Area 51 has long been at the centre of conspiracy theories ranging from the storage of alien spacecraft to the use of weather control equipment, but the US government says it is an open training range

11:12, 27 Feb 2025Updated 13:09, 27 Feb 2025

The secrecy surrounding Area 51 has fueled widespread conspiracy theories about its true purpose (file)(Image: Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Three top secret US Air Force jets have been spotted flying in an out of the mysterious Area 51.

The planes - part of the military's top-secret passenger jet Janet fleet - took off from Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas about 18 miles from the base in the Nevada desert.

The fleet flies Department of Defense staff and military personnel to secure spaces that house classified information.

The first plane, labelled Janet 33, left the runway at 7:09am and landed at 7:24am on Wednesday. The next craft, Janet 32, departed from Las Vegas at 9:38am and touched down at 9:56am.

Flight tracking data shows the flight path of the planes(Image: Flight Aware )

The third, Janet 46, took off at 2:11pm and landed 18 minutes later, flight tracking data shows.

Area 51 is located within the US Air Force's Nevada Test and Training Range (NTTR) and has long-been rumored to be home to crashed alien spacecraft and extraterrestrial technologies.

Live flight tracking website FlightAware shows all three jets taking a similar path to Area 51 on Wednesay. Flight tracker ADS-B Exchange captured at least 18 Janet jets flying from Las Vegas to Area 51 since February 20.

The Janet aircrafts transport Department of Defense staff and military personnel to secure spaces that house classified information (file)(Image: NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Janet - said to stand for Joint Air Network for Employee Transportation' or 'Just Another Non-Existent Terminal, or 'Just Another None Existent Terminal' - has a fleet of six Boeing 737 jets.

Area 51 has six runways for the Janet planes to land, including a monster 12,000-foot-long strip that is among the longest in the world.

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The highly classified facility gained notoriety during the Cold War when it was used to test the U-2 spy plane, used for crucial for intelligence gathering against the Soviet Union.

It has six runways for the Janet planes to land, including a monster 12,000-foot-long strip that is among the longest in the world.

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