Awesome video! But....... that's actually a different rocket testing site, believe it or not. There are two different sites in the same general area - Laborde and Potrero - but they're on opposite sides of Lamb's Canyon (Highway 79) from one another. Through the extensive research I've done on these sites, I've learned that they began as smaller, independent companies from one another, and both were acquired by Lockheed Martin when their parent companies were bought up. Lockheed Martin developed several programs and weapons at the Potrero site, and used the Laborde facility on a smaller scale, mostly for testing. During the late 90s and early 2000s, Lockheed Martin sought government financial aid to clean up the sites and, because of this, there are some pretty cool environmental studies and reports that were done on both sites. These documents can be found online and include maps and other descriptions of the sites and what was done there.
The Laborde facility, which is the one I'm trying to access, is the smaller of the two at about 2000 acres. It sits in the hills north of Gilman Springs Road, East of Jackrabbit Trail, South of Highway 60 and West of Highway 79. The center of the facility is
here, and you can see all kinds of old concrete pads in the area if you scan around on the satellite images. Per the environmental reports and maps, the largest slab (in the northernmost portion of the site) was a rocket assembly factory, and there were several smaller buildings around the site used for various purposes. There were a few tunnels/bunkers for testing rocket engines (most may be gone now), and there is also a massive man-made hill known as "the prism", which was built to test radar systems and was constructed from the tailings of the tunnel/bunker diggings.
The facility shown in this video is the Potrero testing site, which is about 5 times larger than Laborde at about 9500 acres. It's located East of Highway 79, North of Gilman Springs Road, South of the southernmost tip of Highland Springs Ave. and west of Highway 243. It's a HUGE site and had facilities spread all over the place, including underground/hillside bunkers, buildings, factories, living quarters, etc. Nearly all remaining buildings were destroyed in the Esperanza fire during 2007. Because of the size and dispersed nature of the site, it's hard to show on satellite images, but it's roughly centered
here. Because it was used on a much larger scale, there are MANY more "goodies" to explore around there. But unfortunately, the area is all a state wilderness preserve owned by the State of California and controlled by the State Fish and Wildlife Department. As with all wilderness areas, motor vehicles are strictly prohibited and all access roads are closed off with high quality fencing and gates. The Fish and Wildlife game wardens patrol the area regularly, and I've heard of people being arrested or fined for driving within the preserve. It is open to hiking and hunting, but you have to enter on foot. Additionally, Lockheed Martin still owns about 900 acres in the dead center of the preserve. The groundwater within that 900 acres was too contaminated with chemicals and therefore, the state refused to purchase it as part of the rest of the preserve and the EPA required Lockheed Martin to clean up the ground water. Lockheed Martin uses an environment contractor to maintain ground water monitoring and clean-up equipment at the site, most of which is contained within an underground bunker left over from when it was still a rocket testing site. The bunker is heavily secured and has extensive video cameras, and Lockheed Martin uses a national defense contractor to patrol the site and keep trespassers out (that's probably what people are talking about in the comments on the youtube videos where they say they were escorted out by armed guards). There are lots of stories all over the web of people in black SUVs patrolling the site with AR-15s or M-16s (mostly in the late 90s and early 2000s), which of course has led to many conspiracy theories that there is an underground military base and all kinds of other crazy stuff. But, simply put, you're allowed to access all of the site except for the center-most portion, but you have to do it on foot. Lockheed Martin still owns the center-most portion and doesn't let anyone in because they have a very expensive and sensitive groundwater cleanup operation taking place there, but some people have successfully accessed this area and there are some photos around the web.