1994: Glenn Campbell complicates Groom Lake's aircraft test

a reply to: TNMockingbird

Actually, on his "Mothership" site (that I assume is long gone) he fairly well destroyed Lazar with actual data about Lazar's abilities and work history at Area 51. None the less, Lazar as has many others, helped advanced the UFO cause by their various utterances.

The road sensors are either seismic or magnetometers, not microwave. The links are VHF.

Going to Freedom Ridge, he would trip the sensors. This is true today, though you have to stop short of Freedom Ridge. The camo dudes would get his plate and probably do a visual as well, so they would know it was Glenn.

The scanner jargon is reasonable, though it would not be SOP today. Once on Groom control, they change callsign. Janets are either large cargo (737) or small cargo (Beech). Squawk code format is 033x.

The story rings true to me.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
Camino was one of the callsigns used by the F-117s. It could have been Nighthawks testing something.

Though at the time the F-117 wasn't a secret, so I'm not sure why the base would care if Glenn saw them. The base would be more concerned if the plane was OT.

The pilot's lack of familiarity with the area does jive with being from HO.

originally posted by: Aliensun
a reply to: TNMockingbird

Actually, on his "Mothership" site (that I assume is long gone) he fairly well destroyed Lazar with actual data about Lazar's abilities and work history at Area 51. None the less, Lazar as has many others, helped advanced the UFO cause by their various utterances.

www.otherhand.org...

Mahood did the best Lazar debunking. I do suggest you start another thread if you want to get into this.

Glenn's research is decent and shouldn't be tangled up with Lazar's bunk. You do need to read the old Desert Rat newsletters with a grain of salt. Sometimes Glenn is just trying to be funny. For example, I don't think he really believes Larry King received an alien implant when his plane landed at Nellis.

There is a lot of old usenet material from Glenn and the Interceptors. You have to realize they did their research prior to the WWW.

a reply to: gariac

They weren't secret, but that doesn't mean they weren't testing something, or doing something they didn't want seen.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: gariac

They weren't secret, but that doesn't mean they weren't testing something, or doing something they didn't want seen.

The OT wing should be testing. That would be Edwards. But they could be at Groom to be sniffed by some radar or RCS.

I'm told if you get a Nellis media pass, your not supposed to photograph their OT planes. Which of course is silly since you can get very good photos off base.

When I've had media passes at Edwards (grumble no open house in a long time grumble), they didn't want photos of the butt end of a B-2, but only when on the ground. This makes for an entertaining scene since you have a long row of photographers tracking the B-2 as it taxies, then suddenly the shutters start clicking when it is barely a foot of the ground.

Regarding if Tikaboo is "staffed", they send the chopper. But at the distance to Freedom Ridge, you could spot a person on the hill from the control tower. It is similar to watching the TTR from Brainwash Butte. That is you can see workers on the ground at the base from the hill. Not very well, but enough to see somebody is there. This is with binoculars obviously.

Going back to the scanner audio, the base uses the term "company traffic" often to alert one Janet of the presence of another Janet.

I have an "experimental" scheme set up to stream the Groom scanner audio I have collected with the addition of identification tags regarding the channel used. This way you can tell tower from ops, etc.

www.inplanesight.org:8000...

You have to play it with a suitable client like videolan (vlc).
www.videolan.org...
There is also an app for smartphones.

I'm still working on the scripting to automate the encoding process.

a reply to: SpeedFanatic

Discuss..

lets discuss the absence of an audio recording to veryify this " transcript "

originally posted by: ignorant_ape
a reply to: SpeedFanatic

Discuss..

lets discuss the absence of an audio recording to veryify this " transcript "

Well there was streaming 22 years ago, but IIRC it was stuff like "real audio". I can cut someone slack not uploading audio at a time when the WWW was still new. You realize we're talking about a period four years before the birth of Google. This is 3 years before the first trunking scanner.

There is a lot of scanner audio from back in the day that has never hit the web. For instance the camo dudes in the clear.

Glenn's transcript is reasonable. If you want nonsense, dig up the blather from "Swiss Mountain Bat."

For example, take the Swiss Mountain Bat, who badly wanted to be a member of our group and even flew in from Switzerland to join some of our expeditions. An insurance accountant by day and enthusiastic UFO researcher at night, the Bat would have been the first Yodeling Interceptor had he made the grade. He didn't. He was amusing at first but became merely annoying, and no one ever considered him "one of us."

www.aliensonearth.com...

This sort of behaviour is probably why they knew it was Glenn Campbell


Irregardless, all credit where its due, as far as I can tell Glenn did a whole lot of research into Area 51 and Nellis when it took leg-work and not a google search. Him and all the other guys who were out on Freedom Ridge in the 90s are the reason this forum is as well informed today as it is!

a reply to: gariac

What are you opinions on the Swiss Mountain Bat and the famous sighting, Gariac?

Thanks for posts in this thread!
I heard that the radio transcript from the Glenn Campbell sighting wasn't avalible to hear or download because Glenn just forgot who recorded it... but I'm sure that he is a credible person purely on his involve to Area 51 terminology.

Zaph, thank you for your post. I didn't know that Camino was F-117 callsign.

a reply to: SpeedFanatic

F117 was a 1970's design, since that was before personal computer networking the locals would have used HAM radio to keep tabs on area 51. Glenn would have only been a 4 YO in 1963 when area 51 security was at its tightest. There were death threats and quarantine actions in those years which we will never hear about.

originally posted by: gfad
a reply to: gariac

What are you opinions on the Swiss Mountain Bat and the famous sighting, Gariac?

Swiss Mountain Bat reports are fecal matter. No physical evidence. Also it is funny how he is the only person to view secret tests. And mind you on every visit.

originally posted by: SpeedFanatic
Thanks for posts in this thread!
I heard that the radio transcript from the Glenn Campbell sighting wasn't avalible to hear or download because Glenn just forgot who recorded it... but I'm sure that he is a credible person purely on his involve to Area 51 terminology.

Zaph, thank you for your post. I didn't know that Camino was F-117 callsign.

There are callsign lists on the interwebs.
nato.radioscanner.ru...

Much like frequency databases, they are copies of copies, mixtures of lists, etc. But callsigns don't change all that much.

The key is how recently the callsign was monitored.

originally posted by: gariac
The road sensors are either seismic or magnetometers, not microwave. The links are VHF.

Going to Freedom Ridge, he would trip the sensors. This is true today, though you have to stop short of Freedom Ridge. The camo dudes would get his plate and probably do a visual as well, so they would know it was Glenn.

The scanner jargon is reasonable, though it would not be SOP today. Once on Groom control, they change callsign. Janets are either large cargo (737) or small cargo (Beech). Squawk code format is 033x.

The story rings true to me.

The road sensors are looking for vehicles (heavy with a lot of steel). The personnel sensors off the road and distributed through the countryside were microwave. They had to all have line of sight to each other and a sufficiently large body mass crossing the 'beam' caused a dip at the receiving antenna (I believe). A similar system was used outside where I used to work (a military aircraft contractor in Australia), essentially a microwave tripwire.

originally posted by: chr0naut

originally posted by: gariac
The road sensors are either seismic or magnetometers, not microwave. The links are VHF.

Going to Freedom Ridge, he would trip the sensors. This is true today, though you have to stop short of Freedom Ridge. The camo dudes would get his plate and probably do a visual as well, so they would know it was Glenn.

The scanner jargon is reasonable, though it would not be SOP today. Once on Groom control, they change callsign. Janets are either large cargo (737) or small cargo (Beech). Squawk code format is 033x.

The story rings true to me.

The road sensors are looking for vehicles (heavy with a lot of steel). The personnel sensors off the road and distributed through the countryside were microwave. They had to all have line of sight to each other and a sufficiently large body mass crossing the 'beam' caused a dip at the receiving antenna (I believe). A similar system was used outside where I used to work (a military aircraft contractor in Australia), essentially a microwave tripwire.

Nobody has documented a microwave sensor in border area. Note that the MIDS/EMIDS are battery powered. The dudes have "diaper change" duty. Relay facilities are needed as well. Microwave systems tend to be more power hungry. But if you have any actual hard data on microwave detectors used around the range, I'm all ears. Er, eyes.

There have been a number of Doppler type microwave detectors tested at the NTS based on published studies. The fact being there are wild animals all around the range complicates things.

It wouldn't surprise me at all if there are microwave perimeter controls at the base itself since I've seen them at Edwards South Base.

Regarding the remote cameras around the range, I have a theory on how the work. (Technically I have a hypotheses, not a theory). The border crossing have a camera, solar cell, microwave dish and yagi. The microwave dishes point toward Bald Mountain. The yagi points to the road. I think the road sensor alerts security. Security might remotely turn on the camera at that point. The yagi antenna is cut to the UHF business band to the best I could measure. (I used a combination of laser ranging and photography to measure the driven element to then infer the frequency.) The person that wants to cross the border gets on the two way radio and says "I'm Joe Contractor at point XYZ" or something to that effect. The camera is used to visually identify the vehicle. I don't believe the solar cell has enough capacity to run the radio link and camera continuously.

The base has started construction on a site that I believe will be a powered security camera near Bald Mountain. The camera on Bald Mountain can't see near the base of the mountain, so they have a camera at ground level with pan capability. But I'm sure it had battery limitations.

a reply to: chr0naut

Probably gravitational monitoring by satellite as well these days.
May all the crash victims from the recon flights in that era RIP..

Glenn was a pioneer when it comes to Area 51! It was the wild Wild West Back then. There’s a new guy on YouTube called “Adventures with Christian” who tools Around Area 51 birder weekly. I’d love to see him and Glenn team up. Sadly the fun days with groomlake are long gone.

originally posted by: EngineerGuY
Glenn was a pioneer when it comes to Area 51! It was the wild Wild West Back then. There’s a new guy on YouTube called “Adventures with Christian” who tools Around Area 51 birder weekly. I’d love to see him and Glenn team up. Sadly the fun days with groomlake are long gone.

Careful my friend I mentioned this Youtube guy once and got chewed out.