Last week, a Facebook event encouraging people to storm Nevada’s Area 51 in order to discover its alien secrets garnered a lot of attention and over one million RSVPs. Organized by alien enthusiasts, the point of the event was apparently to put pressure on the government to stop hiding alien research from the public and finally get the answers everyone has been craving. Unsurprisingly, the Air Force is having none of it.
Photo: Zhi Yang/Shutterstock
Air Force Issues Strict Warning to People Planning to Storm Area 51
The event invited people to “meet up at the Area 51 Alien Center tourist attraction and coordinate our entry. If we naruto run, we can move faster than their bullets. Let’s see them aliens.” To participate in the event, you were asked to show up at the designated meeting spot on Friday, September 20, with the “storming” scheduled to last from 3:00 AM to 6:00 AM.
The Air Force, however, which staffs the area, isn’t taking any chances. A spokeswoman for the Air Force somewhat ominously told The Washington Post that the military is “ready to protect America and its assets. [Area 51] is an open training range for the US Air Force, and we would discourage anyone from trying to come into the area where we train American armed forces.”
The event’s organizer got the message loud and clear. Jackson Barnes, who created the event, wrote on Facebook, “Hello US government, this is a joke, and I do not actually intend to go ahead with this plan. I just thought it would be funny and get me some thumbsy uppies on the internet. I’m not responsible if people decide to actually storm Area 51.”
But then again, he kind of is? Time will tell to see how many people actually try and show up and what consequences they, or the organizer, may face. 
This article was updated on July 16, 2019.
H/T: BBC