Las Vegas Review-Journal July 17, 2002
Project cancellation draws speculation
By Keith Rogers
The reason behind last week's abrupt cancellation of a $130 million wind farm project at the Nevada Test Site may go beyond possible radar interference from turbine blades, sources with knowledge of nearby Air Force operations said Tuesday.
A more plausible explanation, they said, would be the disruption of sensitive sound-tracking equipment at the government's secret installation along the dry Groom Lake bed.
For years, the Air Force has tested high-tech aircraft, including radar-evading stealth attack jets, at the base widely known as Area 51. Air Force officials generally keep quiet about base operations. But a former Groom Lake worker and an East Coast defense analyst said special microphones that convert sound waves from aircraft into electric signals could be used to detect low-frequency waves from the turbofan engines that power stealth aircraft such as the F-117A Nighthawk.
At least a decade of research on concealing sound tracks from U.S. military aircraft, as well as work on the detection of sound waves from futuristic foreign stealth jets, could be spoiled if a network of wind-powered turbines was installed at the test site, the former base worker said on the condition of anonymity.
The source said 300 wind turbines on 264-foot towers could affect the calibration of what he described as dish-shaped 'sound trackers,' stationary devices that listen for aircraft engines.
John Pike, director of globalsecurity.org, a defense and intelligence policy organization based near Washington, D.C., agreed that interference with sound tracking tests is one possible reason the Air Force opposed the wind-power project atop Shoshone Mountain, 85 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Pike also said the Air Force's stated reason for rejecting the wind farm -- radar interference caused by turbine blades -- also has some merit.
'The stealth aircraft have been optimized to reduce radar signatures and thermal signatures, and they are certainly not the loudest built,' he said. 'I think they've done more about reducing the radar cross-section than making them quiet.'
In theory, if a number a microphones were positioned at various locations, Pike said, sound waves from stealth engines could be triangulated 'and the airplane wouldn't have to be terribly loud in order for you to detect and track it.'
A radar system works by transmitting and receiving radio waves that are reflected off moving objects. When the radio waves bounce back, radar equipment can determine what direction an object is traveling, its speed and its distance. Sonar is similar in transmitting high-frequency sound waves through water.
In contrast, sound trackers listen for sound waves and follow the source as it moves.
Mike Estrada, a spokesman for Nellis Air Force Range, which flanks three sides of the Nevada Test Site, said radar interference, not effects on sound tracking equipment, was the unclassified reason Air Force officials gave for rejecting the wind-power project. 'But there is a classified document as well,' he noted.
Estrada said Air Force and Pentagon officials had voiced concerns about the wind farm project two years ago, although their formal objection wasn't released until Friday.
Copyright 2002 DR Partners d/b Las Vegas Review-Journal
