 aircraft, the D-21 is a supersonic reconnaissance drone with a maximum speed of Mach 3.3 (2,200 miles per hour) and an operational altitude of 90,000 feet.

The aircraft was originally known by the Lockheed designation Q-12, and was intended for surveillance use deep in enemy airspace. It was designed to carry a single, high-resolution camera over a pre-programmed path, release the camera module to be retrieved, and then self-destruct.

After a fatal accident occurred when launched from an M-21, the aircraft was redesigned to be launched from a Boeing B-52 Stratofortress.

Several test flights and four unsuccessful missions over China later, the program was cancelled in 1971.

1968

OXCART program

Declassified documents signed by Clarence “Kelly” Johnson himself.

1972

Janet Airlines

Unofficial name given to a highly classified fleet of passenger aircraft

The main purpose of Janet Airlines is to act as an employee shuttle for military and contractor employees — picking them up at their home airport in the morning and taking them to work, then transporting them back to their home airports in the evening.

Janet Airlines mainly serves the Nevada National Security Site (N2S2), which includes Area 51 and the Tonopah Test Range. It operates out of a private terminal on the west side of the Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, and even has its own terminal building.

The aircraft are mostly unmarked, but have a red line along the windows, which is a sort of hint at Janet being the operator.

Janet flights use three-digit flight numbers with a WWW prefix, although the three-letter designator is marked as "blocked" in the official International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The official airline callsign is simply "Janet," but a different callsign is used once the aircraft is transferred to Groom Lake from Nellis control.

The callsign name would change, and the number becomes the last two digits of the flight number plus 15. "Janet 412" would become something like "Bunny 27."

December 2007

Airbase Appears in New Civilian Aircraft Navigation System Update

The latest database revision from Jeppesen, a aviation navigation manufacturing company, contains the location of Area 51, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) identifier code KXTA, and is listed as "Homey Airport."

The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) released a notice that all student pilots should be explicitly told about KXTA, and not to use it as a waypoint or destination for any flight, regardless of its appearance in public navigation databases.

2013

CIA responds to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request

An official history of the U-2 and OXCART projects were released by the CIA following a FOIA request by Jeffrey T. Richelson of the National Security Archive at George Washington University.

His request was submitted in 2005.

The CIA response mentioned Area 51 and Groom Lake multiple times, and included a map of the area.