Sitting just about 83-miles outside the bustling city of Las Vegas, Nevada, lies the Mojave Desert. Las Vegas, or often known simply as Vegas, is the 28th most populated city in the United States and the most populated city in the state of Nevada. While most visitors to this city get lost in the lights, casinos, and famous Las Vegas strip, there is a sequestered area that lies outside of the hustle and bustle of Las Vegas. 

We have all seen in the news about the “Area 51 Raid.” Area 51 is the common name of a highly classified United States Airforce facility located within the Nevada Test and Training Range. The facility is officially called Homey Airport or Groom Lake, named after the salt flat situated next to its airfield. Located almost three hours north of Las Vegas, the Area 51 facility is considered to be one of the most heavily-guarded federal government property in the United States. 

Earlier this summer, a new Facebook group was created called “Storm Area 51: They Can’t Stop Us All.” This group started out as a joke and then very quickly went almost instantly viral. The intended purpose of this Facebook group was to get “alien enthusiasts” to storm the Area 51 facility in the dead of night in the early morning hours of September 20th and 21st, 2019. More than two million people has RSVP’d to the event. Numerous memes about storming Area 51 had instantly spread throughout Facebook and then spread to other social media platforms including Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and Discord. People joked about how they intended to “see them aliens.” The town of Rachel, Nevada, which is near-ish to Area 51, but about 45-miles from the nearest gas station, braced for visitors. 

It was not totally clear how much this Facebook group thing was a joke or whether it was serious–an Internet meme that got stuck somewhere in the delicate membrane that separates the online world, with its anime-inspired advice for how to sprint in a way that helps you dodge bullets (head forward, arms pointed straight back, it’s called “Naruto running”), and real life, where Area 51 is guarded by armed military officers who probably could stop as many people as they wanted to.

Who were these people and why did they come to this Facebook group? Some came for the memes while others came because they love and have an interest in the paranormal or they were bored. Some even had intentions to sell stuff or some combination of these reasons. Many jokes came up from this idea of storming Area 51. Over time, the memes, jokes, and Facebook group had seemed to die down in activity. As the storm date of September 20th grew near, many people who followed the event wondered if people were actually crazy enough to storm Area 51. On the morning of the storm date, crazy-enough people actually did show up to the testing facility. At least 2,000 people showed up for the gathering and prepared to “storm Area 51.” The visitors had come to test the boundaries. 

While being a very secretive U.S. military base, Area 51 is best known among conspiracy theorists and in popular culture as the place where the U.S. government has stashed alien spacecraft. (The Pentagon has acknowledged funding UFO research in general, but the U.S. government has said that Area 51 was a secret 

While this whole “Storm Area 51: They Can’t Stop Us All” joke came into play, it was unclear about the intentions for storming this U.S. military base. While adventure seekers went to the grounds of Area 51, others stayed behind and watched it all uncover on the news. Area 51 is definitely a strange place with strange activities occurring.