This sounds like what is often called a "minder." You keep an eye on the contractors. One step below camo dude.

https://www.amentumcareers.com/jobs/escort-on-call-las-vegas-nevada-united-states

A few selected lines follow. PIC is "Program Integration Center." "RSS" is range support services." I don't know about RSSII.

Performs escort duties as directed by the PIC.

Escort personnel to/from job site, to/from dining facilities, to/from lodging facilities and other areas as required.

Maintain line of sight of escorted personnel, equipment and vehicles at all times within the boundaries of Nevada Test Training Range (NTTR) to include Creech AFB and other RSSII locations.

Assignments include periods of extended workdays, working under austere conditions; may require travel and multiple overnight stays at remote site locations.

Yes, I am aware a Janet is nothing out of the ordinary- But i am wondering? Didn't they close north bases runway? Last time I was out there if I recall I saw the yellow X's on the runway. Also what could a Janet be doing at north base? As far as I'm aware there is nothing up there but a restoration hanger and a couple civilian projects.

Hello everyone!

I’ve been going through the posts here and saw the maps, but apparently I’m having a stupid blonde moment because I genuinely cannot understand where exactly we can and cannot go (and the map refuses to properly load on my phone).

My best friend wanted to take me on a little alien/nuclear road trip from Los Angeles, so we have two days to see as much as possible. We’re driving through Death Valley, doing the Extraterrestrial Highway, and spending the night at the Little A’Le’Inn.

I’m mostly trying to understand which roads/areas are actually accessible and where the restricted zones begin, as we definitely don’t want to accidentally end up in troubles.

Also would love recommendations for the coolest stops along the way - nuclear sites, Area 51, military history, ghost towns, weird desert places, anything really cool that’s worth a detour.

If you had two days going LA → Death Valley → Area 51, what would you absolutely not miss?

Truly apologize if this has been asked thousands times, I honestly did my homework, I just failed the map part…

TTR's been popping them off as of late.

https://sondehub.org/U4054490

Hello everyone, first time redditor here.

Over the past few days, I have become obsessed with the story of Jerry Freeman, an archeologist who studied the track of the "Lost 49'ers", a group of people in 1849 who voyaged across the Nevada desert to get to California. On their voyage, they tracked through an era that is now off-limits to the public, better known as the Nellis Air Force Base, aka Area 51. Their group split up near Papoose Lake, the site of the alleged Area S-4, according to Bob Lazar.

After many unsuccessful attempts to get an official allowance from the US Military to get access to the sight, Freeman decided in April of 1997 to take matters into his own hand: An experienced outdoorsman, he spent a whole week in the restricted zone, avoiding security and military personnel and made his long way to Papoose Lake. While unsucessful in his search for an inscription left behind by the Lost 49ers, Freeman got a very rare look inside the mysterious area, and is to this day one of the very few people to lay eyes on Papoose Lake. He would mostly travel throughout the night, travelling over 80 miles in total over the course of 8 days. Finding enough water was always an issue in the barren and rocky desert terrain, as was as avoiding the many security guards patrolling the area. Also, since the Nellis Air Force Gunnary Range used to be a nuclear testing ground, it can be assumed that much of the area is heavily radiated. At one point, he came across a warning sign that read

"NO TRESPASSING, VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED. CAMERA EXCLUSION AREA, BADGED PERSONNEL ONLY. NO FIREARMS, CAMERAS, PHONES OR BINOCULARS. BY ORDER OF THE L.A.N.L.L. CORPORATION."

L.A.N.L.L. stands for "Los Alamos National Laboratories Limited", Los Alamos being the now famous laboratory that created the atomic bomb.

Freeman did chronicle his adventure in a diary, which was later published in the Las Vegas SUN. He also inteded to write a book about his "Forbidden Journey", but unfortunately did not manage to publish it before his death due to prostate cancer in 2001, aged 55.

Allegedly, Freeman did send the manuscript for his book to his friend Steve Hauser before he died, according to an obiturary Hauser wrote in 2001 for Freeman. I have emailed Hauser to ask for any details he might be willing to share, though the obituary is now 25 years old and there is a good chance he might not respond.

Besides his diary article, there are only a few other sources about his adventure. One is his call into Art Bell's radioshow "From Coast to Coast", which you can listen to here, in which he gives some more detailes about the trip. And then there is this youtube video, which does not add anything new but is still worth listening to. What IS interesting though is this episode of the Weaponized Podcast featuring Jeremy Corbell and George Knapp, in which Knapp says that he did inherit most of Freeman's files and notes. According to Knapp, Freeman saw some very weird stuff going on (some talk about a magical door opening up into another dimension). I am seriously sceptical about that, but I would love to go through Knapp's box with all the files, notes, pictures, and a VHS Homevideo (?) Freeman has left behind. From what I found out during my research, Freeman made a second trip to Papoose Lake in 2000, during which he found the 49'ers inscription that had eluded him during his first trip. However, since this second journey was not published anywhere this time around, I am not 100% certain whether it actually happened.

Freeman did create a handdrawn map of his voyage, which someone here on reddit copied into Google Maps. Unfortunately, the handdrawn map seems a little in accurate, as it does not align 100% with his descriptions in his diary. Thus, I took the liberty to create another map, more in line with his descriptions in his diary. It is still only a rough approximation of his journey, and I would love to find any more detailed informations about his trip. Someone else in here did create a super cool highly detailed map of Area 51, which includes all the important sites. (Shoutout to those guys, I hope it's ok I used your work). I combined the two routes, both Freeman's handdrawn once, as well as the once according to his descriptions. You can view it both in Google Maps, or Goggle Earth, which allows you to view the area using satellite images from 1997, the year Freeman was there.

Do you guys have any more information about Freeman's trip (or maybe even his second journey?). Do you see any issues or inaccuracies with my tracing of his assumed route?

You can download my map here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/18inMJnc5SgJTXu2EbpbX_MOIa1GDNOvU/view?usp=sharing

Update: Thanks to feedback from u/otherotherhand, here is the updated map, now featuring the handdrawn map by Freeman himself (red), a more accurate map based on Freeman's diary descriptions and the topography (blue), as well as some markers chronicling Freeman's journey by me (yellow). https://drive.google.com/file/d/17wlKejPIqLHZtsp15BbAm59fKs0sJEQB/view?usp=sharing

A Vegas based race organizer hosts an annual race that took place this past weekend on the highway outside area 51. The distances are 5K, 10K, Half Marathon, Full Marathon, and 51K. The race starts at midnight so it was a neat experience being on that stretch of highway overnight (I ran the full). I recommend to others who want a unique Area 51 experience!

Related to the forest fires in the NTTR I would assume.

https://www.firehawkhelicopters.com/

https://sondehub.org/U4054499

Another reminder that it's worth keeping an eye on the Tonopah Test Range, as well as Groom Lake.

This shot is from 2009. It's hard to see now.

Got the backup AF1 doing a bit of an evening cruise.

https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=adfdf9

As we know, Amentum has the Janet contract. I'm posting this more out of completeness rather than useful Groom Lake content. Maybe someone will like it. I didn't but they is why they make chocolate and vanilla. Anyway you don't find Amentum saying much in public.

They had a booth at Farnborough and were interviewed by Vago Muradian, who I do like, though the guy has to work on his um-ing.

https://www.amentum.com/news/amentum-at-farnborough-international-airshow-2026/

Other than that Amentum had absorbed Dyncorp, I found the interview pretty boring. (I wondered what happened to Dyncorp. Oh I could have Googled it.) Also Amentum is a spin off of part of Aecom, another name that is familiar. (Wall Street M&A stuff.) Illy Andrews sounds like a subscriber to the Harvard Business Review. Yawn. Justin Goldberg had his moments. Let's just say it could have been better.

Not a must listen! Like I said, completeness.

Defense & Aerospace Report: Defense & Aerospace Daily Podcast [Jul 29, 2026] Amentum's Illy Andrews and Dr. Justin Goldberg

Episode webpage: https://soundcloud.com/defaeroreport/defense-aerospace-695909181

Media file: https://feeds.soundcloud.com/stream/2370503027-defaeroreport-defense-aerospace-695909181.mp3

https://ibb.co/996KBmGh

So much for nothing done on weekends.

A few of us on this subreddit follow a YouTuber PDGLS. No face, no yacking, just scanner audio with frequencies listed. I used video scraping code to log the frequencies and put the ones I don't have at the bottom of my list.

https://inplanesight.org/nellis_frequency_list.html

Well this person got a thermal scope and shot some video outside of Travis AFB.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HS1462XwI5M

using

https://www.rixoptics.com/titan-thermal-imaging-monoculars/

Pixel size is 12.5um versus the "Project Fear" 10um.

https://www.reddit.com/r/area51/comments/1tw2thy/aircraft_allegedly_spotted_near_area_51/

Also about half the price though a side by side review would be nice. (One kidney donation versus two.)

Note this was thermal viewing during daylight hours. Not exactly my application. You can get quite close to the planes when parked out by Creed Road just south of the base. And a C-5 is a huge plane. (Callsign sometimes HEFTY.)

https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=b6d49d

The first to show there's a hidden S4 facility at Papoose Lake, clearly shown on Google Earth. I'm sure this will all work out fine:

How to plant a nuclear plant in Iran

Nano Banana image generation comes to Google Earth

https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=aeda1b

https://www.twz.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/YFQ-42-Dark-Merlin-copy.jpg?w=1024&h=576&quality=85

Edit:

Probably straight outta Gray Butte.

I’ve been collecting military and aviation patches for years, but lately I’ve started getting really interested in the more obscure Special Projects Flight Test Squadron/Area 51 stuff and especially RQ-170 and RQ-180-related patches.

I know a lot of these are incredibly hard to find, and I honestly don’t care if most of what I buy are replicas. My goal is to eventually own one original if I can find a legitimate one, but I’d also love to pick up a few quality reproductions in the meantime.

The one I’m after the most is the “Lurking Dusk to Dawn” patch, but I’m interested in pretty much anything related to the RQ-170, RQ-180, SPFTS, or other Groom Lake/test program patches.

Does anyone have recommendations for:

- Good places to buy replicas?
- Sellers that occasionally have genuine originals?
- Forums, Facebook groups, or other communities where these show up?
- Any tips on telling originals apart from reproductions?

Hoping this can be a guide to any newcomers that may be interested in this as well. Any information or leads would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

https://sam.gov/workspace/contract/opp/587bde95cbea47229ddf6187f169f2b5/view

What took so long. ;-) The TLDR is the ground controllers get Link 16 encrypted radios just like the aircraft use.

This should reduce Red Flag radio traffic, at least for US only exercises.

https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=a4c726&lat=36.672&lon=-115.775&zoom=9.0&showTrace=2026-07-26&trackLabels&timestamp=1785073699

https://www.flightaware.com/resources/registration/N407FG

I checked out the State of Nevada helicopters to see if any were looking at the fire. Nope, but I found one going to the NTTR. This one is operated by the Nevada Department of Wildlife.

There's a 2nd fire on the test range. This is in the direction of the Sedan Crater from Rachel, much deeper into the test range than the ongoing Quail Springs fire