I read somewhere that the Air Force put out the 'aliens' story as a coverup for the fatal crash of an experimental, secret plane there. In an era when claimed flying saucers sightings were often in the news.
More relevant to today's news - the true story of a German family who all died of exposure in a remote area near Death Valley. The had a map showing a vast bombing test range as a 'military base'. (China Lake). It was assumed that when their car broke down miles from help, they walked there expecting help from perimeter guards like at a European military base. Instead they found nothing but vast open desert, not even monuments to mark the base border. A determined search-n rescue guy went in years later looking for evidence of what happened and
wrote an interesting account of it.
Hope these present idiots don't try sneaking in some back way just to end up like that! It sounds like some of them are flat-earth type personalities and could be stupid enough to try that. In July. In the desert. With the same result.