FC: Astronomers take over abandoned NSA base, from Baltimore Sun

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

[This is one of the most remarkable newspaper articles I've read in a 
while. Some photos are at http://www.pari.edu/ToursHistory.htm --Declan]


http://www.sunspot.net/content/cover/story?section=cover&pagename=story&storyid=1150520223288

   NSA abandons wondrous stuff
   Surprises: Astronomers who took over an abandoned spy base find
   remarkable, expensive and often incomprehensible stuff at every turn.
     _________________________________________________________________

   By Laura Sullivan
   Sun National Staff
   Originally published Jan 5 2001

   TRANSYLVANIA COUNTY, N.C. - Along the long, twisting road through the
   Pisgah National Forest, the first sign that something is out of the
   ordinary is a line of giant transformers. Then, around the bend, a
   barbed-wire fence, guard shack and surveillance cameras protect what
   looks like nothing more than another hill of trees and dense
   shrubbery.

   It is anything but.

   This is the entrance to one of the National Security Agency's former
   spy stations, a place shrouded in secrets and denials, the source of
   local lore that seems right out of "X-Files."

   What is inside that giant geodesic dome that looks like a golf ball?
   Where do the tunnels snaking beneath the 202-acre site lead? Why are
   the rugs welded to the floors of the windowless buildings?

   Few people have been beyond these gates, deep inside the Appalachian
   Mountains, 50 miles southwest of Asheville.

   The NSA abandoned the site to the U.S. Forest Service five years ago,
   leaving behind a deserted minicity in the middle of nowhere. Now, some
   of the secrets are being revealed.

   Last year, with the base boarded up and close to demolition, the
   property was transferred to a group of astronomers in exchange for a
   piece of land in western North Carolina. Over the past year, they have
   begun piecing together the site's past.

   "There are things on this site you will never see anywhere else," said
   site manager Jim Powers. "I've never had someone come here that wasn't
   blown away."

   The astronomers, who formed the Pisgah Astronomical Research
   Institute, were attracted by two 85-foot satellites dishes on the site
   - some of the largest in the country - which could be repositioned to
   catch deep-space radio signals and allow them to study the life and
   death of stars.

   When the group arrived in January 1999, they expected a basic, albeit
   large, government facility, but as the weeks passed they realized
   little about the site was what it appeared.

   As they began to install their computers, they found hundreds of miles
   of top-of-the-line cabling running under every floor. They discovered
   that the self-contained water and sewer treatment plant could handle
   tens of thousands of gallons of water at a time and the generator
   could produce 235 kilowatts of energy - powerful enough to light up a
   small city.

   In a basement room of one of the larger buildings, they found the
   entrance to a 1,200-foot tunnel system that connects two of the site's
   main buildings.

   Every inch of floor in more than four buildings was covered with
   two-by-two-foot squares of bleak brown carpet. When the astronomers
   tried to replace it, they discovered it was welded with tiny metal
   fibers to the floor. The result, they eventually realized, is that the
   rugs prevent the buildings from conducting static electricity.

   [...]




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