Nevada state route 375, dubbed the Extraterrestrial Highway, on the way to Nevada Test and Training Range near Area 51. Photo / AP
Nevada state route 375, dubbed the Extraterrestrial Highway, on the way to Nevada Test and Training Range near Area 51. Photo / AP
Fearing they could be overwhelmed with visitors, officials in the remote Nevada county that's home to the Area 51 military base have drafted an emergency declaration and a plan to team resources with neighbouring counties and the state ahead of events next month tied to the "Storm Area 51" internet drive.
Storm Area 51 is an upcoming event in which thousands of "alien tourists" plan to march on the top-secret military base to "see them aliens" — a reference to the long-held conspiracy theory alien life is hidden there.
The Area 51 Alien Centre in Amargosa Valley, Nevada. Photo / AP
The elected board governing the county with about 5200 residents conditionally approved two events on Monday for tiny desert towns near the once top-secret US Air Force test area known in popular lore as a site for government studies of outer space aliens.
"Oh, we're taking this seriously," Lincoln County Commission chairman Varlin Higbee told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
"With the possibility of 35,000 to 40,000 people showing up, yeah, this is serious."
County officials are concerned that a surge of visitors will crowd campsites, gas stations and public medical, internet and mobile phone services. Officials count just 184 hotel rooms in the county nearly twice the size of Connecticut.
"The cellphone system is going to go down," Mr Higbee said. "You get more than a couple of hundred people there, and it's going to crash. Cell service won't be available."
The Little A'Le'Inn in the community of Rachel, population about 50, is scheduling a three-day music festival on September 20-22 dubbed Alienstock. Hotel co-owner Connie West has said she's expecting 10,000 people.
The Alien Research Centre souvenir shop in Hiko, a town of about 120 a 45-minute drive from Rachel, plans a September 20-21 exposition.
Alien-themed graffiti adorns a rock along the Extraterrestrial Highway, near Rachel, Nevada. Photo / AP
The events evolved from an internet post inviting people to run into the remote test area in the Nevada desert that has long been the focus of UFO conspiracy theories.
County Sheriff Kerry Lee said on Tuesday he was meeting with state emergency planning officials.
County officials have also met with officials from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department in Clark County, the sheriffs of White Pine and Nye counties, and the Nevada Highway Patrol.
Eric Holt, county emergency manager, asked commissioners to "pre-sign" the emergency declaration.
Signs warn about trespassing at an entrance to the Nevada Test and Training Range near Area 51 outside of Rachel, Nevada. Photo / AP
Mr Higbee, who has authority to invoke a declaration, said it would let Lincoln County seek financial help and emergency personnel from the state.
"We don't know where or how far our resources are going to go," he said. "A lot of it is equipment and financing. The county only has so much money to deal with."
Mr Higbee said visitors should not to try to enter Area 51.
"We don't want them going down to government property; it will probably be blocked off," he said.
"We don't want civilian people in contact with the military at all. That will get ugly."
