
Storm Area 51: The joke that became a ‘possible humanitarian disaster’ - pseudolus
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49667295
======
perl4ever
If only a few people go, then it isn't a major disaster whatever happens.

If a lot of people go, they will run into difficulty long before they get to
the fence with threatening signs. There isn't remotely the infrastructure to
support people on a large scale. The roads don't exist, the hotels don't
exist, the food and water and gasoline sources don't exist... If a million
people decided to go, that doesn't mean they will get there because they can't
teleport. And they won't all fail at once in the same spot.

I'm from NY, but I've _been_ to Rachel. No gasoline and total hotel capacity
of maybe 15 rooms? I remember seeing a defunct gas station that looked like it
had closed in the 1960s.

~~~
fnord77
> There isn't remotely the infrastructure to support people on a large scale

This hasn't stopped the Burning Man crowd in BRC

~~~
bardworx
But burning man provides the infrastructure. This like burning man but with no
food, water, gas, place to stay, and folks possibly shooting at you...not
exactly a direct comparison.

~~~
bigiain
> This like burning man but with no food, water, gas, place to stay,

so just like Burningman?

> and folks possibly shooting at you

Or Burningman back before '99 when people were still allowed to take firearms?
(Anyone else remember the Drive By Shooting Range? Drums of avgas, stuffed
toys, tracer rounds, and tequila, all from the back of a moving pickup - what
could possibly go wrong?)

~~~
sneak
I still quite wonder how it is constitutional for the BLM to ban firearms
during Burning Man.

~~~
paggle
What part of the Constitution would it violate? Is it unconstitutional to ban
firearms when boarding a flight? When attending a speech by the President of
the United States? When visiting your spouse in jail?

~~~
refurb
All of those examples have passed the scrutiny of the courts. Just banning
firearms in large groups hasn’t.

~~~
paggle
Well the only way to get court scrutiny is to gain standing and sue them.

~~~
refurb
You can infer whether it would pass by past cases.

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schaefer
So, I was traveling in remote Nevada two weeks ago. camping and rock climbing
in the desert.

we took a rest day and went into the nearest medium sized town. i was chatting
with the cashier at a diner... she said some out of towners bought out the
entire town's supply of rat poison. the poison-stockpilers were asked by
another casher what they were going to do with the rat poison, they replied
that they were prepping for the area 51 event.

I very clearly understood that the casher wasn't just telling us a story, she
was warning us of something she herself was deeply uncomfortable.

~~~
noneeeed
Why are they buying rat poison in bulk?

~~~
RandomBacon
Poison the food supply so a number of guards are sick?

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jpindar
>WARNING: At this time we have to warn people against coming to Rachel for the
botched Storm Rachel event next weekend. The organizers are suing each other
and in the meantime nothing is being done to prepare for the event. We expect
riots when those visitors that may show up and paid good money find out that
the reality looks nothing like what they were promised. People will get hurt.
STAY AWAY FROM RACHEL NEXT WEEKEND!

From [http://www.rachel-nevada.com/](http://www.rachel-nevada.com/)

~~~
djsumdog
So .. Fyre Festival?

At least in this situation, they should be able to turn around and drive home.
That is, if the last gas stations to that location don't run out. FEMA should
already have tankers ready to head out there. More than food; having fuel to
make it back to populated areas is probably more important.

~~~
rocqua
If I were FEMA I'd have fuel and water trucks lined up. Moreover, I'd keep
that fact quiet so as not to encourage anyone.

~~~
kenneth
Why is it FEMA's responsibility to help idiots who are doing things they've
been warned not to do that'll probably kill them?

~~~
oh_sigh
Probably because the government thinks you don't deserve to die even if you're
stupid. Just like people who get helped even though they stay in the path of
hurricanes despite evac orders

~~~
hutzlibu
Very noble view of the government .. another view is, the government wants
order, and desperate people tend to do drastic things, which disturbs order.
And with evac orders ... there is also the assumption that not everybody got
the order clearly (or understood it) and you would have upset citiciens who
complain the government let elder people die ..

------
app4soft
> _Unlike most large-scale festivals, these events were not years in the
> making._

According _BBC_ , any open air party first session was ‘possible humanitarian
disaster’.

~~~
mhh__
Are most impromptu festivals held in the middle of nowhere in a desert with no
water?

~~~
coldtea
As if Area 51 is some remote desert area that takes weeks for help to arrive?

There are highways and roads, the desert itself is perfectly drivable with 4WD
vehicles, you can land helicopters, planes, there are cities nearby, people
have mobile phones to call for assistance easily, they would be altogether
anyway, etc...

------
darepublic
It's not a Humanitarian disaster if someone sponsors themselves to travel to
the Nevada desert and take on the US military in response to a Facebook post.
It's Darwinism at work.

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SamReidHughes
There might be a traffic disaster, but if people fuel up and bring a few extra
jugs of water and granola bars on the way in, everything will be fine.

~~~
Sendotsh
Yeah this is being compared to Fyre Festival. The difference is Fyre Festival
was on an island ill-equipped to handle that many stranded people.

This is going to end up more like your typical Internet meetup, just bigger.
Lots of people will roadtrip out there, it'll fizzle out or at least be mildly
entertaining, then drive home. Only problem I foresee really is traffic, but
that's just boredom, not a humanitarian disaster.

~~~
partialrecall
Fyre Festival also involved a significant amount of fraud. I don't think
anybody is fraudulently claiming that Area 51 will offer luxury accommodations
to visitors.

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phjesusthatguy3
If they're going to get themselves killed at Area 51 that means they won't
have much time to play Untitled Goose Game[0].

I mean seriously, if you're going to do something stupid that day, why not
play a video game?

[0][http://goose.game](http://goose.game)

~~~
kylehotchkiss
Best Untitled Goose Game promo I've seen all week!

~~~
phjesusthatguy3
I am _so_ looking forward to this game. I don't even know anything about it,
it just looks so stupid.

------
jpindar
Looks like Alienstock is on. I'm seeing photos on Twitter that show a stage
with bands setting up, a first aid trailer and tent, portapotties, a few
booths selling drinks, souvenirs etc. It's hard to tell how many, but people
are starting to arrive and set up camp.

So the reports that said there was no preparation at all are false, as are the
predictions that no one would show up. Whether there will be a large crowd and
whether they are prepared to handle that is a different matter.

------
nperez
If there's still anything remotely serious that goes on there, they should
just wrap it up. It's been a source of urban legends long enough that its best
role at this point is to be a tourist destination with some cute attractions
and a gift shop.

~~~
tlb
Even if they wrapped up a long time ago, the ground may still be contaminated
with some top-secret (or just nasty) chemicals.

~~~
nperez
I didn't even think of that, but it's a really good point and a likely
scenario.

------
djsumdog
eh ... I bet this is blown way out. I bet less than 1,000 people actually show
up. People should start office pools.

~~~
hutzlibu
Probably, like with most internet events. There are much more people on the
internet who say they are doing things and people who say and actually do
things. (In lots of cases luckily, though)

------
Zenst
Having recently read
[https://kar.kent.ac.uk/14884/](https://kar.kent.ac.uk/14884/) "Western Media
Coverage of Humanitarian Disasters" from 2006, I dare say it has not improved.

------
mises
I think this is going to be like that "unite the right thing", where a bunch
of people talked tough on-line, but couldn't be bothered to get off the couch.
I sincerely doubt this will turn into something serious.

Edit: some one pointed out this was a bad analogy because there was violence.
I was not referring to the one in Charlottesville, VA; but the one the next
year in Washington, D.C. as about twenty-four people showed [0]. I should have
been clearer.

[0]: [https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/gy3kb9/unite-the-right-
ra...](https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/gy3kb9/unite-the-right-rally-dc-
jason-kessler)

~~~
smt88
Unite the Right is a poor analogy for this, since it was a white-supremacist
rally featuring neo-Nazis that included the public murder of a peaceful
protestor. It was "serious" whether well-attended or not.

If someone is shot by a US soldier trying to enter Area 51, it will also be
serious, even if attendance was low.

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Simulacra
My husband and I were thinking of going just to watch the spectacle from a
distance. I’m kind of curious to see who’s going to show up, but have no
desire to get in the mix.

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bigred100
Many times people should just stay home and do their laundry instead of
engaging in these weird adventures, in my opinion

------
sysbin
I know some suicidal people that are thinking it will be fun to go for ending
their life. I doubt most people think about how many vulnerable people are
going to use this event as their exit. Nevertheless they might just all back
out.

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ivymike123
Everybody that hasn't realized that the alien space ship actually existed -
and was prototyped by Skunk Works - should read through the A12 Oxcart
project.

Because the alien space ship sighting was reported exactly when they did the
first radar test (14th Sept 1959) with the shiny silver prototype of it far
out in the desert.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_A-12](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_A-12)

Lockheed engineers on the project were the best ones, I guess. I mean, 60
years later people still believe it was an alien space ship. That's gotta
count for something.

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ryanmarsh
This is not the most popular meme on the internet yet it has been amplified by
large media outlets, why? It's not funny, people have died trespassing on that
base. Forcible unauthorized access of a military installation is taken deadly
seriously. The security force on that base has squeezed (the trigger) on
trespassers. Does anyone realize that the base security force already has
positions for high causality producing weapons (machine guns), and
interlocking fields of fire defined? The stupidity of this astounds me.

Where's the editorial discretion of these news outlets? BBC calling it a
"possible" disaster isn't helpful and doesn't absolve them of their sins.

News flash, foreign governments would love access to a number of US military
facilities. Trespassers won't be dealt with like Portland deals with ANTIFA.

~~~
partialrecall
> _" It's not funny"_

Humor is subjective; a lot of people are laughing.

~~~
ryanmarsh
True, some people find dead people funny.

