On Monday, flight tracking data showed a top-secret U.S. Air Force jet landing at the secretive Area 51 military base in the middle of the Nevada desert. It was the sixth Air Force flight to have landed at the installation within the span of a week.
The jet was part of the U.S. Air Force’s Janet fleet. The acronym stands for Joint Air Network for Employee Transportation or Just Another Non-Existent Terminal.
These aircraft are used for transporting contractor employees, Department of Defense staff, and high-ranking military officials to and from secure facilities such as Area 51 that contain classified information.
Most of the current Janet jets are designed by Boeing and are white with a single red stripe, or “cheatline,” which runs from each aircraft’s nose to tail. Douglas DC-6 airliners have been used in the past, but more recently they have been Boeing Air Force T-43 jets and Boeing 737-200 airliners. Several Beechcraft B200C are also reportedly part of the fleet.
Area 51, part of the U.S. Air Force Nevada Test and Training Range, does not allow commuting by land vehicles.
Something has been happening at Area 51, but we may never know what
According to DailyMail.com, this particular Janet aircraft departed Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas at 8:25 a.m. local time and landed at Area 51 at 8:42 a.m. The jets operate out of a dedicated standalone terminal on the west side of the airport in Las Vegas.
Flight data also shows other Janet flights taking the same path every day last week. They all departed from Las Vegas between 8:25 a.m. and 8:29 a.m. local time. Each flight also took no longer than 20 minutes. Janet flights are operated by a defense contractor for the U.S. Air Force.
Area 51 has six runways, all utilized by the Janet aircraft, which have been in operation since 1972. A Beechcraft 1900C crashed on approach for Tonopah Test Range Airport in 2004, killing the pilot and five passengers. The crash was blamed on the pilot suffering a sudden heart attack.
In October, the U.S. Air Force reported the FBI was investigating multiple objects that were placed for unknown reasons at an aircraft crash site near Area 51. The crash reportedly involved an unidentified aircraft that was assigned to the 432nd Wing.
A little over two weeks ago, a massive fire at the Roswell Air Center in New Mexico occurred just south of Hangar 84 – a site long linked to the infamous 1947 UFO crash.