- A Facebook event focused on storming the infamous Area 51 United States Air Force base started as a joke, but has since taken on a life of its own.
- The event, originally known as "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," has garnered over 2 million "I'm going" responses.
- In the weeks since the page originally appeared, the event has morphed into something entirely different.
- Today is the big day. Here's what the would-be invaders will find when they reach Nevada.
- Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
"We will all meet up at the Area 51 Alien Center tourist attraction and coordinate our entry," it said on the Facebook page. "If we naruto run, we can move faster than their bullets. Lets see them aliens."
In just three short sentences, the Facebook event page originally titled, "Storm Area 51, They Can't Stop All of Us," issued a tongue-in-cheek call to action. Get to this tourist attraction, coordinate entry, and storm Area 51!
The page went from silly goof to viral meme in a shockingly short time, and it's easy to understand why: Aliens are a constant source of cultural interest, and the secretive US Air Force base is notoriously associated with housing secret aliens.
So, are millions of people about to "naruto run" into a US Air Force base in Nevada? The short answer is no, probably not. Here's a look at what they would find if they did:
The Little A'Le'Inn, in Rachel, Nevada, is a tourist-favorite stop near the USAF base known as Area 51. The 25-year-old hotel offers housing, and sells souvenirs — it is "booked solid" for the upcoming event, according to the website.
"MORE CAMPING MAY BECOME AVAILABLE," it says on the website.
The Little A'Le'Inn sits along Nevada's Route 375, known as the "Extraterrestrial Highway"— that's the official name of the route as of 1996, so-named by state legislators.
Not to be outdone by the US government, the Little A'Le'Inn has its own flying saucer for tourists to snap photos with.
Despite Rachel, Nevada's relatively remote location in the desert, the folks at The Little A'Le'Inn are well aware of the upcoming "Storm Area 51" event.
But the Little A'Le'Inn isn't the main attraction for "Storm Area 51" attendees — it's the Area 51 Alien Center tourist attraction where attendees are supposed to assemble before the proposed storming of the base.
The Area 51 Alien Center is a full-service tourist attraction, providing everything from a gift shop to a restaurant to a 24-hour brothel — the Alien Cathouse.
But all of these tourist attractions only serve to distract the event from its mission: To storm the United States Air Force base known as Area 51. That could be tough.
Though the base is known for conspiracy theories about it housing aliens, in reality it's a United States Air Force base that works on "Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information."
As such, it's heavily guarded with perimeter security. Straight up: It would be a very bad idea to "storm" the base given that it's a military facility.
A US Air Force spokesperson told the BBC that the facility, "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 US Air Force always stands ready to protect America and its assets."
Fatal injury aside, the concept of people storming Area 51 has led to some pretty fantastic goofs:
//twitter.com/mims/statuses/1149670302575501314?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
me suiting up to join the area 51 raid to break the transformers out of jail pic.twitter.com/ZJIW6Uu0Fl
//twitter.com/mims/statuses/1149677446972747776?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
How I'm pulling up to Area 51
vs
How I'm leaving Area 51 pic.twitter.com/WLAqAWZK1B
Just like the aliens that supposedly exist within the walls of Area 51, it's entirely likely that the millions of people who signed up to storm the facility won't materialize for the event. But just in case they do, there will be plenty of tchotchkes to buy.
Preliminary reports from Nevada show that some folks have begun arriving in town, and one local news station even caught a person "naruto running" on camera:
//www.youtube.com/embed/RL0P76BULHY
Width: 800px
Height: 450px
But some of those folks are no doubt in town for what quickly turned into a music festival, known as "Alienstock"— it's two festivals, actually.
After the original Facebook event page went viral, and the US government warned potential visitors about the dangers of storming a military base, the event split in two: There are now at least two events known as "Alienstock."
One, in Rachel, Nevada, is a free music festival from the owners of the Little A'Le'Inn.
The other, a Bud Light-sponsored music festival that took place on Thursday night in downtown Las Vegas, was more of a spin on the original theme than anything else. There was an outright split between the folks in Rachel and the event's original planners.
The latter group posted the following statement on its website:
"Due to the lack of infrastructure, planning, and risk management, along with concerns raised for the safety of the expected 10,000+ attendees, we decided to transition Alienstock away from the Rachel festival towards a safer alternative.
We are officially disconnecting from the Little A'LE'INN, Rachel NV, and AlienStock's affiliation with them. We will no longer offer our logo, social media, website or Matty Roberts likeness or scheduled appearance. In short, the relationship has ended permanently.
AlienStock will be moving to a safe, clean secure area in Downtown Las Vegas as an alternative.
We are not interested in, nor will we tolerate any involvement in a FYREFEST 2.0. We foresee a possible humanitarian disaster in the works, and we can't participate in any capacity at this point.
AlienStock is a brand that stands for unity and concern for like minded people. It's grown into much more than a location. It's a phenomenon that can only promise absolute safety and peace, and we need to move the Festival to guarantee that."
Yikes.