Deadly force is authorized at this facility!

[EQGuy]

I have done several projects at JPL in Pasadena in the past. When you check in at the main gate guard house there is a sign prominently displayed that states “deadly forced authorized at this facility”! The guards are obviously armed and I can guarantee you that I do not fool around with armed security guards as they generally do not have a sense of humor. Prior to 9/11 we were issued a temporary pass that allowed us to go just about anywhere on the facility. Post 9/11 we had to be escorted everywhere we went even though we were Federal Employees with proper ID’s. Heck we even had Cal Tech ID’s as that is where our local office was located and we still had to be escorted. JPL is run by Cal Tech for NASA. Anyway I just wondering why they needed the sign.

 

[venomballistics]

if you spent any time on facebook .. you'd know just how many are capable of totally missing the obvious.... there's their sign

 

[EQGuy]

if you spent any time on facebook .. you'd know just how many are capable of totally missing the obvious.... there's their sign

Sorry, I am old fashioned and do not do Facebook. I do not have that many friends anyway.

 

[venomballistics]

that's alright. Ive made many mistakes in my life, and facebook might be one of them. Necessary evil given my situation. Its the most practical means of keeping in touch with my family and friends back in WI till they screw it up like every other social networking service has.

 

[A10]

Psyops.....make potential badguys think twice......

 

[mwtdvm]

IIRC ARADCOM Sites in the 70's

Had the same signs and they meant it. Sentry Dogs within the perimeter and these were GSD's that probably went over 100#.
Nike Hercules sites with tac nukes as the warhead. I was escorted and had to check any spark producing devices when you signed in.
Uncle Sam takes his nuclear arsenal very seriously.

 

[Alpo]

In this country, at least, cops aren't supposed to kill you. Cops are supposed to arrest you. You do something wrong, and you get caught, and they arrest you.

The sign is just to let people that KNOW (from years and years of television) that no matter what you do, the worst that will happen is you get arrested, that in HERE, they don't arrest you. They kill you.

 

[FTG-05]

Usually the only thing that warrants the "deadly force authorized" are nuke warhead facilities (Bangor, Nellis north, Kirkland east etc.) or ultra secure areas like Area 51.

Why JPL would have DFA signs is beyond me unless they have nuclear material (i.e. plutonium) for nuclear propulsion engines for some of their spacecraft.

 

[LVSteve]

It sounds like JPL are finally operating their security properly. If you are not in the fold for the hairy stuff, you are treated with as a visitor, regardless of who you are or how long you have worked for the government. This is not just a 9/11 thing. I believe the security debacle at Los Alamos has had an even greater effect.

Having a Facebook account can be a proper PITA if you want to work anywhere like JPL. I know some folk who work at Nellis and they said reporting on me as a foreign national was easy. Having to cough up details on extended family they might have contacted once on Facebook was not so painless. If that family member was overseas, the scale went into the agony range really quickly.

 

[feralmerril]

I done a little over 35 years as a lockheed guard. I was lucky in never being laid off. In that field a lot of guards floated around. I belive as far as california defense jobs I knew guys that had worked all of the plants you can name includeing JPL. When I started out in 1965 the majority of the guards were retired LEO or military. It cost`s a company plenty to get the required clearances. If contracts were cut back and a guard got laid off it was pretty easy to get hired in somewhere else as that company could save on getting you fully cleared again. Kinda like picking grapes. You could be sure if we got a new hire that some of our guys had worked with him elsewhere and we had the word on him. Also some of us seemed to come from working various movie studios too.

 

[EQGuy]

Had the same signs and they meant it. Sentry Dogs within the perimeter and these were GSD's that probably went over 100#.
Nike Hercules sites with tac nukes as the warhead. I was escorted and had to check any spark producing devices when you signed in.
Uncle Sam takes his nuclear arsenal very seriously.

This brings back memories that I had forgotten about. Back in 1973 when I was new on the job I was sent to the Milagra Ridge Nike site near Pacifica. We had a radio receiver site for a seismograph we had on the Farallon Islands there. Being the new guy on the job I was told that I did not need to check in at the facility, to just drive to the telephone pole where we had our radio and change the battery. When I arrived I looked down the hill to the Nike site and the missiles were above ground. I looked again just a few moments later and they were gone. I guess they can really move those things. Anyway I also noticed they had dogs patrolling the inner fence perimeter. In another couple of minutes a Pacifica patrol car showed up with two officers and they asked me who I was and what I was doing there. After I explained what I was doing they chuckled and told me that I was lucky they did not release the dogs on me. After that every time I had to work there I always checked in with base operations.

Many years later I was at the San Leandro Hills Nike site which was a county park then. I noticed that they had painted o the concrete in big yellow letters the following; FLASH TO BANG DUCK AND COVER. I sure am glad it never came to that.

 

[EQGuy]

Feralmerril, do you recall if there were similar signs posted at Lockheed while you were working there?

 

[Straightshooter2]

I remember when we would hang "crowd pleasers" on the wings of A-7's during drills. I never really wanted to find out if those M-16s the Marines carried were locked and loaded but you can bet deadly force was authorized. There is just something spooky about handling a nuclear bomb at 3am just 20 feet from the edge of the flight deck and all you can see beyond that edge is a big black nothing. All the while a Marine is watching you with a look on his face that says please give me a reason to shoot you.

CW

 

[ThirtyAcres]

I was a government contractor from 1982 to 2007.

On a couple of occasions I visited the Pine Bluff Arsenal / National Center for Toxicological Research in Pine Bluff , Arkansas.

You started seeing DFA signs not far from the gate. When you got out close to the igloos where they stored the chemical / biological agents the signs became more threatening.

I cannot remember the exact wording but it was basically ..... unescorted people are subject to being shot on sight.

One thing I do remember vividly is in one of the buildings they had row upon row of chimps / monkeys in small cages. I know they served a purpose, but it made me sad to look them in the eyes.

 

[feralmerril]

EQ, no, I never seen signs at lockheed saying you could be shot. When we were briefed on certain projects they would try to put the fear of God in us. I have been around a lot of stuff I still cant talk about per threat of jail. Really, its probley stuff that has been declassified for many years but we never get released from haveing to keep our mouths shut. Something might show up in magazines that we knew about for ten years or more that was released by high powers like Mc namara, yet I dont recall even once any security agent ever saying we were good to talk now. We were told to plead ignorance even when the world knew otherwise.
I have been thrown down on several times by military security until we could get things sorted out when I was on several plaincloths details. Sometimes we would be "tried out" by different agencys. I remember one guy jumping me in the dark and saying he had a gun on me. He was damn lucky I wasnt armed as usualy we always were but I was working on a military base in plain cloths.
By my choice I worked about 32 out of 35 on graveyard. It paid the most, was more laid back and cooler. Working graveyard was a entirely different job than dayshift. Usualy dayshift guards were mostly tied to a gate. On graveyard you prowl most the night like ghost. It wasnt a normal life.

 

[jimmyj]

A U.S.Marine with a rifle--No better security!
Would they use "Deadly Force"? Know anyone above ground that violated the Marine's post?

 

[NYlakesider]

A couple of decades ago due to my work I had clearances to get into nuclear facilities. Even back then you were investigated back as far as your great grandparents. Just getting into the outside gated area parking lot was interesting but after you entered into some plants the security was intense. I realize what I experienced by now has increased at least ten-fold.

Back then they carried some revolvers and were moving into the Beretta for short guns. They also carried M16s and had a few more goodies available for special occasions. One of the guards there was a good friend and shooting buddy at my gun club. He told me of the intensive constant practice they were always doing and also the physiological training they went under in order to enforce compliance in the “Deadly Force Authorized” in that plant. No doubt in my mind a stupid or criminal move would put you in serious jeopardy.

 

[Frank237]

Several years back on a bike ride through Nevada I took a short ride from Rachell over to the "black mailbox". Turn south at the mailbox onto a dirt road and in a few miles theres one of the gates into Area 51.

They had the same red/white "Use of DEADLY FORCE Authorized" signs at that gate. As well as Guards with MP-5's!
I approached very slowly...stopped maybe 50 yds from the gate and used a VERY well worn U Turn lane and back I went.

MY only "Come close, and we Kill you", sign story.

FN in MT

 

[BearBio]

Slightly off topic but when I became a Federal supervisor, I had my security level raised and that required a new background check. An NSA investigator came in and interviewed me. As he was leaving he said" I almost forgot. Are you now or have you ever been a member of any organization that advocates the violent overthrow of the government?"

I answered " I am a Freemason. A few of us had a disagreement with King George a couple of hundred years ago!"

He was still chuckling as he went down the hall from my office.

 

[GatorFarmer]

You can be shot whether the sign is up or not. Oh there are probably a more open set of ROE but the guards here would shoot if you tried to run the gate or some such. The National Defense Act of 1947 authorizes such. The signs are just sort of a courtesy reminder.

That reminds me... I need to send all those GPS coordinates to my new pen pal Achmed. He sure is interested in geography.

Back in the early/ mid 90s you could flash photocopied credentials and walk into the Pentagon armed. There was a minor scandal when the GAO reported on it.

As an aside... at the coffee/snack bar in the FBI HQ at Quantico.... theu have to keep the Powerbars and what not locked up. Otherwise people steal them. Reassuring is it not?