Patrick Shank | My Father Was an Area 51 Engineer | Part 1 of 2

My name is Patrick Shank. My father, Ray Shank, was an electrical design engineer. He was in radio first (military and commercial), while he attended school for electrical design. After college, he was recruited to go to Libya. During his career he worked on a number of SAP (special access programs), SR-71, Nike Missiles, Titan 1, Titan 2 missiles, Mercury, Gemini and Apollo Missions, Tomahawk Cruise Missiles.

Partial llist of some contractors he worked for:

Hycon Page - 1950s

Bell Labs - 1950s

Lockheed - Late 1950s

NASA - 1960s and 1970s

Aramco - 1970s

NASA (second Time) - 1980s

Martin Marietta - 1980s

McDonnell Douglas - 1990s (Retired)

1950s - He designed and built a radio listing station in Libya - for Hycon Page which later ended up being used to help the Israelis in two wars. Later he was told to leave by the Gaddafi regime. My father, wife and my sister had 24 hours to leave. But this put him in a good position with the Department of Defense, which offered him a world of possibilities.

After Libya he went to work at White Sands Missile range (Nike Missile). Shortly after, he was relocated to the Ranch also known as Area 51 (Lockheed) to work on electrical design for the SR-71 project.

1960s, 1970s - Space Race, working on Titan landed him at NASA for Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs.

1970s after Apollo, he went on a brief hiatus and then went to Saudi Arabia. In 1977 and 78 he helped Bin Laden Construction, (ARAMCO) build commutation systems and radar.

1980s - Went back to NASA to work in the Space Shuttle program, but was laid off after budget cuts. He then went to Martin Marietta to work on missile design.

1990s - He was hired by McDonnell Douglas to work on the Tacit Rainbow Project (Tomahawk Cruise Missile).

We also discussed:

Fathers Early Life - how it all got started

Our family

Me - growing up with all of this happening in front of me.

He also told me about:

Secret Space Program

UFOs over missile sites

UFOs during space race

Strange things on the moon

Neil Armstrong and what happed to him on the moon.

UFO crash in Florida swamp

DOD Security sweeps at our house

His regrets of the things he worked on.


Some photographs:

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Right before he went to Lybia.

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My father, his first wife, and my sister Cheryl. Notice jaciet and patch.

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