Message posted by Andrew R on October 24, 2000 at 22:52:10 EST:
I just got home from a trip out to watch Red Flag. I picked a bad week to go. The weather just wasn't good enough to see anything. Most of the stuff was above 10,000 feet, at least thats what I heard on the scanner. On Monday we got a late start and missed the morning runs, for those of you going out there the runs are starting around 8:30AM and going till around 12 in the afternoon, plus that night stuff but man..thats starting at 2:30AM. We headed to Rachel to chat at the research center then headed to the Cedar Gate, hoping Fighter School training would be taking place, seeing Red Flag was done already. We drove all the way to the gate and parked on the side of the road...while we were eating our lunch a camo came down and warned us about the gate and not to pass it. We said we understood and asked if he would like something to eat, he said no. Some how we got to talking and ended up chatting for 45mins....here are some things that we covered (he was super nice!)... these are things i found interesting, maybe you already know about them... 2) He had been working there for 17 years and was once a military police for the army. 3) He is a civilian worker but he mentioned the farther south you go (groom lake area) they are both military and civilian...he said that they were really paranoid and didn't mind pointing a M-16 at your head if you crossed the border (mmm...that sounds like FUN!) Then he went on to say that "I don't know why they are so paranoid...I mean..we don't even have the stealth anymore, so there is nothing to even see" we talked a bit about the SR-71 being retired...he said he figured it was just because they had something faster... oooooh on the subject of work, he said that if he had forgot his badge or he wasn't allowed to work...even though everyone knew him they couldn't let him in...the badge pretty much gives him the rights to enter the area and not be arrested. He said he was NOT allowed to fly on the 737's either...he said he had to drive to work everyday. Well thats all i can think of from the conversation...if you are heading out there and want the Freq's for Red Flag n' such email me! I'll make a list of the active ones i heard... Andrew
1) He is employed by a company in Las Vegas (Eg and G i assume) and they don't get anyyyyy retirement! wow..bummer..but he said it was a well paying job so he didn't mind the retirement bit.
we got to talking about the b-2 and such and he said that they only test the "good stuff" on weekends...and on the DARKEST NIGHTS (well we knew that but i thought it was cool comming from a Camo!)...he said he didn't even know what was going on, on those nights. He said all the camos from the range would start from the groom area and press EVERYONE, that didnt have clearance, out to the north (TTR AREA)...INCLUDING the camos that were just civilian, even himself...he wasn't allowed at the Ceder Gate on a testing night!...he mentioned having to guard the hangers the f-117 was in (back in the F-117 Top Secret days), at the TTR, but never really knowing what was inside (errr really??) we then joked about him being on the bottom of the food chain....he laffed.
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