This photo shows the explosives storage area at the south end of the base. There is a new road and a new building in the north-east corner of the storage area. It looks like part of the roof of the new building is still missing.

It has been suggested that the older building at the bottom is the "Line D", or line delivery building. It is used by personnel driving the explosives to the flight line. The new building is likely an assembly, inspection and testing facility. Typically missile and bomb shops are separate buildings, but they may be combined in one building here. Or they only need a test facility for missiles, not bombs (or vice versa). The shops usually have doors on both ends so a "Line D" bobcat can drive in one end with the explosives and leave out the other end. The door on the north end can be seen in our Tikaboo photos from June 2007. The southern door is visible here through the unfinished roof.

The need for the new assembly/inspection building could indicate a new project at Groom that requires testing with live ordinance. This may be a new UCAV design, possibly housed in the new hangar south of the South Ramp. Proximity to the live bombing and gunnery ranges just south and north-west of Area 51 would make this an ideal location for such tests. We have very reliable reports of a new Lockheed UAV/UCAV project being flight-tested in total secrecy in an even more remote location in the Summer of 2007. Around mid-October 2007, the project was suddenly transferred from there to an unknown location. This location may be the new hangar at Groom, where the UCAV is being tested with live ordinance. This would explain the location of the new hangar on the far south end of the base, as close as possible to the ammo dump in this photo. Of course, this is all speculation.

Satellite image taken by the IKONOS-2 satellite on Wednesday, July 18, 2007 at 11.43am PDT. © 2007 GeoEye and Dreamland Resort. Publication outside of the Dreamland Resort web site is strictly prohibited.