the corpsmen prepare to do a full radiation scan as well.”
The last order froze everyone on the bridge in their tracks. The captain was silent for a long moment, then said, “Get to it, gentlemen. Keep your damn eyes open.”
It took less than twenty minutes for the two Air Force jets to fly back to Elliott Air Force Base. The base, ninety miles northwest of Las Vegas, was situated near a dry lake bed named Groom Lake. Anyone who viewed the lake bed—which would have been both difficult and illegal, since the airspace for fifty miles around the base was restricted from ground level to
infinity
—would have seen a roughly five-mile sheet of hard, sunbaked sand. But seconds before the planes touched down, sprinklers popped on and highlighted a long strip of sand-colored concrete in the lake bed. Less than three minutes later Terrill Samson had turned off the runway and the sun evaporated the water. The runway disappeared once again.
Bradley James Elliott Air Force Base was the name of the installation built next to the dry lake. It resembled a cross between a small, old, nearly abandoned air base and a modern industrial development facility. It had some old wooden buildings and many modern concrete buildings. Because it was so far from the nearest town, it had dormitory-style enlisted, officer, and civilian quarters. There were few amenities: a mess hall, only a small shopette instead of a full commissary and exchange, a little-used outdoor pool, and no base theater.
The roads were well maintained and the sidewalks were lined with cactus and Joshua trees. The roads had typical Air Force base names, honoring Air Force legends: military aviation pioneers like Rickenbacker and Mitchell, leaders like Spaatz and LeMay, Air Force Medal of Honor recipients like Loring and Sijan, and air combat aces like Bong and DeBellevue. Other streets had names that most people new at the base might not immediately recognize, like Ormack and Powell—names of dead test pilots who had been assigned to the base. About two thousand men and women worked at the base, typically four days on, three days off. They were either bused in in convoys of air-conditioned Greyhound buses, making the 110-mile drive in under two hours, or flown in on unmarked jet airliners from Nellis Air Force Base north of Las Vegas in a matter of minutes.
The one difference between this base and dozens of other military bases resembling it around the world: Elliott Air Force Base did not appear on any map. There were no signs for it. It was not on any listing of active Air Force bases. No one could ask for an assignment there, and if someone did, he or she would be likely to come under secret investigation as to why the request had been made. Every person assigned there swore an oath never to reveal any details about the baseor its activities. Most people took that oath very, very seriously—not because of the substantial legal penalties, but because they really believed that keeping their activities secret contributed to the strength and security of their homeland. By almost every conventional measure except physical presence, Elliott Air Force Base did not exist.
The base was the home of the High Technology Aerospace Weapons Center, under Terrill Samson’s command. HAWC was officially Detachment One of the Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center headquartered at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Before any new aircraft or air-launched weapon began unclassified operational testing at any of the Air Force’s test facilities prior to full-scale production and deployment, it flew at HAWC first. HAWC’s pilots and engineers worked with aircraft and weapons years before the rest of the world ever saw them, and in many instances worked with weapon systems the world would never see. What would seem like the stuff of science-fiction novels were commonplace devices at HAWC. The secrecy and the weird sightings reported in the deserts of southern Nevada led many
The last order froze everyone on the bridge in their tracks. The captain was silent for a long moment, then said, “Get to it, gentlemen. Keep your damn eyes open.”
It took less than twenty minutes for the two Air Force jets to fly back to Elliott Air Force Base. The base, ninety miles northwest of Las Vegas, was situated near a dry lake bed named Groom Lake. Anyone who viewed the lake bed—which would have been both difficult and illegal, since the airspace for fifty miles around the base was restricted from ground level to
infinity
—would have seen a roughly five-mile sheet of hard, sunbaked sand. But seconds before the planes touched down, sprinklers popped on and highlighted a long strip of sand-colored concrete in the lake bed. Less than three minutes later Terrill Samson had turned off the runway and the sun evaporated the water. The runway disappeared once again.
Bradley James Elliott Air Force Base was the name of the installation built next to the dry lake. It resembled a cross between a small, old, nearly abandoned air base and a modern industrial development facility. It had some old wooden buildings and many modern concrete buildings. Because it was so far from the nearest town, it had dormitory-style enlisted, officer, and civilian quarters. There were few amenities: a mess hall, only a small shopette instead of a full commissary and exchange, a little-used outdoor pool, and no base theater.
The roads were well maintained and the sidewalks were lined with cactus and Joshua trees. The roads had typical Air Force base names, honoring Air Force legends: military aviation pioneers like Rickenbacker and Mitchell, leaders like Spaatz and LeMay, Air Force Medal of Honor recipients like Loring and Sijan, and air combat aces like Bong and DeBellevue. Other streets had names that most people new at the base might not immediately recognize, like Ormack and Powell—names of dead test pilots who had been assigned to the base. About two thousand men and women worked at the base, typically four days on, three days off. They were either bused in in convoys of air-conditioned Greyhound buses, making the 110-mile drive in under two hours, or flown in on unmarked jet airliners from Nellis Air Force Base north of Las Vegas in a matter of minutes.
The one difference between this base and dozens of other military bases resembling it around the world: Elliott Air Force Base did not appear on any map. There were no signs for it. It was not on any listing of active Air Force bases. No one could ask for an assignment there, and if someone did, he or she would be likely to come under secret investigation as to why the request had been made. Every person assigned there swore an oath never to reveal any details about the baseor its activities. Most people took that oath very, very seriously—not because of the substantial legal penalties, but because they really believed that keeping their activities secret contributed to the strength and security of their homeland. By almost every conventional measure except physical presence, Elliott Air Force Base did not exist.
The base was the home of the High Technology Aerospace Weapons Center, under Terrill Samson’s command. HAWC was officially Detachment One of the Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center headquartered at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Before any new aircraft or air-launched weapon began unclassified operational testing at any of the Air Force’s test facilities prior to full-scale production and deployment, it flew at HAWC first. HAWC’s pilots and engineers worked with aircraft and weapons years before the rest of the world ever saw them, and in many instances worked with weapon systems the world would never see. What would seem like the stuff of science-fiction novels were commonplace devices at HAWC. The secrecy and the weird sightings reported in the deserts of southern Nevada led many
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