A solar observatory in New Mexico is evacuated for a week and the FBI is investigating.
SUNSPOT, N.M. — At a small solar observatory tucked away in the woods of a national forest here, scientists and other personnel were commanded last week to leave at once. A week later, the facility remains vacant, and no one is willing to say why.
On Friday, the entrance to the National Solar Observatory was blocked by yellow crime scene tape and two security guards, who said even they had been kept in the dark ... and that only the “director and an assistant” were allowed in. There was no obvious sign of law enforcement activity. “We don’t know anything. We’re just as curious as anyone else,” one guard said.
A spokeswoman for the nonprofit group that runs the facility said the organization was addressing a “security issue,” but offered no additional information ... She said Friday that the facility “will remain closed until further notice.” Neither the FBI — which was spotted on the premises around the time of the evacuation — nor those who worked at the facility would tell local law enforcement what had happened, said Otero County Sheriff Benny House.
House, the sheriff, said that just before 10 a.m. Sept. 6, staffers at the Sunspot facility called to report that they were “evacuating the building” and asked if deputies could assist. He said a sergeant and a deputy were dispatched and told upon arrival that the FBI had been there earlier. But neither staff nor the bureau would explain why the facility had to be vacated, House said.
Unlike some of New Mexico’s other research facilities, the solar observatory in Sunspot is not usually shrouded in such secrecy. The facility — in the Lincoln National Forest in the southern part of the state — is open to the public, and the scientists who work there offer guided tours of the site, said James McAteer, a professor at New Mexico State University and director of the Sunspot Solar Observatory consortium.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/a-solar-observatory-in-new-mexico-is-evacuated-for-a-week-and-the-fbi-is-investigating-no-one-will-say-why/2018/09/14/ea006a96-b78b-11e8-a2c5-3187f427e253_story.html?utm_term=.2df40d44cf3e
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that some nearby civilian residents have been forced out of their homes as well. Very strange, indeed 
but nothing about hazmat, etc.
"underground" if we are days or hours away from the storm? Wouldn't we be warned to prevent panic?
