The High-Frequency Active Aurora Program (HAARP), or Project HARP, was established covertly at military facilities in Gakona, Alaska, by BEAT Advanced Technologies for Radio Communications and Envelopment Analysis Surveillance Ionosphere "ionosphere" and research the possibility of developing and promoting ionosphere technology.

ionosphere layer

The ionosphere is a sublayer of the Earth's atmosphere, located between the mesosphere and the thermosphere and the outer atmosphere. It is characterized by its ionization affected by solar and cosmic radiation. It extends at a height of up to a thousand kilometers above the Earth's surface. Compared to the size of our planet, the ionosphere is very small.

The phenomenon of the aurora borealis is formed in this layer as a result of an electrical chemical interaction between the Earth's magnetic field and the solar wind, and the high energy of the sun and cosmic rays affect the atoms in the ionosphere layer, where they remove one or more electrons from them, which makes them "ionize", that is, they become positively charged (electrolyte). ).

Ionized electrons behave as free particles, and are constantly affected by the continuous flow of ultraviolet rays and plasma from the sun in addition to X-rays, and during the night the ionosphere is less affected by cosmic rays such as rotating neutron stars, supernovae, galaxies, etc., which facilitates the process of detecting the effects of this layer for easy observation .

The importance of the ionosphere layer is that it affects the extent of radio spread and its reach to distant areas, as well as the transmission of signals between satellites and the Earth.

On the other hand, this layer represents the protective wall of the planet from meteorites and others. Anything that passes through it will be dismantled and burned due to its high temperatures, and it is the dividing line between space and the atmosphere in which we can live.

The "Fugitive" project was established by the US Air Force and Navy in 1993 and was later handed over to the University of Alaska (Getty Images)

Origin and establishment

The initial idea of ​​the project goes back to the American physicist Nicholas Tesla (1856-1943), who crystallized in 1891 the first foundations of the scientific theory on which the project was built, and after about a century, work on it officially began in 1993 and ended in 2007, and it was built on a site belonging to the Air Force. USA, funded by the US Air Force, US Navy, Alaska State University and DARPA.

BAAT Advanced Technologies is the prime contractor for this project, and several universities including Stanford, Cornell, Massachusetts, California, MIT, Dartmouth, Clemson, and Universities have also contributed to the project. Pennsylvania, Tulia, and Maryland.

The US Air Force announced the closure of the project in 2015, stopping its experiments and activities, and handing it over to the University of Alaska Fairbanks. The project became a scientific research facility for students at the university, and is used for research, development, and exploration of ionosphere phenomena.

The most capable and advanced in the world

The University of Alaska defines "Harp" as a high-power and frequency transmitter, and it is the most capable and advanced in the world to study the ionosphere layer. It does not work all the time, but only several times a year for a period of one to two weeks. In 2022, the project operated only 4 times.

The project includes advanced facilities, including an operations center of approximately 22,000 square feet, a maintenance and storage building of 2,400 square feet, a 12-megawatt power station, 8 scientific platforms, and 10 semi-transportable shelters in the Arctic.

180 antennas were built, distributed over an area of ​​14 hectares, and they emit high-frequency radio waves that cause the waves in the ionosphere, which extends from 50 to 400 km, to be reflected in the Earth's ionosphere.


One of the main tools on which the program relies is a high-power, high-frequency radio transmitter known as the IRI Ionosphere Research Instrument, as well as optical and infrared spectrometers and cameras that are used to monitor natural variations of the ionosphere, as well as to detect artificial forcings. It is produced by the IRI device.

Other tools are used to measure and study the geophysical processes that occur in that specific area, including the very low frequency (ELF) tool, the ultra-high frequency (VLF) radar, the magnetometer, and the magnetic extrapolation device.

The university is working on a plan to complete an ultra-high frequency radar in order to measure electron densities, temperatures, ions and Doppler velocities in the stimulated region and in the natural ionosphere using incoherent scattering techniques.

How does the "Fugitive" project work?

The station relies in its mechanism of operation on the Ionospheric Research Instrument "IRI", which is responsible for transmitting high-power radio frequencies (HF), which is used to activate and heat a specific region of the ionosphere for a period of time.

Amplifiers send frequencies between 2 to 2.5 gigahertz, and launch a wave packet of up to 500 megawatts through antennas that send equal frequencies in all directions.

The frequencies do not penetrate the ionosphere, but are reflected towards the earth, and may result in a rise in the temperature of the region only, so it was previously used for “beyond the horizon wireless” communications, which were used before the discovery of satellites, and provided long-range communication between countries and continents.

This feature depends on the density of ions in the "ionosphere" layer and its positive polar ionization, which varies according to the succession of night, day, summer and winter, because it affects the frequency that must be used.

The phenomenon of the aurora borealis on the Reykjanes Peninsula, Iceland (Getty Images)

The uses and scope of the "Fugitive" project

The University of Alaska states that the project is used to monitor the processes resulting from the use of the IRI device under the control of scientists in order to better understand the processes that continuously occur after the layer is exposed to sunlight.

Also characterizing the ionosphere using satellite signals and telescopic observations of the fine structure of the aurora borealis, and documenting long-term changes in the ozone layer.

In the field of research studies, it is used in plasma physics, radio sciences, diagnosis of the "mesosphere" (thermal atmosphere) and also "space weather", which is concerned with the study of changing temporal conditions within the solar system, including the solar wind.

It is also used to study Arctic marine domain awareness, magnetospheric-radiobelt studies, "physics under the aurora", plasma channel generation, extremely low frequency (ELF) propagation, ground cavity detection, trans-horizon radar, ionospheric and atmospheric conditions.

The importance of the project

The ionosphere can affect, reflect and absorb radio signals, and thus can affect many civilian and military communications, navigation, surveillance and remote sensing systems in a variety of ways.

For example, radio broadcasts that can only be heard during the day can be heard at a distance of a few tens of miles from the station, while at night (sometimes) they can be heard hundreds of miles away, due to changes in the signals coming from satellites in the "ionosphere" layer. by natural changes.

Or even the broadcast signals may overlap between the stations, which creates interference so that one radio broadcast is heard on other radio frequencies.

For this purpose, the "HARP" project is trying to understand the natural or even industrial changes that occur in the "ionosphere", which contributes to the development of communications, broadcasting, and others.


Conspiracy theory about Project "Fugitive"

Because of the great secrecy that surrounded this project and the relationship of the US Army with it since its inception, many rumors and rumors circulate around it that relate it to catastrophic events that have occurred or may occur, such as the possibility of reversing the Earth's poles and controlling the weather and climate.

It was also rumored that it is part of the secret electronic weapons of the US army, and there were rumors of its ability to control human brains, and that it was the reason behind the large earthquakes that caused the earthquake in southern Turkey and Syria, which occurred on February 6, 2023.

Those in charge of the project deny that it caused any environmental or health damage, and also deny the theories that link it to fabricating natural phenomena such as earthquakes and others, and confirm the impact of its devices in the area in which it works only, and explain that the reason for its relationship with the US army is that the land on which the project works is still owned by the Air Force. American.

The HARP project confirms that an environmental impact study was conducted in 1992 and 1993 in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act, and that the documents are open to the public.

Because of the continuous heating of the "ionosphere", there are still concerns about the possibility of a long-term impact on the ionosphere.

The University of Alaska says that the envelope will not be affected, because it is by nature a turbulent medium that is moved and renewed by the sun, so the artificially created effects are quickly erased, and depending on the height within the ionosphere where the effect originally occurs, these effects can no longer be detected after times ranging from Less than a second and 10 minutes.

The Harp project is likened to a large radio broadcasting station, which is not even capable of creating artificial auroras, because the energy generated by the project is much weaker than the natural energy generated.