It would seem like Area 51 still has many secrets to be kept behind locked doors, barbed wire, and guards with rifles, and you would think the security there would be extremely tight, right? Well, a 12-member team filming for a BBC televsion show wondered around ON BASE for almost an hour without being seen or questioned, that is, until they knocked on the window of a room with guards eating dinner and watching tv.
This is the moment a BBC film crew were held by security teams at the notoriously secretive Area 51 – where conspiracy theorists believe the American government is hiding a flying saucer.
Irish comedian Andrew Maxwell and UFO expert Darren Perks sneaked past the border at the site – and were forced to lie on the ground at gunpoint for three hours while the FBI checked their credentials.
It is the same ‘documentary’ team that caused outrage in Britain last week when they suggested that the 7/7 London bombings were part of a government conspiracy to boost support for the Iraq war.
The ‘UFO: Conspiracy Road Trip’ documentary, airing next Monday, will show how the BBC film crew were arrested at gunpoint.
They were forced to lie on the ground for three hours as guards surrounded them armed with M16 assault rifles.
The crew, 12 people in total, were investigating Area 51 in Nevada – where the U.S. military allegedly hold the bodies of aliens and the remnants of ships which crashed in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947.
As they crossed the border, military officers arrested them, confiscating their phones, wallets and identification.
Darren told the Mail Online: ‘Basically the concept of the trip was to tour across California, Arizona and Nevada with comedian presenter Andrew Maxwell and four people who had an interest in the UFO phenomena.
‘We went to Area 51 in Nevada firstly because it’s related to the UFO phenomena and secondly so we could do a night time sky watch to see if we could spot anything unusual.
‘On May 14 we arrived there at approximately 5pm.’
‘We drove to the nearby township of Rachel which is the closet public residency to Area 51 base and drove down a dirt road to the ‘Back Gate’ of Area 51 officially known as ‘Rachel Gate NT TR Boundary North’.
‘We stopped the tour bus approx 50 metres from the restricted area barriers and started to film.
‘There was no one around, no guards, no vehicles – nothing.
‘We filmed for approximately 30 minutes and tried to call the guards but there was no one there and no sign of them.
‘So we all decided to walk past the barriers onto the restricted area past the security huts and basically onto Area 51. Nothing happened….’
He continued: ‘We filmed again for another 30 minutes and even messed around doing a silly dance, but still no guards.
‘Then one of the other stars of the trip pointed out that on looking through one of the security hut windows, she could see the guards all sitting down eating dinner and watching the basketball game on TV. They did nothing.
‘So after a few more minutes and a few more picture taking and filming, one of the crew decided to speak to the guards and knocked on their hut door. All hell broke loose.’
‘The guards rushed out with their weapons and forced us all to lay face down at gunpoint in the tarmac.
‘We were all searched, had our phones, wallets and IDs taken and the film equipment taken. This was at approx 6:15pm.
‘For three hours we lay face down until the Lincoln County Sheriffs arrived on scene.
‘Things then eased off a bit and we were all then taken one by one off the restricted area to the sheriffs who issued us with a ticket and grilled us about what we were doing. We all got fined £375 each.
‘We were told that this incident was so serious that Washington had to call London to advise that 12 ‘Brits’ had just breached security at America’s most top-secret military base and that we all were at one point going to jail for six months.
‘Luckily whoever it was in Washington was kind enough to just fine us.’
