The UFO Report

AVON BOOKS-1 . -USS439

AN IN-DEPTH, AUTHORITATIVE

AND ASTONISHING UPDATE
ON THE MOST RECENT
SIGHTINGS AND CLOSEST
ENCOUNTERS WITH
EXTRATERRESTRIAL .
PHENOMENA

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PORT

EDITED BY

TIMQTHY

GOOD

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7

A

Subject: Unexplained Lights

Later in the night a red sunlike light was seen
through the trees. It moved about and pulsed. At
one point it appeared to throw off glowing particles
and then broke into five separate white objects and
then disappeared. Immediately thereafter, three
starlike objects were noticed in the sky, two objects
to the north and one to the south, all of which
were about 10° off the horizon. The objects moved
rapidly in sharp angular movements and displayed
red, green and blue lights. The objects to the north
appeared to be elliptical through an 8-12 power
lens. Then they turned to full circles. The objects
to the north remained in the sky for an hour or
more. The object to the south was visible for two
or three hours and beamed down a stream of light
from time to time. Numerous individuals, including
the undersigned, witnessed the activities.

—from an official memorandum
written by Charles I. Halt, Lt. Col., USAF
to the British Ministry of Defense
January 13, 1981

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by Whitley Strieber

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in U.S. History

by Ed Walters and Frances Walters

Phenomenon:

Forty Years of Flying Saucers

edited by John Spencer and Hilary Evans

Report on Communion

by Ed Conroy

Transformation

by Whitley Strieber

UFO Crash at Roswell

by Kevin D. Randle and Donald R. Schmitt

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THE

REPORT

EDITED BY

TIMOTHY

GOOD

AVON BOOKS d NEW YORK

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Copyright © 1989 by Timothy Good

Cover photograph by Daniel Fry

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Contents

Editor’s Foreword vii

1 A British Perspective 1988 1

GRAHAM AND MARK BIRDSALL

2 UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 35

RALPH NOYES

3 The English Com Circles in 1988 59

GEORGE WINGFIELD

4 So You Want to Be a Ufologist? 96

PATRICIA GRANT

5 Testimony from Africa 105

CYNTHIA HIND

6 The Soviet Scene 1988 121

NIKOLAI LEBEDEV

7 UFOs in China 1987-88 132

PAUL DONG

8 UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 145

PAUL NORMAN

9 UFO Crash/Retrievals: Is the Cover-Up Lifting? 169

LEONARD STRINGFIELD

10 The Gulf Breeze (Florida) UFO Encounters 196

DONALD WARE

THE UFO REPORT

vi

Appendix

Some Major UFO Organizations 223

The Crop Circles 224

Some UFO Journals 225

Bibliography 226

Services 228

Index 231

Editor’s Foreword

“Whatever anyone will say, both my son and I will never
forget the 19th November, 1987,” wrote Mrs. Barbara
Forrest, in a letter to me describing a sighting at Brierley
Hill, West Midlands, on that evening. “The craft came so
very low, to enable us to have a very close look. It was
massive, wonderful, and frightening.”

Mrs. Forrest and her son were just two of hundreds of
witnesses who reported UFOs during the latter half of
1987, when a massive wave of sightings proliferated
throughout the U.K. and in many other countries; a wave
which was to continue unabated in 1988.

With a few exceptions (such as the Nullarbor case, de¬
scribed in Chapter 8) the national media continue to ig¬
nore these important events, or to pour scorn on the
subject. “Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,” began
Michael Thompson-Noel in a lengthy article for the Fi¬
nancial Times in June 1988, “believe it or not but the
modem religion of Ufology today enters its 42nd year. . . .
It is a religion of the space age that offers us heavenly
lights, god-like aliens and flying green jellies.” Ufology,
said Mr. Thompson-Noel, is based on “a rubbish-
mountain of non-evidence.” 1

Since Above Top Secret was published in June 1987, my
travels have taken me to Australia, Brazil, Canada, the
U.S.A., and the U.S.S.R. I have found encouraging signs
that not all journalists share Mr. Thompson-Noel’s view.
And in the Soviet Union, I had the opportunity of express¬
ing my own views in an interview for Leningrad TV’s
Open Door program in January 1989. That would have
been inconceivable only a few years ago.

On October 14, 1988 a two-hour TV documentary, UFO

vii

viii THE UFO REPORT

Cover Up? Live, was shown in the U.S.A., Canada, Aus¬
tralia, and New Zealand. The program included live par¬
ticipation from Washington DC, Gulf Breeze, Florida, and
Moscow. A telephone poll conducted during and after the
program revealed that 30,835 people had experienced a
Close Encounter of the First Kind (CEI—UFO seen within
500 ft); 2,482 reported a CEII (involving physical evi¬
dence); 1,477 a CEIII (alien occupants seen); and an
astonishing 2,969 witnesses who claimed to have been ab¬
ducted by aliens (CEIV). 2

On the program, Paul Shartle, former security man¬
ager and chief of requirement for the audio-visual pro¬
gram at Norton Air Force Base, California, revealed the
existence of an official film taken at Holloman AFB, New
Mexico, which allegedly shows a UFO landing and the
occupants communicating with various personnel at the
base. Interviewed with Shartle was the TV producer Rob¬
ert Emenegger, who obtained the film via the Pentagon in
the early 1970s when he was in the process of making a
documentary on the subject. He had hoped to include the
film in his documentary, but permission was suddenly
withdrawn.

Two alleged U.S. Government intelligence agents,
“Condor” and “Falcon,” appeared on the documentary,
with their faces blacked out and voices electronically mod¬
ulated. They confirmed the existence of the so-called
“Majestic-12” committee, established under President
Truman in 1947, following the retrieval of an alien space¬
craft and its dead occupants in the New Mexican desert
(details of which were first published in Above Top Secret).
They further revealed that there had been actual commu¬
nication with a number of extraterrestrials.

All this could be disinformation, of course. And the
obtrusive synthesized background music that pervaded the
entire documentary did little to enhance the agents’ cred¬
ibility. Nonetheless, I have been informed that their cre¬
dentials, at least, are bona fide.

Many people have written to ask me if the Majestic-12
briefing document, prepared for President-elect Eisen¬
hower by former CIA director Vice-Admiral Roscoe Hil-
lenkoetter in November 1952, reproduced for the first time

Editor’s Foreword ix

in Above Top Secret, is authentic. The document (which I
obtained from a CIA source) received world-wide public¬
ity in 1987, and lengthy, articles appeared in such news¬
papers as the Observer and the New York Times. The
document’s authenticity has been questioned by the Dwight
D. Eisenhower Library, the Harry S Truman Library, and
the National Archives, but a great deal of information has
now surfaced which tends to indicate that it is genuine.

A 1954 top secret memorandum from presidential as¬
sistant Robert Cutler to the then Air Force Chief of Staff,
General Nathan Twining, makes reference to the “MJ-12
Special Studies Project” in connection with a meeting at
the White House on July 16 that year. The memorandum
was located in the files of USAF Intelligence at the Na¬
tional Archives, and there is every indication that it is
genuine.

Dr. Roger Wescott, Professor of Anthropology and Lin¬
guistics at Drew University, Madison, New Jersey, has
compared the writing style on the Eisenhower briefing pa¬
per with known-to-be-authentic examples of Hillenkoet-
ter’s writings. In April 1988 he stated as follows: “. . .In
my opinion, there is no compelling reason to regard any
of these communications as fraudulent or to believe that
any of them were written by anyone other than Hillen-
koetler himself.” 3

This does not, of course, prove that the document is
legitimate. Further research is currently being done by
Jaime Shandera, William Moore, and Stanton Friedman,
and $16,000 has been appropriated by the Fund for UFO
Research so that Friedman can devote several months to
the project. At the time of writing, there are some posi¬
tively encouraging developments.

Sightings by civil and military pilots continue to impress
me. In Chapter 5, Cynthia Hind gives us details of a UFO
report made by the crew and passengers aboard a Mo¬
zambique Airlines (LAM) plane, as well as air traffic con¬
trollers, at Beira, on February 11, 1988.

Two days earlier, on February 9, an unidentified object
was observed over Medellin airport in Bogota, Columbia,
by several pilots and air traffic controllers. The crews of

X

THE UFO REPORT

five different aircraft, including a military plane carrying
Army chief General Oscar Botero, reported seeing the ob¬
ject, which remained in the area for half an hour. At one
stage, the international Jose Maria Cordova airport control
tower actually gave landing instructions to the UFO, be¬
lieving it to be a private plane. The crew of an Avianca
Boeing 727 radioed the control tower that the object was
following them, and the tower ordered the plane to circle
instead of landing, to avoid a collision.

Significantly, an aeronautical board imposed a news
blackout on the incident, but a journalist who later suc¬
ceeded in obtaining permission from the regional prose¬
cutor to listen to the tapes of air traffic communications,
reported that the object looked like a fast-moving star. 4

Later that month a helicopter had a near collision with
a 300-ft-long UFO over southern England. It was estab¬
lished beyond doubt that no other aircraft were in the area
at the time. I have interviewed the pilot and hope to pub¬
lish details of this important case in the near future.

On March 18, 1988 a Xinjiang Airlines plane encoun¬
tered a UFO over China. As in the Mozambique Airlines
incident, the captain signaled the intruder with the plane’s
landing lights. (See Chapter 7.)

On October 3, 1988 two Brazilian airliners (of VARIG
and VASP) were followed for fifteen minutes by a circular
object, which was also detected on radar.

Another interesting revelation in 1988 was that ex-
President Ronald Reagan had witnessed a UFO while he
was Governor of California in 1974. “We were flying near
Bakersfield when Governor Reagan and the others called
my attention to a big light flying a bit behind my plane.
It appeared to be several hundred yards away,” reported
Reagan’s pilot, Bill Paynter. “It began to accelerate, then
it appeared to elongate. Then ... the UFO went from a
normal cruise speed to a fantastic speed instantly.”

Reagan himself described the incident to Normal Mil¬
ler, then Washington Bureau chief for the Wall Street Jour¬
nal. According to Miller, Reagan ordered the pilot to
follow the object. “We followed it for several minutes,”
said Reagan. “All of a sudden to our utter amazement it
went straight up into the heavens. When I got off the plane

Editor’s Foreword xi

I told Nancy all about it. And we read up on the long
history of UFOs ...”

“I didn’t report the conversation at the time,” said Mil¬
ler. “Reagan didn’t go into detail about the research he
and his wife had done, because it was at that point that I
asked him if he believed in UFOs, and he clammed up.” 5

The year 1988 saw the passing of two great pioneers in
UFO research: Donald Keyhoe, who died on November
29, and Coral Lorenzen, who died on April 12.

Coral Lorenzen and her husband Jim founded the Aerial
Phenomena Research Organization (APRO) in 1952. Both
served in the U.S. Air Force and at one time held high
security clearances. Coral was convinced that UFOs were
of extraterrestrial origin and had been observing our planet
for thousands of years. Her remains are interred at Arling¬
ton Cemetery, beside those of her husband.

A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and an aide to
Charles Lindbergh, Major Donald Keyhoe served in the
Marine Corps as an aircraft and balloon pilot. He had
many contacts in the Pentagon, and was the first to expose
the UFO cover-up, in a series of articles and books. By
the early 1950s he was convinced that the cover-up was
organized by what he called “The Silence Group.” That
group, in my opinion, was the Majestic-12 committee, and
this was one reason I dedicated Above Top Secret to him;
the other reason being that it was Keyhoe’s book, The
Flying Saucers Are Real, which stimulated my interest in
the subject back in 1955.

Sightings have continued in 1989 at a steady rate. The
most important of these was made by the astronauts on
the Discovery space shuttle on March 14. The story first
broke on LBC Radio on March 29, after I had provided
them with a copy of a tape which had been given to me
by former NASA mission specialist, Bob Oechsler. Bob
had received the recording from Donald Ratsch, a radio
ham who had been monitoring the astronauts’ communi¬
cations, which were being transmitted on WA3NAN, the
Goddard Amateur Radio Club at the NASA Goddard Space
Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, on 147.50mhz. At

xii THE UFO REPORT

06:42hrs EST, as the Discovery was over the French Poly¬
nesian Islands in the Pacific, one of the astronauts re¬
ported “HOUSTON, THIS IS DISCOVERY. WE STILL HAVE THE
ALIEN SPACECRAFT UNDER OBSERVANCE.”

At the time of writing, NASA is denying that the inci¬
dent took place. Bob Oechsler arranged for independent
voice-print analyses to be made, and the results will be
published in due course. Interestingly, at about 06:35hrs
EST, Donald Ratsch heard (but did not record) one of the
astronauts say: “we have a problem—we have a fire.”
According to Bob Oechsler, “Fire” is most probably a
code word. He further believes that the Discovery had been
paced by a UFO for several hours prior to the “Alien
Space Craft” communication. A number of other radio
hams heard both communications.

Finally, I would like to record my thanks to the interna¬
tional team of dedicated men and women who have con¬
tributed to The UFO Report 1990. I would also like to
thank Lord Rees-Mogg, who suggested the idea; Cyril
Darbyshire, for translating much of Chapter 6; Duane
Cook, editor of the Gulf Breeze Sentinel, who kindly sup¬
plied me with the cover photo, taken by “Jane,” and Do-
rothee, who helped me so much with the typing.

TIMOTHY GOOD

London
April 1989

References

1. Thompson-Noel, Michael: “Wacky world of the
Ufologists,” Financial Times, June 25, 1988.

2. UFO Cover-Up? Live was produced by Michael
Seligman and distributed by Lexington Broadcast
Service (LBS). The results of the survey were
published by Walt Andrus, director of the Mutual
UFO Network, in the MUFON UFO Journal, No.
248, December 1988.

3. Letter from Dr. Roger Wescott to Robert Bletchman,
April 7, 1988.

Editor’s Foreword xlii

4. El Colombiano, February 22, 1989, as reported in the
Shropshire Star, February 23, 1989.

5. New Truth, Dunedin, New Zealand, October 17, 1988.
The Reagan incident was first mentioned in Landslide:
The Unmaking of the President, by Jane Mayer and
Doyle McManus (Collins, London 1988, page 402).

1

A British Perspective
1988

GRAHAM and MARK BIRDSALL

Graham and Mark Birdsall have been interested in
UFOs for many years, and in 1981 formed the York¬
shire UFO Society.

Despite its title, namely that of a group which op¬
erates out of Britain’s largest county, YUFOS has
succeeded in establishing itself as one of Europe’s
leading organizations, with a flourishing member¬
ship.

The Birdsall brothers both work in the printing
industry, and devote most of their spare time to the
society and its bi-monthly journal, Quest Interna¬
tional (see Appendix).

The illustrations are by Mark Birdsall.

Britain, with a population of nearly 60 million, has the
highest number of reports in proportion to the rest of the
world. One of the reasons behind this extraordinary fact
is the number of dedicated researchers who actively pursue
the phenomenon on behalf of several organizations, one
of which is the Yorkshire UFO Society.

It is here in the United Kingdom that our active inves¬
tigators have found ample evidence to convince us that we
are facing a genuine phenomenon that simply cannot be
dismissed by this or any other government as being merely
misidentifications or products of the mind. Nor do we be¬
lieve that perfectly honest and respectable people, from a
police officer of twenty-five years’ service, through to the
average man and woman with able background and char-

1

2

THE UFO REPORT

acter, are always mistaken in their conviction that they
have encountered something that defies logic.

When one speaks with police officers, who are generally
the most objective of people, and listens to their descrip¬
tion of a UFO encounter that leaves them nonplussed and
clearly shocked by their experience, one begins to ques¬
tion those in the UFO community and elsewhere who in¬
sist that we are dealing at all times with simple
misidentifications of aircraft lights, meteorological phe¬
nomena, astronomical events, or even some form of psy¬
chic experience.

We have every confidence in our researchers’ ability to
get at the truth, but some UFO groups continually mock
those very people who risk ridicule and sometimes their
livelihood for having the courage to describe their encoun¬
ters with the unknown.

As an organization, we are careful to protect the identity
of all witnesses who claim to have confronted some form
of UFO. It is a sad reflection on ufology that some inves¬
tigators clamor to involve what is, after all, a very skep¬
tical media. In doing so, mostly for private gain, it is at
the expense of the witnesses, who suddenly find them¬
selves thrown into the public limelight and wish they had
never agreed to disclosing their information in the first
place. There is intense rivalry, almost bordering on the
fringes of common decency, amongst many UFO groups
and self-made experts, to be the first to a UFO case, to
be the first to research it, to be the first to relate details to
the media, and to hell with the consequences.

British UFO research has often dealt with some of the most
important events to have occurred during the last four de¬
cades. It has failed, however, to deliver much in the way of
real progress, simply because it has never got its act together.

The most notable success in the UFO field of literature
in recent years was Above Top Secret, whose author Tim¬
othy Good, a great supporter of our organization, set out
to redress the balance. It is no secret that Timothy con¬
ducted much of his research practically isolated from the
major U.K. groups. The result was unquestionably the best
work ever written on this subject.

Timothy presented a calculated appraisal of the phe-

3

A British Perspective 1988

nomenon, and in doing so proved that many governments
both here and abroad were and still are actively engaged
in suppressing known facts relating to their own research
from the public. Using hitherto secret official documents,
all relating to the UFO subject, he exposed the myth once
and for all that UFOs do not interest government agencies,
and therefore must be dismissed as being mere fanciful
tales of imagination.

Our organization has centered its activities on similar
areas of research. Here in Yorkshire, for example, is the
ultra-sensitive Distant Early Warning base of RAF Fyling-
dales. This complex can detect any item in orbit around
our planet, from 1,500 satellites to 15,000 items of space
debris. It is known, for example, that the base can detect
an object as small as a tea tray above Moscow, so one
would think it highly likely that if structured UFOs are
indeed entering or leaving Earth’s atmosphere at will, they
would know about it. Perhaps not. At this, and other key
sensitive bases within these shores, personnel operate on
a “need-to-know” basis. At the top-secret listening post
at Menwith Hill, close to Harrogate in North Yorkshire,
and operated by over 1,000 members of the U.S. National
Security Agency, personnel come under many security
classifications, none more sensitive than “S.C.I.” (Sen¬
sitive Compartmented Information).

During his research for the book Deep Black, author
William E. Burrows interviewed General Paul D. Wag¬
oner, then head of the North American Aerospace Defense
Command. It is to here that all data from RAF Fylingdales
is sent. The General was invited to comment on the exis¬
tence of a top-secret imaging satellite codenamed KH-11.
He refused point blank, and then went on to explain that
the KH-11 project was more sensitive than the “Top Se¬
cret” category, and came into the classification known as
S.C.I. Staff who work on such “black” projects (the Gen¬
eral included) come under this classification. They are
given only enough access in order to do whatever is nec¬
essary to complete their task.

On his own admission, General Wagoner is allowed to
know as much data about “blacker” than top-secret proj¬
ects as his immediate superiors will allow. 1 It follows

4

THE UFO REPORT

therefore that officers and personnel within security agen¬
cies are themselves allowed to know only so much. How
is the young RAF operator to know if the object seen over
Moscow is just a tea tray?

For as long as we can remember here in Britain, the
Ministry of Defense has taken the view that until such time
as UFOs constitute a threat to the defense of the realm,
no active research is being undertaken by Her Majesty’s
Armed Forces, or any other body. The MoD’s official
clearing house for all UFO reports within Whitehall is
publicly known as AS2 (Secretariat, Air Staff 2), where
public and official reports are purportedly routed, be they
from the police or civilian pilots, etc.

DI55

Our organization made repeated requests to the MoD to
formally admit that UFO reports also made their way to
other agencies, but they persistently denied this. However,
it is a fact of life that occasionally some government de¬
partments have a tendency to release information by ac¬
cident that should have never been made public. Such a
“gaffe” occurred when an official document came into
our hands which detailed a distribution list at the foot of
a report that examined a UFO incident over Bradford, in
Yorkshire, which had been telexed through to the MoD by
Leeds & Bradford regional airport.

No previous documents of this kind had ever included
such a distribution list. It was a major breakthrough, and
revealed at a stroke that the MoD had an intricate system
for analyzing and actioning UFO reports within the United
Kingdom and abroad. This official document listed the fol¬
lowing organizations and departments that would have re¬
ceived copies of the UFO report:

Sec (AS)2 [Secretariat, Air Staff 2]

AEW/GE [Airborne Early Waming/Ground Environ¬
ment]

AF/OPS/1/11 [Air Force Operations]

DI55 [?]

5

A British Perspective 1988

From this distribution list, we established definite links
between Britain’s Air Early Warning systems and NATO
(North Atlantic Treaty Organization). We also established
that the North Atlantic Defense Ground Environment
(NADGE) and the United Kingdom Air Defense Ground
Environment (UKADGE) would be relayed data on the
report.

UKADGE is probably the most advanced air and
ground defense system operated in the world today. The
network includes all Royal Navy and NATO surface ves¬
sels, AWACS aircraft (Airborne Early Warning and Con¬
trol System), Ground Radar bases around Britain,
including Staxton Wold in Yorkshire. The data that is re¬
ceived from such sources enters RAF bases at Buchan,
Boulmer, Ash, and Neatishead, and is then channeled
through to the Air Defense Operational Center (ADOC) at
High Wycombe.

As UFO researchers, we recognized the fact that any
unknown target, be it a Soviet Backfire bomber or UFO,
must be pinpointed at some stage by this virtually im¬
pregnable defensive system. Given these facts, could we
really believe the MoD has no interest in UFO reports?
And what of the other listing as yet not identified—
DI55?

Whitehall is a vast infra-structure of various government
bodies dealing with a host of day-to-day tasks affecting the
Armed Forces of Great Britain and its allies. There must
be hundreds, if not thousands of telephone lines inter¬
secting the corridors of this famous establishment.

Mick Hanson, a keen and dedicated researcher for our
organization, elected to solve the mystery of DI55 using
guile, and a bit of cheek. He rang Whitehall and asked if
he could be put through to AS2, but found himself being
put through to another department. A few minutes later,
he was speaking to yet another department, again the
wrong one. He was being transferred all the time, but was
eventually put through to AS2, although, we believe, on
an entirely different and internal' phone, thus raising no
question in the mind of the AS2 operator that he was
speaking with a civilian UFO researcher.

6

THE UFO REPORT

The AS2 operator was unable to help Mick with his
request for data relating to a particular case that had been
reported to him via South Yorkshire police in his capacity
as co-ordinator of research in that area. He was put back
to the internal switchboard, and requested that the opera¬
tor put him in touch with any Whitehall department that
might assist him with his research. The operator told him
that if AS2 could not help, perhaps DI55 may be more
forthcoming! Mick had a very fruitful conversation with a
gentleman at this previously unknown department that
dealt directly with U.K. UFO reports.

Further research concluded that the Ministry of Defense
had been caught with their pants down. Letters demanded
an explanation as to why the existence of DI55 had been
kept hidden from researchers, but the MoD were very re¬
luctant to admit or deny anything. We continued to delve
into this deception and with the assistance of Timothy
Good, finally unwrapped the most secret information of
all.

RAF Rudloe Manor

As long ago as 1979 our organization knew the precise
location of a base, located discreetly in the beautiful Wilt¬
shire countryside, that had some real connection with UFO
research. We knew from our source that the British Armed
Forces, in co-operation with the National Security Agency,
were heavily involved in something that they wished to
keep secret.

This base was RAF Rudloe Manor, and without Timo¬
thy’s active research, combined with information supplied
by a source known only to him, and our own co-operation
in revealing what we knew at the time, this base would
still be operating covertly.

Several communications had been made between DI55
and Rudloe Manor, all connected with UFO sighting re¬
ports. And in Above Top Secret, Timothy reveals that the
Flying Complaints Flight, now based at Rudloe Manor,
incorporates a UFO investigation unit, staffed by person¬
nel of the Provost & Security Services.

7

A British Perspective 1988

The Ministry of Defense denies that Rudloe Manor is
involved in UFO investigations, however. According to
them, one civil servant alone is employed full time at
Whitehall, who amongst other duties studies UFO reports.
Yet the MoD confirmed to Timothy that DI55 was also
involved in investigations. 2 It is therefore untrue to state
that only one civil servant is actively engaged in investi¬
gating and disseminating the bulk of UFO reports that are
dispatched via Whitehall. We believe that task is too great
for one individual, and are convinced we have merely
scratched at the surface of our government’s real interest
in the phenomenon.

White other British groups involved in the UFO subject
choose to research mundane reports, delve over past en¬
counters stretching back for decades, dabble in the psychic
and bizarre, our organization chose to adopt the current
American UFO researchers’ attitude; namely, believe your
government is withholding UFO data, and strive to get at
the real truth surrounding what can only be described as
a cover-up of enormous proportions.

The 1988 Flap

With all this new and important data at hand, 1988 offered
British UFO researchers a great opportunity to study and
act upon the biggest wave of sightings to have occurred
within this country for a decade.

We will now present some of the most fascinating UFO
case files researched by our team of investigators, who
knew full well that our current government would be
keenly following developments at every stage, recognizing
they were no longer dealing with a more placid UFO re¬
search group. The MoD also appreciated that our research
was broadening to cover Stealth technology, the Strategic
Defense Initiative program (SDI), and hugely secretive
sorties made by Remotely Piloted Vehicles (RPVs). Per¬
haps we had become a threat to those within the Defense
lobby who wished to perpetuate the official government
stance that they had no interest in UFO research.

Investigators of the UFO phenomenon have no sixth

8

THE UFO REPORT

sense in determining just when a major “flap” will occur,
but when one begins to receive reports from around the
country, and on a daily basis, culminating in twenty-two
independent sightings on one night alone, there is ample
justification for believing that something peculiar is going
on, or is about to happen.

During January 1988, this organization received eighty-
nine accounts of UFO activity, only four of which origi¬
nated with the media. As a result, we had a mass of
information about the nature of the sightings. But could
we draw any conclusions?

January 2

Just before midnight on Saturday January 2, a sixteen-
year-old girl with a keen interest in astronomy thought she
saw a UFO above London. When informed of the sight¬
ing, police officers based at Kensington rushed outdoors
to catch a glimpse of the object. They did see it, and were
convinced it was some sort of UFO. The media reported
the sighting, and a headline proclaimed “Jellyfish over
London.” (Apparently when asked what the UFO looked
like, one of the officers made the unfortunate “jellyfish”
remark.)

It later transpired that the “UFO” was nothing more
than a brightly shining planet, often misidentified by in¬
experienced observers as a genuine UFO. It is a fact that,
while we all have a high regard for the abilities of police
officers, very few receive basic astronomy lessons while
in the service!

Ray Barron, 200 miles away, had just parked his vehicle
in the driveway of his home, situated in a quiet suburb of
Leeds, England’s third largest city, and commercial “cap¬
ital” of Yorkshire. It was a chilly dark night, and the re¬
tired construction engineer was in a hurry to reach the
warmth of indoors. What made him stop and stare into
the starlit sky for the next two minutes takes us to the heart
of a typical UFO report, which our researchers are con¬
stantly attempting to explain.

Mr. Barron had caught sight of an object, later de¬
scribed as plate-shaped and colored orange and yellow,

A British Perspective 1988 9

which moved across the Leeds skyline, spinning or rolling
as it did so. It appeared to descend a fraction, and it was
then that he noticed some kind of smoke or vapor being
emitted from the rear. Mr. Barron takes up the story: “The
light was brilliant and quite large, practically half the size
of a full moon. As I watched in the freezing cold, the
damn thing ‘switched off’ like a light bulb. I peered up¬
ward and tried to find out where it had gone, but was
absolutely shattered to see the spiraling smoke continue
its journey! Yet it was coming out of nothing ...”

Fortunately, the great advantage of having a network of
researchers spread around the country is that we may be
able to offer further data that could correlate a sighting
with another report that has reached us from a completely
independent source. This is exactly what occurred on this
particular evening.

Mr. Barron had left his vehicle at precisely 7:50 that
evening. Several miles away, in the small market town of
Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, Jane Marsden and her friend
Vivienne O’Donnell were sitting in a parked vehicle, en¬
gaged in conversation. Suddenly, at 7:50 p.m. they no¬
ticed through the offside window of the vehicle a large ball
of light passing through the night sky. Their initial reac¬
tion was one of dread, for they had no doubt an aircraft
was possibly on fire and in serious trouble. However, if it
were an aircraft, it was taking an awfully long time to
move across the sky. Both ladies had now centered their
attention on the object, and were oblivious to people and
traffic passing close-by.

The object was now brightly lit, orange and yellow col¬
ors could be seen, and the definite shape of a red tail could
be seen behind the main body. Both women were per¬
plexed and disturbed. Jane later told us: “Behind the or¬
ange ‘ball’ was a pale blue flame, then came a long slender
red tail. It was moving very, very slowly indeed.”

Two concise reports, covered in depth by our research¬
ers—but were both objects one and the same? If the con¬
sensus is that they were, then what on earth could it have
been? It has been estimated that only ten percent of UFO
witnesses actually bother to report their experiences to the
media, police or local UFO groups. If we had received a

10

THE UFO REPORT

further twenty-seven reports from various people and lo¬
calities, our researchers might well have been better placed
to form an opinion. But with only three witnesses to an
unusual event, seen over an area containing at least one
and a half million people, what chance did we have? And
yet . . .

Our investigators were no sooner attempting to resolve
the events of that night (by the common practice of con¬
tacting the police, civil and military airfields, etc.) when
we were further confounded by a reported UFO sighting
that had taken place at nine o’clock that same evening in
Leeds.

Mr. Ted Johhson lives close to the north-west of the
city. He told us of an object that had flown extremely low
as it followed the contours of a nearby valley. Yet this was
no aircraft, but a large orange- and yellow-colored ball of
light. Behind it came a vast stream of grayish smoke, and
long after the object had disappeared to the north, this
vapor remained visible. Ted is adamant that the time was
9:00 p.m., but he had no idea, of course, that three other
people in the region that night had also seen some kind of
strange aerial object.

During the next twenty-four hours we sought out data
from our team of investigators and, as luck would have
it, a report came back from the Worksop, Nottingham¬
shire, area. Two people, both of whom wish to remain
anonymous, were close to their village on the outskirts of
Worksop at approximately 7:30 p.m. Apparently, two odd¬
shaped “aircraft” had flown in and around the area for
several minutes. The observers noticed some unusual as¬
pects regarding shape: very thin in terms of depth, both
triangular, and each with prominent fins. (See Fig. 1:1.)

Were these aircraft or UFOs? The immediate task facing
any investigation in an event like this is to discover if there
are any known military exercises going on in the area of
the sightings. As it transpired, there were none—officially.
Yet we have recorded dozens of instances when military
maneuvers have taken place, and have invited the MoD to
confirm this, yet they usually plead ignorance.

Our organization has made a thorough study of the de¬
velopment of so-called “Stealth” aircraft. It is believed

A British Perspective 1988

11

Figure 1:1. Worksop, January 2, 1988.

that the F-117A Stealth fighter has flown from bases in the
U.K. for some years, even before being officially recog¬
nized by the U.S. Department of Defense as even existing,
in November 1988. However, there is no hard evidence
that Stealth craft have flown in this country. To claim that
some UFO reports can be attributed to these top-secret
aircraft is foolhardy, unless one is in possession of the
facts. It is more reasonable to look at conventional aircraft
that operate in pairs, have highly unusual designs, and fly
in a manner which is calculated to confuse. Such an air¬
craft is the American A-10 Thunderbolt, many of which
are based in Britain. These usually operate in pairs, fly at
very low altitudes, and sometimes use motorway traffic as
“targets” on operational sorties. They will duck and weave
among hilltops and trees, and at night such maneuvers will
always appear peculiar to the unaccustomed observer.

January 3

Just as we were discussing the merits of whether or not to
place this Worksop sighting in the “possible aircraft” cat¬
egory, came news of a very disturbing encounter in Hum¬
berside (formerly East Yorkshire). It was 5:00 p.m.,
Sunday January 3, almost twenty-four hours after the
events in Leeds.

Mrs. Annette McDonaldson and her young daughter had
been visiting friends in Grimsby, a fishing port on the east
coast, and had just set off to return home to York. Trav¬
eling on a road just outside the town, the night had closed

12

THE UFO REPORT

in, but traffic was light and there appeared to be no obsta¬
cles to delay their journey.

The bright lights which appeared in their car’s rear-view
mirror suggested to Annette that some large lorry was fast
approaching, and she slowed down in order to let it pass.
Despite relaxing her foot on the accelerator the distance
between her and the lights remained the same. She asked
her daughter to look behind and see what this lorry driver
was playing at.

Clare McDonaldson arched round and focused her eyes
on the lights, some 100 yards behind. After a while, she
began to make out the surface of the road, and was shocked
to realize that the lights were actually airborne, just above
the ground. She could see no shape whatsoever behind the
bright glare. During the course of the next three minutes,
the lights bore steadily closer to the car, but suddenly van¬
ished in an instant.

By now, confused and frightened. Annette instructed
her daughter to keep a look-out for the lights. She did not
have long to wait before a startled cry told her the lights
were directly above their car. Panic set in, and Annette
slammed her foot down hard on the accelerator, and in a
short while was beyond the legal speed limit. Two more
minutes passed by, and then to her horror she saw the two
bright lights ahead of her and. above the road. Whatever
lay behind the lights was cautious enough not to allow the
car to smash headlong into it. It kept an even distance
between them for a number of miles. Almost as suddenly
as it had appeared, the lights shot straight up into the sky
at a steep angle and disappeared. [The McDonaldsons were
luckier than the Knowles family, whose car was picked up
and dropped back on the road by a UFO in Western Aus¬
tralia only a few weeks later. See Chapter 8—Editor.]

The mother and daughter had been left in a shocked
state. Their experience had so affected them that as soon
as they had an opportunity, the police were called. Good
co-operation between our organization and several police
authorities ensured that we were immediately given the
relevant information. Despite this early opportunity to quiz
the witnesses, we were later no nearer to finding any sen¬
sible answer as to the probable cause of the incident. Per-

A British Perspective 1988 13

haps some lunatic at the controls of a helicopter had de¬
cided to stage a terrifying low-level “chase” with a pass¬
ing motorist? But the two women were adamant: if it had
been a helicopter, they would have said so.

As if to reinforce our growing unease that we could be
witnessing the start of a major “flap,” we received a call
from Pauline Russell, who had witnessed something rather
odd near her home in South Leeds at nine-thirty that same
Sunday evening. She had been out walking when she was
attracted by a brightly lit “egg-shaped object” moving
slowly across the sky. Its design was so unusual that she
stood still in order to try and fathom what it could be.
There were no aircraft navigation lights visible on the ob¬
ject, but suddenly a real aircraft displaying its lights came
into view from the opposite direction.

The aircraft and object were moving rapidly toward one
another. Whatever the UFO was, it moved across the sky
in a staggered motion, almost zig-zagging. The conven¬
tional aircraft came within a whisker of colliding with the
unknown light, and passed just to the right-hand side of
it. Pauline later admitted: “The object was unlike any¬
thing I have ever seen in my life, and anyone on that air¬
craft must have seen it.” Needless to say, no one within
aviation circles reported seeing anything.

January 4

This day was to prove our busiest of the whole year. In a
period of just six hours and fifteen minutes, we received
twenty-two reports of UFO phenomena from around the
region. The events of that day are recorded by our inves¬
tigator during the course of that week and beyond.

5:25 p.m. A married couple reported a massive white
sphere moving just above the clouds over Harewood, near
Harrogate, North Yorkshire.

7:00 p.m. A woman reported seeing a glowing white ob¬
ject stationary over South Leeds at a height of 1,000 ft. The
object slowly moved south after some two minutes. She
could see several dark points or patches on the object.

7:20 p.m. A gentleman in the small Yorkshire village of

14 THE UFO REPORT

Mosbrough, near Rotherham, rang to say he was observ¬
ing a cluster of brilliant red- and yellow-colored lights at
a height of between 500 and 1000 ft. Local investigator
Allan Petres hurried to the scene, and confirmed the sight¬
ing.

7:30 p.m. Mr. J. S. Rhodes, an experienced ex-RAF of¬
ficer, observed a strange-looking “aircraft” without wings
over Scholes, West Yorkshire. It glowed orange in color,
but had five darkened portholes running the entire length.
He also noticed two aircraft, possibly military, near the
scene. There was sound coming from them, but not from
the mysterious shape which was quickly leaving the area.

7:45 p.m. Two young women were leaving their work
premises in the center of Derby when they were astonished
to see three brilliantly lit white spheres directly overhead.
There was absolutely no sound or movement, but as
quickly as they appeared, they disappeared.

7:46 p.m. Two young men parked in the center of
Chellaston, Derbyshire, observed a large circular shaped
object that looked to be made of glass, “sewn together by
threads.”

8:00 p.m. Mr. Bill Moran was making his way home
to Kimberworth, Rotherham, when he saw an intensely lit
bright ball of light moving extremely slowly toward the
north-west at very low altitude. It had two distinct colors,
yellow and orange.

8:02 p.m. Mr. Thomas Jordan and his son were puz¬
zled to see a brilliant yellow sphere move slowly due north
above their home in Roundhay, an attractive suburb of
Leeds. Not unfamiliar with aircraft, neither could offer
any explanation for what they saw. Surprisingly, three air¬
craft in formation appeared to head after this object shortly
afterward. Both men are very keen amateur astronomers
and have always been skeptical about so-called UFOs, yet
despite this they were sufficiently impressed by their ex¬
perience to contact our organization.

8:15 p.m. A gentleman from York, North Yorkshire,
reported seeing an object which to him resembled the old
V-l flying bomb. It flew at very low altitude and emitted
sparks, debris, and flames.

8:15 p.m. An entire family was watching television in

A British Perspective 1988 15

their home at Kirkhamgate, near Wakefield, West York¬
shire. Through the downstairs window they saw a large
luminous green ball of light traveling slowly across the
sky. They rushed to the window, then made their way
outside to get a better look. The object was releasing some
kind of vapor behind it which was clearly visible due to
the bright light coming from the object itself. It finally
disappeared out of sight beyond some hills, but apparently
following the course of the nearby Ml motorway.

8:15 p.m. A woman in York was outside her home,
about to call for her children who had been playing in the
street, when she saw a brilliant yellow and orange sphere
of light move slowly across the night sky heading west.

8:17 p.m. Mr. Lee was traveling along the dual car¬
riageway of the A38 near Shelton Lock, Derbyshire, when
he suddenly became aware of a large “lemon-shaped”
object moving westward in the sky. It was totally white in
color, but surrounding it there appeared to be a blue- or
green-glowing halo. It was moving extremely quickly, and
at one point Mr. Lee thought the object was set to crash
into the ground.

8:45 p.m. Two men traveling over the moor-tops at
Blubberhouses, North Yorkshire, heading east, saw an ob¬
ject emitting sparks and debris at low altitude, and were
convinced it was going to crash into a hillside. Both men
thought the object resembled a V-l rocket.

8:50 p.m. Several witnesses reported seeing two ex¬
tremely large, glowing white spheres that flew side-by-side
near Collingham, West Yorkshire. At one point, the
spheres descended quite close to the vehicle in which they
were traveling, causing one or two unprintable expletives!
One man said the effect was like putting a brightly lit lorry
in the sky.

8:50 p.m. Mr. Jones of Guiseley, West Yorkshire, ob¬
served a thin green “laser beam” that “shot from horizon
to horizon in a matter of seconds.” Being ex-RAF, he felt
suitably qualified to suggest that some sort of test was
being carried out in the upper atmosphere, but of what
and by whom remains unanswered.

8:50 p.m. Mr. Scotsman from Selby, North Yorkshire,
reported seeing a thin pencil-shaped object above the area.

16

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 1:2.

It displayed several constant blue lights, and a number of
red ones along its side.

9:10 p.m. Gordon Blake, an ex-RAF resident of Leeds,
had been outdoors when suddenly a large, glowing, orange
light appeared in the north-east sky. His immediate reac¬
tion was to study the light more closely, because, in his
words, “it did not conform to any aircraft navigation
lighting system that I had been used to.” A few seconds
elapsed and then the object drew closer, finally enabling
him to see that it was truly gigantic, and in his estimation,
some 400 ft in diameter. It had several “layers” and at
least twelve lights flashed in or around it in formation.
Mr. Blake is very familiar with air-refueling exercises that
can often be mistaken for something more exotic by ground
observers, but he dismisses the theory for this particular
sighting. (Fig. 1:2.)

9:10 p.m. Mrs. Robson and her friend had never seen
a UFO before, but now they are not so sure. Close to their
home in Morley, on the outskirts of south Leeds, they saw
a “rocket-shaped object” move across the sky, then

A British Perspective 1988 17

downward at high speed. Blue- and red-colored flames
poured from the rear. Without any prompting from us,
they compared the object with an “old V-l rocket.”

9:15 p.m. Close to the A1 near Wetherby, West York¬
shire, a married couple reported seeing “a large white
light with several smaller lights within.”

9:16 p.m. Two residents at Harrogate, North York¬
shire, were disturbed to spot a large, glowing, orange-
colored object high above the town, practically stationary.
It did move slowly toward their position, however, and
they could make out three separate points of orange- and
yellow-colored lights within the main body, almost in
cluster formation.

11:30 p.m. An elderly couple from Dewsbury, West
Yorkshire, were about to retire for the night. As they were
about to close the bedroom curtains, they were astonished
to see a large brightly lit object, like a dinner plate, move
back and forth across the sky. They managed to open the
window to get a clearer look and could hear a loud
“swishing noise,” presumably from the object itself. They
watched, fascinated, for as long as ten minutes, before the
light, which had given them the best aerial display since
Guy Fawkes’ night, simply “switched off.” Perhaps this
was a means of suggesting to dozens, if not hundreds of
people who had witnessed the night-time events: “That’s
all folks!”

This ended any further reports that night, but over the
course of the next twenty-five days, fifty-six more UFO
encounters would be placed in our computer files, leaving
each and every one of us involved quite astonished.

January 11

One of the most intriguing encounters occurred in daylight
on Monday, January 11 at 10:30 a.m. It happened on the
B6265 Grassington to Skipton road, North Yorkshire. This
beautiful part of the English countryside has possibly seen
more reports of alleged UFO sightings than any other re¬
gion of the United Kingdom over the past twenty years.
Steep hills and fells overlook the area for miles around,
and one needs only to progress a few yards in any direc-

18

THE UFO REPORT

tion to become virtually isolated from civilization. We
could write a whole chapter on fascinating reports that
have emerged over the years from this one spot alone.

Tony Dodd is head of YUFOS Research and Investiga¬
tions. For twenty-five exemplary years, he served in the
North Yorkshire Police Force before retiring in 1988.
Based at Skipton, then later in Grassington, Tony has a
high regard for the people in the area. His deep-seated
interest in the subject began in the late 1970s, when he
personally witnessed a number of, strange aerial craft at
close proximity (one of which is described in detail in
Above Top Secret 3 ). These encounters, also witnessed by
several colleagues in the force, convinced him we were
dealing with a “nuts-and-bolts” phenomenon.

For the witnesses’ own protection, we have used pseu¬
donyms in this case, which was investigated by Tony Todd,
but their backgrounds and qualifications are genuine.

Dr. P. T. Watkins (Ph.D. Oxon.) is a retired professor
of organic chemistry, aged sixty-five. His wife, Mrs. A.
D. Watkins (M.A.), is sixty-seven years of age. They were
traveling toward Skipton by car and were approximately
one mile on from the Grassington side of the Craven Heifer
public house, when an object suddenly appeared ahead of
them, resembling a flat “hovercraft” or disk. It was de¬
scending all the time from a height of 200 to 300 ft, and
was 100 to 200 yards away, approximately 20 ft in diam¬
eter, and moving between 0 and 50 m.p.h. Their imme¬
diate reaction to the pulsing object was to believe some
kind of partially deflated meteorological balloon was about
to come down. It was traveling in a south-west to north¬
east direction. Mr. Watkins described the object, and what
happened next: “The object seemed to have a flange or
rim which undulated as it came down. It had appeared in
front of us very suddenly, as though it had made a very
rapid vertical descent. It then changed direction to move
parallel with the ground. The front edge of the object ap¬
peared to be moving toward us initially as it passed in
front of our car.”

Its edges were sharpened, and the color appeared
silvery-pink. It veered to the left of the vehicle, as if to
make a landing, but then disappeared from view. Tony

19

A British Perspective 1988

carried out a meticulous search of the area in question,
known as the Crookrise Plantation, but found no evidence
of anything untoward. He questioned the farmer who
owned the land, and spoke with several workers on the
plantation, but no one could add anything which might
have produced an explanation. Checks with the regional
police force and MoD were made, but again, Tony’s in¬
vestigations drew a blank. The witnesses are highly re¬
spected members of the local community, and their
sighting must be considered a genuine Close Encounter of
the First Kind.

That same evening, a YUFOS team in the Kimberworth
valley area of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, identified sev¬
eral unknown “targets” at 8:05 p.m., 8:30 p.m. and 9:05
p.m. Several photographs of the phenomena were taken
using an Olympus camera and 1600 ASA film. When de¬
veloped and analyzed, these showed an unusual orange-
colored ball of light.

There was another sighting on January 11, reported from
southern England. According to the Camber ley News, Mr.
Fred Clarke and his stepson Darryl Robson, were driving
to work at 6:30 a.m. when they saw strange bright lights
in the sky. On reaching Bentley, Hampshire, Mr. Clarke
stopped to go to a shop. “I looked up and there was a
massive object moving slowly toward Famham,” he said.
“It was shaped like a fifty pence piece and was larger than
an airplane.” The object had a light at opposite ends and
was making a droning noise. 4

January 16

At 12:45 a.m. on January 16, Police Sgt.Thompson and a
colleague, along with numerous members of the public,
watched a glowing red ball of light hang motionless above
the city of Sheffield, South Yorkshire. Such was their con¬
cern that they officially notified headquarters, and ques¬
tions were asked among regional military establishments
if an exercise flare was being used, but the authorities
denied any knowledge of the sighting. Both police officers
said that the object remained hovering for at least seven
minutes, until it finally vanished in an instant.

20

THE UFO REPORT

January 22

More and more reports were coming in from the region,
where the phenomenon appeared to be concentrating. A
highly interesting case occurred near Kettlewell, North
Yorkshire, at 9:00 p.m. on January 22. Mr. and Mrs. Alan
Davidson had been driving north when they encountered
a large triangular-shaped object directly in front of their
car, moving left to right across the windscreen. In the few
seconds available to them before it disappeared, they both
saw that the object had a bank of lights on its base, with
several more across the center. A number of these were
flashing on and off across the whole length of the 60 ft-
plus structure. It was totally noiseless so far as they could
ascertain.

The couple, quite understandably, had been badly
shaken by this experience. They negotiated a difficult bend,
then stopped the car and walked back to see if they could
catch sight of the strange craft, but a search of the sur¬
rounding fields and sky proved fruitless.

January 23

Ivan Spenceley is a man of impeccable background, well
educated and informed. When he first gave details of his
extraordinary sighting, which took place near Chester¬
field, Derbyshire, at 12:45 a.m. on January 23, we could
not fail but to be impressed by his attempts to rationalize
his UFO encounter. During 1988, we had worked closely
with researchers at Central Television who wanted to pre¬
sent a live UFO debate on the national network. We pro¬
vided some material, and more importantly, witnesses who
we felt would do the subject justice, such as Ivan.

He was out walking his dog late at night close to wood¬
land, a task he had performed regularly for a number of
years, when he suddenly became aware of a “massive”
oval object in the sky. On closer inspection, he could make
out straight and curved lines around it. There were a series
of red and blue lights constantly shining, but not in a
position where you would expect them to be on an aircraft,
or airship. From what appeared to be tinted windows, light
was emanating continuously. The object was very low in

A British Perspective 1988

21

Figure 1:3. Object seen by Ivan Spenceley, January 23, 1988.

the sky and moved at a snail’s pace away from him, with¬
out any sound. (See Fig. 1:3.)

February 3

Reports continued to pour into the organization during
February, and we have selected a few that typify the di¬
versity of the phenomenon and the backgrounds of our
witnesses. On Wednesday evening, around six-thirty on
February 3, an incident took place on the main Harrogate
to Skipton road. This often narrow and winding route car¬
ried a coachload of forty pupils and staff who were shocked
to witness an oval-shaped ball of yellow light travel along¬
side their vehicle. After descending to their level very sud¬
denly, the object “paced” the vehicle for a few seconds,
moved for a while slightly ahead of it, then sped off at an
estimated speed of 120 m.p.h. toward the village of Blub-
berhouses. Twenty seconds later, a similar object came
from the rear of the coach and carried out almost the same
maneuver.

February 8

A 23-year-old housewife from Sheffield had opened her
attic window to allow in some fresh air, when she saw a
brightly lit object descend through thin cloud and hover
approximately 100 ft above the ground. It was illuminated

22

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 1:4. Sheffield, February 8, 1988.

by an array of beautiful, colored, dazzling lights. These
were peppermint green, ice-blue, and bright red. At the
object’s base she could see a massive circular white light.
For a staggering twenty minutes, this young woman
watched in awe as the rooftop-shaped craft remained still
and quiet. A streetlight nearby dimmed during this time,
and her bedroom light would flicker on and off. The object
then moved away very slowly, close to housetops and trees,
before quickly disappearing at an estimated speed of 100/
120 m.p.h. (Fig. 1:4.)

Approximately one hour before this particular sighting,
two independent reports from the Rotherham area cited a
cone-shaped object displaying orange and white lights
moving slowly over the town, which was only several miles
from the housewife’s location.

February 15

At 12:15 a.m. on February 15, in Rotherham yet again, a
father and son were returning home from an enjoyable
evening out with friends. The son was attracted to a cluster
of bright lights which appeared to be hovering high in the
sky ahead of them. There was little traffic around them at
the time, and the night sky was clear and the weather
crisp. James Adams, fifteen years old, had not mentioned
the lights to his father at the time, but when he saw the
object descend over an electricity pylon approximately a
quarter of a mile away, he frantically drew his father’s
attention toward it. “My dad was amazed,” James said

23

A British Perspective 1988

later. “We could see this disk-shaped thing with a large
dome on top and flashing lights around the base.” These
lights were colored red, green, yellow, orange, and white.
The light on top was brilliant white. “After twenty sec¬
onds,” added James, “it moved away like a bullet, but
we never heard a sound.”

February 16

On February 16 two separate police patrols observed a
UFO over Walsall, West Midlands. According to the Bir¬
mingham Daily News, Sgt. Stuart Griffiths and PC Mi¬
chael Powell were on a panda car patrol when an
extraordinary sight brought them to a halt.

“In the sky up in front of us was a very bright light,”
reported Sgt. Griffiths. “I cannot be sure but the object
could have been oblong in shape. It had green and red
lights which were either flashing on and off or spinning
around.” The officers got out of their car and were amazed
to find that the craft was noiseless. “We watched it for
about two minutes and then it suddenly disappeared to¬
ward the south-east. It seemed to move much faster than
an airplane,” said Sgt. Griffiths. 5

Fifteen minutes earlier, at 9:15 p.m., Inspector Roger
Clarke and Sgt. Steve Godwin sighted a UFO in Darlaston
when they were on patrol. “We were driving toward Cald-
more when we saw a massive object in the sky,” Sgt.
Godwin reported to the Birmingham Evening Mail. “There
were loads of lights but it was far bigger than any aircraft
I’ve seen.” 6

On the same evening, Mrs. Margaret Brannan and her
two children, together with two other young witnesses,
had an extraordinary sighting near Redditch, Worcester¬
shire. “My brain was telling me it must be a plane,” said
Mrs. Brannan, “but as I looked I realized that it couldn’t
be. It was the most fantastic thing I have ever seen. I still
can’t get over it,” she told the Redditch Weekly Mail. “It
was like a floating city in the sky, and the most vivid
memory I have is of the tiny windows on it, which made
it look like a block of flats.” 7

24

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 1:5. Doncaster, January 12, 1988.

February 24

Just nine days later, a Hull taxi-driver spotted a reddish-
orange, spinning-top-shaped object near the Leeds Road
roundabout at 4:00 in the morning. He said it was about
the size of a hot-air balloon and made several changes of
direction. He was sufficiently impressed to call the police
immediately.

We received many reports like this during February.
They came from policemen, security guards, schoolchil¬
dren and their teachers, housewives, and various members
of the public. Each case was fully evaluated and judged
on its merit, and where possible, comparisons were drawn
with other cases that may have been somehow connected.

March 10

Such a connection appears to have occurred on March 10.
Ian Smith, a local UFO investigator for the organization
in South Yorkshire, submitted a report of his sighting

A British Perspective 1988 25

which appeared to tie in with another UFO report sent to
us on March 23, but relating to that night of the 10th. So
we had totally independent witnesses, who had no prior
knowledge of each other’s sighting in Rotherham and Os-
sett, West Yorkshire.

Ian was driving back from Sheffield with a colleague
and fellow Society member, Paul Gamer. Close to the
junction of the A629, Paul drew Ian’s attention to an elon¬
gated object which appeared to be internally lit by some
form of orange light. The entire length of the object, which
was low in the sky, approximately 400 ft above the ground,
appeared to pulsate. Both men could see distinct black
lines running vertically around the object giving the im¬
pression that they may have been some type of windows.

The experienced investigators could hardly believe their
luck—here was a possible UFO staring at them in the face!
They had, of course, immediately stopped the vehicle and
taken precise notes of every aspect of the object’s size,
color, and shape. At precisely 8:55 p.m. the object dis¬
appeared from view traveling in a northerly direction.

Twenty minutes later, over the town of Ossett, Dianne
Wild, aged twenty-eight, was closing her kitchen curtains
when she noticed a brilliant yellow light approaching from
the south. Although indoors, and with both windows and
doors closed, she could hear a distinct humming noise.
The object approached steadily, and, somewhat taken
aback at the growing size and shape of the object, Dianne
remained rooted to the spot. “It was shaped like a cross,
and at least the size of a football field,” she said. “I saw
a red flashing light toward the rear, and yellow lights ran
along its side. I could clearly see gray and black stripes
on the underside as it passed overhead, slightly to the left
of our house. I have never seen anything as big or as clear
in the sky before.”

Further Activity

The center of UFO activity then appeared to be concen¬
trated in the Midlands. Local newspapers, including the
Chase Post in Cannock, highlighted the events, reporting
no less than ninety separate UFO sightings. Amongst these

26

THE UFO REPORT

were twenty-six over Rugeley, Bumtwood, Boney Hay,
Lichfield, Brownhills, Willenhall and Walsall. In just two
hours, sixteen sightings came from Rugeley alone.

A frightened 12-year-old-girl and two friends saw a
huge, oval-shaped craft hovering at 600 ft, covered with
green, blue, and white lights which moved in and out of
the object. Four police officers in separate towns also spot¬
ted the amazing craft. A cigar-shaped craft hovered over
a Lichfield church one early morning at eight o’clock. Mr.
Edwards of Friday Acre said: “It was huge and had a
mushroom-shaped top which came down to a long, cigar
shape underneath.” Other witnesses reported seeing a
similar object rise from behind trees. 8

Another sighting was reported by an RAF jet engine
technician with ten years’ service. He spotted an unusual
craft in Boney Hay, and said he had never seen anything
like it. He claimed to have seen a “brilliant white, smoke
ring at nine o’clock in the morning.” Above it was an
object with a small rotating blue light. It hovered at the
spot for a full minute before moving off at great speed,
leaving what looked like a vapor trail coming from the
object’s left side. Within a minute or two it had disap¬
peared completely. A radar operator was reported to have
disclosed to the Chase Post newspaper that he could con¬
firm something unusual had been seen, but could not go
into detail. 9

When ordinary men and women encounter UFO phe¬
nomena, and are brave enough to speak about their expe¬
rience with investigators or the media, their description of
events offers a valuable insight into this hugely complex,
but fascinating subject.

April 10

On Sunday night, April 10, 1988, David White, head of
Artwork and Illustration Studios in Oxford, was driving
home after a visit to Blewbury. In the sky a red glow
followed his car traveling several hundred feet above.
When he stopped at a crossroads, the light stopped too.
He wound down his window but could hear no sound from
the mystery object.

A British Perspective 1988 27

“I thought I was going crazy. Just for my own peace of
mind, I drove back across the Downs to see if I could
get closer to it. I drove off toward Wantage and it moved
with me again. I kept flashing my car lights and when
I stopped again, it stopped and was just sitting station¬
ary above me.

“I went through Wantage and I could still see it as I
drove toward Faringdon. Then, two or three miles on
that road, it disappeared. Just like that! I first saw the
object at precisely 11:00 p.m. When it vanished—it was
11:41 p.m.—I looked at the car clock. It could not have
been a plane as no plane could just stop still in the sky
without a sound.

“The second time I stopped, I could see that it was
a red light and at the center it was white. There was no
shape to it and as I kept looking at it, it was zig-zagging
up and down. I knew everyone would say I was potty,
or that some RAF pilot was having a damn good laugh
at my expense, but it was really weird and I have never
seen anything like it.”

Despite calls to the police and local RAF bases, no one
could satisfy Mr. White with a rational explanation.

Another equally interesting account of a UFO encounter
during April came from Cwmdare, South Wales. John Rees
was out walking his dog when something caught his atten¬
tion in the sky. He saw a luminous object moving along a
spiral path in a north-easterly direction toward Neath:

“I would not have bothered to take a second look if it
had not been for the spiral path and the intense lumi¬
nosity—and two downwardly directed parallel beams. It
had a cylindrical shape, like a lager can. The clouds
were pitch black on the horizon, but the moon was above
the cloud line and it was very bright. Fortunately, the
object stayed above the cloud line and I was able to keep
it in view. It moved toward Neath and then back, in a
southerly direction toward the Meardy mountain. I was
watching it for about three-quarters of an hour.

“I usually meet a teacher when I am out walking the

28

THE UFO REPORT

dog between 10:15 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. I was hoping
he would come by, so I could have someone to verify
the sighting, but unfortunately he did not turn up this
time. I was shocked I can tell you. I have never seen
anything like that before. I thought it was a plane out
of control at first. Planes do fly over the Cynon valley
at that time of night. I have never believed in UFOs but
there is no doubt that I saw something out of the ordi¬
nary. There was no noise from it.”

John is closely linked with local operatic groups in the
area and is warden of Cwmdare Youth Club. A respected
member of the local community, he is foreman at Enghart
Fans, a large industrial firm where several workers have
remarked “Beam me up Dr. John!” 10 He has nevertheless
stuck to his account through all the ridicule and is typical
of thousands of witnesses to UFO phenomena who brave
the critics and speak the truth.

April 24

Some people, however, prefer to remain anonymous, like
the Elsecar man who was driving home after finishing work
in Ecclesfield, just north of Sheffield, on April 24. Just
after 10:00 p.m., he spotted a hovering UFO over Hoyland
and Elsecar. He stopped the car twice so he could study
the silent object more carefully.

“It was really very strange. Although it was dark I could
see it was a vague box-shape and there were big green,
white, and red lights on it which stayed lit-up all the
time. It was huge and absolutely still, and what really
surprised me was that it did not make a sound. I thought
it must be some sort of aircraft, but it was so still and
quiet it could not possibly have been.”

The 38-year-old man drove home keeping his eye on the
object, but by the time he drove into his driveway, it had
disappeared from view. A next-door-neighbor was out
walking her dog, so he quickly mentioned what he had
seen. They both set off walking down the road to see if it

A British Perspective 1988 29

was still there, but there was no sign. Later, he went in¬
doors and told his wife what he had seen. He kept return¬
ing to the window to see if it had returned, and was
rewarded. “I couldn’t believe it when I saw it there again,
so I called my wife to have a look.”

Together they watched the object move slowly across
the sky until it disappeared for the last time.

“We even opened the window to see if we could hear
a noise, but it did not make a sound. I could not believe
how big it was. Then it suddenly disappeared. Neither
of us have ever experienced anything like it before, and
I don’t particularly want to ever again, although we were
not frightened—just inquisitive really.

“I don’t want people to think we are crackpots. I
know it sounds stupid, but I know what I saw and I’m
glad my wife witnessed it too. It’s just a pity that we
didn’t have a film in our camera. If we had managed to
take a picture of it, people would have to believe us!”

April 29

Since the beginning of the year, when it became apparent
that UFO activity was much higher than normal, our re¬
searchers had devoted many long hours during bitterly cold
nights attempting to photograph the phenomena through¬
out the region. On some rare occasions we had been suc¬
cessful, but none more so than on the night of April 29,
around nine o’clock.

YUFOS investigators Paul Gamer, Ian Smith, and Allan
Petres had been called out to the Kimberworth area of
Rotherham, South Yorkshire. Several witnesses had re¬
ported seeing an unusual light and contacted our South
Yorkshire Co-ordinator Mick Hanson, who quickly orga¬
nized a team to investigate. Our three-man team had be¬
gun their journey full of optimism that perhaps this would
be the night when they would arrive at the scene in time
to see a UFO.

Armed with three cameras and films of various speeds,
they reached a high vantage-point known as Fenton Road.

30

THE UFO REPORT

At exactly 9:00 p.m., the men noticed a distinct yellow
and orange, glowing ball of light approaching their posi¬
tion. They estimated the first point of reference in terms
of distance was approximately five miles. The men de¬
scribed the object as long and oval-shaped, but no sound
could be heard. Allan Petres, using Konicacolor very fast
SR-V3200 ASA film, managed to take a series of pho¬
tographs when the object came within a mile of their
position.

Photo 2 is representative of many similar photographs
that have been taken of UFOs. One finds an unusual shape,
pretty colors, but little else. On the other hand, by adopt¬
ing computer-enhanced techniques, one is able to compare
such images with those of conventional craft. These sci¬
entific methods have been used by some UFO groups for
many years, but as yet we have not received the completed
findings for this particular shot. The apparent vapor image
on the Kimberworth photograph was not visible to ground
observers, yet the camera recorded it. This could prove to
be highly significant.

Military Activity?

A common feature of many UFO reports that appeared
throughout the summer months of 1988 was that of a large
triangular-shaped object displaying bright, illuminated
lights. Two of these appeared together over Stafford during
May. One witness, Mr. John Teasdale, felt sure that the
objects were no more than VC-10s flying from RAF Brize
Norton in Oxfordshire. Checks with the base revealed two
such craft had taken off from the base on the night in
question and it was possible they may have flown over
Staffordshire.

However, another witness, Enid Turner of Uttoxeter,
disagreed. “I don’t believe they were VC-10s, no way,”
she said. “I would know one if I saw it. I often used to
go to air displays, and they definitely weren’t that.” She
said the objects were very low, silent and slow-moving,
with a lot of very bright lights." Other witnesses reported
seeing a strange cluster of orange and red lights. This
brings us to an area of UFO research which few groups in

A British Perspective 1988 31

Britain become involved with: the role of the military, and
as a consequence, the government.

The public has a fair conception of what is traveling on
our roads, on the railways, and at sea. It has less idea of
what is flying overhead. In Britain, there are numerous
military airfields, as well as test sites for experimental
craft, some of which are used to fly remotely piloted ve¬
hicles (RPVs) that are later used in Northern Ireland and
along the Soviet border, for example. Combine these with
flight-refueling exercises, and it is easy to understand how
many people can be forgiven for thinking they are wit¬
nessing some form of UFO activity. During the miners’
strike of 1984, hundreds of people reported seeing a clus¬
ter of lights over East and West Yorkshire. Headlines next
day pronounced the visitor was a UFO; something the
Ministry of Defense were happy to go along with, adding
they had no idea what the object may have been. Our re¬
search proved that it was in fact a military helicopter using
a “Nightsun” searchlight that had been used to pinpoint
several power plants and coal mines in the event that it
would be needed by the police to hurry to a precise lo¬
cation. This had happened in Nottinghamshire, where
pickets had appeared from woodland to confront men who
had defied the strike call and were heading for work. The
police had used helicopters to illuminate the area, thus
depriving the pickets of their cover.

The government at the time insisted that the Armed
Forces were not involved in the strike, but we eventually
uncovered the truth. The Bradford Telegraph & Argus
newspaper received our findings, conducted their own re¬
search, and on New Year’s Eve splashed a front-page story
confirming our analysis. The MoD would not comment,
nor would a number of airport spokesmen who were ac¬
tively involved in the episode.

Frightening Encounter

During the winter of 1988-89, four young women had set
out in a car for a night out in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire.
It was after 7:30 p.m. and their journey would take them
through dark, remote country lanes. Suddenly, two of the

32

THE UFO REPORT

women became aware of a large star-like object to their
right which was airborne and keeping pace with them.
They frantically alerted their companions when the huge
diamond-shaped object shot toward the car. On its top was
a large, red light, and around the center were red, blue,
green, orange, and mauve lights.

The driver panicked at the close proximity of the object,
which was brilliantly illuminated. She accelerated to a
dangerous speed in an effort to put some distance between
them and the craft. The women became more terrified
when it came to within feet of the car, sped past them and
descended, stopping suddenly at ground level 100 yards
ahead of them. As the driver braked, and the car went into
a skid with wheels locked, the object “flipped” over and
came down to land on the side of the road. All four women
briefly observed some form of dome on the craft.

The car had come to a halt, but had spun round facing
the opposite direction. All the women were hysterical and
frantic with fear. The driver put her foot on the accelerator
and raced away, leaving the UFO behind. Not daring to
look back, they sped up a slight incline and were horrified
to see flashing blue lights in the sky above it. All thought
another UFO was waiting for them, but when they reached
the top of the incline were surprised to see four police
vehicles parked on the side of the road, which had not
been there before. They slowed down but did not stop, for
although they all felt relieved to see the cars, and six po¬
lice officers who were moving into nearby fields and
woodland, they somehow didn’t trust them and sped away.
The officers were carrying some kind of equipment, and
a couple of the women thought that at least two were armed
with rifles. All the women reported hearing the distinct
sound of a helicopter after passing the police vehicles, but
the UFO was not a helicopter, they agreed, and in any
event it was enormous and silent.

The women took another route back home, canceling
their night out, and were comforted by their parents.

This case is under investigation by our organization. We
find it significant that four police vehicles should converge
in such a remote area, and hope to be able to throw more
light on this aspect of what is clearly an important case.

A British Perspective 1988 33

* * *

The summer months saw a familiar crop of reports, but
clearly there had been a marked downturn in the number
of sightings. Some areas, however, experienced a burst of
activity, notably in the Midlands, around Stafford. The
Member of Parliament for Stafford, Bill Cash, requested
that witnesses contact him directly in order that he could
raise the matter with an appropriate minister at the House
of Commons.

Reports continued to come to our attention until the end
of the year; some good, others indifferent, but each given
our attention—from the Merseyside cinema manager who
left his premises on October 17 and saw a silver disk¬
shaped craft descending over the area, hover and then de¬
part—to the Sheffield couple who watched in awe as a
Mexican hat-shaped object illuminated the sky just 600 ft
above them, its dazzling light spinning continuously.

We also ended the year with a spectacular night-time
“fireball” event which was seen over much of northern
England. On December 21, reports began to reach local
police authorities and the media that a large glowing ball
of light had passed across the sky around midnight. By
contacting civil and military authorities, coastguards, and
witnesses, we built up a picture of the event that satisfied
us we were dealing with either space debris or satellite re¬
entry, which disappointed a number of journalists who
thought a UFO story was about to break.

Whilst no single UFO case in Britain drew national or
international front-page headlines during 1988, we still
witnessed a greater increase in the overall number of
sightings than in recent years. The Ministry of Defense
received approximately 400 reports, a figure not exceeded
since 1981 (600 reports). And at the same time, 1988 pro¬
vided us with the largest public gathering for an organized
UFO conference here in Britain for a decade, when 420
people attended our annual event.

We were happy that so many witnesses to the year’s
phenomena had come forward to divulge their experi¬
ences, but disappointed that no real breakthrough had been
made in our efforts to identify the true nature of UFOs.
Much of the progress in that field has come from the

34

THE UFO REPORT

United States, where researchers have access to documen¬
tation through the Freedom of Information Act, the media
is more responsive than in the U.K., and the public are
more positive in their attitude.

The reports we have gleaned throughout the year, and
last decade, tell us that we are dealing with a very real
phenomenon that demands scientific study and greater in¬
terest shown by politicians, who must begin to appreciate
that not everyone who claims to have seen a UFO is al¬
ways mistaken. Until that takes place, it is left to organi¬
zations like ours to maintain vigilance, and to apply
pressure on those key personnel within the government
who prefer the status quo to remain—perhaps forever.

References

1. Burrows, William E.: Deep Black: The Secrets of
Space Espionage, Bantam Press, London 1988, pp.
22-4.

2. Good, Timothy: Above Top Secret: The Worldwide
UFO Cover-Up, Sidgwick & Jackson, London 1987,

pp. 120-22.

3. Good, Timothy: op. cit., pp. 115-16.

4. Camberley News, Surrey, January 29, 1988.

5. Birmingham Daily News, February 18, 1988.

6. Birmingham Evening Mail, February 17, 1988.

7. Redditch Weekly Mail, February 26, 1988.

8. Chase Post, Cannock, March 17, 1988.

9. Chase Post, March 7, 1988.

10. Aberdare Leader, April 28, 1988.

11. Stafford Newsletter, May 27, 1988.

2

UFO Lands in Suffolk—
and That’s Official!

RALPH NOYES

Ralph Noyes was bom in the tropics and spent most
of his childhood in the West Indies. He served in the
RAF 1940-46 as a navigator, engaging in active ser¬
vice in North Africa and the Far East.

He entered the Civil Service in 1949 and served
in the Air Ministry and subsequently the unified
Ministry of Defense. For nearly four years he headed
Defense Secretariat 8 (DS8) which among other
tasks logged UFO reports from members of the
public.

Ralph Noyes retired in 1977, leaving in the grade
of Under Secretary of State. He has since pursued a
writing career, and has written a number of articles
and science fiction stories. A Secret Property (Quar¬
tet Books, 1985) deals largely with UFOs, includ¬
ing—in fictionalized form—the Rendlesham case. In
1989 Country Life published several articles by him
on the mystery cornfield circles.

“UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official!”

These were the words in which a British Sunday newspa¬
per told us, in October 1983, of one of the most remark¬
able UFO cases in British history. The events they were
reporting had taken place nearly three years before, in
December 1980, in Rendlesham Forest in the English
county of Suffolk. Now, almost a decade after these events,
much more has come to light, and we have had time to
draw conclusions. No apologies need be offered for re-

35

36

THE UFO REPORT

telling this extraordinary story: it encapsulates many of
the central problems of ufology.

I call these incidents “The Rendlesham Case,” after
the pine forest in which the events took place (see Fig¬
ure 2:1). Other commentators have used other names,
including “The Bentwaters Case” and “The Wood-
bridge Case.” A glance at the references at the end of
this article will remove any doubts about which case is
meant.

Why Is the Rendlesham Case Important?

In most UFO cases we have nothing more to go on than
what a witness is able to tell us, often some days or weeks
after the event and not infrequently after the lapse of
months or even years. If we are lucky, there may be two
or more people who claim to have seen the same event.
At the end of the investigation we are left with our notes
of what the witness(es) have told us, supplemented per¬
haps by a rough sketch of the site and an artist’s impres¬
sion of whatever “entities” and/or “vehicles” formed
part of the narrative. Increasing shrewdness, painfully
learned over several decades, forces us to reduce most of
these laboriously gathered stories to the probable mis¬
perception of something quite ordinary (or, rather rarely,
to hoax). What remains when these “IFOs” (Identified
Flying Objects) have been eliminated makes up the hard
core of our “great cases,” those bizarre and puzzling
reports for which no conventional explanation seems
possible and which continue to interest those many of us
who suspect that behind all this “smoke” there must be
some important “fire.” But the hard evidence which
might convince our critics—or even persuade our¬
selves!—tends to remain woefully absent; as elusive, in¬
deed, as the clinching facts which, for more than a
century, have been sought by those engaged in psychical
research in pursuit of their own (surprisingly similar)
dreams, hunches and El Dorados.

The crucial importance of the Rendlesham case is that
we have the signed statement of a relatively senior officer

29/30 December)

Figure 2:1. The Rendlesham Forest landing. Adapted from a
sketch by Dr. Jamison.*

(Wirnesses fo / ^
sighring on
26/27 December)

38

THE UFO REPORT

of the United States Air Force, Lt.-Col. (now Brigadier
General) Charles I. Halt, the then Deputy Base Com¬
mander of the important USAF complex at RAF Bent-
waters/Woodbridge in Suffolk, submitted to the British
Ministry of Defense shortly after the alleged events oc¬
curred. The receipt of this document by the British MoD
has been formally acknowledged in the British House of
Commons by the responsible Minister (even though it
took more than two years to wring out this statement,
following a long period of denials and prevarications).
And Colonel Halt has repeatedly confirmed that it was
indeed he who signed it. Whatever interpretation we
care to place on this document, and much of this article
will be concerned with interpreting it, there can be no
doubt that it was officially issued by an officially ap¬
pointed U.S. authority to an official British governmental
agency.

The importance of this fact can hardly be exaggerated.
It is unique in British ufology. Although diligent research
by ufologists has turned up some interesting cases in
which the British MoD were undoubtedly involved, for
example the Bentwaters/Lakenheath incidents of August

1956 and the occurrences at RAF West Freugh in April

1957 (of which good accounts are given in Above Top
Secret' and have since been supplemented elsewhere), no
definitive statement has ever been issued about them, and
I doubt, as a former official of the Department, that any¬
thing ever will be. The Halt memorandum is altogether
special in being an official— and officially authenti¬
cated— statement. Few other documents match it in this
respect. I can think of nothing except certain of the re¬
leases made in the United States under the American
Freedom of Information Act and reproduced by Law¬
rence Fawcett and Barry Greenwood in Clear Intent, 2
and, to a greater extent, by Timothy Good in Above Top
Secret.

As that Sunday paper put it, “UFO Lands in Suffolk—
And That’s Official.” It was those last three words which
persuaded me, for the first time in my life, to buy that
particular scandal-sheet. Having bought it, I knew that the
case was crucial.

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 39

What Happened at Rendlesham?

Great difficulties have dogged all students of this case,
partly as the result of deliberate obfuscation by the USAF,
the Pentagon, and the British Ministry of Defense; partly
because the wide range of alleged witnesses (many of them
demanding anonymity) have told an equally wide range of
conflicting stories; partly because UFO-skeptics have
strenuously sought to distort facts in favor of their own
views; and partly, alas, because some serious researchers
have allowed their prejudices and suspicions (and, in some
cases, sheer lack of judgment) to introduce wholly unnec¬
essary complications.

Credit must always go to the authors of Skycrash 3 for
the immense efforts which they devoted to this case and
for producing the only full-length book we yet have: noth¬
ing can detract from the dedication with which they pur¬
sued an exceptionally difficult investigation. But the book
remains irretrievably marred by the attempt of the authors
to combine their account of the case with a travelogue of
their researches and to report a number of irrelevancies
which range from the naive to the unwittingly comic. (The
ladies’ pursuit of the unfortunate Col. Halt and his teenage
son—see, for example, Chapters 16 and 30, and pages
186-9 and 194-7—is the stuff of which high farce is writ¬
ten. To take merely one example, I doubt that any of us
has much to learn from the account on page 35 of the
unfortunate mishap which two of the authors suffered while
driving their car along a rutted, dirt-track road at a con¬
siderable distance from the supposed UFO landing-site
more than a year later.) The book remains a mine of po¬
tential information—but also a minefield of dubious spec¬
ulation, without so much as an index or an attempted
calendar of events.

The most convincing attempt to give us a connected
narrative, while at the same time fully exposing the diffi¬
culties which beset us, is given by Timothy Good.' This
is indispensable reading for anybody coming fresh to the
case.

Since Above Top Secret was written, we have had the
interesting research undertaken by Dr. Jamison of the State

40

THE UFO REPORT

University of New York. 4 It is surprising that Jamison fails
to indicate any awareness of Good’s book or of the highly
significant investigations undertaken in the United States
by Raymond W. Boeche, 5 but his article is useful in clearly
establishing the USAF chain of command at Bentwaters/
Woodbridge at the relevant time, and in placing beyond
reasonable doubt that it was Halt—the fourth down in that
top echelon—who led a party of his subordinates into Ren-
dlesham Forest on December 29/30, 1980. This provides
further collateral for those of us (myself included) who
have always held, since the release of Halt’s Memorandum
was secured under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act
in June 1983 (two and a half years after the events it re¬
ports), that Halt was an eyewitness to the events of De¬
cember 29/30 and that his memorandum is the key
document. In answer to the question which heads this sec¬
tion, “What happened at Rendlesham?,” I believe that we
are right to take Halt as the one and only first-hand source
whose report is on the official record. All else, important
though much of it is, rests on hearsay and requires the
caution with which we must always approach the second¬
hand.

Is the Halt Memorandum a Truthful
Account?

Halt’s statement to the British Ministry of Defense, signed
on January 13, 1981 (see Figure 2:2) reports the follow¬
ing, roughly a fortnight after the events it describes:

(a) In the small hours of the morning of December 27,
1980 three USAF patrolmen encountered a “strange
glowing object” of not inconsiderable size in a part of
Rendlesham Forest adjoining the “back gate” of the
Woodbridge airbase. [This “back gate” can be confi¬
dently identified as the East Gate in the Figure 2:1.]
The object possessed some of the characteristics of a
structured “vehicle”: it was “metallic in appearance
and triangular in shape,” two to three meters across the
base and roughly two meters high. As the patrolmen

o

DEPARTMENT OF THE AIR FORCE

HCADOUA1TEIR HIT COMSAT IUPAOIT CIOUP (UIAEI)
APO NEWT TOtS I»m

TUPtf TO
ATTN OP,

CD

13 Jar 81

.umo, Unexplained Lights

RAF/CC

1. Early In the morning of 27 Dec 80 (approximately 0300L), two USAF
security police patrolmen saw unusual lights outside the back gate at
RAF Woodbrldge. Thinking an aircraft might have-crashed or been forced
down, they called for permission to go outside the gate to Investigate.

The on-duty flight chief responded and allowed three patrolmen tc pro¬
ceed on foot. The individuals reported seeing a strange glowing object
In the forest. The object was described as being metalic In appearance
and triangular In shape, approximately two to three meters across me
base and approximately two meters high. It Illuminated the entire forest
with a white ltght. The object Itself had a pulsing red light on top and
a bank(s) of blue lights underneath. The object was hovering or on legs.

As the patrolmen approached the object, It maneuvered through the trees
and disappeared. At this time the animals on a nearby farm went into a
frenzy. The object was briefly sighted approximately an hour later near
the back gate.

2. The next day, three depressions 1 1/2" deep and 7" in diameter were
found where the object had been sighted on the ground. The following
night (29 Dec 80) the area was checked for radiation. Beta/gamma readings
of 0.1 mil 11 roentgens were recorded with peak readings In the three de¬
pressions and near the center of the triangle formed by the depressions.

A nearby tree had moderate (.05-.07) readings on the side of the tree
toward the degressions.

3. Later In the night a red sun-like light was seen through the trees.

It moved about and pulsed. At one point It appeared to throw off plowing
particles and then broke Into five separate white objects and then dis¬
appeared. Immediately thereafter, three star-like objects were noticed
In the sky, two objects to the north and one to the south, all cf which
were about 10° off the horizon. The objects moved rapidly in sharp angular
movements and displayed red, green and blue lights. The objects to the
north appeared to be elliptical through an 8-12 power lens. They then
turned to full circles. The objects to the north remained in the sky for
an hour or more. The object to the south was visible for two or three
hours and beamed down a stream of light from time to time. Numerous indivi¬
duals, Including the undersigned, witnessed the activities in paragraphs

Deputy Base Coimiander

Figure 2:2. The Halt Memorandum.

42

THE UFO REPORT

approached it, it maneuvered away from them and dis¬
appeared. An hour later, however, it was briefly seen
again outside the back gate.

(b) “The next day,” three depressions in the ground
were discovered where the object had been sighted.
[“The next day” could conceivably mean the daylight
hours of December 27, or possibly the day of December
28. Some commentators have made heavy weather of
this ambiguity. My own view is that it is wholly unim¬
portant.]

(c) On the night of December 29, Halt and “numer¬
ous individuals” took radiation readings in the area of
the sighting; and later (over a period extending into the
small hours of the morning of December 30) they saw
a succession of complex light-phenomena, both within
the forest and subsequently in the sky.

This, in essence, is all that Halt tells us. There are strong
indications that other, much stranger, things were taking
place on the night of December 29/30, and that the mem¬
orandum is, to say the least, deliberately tight-lipped and
low-key. This has interesting implications on which I shall
comment later. Immediately, however, we have to con¬
sider two possibilities which have been much discussed:
first, that Halt seriously misperceived something quite or¬
dinary (or was even the subject of hallucinations); second,
that he wrote his memorandum as a deliberate piece of
misinformation for the concealment of some wholly mun¬
dane accident or military embarrassment.

Those who want explanations of this kind have sought
either to explain away the events which Halt describes or
to discredit the memorandum on some other grounds. Let
us consider these ploys in turn.

\

Attempts to Explain Away the Memorandum

Over the night of December 25/26, 1980 the re-entry of
space debris, and subsequently a bright meteor, were seen
by many people in the eastern counties of England. Bright
meteors and space debris are sometimes mistaken for

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 43

UFOs. It is always convenient for those who abominate
UFOs to discover that there has been something of the sort
in the immediate (or even rather remote) neighborhood of
an alleged UFO sighting. It has therefore suited some
skeptical commentators (for example, Ian Ridpath at a
meeting of the British UFO Research Association on De¬
cember 10, 1983 and again in the Guardian, on January 5,
1985) to argue that the first event reported by Halt (item
(a) in the above summary) took place in the early hours
of December 26, when there was a brief but conventional
bright light in the heavens, and not on December 27, as
Halt tells us, when there was, alas, nothing important of
an astronomical nature going on.

Efforts have been made to sustain the “meteor hypoth¬
esis” by references to an entry in police records in the
neighboring village of Woodbridge on the morning of
December 26, recording a telephone call from the Wood-
bridge airbase to the effect that they were anxious about
“a light in the forest.” And at least one television docu¬
mentary has dropped the broad hint (by way of visual in¬
nuendo) that the consequent arrival in Rendlesham Forest
of a police car with flashing lights a little later that Boxing
Day morning accounts for at least the first paragraph of
Halt’s memorandum.

A long chapter could be devoted to untangling this pe¬
culiar story, in which one commentator after another has
repeated, apparently without much checking, whatever was
last printed by his predecessors, and in which many alle¬
gations have been made on little documentation. Suffice it
to say that the police found nothing on their two sorties
into Rendlesham Forest on December 26 (according to the
report which Ian Ridpath very creditably obtained from
them in 1983); and that, even if Halt had made the extraor¬
dinary error of mis-dating his “first event” (and Service
officers, if nothing else, are well trained to be meticulous
about dates and times), a police car can hardly be mis¬
taken for a “strange, glowing, triangular object, two to
three meters across the base and two meters high,” skit¬
tering about a pine wood. Finally, the “meteor hypothe¬
sis” leaves utterly unexplained the occurrences which Halt
felt it was his duty to report to the British Ministry of

44 THE UFO REPORT

Defense as having taken place two days later on December
29/30, 1980.

This “second event” has proved something of a prob¬
lem for most commentators. Even those of us who are
inclined to take Halt’s memorandum at its face value find
it surprising: UFOs, like lightning, rarely strike twice at
the same place. But skeptics are faced with a far greater
difficulty. If they are to seize upon that bright meteor as
the likely trigger for some flight of hysterical hallucination
among a sizable number of American servicemen, they
then have a strong temptation to cook the books in favor
of assuming that both the first and second events reported
by Halt took place on the same night, preferably Decem¬
ber 25/26 (or, less plausibly, December 26/27) when there
was not only a recent meteor and/or police car but also,
perhaps, some spirits of the season acting in support of
them!

But very tortuous arguments are needed to sustain this
approach. A thoroughly blinkered view has to be taken of
the strong collateral which exists for the occurrence of
events on two separate occasions (there is ample material
in Above Top Secret 1 and Skyer ash 3 ). And Halt has to be
assumed as totally incompetent about dates and/or as pos¬
sessed of an inexplicable wish to mislead the British Min¬
istry of Defense in a document intended solely for them.
Skeptics have accordingly tended merely to toy with the
“single night” view and to pass rapidly to a search for
some additional “trigger” which can be invoked for the
second occasion.

The front runner in this somewhat breathless search has
been the Orford Ness lighthouse (though the hazard-lights
on a nearby MoD establishment have also sometimes been
invoked). The lighthouse, which is roughly five to six miles
from the likely site of the events of both December 26/27
and 29/30 and on a bearing of between 90 and 100 degrees
or so, can certainly be glimpsed through the pine trees of
Rendlesham Forest—so readily, indeed, that it must seem
like an old friend to anybody who has served at the Wood-
bridge airbase for more than a few days. Its color is white;
it makes one revolution per minute; its flash is five sec¬
onds long; it is as regular as clockwork. The theory of

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 45

those skeptics who wish to invoke it as an explanation is
that Lt.-Col. Halt and “numerous individuals” misper-
ceived this cozy old acquaintance as a complex series of
remarkable light-phenomena, including “a red, sun-like
light” which “moved about and pulsed,” threw off
“glowing particles,” broke into “five separate white ob¬
jects” . . .etc. (see Figure 2:2).

Much ingenuity, verging on the deceitful doctoring of
television film, has been used by those who see the light¬
house as their refuge against the marvelous. Connoisseurs
of tormented explanations should read the enjoyable ac¬
count of these follies (or dishonesties) given by Randles et
al. 3 and Good. 1 One only regrets that Charles Fort, that
assiduous collector of the ridiculous statements made by
“experts,” was not alive to see these choice specimens of
his favorite indoor sport.

Attempts have also been made to explain away the con¬
cluding Sentences of Halt’s memorandum in which he de¬
scribes some prolonged phenomena in the sky at a very
late stage in the morning hours of December 30, 1980. I
happen to share at least some of the doubts of the skeptics
about these relatively unexciting events toward the end of
Halt’s unusually busy night. It seems possible that these
belated celestial objects were, indeed, bright stars. . . .
Perhaps Halt and his “numerous individuals,” emerging
from the most momentous occasion of their lives, were
somewhat conditioned to see wonders in the skies where
possibly none existed—just as I, groping my way into Pic¬
cadilly from a Royal Academy exhibition of the Post-
Impressionists a year or two ago, continued for a while to
see trees and even buses pulsating with the extraordinary
energies which Vincent van Gogh had, on behalf of us all,
perceived in Provence a century before. But in conceding
this point (if concession it is) I think it should be stressed
that, at this point in their argument, our worried skeptical
colleagues have already had to advance an extraordinary
hotch-potch of explanations: space debris, a bright me¬
teor, a police car, drink and drugs, a lighthouse, other
lights on the coast, dear old Sirius . . .

Occam, you will remember, urged us to cut away un¬
necessary complications in our attempts to explain phe-

46

THE UFO REPORT

nomena and to look for the simplest explanation. The
simplest explanation of Halt’s memorandum is that he was
reporting—as precisely as wondrous events permit—what
he and “numerous individuals” encountered on Decem¬
ber 29/30, together with such facts as he had been able to
ascertain from his subordinates about the occurrences of
December 26/27.

But if you cannot “explain away,” the next most useful
step is to discredit—a process somewhat analogous to that
old lawyer’s saying, “No case; abuse the plaintiff’s attor¬
ney.” Let us consider the discreditors.

Attempts to Discredit the Memorandum

In June 1985 I attended a meeting of the Committee for
the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal
(CSICOP) held at London University in Gower Street. It
has done sterling work in exposing fraud, gullibility and
misperception in many areas of superstition, and it is
greatly to be valued on this account. It also has its own
shabby record of cooking the books when faced with any¬
thing truly remarkable which appears to breach the “con¬
tinuity of nature,” as understood in its own curiously
nineteenth-century terms.

At that June meeting I discussed the Rendlesham case
with a notable UFO-skeptic (whose name I won’t mention
lest it involves him in a suit for damages!). “Halt,” he
said, “is an overgrown boy scout. Everybody knows that
you cannot trust a word he says once he’s got involved
with some freaky obsession.”

This was not my first encounter with attempted
character-assassination: former Whitehall officials (of
whom I am one) are familiar with this kind of thing among
politicians, journalists, and even civil servants. What
struck me on that CSICOP occasion was that not one word
was uttered by my informant which bore directly on the
Rendlesham case; he rested himself entirely on seeking to
discredit the unfortunate officer who had the glum respon¬
sibility of recording the facts as he saw them. The attempt
struck me as crude—but probably effective. How many

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 47

others, I wondered, had now written off the Rendlesham
case on nothing more than this? As it happens, I have
every reason to believe from many other sources that Halt
is a reliable USAF officer and a valued colleague: his pro¬
motion to full Colonel in November 1983, while still serv¬
ing at Bent waters/Woodbridge, is testimony enough. I
mention the CSICOP incident merely to convey how per¬
ilously easy it is to get damaging innuendo about the place
if one’s motive is to rubbish remarkable reports. Naturally,
I discounted the innuendo entirely, and I continue to do
so.

Other, less crude attempts have been made to discredit
the Halt memorandum, and by people who are genuinely
seeking the truth (and who must therefore be forgiven!).
The following are the main contenders, selected from the
references at the end of this chapter. In each case the Halt
memorandum is interpreted by the “discreditors” as in¬
tended to conceal some non-UFO event by way of offering
a cover-story plus disinformation. On this theory, Halt
(perhaps under instruction) was trying to divert attention
from:

(a) Something nasty which the military had lost in Ren¬
dlesham Forest (nuclear? chemical? biological?).

(b) Something secret which the military had lost in
Rendlesham Forest (a new quick-descent helicopter? A
pilotless drone of astounding new abilities? Space-gear/
space-specimens? Or the Stealth aircraft?).

(c) Something intrusive from the “Other Side” (a
crashed Bear or Badger? A crashed pilotless probe?).

As a former Defense official, who had responsibilities
for designing and frequently reviewing the procedures for
handling major mishaps (e.g. the possible loss of nuclear
contraptions, the crash of aircraft, the “going-spare” of
other troublesome items), I have no doubt at all that we
and our American allies would never have been so foolish
(or irresponsible) as to conceal our problems by propagat¬
ing peculiar stories of a kind hard to believe. We would
either have kept the whole thing secret (if the public hadn’t
heard of it and we were also satisfied that no public dam-

48

THE UFO REPORT

age would ensue), or we would have conspicuously cor¬
doned off the area and braced ourselves for the inevitable
questions. In neither case would we have engineered the
release of some strange narrative to, for example, the au¬
thors of Skycrash 3 by way of anonymous airmen in local
pubs.

But there is a far more convincing argument than any¬
thing which can be uttered from the suspect throat of a
former Defense official! Halt’s memorandum was sent to
the Ministry of Defense; it was not given any public cir¬
culation; it was clearly never intended for public release;
and it was more than two years before it leaked into the
public domain. It can, therefore, never have been intended
as a piece of disinformation. (And I cannot resist adding
that if good officials had really wanted to conceal some¬
thing, the last thing to cross their minds would have been
to stimulate the susceptibilities of over-excitable ufolo¬
gists!)

Sol reach the conclusion that Halt’s memorandum was
not designed to serve any ulterior purpose; that it was the
carefully considered document of a wholly competent
USAF officer; and that we must take it at its face value.

The Halt Tape

Late in 1984, more than a year after the Halt Memorandum
had been made public via the U.S. Freedom of Information
Act, the officer who succeeded Halt in the chain of command
at BentwatersAVoodbridge, Col. Sam Morgan, released a
copy of a tape-recording which he said had been made by
Halt during the events of December 29/30, 1980 and which
had subsequently come into his (Mohan’s) possession. Mor¬
gan chose to send this tape to a ufologist—Manchester solic¬
itor Harry Harris—who had, from time to time, associated
himself with the investigations made by the authors of Sky-
crash. Harry Harris, in turn, made this tape-recording avail¬
able to the public. Copies of it have been on open sale ever
since. The publicly obtainable copy is of poor audio quality,
but a written transcript of it, made by Ian Ridpath and Harry
Harris, is also on sale. 6

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 49

There has been much speculation about this tape, in¬
cluding, inevitably, many guesses about the possible mo¬
tives and reliability of the several hands through which it
has passed. Those who are doubtful about its authenticity
have tended to adopt one of two theories. The first, fa¬
vored by those who regard the Halt Memorandum itself as
deliberate disinformation designed to divert attention from
a military mishap, tends to argue that the tape is “more
of the same kind,” that is, that it has been put into cir¬
culation by Defense authorities, using as their channel the
relatively low-level (and therefore, if necessary, disavow-
able) Sam Morgan, together with a ufologist who could be
counted upon to give it further currency among ufological
colleagues. The second (somewhat scurrilous) view is that
a person or persons unnamed saw some possible gain to
themselves in disseminating this irresistibly interesting
electronic article.

c Both of these views imply, of course, that the tape is a
fake. And any serious commentator would be failing in
his duty if he neglected this possibility. I, personally, dis¬
miss the “disinformation” theory on' much the same
grounds which persuade me that Halt’s Memorandum was
not intended as a cover-up. By the time of the tape’s re¬
lease into the public domain the events of December 1980
were already nearly four years past. The British MoD, the
Pentagon and the USAF had weathered without difficulty
the minor rumpus attending the publication of Halt’s
Memorandum in mid-1983. Who in their senses on the
official side—whatever the motives—would have wanted to
risk stirring up a renewed row in late 1984 by putting into
public circulation a sensational new piece of information,
whether faked or not? The theory strikes me as simply
absurd.

Excluding the Defense authorities on these grounds, did
somebody else fake the tape? Ufology (like psychical re¬
search and, indeed, many other fields) is open, alas, to
the depredations of practical jokers, of a wholly terrestrial
kind, even when monetary gain is not in question. We
know, for example, thanks to the diligent researches of
Jenny Randles and others, that a reputable astronomer
chortled quietly in his study for three decades after putting

50

THE UFO REPORT

into circulation under a pseudonym an account of a close
encounter in Scotland which fazed quite a number of ufol¬
ogists. We also know that whoever faked the remnants of
the Piltdown Man went to his grave with nothing more to
reward him than whatever perverse satisfaction he may
have felt at diddling the paleontological establishment. We
need not look for monetary gain in suspecting a possible
hoax; human nature is quite enough to be going on with.
It is far from ridiculous to wonder whether somebody,
somewhere, faked the “Halt Tape”; and the fact that some
small profit may have been made by selling the alleged
copies has understandably reinforced the critical observa¬
tions of at least some commentators.

In the circumstances, the best we can do with the “Halt
Tape” is to use the well-tried methods of research histo¬
rians and investigative journalists, that is, to ask ourselves
two questions: first, is the tape internally consistent?; sec¬
ond, how does it relate to any primary document (in this
case the Halt Memorandum)?

As for internal consistency, two points must immedi¬
ately be stressed. The first is that the tape made available
to us on public sale cannot possibly be a full recording of
any original. It runs for only about eighteen minutes
whereas the events it describes—on the time-readings
which it distinctly records—extend over several hours. The
second, somewhat daunting, fact is that the tape is inter¬
rupted by two short passages, one of piano music (!) and
one of a voice uttering (as far as I can judge) the cryptic
words, “He took this long to dock,” both of which differ
greatly in their acoustic quality from the rest of the re¬
cording. I can understand the position of anybody who
considers that these points are sufficient grounds for dis¬
missing the tape from further consideration. My own view,
however, is that the second of them is, if anything, para¬
doxical evidence that the tape is genuine: any committed
faker could easily have eliminated these traces that the
tape he was using for reproducing Halt’s original had been
employed earlier for other purposes (including the record¬
ing of some favorite piece of piano music!). The first
point—the abbreviation of the tape—could well be ex¬
plained by some understandable decision on the part of

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 51

those who released it that there is a limit to what listeners
will put up with! My own suspicion, however, is that the
abbreviation was made, possibly by Halt himself, to ex¬
clude material which, though honestly perceived (not only
by Halt but by other witnesses), was far too bizarre to be
left on record (and I shall return to this point). But which¬
ever of these views you take, the abbreviation does not in
itself discredit the tape.

As for compatibility with the primary document, Halt’s
Memorandum, the tape seems to me to stand up to any
test one cares to apply: it covers about the same time-span
(taking the time-readings it contains); it deals with the
same events; and it describes them in the same sequence.
It has the kind of messy, half-audible quality which one
might expect from the “electronic notebook’’ which any
sensible officer takes with him to the scene of an incident
on which he may later have to make a written report (and
which he never expects will be listened to by anybody
except himself). And—apart from the two brief interrup¬
tions discussed above—it has what BBC engineers de¬
scribe as “exterior acoustic,” that is, it was manifestly
made in the open air (together with a large supporting
cast). Those who wish to regard it as a fake will have to
envisage a very elaborate piece of deception and to explain
why they think it was undertaken.

Having exercised the caution due to evidence which
lacks the official stamp given to Halt’s Memorandum, I
personally accept the tape as authentic. It adds useful de¬
tails to our knowledge of the events of December 29/30,
1980, and it puts beyond reasonable doubt that Halt was
following up occurrences which had been reported to him
from the night of December 26/27. My only reservation
is that I suspect the tape has been deliberately abbreviated
to exclude the weirdest part of the encounter.

Other Witnesses, Other Allegations

Shortly after the publication of Sky crash in the late sum¬
mer of 1984 I made a visit to the Rendlesham area and
talked with several of the local characters which the book

52 THE UFO REPORT

identifies. Halt, of course, had already departed, and so
had his RAF counterpart, Squadron Leader Moreland
(technically the resident British “landlord” of the Bent-
waters/Woodbridge complex and the officer who trans¬
mitted Halt’s Memorandum to the British Ministry of
Defense).

I found that USAF families on the base had only a dim
and hearsay recollection that something odd had happened
on those December nights of nearly four years before.
(Such is the speed of turn-over of military personnel and
the shortness of human memory.) Mrs. Boast, whose fam¬
ily live on a farm quite close to the likely site of the UFO
visitation and who are described in Skyer ash as “fright¬
ened people,” terrorized into silence by “strange” visi¬
tors, told me that she and her husband had little to tell
except the memory of something bright in the sky, which
could well have been the meteor of December 25/26. She
said that she was not frightened and had never been per¬
secuted except by ufologists. Later, in the pub at Butley,
I chatted with the two elderly brothers (a pair of friendly
and entertaining “characters”) who are described in Sky-
crash as having suffered mysterious disturbances to their
television in December 1980. I gathered that they were
still having the same sort of problem from time to time,
the TV set being in the nature of a much prized vintage
article.

I came away from Suffolk with only two vital pieces of
information: first, a vivid impression of the Rendlesham
area from which, helped by Halt’s Tape, I feel confident
in marking on the map (Figure 2:1) the route probably
taken by Halt on December 29/30, 1980; second, the rec¬
ollection of some superb oysters in the village of Orford.
I cannot subscribe to any view that local residents saw
much of significance in December 1980 or that they live
under obscure threats from obscure authorities (without so
much as mentioning the matter to their lively and energetic
Member of Parliament).

Much more important are the many accounts of the
events of December 29/30, 1980 which have been given
to investigators by a range of alleged USAF witnesses. 1 - 3
These accounts are, of course, wholly without the official

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 53

stamp carried by the Halt Memorandum, and it is impos¬
sible to apply to them the kind of analysis which persuades
me that the Halt Tape is authentic. They tend, moreover,
to contradict each other on points of detail. In total, how¬
ever, they add up to a formidable body of testimony to the
occurrence of highly bizarre events which none of the wit¬
nesses had anything to gain by describing—and probably
something to lose.

We are told by these witnesses of interferences to the
functioning of military vehicles and equipment; of a
dense yellow mist or semi-substantial disk which formed
in the forest (like a “transparent aspirin tablet,” said one
witness with inadvertent whimsy); of the sudden transfor¬
mation of this “proto-form” into a large domed or saucer¬
shaped structure following a spectacular display of lights
(one account calls this new object “tremendous” and
expresses surprise that it was able to fit into the clearing);
of silver-suited entities suspended in a shaft of light;
of a local distortion of perception which caused shadows
to appear to move independently of the objects casting
them . . .

This sensational scenario, which reads like a drug-
induced nightmare, is not mentioned in Halt’s Memoran¬
dum and forms no part of his tape-recording. Its absence
from the latter in particular has been thought by some to
be damning evidence against its “real” occurrence. But
the tape, as already mentioned, is greatly abbreviated. It
also moves from one time-check to another (recorded in
Halt’s voice) at a very uneven rate. There is, in particular,
one passage of nearly an hour—from 1:48 a.m. to 2:44
a.m.—which passes in a mere three to four minutes and
contains an extraordinary discontinuity. At one moment,
which can be put at roughly 2 a.m. or a little earlier, Halt
reports a remarkable object:

“ ... It looks like an eye winking at you. Still moving
from side to side. And when you put the starscope on
it, it’s like this thing has a hollow center, a dark center,
like the pupil of an eye looking at you, winking. And it
flashes so bright . . . that it almost bums your eye.”

54

THE UFO REPORT

There follows what the transcribers of the tape call “a
garbled security communication” and then Halt immedi¬
ately resumes, in a remarkably steady voice, with rela¬
tively unexciting information that has nothing to do with
the breathless wonder of that great winking “eye.” He
says:

“We’ve passed the farmer’s house and across into the

next field ...”

Half a minute later Halt gives a time-check of 2:44 a.m.
For the rest of the tape, events are reported in somewhat
low key. All are of the kind which determined critics
have interpreted as the inadvertent—or even deliberate-
misperception of the Orford Ness lighthouse and of the
bright stars in the sky (and which I, personally, would not
go to the barricades to defend against that suggestion).

Some of these other witnesses have given us not only
their extraordinary UFO visions but also the suggestion
that General Gordon Williams (the Bentwaters/Wood-
bridge supremo) hastily joined Halt’s posse in the small
hours of December 30; that he communicated with the
“silver-suited entities”; that members of U.S. Intelli¬
gence were also present; that cinefilm was taken; that this
film was flown immediately to USAF headquarters in Ger¬
many; that exceptional steps were taken to swear all wit¬
nesses to silence.

No collateral has ever been obtained for these other al¬
legations, despite inquiries which I (and more significantly
Lord Hill-Norton, former Chief of the Defense Staff) put
to the Ministry of Defense, and notwithstanding the de¬
termined attempts of Ray Boeche 5 to secure information
through Senator Exon, a member of the Senate Armed
Services Committee. Nor has any of us been able to verify
the persistent rumor that radar traces exist of the Rendle-
sham events. On all these matters I think we are bound to
remain reserved—noting, however, that the Defense au¬
thorities, both here and in the U.S.A., have given unmis¬
takable signs of unease, prevarication and downright
dishonesty.

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 55
So What Really Happened at Rendlesham?

My own conclusions are as follows.

On two occasions in late December 1980 USAF person¬
nel serving at Bentwaters/Woodbridge came face-to-face
with the UFO phenomenon in its most dramatic form. The
Halt Memorandum and the Halt Tape put this among the
few cases which cannot be denied.

The events encountered were weird almost beyond be¬
lief—though quite consistent with many other reports we
have had of the UFO phenomenon. These events were
only partially “substantial,” but “real” nonetheless.
Something “manifested” which was absurdly large for the
forest clearing in which it appeared and the spacing of the
pine trees among which it skittered. We have little evi¬
dence of serious damage to the environment but every in¬
dication of a profound effect on the humans involved.

The authorities—as often before—had no idea what to
do with this startling intrusion into human affairs. Perhaps
photographs were attempted; perhaps they were sent to
Defense authorities “up the line”—but the only trace we
have subsequently had 5 is that they were probably
“fogged” and that nobody will acknowledge them! The
tree-damage and radiation traces have long since disap¬
peared. .

The unfortunate Col. Halt, faced with the burden of
having encountered the miraculous, and conscious of hav¬
ing caused a rumpus on British territory (a fact about
which he has shown himself to be courteously concerned),
consulted his British “landlord” (Squadron Leader More¬
land). After the lapse of a fortnight he cleared his yard¬
arm by sending a curtailed report to the British Ministry
of Defense (via Moreland). (He may, of course, have sent
other reports to his own superiors, but I doubt that we
shall ever see them.)

The MoD, as often before (I speak with feeling as a
former member of that troubled Department of State!),
were merely embarrassed by this latest outbreak of ghostly
occurrences and/or the evidence that USAF colleagues had
gone out of their minds. They filed a report and forgot it.
In 1983, some clerk in the department, quite unaware that

56

THE UFO REPORT

anybody might care (because nobody had ever seemed to
attach much importance to this kind of thing) released
Halt’s report to American friends who seemed to be inter¬
ested for obscure reasons of their own.

British officials and Ministers—with their accustomed
genius for evading embarrassing matters—have stalled ever
since. Senator Exon in the United States (far more re¬
sponsive to questions from the public) took a hard look at
the matter but was horrified by what turned up: members
of the USAF, and even the denizens of the Pentagon and
the Intelligence community, had clearly gone soft in the
head about ghost stories. Goodness knew what damage
this might do if the Russians (or, worse, the American
public) got wind of this evidence of vulnerability to su¬
perstition. Better check out that Boeche fellow . . . Better
clam up . . .

But the U.S. is a more open society than Britain. Not
only were the Citizens Against UFO Secrecy (CAUS) able
to force out the Halt Memorandum (a step inconceivable
in the U.K.), but some members of the USAF were de¬
termined that the events of December 1980 should not
remain buried. Witnesses were prepared to tell their sto¬
ries; a few senior officers took the responsibility of uneas¬
ily backing them; and one of them, Sam Morgan, released
the Halt Tape. Perhaps some last-minute failure of nerve
led to the serious expurgation of the tape (as I have con¬
jectured above); and perhaps somebody may now take
courage and give us the tape in full. But more has already
been provided to us in this case than in most others.

What does the case tell us? Not much more, perhaps,
than many other “high strangeness” occurrences—but
with the fairly rare collateral of an authenticated document
and a much wider range than usual of witness reports. It
confirms what some of us have long felt—that the UFO
phenomenon is utterly “real,” but something other than
wholly “nuts-and-bolts”; that it is, indeed, a phenomenon
at the very edge of human comprehension, more analo¬
gous to the apparitions and poltergeists of psychical re¬
search than to the space-vehicles and space-brothers which
(some decades ago) I would have been glad to welcome.
If I have been unkind to the authors of Skycrash, may I

UFO Lands in Suffolk—and That’s Official! 57

now make amends by quoting their conjecture [page 93]
that the UFO experience is possibly some “incomprehen¬
sible meeting with an alien phenomenon which the mind
can only embody in symbolic terms.”

The Rendlesham case also confirms, at least for me, that
governments and their official agencies are undoubtedly
engaged in concealment and obfuscation—but that the
cover-up is of ignorance and unease. (This was certainly
the game which I felt it necessary to play, myself, during
my own term as an official of the Ministry of Defense from
1949 to 1977.)

Finally, I draw the conclusion that even very sensible
ufologists are capable of utterly confusing their own in¬
quiries by pursuing dark suspicions of anybody with a uni¬
form or an official title, rather than examining the strange
facts which come their way. They might be surprised to
know how expert and well informed ufologists look to
unfortunate officials sitting behind a Whitehall desk with
the job (competing with many others) of responding to the
public about inexplicable events!

Whatever “intruded” at Bentwaters/Woodbridge in De¬
cember 1980 has possibly done so often before in human
history. It will probably continue to do so—in its own time
and according to its own inscrutable purposes. It seems to
have been manifesting with increasing frequency and in¬
creasing elaboration in recent years; it is, indeed, nearly
shouting its head off . . . and it may be important to our
species to come to terms with it. If Col. Halt has done
nothing except to draw attention to it in undeniable form,
we shall probably have to put up a statue to him some day
in some leafy square.

References

1. Good, Timothy: Above Top Secret, Sidgwick &
Jackson, London 1987, Chapter 4 (pages 78-95).

2. Fawcett, Lawrence and Greenwood, Barry: Clear
Intent, Prentice-Hall, New Jersey 1984.

3. Butler, Brenda; Street, Dot and Randles, Jenny:
Skycrash, Neville Spearman, 1984.

4. Jamison, Benton: “A Fire in the Forest: New light on

58

THE UFO REPORT

the Rendlesham Landing,” International UFO
Reporter, Vol. 13, no. 5, September/October 1988.

5. Boeche, Raymond W.: “Bentwaters: What do we
know now?,” MUFON 1986 UFO Symposium
Proceedings, June 1986.

6. A copy of the Halt Tape and transcript is available
from Quest Publications International Ltd, 15 Pickard
Court, Temple Newsam, Leeds, LS15 9AY.

3

The English Corn Circles
in 1988

GEORGE WINGFIELD

George Wingfield was educated at Eton College and
Trinity College Dublin, graduating in 1966 with an
M.A. Hons, degree in Natural Sciences.

He worked briefly at the Royal Greenwich Obser¬
vatory, Herstmonceux, on stellar spectra and the
Earth’s magnetism. He currently works for IBM
U.K. Ltd. in the field of Systems Engineering.

George Wingfield became interested in the Com
Circles phenomenon on August 8, 1987, after visit¬
ing Westbury, Wiltshire, where a number of Circle
formations had recently appeared. This also led to
an interest in the related subject of Ufology.

During 1988 the strange phenomenon of the English Com
Circles developed once more in the most unexpected fash¬
ion. Since the early 1980s when the press first drew public
attention to the Circles, a furious controversy has raged as
to their cause. There were those who considered that they
had to be hoaxes. There were those who thought they must
be caused by the downwash of helicopters, and others who
were convinced they were made by animals chasing in
circles in the crop. Some insisted that they were meteor¬
ological effects. And, naturally enough, there were those
who suggested that they were made by UFOs.

The more serious investigators of the phenomenon in
this country got together to form a Circles investigation
group a few years ago. Among the five original members
were Colin Andrews, an electrical engineer from Andover
who works for the Test Valley Council; Pat Delgado from

59

60

THE UFO REPORT

Alresford, Hampshire, who once worked for NASA in the
U.S.A.; and Dr. Terence Meaden, a prominent meteor¬
ologist who runs the Tornado and Storm Research Orga¬
nization (TORRO) from his home in Bradford-on-Avon,
Wiltshire.

To these researchers it soon became abundantly clear
that the Circles could not possibly be produced by heli¬
copters or wild animals, and that their sheer numbers,
going back over the years, precluded hoaxing as an expla¬
nation, although just a few Circles were recognized as
hoaxes. Certain features of the Circles which were regu¬
larly seen would moreover be impossible to hoax. So what
then was the solution to this mysterious problem?

There were certainly no easy answers. From the outset,
Dr. Meaden was convinced that the Circles were caused
by atmospheric vortices of wind, and he has maintained
that view until recently. Although he has propounded this
theory at great length in The Journal of Meteorology,' it
is fair to say that there are many meteorologists who do
not support his standpoint.

None of the other four members of the Circles investi¬
gation group agreed with Dr. Meaden’s meteorological ex¬
planation, and subsequently the group split away from him
in 1988. Colin Andrews and Pat Delgado now head a larger
team. Circles Phenomenon Research (CPR), and their
book. Circular Evidence , 2 was published in 1989.

Their approach to the Circles phenomenon is much more
widely based. In addition to a wealth of conventional sci¬
entific data which has been amassed, they have researched
evidence of a UFO connection and also investigated the
possibility that the Circles are caused by “Earth Ener¬
gies,” a concept that has been developed by other scien¬
tists and archaeologists. This subject is often referred to
as “Earth Mysteries.”

Unfortunately, serious study of the Circles along these
lines is frequently ridiculed by the ill-informed and by
those who are anxious to rubbish explanations which con¬
flict with their own. Their usual method of avoiding dis¬
cussion of uncomfortable facts about the Circles which do
not suit their theories is to try discrediting their adversary
with charges like: “But he is a UFO believer.” This is,

61

The English Corn Circles in 1988

of course, intended to invoke the public’s preconceived
idea of UFOs—that peddled by the tabloid press—as solid
circular spacecraft flown by little green men. This is a
cheap trick. The UFO phenomenon is something far more
complex and subtle than this simplistic concept, and it
would be a foolish man indeed who maintained that the
UFO phenomenon, whatever its nature, was nothing but
an illusion.

Certainly the Circles remain as much of an enigma as
ever, but 1988 brought many new clues which gave con¬
siderable support to both the Earth Mysteries interpreta¬
tion and to the UFO connection. Quite possibly these two
approaches have much in common, and there readers must
make their own judgment.

Circle Characteristics

The Com Circles may have been with us for many years,
but they have hardly been a regular feature of agricultural
life in this country. They appeared in small numbers in
the late 1970s and early 1980s, and we have a few reports
from earlier years, although some farmers claim to have
seen Circles in their fields as long ago as the 1930s and
1940s. A woman whose husband farmed in Hampshire
forty years ago remembers seeing Circles then; the coun¬
try people would not hand-reap them, since they thought
them “uncanny and of devilish origin.” 3 But unfortu¬
nately such reports cannot be verified since there is no
photographic evidence to confirm that this was indeed the
same phenomenon.

Since 1980 the number of Circles found each year has
risen slowly but steadily to nearly 100 reported in 1988.
The Circles themselves vary in size from about five to
sixty feet in diameter and the crop within is flattened in a
spiral swirl. The crop in question is usually wheat or bar¬
ley, though some Circles have been found-in rye, oats,
rape-seed, and occasionally long grass. The Circles occur
between late May and September when the crop is grow¬
ing and has reached a fair height. Most strikingly, the flat¬
tened com is laid with an almost geometric precision,

62

THE UFO REPORT

leaving the standing crop at the perimeter upright and vir¬
tually untouched. The plants are almost invariably bent,
but not broken, so that they lie flat and continue to grow
horizontally. Sometimes, though, the force is such that a
few plants are ejected from the ground and flung out of
the Circle. Very often the swirled com is layered, with the
lower plants pointing at different angles to those above; an
effect that would be very hard to produce artificially. Most
of the Circles are slightly elliptical in shape, although this
is rarely apparent to the untrained eye. And one never
finds indentations in the ground indicating that any solid
object has landed, though a Circle found at Childrey, Ox¬
fordshire, in September 1986, exhibited a clean-cut cylin¬
drical hole, nine inches deep and a foot across, from which
the soil had vanished.

The most noticeable feature of the English Circles, un¬
like the few which have been reported from abroad, as far
as we know, is that they occur frequently not only in mul¬
tiples, but in elaborate formations. There have been dou¬
blets, triplets, quadruplets, and quintuplets, some of which
are illustrated in the accompanying diagrams. There are
also ringed Circles and double-ringed Circles. But let us
deal with what was found in 1988.

The Meteorological Explanation

Shortly before the first Circles of 1988 appeared at the end
of May, a conference of meteorologists in Oxford was told
by Dr. Meaden that he had “solved the mystery of the
Crop Circles.” They were caused by “descending atmo¬
spheric vortices” or “stationary whirlwinds,” the math¬
ematics of which were well understood. This claim was
reported in the national press and no doubt widely be¬
lieved by many people. It was said that Dr. Meaden was
quite adamant that his explanation of the Circles was cor¬
rect. Nevertheless it is fair to say that his claim will most
likely come to be seen as ranking with the 1956 declara¬
tion of the late Astronomer Royal, Professor Richard
Woolley, that space travel was “utter bilge,” not long be-

The English Corn Circles in 1988 63

fore artificial satellites and astronauts in orbit round the
Earth became routine.

Dr. Meaden stated that the Circles are formed by the
action of atmospheric vortices or “stationary whirlwinds”
and it is quite easy to see why he should think that was
the case. 14 The swirl of the flattened crop in the Circles
carries the unmistakable signature of a rotational force,
and if a rotating column of air is artificially produced in a
wind tunnel fitted with equally spaced woollen strands,
similar swirl patterns to those seen in single Circles in the
cornfields can be produced.

Unfortunately, that is just about where the similarity
ends, and there are very good reasons for believing that
the force which acts on the com is not atmospheric at all.
First, the precise geometry of the Circles, which often
consists of patterns of considerable complexity, is unlike
anything produced by meteorological effects. All other ro¬
tational winds, such as whirlwinds and tornados, move
across the countryside leaving a swathe of destruction and,
usually, anything but neat markings.

Second, even if one could produce a stationary rotating
column of air, it seems certain it could not produce the
effect which is observed. The precise patterns indicate that
some force has acted directly on the plants themselves
causing them to bend through ninety degrees. If one uses
normal manual force to make such a bend, the result is
either that the stalk buckles (so that the upper part of the
plant dies) or else the plant returns to its original vertical
position without any permanent bend being effected. In
the Circles the plants remain bent, growing horizontally.
One has only to see the effect of a strong atmospheric
force, such as the downdraft of a helicopter, on com or
grass, to realize that high-speed air simply would not pro¬
duce this effect on plants, even if it could be manipulated
like a precision drill, as one is required to believe.

Third, why did these “stationary whirlwinds” seem¬
ingly reappear around 1980, and occur in increasing num¬
bers throughout this decade? This is hardly indicative of a
meteorological effect. There is also the fact that the Cir¬
cles without any doubt whatsoever have evolved over the

64

THE UFO REPORT

last few years in a way that is totally unlike any other
natural phenomenon. The increasing size and complexity
of the patterns cannot be dismissed merely by saying that
we only see all these now because we are looking for
Circles, which was not the case in previous years. That
simply is not true, as I hope to demonstrate in this chapter.

The First 1988 Circles

On the morning of June 4 the first set of 1988 Circles
appeared, overnight as usual, in the middle of the great
punchbowl below Cheesefoot Head near Winchester.
Clearly visible from the road above, three thirty-foot-
diameter Circles, all swirled clockwise, had formed in a
neat equilateral triangle in the barley crop. This was a
formation seen just once before at Bratton, Wiltshire, in
1982. At Cheesefoot Head, Circles had appeared regularly
each summer since 1981 in varying formations, with the
sole exception of 1984. The landowner, Lieutenant-
Commander Henry Bruce, and his son Peverill had dog¬
gedly believed that the Circles were the work of hoaxers,
but although one Circle found here in 1986 was proved to
have been a hoax, this belief has become increasingly dif¬
ficult to sustain. The 1988 triple set was in barley which
had no “tram-lines” (the usual parallel paths made by the
tractor wheels) that could allow intruders or hoaxers ac¬
cess without trace. The Bruces had zealously excluded all
potential trespassers, and no visible tracks through the crop
could be seen leading to these Circles.

Four days later an identical triple Circle formation was
found six miles away in barley at a remote location near
Corhampton, although it is possible that these were formed
up to three weeks earlier. These Circles proved even more
remarkable. They were not visible from the nearest road,
and were accidentally discovered by Mr. Hall, who farms
this land, when he walked into them (along a “tramline”)
while inspecting his crop. Two of these Circles were lo¬
cated in such a way that they were exactly tangential to
adjoining tramlines on both sides, with the third Circle
centered exactly on one of the tramlines, as can be seen

65

The English Corn Circles in 1988

from Photo 3. The “locating” of Circle formations like
this is frequently found and gives reason to believe that
the referencing of the Circles to artificial features, such as
“tramlines,” has been intelligently contrived. Although
there are no set rules which govern this aspect of the Cir¬
cles, it is definitely something that cannot be ignored.

The most remarkable thing about this Circle set only
became apparent some days later. The crop, which had
originally been swirled flat, grew upward again to almost
its previous level; but in doing so, it appeared to undergo
some peculiar sort of change which is apparent only in the
aerial photograph (Photo 3). Each of the three Circles
could be seen to be “imprinted” with markings which
divide it into seven concentric rings and forty-eight sepa¬
rate sectors. This was a major new CPR discovery, and at
the time the effect seemed totally inexplicable. But it did
strongly suggest that whatever force had caused the com
to fall might remain in situ, producing other more subtle
effects under certain circumstances. And it seemed quite
impossible to explain in terms of “stationary vortices.”

The Double-ringers

In August 1987 there had appeared near Bratton in Wilt¬
shire a double-ringed Circle which was unique. It con¬
sisted of a circle, fifty-five feet in diameter, in which the
wheat was flattened in a clockwise swirl, surrounded by
two concentric flattened rings, each about three feet wide.
These rings were separated from each other and from the
central circle by belts of standing wheat about eight feet
wide that were quite untouched. Most remarkably, the com
had been flattened anticlockwise in the enclosed ring, and
clockwise in the other one. Nothing like this has been
reported previously anywhere in the world and this served
to confirm the evolving nature of the Com Circles.

In June 1988 three of these double-ringers, of similar
size and configuration to the 1987 one, appeared in Hamp¬
shire within a fortnight. Again the mysterious and extraor¬
dinary nature of the Com Circles was exhibited, for anyone
who cared to look, in a way that left little doubt in the

66

THE UFO REPORT

minds of most open-minded people that these things were
intelligently produced. The very precise geometric pat¬
tern showed nothing of the randomness which we asso¬
ciate with natural phenomena, yet the obvious alterna¬
tive that the Circles were man-made seemed untenable
too.

The first of the 1988 double-ringers was found on June
11 on the Longwood Estate in barley, about three-quarters
of a mile south-east of the Cheesefoot Head triple. Be¬
sides the large double-ringer there were five additional
single Circles (of fifteen feet diameter or less) nearby,
seemingly scattered about a line running north-west to
south-east through the main Circle (Photo 4). Circles
had been found here in the previous year, but nothing
quite like this prodigy, which was only the second of its
kind ever seen. Then, some days later, the Army Air
Corps at Middle Wallop contacted Colin Andrews to in¬
form him that another double-ringer had appeared in a
wheat field at Charity Down, thirteen miles north-west,
not far from their airfield (Photo 5). As with quintuple
Circles which had appeared at Charity Down in 1985,
this had been spotted from the air, and from that time
one has been aware that the military maintain an interest
in the Circles, which they regularly photograph from their
helicopters.

On June 27 I flew, together with Timothy Good and
Ralph Noyes, in a light plane piloted by Leslie Banks with
a view to photographing the 1988 Circles which we knew
about. Our first target was, naturally, Cheesefoot Head,
where we expected to find just the triple set of Circles
which had been the first of the season. We were amazed
to find not only that set but a huge new double-ringer
Circle which had appeared in the punchbowl two days ear¬
lier and which we had not heard of (Photo 6 and Figure
3:1). This was of similar size (100 feet in diameter across
the outer ring) to the other two, and had formed in that
part of the punchbowl nearest to the main road (A272)
where some of the research group had kept vigil on vari¬
ous nights earlier in the month. Needless to say, nothing
had been seen on those occasions.

The English Corn Circles in 1988

67

Figure 3:1. Cheesefoot Head Corn Circles: (A) a Triple, June 4,
1988; (B) Double-ringer, June 25, 1988. (The separation between
the formations is not to scale.)

Eye-Witness Accounts

The elusive nature of the Circles has always been one as¬
pect of the mystery which is most frustrating. Despite the
increasing number of Circles that are found, no one ever
seems to have seen one actually being formed, with two
notable exceptions. This would appear to indicate that most
Circles are formed at night, and also that they form ex¬
tremely rapidly, within, say, ten to twenty seconds. On
the two occasions when witnesses claim to have seen a
Circle form, nothing was visible in the air above the site,
though in one case a high-pitched humming sound was
heard.

In the summer of 1983, Melvyn Bell, who lives near
Bratton, says that while out riding a horse at dusk near
there, he saw frenzied agitation in the com some sixty
yards away, and saw a thirty-foot Circle being flattened
out. No noise was heard at that distance. The witness is
an associate of Dr. Meaden, so it was perhaps inevitable
that this event was described by Mr. Bell as a “stationary
whirlwind.” Despite subsequent reference to “dust, dirt
and light debris spiraling into the air,” 4 which was not

68

THE UFO REPORT

mentioned to Colin Andrews when he was first told the
story, it does not seem that one can draw much conclusion
as to what caused this Circle.

The only other reported observation of a Circle being
formed in this country was when many people apparently
saw one appearing in daylight. This was when a Circle
formed in grass near Warminster, “just like the opening
of a lady’s fan,” and was observed by about fifty people
skywatching for UFOs at a time when that town was the
Mecca of UFO hunters in the 1960s and 1970s. “A perfect
circle was accompanied by a high-pitched humming
sound.” This event was reported by Arthur Shuttlewood
in the magazine Now! 5 It is highly ironical that the meteo¬
rologists who are anxious to debunk any UFO connection
with the Circles should pick Shuttlewood’s report to sub¬
stantiate their case. That what they saw was caused by a
whirlwind was most certainly not Arthur Shuttlewood’s
interpretation of the event, nor that of the other skywatch-
ers. Sadly enough, many UFO researchers have rejected
as loo unbelievable much of what he reported from War¬
minster during that period, and it is high time that this
was reappraised.

For some unknown reason we seldom now receive re¬
ports of Circles in grass in this country, but nearly always
of Circles in cereal crops. Nevertheless, it would be rea¬
sonable to suppose that the phenomenon described by
Shuttlewood is the same as that we are dealing with today.
More significant is the fact that it is in just those places
where we find the Circles today that Arthur Shuttlewood
and the skywatchers of yesteryear were observing UFOs
twenty years ago. And also some reports of close encoun¬
ters with landed UFOs and their occupants—that rarest of
UFO events—during the 1970s, are in exactly the places
where today’s Circles occur.

UFOs and Circle Sites

This correlation is very remarkable. During that particular
flight in June we flew over and photographed a quintuple
set of Circles in a barley field between Upton Scudamore

69

The English Corn Circles in 1988

and Cradle Hill, near Warminster. This 170-foot formation
appeared on June 14 and was, we mistakenly thought, the
first set of 1988 Wiltshire Circles (see Photo 7). It was of
interest in that the main circle of this quintuple was swirled
in an anticlockwise spiral, unlike any in the quintuple Cir¬
cle sets that have been found before or since. It was also
exceptional in having opposite pairs of clockwise and an¬
ticlockwise satellites, which had then never been seen be¬
fore. With the sole exception of another quintuple that had
appeared in August 1987 in a field just a few hundred
yards away from this one, all quintuple Com Circles pre¬
viously reported displayed clockwise swirl in all five cir¬
cles. Once more the Circles had given a clear indication
of their evolving nature.

Now consider the following account which Arthur Shut-
tlewood was given by a prominent local businessman and
Justice of the Peace. The J.P. was driving with his wife
and son from Warminster toward Westbury when he
rounded a sharp bend past the first turning off to Upton
Scudamore. It was on a clear bright August night at about
eleven o’clock. He continued:

I saw a huge red ball, fiery and glowing, which rolled
slowly over a clump of trees and above a hill on the
right. It hung suspended for a time in the air, the roll¬
ing motion ceased, and I drew to a halt to watch more
closely. It drew me like a magnet, that shining light!

Gradually the large ball commenced to turn on its
axis, revolving and changing color as though cooling
down from immense heat. It was now a fluorescent egg,
flattened out somewhat, a brilliant orange in the sky. A
deep crimson band spread along or through the center
of the egg, jutting out slightly from either end.

We looked on amazed as four small red balls of light
shot out of the main scarlet beam and protruded into
the air for what we estimated to be twenty feet or so.
At no time were these smaller spheres disconnected
from the main object. They seemed to be linked to it
by a slender thread of paler red light that swayed like

70

THE UFO REPORT

the tentacle of an octopus! They remained in that posi¬
tion dancing vaguely from side to side, for about two
or three minutes. Then they quickly shot back into the
larger shape and disappeared from sight. 6

This extraordinary description of a UFO near Upton
Scudamore coincides rather remarkably as regards shape
with that of the quintuple sets of Com Circles, which have
been found in just that place in 1987 and 1988. And yet
the episode described above took place in 1966! Can there
possibly be some connection?

A similar object was sighted near Charity Down in Au¬
gust 1985 by Mrs. Joan Simms of Over Wallop, about
seven days after a quintuple set of Circles had appeared
there. This UFO consisted of five lights positioned like
the five spots on a dice, and the outer lights repeatedly
entered and left the central light. Mrs. Simms said that
the UFO was so bright that it hurt her eyes to watch it for
too long. A BUFORA investigator subsequently suggested
that what Mrs. Simms had seen was the planet Venus,
which surely deserves some sort of prize for silliness. 7
Nevertheless, it does prove difficult to establish a direct
connection between particular sightings and the formation
of a set of Circles. However, the coincidence of place
between UFO sightings and the actual Circles remains in¬
escapable.

Close Encounters

Besides UFO sightings, it was intriguing to find that it was
in the lane running beside that very field near Upton Scu¬
damore where the Circles now appear, that German para¬
chutist Willi Gehlen had a close encounter experience in
September 1976. While sleeping in his estate car which
was parked in the gateway to a field, he found that the
car’s hatch-back had apparently unlocked itself and
opened. After this happened a second time he heard a
strange humming sound like a swarm of bees, and then
saw a very tall figure, which he assumed was the farmer,
standing near the gate. This figure did not reply when

71

The English Corn Circles in 1988

Gehlen excused himself for parking there, but shone a light
at him then went away. Shortly after, he heard the hum¬
ming noise again, and saw a large shape lift off from the
ground. There was a “pink, pulsating glow” coming from
it as it flew into the sky at an angle of 45°. 8 All this was
recorded well before people became aware of the Com
Circles mystery, or that the Circles were appearing where
these events had happened.

Mrs. Joyce Bowles of Winchester claimed to have had
four separate close encounters with “aliens” in 1976 and
1977. These were at Chilcomb, where Circles have been
found (see Photo 8), two miles east of Winchester and
a little over a mile from the punchbowl at Cheesefoot
Head, and also near Headboume Worthy, just north of
Winchester, where Circles first appeared in the summer of
1976 close to where one of her encounters occurred during
the same year. On each occasion she was accompanied by
a second witness who supported her story. During one
encounter she was taken inside what seemed to be a landed
UFO. “Lights were blinking and flashing everywhere,”
she said. “The man told us this was his field, whatever
that meant. One of his colleagues pulled out a paper which
had all sorts of lines on it. In the middle was a circle with
rings round it.” 9

Again, all of this was reported and published well be¬
fore the Com Circles became known. And it is not as if
reports of close encounters with aliens were so common
in this country that the coincidence of their extremely close
proximity to principal sites where the Circles are found
can just be shrugged off. Although the nature of the two
UFO phenomena (those observed near Warminster and
near Winchester in the 1960s and the 1970s) seems to have
altered, there would appear to be very strong indications
indeed that the Com Circles of the 1980s are part of the
same mystery. It is easy then to see why some have sug¬
gested that what we are looking at may well be “time-
travelers” from either beyond this planet or from the
Earth’s own future. But obviously in our present state of
knowledge such an explanation can only be treated as wild
speculation.

72

THE UFO REPORT

The Yatesbury Circles

At the end of June an aerial survey by the Circles Phenom¬
enon Research group revealed no less than thirteen Circles
in several large fields of barley at Yatesbury, just two miles
west of the famous Stone Circle at Avebury. Many of these
had been discovered earlier by local farmers, and they were
all plain circles swirled both clockwise and anticlockwise
in groups of two or three. Several other Circles were found
a mile away near Beckhampton.

Further inquiries in the area led to some surprising new
information which was volunteered by Mr. Roy Lucas, a
farm worker. He had been cutting verges near Yatesbury
between 7 and 8 a,m. on June 16, which was an overcast
day, when he observed in an adjoining field about 400
yards away something like a “puff of smoke” rise from
the ground and drift slowly upward. When about ten feet
high it had suddenly billowed and swirled about. The cen¬
ter of this column of vapor then appeared gray and dense,
and twisted very rapidly. Then, all within a few seconds,
the “smoke” dispersed completely. Mr. Lucas said that
his first impression was that a tramp had lit a small fire in
the field. Then a few minutes later the same thing hap¬
pened again further across the field, and five minutes later
the sequence was again repeated. When he went to inves¬
tigate there was, needless to say, no tramp, no fire, and
nor for that matter any holes in the ground. But neither
were there any Com Circles, although some of these were
found later that day in an adjoining barley field. Mr. Lucas
admitted that the “smoke” could well have been steam,
fog, or any white vapor for all he knew.

Naturally, Dr. Meaden interpreted this as a “descend¬
ing atmospheric vortex,” despite the fact that whatever
was observed appeared to have risen up from the ground.
Whether or not this phenomenon is what caused the Yates¬
bury Circles, we cannot tell, but it does sound very similar
to what was observed near Trowbridge, Wiltshire, in 1979.
Here the witness saw “smoke” coming through the hedge
as he drove along the main road. “Whatever it was,” he
said, “I don’t want to see it again. Six feet of it came into
the middle of the road. It stopped and tilted on end. I

73

The English Corn Circles in 1988

thought it was going to hit the van.” The smoky column
traveled ahead of the van, which was moving at about 35
m.p.h., for a short distance, then it “just went into a gate¬
way.” 10

Distribution of the Circles

Besides the English Com Circles, there are various reports
of single Circles in Australia, Canada and Japan, and a
very few in the U.S.A. Photographs of some Australian
ones show that we are dealing with the same phenomenon,
but there is no indication that the foreign Circles display
anything like the complexity of pattern and the frequency
of occurrence of the English Circles.

Those who regard the Circles as meteorological phe¬
nomena maintain that they are most likely widely distrib¬
uted throughout the British Isles. The fact that the great
majority of those reported in Britain during the 1980s have
been clustered in Wiltshire and Hampshire, with just a few
in adjoining counties, is solely because that is where the
Circles investigators have been looking, they say. This
supposition is patently untrue. In the last few years an
increasing number of pilots have become aware of the Com
Circles, and many first reports come from them. It is al¬
most certain that the vast majority of Circles do not go
undetected. Not only do they occur mainly in very specific
parts of Wiltshire and Hampshire, but at two principal
sites, Cheesefoot Head and below the White Horse at
Westbury, they have also returned to the very same fields
with annual regularity since about 1980. This is more rem¬
iniscent of a rare bird’s nesting habits than of a meteoro¬
logical effect! And when they do appear, they often
proliferate like mushrooms, as at Yatesbury.

In June 1988 I photographed the luxuriant green wheat
field below the ancient Westbury White Horse, which is
carved in the chalk hillside. No wind damage of any kind
was to be seen in the crop. I knew with complete certainty
that the Circles would soon return to this field, and indeed
they did so on June 30. The “loose” triple set and the
linear triple which appeared that day can be seen in Photo

74

THE UFO REPORT

9. Each set consisted of a small (20-ft), medium (30-ft),
and large (50-ft) circle which were swirled both anticlock¬
wise and clockwise. They reappeared within yards of the
positions where Circles of different configurations had
been found in 1987, and also in previous years.

The Oadby Circle

So consistent are the Circles with regard to places and the
sort of places where they appear—usually in the immediate
vicinity of prehistoric sites or tumuli—that it is of great
interest when one is found outside the usual area. A few
have been found in previous years in Sussex, and some
near Wantage in Oxfordshire, but nothing of this kind had
ever been found north of Wantage.

On June 26 I wrote to my brother, a geologist living in
Leicestershire, on the subject of the Circles. I concluded
with the sarcastic remark that if he really wanted to see
what I was talking about he would have to travel to Wilt¬
shire or Hampshire, since I could not possibly arrange for
a “stationary whirlwind” to travel to his part of the world.
Rather curiously, just one day after he received this letter,
he saw a report on the local Central Television news that
a mysterious ringed circle had appeared in a cornfield at
Oadby, just outside Leicester. At this point, let me hasten
to disclaim any credit for this strange occurrence, which
had in fact been first discovered about a week earlier! This
flattened circle of wheat was about fifty-three feet in di¬
ameter and surrounded by a narrow concentric ring. Sym¬
metrically disposed about this were three small satellite
circles (each of four feet diameter) which were approxi¬
mately at the apexes of an equilateral triangle (see Figure
3:2).

Members of the Circles Phenomenon Research group,
who examined this, were cautious at first, but finally de¬
cided that it was indeed the genuine phenomenon. The
configuration was not the same as any seen previously,
and the plants in the main circle had been flattened radi¬
ally with hardly any swirl and as if by tremendous force
from the center.

The English Corn Circles in 1988

75

O 50

I_i_i i > --J

Scale: Feef

Figure 3:2. The Oadby Circle, June 1988.

On the night before the Oadby Circle was found, a lay
preacher from Fleckney, who asked to remain unnamed,
was driving near Oadby with his wife and son, when they
saw a very bright, white light apparently hovering over the
field. The family were alarmed and stopped. After a time
the object vanished upward into a cloud at great speed. It
was later established that there had been no night flying
from the nearby airfield on that night. The lay preacher,
who was apparently disturbed by what they had seen, said:
“It was weird, but we know what we saw.”

A Mrs. Hudson, whose house in Oadby overlooks that
field, said that although she does not usually draw her
curtains on that side, she was overcome with a panicky
feeling at 11 p.m. and felt she had to draw them. Her
neighbors, who were having a late supper at the time, saw
a bright, white flash from the field, followed a few minutes
later by a second flash.

A local resident subsequently made a number of tape-
recordings in the Oadby Com Circle. Some of these, which
I have listened to, have picked up distinctive repetitive
noises which are similar to noises that registered on tape-

76

THE UFO REPORT

recordings made in Circles in Hampshire and Wiltshire.
When BBC Television were making recordings for the
Country File program, screened in October, they too
picked up this sort of noise when interviewing Colin An¬
drews in a Circle, and there were also “ghost voices” on
one of their tapes. At Oadby the recorder was left to run
while those present withdrew a good distance to ensure
their sound would not be heard. Recordings were made at
various times of day with different tape-recorders to elim¬
inate instrument faults. At no time are the recorded noises
heard directly by anyone in or near the Circle. In view of
this, it is possible that what is picked up is caused by sharp
variations in the magnetic field, since the recording me¬
dium is magnetic. In particular, there is a hollow tapping
noise with a beat of about 100 per minute. Its slightly
irregular variation gives the impression of, say, a heartbeat
rather than anything of mechanical origin.

Tracks into the Circles

Despite the widely differing theories as to the origin of the
Circles, most serious researchers are unanimous in agree¬
ing that the Circles phenomenon is not a hoax. Over the
last five years or so there have certainly been several
hoaxed Circles, which usually looked neat and impressive
to the unititiated but could always be seen to be fake by
those who were familiar with the phenomenon. This was
because genuine Circles almost always show fine details
which would be extremely hard for a hoaxer to replicate.
First, the swirl patterns are mostly in the shape of an elabo¬
rate spiral and not just concentric rings, such as would result
from the drawing round of a chain or rope attached to a
central post. Second, the com is usually laid flat with a kind
of “veining” effect, in that it is alternately bunched together
and thinned out on the ground (see Photo 9 and Figure 3:2).
And third, the Circles are nearly always slightly elliptical,
which is indicative of a rotating force, and not something
that a hoaxer would find easy to reproduce.

The “tramlines” in the crop almost always intersect the
Circles and allow access on foot without any treading down

77

The English Corn Circles in 1988

of the crop. For quite some time this led people to believe
that hoaxing could still be the case. But with an increasing
number of Circles to inspect it was soon apparent that
satellite circles, or smaller ones not intersected by tram¬
lines, were very often without any tracks through the com
to or from them, in the case of fresh Circles. Naturally,
unless one was first on the scene, it was not possible to
make much in the way of sensible judgments about tracks,
since the tendency of visitors is to go into every Circle in
the group, and where there is no tramline access, to push
through the standing crop.

But the Circles investigation group did find that unvis-
ited Circles occasionally had thin tracks to them even
though the Circle was ostensibly fresh. Initially it was as¬
sumed that these tracks were made by animals, such as
deer or hares, which were sometimes seen in the Circles.
On a few occasions a single, thin track, whose direction
was indicated by the way the com was bent, led either into
or out of a satellite Circle without a return track. This
looked strange indeed! Could they have been made by
birds which had landed in the Circle or had flown out of
it? There seemed to be no reason why not, since game¬
birds, in particular, often run through the crop rather than
fly.

Footprints in the Com

Then came new indications of visitors to the Circles which
proved even more puzzling. After the appearance of the
double-ringer Circle at Cheesefoot Head, all further Circle
activity in Hampshire ceased. All new Circles were to
appear in Wiltshire during July, and again this strange phe¬
nomenon moved into a new phase. After the first six Cir¬
cles below the Westbury White Horse were found, we
naturally expected many more just there, as had occurred
in 1987. But this was hot the case. The next group was
formed during the night of July 7/8 in a field beside the
Warminster to Westbury road just beyond the turning to
Upton Scudamore, exactly next to where the J.P. had
stopped to observe that bizarre UFO many years before.

78

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 3:3. The Upton Scudamore triple, July 8, 1988.

The farmer, whose land it was, saw the Circles in his
field from his farmhouse at an early hour. There was a
“loose” group of three similar to one of the earlier triples
at Westbury. He telephoned Colin Andrews, who drove
over at once from Andover. The farmer had inspected the
crop in his wheat field late on the previous night, when
there had certainly been no Circles. Since they were not
visible from the nearby A350 road, he assumed that he
alone was aware of them, and was therefore very surprised
when a white helicopter appeared in the sky and hovered
low above the Circles, presumably photographing them.
Possibly this was the military from Warminster, though a
white helicopter is unusual.

When Colin Andrews arrived he went straight to the
field with the farmer, and they both felt certain that they
were the first to reach this set of Circles. But in the stand¬
ing com between the Circles he could see small tracks,
mostly along the seed-line, which seemed to have been
surreptitiously made. In places, what appeared to be a
small shoeprint could be detected, such as one might ex¬
pect to belong to a woman or a child. These prints were
even found under the flattened wheat on one or two places,
which seemed to indicate that they either preceded or were
contemporary with the formation of the Circle.

These tracks and the occasional “shoeprint” were to be
found again and again in all of the Circles which appeared
in the vicinity of Silbury Hill within the next month. Ev¬
eryone who was aware of them suspected initially that
some sort of hoax was being perpetrated. But the later

The English Corn Circles in 1988 79

conclusion was that, otherwise, these Circles gave every
indication of being genuine.

So what possible interpretation can be put on these
tracks? Possibly we were mistaken, and persons unknown
had entered the Circles before the investigators, on each
occasion. But it did not seem that way. Possibly these
particular Circles were formed using some kind of human
involvement of a sort at which we can only speculate.
Possibly the tracks and the “shoeprints” were not of hu¬
man origin at all.

Alas, one cannot be served up with Circles in the way
we might like to have them. Each new feature we discover
brings with it more doubt and more bewilderment. Each
aspect seems capable of different interpretations. One
wonders what the meteorologists will make of Circles
which come with built-in footprints, though no doubt they
will have an explanation. The only lesson which can really
be learned from this odd development is that a rather less
dogmatic approach to the whole phenomenon is advisable.

The Silbury Hill Circles

In mid-July a completely new chapter opened in the Cir¬
cles saga. We were first aware that an enormous quintuple
set of Circles had been found very close to Silbury Hill
on July 15. This formation was far larger than anything
previously seen, measuring about 290 feet across. Its sit¬
uation beside the main A4 trunk road meant that no pass¬
ing driver could avoid seeing it. Large numbers of cars
stopped and their occupants went into the wheat field to
visit the Circles, or climbed Silbury Hill to view this great
imprint, which resembled the five faces of a giant dice.
Naturally, this mystery received extensive local TV and
newspaper coverage.

Apart from its size, the most remarkable thing about
this Circle was its proximity to Silbury Hill, which is the
largest prehistoric artificial mound in Europe. This 130-
foot, flat-topped, conical barrow was constructed in elab¬
orate layers in about 2600 bc for an unknown purpose. A
ley line which runs through Avebury Stone Circle and Sil-

80

THE UFO REPORT

bury Hill also crossed the position where this new set of
Circles had appeared.

The central fifty-five-foot Circle was swirled in a clock¬
wise spiral, and its satellites, each about twenty-one feet
in diameter, were anticlockwise but for the clockwise
northerly one, which was nearest to Silbury Hill. Shortly
afterward a further quintuple set was found a mile to the
west near Beckhampton. This was of similar size, but with
smaller fifteen-foot satellites, three of which were clock¬
wise and one anticlockwise. This completely new fea¬
ture—the asymmetric disposition of the satellite circles’
swirl—tempted one to think that these new Circles pre¬
sented some coded clue as to their origin or purpose. Quite
apart from this, the sheer size of these quintuples, in which
the satellites were roughly 100 feet distant from the main
circle, was unprecedented.

On July 24 we discovered a third huge formation in a
remote area nearly three miles west of Silbury Hill, and
well away from the road. It is known as “Rupert’s Circle”
(after discovery by my son, Rupert). This was of similar
size to the first two quintuples, but completely lacked one
satellite, the most northerly. The east and west satellites
were both twenty-four feet in diameter and were swirled
anticlockwise and clockwise respectively. The southern¬
most satellite was only twenty feet in diameter, anticlock¬
wise, and separated by a record 140 feet from the main
Circle. The distortion of the regular quintuple set shape
was unexpected, but not inexplicable in the light of sub¬
sequent investigation. And here, once more, despite being
first on the scene as far as we could tell, we could see the
small tracks between the satellites and the main circle,
which characterized all of these large quintuples.

Curiously, all three of these large quintuples lay close
to the line of an ancient Roman road. So too had the Oadby
Circle. Most likely this was purely coincidental, but such
is the strangeness of this phenomenon that it is perhaps
worth bearing in mind. And in each case one of the two
axes of the formation was exactly parallel to the tractor
“tramlines” in the field. This could hardly be mere
chance, and this “locating” of the formations can imme¬
diately be seen from the photographs (Photos 10 and 11 and

power line

©

©

©

0 100 200 300 ® ©

Anriclockwise swirl ©Clockwise swirl

Figure 3:4. Diagram showing location of the Silbury Hill Com
Circles.

82

THE UFO REPORT

0 50

i-1

Scale •. Feet

Figure 3:5. “Rupert’s Circle,” a huge formation in a remote
area nearly three miles west of Silbury Hill, July 1988.

Figure 3:7). To any objective observer, one thing was by
now abundantly clear: the Circle formations were not just
randomly positioned, as one might expect of a completely
natural phenomenon, but appeared to be intelligently lo¬
cated with respect to linear features of the landscape—not
something necessarily requiring high intelligence, but in¬
telligence nevertheless.

The Avebury UFO

On July 22 the local Marlborough Times led with a head¬
line story entitled “Strange Sighting at Silbury Hill.” This
featured a large photograph of the Circles opposite Silbury
Hill, but also made brief mention of the fact that an un¬
named woman from Marlborough had witnessed a bright
object in the sky near Avebury a day or so before the first
Com Circles appeared there.

This story, in conjunction with the tracks and “shoe-
prints” in these recent Circles, naturally aroused the sus¬
picions of those in the Circles investigation group.

83

The English Corn Circles in 1988

“Footprints means hoax” was the obvious conclusion to
be made, though the elaborateness and scale of such a
production was unbelievable. If this was the case then
surely the UFO witness’s account must also be bogus. It
was with this in mind that Colin Andrews and I went to
interview Mary Freeman, whose name we had discovered
by inquiries. Much later that evening we left, sure that this
was not the case, and impressed by her detailed and con¬
vincing account of what she had experienced.

On the evening of July 13, perhaps twenty-four hours
before the first Circles were formed at Silbury Hill, Mary
Freeman had had dinner with a friend near Avebury, and
was driving home along the A361 road through that vil¬
lage, which is a mile north of Silbury Hill. (See Figure
3:6.) She followed the road through the great Stone Circle
and turned left into the “Avenue” (so-called because it is
partly lined with ancient standing stones) to go toward
Marlborough. No other cars were about. Over to her right
she caught sight of an intense golden/white glow in the
clouds. The source of this light, which she said was much,
much brighter than the full moon, was enormous, silent,
and stationary just above the ceiling of low cloud. Since
it was New Moon that day, no moon was visible.

She glanced back at the road, and when her eyes re¬
turned to the object she then saw a long, narrow beam of
white light shining obliquely downward at the ground. Her
immediate impression was that this was an “energy
beam,” or that it was “channeling energy.” She did not
know why she had this thought. The beam was directed
south over the top of Silbury Hill or, at least, where she
knew Silbury Hill must be, since it is not visible from that
point on the road. Her instinct was to drive on and turn
toward Silbury Hill to find the place where the beam
touched the ground.

Within seconds of her seeing this immensely bright ob¬
ject, there was a further strange occurrence. Various things,
such as a booklet and a cigarette pack, which had been left
on the front shelf of her Renault 5, suddenly flew into her
lap for no apparent reason. She drove on slowly, watching
the UFO and its beam, and turned right onto the A4 road
toward Silbury Hill. There were still no other cars on the

84

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 3:6. Map showing the roads which Mary Freeman traveled on
July 13, 1988, when she was attracted by an “energy beam. ”

road. But before she reached Silbury Hill, her view was
briefly obscured by trees, and when she next looked there
was nothing to be seen. When the things had flown off the
shelf, she noticed that the dashboard digital clock read
11:13 p.m. The whole episode lasted barely three minutes.

The object which Mary drew for us was an elliptical
shape, and from the center of its base shone a thin beam
of light at 45° to the vertical. Since it was in cloud, its
edges were not sharply defined, but the clouds did not
appear to affect the beam. I asked whether the beam di¬
verged downward, indicating that the UFO was its source,
or diverged upward from the ground, suggesting that car
headlights or a searchlight was shining on the clouds to
produce this effect. Mary indicated that the beam of light
was parallel-sided; indeed, there was no way of telling
whether it shone down from the UFO, or up from the

85

The English Corn Circles in 1988

ground toward it. It could not possibly have been a car’s
headlights or a searchlight; the object in the cloud was far
too bright, and moreover the base of the cloud, through
which the beam projected, was not lit up. Mary said she
was not frightened by this strange and silent spectacle;
perhaps more awed, or “honored,” as she put it.

Clearly this experience had a deep emotional effect on
Mary Freeman. She returned home by midnight and told
her flatmates, whom I met and talked to, and, later, her
mother and brother, what she had seen. It was not until
six days later that she was told by Richard Martin, whose
story subsequently appeared in the Marlborough Times,
about the Circles at Silbury Hill. The possibility of a con¬
nection between these and her UFO sighting then seemed
inescapable. Despite a gap of at least twenty-four hours
between Mary’s sighting and the appearance of the Cir¬
cles, the UFO beam had touched the ground where the
Circles had formed.

Further Circles at Silbury Hill

On July 26 farmer Roger Hues discovered that a new quin¬
tuple set of Circles had formed in his wheat field opposite
Silbury Hill, immediately adjacent to the original set. This
configuration was identical to the first set and virtually the
same size. And, as can be seen from Photo 13, this new
quintuple has two sides of the square whose comers are
the centers of its satellite circles, exactly parallel to the
“tramlines.” Its orientation was 135° different from the
first formation in that its single clockwise satellite pointed
roughly south-east, toward West Kennet Long Barrow.
Even though it lay in full view beside the main A4 road,
no one had reported seeing a thing. A night-long vigil on
Silbury Hill several days later, using an infrared night-
sight through which the Circles were clearly visible in the
dark, failed to give any sign of who or what was producing
them. There were no nocturnal visitors and nothing was
seen to move.

Again, the Marlborough Times lead story headlined
these events: “Circles Mystery Intensified by Further

86

THE UFO REPORT

Sighting.” But this referred to the new Circles rather than
to any further UFO sighting. And at some stage in the
following days a further three single Circles appeared in
the field close to the two large quintuples. They now
seemed to be spreading like a rash!

Significant Alignments

On August 4 yet another large quintuple set of Circles—
the fifth—was reported to have been found in a remote
wheat field on the slopes of Allington Down, about a mile
and a half south of Silbury Hill (see Figure 3:7). This
quintuple was of similar size to the others but had adjacent
pairs of clockwise and anticlockwise satellites. For once,
the formation was not aligned with the “tramlines”
through the com, which was surprising. However, when I
first reached the main circle, I found that large sections of
this particular field displayed long parallel striations in the
crop where the wheat was more lightly colored. One axis
of the quintuple was aligned precisely parallel to these
features.

If this alignment merely reinforced the unmistakable in¬
dication of intelligent “location,” another significant
alignment was now quite apparent. A line drawn through
this latest quintuple and through the position of the other
two at Silbury Hill also runs through Silbury Hill itself as
well as Avebury. Moreover, the position of the UFO seen
by Mary Freeman just south of Avebury, as indicated by
her, lay, so far as we could be sure, right on the line. The
“energy beam” which she had seen was, it then appeared,
directed along this imaginary line.

Quite apart from this, one could see from the map (Fig¬
ure 3:6) that another line drawn through the two western
quintuples near Beckhampton intersected the first line in
just the position where the UFO had been seen. Surely
this was more than coincidence?

Further investigation soon led me to think that the first
line described above was indeed a ley line. It additionally
passed through other ancient sites including that of a Stone
Circle, of which no trace now remains, at O.S. Grid Ref.

87

The English Corn Circles in 1988

SU098671. It was after writing an article for Flying Saucer
Review on the Silbury Hill Circles, in which I referred to
this as a ley line," that I went to consult John Michell on
the subject. While with him, I was looking through his
copy of Paul Devereux’s book, The Ley Hunter’s Compan¬
ion,' 2 when I chanced on an aerial photograph of Avebury
and Silbury Hill on which was imposed an oblique white
line. Such was the position of this line that my initial re¬
action was that this was an artist’s impression of the beam
shining down from Mary Freeman’s UFO. It was in fact
a representation of the ley line which passes through Ave¬
bury and Silbury Hill, and is described in great detail by
the author. This corresponds very closely with our first
line, described above.

Earth Mysteries and the Circles

Evidence of a connection between UFOs and ley lines is
examined in some detail in Paul Devereux’s book, Earth
Lights , 10 which explores the thesis that UFOs are basically
an Earth phenomenon associated with Earth energies, but
does not exclude the idea that the phenomenon interacts
with the human psyche in some way, giving the impression
of a living thing, or even intelligence.

Without entering into detailed consideration of this
analysis, it is instructive to look at the Earth Mysteries
interpretation of the Circles, although there are many con¬
flicting points of view. The basic thesis is that there exists
an as yet undefined force, or Earth energy, that is associ¬
ated with many of the ancient sites such as stone circles,
henges, dolmens, barrows, and tumuli. Such sites are very
often found to be in alignments, and the straight lines
connecting these sites are known as leys, or ley lines. The
ley lines, it is suggested, are channels along which this
energy flows, or else the sites, which define the leys, have
been specifically positioned as markers along such chan¬
nels, which were known to their prehistoric architects.
Taking this argument further, some protagonists of this
theory maintain that the Com Circles are indeed caused
by manifestation of this Earth energy; it is the rotating

88

THE UFO REPORT

force, coming up out of the ground, that causes the com
to fall. Many researchers are breaking new ground cur¬
rently in their efforts to understand more about the nature
of the leys, and iheir mysterious Earth energy.

Although many orthodox scientists would react to all of
this with derisory snorts of “Pseudo-science!,” there is
an accumulating body of evidence to support this partic¬
ular approach. The primary method of detecting this Earth
energy is by means of dowsing, using metal rods, but much
work has been done recently at various ancient sites using
standard scientific instruments to measure electrical cur¬
rents and magnetic fields that appear to be associated with
the Earth energy. In particular, significant results have
been produced by the Dragon Project, in which lengthy
investigations were carried out at the Rollright Stones and
other sites.

CPR has carried out extensive tests with dowsers in the
Circles and in positions where Circles have been. Almost
invariably, very strong dowsing reactions are observed,
which have proved extremely consistent. Results in the
Hampshire and Wiltshire Circles show a force that acts on
the dowsing rods which is generally in the same direction
as that in which the com is swirled. The force is also
detectable in the standing com, and varies in direction and
strength depending on distance from the center. This force
can be frequently detected flowing to the Circle along an
energy path from a nearby archaeological feature such as
a tumulus, which may be situated on a known ley line,
and this energy path may distort the formation or cause a
quintuple’s satellite not to form, if it crosses such a posi¬
tion. Quite apart from the dowsing experiments, electrical
measurements have shown consistently anomalous values
in the Circles and their vicinity.

Although it is too early to assess the results of this work,
there is a strong indication that whatever force causes the
com to be laid flat, it persists in and around the Circle for
long after the Circle forms, and can usually be detected in
that place weeks after the crop has been harvested and the
field ploughed. In fact, a good dowser can, without too
much difficulty, pinpoint the position of a previous year’s
Circle in a field, without having been told where to look.

89

The English Corn Circles in 1988

The dowsers also sometimes detect definite changes of po¬
larity in this force long after the Circle has been formed
and the crop harvested. Visually observable changes in the
direction of swirl of the com, and even the size of some
Circles, have been noted in a very few cases, such as two
formations near Westbury in August 1987.

All this serves to confirm something which has long
been suspected: That whatever “agency” produces the
Circles, it is not only invisible, but is most likely present
for some time before and after the com is found to have
been laid flat. This would explain why various effects such
as “electrical crackling” noises, humming noises, beating
noises, bright flashes, recurring flashes, and indeed,
UFOs, have been reported, sometimes before, and some¬
times after, the Circles have been formed. The true nature
of this “agency,” whether it involves Earth energy or
electromagnetic energy or something else, remains, for
the time being, a mystery.

A Religious Perspective?

There is also another perspective to the Circles that de¬
serves mention, even though most people will consider
such an approach quite beyond the pale. This is the inter¬
pretation given by religious groups such as New Era, which
believe that the Circles portend the coming of the New
Age. Associated with this group, though not part of it, is
the medium Isabelle Kingston.

In March 1987, when she had been working with a group
of students on Silbury Hill, she channeled messages which
purported to come from “The Watchers,” a higher intel¬
ligence referred to as “beings from other areas.” It should
be stressed that similar messages from supposedly extra¬
terrestrial entities known as “The Watchers” or “The
Guardians” are not new and have been reported for many
years.

Isabelle Kingston’s channeled message indicated that
the building of the Hill of Sil (Silbury Hill) was originally
commandeered by these beings. “Sil” is apparently de¬
rived from the word meaning “Shining Being.” Temples

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THE UFO REPORT

such as Silbury Hill were allegedly built with the intention
that they should last until this time in history to help hu¬
manity. The Avebury Sanctuary, in particular, was appar¬
ently alive with a pure energy that links all places of power
around the globe.

Two weeks before the Circles appeared at Silbury Hill,
Isabelle Kingston says that she was told that “they” would
appear there, and she then channeled a further message
addressed to her group of healers, who had asked about
the meaning of the Circles. They were told that these had
made them aware of the presence of “The Watchers,” and
that these guardians had been linked with humanity in or¬
der to bring the power necessary “to build the new Jeru¬
salem.” “The Watchers” had been coming here for many
years but until now Man’s awareness did not recognize the
signs. England lay at the center of the great “Pyramid of
Light” that will be guiding humanity’s understanding.
“The Watchers” was the name of a collective intelligence
guiding human mortals. It was an intelligence from out¬
side the planet, not linked to angelic beings, but part of
the “cosmic consciousness.”

The symmetric pattern of the Circles allegedly indicates
where the power enters the Earth’s magnetic field. Silbury
Hill draws such cosmic power. There were ley lines run¬
ning through the Earth, and at various points lines of
power were energized. “You are witnessing the coming
of the New Age,” the medium was informed.

It is difficult to see why there should be any connection
between the presumably pagan ancient sites of Salisbury
Plain and the Christian religion, from which derive the
references to the “new Jerusalem.” But perhaps one
should not quibble over minor details. Clearly, acceptance
of channeled messages like this requires an act of faith,
and equally clearly they will be dismissed as pure fantasy
by those who are guided solely by orthodox Western sci¬
ence of the 1980s. Nevertheless, I think that omission of
this part of the story of the 1988 Circles would be a mis¬
take.

Besides New Era, there are other groups that claim to
summon up Earth energies by various methods and which
use dowsing to detect certain symbolic patterns of reli-

91

The English Corn Circles in 1988

gious significance on hillsides in Wales and Cornwall.
These would presumably be visible, like the Circles, had
the places where they are found been sown with suitable
crops. One cannot help wondering whether these people,
if they have the power they claim, are those who made the
mysterious footprints on the Silbury Hill Circles or indeed
whether they were in some way involved in the creation
of these Circles.

Certainly one should not overlook the symbolism that
the Circles embody, and this is most apparent in the final
part of the 1988 Circles story. This episode is just as cu¬
rious as the Silbury Hill saga, and once again the reader
will have to decide whether this, too, might have a reli¬
gious dimension.

The Celtic Cross

After the discovery of a sixth huge quintuple Circle in
wheat near Hungerford, fifteen miles east of Silbury Hill,
on August 16, things seemed to go quiet. By this time most
barley had been harvested and within a week or two the
combine harvesters were at work in the wheat fields. It
seemed natural to assume that the 1988 Circle season was
over.

At the beginning of September, Colin Andrews men¬
tioned on several occasions a Celtic Cross, which fellow
CPR researcher “Busty” Taylor had discovered in 1985 in
the churchyard at Goodworth Clatford, not far from his
home in Andover. He showed me photographs of this, and
speculated that we might get Com Circles of this pattern-
something that I thought most unlikely, since the only Cir¬
cle remotely like this had been an ordinary ringed one,
but with four small satellites outside the ring, on the Long-
wood Estate, Hampshire, in 1986.

The churchyard Celtic Cross at Goodworth Clatford
commemorates various members of the Thornton family
including Herbert Thornton, Canon of Winchester, who
died in 1923. It bears a fair resemblance in shape to the
magnificent High Crosses of Ireland, which were carved
between the eighth and tenth centuries ad, and of which

92

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 3:7. A “Celtic Cross ” at Charity Down. September 1988.

there are particularly fine specimens at Clonmacnois and
Ahenny. The Thornton’s Cross, like these, has a central
circle in the cross, and four smaller circles on the positions
where its large concentric ring intersects the arms of the
cross. The ornamentation on the central circle even has a
distinctive clockwise swirl. Colin had become so inter¬
ested in this cross at that time that he even took a Canadian
TV crew, who were making a program on the Circles, to
see it.

A week later, on Saturday, September 10, Colin re¬
ceived a telephone call from the farmer on whose land the
double-ringer Circle at Charity Down had appeared in
June. “Do you want to look at another one?” he said. “If
so, you’ve got just four hours. I’ve got men standing by,
and the field has got to be cut today.”

Two days earlier, on the Thursday evening, Colin had
visited the double-ringer and had made certain electrical

93

The English Com Circles in 1988

measurements. He had noticed then a significant increase
in energy at this Circle, which had been more or less dor¬
mant since June. The new Circle formation, which had
appeared since, was less than 100 yards away. Its shape
was that of an enormous Celtic Cross.

The central circle, in which the com was swirled in a
clockwise spiral, was about forty-seven feet across. Sur¬
rounding this at a comparatively great distance, unlike any
other ringed Circle, was a vast outer ring, measuring 153
feet in diameter and four feet wide. Equally spaced around
the ring were four satellite circles, each of about fourteen
feet diameter and clockwise. These lay on top of the flat¬
tened ring, since one could see that the com in these had
been laid down later, if only perhaps by a few seconds.
And instruments showed higher electrical readings in this
formation than in any previous Circle.

Nothing quite like this extraordinary and elaborate hi¬
eroglyph imprinted in the com at Charity Down, just
two-and-a-half miles from the stone Celtic Cross in the
churchyard, and four miles from Colin’s home, had ever
been seen before. It was recorded on video from both the
ground and the air that day, and a photograph of it appears
on the front cover of the book. Circular Evidence . 2 In view
of Colin’s earlier obsession with the Celtic Cross, one
might be forgiven for assuming that “they” had read his
mind—or else that he had read “theirs.” Skeptics who are
unable to assimilate such a bizarre conjecture would prob¬
ably insist that he must have faked this Circle. But this
was undoubtedly the genuine phenomenon at work, and
for anyone who knows Colin, there is not the remotest
possibility that he could have done such a thing.

During that afternoon on September 10 the crop was
cut, and so ended the 1988 Com Circle season. But the
fallen com is merely an outwardly visible sign of what is
at work here, and the “Circles” are undoubtedly with us
even after they are harvested. The episode of the Celtic
Cross Circle had a curious sequel some weeks later.

On January 14, 1989, Colin went with Pat Delgado and
George de Trafford (another researcher) to visit Isabelle
Kingston for the first time. After discussing the Circles,
he drew her attention to a small Celtic Cross ornament

94

THE UFO REPORT

which she possessed, just as they were leaving. Three
hours later, while watching TV with her family, the set
turned itself off and a similar Celtic Cross, composed of
many red and blue dots, appeared on the TV screen, de¬
spite the fact that the set was unplugged from the main
supply. This was witnessed by Isabelle’s mother and by
her neighbors. Isabelle says that she was aware of “excep¬
tionally high energy levels” in the house, during and after
the visit.

How can one possibly interpret what happened here?
Clearly some agency of which we only have the haziest
perception seems to be at work. Perhaps more of the
enigma will be revealed in the coming months. If the Cir¬
cles run true to form, they will return to perplex and amaze
us once more in the summer of 1989. [Indeed, they have!—
Editor.] Most likely we will see more Celtic Crosses, in
the same way that 1987’s unique double-ringer was thrice
replicated at the start of the 1988 season. Whether or not
we come any closer to understanding what lies behind this
mystery is anybody’s guess. But there seems little doubt
that quite a few people will have to set aside their preju¬
dices and preconceived ideas, and look once more at this
strange phenomenon with rather more open minds.

References

1. The Journal of Meteorology, Vol. 6, no. 57 (1981),
Vol. 7, no. 66 (1982), Vol. 8, no. 75 (1983), Vol. 9,
no. 89 (1984), Vol. 10, no. 87 (1985), Vol. 11, no.
109 (1986), Vol. 12, no. 116 (1987), etc.

2. Delgado, Pat and Andrews, Colin: Circular Evidence,
Bloomsbury Press, London 1989.

3. Anecdote from a correspondent of Ralph Noyes
(January 1989).

4. Journal of Meteorology, March 1985.

5. Now!, August 29, 1980.

6. Shuttlewood, Arthur: Warnings from Flying Friends,
Portway Press, Warminster 1968, pp.78-9.

7. Fuller, Paul and Randles, Jenny: Mystery of the
Circles, BUFORA, 1986.

95

The English Com Circles in 1988

8. Blundell, Nigel and Boar, Roger: The World’s Greatest
UFO Mysteries, Octopus Books, London 1983, p. 131.

9. Ibid., p. 129.

10. Devereux, Paul: Earth Lights, Turnstone Press,
Wellingborough, Northants. 1982, p. 209.

11. Wingfield, George: “Did Avebury UFO Produce the
Silbury Hill Com Circles?,’’ FSR, Vol. 33, no. 4,
1988.

12. Devereux, Paul and Thompson, Ian: The Ley Hunter’s
Companion, Thames & Hudson 1979, pp. 132-3.

13. Kindred Spirit, Vol. 1, no. 5, November 1988. P.O.
Box 29, Warminster, Wiltshire, BA 12 9YD.

14. Dr. Meaden has now modified this theory. See his
new book. The Circles Effect and Its Mysteries,
Artetech Publishing Company, 54 Frome Road,
Bradford-on-Avon, BA 15 1LD.

4

So You Want to Be
a Ufologist?

PATRICIA GRANT

Patricia Grant was bom in Zanesville, Ohio, in 1922.
She was educated in Ohio, California, and Massa¬
chusetts, and obtained a B.Sc. degree in architecture
from the University of Cincinnati.

She came to the U.K. in 1958 as a civilian architect
with the U.S. Navy. Her interest in UFOs began with
the Kenneth Arnold sighting in 1947, and has contin¬
ued unabated to the present day. Now retired, she is
no longer engaged in active investigations, but contin¬
ues her research into UFOs and related subjects.

The Portsmouth Journal, Cosham, of December 11, 1988,
gives us the latest “gen” on UFO statistics. An “expert”
has told the Journal that 99.9 percent of UFO sightings
can be easily explained. One must point out that these
odds are slightly better than those the United States Air
Force gave us nearly forty years ago when they announced
that 100 percent of sightings could be explained if there
were sufficient information to hand.

These latest statistics advise us that one must investigate
100 cases of UFO sightings per year in order that one tenth
of one UFO sighting will have any significance whatso¬
ever. One would assume that the Portsmouth Journal's
“expert” has a doctorate in statistics. He does not: he is
a photographer’s technician. However, appearances can be
deceiving. In our community there was once a dairy man
who entertained his customers by reciting excerpts from
Lucretius, Catullus, and Horace, with a bit of Virgil
thrown in. Rumor had it that he crooned the fragments of

96

97

So You Want to Be a Ufologist?

Euripides’ Phrixus while milking his cows. It transpired
that he was a classics scholar with a respectable Ph.D.
and had opted for the “good life.” It follows that the
Portsmouth Journal's favorite son very well may be a
mathematics whiz kid who cares naught for academe.

The point being made here is that your profession, craft
or occupation will not disqualify you from becoming a ufol¬
ogist or even an “expert” ufologist. You may be a scientist,
artist, teacher, policeman, lorry driver, machinist ora dust¬
man. Journalists, postmen, housewives or stockbrokers are
all welcome. In seeking new outlets for your energies and
creative instincts you need have no hesitation in entering this
field of study. As Dr. Jacques Vallee was once overheard to
remark: “In ufology, we are all beginners.”

If you decide to become an adept in this arcane occu¬
pation, you will want to know where to begin. Burning
with enthusiasm for the subject, you probably have read a
great deal about it. Read more. There are two major rules
in ufology—although many ignore them—and the first rule
is this: Collect and catalog as much data on the subject
as you can. The second rule is more difficult for some:
While engaged in the pursuit of scholarship, try to develop
a lot of good old-fashioned common sense, because you
will certainly need it. As for recommended reading ma¬
terial, FSR (Flying Saucer Review), 1 the oldest remaining
and internationally acclaimed UFO forum is a must. Sub¬
scribe to it, and as a companion, the purchase of The
Encyclopedia of UFOs 2 is a valuable investment as a source
of information. Apart from these indispensable guides,
read everything else on the subject that you can lay hands
on.

When you think you are prepared to take the next step
(sighting investigations), you may want to join a UFO
group. There is a plethora of these about, some large,
some small, but each of them fall more or less within one
of the following four categories:

Contactee Cults (CCs)

Skeptical True Believers (STBs)

Pseudo-Scientific Activists (PSAs)

Serious Scientific Approach groups (SSAs).

98

THE UFO REPORT

Only you can judge which type best suits your temper¬
ament. If you feel uncertain, let us look at them all, one
at a time.

Contactee Cults

Your short-cut to Arcturus or Vega may be found in almost
any Contactee cult. All CCs have one thing in common:
a “Master” who is in close contact with loving, helpful
Alien Beings of high intelligence from Zeta Reticuli, Tau
Ceti, or wherever. (So far nothing has been heard from
the Crab Nebula, but word may come any day now.) When
the “Master” receives the messages he will transmit them
to all and sundry who have joined his cult and paid the
subscription fees.

A surprising number of initiates join these groups. One
“Master” rented Caxton Hall for an evening to announce
the latest Cosmic Communique and the auditorium was
packed. Unless rent-a-mob was on hire, there were an
awful lot of eager would-be emigrants to Jupiter on the
scene.

Having joined the Common Market, England is pres¬
ently playing host to a branch of a European CC which
promises to “demystify” the human body. This cult came
into flower when its “Master” met small aliens from a
silver spaceship which hovered near him as he walked in
the old volcano country in France. Claiming to have spent
an entertaining evening with Jesus and Buddha, he has
recruited, among others, a charming Quaker lass as
spokeswoman for his movement in Britain. 3 Her atten¬
dance at one of the cult’s camps in Europe unveiled a lot,
literally. Putting it baldly, there was a lot of nudity and
“everyone did their own thing.” Of course everyone was
terribly responsible about sex, “with the AIDS problem
and all that.”

It is self-evident that the CCs do not really investigate
UFO sightings. Membership is “no work and all play”
and “follow the leader.” Although the United States has

99

So You Want to Be a Ufologist?

the largest number of CCs in the world, Great Britain does
not do badly considering its size and population. In order
to understand how they operate it is not a bad idea, if you
can afford it, to join several of them. Apart from the pa¬
thetic footnotes they engender, you may find them highly
entertaining, but they do much to hinder serious research.

By following the two major rules of ufology you can do
something to counteract the highly publicized antics of the
groups. For one thing, you can repeatedly point out that
the Contactee cult must not be confused with the individ¬
ual who claims to have had contact. That person is an
alleged witness and seldom has a following of any sort. In
this exercise, however, we are not examining witnesses,
we are looking at UFO groups.

To return to the main theme, finding the type of group
that best suits you as a budding ufologist, do not despair
if the CCs fail to inspire you. You have learned something,
albeit nothing about investigating UFO sightings. For the
time being, apply rule one, apply rule two, and keep on
reading.

Skeptical True Believers

This cult consists of individuals and a few groups with
their various hang-ups, and to become one of them you
must support their dictums and recite a few idiocies of
your own, ever remembering that all witnesses are to be
denigrated, ridiculed, or patronized. Let that hubris of
yours really all hang out!

Your STB colleagues will be highly vocal individuals
who truly believe that all sightings of UFOs are (a) mis¬
conceptions, (b) hoaxes, or (c) hallucinations. They truly
believe that they know better what the witness or witnesses
saw than the witness does. This category includes men and
women with completely open minds: whatever they hear
goes in one ear and right back out the other. Since they
truly believe they know best in all things, they manufac¬
ture any data to support their hypotheses. This method of
research is hardly acceptable in scientific circles, but this

100

THE UFO REPORT

does not bother them in the least. They truly believe that
anything they do not know is not worth knowing. When
there are UFO photographs that have been painstakingly
authenticated, they declare the same to be fakes. By the
same token, pilots have eyeball floaters and experienced
radar operators are ignorant. To prove their commitment
to the faith, they descend to near-libel against the serious
scientist who studies the UFO phenomenon.

There is now evidence that some STBs are in the em¬
ploy of the government, and of course, those who are jolly
well know that people are seeing odd things in the sky.
Leam to recognize an STB because there have been efforts
by one or more of them to infiltrate genuine UFO study
groups. The accomplishment of this aim spelled disaster
for one group. 4 And leam to distinguish between the STB
and the reputable scientist, who through lack of time or
inclination has never studied the UFO problem. The latter
will be a skeptic because he knows nothing of the subject
and will freely admit it.

With an inquiring mind and a healthy curiosity about
life, you will not wish to be associated with the STBs and
their ostrich philosophy. Do not despair yet. You have
learned something, albeit mostly about the vagaries of the
human psyche. As we prepare to move to pastures greener,
apply rule one, apply rule two and keep on reading.

Pseudo-Scientific Activists and
Serious Scientific Approach groups

Most groups, other than the CCs and STBs, genuinely try
to adopt a serious scientific approach to the solution of the
UFO problem. Since most ufologists have had little or no
training in the disciplines of science, one must make al¬
lowances for the members who fall by the wayside through
excessive zeal. The major responsibilities of ufologists are
investigations of reports of sightings, and analysis of the
data for each sighting report. The work of these groups,
large or small, is extremely valuable because they inves¬
tigate mountains of UFO reports.

The priority in each case is to discover whether or not

101

So You Want to Be a Ufologist?

there is a mundane explanation for the sighting. In spite
of the depressing statistics given by the Portsmouth Jour¬
nal's blue-eyed boy, around 15 to 20 percent of sightings
are unexplained after thorough investigation and analysis.
Both the PSAs and the SSA groups are usually very good
at sorting the wheat from the chaff. However, on occasion
one of the PSAs will publicize a “mundane” explanation
that is so utterly ridiculous that it makes our STBs look
like Nobel candidates.

These groups have the most far-reaching interests. Not
only are UFO sighting reports investigated, much atten¬
tion is also given to space travel and secret weapons, hu¬
manoids, contactees and abductees, brainwashing, and ball
lightning. You will enter the world of time travel, parallel
universes, and the ten or twenty-six dimensions other than
the three-plus space/time we can understand. (Few will
mention the heterotic string theory on which the theory of
these dimensions has been conceived, nor will there be
much discussion of the fact that if they do exist, they are
pretty small . . . one million, million, million, million,
millionth of an inch! 5 ) You will hear much about certain
curious apochrypha of science: poltergeists, Nessie, Big-
foot, tulpas, monsters, fairies, ley lines, the pendulum,
dowsing, Earth lights, fungus-ingesting owls, and fair-
weather whirlwinds. Any one or all of these may or may
not be related to the UFO phenomenon. They are all unex¬
plained and nobody knows where they fit into the picture.

Anyone who has lived as long as I have probably will
realize that there are many unexplained things in life. The
only time I was privileged to meet the late Dr. Allen Hy-
nek, he made the comment to me that a certain witness
was a “repeater.” (As with all new “ologies,” one must
become acquainted with a special glossary. In ufology, a
“repeater” is a witness who has had more than one sight¬
ing of a UFO.) By Dr. Hynek’s demeanor I was unable to
tell whether he was inferring that this witness had been
lying or whether he thought a different significance should
be assigned to the case.

Weeks later, while walking my dog through a Kentish
meadow, I thought about Hynek’s remark at some length.
It suddenly occurred to me that when a child, in a different

102

THE UFO REPORT

meadow, I had known a “repeater” of quite a different
sort. A little playmate of mine, hereafter to be known as
Nancy B., had a genius for finding four-leaf clover. Dur¬
ing one happy summer, she and I and several other little
girls spent hours roaming through a Connecticut pasture
looking for these good-luck charms. Nancy found one or
two every single day! I had no luck at all and the rest of
the girls found only one or two during the entire holiday.
While preoccupied by these thoughts, involuntarily, al¬
most unconsciously, I bent down and plucked ... a
four-leaf clover! I was astonished; I remain astonished. I
cannot understand it, nor the significance of it, if there is
any. What I do know is that that did happen to me, that
Nancy B. did find four-leaf clover day after day, and that
in all cases the clover were certainly not figments of the
imagination: they were real. By the same token, it is prob¬
able that people see UFOs because UFOs are real and are
there to be seen. Why some witnesses have more than one
UFO experience is another question. It may be simply that
they happen to be in the right place at the right time, or it
may have a significance which evades our reason. Nobody
knows.

There is no harm in forming hypotheses that incorpo¬
rate these mysteries into the UFO problem. Of course the
bulk of this “esoteria” (to coin a new word!) is as unex¬
plained as is the UFO. When a hypothesis is confused
with a solution, the trouble begins. Some ufologists be¬
come so enamored with one or another of their own pet
theories that they convince themselves they have found the
answer. It is usually the pseudo-scientist who commits this
faux pas. When whole groups become oriented toward one
or another theory, hostilities are formed between rival
groups and research is damaged. A recent article by Pieter
Hendrickx of Belgium in Quest magazine, 6 calls for vari¬
ous groups to end their differences and co-operate with
one another, and one can support Hendrickx whole¬
heartedly. Of course, dissension is nothing new in scien¬
tific pursuit. Isaac Newton was an irascible old codger and
Paracelsus was not noted for a friendly disposition. Nev¬
ertheless, the UFO is such a complex problem that it will
require a genuine team effort to solve it.

103

So You Want to Be a Ufologist?

For the purpose of this exercise it is assumed that the
many drawbacks discussed have not diminished your in¬
terest in ufology and that you wish to soldier on. As you
sit leafing through the latest batch of news cuttings, you
will find much to interest and amaze. Here, a book review
in the January 26, 1989 issue of the Cambridge News be¬
gins: “Jacques Vallee claims in DIMENSIONS that he has
been abducted and experimented upon by humanoid
aliens.” Having read the book with care, you will proba¬
bly return to its pages and read it again and again in search
of this claim. You will not find it. Never mind. If the
Schonnel Reading Scale is valid, that poor journalist has
not reached the proficiency of age nine yet. And in the
Essex Chronicle of February 10, 1989, you will see a pho¬
tograph of a teacher and his pupils holding up a tissue
paper and cane hot air balloon. Having sent several aloft,
these happy pranksters are delighted that members of the
public have mistaken the balloons for UFOs. Never mind.
The glee will soon turn to grief when Farmer Brown’s bam
is set alight. And in at least half a dozen of these scrib-
blings you will find mention of little green men, to say
nothing of the queries of the witnesses’ bibulous habits
. . . Best of all, here are pictures of Stealth aircraft, look¬
ing no more like Stealth than a wolfhound looks like a
chihuahua. And although the Stealth bomber has not been
flown outside the United States as yet, you will be told
that this craft accounts for many sightings in Great Britain.
If you shrug and yawn at this rubbish, you have become
a good ufologist. You will know that disinformation, in¬
cluding this garbage, is the virus in the ufo computer.
Now you can help program.

Carry on! Apply rule one, apply rule two, and continue
to study with diligence. In ufology, no one yet has reached
the Pons Asinorem, 7 much less crossed it. You well may
be the first—and the best of British luck to you!

References

1. FSR Publications Ltd., P.O. Box 12, Snodland, Kent
ME6 5JZ.

2. The Encyclopedia of UFOs, edited by Ronald D.

104

THE UFO REPORT

Story, New English Library, London 1980. (A new
edition is planned for 1990.)

3. Herald Express, Torquay, Devon, November 19, 1988.

4. Good, Timothy: Above Top Secret, Sidgwick &
Jackson Ltd, London 1987.

5. Hawking, Stephen W.: A Brief History of Time, Guild
Publishing, by arrangement with Bantam Press 1988,
pp. 162-3.

6. Quest International, Quest Publications International
Ltd, 15 Pickard Court, Temple Newsam, Leeds, LS15
9 AY.

7. Pons Asinorem (“The Bridge of Asses”), Euclid,
Elements, Book 1, Proposition 5—“Too difficult for
asses or stupid boys to get over. ’ ’

Testimony from Africa

CYNTHIA HIND

Cynthia Hind was bom in South Africa and studied
at Cape Town University until World War II, when
she served with the South African WAAF. She then
moved to England, where she lived for eleven years.

She has written numerous short stories for radio,
including the BBC, as well as many articles on a
variety of subjects. She has been interested in UFOs
for seventeen years, and is the author of UFOs—
African Encounters (Gemini, Zimbabwe 1982).

Cynthia Hind has traveled all over the world as a
UFO researcher, and is the MUFON Co-ordinator
for Africa. She lives in Harare, Zimbabwe.

It has always been important for me to prove that Africa
is an excellent example of the evidence for the existence
of UFOs. The reason for this is that so many people have
had interesting experiences and reported case histories,
when I know that the vast majority are totally unexposed
to media influence or interpretation.

It is true that although television is affordable only by
the more affluent, neighbors, friends, and family do share
the viewing. My domestic staff of three, for example,
whom I have provided with a TV set, will often have ten
or twelve persons to watch with them. Nevertheless, it is
a very limited audience out of the eight million people in
my country (Zimbabwe) alone, and the choice of program
veers more toward Mavengwevengwe (local music) or
Makadoka (a sit-comedy) than, say, Star Trek or V. And
even then, the viewing is limited to the towns and not the
rural areas.

105

106

THE UFO REPORT

With regard to radio broadcasts, the listening public is
divided between a station broadcasting continual pop mu¬
sic and programs in the vernacular. The English language
programs, although including sophisticated science pro¬
grams from the BBC as well as some locally produced,
are seldom listened to by the rural population, who obvi¬
ously prefer programs in their own dialect.

I have kept a watching brief of programs over the past
few years. Astrology, UFOs, and some paranormal sub¬
jects are dealt with on an irregular basis but always in
English only.

With reference to UFO books, there is an absolute
dearth of these in Africa—perhaps with the exception of
South Africa. Most African countries are in tight eco¬
nomic straits, and although some countries do import
books from abroad, I can almost guarantee that no allo¬
cation will be made for the purchase of books dealing with
UFOs. It would be an interesting exercise to find out from
British publishing houses what percentage of the most re¬
cent UFO books ever found their way to English-speaking
Africa.

On examination of the evidence, I want to make it clear
that although people are never liberally exposed to UFO
lore or its case histories, there is always the off-chance
that people might hear something in this connection. Thus,
even though I have stated that UFO witnesses are never
exposed to pre-knowledge of the UFO syndrome, there is
always the remote possibility that some type of contact
has been established. I say all this in deference to the more
skeptical students of Ufology.

Like the Brazilians, the African people have in their
culture many references to vadzimu (spirits), such as
shave, Mudzimu, Ngoza, all of whom must, to them, em¬
anate from “somewhere above.” Therefore, it should not
be difficult for the people to relate to entities from other
worlds, be they physical planets or even another dimen¬
sion.

But it is the concept of “outer space” which is daunt¬
ing. With the rural African people, measurements relate
in terms of the next village or the nearest big town. To
explain “overseas” is difficult; to explain “outer space”

Testimony from Africa 107

even more so. Many have never viewed the open sea and
the largest expanse of water they have seen is an inland
lake, where the opposite shore is often clearly visible, for
example, Lake Malawi, Lake Kariba, Lake Victoria. As
to visiting the moon or other planets, “Only God can walk
on the moon” they say.

If one stops in the country to ask one’s way, your infor¬
mant will look at you first. If you appear tired and weary,
dripping with perspiration and fatigue, he will say, “It is
not far, a few more turns in the road,” despite the fact
that your destination might be many kilometers away. On
the other hand, if it is a beautifully cool, brilliant day, and
you are fit and eager, he will describe in minute detail
every turn of the road, every identification on the way,
happily wishing you a long and rewarding journey. It is in
the African culture to say what pleases you most, so one
has to be especially careful during investigations to put
your question in such a way that you can elicit an accurate
reply, as opposed to what the witness feels you want to
hear.

Another point I find significant is the short memory of
the rural people about matters which they deem unimpor¬
tant. UFOs are unimportant. The African, on the whole,
does not understand the concept of UFOs nor their impact
on civilization. It does not matter to him that the entities
emerging from strange machines might be from another
world. They are not part of his culture. He does not relate
to them, and aside from his immediate fear of their
strangeness, they are entirely irrelevant to his life style.

I feel that, unlike a UFO experience for an average Brit¬
ish family, who would probably recall events in terrifying
detail for the rest of their lives, the rural African is more
involved with production, procreation and possible prom¬
ises of a better life. And indeed, who can blame him?

In Dr. Roberto Pinotti’s excellent paper Contact: Re¬
leasing The News, which he presented at the IAF Congress
in Brighton on October 15, 1987, he gives his reasons on
why governments have not informed the public of the ex¬
istence of UFOs.

He speaks of “ET and Culture Shock,” and to me this
would be a deciding factor, certainly in relation to the

108

THE UFO REPORT

African continent. We all relate to our own particular cul¬
ture. Although we know that we are not the center of the
Universe, “we are central in essence,” he says. Anything
widely divorced from our own familiarities, our own
dreams of what and who we are, is foreign; more so to
the unsophisticated who are barely aware of the greater
and lesser societies on our own Earth. Pinotti says:

“from the cultural point of view, their contact with Eu¬
ropeans castrated African and pre-Colombian societies,
destroying most of their original age-old characteristics:
from their practical everyday life to their version of the
world and its existence. It was culture shock they had
to face; and their technology, their science, their econ¬
omy, their religion, their philosophy and their ethics,
disintegrated against the structure of the European civ¬
ilization.”

How true that is.

Although I cannot always be sure that the rural African
people I interview have never heard of craft from outer
space, at least I know that whatever they have heard, it
would be extremely superficial, with a lack of understand¬
ing; a mere peripheral acknowledgment that there may be
something untoward coming from out of our skies.

Abductions

Whilst abductions are the current enthusiasm of ufolo¬
gists, I am finding that whatever abductions are—whether
a psychological subconscious concept or an absolute re¬
ality—they are certainly occurring in Africa. Unfortu¬
nately, I have not come across any cases where brown¬
skinned Africans are involved. Indeed, this would be a
tremendous breakthrough. However, even with the few
cases I now have, it still shows that UFO events occur in
waves.

When there were lights in the sky, lights in the sky were
visible in Africa. When craft landed on the ground, some
of the best CEIII cases occurred. And since my return to

Testimony from Africa 109

Africa from the MUFON/Fund for UFO Research Con¬
ference in Washington, DC in June 1987, I have inter¬
viewed several abductees. I must admit that my first
reaction was that of ambivalence: how come the abduction
reports from the sixties and seventies were almost totally
unacceptable (Elizabeth Klarer/Edwin of Durban) and now
suddenly in the eighties, they were genuine physical af¬
fairs?

On the other hand, Budd Hopkins’s investigations were
thorough and professionally conducted with positive re¬
ports from psychologists. The psychological implications,
according to Hopkins, had been carefully examined and
he had been assured that the abductees were not suffering
from some mental aberration; they were not schizophrenic
nor paranoiac. If they were reacting to an abnormal expe¬
rience, it was because the experience was abnormal.

But whereas in Great Britain, Australia, Europe, and
America, books such as Intruders by Budd Hopkins, Ab¬
ductions by Jenny Randles and Communion by Whitley
Strieber must stir the imagination of their readers, in most
of Africa such books are not available.

I have found that when dealing with witnesses in ab¬
duction cases in Africa, there is an innocence to their
awareness; they are embarrassed by the story they are tell¬
ing me because it is not like anything they have heard
before. They know no one has experienced what they have
experienced and they are afraid of the ridicule, and a little
ashamed of repeating it aloud. They have never heard of
Budd Hopkins, Kathy Davis or Whitley Strieber: they
would never apply the term “abduction” to their experi¬
ence, nor are they sure it is a UFO case.

In December, 1988,1 interviewed Janet from Bulawayo in
Zimbabwe. For me, her experience, which occurred in
1982, was an exciting one. It came to her in the form of
a dream where she dreamed she was in a large room made
entirely of metal—the floors, the walls, the ceiling. The
room was filled with rows of tables on which were lying
many medical instruments. Janet cannot recall being ex¬
amined except that she could feel the people in the room
putting something on her head, something like a cap. They

110

THE UFO REPORT

were normal people except that they were dressed in one-
piece suits of a shiny white or silvery color.

When she awoke the following morning there was a
lump the size of a five-cent piece on the right-hand side
of her head. She showed the mark to her mother. The
mark is now very much reduced but still visible. I did see
it, but frankly, it could be anything. However, the impor¬
tance of this case is that Janet was not aware of people
having pellets implanted into their heads, and when I men¬
tioned such a possibility at the end of our interview she
did not appear to be particularly interested.

Since the dream, Janet has noticed many different
things. She now has an adverse reaction to anything elec¬
trical. When she uses her hairdryer or curling tongs, the
surge of electricity is unpleasant and her head is painful
where the mark is. During thunderstorms, frequent in
summer in tropical Zimbabwe, she experiences a disturb¬
ing tingling sensation whenever lightning strikes.

In 1984, while working in a London office, she was
sitting at her desk and moved backward (she is not sure
for what, reason she did this!) when a string of neon-tube
lights fell and broke on her desk. On another occasion, in
her dining-room, a neon light bulb fell and shattered on
the table, barely missing her. More recently, while in her
kitchen, a similar incident occurred, when an ordinary
light bulb and its light shade fell and shattered a few cen¬
timeters from where she was standing. She commented
that in each instance she recalls moving away from the
spot where she had been standing, seconds before the
lights fell, thus avoiding injury.

Apart from some recurring astral traveling dreams, she
records only one other psychic experience. She was in the
garden of her home when she saw two creatures she de¬
scribes as “fairies.” They were very small, about six cen¬
timeters perhaps, dressed in long, flowing white gowns
and with gossamer wings. As Janet told me this, she
laughed and appeared embarrassed. I felt she did not re¬
ally want to talk about the “fairies” to me; she parted
with the information reluctantly. They were stationary just
above some golden nasturtiums and she saw them only

Testimony from Africa 111

briefly. One moment they were there, and the next, they
were gone.

With regard to her “dream,” I asked who she thought
the people were and what they wanted from her. She did
not know, she said, but she has become increasingly afraid
that they are coming to take her away. And yet, she added,
if they want her to go with them, she would do so. She
would like to go somewhere else; to another planet, per¬
haps. She feels there is little on Earth that can make her
happy. She also had an emotional problem at home (she
did not clarify this) and has not found a satisfying rela¬
tionship for herself although she is a very attractive young
woman; slight, small in build, with wide blue eyes and
blonde hair. She told me she was a “loner” and really
prefers her own company.

A second Bulawayo witness was Jenny. Briefly, her story
is the retelling of a dream which she has had at various
times of her life going back some twenty years. The sig¬
nificance of the dreams was that they were precognitive
and involved a man dressed in white who would take Jenny
to places prior to her going to live there; in fact, without
any knowledge on her part that she and her husband would
be moving. She would only recognize the area when her
husband was posted there (he was in the British Army at
the time). She was convinced that these dreams were dif¬
ferent from ordinary dreams. The reports on the whole
were not particularly out of the ordinary except for one
incident.

Jenny recalls being taken over a choppy sea toward an
octagonal building with large windows, floating on top of
the water. She was taken inside where there was a hive of
activity monitored by people dressed in blue. A beautiful
woman (obviously humanoid) came to Jenny and ex¬
plained that “they” were watching our Earth. A young
man, to whom she pointed, was monitoring an earthquake
condition about to occur in Tbrkey. Jenny was distressed.
She says, “Although they were very kind, some sort of
manipulation was going on, in our own interests, they said,
and helping with the over-population of our planet.”

An extension of the abductee’s own thoughts on the mat-

112 THE UFO REPORT

ter? After all, even the most uninvolved in Africa must
realize the basic problem of the population explosion
among our people. Or indeed, is there some form of ma¬
nipulation really going on by an alien civilization older
and wiser than we are?

MB of Masvingo, Zimbabwe, had a less explicit experi¬
ence. Her alleged abduction was rather vague, with hu¬
manoid beings of great physical attributes. Again, in this
case there was no exposure to contemporary UFO reading
matter, nor to media reports of small beings with slanting
eyes and sexless appearance.

With MB, the interesting feature of her report was the
sudden appearance, during the night, of a round, silvery
object humming “like a swarm of bees.” The object ap¬
peared a second time two years later when she was taken
inside the craft.

She described flying in the craft and being so close to
the ground that she could see small pebbles on the Earth
and the furrows of ploughed fields. At one time she found
herself in a corridor with a choice of doors. (Some emo¬
tional indecisiveness in her personal life?) When she re¬
alized “they” were taking her back to Earth, she panicked.
She pleaded with them to keep her there—wherever
“there” may be.

Janet of Durban, South Africa, says she was drinking cof¬
fee late one night when she saw a man step out of her
wardrobe, which appeared to change into a long, endless
tunnel. The man beckoned to her but she was determined
not to go to or with him, and clung to the sides of the
bed. She found that she had no free will and subsequently
felt herself dragged down the tunnel.

In the morning she had difficulty in raising her bruised
arms and was unable to comb her hair. (There is no cor¬
roborative evidence for this as Janet was divorced and lived
alone.) She recalls being taken to a room with a table
(examination table?) and a strange smell.

Caroline of Chipinge, Zimbabwe, has the most interesting
story of all. She was lying on her bed awake when she

Testimony from Africa 113

saw a ball of light shoot through the ceiling and come
down to the floor. The following then occurred:

(a) Caroline was paralyzed by the object.

(b) The light, which was extremely bright, beamed
downward.

(c) Caroline felt “they” wanted to take her up in the
beam.

(d) She was able to see through the ceiling of her bed¬
room to the trees and sky outside.

(e) She tried to call out but no sound came from her
throat.

(f) When the object had gone, she rushed to call her
mother, putting on the lights as she moved through the
house. (During our War of Independence most farmers
used extensive security lighting in the immediate vicin¬
ity of their homes. This has been retained despite the
end of the war, owing to terrorist attacks.) All the lights
went out.

(g) A whirring sound accompanied the movement of the
object.

(h) When Caroline was talking to her sisters after the
event, they maintain that her words were confused and
distorted. She also noticed that her sisters, when speak¬
ing to her, were slurring their words. (This slurring of
speech occurred in the Nullarbor Plain case in Austra¬
lia, 1988. See Chapter 8.)

I am surprised at the number of reports I have received in
the space of a year. And why now and not before?

Overall the average number of cases of all types varies
from one or two per month to about five or six per month
in a busy period. But most of these used to be misidenti-
fied lights in the sky, which Dr. Willy Smith, an able and
respected colleague, would soon identify for me: a bolide;
part of a meteorite shower (all so clearly visible in the
unpolluted skies of Africa); space debris; or a satellite.

But abductions are different. There can be no misiden-
tification as the story is so clear: the witness is aware of
what is happening and is taken aboard or away by, pre¬
sumably, alien beings. And although on occasions the wit-

114 THE UFO REPORT

ness admits that it occurred during a dream, why does this
dream stand out so clearly from all others? Abductions
don’t happen every night, or even once a month. They
usually occur once in a lifetime, sometimes twice. Only
in the case of Jenny did meetings happen more frequently.
The witnesses do not speak readily or eagerly of their ex¬
perience, and because they usually don’t know who to tum
to, some stories don’t come to light for years. And how
many hundreds are never revealed?

With me, at least the witnesses know that I am sympa¬
thetic and understanding: they know they can talk to me,
and that in itself is a release. But I cannot answer their
questions: Why did this happen and why to them?

Of course, there is a pattern, but with wide margins. I
know, for example, that the abductions happen mostly to
women: they are all good-looking—some exceptionally so.
They were young when it first happened, although not in
terms of Budd Hopkins’s seven-year-old syndrome. There
are other major factors, but they do not apply to everyone,
and with only five or six cases I cannot formulate a distinct
enough pattern. So I will just have to wait and see.

As far as I know, the psychologists have not yet pro¬
vided an answer either. Thus the enigma remains, and it
grows on a psychological level. When UFO events were
all physical, it was interesting but remote. Now that there
is interference with the mind and control of the will,
should not our voices be more clearly heard?

Airline Crew Sighting, 1988

My most recent report of a UFO is a well-observed pilot
and crew case that took place over Beira, Mozambique,
on February 11, 1988.

Commandant Simplicio Pinto of Mozambique Airlines
(LAM), was Chief Pilot on a flight from Quelimane to
Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, in a Boeing 737.
As there was no fuel at Quelimane, Pinto made a short
stop-over in Beira, landing at 18:09 hrs. At the end of the
runway there is a tum-around area, oriented to 170° mag-

Photo 1: The National Security Agency station at Menwith
Hill, Yorkshire.

(Copyright © Timothy Good)

Photo 2: The yellow and orange glowing ball of light seen
at Kimberworth, Rotherham, photographed by Allan
Petres.

(Copyright © YUFOS)

Photo 3: Triple Circle formation at Corhampton, June
1988.

(Copyright © Colin Andrews)

A

Photo 4: Double-ringer Circle on the Longwood Estate,
near Cheesefoot Head, together with five single Circles,
June 1988. Wind damage is also visible.

(Copyright © Timothy Good)

Photo 5: Double-ringer Circle at Charity Down,
Goodworth Clatford, June 1988.

(Copyright © Timothy Good)

Photo 6: Double-ringer at Cheesefoot Head, June 1988.
(Copyright © Timothy Good)

Photo 7: Quintuple set of Circles at Upton Scudamore,
June 1988.

(Copyright © Colin Andrews)

Photo 8: George Wingfield standing in a Circle at
Chilcomb, August 1987.

(Copyright © Lord Haddington)

Photo 9: “Loose” triple and “Linear” triple below the
Westbury White Horse, July 1988.

(Copyright © George Wingfield)

Photo 10: The first quintuple set of Circles at Silbury Hill,
July 1988.

(Copyright © George Wingfield)

Photo 11: Satellite in Silbury Hill quintuple set, July 1988.
(Copyright © George Wingfield)

Photo 12: Silbury Hill from the air.
(Copyright © Timothy Good)

Photo 13: The two quintuple sets of Circles at Silbury Hill,
August 1988.

(Copyright © George Wingfield)

Photo 14: The Knowles family. Left to right: Faye, Patrick,
Sean and Wayne.

Photo 15: The Knowles’car on February 1, 1988. It was
inspected by Paul Norman (shown) and John Auchettl.

Photo 16: The damaged tire.

Photo 17: Donald Ware and Robert Reid at Shoreline
Park, Pensacola Beach, scene of one of Ed’s dramatic
encounters.

(Copyright © Timothy Good)

Testimony from Africa 115

netic. As he entered this area, Pinto could see a strange
object in the sky.

“It looked like a wing parachute or something like a
flying mattress, and appeared to be in layers,” he said.
“The object had a fluorescent light, like those mercury
lamps which give off an intense, very white light; the hot¬
ter the lamp gets, the whiter and more intense the light
. . . something like that.”

Captain Pinto reported that the object seemed to be sta¬
tionary or moving extremely slowly and he had no idea of
its altitude. It was like nothing he had ever seen before.
“Just to make sure, I asked my co-pilot, Jamal, to inquire
of the control tower whether they had sent up a weather
balloon. They replied with the questions: ‘Why are you
asking? Is it because of that object up above? We began
to see it at about 15:00 hrs and the Air Force radars have
also picked it up. So far, we don’t know what it is, but it
seems to be positioned about 125 kilometers from
Beira.’ ”

Pinto remarked that for an object to be seen so clearly
at 125 km distance, it would have to be a very large object; a
Jumbo would not be seen at such a distance, he added.
Also, it would have to be metallic to be detected by radar.

The stop-over in Beira was short. Three passengers left
and fourteen boarded the plane. When the Chief Steward¬
ess, Isabel Lobo, opened the dopr of the plane, she saw
- many people looking up at the sky, and running up to the
flight deck she asked: “Did you see it? What is it?” Pinto
confirmed that they had also seen it.

Half-an-hour later Captain Pinto asked the control tower
for permission to take off. Meanwhile, the object still hov¬
ered over Beira. The control tower asked Pinto if he was
prepared to take off with the object right above him. He
replied that of course he would take off—why should he
not? Apparently, the control tower had reservations about
this, but finally the plane took off southwards toward Ma¬
puto. At this stage, the object was also to the south. Said
Captain Pinto:

“As soon as I was up, I could see the object from much

closer. I had no further doubts. It was not a plane, it

116

THE UFO REPORT

was not a weather balloon, it was not something ejected
from an aircraft or satellite. It was like nothing I have
ever seen in my twenty-two years of flying.”

Pinto then continued heading south to identify the ob¬
ject. This was at about 18:40 hrs and it was getting darker
on land, although in the air it was much lighter. The sun
was on Pinto’s right and it was not difficult for him to see.

‘‘I saw the thing. It was simply enormous. It seemed to
be stationary south of Beira, but did not seem to be as
high up as I had originally calculated. I climbed above
11,000 feet (3,300 meters), but had to veer right a bit
as the lights were so intense, they blinded me. There
were three, like searchlights, placed in a triangle.”

The “searchlights” emitted so much light that it be¬
came difficult to focus or judge distances. Positioned be¬
hind Pinto, Isabel Lobo could not take her eyes off the
object. The Captain asked her to find out discreetly if any¬
one in the cabin had a camera so they could take a picture
of whatever‘'it was. She had seen a Japanese passenger
with one, but he had disembarked at Beira and nobody
else had one. Pinto did not inform the passengers about
anything untoward: with 114 people on board he was afraid
that there might be some panic.

“I then decided to switch on the two landing lights on
the port side to see whether there would be any response
from the object. But because of its powerful lights, it
was difficult to distinguish anything. I had thought of
climbing above the object but as much as I tried, it was
always above us. I called the stewardess to witness what
I was about to do. Then I switched the lights on and off
twice.”

Suddenly, the object started to climb vertically, its lights
becoming weaker as the distance increased. Captain Pinto
turned the plane back to its original course. The object
was still in sight and he kept in touch with the control
tower, wanting them to have a complete record of what

Testimony from Africa 117

went on. He tried to locate the object on his radar but no
image showed. He climbed again but the object remained
much higher, still on the port side.

“By this time we were flying at about 24,000 feet and
it seemed stationary above the mouth of the Save River,
near Mambone. I continued to climb but it appeared to
be very far away, even when we reached our cruising
height of 31,000 feet.”

Meanwhile, it had become dark, although for a long
time they continued to see the UFO with its triangular
lights. Then they flew into storm clouds and it was lost
from sight.

The following day (February 12), Captain Pinto flew
along the same route on the Harare (Zimbabwe) flight, at
about the same time of day. Though he searched the sky
carefully, there was nothing to be seen—not even a star or
planet.

“What was the object we saw? I don’t know, but I would
really like to find out. I think that with more sophisti¬
cated instruments, there would have been enough time
to obtain more detailed information. I saw the object for
forty-five minutes while people in Beira saw it hovering
for more than three hours. I keep on asking myself:
what could it be? Why did it suddenly climb higher?
Was it in response to our signal with the landing lights?
Did their instruments perhaps signal that our plane was
getting too close?”

Captain Pinto said that two days before his sighting, an
object with similar characteristics had been observed above
Medellin Airport in Colombia, South America (see page
ix). Two days later, another was seen over Madrid. Com¬
mented co-pilot Jamal:

“There are always reports of UFOs, but I have never
seen one until this time. Commandant Pinto called my
attention to the object, saying ‘Do you see that thing
over there?’ I looked and saw a long object, bigger than

118

THE UFO REPORT

our plane, without windows and with a metallic look
about it. It seemed to hover above the mouth of the
River Save. I asked the control tower, ‘I thought you
said there was no traffic around: what is that thing doing
above us?’ They replied, ‘We see it but we don’t know
what it is . . .’

“When we asked for permission to take off, the con¬
trol tower gave us clearance: that is, they said we could
go but at our own responsibility. So we took off and
went to have a closer look. It had very powerful search¬
lights. Then, when Commandant Pinto switched on our
landing lights, the object slowly drew away, as if letting
us overtake it. Yes, we all saw the object very clearly,
but nobody could explain what it was. One thing I know
for certain: it was like nothing I have ever seen before.”

Chief Stewardess Isabel Lobo added:

“When our plane stopped in Beira, I looked up and saw
the object. It looked like a very large star but it did not
twinkle. I asked the pilot if he had seen it and he said
he had. It was a very large and powerful light. They
told me it had been detected on radar, therefore it was
no star.”

Isabel Lobo said that the Captain then climbed as
quickly as possible and she could clearly see the search¬
lights in a triangular formation, almost like those of a foot¬
ball field. Even at ground level, the light hurt one’s eyes.
She said she was not afraid when the Captain switched his
landing lights on and off, but the object then moved away
suddenly in the opposite direction. “I think that if the
plane had not had so much cargo and so many passengers,
the Commandant would have gone in closer,” she said.

When the object moved away, she likened it to a dia¬
mond ring with all the little lights shining. She was not
sure if it was stationary or not, but it seemed to be moving
very slowly, almost as though it was hovering. “The truth
is that in my twelve years as an air hostess, I have never
seen anything like that, whatever it was,” she concluded.
My first reaction was that either NASA or the French

Testimony from Africa 119

space agency were involved with further balloon experi¬
ments (such as those in 1985 and 1987, which led to UFO
reports in Zimbabwe), but there has been no verification.
There are also many peculiarities that do not fit. How does
one establish the truth, one way or another?

Speculations

I ask myself—not unreasonably I feel—what in Heaven’s
name have I achieved in all these seventeen years? From
1972 I have been involved with UFO investigations in Af¬
rica. I have traveled thousands of miles, been in often
unhealthy areas and even dangerous situations. I have also
been invited to speak at numerous international confer¬
ences, UFO group meetings, men’s and women’s groups,
schools, and sometimes in remote places where only four
or five people were able to attend.

There are those who are resentful to me, disbelieving
of me and who perhaps intensely dislike me and what I
am doing. On the other hand, I have believers from the
abysmally ignorant, to respected pilots, policemen in high
standing, and university students.

It is an exacting and tiring task where abuse and praise
are given liberally; where TV shows and radio broadcasts,
despite the hard work and research involved, rarely pay.

I live in a country where foreign exchange is a very
precious commodity and while some people are sure that
UFO lecturing is a lucrative occupation, I do not find it
so. My travel allowance of 300 U.S. dollars per annum
covers very little.

Leo Sprinkle, Psychology Professor at Wyoming Uni¬
versity in Laramie, once said to me, “Serious UFO in¬
vestigators are not only dedicated people, they are chosen
people.” Well, whoever chose me, I wonder if they really
did me a favor?

I have never seen a UFO although I have stood for many
hours in Zimbabwe watching the marvelously clear, star-
studded skies of Africa. I have sat in the Karroo, South
Africa, on a moonless night, where not a single blemish
marred the breathtaking dark of the night. I have stood

120

THE UFO REPORT

(with Timothy Good) on a balcony in Brazil, watching for
one vestige of movement from that vast bejeweled pan¬
orama above Sao Jose do Rio Preto. Nothing stirred: no
huge starship hovered dramatically above me, and no one
attempted an abduction of either of us! And still, I believe.

What is it then that drives us? Is it faith in humanity;
that so many people cannot all be lying? Is it a conviction
that somewhere there must be other better beings, other
knowledge greater than ours? Or is it because subcon¬
sciously, I know something, like Leo says, that has not yet
manifested itself in my conscious mind?

I am not growing younger, but I am growing wiser and
more experienced, more questioning, ever seeking. There
is bound to be a time when it will all pay off, one way or
another.

The Soviet Scene
1988

NIKOLAI LEBEDEV

Nikolai Lebedev was bom in Valday, U.S.S.R., in
1950. He studied at the Institute of Mechanical En¬
gineering in Leningrad, 1968-75, at the same time
studying developments in aeronautics and astronau¬
tics. He now specializes in irrigation engineering and
lives in Leningrad, where I had the pleasure of meet¬
ing him in January 1989.

His interest in UFOs was stimulated in 1983, when
he read a book about unexplained mysteries by Hel¬
mut Hoflung.

I am indebted to Cyril Darbyshire for translating
the majority of the following reports, which are
mainly from the Dalnegorsk, Dalniy Vostok area (on
the East coast). I have also made use of material
supplied to me in English by Mr. Lebedev, including
some sketches.

Sightings in Dalnegorsk, Dalniy Vostok

Liudmila Moxunova, hostel manager
2/12/88

“On February 12, 1988, I was walking home from the
shop at 8:00 p.m., along with other women carrying their
shopping, when I saw a big yellow sphere, half as large
as the moon, and after it followed a smaller one, keeping
pace with the larger one.

“The spheres moved slowly from Svetliy Klyuch, then
stopped and remained stationary for several minutes. In¬
side the spheres you could make out a sort of unevenly

121

122

THE UFO REPORT

spun network. There was no sound and the intensity of
the light did not change. The spheres were traveling
300-400 meters above the hills and were identical in
color.

“From the big sphere came rays as if from the sun, but
there were none from the other one. The length of the rays
was such that they seemed to reach the roofs of the build¬
ings, their color identical with that of the spheres. The
distance between them was about ten or twelve meters,
and movement was from west to east.”

Vitya Zinchenko, School No. 21, 7th Class
3/14/88

“On March 14, 1988, a large sphere a quarter the size of
the full moon flew straight through the village, in the di¬
rection of Goreloe. When it was approximately in the cen¬
ter of the village, a dark pink sphere of smaller dimensions
split off from it and flew off to the north. There was no
noise during its flight and its color changed at regular in¬
tervals from fully white to having a gray sphere in its cen¬
ter.”

3/18/88

Black-and-white photos were taken at 20:45-20:51 hrs of
a large glowing sphere with a trail in the Beriozovsky area
between Yugo-Aleksandrovka and Bolshaya Zlatogorka.
The photos were analyzed at the Geographic Institute of
Dalniy Vostok with a French computer, and showed the
object to be solid.

Alexei Rodion, School No. 10, 3rd Class
5/1/88

“On May 1, 1988, at 6:00 p.m. I was mending my mo¬
torcycle in the garage on Engineer Street. There weren’t
yet any stars in the sky. I saw a high-flying sphere, orange
in color, about one-sixth the size of the full moon. When
it had flown approximately to the center of the village it
stopped and hung for five or six seconds, then turned off
sharply at an angle of 90°, heading in the direction of the
chemical factory.”

The Soviet Scene 1988

123

V. Pavlov, computer engineer
5/7/88

“On May 7, 1988, I was returning home from the garage,
and at 10:30 p.m. saw a bluish sphere at a height of 600
or 700 meters, making no sound and with a dove-colored
trail behind it, flying parallel to the Earth. It was flying to
the south-west, intersecting the center of the village. The
length of the trail was about 200 meters. In certain defined
sections it flared brightly, in pulses. When it reached the
approximate vicinity of Sakhamaya it again flared and I
didn’t see it anymore, possibly because of a change in
course or because of the distance between us.”

Observation by A. Ya. over Partizanskii
7/25/88

“A large sphere-shaped object went by at 11:09 p.m., one-
sixth of the full moon, lower than the clouds, at about
3,000 to 5,000 meters altitude, at a speed half that of a
jet. The intensity of illumination became extremely
strong.”

8/25/88

On this day there were three reports of sightings.

I. Yu. Sleptsova

“We had returned from the cinema with the girls at 11:00
p.m. and were in our room when we saw a hemisphere of
dull white rise from behind the house opposite. It was
foggy, like a cloud, and close to the Great Bear. It began
to grow, then from the hemisphere came a ray of the same
color—long, narrow, and steady. We watched all this for
about two hours.”

G. B. Karandashov, veterinary surgeon
“On August 25, I was on a business trip and was return¬
ing by official car from Vladivostok, together with a
chauffeur. There was a bright moon to the right. To the
left hung a huge sphere ten times larger than the full
moon. It hung there motionless, dull and dense, with
round, even edges. It was slightly paler than the moon.

124

THE UFO REPORT

Then it began to grow, touched the Earth and quickly
began to grow until it was the size of the firmament.
Then, just as quickly, it dispersed, melting away like a
rainbow. Above the Earth where the sphere had been, a
black body seemed to be suspended. We watched all this
for three minutes, as did people from a service bus stand¬
ing beside us.”

Yu. Grankin, head of a photographic laboratory
“On August 25, 1988, my wife and I were at our datcha
when at 11:08 p.m. we saw a huge sphere, six or seven
times bigger than the moon, flying across the forest and
the taiga from the direction of Krasnorechen, toward Dal-
negorsk. There was no sound. It approached at a tremen¬
dous speed, during which time we noticed that it was
spinning and there were spots on it, but I couldn’t make
out what sort of spots. . . . Then it began to go down
behind the hill not far from Dalnegorsk, and began to
spread very quickly. . . . The sky was black, but where
the sphere had gone down it was milky-white. My wife
and I were very frightened, thinking it was a nuclear ex¬
plosion.”

[These three sightings seem to me to be more probably
due to Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) tests, or barium
gas experiments, but Nikolai Lebedev is sure they were
not—Editor.]

Pavlik Pavlov (graduated from the 10th Class, 1988)
8/27/88

“On August 27, at 10:43 p.m., as I was getting off a
bus in the center of Dalnegorsk, I saw a large sphere de¬
scending just above the Party Committee building, white,
yellow, and orange in color. Its size was approximately
one-fifth of the full moon. It hung for a short while over
Dalnegorsk, then moved off in the direction of the quarry.
I watched it for two or three seconds. Its speed was about
80 k.p.h. As it moved it emitted several bright flashes, as
if at one-second pulses.”

The Soviet Scene 1988

125

Anuchino

Figure 6:1. Sketch of the “shining triangle” seen by workers at
the Automatic Telephone Exchange at Anuchino. September 1988.

Workers from the Automatic Telephone Exchange,

Anuchino

9/4/88

“On September 4, at 11:15 p.m. a triangular-shaped
object, a quarter the size of the full moon, was observed
hovering near the village. It shone brightly and hung
there for twenty minutes. We saw the same sort of ob¬
ject over the same place on another occasion.” (Figure
6 : 1 .)

Pasha Gladkov, School No. 4, 9th Class
9/15/88

“On September 15, between 8:10 and 9:00 p.m., my
friends and I were at a little shop not far from the ‘Khi-
mik’ cultural center, talking among ourselves, when we
suddenly saw an object, disk- or plate-shaped, flying
slowly and evenly from the direction of Lyubov hill. Round
and flat, it shone brightly. Its height was 400 or 500 me¬
ters as it flew low between the hills. Behind it came a
shining whitish trail some tens of meters long, and fading

126

THE UFO REPORT

away. When it had completed a half-circle it passed over
the hill where the road runs to Nikolaeskiy. It hung there
for about a minute, and after hovering for a while over the
north-western slope, disappeared behind the hill in the di¬
rection of the chemical works. In all, we observed it for
three to four minutes.”

I. A. Sabanin, cinema mechanic
9/16/88

“On September 16, I was in a fishing-boat on the River
Listvenno together with my friend V. I: Pristavko, in the
Temevskiy region. At 9:15 p.m. we both saw an unusual
phenomenon which we watched for between forty seconds
and a minute: a series of bright, fluorescent dashes flying
in one group with a diameter of five meters, parallel with
each other, dying out and lighting up at strictly defined
intervals like tracer bullets, at a height of about 3,000
meters and an angle of incline to the Earth of 20°. They
were flying in the direction of Dalnegorsk from north-east
to south-west.”

At the same time, Sabanin’s wife Elvira observed a large
cylindrical object flying from the direction of the sea, from
the TV tower to the north, towards Upper Rudnik. It was
about 200 to 250 meters long, and shining brightly, with
a glowing trail.

V. F. Morozov, worker
9/24/88

“On September 24, I came out of my house into the street
in order to bring our Siamese cat home. It was about 8:00
p.m. but not quite dark yet. I looked at the sky over the
Bruderovskiy Raspadok and saw something quite incom¬
prehensible—a fiery body of cylindrical shape was flying
past, leaving a stripy white trail behind it. It was flying in
a horizontal position. The body was unlike any airplane,
and it was about 400 meters long. There was no sound. It
was not flying very high—just below the hilltops, and it
was flying in the direction of the hill where an object had
fallen on January 29, 1986.”

The Soviet Scene 1988 127

A group of children from School No. 27, 7th Class
9/25/88

During the holidays a group of schoolchildren on Lake
Dukhovo saw a ring-shaped light, yellowish-red in color,
hanging motionless over the mountainous area on the
mainland side nearer to Dalnegorsk. The time was 4:00
a.m. According to the witnesses, the ring-shaped light had
a shining object in the center. A few minutes later the ring
dispersed and the shining object began to make agitated
movements in a circle.

From IZVESTIYA
9/18/88

what’s happening in the heavens?

In Japan last Friday, from 6:30 p.m. onwards, tele¬
phones at police stations and observatories were over¬
whelmed with calls from people reporting that they had
witnessed a unique phenomenon; a huge fiery sphere,
several times larger than the full moon, flew over the
largest Japanese island Honshu from north to south-east
at the speed of a jet-plane, without leaving any traces
on radar screens.

In various parts of the island descriptions of the un¬
known object varied: different colors were named (rang¬
ing from milky-white to orange and gold), different time
parameters (visibility of the UFO was from 2-3 to 40
seconds). At the same time it remained apparent that
the heavenly newcomer could not have been imagined
by dozens of people simultaneously. Consequently,
something really is happening in the heavens . . .

There is no doubt in my mind that the same object flew
over the territories of both the Soviet Union and Japan,
making several landings in remote, unpopulated regions
of the USSR. Unfortunately, no landing traces have been
discovered, on account of heavy rain and the subsequent
fall of leaves.

128

THE UFO REPORT

Observation point-
(two men)

Figure 6:2. At Lomonosov, Leningrad, the object shown here was
seen by two men on October 16, 1988.

Sightings in the Leningrad area

10/16/88

Two men observed the object, sketched in Figure 6:2, at
an unspecified time on the evening of October 16 in the
region of Lomonosov, Leningrad. At least eight circular
areas, glowing with pulsating light, could be seen along
its side, and points of light flew away from the object and
then returned. (Figure 6:2.)

10/20/88

At 6:50 p.m. a witness reported seeing a bright red tri¬
angle, one-third the size of the full moon, moving slowly
close to the horizon, on the road to Koporie, Leningrad
state.

10/25/88

Two men on duty at an observation post at Alma-Ata air¬
field reported seeing a thin, cylindrical object (Figure 6:3),
estimated to be 2,500 meters in length, from which very
narrow beams of what seemed almost “solid” light
emerged. Sometimes the object remained stationary, then

The Soviet Scene 1988

129

>irechon of

Figure 6:3. The object as seen by two observers at Alma-Ata
airfield on October 25, 1988.

seemed to land. The men did not get permission to inves¬
tigate the landing site.

UFO Sighting in Dalnegorsk

12/30/88

At 7:45 a.m. on December 30, Pavel Ujva was driving
with a bus-load of passengers on the Primorskaya-
Himkombinat route. The sky was clear with only a few
high clouds. As he approached a bus-stop, he noticed a
bright, pulsating light ahead of the bus. At the next bus-
stop he could see that the light had become brighter and
he could make out a shape, which was in the form of either
a parachute or a triangle, hovering above one of the high
mountains, opposite the buildings of the Passenger Auto-
transport Association.

The driver announced the presence of the UFO over the
intercom, and the passengers disembarked and watched it
for one minute.

The object appeared to be half the size of the full moon,
and was stationary and noiseless, hovering about 500 me¬
ters above the mountains. At the base of the strange craft

130

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 6:4. Nikolai Lebedev’s impression of the object seen on
December 30, 1988.

many points of light could be seen, flashing at intervals
of a second, and things like “aerials” were visible (Figure t
6:4).

Beams of light then came down from the object to the
aerials of the PATA buildings, and these aerials began to
glow with blue-yellow “hemispheres” (Figure 6:5). A
moment later the beams of light disappeared, together with
the glowing “hemispheres.” The driver ordered his pas¬
sengers to return to the bus, and he drove off. While ap¬
proaching the next bus-stop, the UFO could be seen
ascending and flying in the direction of the sea. (From a
report by V. V. Dvujilniy in Labor World, January 21,
1989.)

I do not yet know why the Dalniy Vostok area appears to
be the focal point for recent sightings in the USSR.

In concluding this report, I would like to point out that
the vast majority of the population of the Soviet Union
remains woefully ignorant of the facts regarding UFOs.
Newspaper articles continue to spread false information,

The Soviet Scene 1988

131

Figure 6:5. Further impressions of the object in Figure 6:4.

and there is a lack of unity among even like-minded ufol¬
ogists, which leads to considerable confusion. The Com¬
mission for the Investigation of Anomalous Atmospheric
Phenomena was disbanded recently, although the local re-
' search teams have been regrouped into a new umbrella
organization known as “FACT.” Regrettably, the ap¬
proach of this group is far from objective, and stories of
actual encounters with ufonauts are largely dismissed as
nonsense.

To my mind, the only weapon against ignorance is
truthful and factual information. It is absolutely clear to
me that our planet is being visited by extraterrestrials.
The main task, as I see it, is to establish this fact on an
official basis. Alas, I doubt that this will happen until such
time as the aliens land beside the Tsar’s cannon in the
Kremlin . . .

7

UFOs in China
1987-88

PAUL DONG

Paul Dong was bom in Canton, China, in 1928, but
now lives in Oakland, California. He has been
studying the UFO phenomenon for many years and
has written over fifty articles for newspapers and
journals in China, a number of books, including The
Four Major Mysteries of Mainland China and UFOs
over Modem China.

In 1981 Paul Dong lectured on UFOs throughout
China, speaking to packed audiences at the Peking
China Hua University Students Union, Canton Sci¬
ence Museum, and Canton Jinan University, etc.

Paul Dong is an editor of the Chinese language
magazine Journal of UFO Research (see Appendix).

UFO research has continued for forty years, but has yet
to reach any satisfactory conclusion. Because of its mys¬
terious nature, bordering between fact and fantasy, it has
attracted the interest of researchers from all countries to
track it down, hoping it will some day give us a “signal.”

Because China was closed to the world for thirty-five
years, it only came to recognize UFOs in 1978. This im¬
mediately generated much interest, and in the short span
of the past ten years, China has compiled over 6,000 UFO
cases, including those from ancient times. Of course,
among these are many false reports. The percentage of
clear-cut cases which cannot easily be explained away was
found to be twelve percent, over twice as high as the rates
found by English and U.S. UFO researchers (Dr. Allen Hy-
nek, for example, estimated that five to six percent of UFO

132

UFOs in China 1987-88 133

reports cannot be explained away). However, because
China’s researchers were lacking in scientific methodol¬
ogy, further analysis explains a half of those cases, so
those which cannot be explained away are also six percent.

Considering that UFO researchers from other countries
have continued to study UFOs with undiminished interest
for forty years, while China’s UFO researchers started just
ten years ago, it is only natural to expect that the Chinese
would have a stronger interest in UFOs than researchers
from other countries. Just look at our Journal of UFO
Research. When it came out in 1981, it sold just 150,000
copies. Since then it has been on a steady rise, and its
1988 circulation was 325,000 copies. Isn’t that any ex¬
cellent indication? A further indication is that when peo¬
ple all over mainland China first became interested in
UFOs, there were no more than twenty-eight UFO re¬
search associations, while today the number has increased
to thirty-six.

China’s UFO researchers lack funding, communica¬
tions, photographic equipment, instruments, and scientific
techniques; otherwise, China would have even more UFO
students and our UFO magazine would have even wider
circulation (an initial estimate would be 500,000 copies).
To mention a few examples, at the second National UFO
Convention, held on February 24 in Guangzhou (Canton),
the number of delegates giving presentations was no more
than 121, from a base of thirty-six local branch UFO as¬
sociations. Thus, each organization sent only three dele¬
gates. Afterward, I inquired why they had so few speakers.
The answer was that they were unable to buy train tick¬
ets—China has a population of one billion, and it usually
takes one month to buy a train ticket!

It was ten years on July 30, 1988, since the founding of
China’s UFO associations, and they held a “Ten Year
Commemorative Exhibition,” also in Guangzhou. Be¬
cause participation was not limited to UFO association
members, it attracted UFO amateurs, journalists, and tele¬
vision film teams from all over the country. An estimated
one million people saw the exhibition. The display showed
UFO photography from around the world, books, maga¬
zines, slide shows, UFO postage stamps from many coun-

134

THE UFO REPORT

tries, special publications of all the local branch research
associations, and so on. Our Journal of UFO Research
sold 36,000 copies during the week of the exhibition.

UFOs over China, an eighteen-minute color documen¬
tary film shot five years earlier, was also shown at the
exhibition. Since it came out, theaters all over the country
have clamored for it, because the film’s length does not
interfere with the time for the main feature film, and also
because China has about ten million UFO enthusiasts. As
a result, this film has continued playing for a long time.

In view of the large number of UFO followers, some
people might wonder why the Journal of UFO Research
sells only 325,000 copies. [Even allowing for China’s huge
population, this is an enviable figure compared to Western
UFO magazine sales—Editor.] Permit me to explain. Since
everybody there has a low income (on average, 120 yuan
in Chinese currency per person per month, equal to 30
U.S. dollars), one magazine or book is usually passed
along and read by more than ten people. Everyone lends
books to one another. Also, many people do not buy books
but do go to the library to read them.

Sightings in 1988

There were not very many UFO cases in China in 1988,
but there were still over twenty reports. Some of them had
rather low levels of credibility. What follows is a selection
of the two best cases and a separate description of each
one.

Xinjiang Airlines Sighting

The New China News Agency of March 20 reported that
at 9:35 p.m. on March 18, Xinjiang Airlines flight 2606
from Beijing to Urumqi was flying above Qijiaojing, Hami
County, at an altitude of 11,000 meters, when suddenly
somebody discovered that a ball of light the size of a bas¬
ketball, radiating intense beams of light as though from a
flashlight, and flying in the opposite direction to the air¬
craft, had appeared on the aircraft’s front starboard side.
The crew immediately contacted Urumqi air traffic con-

UFOs in China 1987-88

135

Figure 7:1. China. 1-Shanghai: 2-Jiangsu: 3-Zhejiang: 4-
Fujian: 5-Anhui: 6-Jiangxi: 7-Hebei: 8-Beijing: 9-Tianjin.

trol, who replied that there was no other flight activity.
Members of the crew turned on the plane’s navigation
lights as a signal. There was no response.

Three minutes later, the ball of light changed course
and flew off to the north and meanwhile turned into two
shapes of light, one above the other. The upper part was
a small circular shape, and the lower part appeared as
bean-shaped. The two parts were both revolving rapidly.
A green halo appeared outside the circle of light.

At this moment, the lights on the plane went off and the
passengers on the plane saw this scene before their eyes
and followed the two forms as they went into the distance

136

THE UFO REPORT

and gradually got smaller. At 9:48 p.m. the unidentified
flying object disappeared northward into the night.

Half an hour after the event, when flight 2011 was re¬
turning from Guangzhou to Urumqi, flying close to the
Hami region, other people saw this UFO.

Corroboration

With regard to this event, Hami Television Broadcasting
Bureau Vice-Chairman and head of Hami Television, Fan
Chengliang, submitted a report to the Journal of UFO Re¬
search, which appeared in the journal in the fourth quarter
of 1988, and is a more detailed account:

At nine o’clock in the evening on March 18, 1988,1 left
the office building to return home. When I had reached
a point some 10 meters from the building, I suddenly
saw a very large ball of light surrounded by a hazy glow
in the north-western sky before me. At the time, my
first impression was that it was a solar eclipse, because
a partial solar eclipse was scheduled on that day. How¬
ever, I immediately realized that was wrong, because it
was past nine o’clock in the evening, and the solar
eclipse had occurred 12 hours ago. A lunar eclipse?
That was not possible, either. The 18th was the first day
of the second month on the lunar calendar, a new moon,
so there was no moon out that night. Just then, several
students came over. 1 pointed it out to them and asked
them what it was. After looking at it a while, they said
it was a disc rotating in a ball of light. I became aware
that this might be one of those UFOs which people of¬
ten speak of.

I gave a quick glance at my watch, and the hands
showed precisely 9:36 p.m. By that time I had been
watching the UFO for about two minutes, which means
that the UFO must have appeared at 9:34 p.m. Sud¬
denly, a child shouted, “It is flying, it is flying!,” and
when I looked again, the ball of light, which had been
hovering motionlessly, was indeed rapidly moving east¬
ward. In an instant, it had flown from the west of the
first antenna to the second antenna of our bureau’s sta-

UFOs in China 1987-88 137

tion 7601. Also, changes in its shape had occurred, be¬
ginning as an elongated, upright circular shape, and then
making a somewhat smaller circle of light, and in a little
while, it formed into a horizontal cigar shape (this may
have been an illusion caused by the sideways flying mo¬
tion of the object). Nevertheless, the yellowish-green
halo it produced and the hazy glow surrounding it re¬
mained the same throughout.

At this point I realized the need to take a picture, so
I rushed back the approximately 80 meters to the tele¬
vision station office building. Before I got there I heard
a commotion from the building. Several workers on
duty for that shift had run out and were looking at the
flying saucer. It turned out that they had also received
calls from viewers. I ran up to the editing room but
failed to find a photographer, so I just stood on the
second-floor balcony and watched. The ball of light
was still in the field of vision, but apparently its bright¬
ness had weakened, and it was getting further and fur¬
ther away. At 9:46 p.m. the flying object flew off to
the east-north-east and suddenly disappeared. By this
time the sky was full of stars, and there was silence
everywhere.

'In my judgment, the unidentified flying object flew
from the north-west to the east-north-east, at times hov¬
ering motionlessly, at times moving rapidly, and it could
fly straight up and down. It remained in my field of
vision fully 12 minutes. The flying saucer appeared
about 15 to 20 kilometers from the city of Hami, at a
height of about 2,000 to 3,000 meters.

Before dawn on March 19th on Xinjiang People’s Ra¬
dio News, and on the 20th on the Central Television
Station’s evening news, it was promptly reported that
two passenger planes (Beijing-Urumqi flight 2606 and
Guangzhou-Urumqi flight 2011) encountered an un¬
identified flying object in the airspace above Qijiaojing,
Hami County (located 200 kilometers from the northern
end of Hami, and 130 kilometers from Hami). The times
of their encounters were from 9:35 to 9:48 p.m., one
minute off the time of my observation.

138

THE UFO REPORT

Among those in the television broadcasting bureau
who had seen this flying object were: television shift
workers Wu Wanjun, Ahmed Jiang (Uigur ethnicity).
Mi Xiuchun (female, Hui ethnicity), anchorman Ming
Aijun, security guard Xu Yongchang, technical engineer
Cheng Jingchun, technician Ju Hang. Among the stu¬
dents were: Zhang Gaofeng (Hami High School 4, high
junior). Ding Zhipeng (H.S. 2, starting sophomore),
Zou Dongjiang (H.S. 5, starting junior), Fan Nanjia
(H.S. 4, high sophomore), Wang Xiaofeng (H.S. 4,
starting freshman), Liang Yong (Elementary School 4,
sixth grader), Cheng Gang (Railroad Technical High
School 2, high sophomore)—over 10 people in all.

The event described above not only caught the attention
of UFO researchers in China, but also the Civil Aviation
Commission and the Air Force.

Important Sightings in August 1987

Another sensational UFO event took place from August
27 to 31, 1987. Although this story does not belong to
1988 news, there was a recurrence of it on January 22,
1988, therefore the following report, from the Journal of
UFO Research, is relevant.

From August 27 to 31, 1987, an unidentified flying ob¬
ject was observed simultaneously in the areas of Jiansu,
Zhejiang, Fujian, Anhui, and Jiangxi provinces, with
China’s largest industrial city, Shanghai, as center, and
also in Beijing, Tianjin (Hebei Province). Many thousands
of people were witnesses to the spectacle, including work¬
ers, peasants. People’s Liberation Army men, technical
engineering specialists, university students, high school
students, graduate students, workers in the news media,
university students, high school teachers, and so on.

According to incomplete figures, the editorial depart¬
ment of the Journal of UFO Research received 600 eye¬
witness accounts. The reputable news media organization
New China News Agency, People s Daily, Literary News,
Liberation Daily, New People’s Evening News, Zhejiang

UFOs in China 1987-88 139

Daily, and Shanghai television and radio stations, all re¬
ported this incident from different perspectives.

Shanghai

Zhang Zhengyong, a teacher at Shanghai’s Guanghua High
School, reported:

“It was a cloudless sky with excellent visibility on the
evening of August 27th. Around 7:55 p.m., Beijing
standard time, an unidentified object flew from the
north-west toward the south-east. The flying object was
orange, and consisted of a ring of light revolving around
an extremely bright focal point. Surrounding it was a
hazy glow in the form of a spiral with three twists,
spinning in a clockwise motion about once every two
seconds. The glow was a pale earthen orange color, and
the flying object was noiseless and flying very rapidly,
disappearing in probably half a minute ...”

Wuxi City

Three aviation engineers at Wuxi Aviation Bureau Con¬
valescent Hospital No. 738 reported that af7:57 p.m., an
unidentified object flew across the sky. “At first, it cov¬
ered a diameter of observation of about 300-400 milli¬
meters,” they said. “It was flying across the sky on a
spiral course, leaving a trail of red and orange light behind
it. At the center was a circular point of light.”

Hangzhou City

On the evening of August 27, the busy airport was quiet
after the 10:15 p.m. flight had left. Ping Xiaojun, an Air
Force air controller, was leaning on the fence outside the
control tower, looking into the clear night sky. “Suddenly,
I noticed an unusual glowing object hovering about 900
meters from the end of the runway,” he said. “It was
giving off an orange glow. Because of its rather small size
and the dazzling brightness of the light, I cannot describe
its shape precisely.”

140

THE UFO REPORT

New China News Agency
8 / 28/87

Our correspondent in Shanghai reports that quite a
number of Shanghai residents observed an unidentified
flying object yesterday evening. Eyewitness descriptions
of the shape of the object varied. Some said it was a
spiral beam of light scattering sparks behind it, some
said it appeared to be an oval disc of light, while others
said it looked like a comet with a tail shaped like an
umbrella.

According to reports, the unidentified flying object
was orange, spinning clockwise, and moving rapidly
from west to east, with only a few seconds from the
time of its appearance to its disappearance. According
to another report wired in from Shengsi county, Zhe¬
jiang Province, when the UFO flew over that area, the
Shengsi county electric generator was suddenly cut off,
even though the switch for its turbine was set as normal,
and the island was instantly thrown into darkness. The
majority of people's wristwatches stopped [Editor’s ital¬
ics]. Just then, the object, shaped like a coiling snake,
was seen to spin across from the north-west toward the
south-east. Its trail was as bright as day. Because the
electricity was cut off, the majority of military and ci¬
vilian residents on the island noticed the spectacle.

Air Force Pilot’s Sighting

According to the Liberation Daily of August 30, Mao
Xuecheng, an Air Force pilot stationed at Shanghai, pur¬
sued a UFO for nearly three minutes on the evening of
August 27. As he telated to reporters:

“I had orders to fly at 7:35 p.m. on the 27, and to return
to base after completing air patrol duty. As I was ap¬
proaching the airspace above the Yangtze river, I sud¬
denly observed that ahead of me to the right, above
Jiading county, was a very bright, dazzling flying ob¬
ject. I immediately hit the throttle hard and pursued it
closely from an angle of 110 degrees at a rate of 900

UFOs in China 1987-88 141

k.p.h. At that time, the clock was showing a little past
7:57 p.m.

“I observed carefully and noticed that the unidenti¬
fied object was descending, the focus of light was an
orange spot, and the spiral tail it was trailing was also
orange. At 7:59 p.m. it went from descending to as¬
cending, and its speed was now much faster than when
it had been descending. After 45 more seconds I was
unable to keep up with it, so I requested permission to
land.”

Following the August 27 incident, a spokesperson for the
Chinese Academy of Sciences observatory expressed the
following opinion:

“Judging from the shape and mode of movement of
the UFO, we may be certain that it was neither an air¬
plane, nor a shooting star, nor a comet. It is also extreme¬
ly improbable that it was an alien visitor. It is possible
that UFOs are man-made flying objects, because they
come in many different shapes and sizes, and perhaps
while spinning at a height of a few hundred kilometers,
they can shine by reflecting sunlight. In addition, we
cannot rule out the possibility that UFOs are a natural
phenomenon produced by the earth and the air.”

James Oberg of NASA was equally convinced that the
sightings had a rational explanation. “The UFO which
appeared in the sky around Shanghai on the evening of
August 27th was actually a large quantity of fuel released
by a rocket launched by the Japanese,” he commented.
“Three hours before the incident, Japan launched an H-1A
rocket 600 miles east of Shanghai, which flew over the
Shanghai vicinity twice.” This explanation was quoted by
People’s Daily in September, and newspapers everywhere
quickly spread it.

The mystery of August 27 appeared to have been solved.
“Was the UFO which appeared on August 27th a carrier
rocket launched by Japan?” the newspapers asked. “Was
it mass hallucination? To put it differently, have the UFO
phenomena observed all over the world up to now all been

142

THE UFO REPORT

discarded carrier rockets or other aerial objects created by
human ingenuity, or figments of the imagination? There
are different schools of thought on these questions. Inves¬
tigation and research is continuing, and the controversy is
far from finished.”

Lu Feng, in a submission to the Journal of UFO Re¬
search, stated that the Japanese rocket explanation was
invalid, for the following reasons: Out of the 112 eyewit¬
ness reports collected from Shanghai, two said they had
seen portholes on the object, and several had seen the
object stop in mid-air. Most importantly, a pilot with many
years experience reported that he saw the object gradually
lower an auxiliary object, and from the way the object rose
straight up, he further surmised that it was self-propelled.
As an afterthought, he added that the way the electricity
was suddenly cut off while the generator mechanism was
working normally when the object passed through Shengsi
County, Zhejiang Province, was a typical case of an elec¬
tricity blackout when a UFO passes. Many such incidents
had occurred throughout the world.

This incident was discussed for months in the Chinese
press. Just when discussion was dying down, at 11:30 p.m.
on January 22, 1988, a similar object flew over Shang¬
hai. The sighting lasted half a minute. This time, however,
there were not many witnesses. It was seen only in Shang¬
hai and all the events were the same as before except that
there was no electricity blackout. Commented Zhang Yun-
hua of the Shanghai UFO Research Association: “Spiral
UFOs over China are not rare. Since 1977, flying objects
have passed over a number of provinces on many occa¬
sions. There have been three cases when the objects were
seen by thousands of people [including the August 27
case]. The first case took place on July 26, 1977, and the
second on July 24, 1981.”

The Future

In the period from the beginning of UFO research in China
ten years ago to the present day, a greater competence in
dealing with the subject has developed. For example, seven

UFOs in China 1987-88

143

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2 minutes 45 seconds on August 27, 1988 (with acknowledgment
to the Journal of UFO Research).

years ago I was appointed Editor-in-Chief of the Journal
of UFO Research (the only UFO magazine in China). Six
years later they replaced me, and five local people are now
able to handle all editorial duties. Six years ago I wrote a

144

THE UFO REPORT

feature called “Questions & Answers on UFOs,” and to¬
day I note that researchers have begun to write similar
articles. In addition, they have discovered sixty examples
of UFO reports in ancient Chinese books. And with the
rise of psychic research in China in the past few years,
they have discovered that there is some kind of relation¬
ship between UFOs and the paranormal.

Practically all developments in Chinese UFO research
parallel the experience undergone in such Western coun¬
tries as the USA, UK, France, and Australia. Even more
fascinating, the Japanese have been enthusiastically seek¬
ing out and collecting Chinese UFO material.

In another ten years, perhaps, Chinese UFO research
will begin to display its own unique features . . .

UFO Encounters along
the Nullarbor Plain

PAUL NORMAN

Paul Norman was bom and educated in the United
States. With the exception of six years in the U.S.
Navy and a short period as a publisher’s represen¬
tative, he has been employed in various positions,
including superintendent in hydro-electric stations
and engineer-in-charge of thermal-electric stations.

He became interested in UFOs in 1953, after ob¬
serving a strange object approach and hover over a
power station in Tennessee. His interest was inten¬
sified when Major Donald Keyhoe was cut off a coast-
to-coast TV network while attempting to tell the public
about official UFO investigations—an incident that
prompted him to join the fight to end the cover-up.

In 1963 Paul Norman emigrated to Melbourne,
Australia, where he continues his research with the
Victorian UFO Research Society (VUFORS) as
Vice-President and Investigations Officer. In 1979 he
joined MUFON as State Director for Victoria. He is
also a member of BUFORA.

He opted for early retirement in 1976 in order to
devote his time to UFO research. Since then he has
traveled the world in search of answers to the phe¬
nomenon, spending summers in both the northern
and southern hemispheres. He has contributed sev¬
eral articles for various UFO publications and or¬
ganizations throughout the world.

January 21, 1988, commenced as a routine day for me.
After awakening, I switched on my bedside radio for the

145

146

THE UFO REPORT

morning news broadcast. There was mention that some
sort of a UFO incident had occurred on the Eyre Highway
near the remote Mundrabilla roadhouse about midway
across the Nullarbor Plain in Western Australia.

After shifting from one station to another the story be¬
gan to emerge as a significant case worth a follow-up
investigation. A Perth woman, Faye Knowles, and her
three adult sons, Patrick, Sean, and Wayne, had claimed
that an unidentified flying object had picked up their 1984
Ford Telstar and given it a shake before dropping it back
to the ground.

I dressed hurriedly and rushed to the news agency for
copies of the Melbourne newspapers to see what was be¬
ing published about the incident. What made the story
more interesting was that policemen were taking the re¬
port seriously because of physical evidence to support the
claim—and there were other witnesses.

The Nullarbor Plain is a dry limestone, almost feature¬
less landscape with little rainfall occurring during the year.
The plain extends to 180 miles west and 150 miles east of
the state border between South Australia and Western Aus¬
tralia. The width from the Great Australian Bight is about
150 miles. The name Nullarbor means no trees. Only
bluebushes and saltbushes survive the harsh desert cli¬
mate. Underground, there are many caves with only a few
having been explored. The openings to the caves are usu¬
ally very small and hard to find. Some were formerly in¬
habited by Aborigines.

After reading the newspaper versions about the event, I
finally got a telephone call through to Judith Magee, Pres¬
ident of the Victorian UFO Research Society (VUFORS),
in Melbourne. She had been tied up all morning answering
calls concerning the fast-breaking story. Judy passed on
the information and said John Auchettl, VUFORS inves¬
tigator, was already in contact with Mr. Frank Pangallo,
Chief of Staff at the Channel 7 TV Station in Adelaide,
who was interested in contacting someone who knew
something about UFO investigation.

Meanwhile, more details were coming to light concern¬
ing the incident. The family had stopped at Mundrabilla

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 147

before the restaurant had opened for business. Three truck
drivers were waiting to have their breakfast. One driver,
Graham Henley, from Melbourne, was the first person to
talk to the family about thirty minutes after they had left
the scene where the highlight of the activity had taken
place.

Mr. Henley said that all four were distressed and in a
state of shock. Two dogs were cowering inside the car in
a state of fright as well. The car was covered with a black
sooty substance, which was described as a fine silicon-
type material. Later, reports came from the police station
at Ceduna, in South Australia, where the Knowleses
stopped to make the report. The Ceduna police confirmed
the excessive amount of black dust and said it was un¬
known material and that a forensic policeman had taken
samples for analysis. Policemen at Ceduna confirmed that
the occupants were visibly shaken as well. One officer said
that calls had come in from other people claiming to have
seen flying objects within the same week, including an¬
other truck driver who reported that his vehicle was being
paced about the time of the Knowleses’ encounter and
near the same location.

Debunking Attempts

As the story began to spread through the press, radio, and
TV, the skeptics (armchair experts) increased their de¬
bunking attempts, even before investigations had com¬
menced. Within forty-eight hours five “explanations”
came in rapid succession from the scientific community;
all contradictory, none satisfactory. This was the type of
mysterious event that makes ufologists out of academics
and clowns out of skeptics.

One of the first “explanations” came from a professor
of impossibility, Ph.D., etc., etc., as being consistent with
a meteorite, in spite of the fact that the object landed on
top of a motor car before flying away moments later. Fol¬
lowing this attempt another “solution” was put forward
by a second gentleman of learning: “The description of
the event was consistent with dry lightning,” even though

Figure 8:1. Maps showing the “Encounter Location ” in the
Nullarbor Plain with inset indicating the position of the area
concerned (© Commonwealth of Australia 1977).

150

THE UFO REPORT

other motorists were driving along the highway and viewed
the maneuvering object and confirmed that no electrical
storm was in the vicinity.

After that amusing interpretation, another spokesman
from the scientific community came up with the “solu¬
tion” that the occupants were fooled by the rising sun,
even though motorists traveling in the opposite direction
saw the maneuvering object fly away in the other direction.

Another expert said it must have originated at the
Woomera Test Range. That statement was followed by an¬
other spokesman who said that could not be true because
it would not be allowed. My own opinion is: of course
not, unless it was out of control. But even so, how could
a missile strike or lift a motor, and drop it back down to
the ground with only minor damage?

Prior to the arrival of the car in Adelaide, where the
first debunking efforts were made, the Knowleses’ expe¬
rience was being treated seriously until the dedicated de¬
bunkers got into the act. The first samples of dust alleged
to have been analyzed were done by employees of a lab¬
oratory in Adelaide. The statement released to the press
was: “The dust was mostly iron oxide consistent with res¬
idue from worn brake linings.” The large amount of dust
was ignored. The report was distributed in Australia and
overseas as if it were God’s gift to the skeptics. Apparently
the first analysts did not realize the matter would be taken
further afield.

Whether the report was an effort to cover up or some
other reason, I am not prepared to state. The opinion of
other analysts is that the dust from the brake linings was
mixed with dust from other parts of the car. Naturally, the
result would show predominantly brake dust. VUFORS
samples taken were kept separate and analyzed accord¬
ingly. With comments being made by dedicated debunkers
from various sources such as: “The family was mesmer¬
ized by a light in the sky; had been driving all night, dozed
off and had overturned the car”; or “UFO experiences
occur during dozing-off stage and while awakening
(dreamtime ufology),” made the situation urgent that ufol¬
ogists should begin investigations.

The facts are: Dreams do not leave holes in the ground.

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 151

Dreams do not lift motor cars off the road. Nor do dreams
lift helicopters hundreds of feet as experienced by Larry
Coyne and his crew while flying over the American state
of Ohio in October 1973.

Meanwhile, the first person to have spoken to the family
after their terrifying experience, Melbourne truck driver
Graham Henley, broadcast a statement that theories aimed
at debunking the encounter, “were a lot of rot.” He said
he had felt the sooty material and it was not brake dust.
He had been around the car-racing scene as well as being
a truck driver and knew what brake dust was like, and
added that the substance on the car was a fine silicon-type
material with an incredible feel to it. Brake dust only gets
on the wheels, not on the roof. Furthermore, the brakes
were not even hot (it was the coolest part of the morning).
Besides, he was convinced when the Knowleses first told
him what they had experienced earlier that they had seen
something frightening when he saw the terror on their
faces. Even the dogs were scared.

The Encounter in Detail

By January 25, John Auchettl had made arrangements for
an interview with the Knowles family, who had arrived in
Melbourne. Interviews were to be conducted by himself,
Judith Magee (VUFORS President), Mark Sawyers (Sec¬
retary), and myself. We arrived at the address of a relative
with whom the family was visiting and found the
Knowleses still in a state of distress and suffering from an
assortment of symptoms, including the swelling of Faye’s
right hand and arm.

We learned that the incident occurred before daylight
after the family had left the Madura Roadhouse and were
heading east toward Mundrabilla, when they sighted a
group of lights. They thought at first that these were street¬
lights but then realized that there were no streetlights in
that part of the outback.

During the three-hour interviews with the mother and
her three sons we were told several details of the encoun¬
ter. Although it was difficult to determine the sequence of

152

THE UFO REPORT

the different phases of the activity, some of the highlights
were clear in the memory of one or more members of the
family. Beginning about a quarter of an hour before the
lights were first spotted, the car radio started malfunction¬
ing, with a lot of static and other noise which continued
for the entire period of the encounter.

At another stage Sean saw another light ahead. He
thought at first that it was a truck with one headlight, but
as he got closer he saw that it was not a truck but a strange
brightly glowing light either on the road or hovering
slightly above the ground. It was on his side of the high¬
way so he had to swerve to the wrong side of the road,
and looked up just in time to see an approaching car pull¬
ing a caravan. They almost collided.

Soon after the near collision, the Knowleses met an¬
other vehicle, with a light flying at the same speed above
it. By this time Sean’s curiosity got the best of him and he
made a U-turn and sped back towards the west to see what
the light was. After chasing it for a few moments the light
changed course and headed back towards the Knowleses’
car. Sean then made another quick turn, and as he was
speeding towards the east again, the object overtook the
car and landed on the roof with a thud (see Figure 8:2).
Patrick said that the object seemed to grab the car and
began to pull it up. At the same time he yelled out, “Why
us?”

“We did not know what to do,” said Patrick. “The
dogs started to go crazy.” All four felt as if they were
about to die. Patrick said that he felt as though his brains
were being pulled from his head.

Sean did not realize that the car was in the air until it
dropped back to the ground, bursting the right rear tire.
He thought he was doing 200 k.p.h. (120 m.p.h.) to es¬
cape from under the UFO. While the object was on the
roof, Faye rolled down the window so she could reach up
and touch the object. It felt like a warm sponge and she
thought it might be a suction pad. She began to scream.
Patrick, who was in the front passenger seat, rolled down
his window, and dust started pouring into the car. When
Faye pulled her arm back inside the car her arm was cov¬
ered with this dust. She said there was an odor that she

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 153

The Knowles
hid behind —
a bush

Figure 8:2. This diagram (not to scale) illustrates how the UFO
attacked the Knowles family around 0500 hours (W.A. time) on
January 21, 1988 (adapted from a sketch by a sister of Mrs.
Knowles).

thought smelled like decayed bodies. [Abductee Alfred
Burtoo reported a smell of “decaying meat’’ during his
encounter in Aldershot, England, in 1983, as described in
Above Top Secret —Editor.]

Sean reported that at one stage he was “out cold” and

154

THE UFO REPORT

could not remember some of the details related to us by
other members of the family. During the time the car was
in the air their voices sounded as though they were talking
in “slow motion.”

When Sean brought the car to a stop, all jumped out
and hid in the bushes along the side of the highway until
the UFO flew away. The family described the object as a
white light about the size of the car, with a yellow center,
“like an egg in a cup.” The sound was similar to a hum¬
ming transformer. They changed the tire as quickly as pos¬
sible before speeding on to Mundrabilla, where they talked
about the frightful experience with three truck drivers. One
of the drivers had been driving some distance ahead and
saw a bright, white light with a yellow center through his
rear-view mirror.

The Investigation Begins

After the interviews we realized that the case required ur¬
gent follow-up investigation on a priority basis. This
prompted John Auchettl and me to go to Adelaide and
check out the car firsthand. On January 30 we arrived in
Adelaide and did some preliminary work. Three days later
John flew in from Melbourne and joined me at Channel 7
TV station for the appointment with Mr. Pangallo, who
arranged for us to begin inspection and test of the car.
Dust in sufficient amounts for several laboratory analyses
was vacuumed from inside and outside the car, and was
also scraped from the brake linings, to compare with sam¬
ples taken from inside the car.

We found the radio which had malfunctioned during the
encounter to be operating satisfactorily. The dents on the
roof were found to be just as the family had described:
they were very slight with the largest one about the size
and depth of an ordinary saucer. Reports of a rack or
baggage strapped to the roof were false, as we learned
from the family. A story being told both locally and abroad
was that the damage was caused by the roof rack and the
owner was trying to collect insurance money by telling the
story. Philip Klass, America’s foremost UFO debunker,

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 155

offered that story as an explanation. So much for his meth¬
ods of scientific investigation—there never was-a roof rack!

The tire was found to be damaged from a blowout and
was ripped all the way around the circumference (see Pho¬
tos 15 and 16). The side mirror on the driver’s side was
broken, but Sean explained that this happened when they
hit a kangaroo while driving in the dark.

Sean had reported that he had been going 200 k.p.h.
(120 m.p.h.) to escape from under the UFO. The 1984
Ford Telstar, a four-cylinder front-wheel-drive automo¬
bile, will not go that fast while on the ground. To check
Sean’s story, the wheels were jacked off the ground, and
in a test documented by Channel 7 on video, it was shown
that the speedometer will register 200 k.p.h. under those
conditions.

After some of the tests were televised on the news pro¬
gram on the night of February 1, we understand that some
of the skeptics made adjustments to their earlier com¬
ments. The story was being treated seriously again.

On March 20 I left Melbourne for San Francisco, arriv¬
ing there in time for the Bay Area branch meeting of the
Mutual UFO Network at Mountain View, where I gave a
set of the samples to Dr. Richard Haines, a scientist from
NASA’s Ames Research Center. A few days later Dr.
Haines submitted the samples to the “state-of-the-art”
Philips Laboratory. Since this laboratory is one of the most
advanced in America, with many people using its facili¬
ties, we had to wait our turn.

In a letter from Dr. Haines, dated July 12, 1988, he
enclosed a report entitled “Scanning Electron Micro¬
scope Results of Mundrabilla Dust and Other Samples.”
The interior dust was not from the brake system of the car,
he reported. This was in direct contradiction to the origi¬
nal findings reported by the analysts in Adelaide. The
Philips Laboratory analysis also revealed the presence of
“. . . oxygen, carbon, calcium, silicon, potassium, and
others. The analyst found fibers typical of pipe insulation
but it is not asbestos. Many of the fibers contained carbon
and oxygen only (cellulose fibers). Atomic element 85 (At;
astatine) is also possible in the sample as is a relatively

156

THE UFO REPORT

long fiber of NaCl which is unusual. However, NaAt does
combine in fiber-like form ...”

On July 3 I returned to Melbourne. Due to briefings
with the VUFORS committee and the necessity of catch¬
ing up with accumulated correspondence and other mat¬
ters, I was delayed until July 22 before going to the
Nullarbor Plain and other areas in Western Australia. Pri¬
ority for the trip was due, of course, to the fact that the
Knowleses’ experience had emerged as the foremost mys¬
tery case of the decade in Australia.

Further Corroboration

The highlight of the itinerary was without a doubt a visit
with a resident of Norseman who was in the Nullarbor area
at the time of the Knowleses’ encounter and had a report
of his own experience. Not only did this key witness pro¬
vide me with accommodation and hospitality in his home,
but spent many hours driving me to the spot where the car
had skidded, and over several miles around the Nullarbor
Plain.

The witness reported that soon after daylight on the day
of the event, fiber-like substance was scattered in places
along the bitumen highway for about three-quarters of a
mile from where the Knowleses’ car was dropped. At that
time he did not realize that the material was associated
with the UFO. As he picked up some of the fibers, they
crumbled into a powder or dust between his fingers. The
dust was similar to graphite, only much lighter.

A few days later this man began to suffer an illness
similar to the Knowles family, only his symptoms were
more severe. He was admitted to a hospital but did not
report the mysterious experience because he feared ridi¬
cule. Nevertheless, efforts are now being made to deter¬
mine whether or not the illness was related.

It now appears that dust samples vacuumed from inside
the car were the best samples, free of contamination from
outside sources. The apparatus used to analyze the dust
was a scanning electron microscope with an EDAX ana-

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 157

lyzer and ECON detector. Some of the particles were
magnified 5,000 times.

The mention of possible astatine in the samples aroused
my curiosity, since I had suspected some sort of radiation
that did not show up by the time the car had reached South
Australia, where it was checked for radiation but found to
be negative. My reason for thinking radiation was involved
was due to the swelling of Faye’s arm, hair falling from
the dog in patches, and other symptoms.

Astatine is a radioactive chemical element that has no
stable isotopes. It was synthetically produced in 1940 at
the University of California, where scientists bombarded
bismuth with accelerated alpha particles (helium nuclei) to
yield the element 85 Astatine. After the reaction, it has a
half-life of only seven to eight hours before decaying. The
Knowleses did not arrive in Ceduna, South Australia, until
1:00 p.m. after the pre-dawn encounter. Naturally, the as¬
tatine, if that is what it was, would have decayed by that
time.

One hour after the Knowleses left Mundrabilla, they
stopped at the Border Village Service Station to inquire
about the cost of a tire. The service station attendant with
whom I spoke said, “I thought at first the four were trying
to be funny when they were telling me about their expe¬
rience. They were excited and scared. When I got near
the car I noticed an odor similar to that of hot insulation,
and there was definitely a scent like ozone.”

The Police Report

The first police station to receive a report directly from
the Knowleses was the Ceduna station in South Australia.
At that time they were still in a state of fright. They had
passed two police stations, one at Eucla, in Western Aus¬
tralia, and one at Penong in South Australia. The station
at Eucla is well hidden behind small trees in that vicinity,
although there is a sign on the opposite side of the road
from the station. At the early stage after the experience
the Knowleses did not know what to do or who to report
to. The following report was taken down by a policeman

158 THE UFO REPORT

at the Ceduna station and was given to me during a visit
there on July 23:

At about 1:00 p.m. (S.A. time) on Wednesday, January 20th,
1988, I was approached at the Ceduna Police Station by two
male persons (Sean Knowles and his brother Patrick Knowles).
They reported to me that while driving on the Eyre Highway
at a point between Madura and Mundrabilla in Western Aus¬
tralia at about 5:30 a.m. (W.A. time) this date they were con¬
fronted by an extremely white light about 50 to 60 feet in front
of their vehicle. They described the light as being extremely
bright, was white with a yellow core. They further stated that
their vehicle, a Ford Telstar, had been damaged by the object
when it landed on the roof of their vehicle while they were
traveling at the speed of about 110 kilometers an hour. They
further stated that the object while on the roof of their vehicle
had showered the vehicle with a black ash-type dust.

They displayed great anxiety and were visibly shaken by the
ordeal. I asked why they had not reported the incident to the
Police Station at Eucla in Western Australia prior to leaving
that state, and they informed me that they had not sighted a
Police Station at Eucla. Neither did I receive from them a
completely satisfactory explanation as to why they had not
reported the matter at the Penong Police Station, being the
first Police Station in South Australia which they had passed.
This may have been a double-sided question therefore receiv¬
ing the one answer.

The vehicle was parked in Poynton Street, Ceduna. I at¬
tended at the vehicle in company with the two persons and
made an inspection of the damage to the hood of the vehicle
which they indicated to me as having been caused by the ob¬
ject when on the vehicle. I found that there were superficial
dents to the four comers of the hood although the remainder
of the hood appeared undamaged. The exterior of the vehicle
was covered by a fine black/gray dust similar to a road film
left on a vehicle in need of washing. That same dust was
obvious on the upholstery within the vehicle. An inspection of
the complete vehicle indicated that it appeared quite well
looked after and did not display any noticeable damage con¬
sistent with having been involved in an accident or collision
of any kind. All tires on the vehicle were in good condition
and showed at least 3 A tread.

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 159

They told me that whilst attempting to escape from the
object, the rear right-hand side tire on the vehicle had blown
out. I asked to see the tire which was produced from the
boot of the vehicle. The tire was of the same make as the
other tires on the vehicle and has the same tread wear. It was
in good condition. However, the complete outer side of the
tire was fractured at the base of the tread. I asked for the
vehicle to be conveyed to the police station where I could
speak further with the occupants of the vehicle and make
further examination.

On return to the station I spoke with Mrs. Faye Knowles
and her son Sean together in a location where we were out
of earshot of the other occupants. Mrs. Knowles was visibly
shaken by the ordeal and insisted her honesty in the belief
that police were skeptical at the report they were making. It
was stated that they had been on the Eyre Highway as before
stated at about 5:30 a.m. when they were confronted by the
brilliant white light in front of the vehicle. The light re¬
mained a short distance ahead of the vehicle and began to
“zig-zag” from side to side across the road. They stated that
the object was about 3 feet in width but were unable to es¬
timate the height except to say that it blocked their view of
the road ahead of the vehicle. At this time a second vehicle
approached their position traveling in a westerly direction on
the Eyre Highway. They state that the object gave chase to
this vehicle and in fact they lost sight of it to the rear of their
vehicle as it circled around their right-hand side in apparent
pursuit of the other vehicle. At this point I asked Sean to
draw a sketch of the object which he did. The sketch resem¬
bled an egg in an egg cup. The ground was indicated at the
base of the cup.

They stated that the object then came from behind their ve¬
hicle and their vehicle began to shake violently on the road
from side to side. Both state having been extremely scared at
this time and Sean states that he increased speed to the vehicle
in an attempt to escape from the object. Mrs. Knowles then
stated that she wound down the rear side window and reached
toward the hood of the vehicle. She stated that she felt some¬
thing on the hood of the vehicle and made her distress known
to the other persons in the vehicle. Both Sean and Mrs.
Knowles could not recall any indication of light at this time
from the object on the roof but Mrs. Knowles states that it felt
soft, spongy and rubbery and was hot, although she did not

160

THE UFO REPORT

bum her hand. On retrieving her hand however she found it
was covered in black-gray dust. Both state that at this time
they were aware of a high-pitched whirring or hissing noise
but which was of normal intensity. Both stated that they felt
disoriented and that they noticed that their voices had become
slow and deep when they spoke.

They were unable to say how long the object was on the
roof of the car but during the time it was there it appeared to
lift the vehicle from the road and then force it back down
heavily on the road. The rear right side tire on the vehicle then
blew out and Sean considered that this occurred as a result of
the weight of the object forcing down on the vehicle. They
state that the object then vanished and they were able to stop
the vehicle. They both state that the wheel was changed hur¬
riedly and they were about to move off again when they no¬
ticed the object again glowing bright white ahead of the
vehicle. The object appeared to be in the center of the road.
They were extremely concerned and scared and in fact drove
the vehicle behind roadside bushes, vacated the vehicle and
hid themselves separately from the vehicle. They remained
hidden for a short period until they could no longer see the
object and then drove from the location to the Mundrabilla
Roadhouse where they spoke with persons at that establish¬
ment shortly prior to 6:00 a.m. (W.A. time).

I then spoke with the passenger who had been indicated as
sitting in the front left side of the vehicle, Patrick Knowles. I
spoke with him separately from Sean and Mrs. Knowles and
before he had an opportunity of conversing with them. His
indication of the situation which had occurred was similar to
that as told to me by the others although his description of
incidents differed. He stated that his impression of the object
was about similar in size to that indicated but appeared to him
to have a brighter light at the top and at the bottom. He de¬
scribed it as being bigger than the car and that the light which
it gave off was brilliant white. He also stated that after the
object was apparently on the hood of the vehicle and his mother
had felt it and remarked, he had opened his left side front
window and had been showered with black powdery dust. He
was also aware of a foul smell. He stated that he began speak¬
ing with a deep voice which was obviously sluggish and he
gained the impression that the object was “taking over’’ his
body!

His impression of the object on the roof of the vehicle was

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 161

that it was heavy and was pushing down on the vehicle and
concurred that at that point while driving faster to escape the
object the rear right tire blew out. His impression of the noise
which apparently emanated from the object was a deep whir¬
ring sound but he made no mention of any light being emitted
from the object whilst on the vehicle. He stated that they had
driven from the location to the Mundrabilla Roadhouse where
they had spoken to persons including a semi-trailer driver who
they believed had made observations of the white light as it
was traveling on the Eyre Highway in the same location at that
time.

I have checked with Eucla Police Station and ascertained
that they received a similar report to that given by the four
persons at the Ceduna Police Station. Their report had been
received early on the morning of 1/20/88, apparently from the
driver of the semi-trailer. Eucla Police were aware of the re¬
port made by the four persons to the Mundrabilla Roadhouse
and were looking for the Ford Telstar vehicle to obtain partic¬
ulars of the incident. They have conducted inquiries in the
Mundrabilla area, particulars of which I am not yet conver¬
sant.

During my visit to the Nullarbor, I learned the details
about the missing jack that the Knowleses forgot after
changing the damaged tire. Truck drivers and other inter¬
ested motorists stopped at the spot where the Knowleses
had changed the tire after the UFO flew away. These peo¬
ple found tracks where the terrified family had run into
the bushes. In addition, dog’s tracks were found, as well
as a print left in the ground by the jack. Police and other
searchers had returned to the spot looking for the jack.
Our contact from Norseman said that one of his employees
had found the jack and had left it in Norseman for the
owner to retrieve.

Fishing Boat Encounter

That same night of the famous encounter, the tuna fishing
boat Monika was buzzed by a strange maneuvering light.
The sighting was confirmed by police at Port Lincoln,
home of the Australian Southern Bluefin fleet. The skipper

162

THE UFO REPORT

was requested to report to the station when he arrived in
port, for an interview, but due to the ridicule already
being dished out by armchair debunkers, the crew de¬
clined. (The owner of Monika told me that the crew only
saw an unexplained light. A newsman invented the story
that the crew spoke in slow-motion voices during the in¬
cident.) However, witnesses from another vessel of the
same fleet did respond to the police request, and later a
report from one of the observers (name in VUFORS
files), given to me by the policeman who conducted the
interview, follows:

I am a resident of Canada, and at present I am having a hol¬
iday on my relative’s vessel. Empress Lady. I reported an in¬
cident which I saw whilst on watch on the fishing vessel. What
I saw was not a usual sight. I am used to looking into the
night sky and looking at stars and have seen aircraft flying
overhead at night. What I saw on this particular night was
none of these.

It was about 12:30 a.m. I was walking around the vessel,
on watch. At the time we were positioned on the Australian
shelf, in the Great Australian Bight. I had been looking into
the sky, and around the horizon . . . using binoculars to as¬
sist my vision. My attention was drawn toward the north
about 20° off north, to starboard. I saw a bright light; at first
I thought it was a star, but on looking and concentrating on
it, I saw that it was much brighter than the stars. I used the
binoculars to view this light and could clearly see several
green lights just above the edge of the light and several red
lights just below the edge of the light. The light remained
stationary. I observed the light for up to thirty seconds and
then went below and called out another deckhand, who also
viewed the light.

We watched the light for another ten seconds, and it then
moved off at a fast rate and went out of sight over the hori¬
zon. It traveled towards the north. I do not know what caused
the light—it was much brighter than the stars. The sky was
crystal clear. In my own mind it was something other than a
star, but I do not know what. This event occurred several
days after the sighting in Western Australia, and I was not
aware of that sighting until the next day when I read it in the
papers.

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 163
Further Incidents

About two weeks after the Knowles incident, a bus driver
told me that he had been traveling west along the same
stretch of highway when he spotted a cigar-shaped object
ahead and to his right. The time was before dark and all
passengers on the bus saw the “thing.” The driver did not
report the sighting because he did not want to get into the
spotlight of ridicule.

Yet another bus driver reported a strange experience to
me. A bright light appeared about a mile ahead of him
and his CB radio began to “squeal” and the static became
unbearable. At the same time his headlights dimmed. By
the time he arrived at the spot the light had gone. He said
he was much concerned about the experience and was at
a loss to explain it.

During October 1988, another bus driver was paced by
a bright, glowing light along the same highway near Mun-
drabilla, just after midnight. The driver, who was con¬
cerned about the safety of those on board, was able to
arouse seven passengers from their sleep. After the inci¬
dent was made public, the witnesses were ridiculed by
debunkers from Adelaide.

Earlier Incidents

The Knowles encounter resulted in some earlier incidents
being reported. An example is that of two motorists (names
on file) who never intended to talk about the incident be¬
cause they did not want to be thought crazy. The event
occurred on the Eyre Highway, near Balladonia, west of
Mundrabilla. Suddenly a big, bright light appeared on the
horizon in front of their car. The driver and his companion
thought it was a truck, so moved over. The light, which
seemed to be hogging the middle of the road, approached
at about the speed of a truck. As it got closer the driver
cursed him for not dipping his lights and gave a blast of
full beam as a warning. This had no effect. With the light
blinding them, the driver slowed down and waited for the
“truck” to pass. When the light came to within about 100

164 THE UFO REPORT

yards, everything conked out—car engine, lights, and ra¬
dio.

The light slowed and made a couple of slow passes over
the car. In no time at all the two were perspiring and the
metal of the car became hot to touch—it was like an oven
inside. The witnesses could do nothing but sit there. The
object made a humming sound like a vacuum cleaner. The
driver said that he was too curious to be scared, but did
admit to being “rattled” by the experience. The whole
incident lasted only a few minutes, then the light turned
and took off at a fast speed in the direction in which it had
been headed.

Another witness came forward with a report that his car
had been picked up on the same stretch of road before
being dropped back to the ground. This occurred about
five years prior to the Knowles event. The witness decided
not to report it at the time because he thought he would
be ridiculed.

Just two weeks before the Knowleses’ experience, the
owner of the Eucla Roadhouse, about sixty miles from
Mundrabilla, sighted strange lights when he was looking
for a plane, the pilot of which was booked to stay at his
motel. When the plane did not turn up at the airstrip at
7:00 p.m., as expected, he went home. Later that night
the owner’s wife said she could see a plane coming in so
assumed it was the expected guest. She saw what looked
like navigation lights moving over the west of Eucla to¬
ward the airstrip. The lights came down slowly like a plane
preparing to land, but then hovered at an elevation of 20°
for about a minute. The owner said the lights moved lower,
then slowly east, before vanishing over the horizon. He
reported the incident to the Eucla police because he feared
the plane might have crashed, and then reported it to Air
Traffic Control in Perth, who checked with Adelaide Air¬
port. No aircraft were in the area at the time.

The Roadhouse proprietor, who described the sighting
as two twinkling lights on top of an “ultraviolet light,”
was mystified by the incident until the Knowles story be¬
came known.

One month prior to the Knowles case a former resident
of Eucla reported a sighting. At that time she was living

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 165

in a house on a hill with an overlooking view of the Great
Ocean Bight. She was in bed looking at the stars when a
bright light appeared and came toward the house, then
zoomed away at high speed.

Aftermath

On the evening of August 2 I arrived in Perth for another
visit to the Knowleses, including Mr. Knowles, who had
not accompanied them on their trip to Melbourne. Mrs.
Knowles and her sons had by then—six months after their
frightening ordeal—settled down to normal routines, but
were still eager for more information and results of tests,
so that they could have a better understanding of their
experience.

All members of the family expressed appreciation for
help from the VUFORS committee; the only people, other
than relatives, who had shown concern for their welfare.
While in Melbourne they had received independent med¬
ical and psychiatric examination and care, including hyp¬
nosis to sort out the sequence of events during the running
encounter with the unknown object.

There were certain aspects which caused us some anx¬
iety, such as the swelling of Faye’s hand and arm, the
patchy loss of hair from one of the dogs, and the general
reaction on the family. Our concern stemmed from knowl¬
edge of other cases where close encounters had caused
similar symptoms.

During my visit, the Knowles family mentioned several
instances when they had been mistreated by the media, as
well as individuals interested only in making money out
of their predicament. During the course of events follow¬
ing the UFO episode, their car was repossessed and sold
at an auction. Mrs. Knowles had requested previously that
I drive the car from Adelaide, when returning to Mel¬
bourne on February 4, where they were visiting relatives
at the time. They considered the vehicle to be “jinxed”
after the alarming experience, and wanted to sell it be¬
cause they needed the money. I was interested in buying
the car myself, paying off the mortgage, and giving a fair

166

THE UFO REPORT

price to help relieve their burden. In addition, I wanted to
drive the car to Melbourne, where the Ford Motor Com¬
pany was very interested in conducting tests on it.

About an hour before I was due to leave Adelaide on
February 4, a man knocked on the door of my hotel room
to tell me that the owner had given him authority to keep
the vehicle in Adelaide for an exhibition. When I arrived
back in Melbourne, I learned that the Knowles family had
been told that I did not want to drive the car to Melbourne.
During my August visit I learned additional details with
regard to the transaction, that is, authorization had not
been signed until February 10, six days after my return to
Melbourne.

The family mentioned several other examples illustrat¬
ing how they had been mistreated. Their hopes had been
encouraged by promises of looking for Australian and
overseas markets for television commercials, and of mak¬
ing a documentary dealing with the encounter. Also, the
Ford Telstar was to be placed on exhibition and all exper¬
tise would be used to promote and market the vehicle to
its fullest advantage. The agent stated that the venture
would be costing him a considerable amount of time and
money in phone calls, faxing, staff, telegrams, travel, and
arrangements for transport of the vehicle. The family was
to receive sixty-five percent net and the commission to the
agent was to be thirty-five percent net. The promises were
altogether different from the reality suffered by the family.
A loss of nearly $20,000 resulted. Most of the money was
tied up in the car, plus the costs of six weeks away from
home and airline tickets to fly back to Perth. The family
had relied on money promised by the agent. In addition
to these troubles, the Knowleses suffered from the ridicule
dished out by the debunkers, reinforced by comments from
individuals in the scientific community who, knowing lit¬
tle about other well-documented cases, were unable to ask
even sensible questions, let alone knowing how to deal
with the problem.

Another disappointment suffered by the Knowleses was
a promise for an overseas trip to Japan, with all expenses
paid. This was the incentive for a television documentary
by a Japanese company. A camera crew came to the Null-

UFO Encounters along the Nullarbor Plain 167

arbor where the drama was re-enacted. Two of the wit¬
nesses were put under hypnosis and were obliged to live
through the ordeal again, all for the benefit of vested in¬
terests. The documentary was completed and later shown
in Japan. Faye and Patrick had been looking forward to
their first trip out of Australia, but at the last minute the
company canceled the trip.

Meanwhile, interest among some Australian scientists
began to manifest, due to the tireless efforts of John Au-
chettl. John submitted a set of dust samples to a Monash
laboratory in Melbourne, where a scientist made further
unusual discoveries. He isolated the potassium particles
and noticed that they had identical straight edges, un¬
known to occur naturally. The scientist’s conclusion was
that an artificial reaction had taken place, for some un¬
known reason.

A third laboratory is conducting follow-up analysis, but
has yet to present a report on its findings. Other samples
are being held in reserve for additional tests if necessary.

While the scientific community, on the whole, makes
one debunking attempt after another, yet a further en¬
counter has occurred which indicates that the mysterious
objects have a strong magnetic, gravitational, or similar
capability. There is reason to believe that this was an ab¬
duction attempt that failed. The Knowles incident is the
fourteenth case that we know about, where cars have been
lifted and dropped back to the ground. There are perhaps
other cases that we do not know about.

There are also twenty known encounters involving' air¬
craft, such as the well-known case involving a four-man
crew aboard a helicopter that was flying at 2,500 feet over
Ohio in the United States, when the crew chief spotted a
light which he at first thought was a radio-tower beacon.
To his surprise, the light was approaching on a collision
course. As the UFO came closer, the pilot, Larry Coyne,
saw that it was cigar-shaped and metallic. Thinking the
object would collide, he put the controls into the descent
position. After reaching 1,700 feet, Coyne looked up and
realized that the helicopter was being pulled up to 3,500
feet in a matter of seconds, with the controls still in the

168

THE UFO REPORT

descent position. At that altitude Coyne regained control
and flew on to his destination.

Australia’s most outstanding case of the last decade, the
Frederick Valentich encounter, when the young pilot and
his aircraft disappeared without trace while being paced
by an unidentified flying object, and an unexplained sound
disrupted his radio transmission with Melbourne Flight
Service, leads me to suspect that this could have been a
successful abduction, and the helicopter incident was an¬
other attempt that went wrong. At least Larry Coyne and
his crew returned to tell the story, as did the Knowles
family. Frederick Valentich did not. [Both the Coyne and
Valentich cases are examined in detail in Above Top Se¬
cret —Editor.]

Before we know for sure what is happening, there are
more reports to check out, and much more research re¬
mains to be done. Meanwhile, the UFOs that have terrified
motorists on the Nullarbor Plain have not as yet been sat¬
isfactorily identified.

UFO Crash/Retrievals:

Is the Cover-Up Lifting?

LEONARD STRINGFIELD

Leonard Stringfield served in intelligence (S2) and
counterintelligence with a unit in the 5th Air Force
in the Southwest Pacific Theater for thirty-one
months during World War II. During this period an
aircraft he was flying in encountered three UFOs
near Iwo Jima, en route to Japan.

He is the author of two books and a number of
monographs on UFOs. Inside Saucer Post . . . 3-0
Blue (1957) reviewed, in part, his close liaison with
the Air Defense Command of the U.S. Air Force,
1953-57, screening and reporting UFO sightings.
Situation Red: The UFO Siege, was published by
Doubleday & Company in 1977. Since then he has
concentrated on UFO crash/retrievals, and is wide¬
ly considered to be the leading authority on this most
controversial aspect of the subject.

This chapter contains most of the information pri¬
vately published in his Status Report V (1989). A
full list of Mr. Stringfield’s status reports is given at
the end of this chapter.

Leonard Stringfield was formerly Director of Pub¬
lic Relations and Marketing Services for DuBois
Chemicals, a division of Chemed Corporation. He
retired in 1981 and lives in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Prologue

At the time of writing, many issues of controversy hang
over UFO research. Some have caused bitter differences

169

170

THE UFO REPORT

between team members; some can backfire and smear the
image of objective research itself. In the middle zone, try¬
ing to avoid the “people” problems, I feel the urgent need
to continue my probes into one basic issue—UFO
crash/retrievals.

In this endeavor, once we can see through the specter
of disinformation and find convincing evidence—or
proof—that UFOs are nuts-and-bolts vehicles with an
alien crew aboard, I believe that serious researchers
can then go forward to disregard all the other wispy
issues and maybe even put a stop to the disruptive
noises coming out of the woodwork from the far-out
fringe.

Ideally, with the media supporting the demands for
“bottom line” facts from a strong phalanx of the
scientific community, and perhaps some politicians,
the UFO cover-up lid might melt or at least be lifted
a little, allowing for some admissions and disclo¬
sures.

Confirming any one case of an alleged UFO crash and
recovery—such as at Roswell, Aztec, Kingman, El
Yunque, or even Brown County, Ohio—could, in itself,
alarm the world public or even demolish some of its cher¬
ished traditions and philosophies. It could also lead to an
eventual sharing of alien technologies—a new propulsion
system for inner and outer space travel or new “metals”
and many other marvels—and certainly it would bring
public support for NASA and a bigger budget for vital
space probes. More importantly, we might leam about the
alien entities themselves; their intent for being here and
an explanation for some of their incursive actions—to name
one, abductions!

Even at this short-of-proof stage the UFO crash/re¬
trieval (C/R) story, still unfolding, I believe, should be
public information, unless it, and the full UFO story, is
too exotically grim to tell. In that case, I reserve judg¬
ment.

Feeling confident, I submit new data, based on research
and the cooperative work of others, for open review. Ver¬
itas vincit.

UFO Crash/Retrievals 171

Part I: The Quiet Of Dusk . . .

As we close out the decade of the eighties, new public
interest in UFOs, it seems, is surging. Some of it is prob¬
ably the trickle-down from new books on the market, but
for the most part new and old researchers alike are being
spurred by recent revelations of official cover-up amid
some sobering reports of human encounters of the first,
second, and third kind.

Perhaps already an established fact is the climactic close
encounter of the fourth kind: contact with an alien race.
Because of rumors contending that a covert human-alien
relationship has been in operation and, of late, more ru¬
mors that tell of a ruptured “alliance,” we must not only
pause and wonder about the magnitude of a colossal cover-
up but also the implications of an eventual open contact-
even if it were on terms of peaceful coexistence. Any other
alternative staggers the imagination! But getting down to
Earth, as we once knew it, we must also pause and ask in
all seriousness: where is the proof that alien spacecraft
exist or, for that matter, that there is a cover-up?

A seemingly stupid question, when we hear so many
lurid tales about abductions, alien underground installa¬
tions, genetic manipulation, animal and human mutila¬
tions, of American and Russian satellites exploding in
space, of alien artifacts on the Moon and Mars, of dire
predictions of the world’s end and, yes, to a lesser degree,
UFO crash/retrievals. Once a blockbuster to research in
the late seventies and early eighties, a crash story in 1988
was no longer big ufological news.

As I weigh all the reports, or rumors, mindful of
mis/disinformation, I still maintain that it is in C/R re¬
search that we may find our elusive proof. Once the hard¬
ware and the crews, cadaverous or alive, are forced into
public view, then we may find credibility for some of the
other postulations, and be in a better position to espouse
endless hypotheses.

Since presenting my paper, The Fatal Encounter at Ft.
Dix-McGuire: A Case Study, at the Mutual UFO Network
(MUFON) Symposium, St. Louis, in 1985, and pursuing
some leads in that case to little consequence, I have re-

172

THE UFO REPORT

mained relatively quiet on the literary front. New C/R
reports have surfaced from time to time since 1985, but
most were secondhand or of the “Cheshire Cat” variety,
providing scant information. What I had, with a few ex¬
ceptions, were not up to Roswell caliber, and these could
wait until . . . August and September of 1988.

Then, in the quiet of dusk, the valley of my research
suddenly hit a peak. As Richard Hall, author of Uninvited
Guests, commented, the “thermostat” seems to have been
turned up (by official operators). During this time ten new
sources emerged, each promising that useful information
about UFO crash/retrievals would soon follow.

By the end of November most promises were fulfilled.
Some were firsthand reports, others secondhand, but more
importantly, some provided new back-up information for
cases cited in my previously published status reports. Most
rewarding was the timely emergence of persons serving in
covert positions with substantial information in key areas
of my work. Reflecting back, I see in them parallels to the
medical sources who surfaced in 1978 and shared graphic
descriptive anatomical details of the alien for release in
Status Report 11: The UFO Crash/Retrieval Syndrome. As
a matter of record, this prototype information remains to
this day analogous to most reports of alien encounters and
is much like the computerized rendition shown in October
1988 on the TV documentary, UFO Cover-Up? Live.

Proof? Of course not. Getting close to it? Perhaps. And,
yes, I am aware of the adroit arts of disinformation. While
I see no evidence of devious game-playing in my current
input, nor in some of the material received in the later
seventies and early eighties, I am aware of another recent
suspect annoyance, where my name was in blatant public
view in a tabloid, the Weekly World News. In its Sep¬
tember 20, 1988 issue I was headlined as an “expert”
having the inside scoop on an alleged alien underground
facility in Dulce, New Mexico. Bunkum! The fact is, I
have no such scoop, although I have heard the rumors
about Dulce as well as the one in Nevada, and others.

Alert to the risk of tabloid exploitation and official
machinations that try to maintain secrecy, those handling
a sensitive subject like crash/retrievals must also expect

UFO Crash/Retrievals

173

the unexpected from even “friendly” quarters. And, most
often unexpectedly, from out of the rank-and-file of re¬
search, comes the sudden strike of a cobra or a “loop”
of such snakes-in-the-grass who try to take one’s work and
credibility to task and make a big stinking mess of it. The
reasons may be many. Is it simply arrogance, a thirst for
fame or power, or is it the work of the orchestrators who
pick and choose their lackeys? Whatever the reasons, I
have felt their sting since I presented my first paper. Re¬
trievals of the Third Kind , at the MUFON Symposium in
Dayton, Ohio, in 1978. While most of these early adver¬
saries have faded away, little loops persist who employ
subtler ways to undermine my work.

Haunting me still is a remark by a loop kingpin averring
that all my case histories, published in my series of status
reports, were “fairy tales,” thus of no substance. Drawn
into his loop is a pundit, a prominent writer in the UFO
media who, having belittled my work since 1978, has
worked well into the scheme. In later years, through his
editorial controls, whenever C/R was an issue, my work
was simply snubbed. More recently, yet another in the
loop told a mutual correspondent that my investigations
have no depth and that I am a good subject for disinfor¬
mation.

Sad to say, these loopers have obviously not done much
“investigation in depth” about my modus operandi, nor
have they taken into consideration the lack of funds at my
disposal to follow up hundreds of leads, coast-to-coast.
Also, it is beyond my comprehension how some of my
contemporaries can entertain the notion that I have gull-
ibly accepted as valid, or bona fide, every item of C/R
material published in my papers. For the record, the pur¬
pose of my status reports is to draw in new sources with
new information that could either strengthen a case or give
reason for dropping it in the circular file.

It is true that some of the best-made plans go awry and
true that some entries in my monographs have obvious
weaknesses and that some, based on new information, have
become questionable. An example is Case A-2, Status Re¬
port III. However, the mainstream material from early
sources remains solid. One that I thought deserved a full

174 THE UFO REPORT

investigation was the Ft. Dix-McGuire case, which has
become stronger as a result of new information from new
sources. Someday, perhaps, I may write a special paper
updating the status quo of my published case histories.

While the mid to late eighties period did not yield any
substantial C/R case histories worthy of a monograph, ex¬
cept the Ft. Dix-McGuire affair, it was not devoid of high
points.

The Pentagon , 1952

While attending the MUFON Symposium in St. Louis in
1985, Raymond Jordan, a MUFON investigator, gave me
a confidential lead to follow up involving a lady who had
worked at the Pentagon in 1952 who, he said, had seen an
alien body “pickled” in a glass tank in an “Off Limits”
room. By mistake, she had entered the room and was
promptly nabbed and forced to sign papers swearing her
to secrecy.

When I reached the lady, who was still employed by a
government office, she said, “I know what you’re talking
about,” then added, “but I can’t talk.” I suggested that
she communicate by other means, to which she replied,
“No. I don’t want to talk about it at all.”

f

Recovered Disk , 1963

Thanks to Michael Johnstone, a California researcher who
did Some good spadework, it was arranged for me to talk
with a former marine who claimed that in 1963 he had
stood guard at an undisclosed military base which houses
a “disk-shaped vehicle with ovoid cross-section, 40 feet
across and 13 feet thick at the center.”

A more detailed description appears in my article, “The
Chase for Proof in a Squirrel’s Cage,” published in the
British book, UFOs 1947-1987 (Fortean Tomes, London
1987). The marine, who signed a security oath, said that
he had guarded the premises for two weeks while a tech¬
nical crew, speaking in code, tried every known means to
gain entry into the craft, including a laser device. Once,
he said, he observed that it deflected off the curved side
of the craft into the rafters, causing some damage. “The

UFO Crash/Retrievals

175

public should know the truth about UFOs,” the ex-marine
told me. I felt that he knew more than he had cautiously
related, but he refused to disclose the name of the base.

McClelland AFB, 1973

Former military sources with information about witness¬
ing a special movie showing deceased alien bodies sur¬
faced in the late seventies. These were published in my
Status Report II (see cases A-4 and A-9). The viewing of
the film was always behind closed doors and the viewers
were few. Then in 1985 Chris Coffey, of Cincinnati, who
was a close friend of astronaut Ellison Onizuka, revealed
to me that she had asked him about his interest in UFOs
when they met after one of his visits to Wright-Patterson
AFB. Onizuka admitted that he kept an open mind on the
subject and added that his curiosity was aroused when he
and a select group of Air Force pilots at McClelland AFB
in 1973 were shown a black-and-white movie film featur¬
ing “alien bodies on a slab.” In his state of shock, he
said he remembered saying aloud, “Oh, my God!”

Chris, knowing my work in C/R, had arranged for me
to meet Onizuka to discuss UFOs after his scheduled flight
on the space shuttle Challenger. As it turned out, fate in¬
tervened tragically when the shuttle exploded.

Mexico, 1948/49

With the confusion among researchers over the number,
locations, and dates of several alleged UFO crashes on the
Texan border with Mexico—and in Mexico—Tom Deuley,
who heads the MUFON team in Texas, wrote to me in
February 1988 saying that his group had been challenged
to look into the El Indio-Guerrero case that is briefly men¬
tioned in the Majestic-12 document. Could I give any de¬
tails, or rumors, beyond what I had already published? he
wanted to know.

I responded that in recently sorting some old corre¬
spondence I had found a letter dated March 1985 on which
I had noted “Follow Up.” I noted also that I had tried to
reach the sender, seeking more information, but got no
reply. So I tried again in January 1988. Fortunately, this

176

THE UFO REPORT

time I was able to reach the son-in-law of the source. Co¬
operatively, he gave me the phone number—Mr. JA, in
California. Having a friendly chat with JA, I found no
reason to question his sincerity. He was no UFO buff,
having no knowledge of current affairs.

According to JA, he was aboard the USS McKinley, car¬
go class, the commandship for amphibious operations,
docked at San Diego, with many admirals aboard, when
the incident took place. His job: messenger. The date: late
1948 or early 1949. It was winter and he remembers a
quick cruise to Alaska in between those years.

JA was on deck when he learned from the top brass that
a small task force was assembled and ordered to go to a
certain location (unknown to him) in Mexico to retrieve a
crashed “flying saucer.” They departed by vehicle, but he
was not certain if they drove to the site or used other
means to reach what was described as a “remote region
of Mexican desert.”

The task force was gone for several days and when they
returned, JA said, everything was hushed up. He did,
however, hear one of the officers on the mission say that
they recovered some dead bodies but some had managed
to get away. “They were able to move at great speed,”
he recalls the officer saying. JA never heard more about
the saucer or the bodies, but he did remember reading a
brief item in a San Diego newspaper about the crash in
Mexico.

St. Geniez, France , 1972

Something unidentified crashed into the rocky slopes of a
mountain in the township of St. Geniez, France, on
March 18, 1972. According to witnesses it caused brush
fires over a forty-acre area. Significantly the incident oc¬
curred during a flap of UFO reports in that south-eastern
part of France.

The story was originally obtained by researcher Olivier
Rieffel in 1986, during a meeting with Leon Visse, the
person identified in Dr. Jean Gille’s papers published in
Status Report III (see Case B-8). With Visse’s disclosure
that the crash occurred near the Durance River, Rieffel

UFO Crash/Retrievals

177

informed his colleague Jean Sider, who found in his rec¬
ords that the time and place coincided with a reported
crash of a “space object” into a mountain near the town
of Sisteron. According to most witnesses, the UFO was
described as a “red ball” of fire and one informed source,
who prefers anonymity, stated that it was “red-orange,
shaped like a disk.”

While the investigations continued, through the well-
coordinated teamwork of Sider and Rieffel, extensive rec¬
ords of their findings were sent to me for appraisal in April
1988. Included was a fragment from the site of a ceramic¬
like substance appearing to have been baked by intense
heat, and three pages of first-hand reports from witnesses
who saw the descending red object, among them farmers
in the region, the son of a mayor, a newspaper reporter
on the scene, and members of the police and fire depart¬
ments. Of note was an astronomer whose investigations
ruled out a meteorite and meteorological and atmospheric
phenomena.

“The facts of the case remain classified in the files of
the military and the Gendarmerie Nationale archives,”
Sider reported, and added, “Confirming all the main de¬
tails was a member of an intelligence agency who stated
that ‘something’ was received by the Gendarmerie and
shipped in a truck to a location near Paris.”

Sider emphasized that his report was not conclusive and
that investigations were still in progress. Listed were many
more names of people directly involved, who he hoped to
trace and interview.

Kentucky , 1987

Far more spectacular, but affording far less supportive ev¬
idence than the St. Geniez incident, is the first-hand report
from a retired medical doctor who alleges that he acciden¬
tally found the skeletal remains of two humanoids, possi¬
bly of alien origin, on his farm in western Kentucky in
March 1987.

When informed of the story, I was eventually able to
reach the doctor through his friend Bill Boshears, who first
aired it on his radio talk show in Cincinnati. Having been

178

THE UFO REPORT

warned to “shut up” since the show, the doctor nonethe¬
less entrusted me with his name, but would not reveal the
location of his farm nor give me his unlisted phone num¬
ber. He also advised that some of the details he shared
with me about the Air Force investigation should be kept
confidential.

The doctor, when he talked with me on his friend’s
phone, was cordial but brief. He said that it was during a
routine evening stroll on his farm property of 400 acres
that he discovered the extraordinary evidence. Next to a
burned-out circle, about four feet in diameter, in an open,
grassy field, he found the skeletons of two humanoid en¬
tities about four feet apart. Without a trace of clothing,
some of the bones showed residual ligament, he said, with
evidence that predators had been at work. As a doctor, he
was certain that the bones were not of animal origin and
on closer examination he was shocked, he said, to find
that the structure was bipedal, about four feet tall, with a
large skull and cat-like jaw, and a barrel-like rib cage with
long arms and three fingers.

The doctor’s next move was to call the sheriff, who im¬
mediately called the Air Force. The next morning at sun¬
rise, the doctor was surprised to see three helicopters land
in a clearing and many people, some in uniform, being
deployed over a wide area. Greeting him was a colonel
(name known to me) who cordially introduced himself and
stated his mission: remove the bones and undersoil, test
and remove the burned circular soil, and comb the area
for any other evidence. Later in the day fresh soil was
filled in the excavated areas, and the doctor was told that
the soil in the circle had been baked at 3,000 degrees.

When asked about the time factor of body decomposi¬
tion (allowing for predators), the doctor estimated that,
according to cursory examination, the aliens had been ex¬
posed for less than a hundred days.

Reminding me that “they put the fear of God” in him
after his trip to a military base for further interroga¬
tion—and where he was shown photos of other alien
corpses—the doctor expressed interest in my research, so
I suggested that we lunch together soon. He agreed, but
never called.

UFO Crash/Retrievals

179

Ohio, 1987

News of a UFO crash on a farm in Brown County, south¬
western Ohio, in the spring of 1987, looked promising at
the outset, but as I tried to put the pieces of raw infor¬
mation into some order to make the next move, mainly to
reach the principal source, I ran into every conceivable
roadblock. A year later, after “giving up,” information
surfaced from a new source to give credence that some¬
thing did crash at the farm site. Whatever happened, I
could now see through some of the bizarre diversions that
blocked me from contacting the farmer who claimed that
he saw the crashed disk, three small female non-human
bodies strewn in the field and, above all, had some un¬
usual metallic fragments from the debris to prove it.

My initial informant was JD, a gemologist and a per¬
severing UFO buff who, in getting many packages by
United Parcel Service, learned from the driver on her rural
route that the farmer “down the road” had pieces of metal
from a UFO that had crashed on his property. When JD
tried to learn the farmer’s name and location, the driver
became scared, and I was later told that to avoid the issue
he even changed his route. Undaunted, JD then opted to
go to the local police office near the site, hoping to locate
the farmer. There she got the runaround and was advised
by one officer to forget the matter. But according to JD,
the officer later visited her home and for some unexplained
reason gave her a photo of the farm property.

At this point, JD suddenly showed signs of confusion
and fear, claiming that her house had been entered, that
the photograph of the property had been taken, which she
had used as a bookmark in a library book (by Major Key-
hoe) and that the book was found on the hood of her car
in the garage. Next came word that she had been injured
in a fall into a sewer hole between her house and the ga¬
rage. The lid had been loosened, she said. Investigating,
my son-in-law and I could find nothing abnormal in her
manner of housekeeping, but we did begin to wonder about
her going off the deep end, and if she had become ob¬
sessed to a degree of fantasy. Or was it a hoax, or a ploy
of disinformation?

180

THE UFO REPORT

Time went by without further contact. I felt that some¬
thing was amiss about the case. Concerned, I got in touch
with a former Air Force intelligence officer who had the
“right” connections, and asked if he could help throw
light on the affair. T\vo days later he called back to relate
that he had been in touch with the “right” person and was
told that there had been “no significant UFO sightings in
that area for the past year. ’ ’ He added that my informant
would soon be visited by two investigators in an official
capacity.

Several weeks later I received a surprise call from JD,
who simply said, “I’m not supposed to talk with you, but
here I am.” She went on to explain that she had had two
visitors who, on learning that she had no hidden metal
artifacts, debunked the crash as well as my crash/retrieval
research, and advised her in so many words that she should
not contact me again.

Not long after that, JD called me again, admitting that
she had met the farmer, had visited the farm, saw the
newly added soil over the crash site and, moreover, gave
me the farmer’s name, and had even arranged for him to
visit me the following week. He never came, as expected,
and when JD called a few days later she regretted to tell
me that he had been moved, expenses paid, to Virginia.
This, if true, I suppose, was his reward for being a good
citizen, a real patriot.

In April 1988 a researcher, joined by a person knowl¬
edgeable of military intelligence operations, visited my
home to discuss an abduction case. Inevitably, the con¬
versation drifted to crash/retrievals and I mentioned the
alleged crash in Brown County. “Oh, yes,” said my
knowledgeable guest, “I heard that a jet crashed on a
farmer’s property.” She added, “It was in an inaccessible
area and they had a hard time getting the wreckage out.”

A jet? Certainly there had been nothing in the news
about a jet crashing the previous spring in that locality
and, as we all know, airplane crashes, of any kind, always
make news. Significantly, my guest also stated, “I heard
from a good source that the government came in and
bought the farm and moved the owner out of town.”
Amen!

UFO Crash/Retrievals

181

Much can be said about this case, pro and con. I have
also omitted some details that might compromise the po¬
sitions and activities of certain people involved.

Part II: . . . To the Burst of Dawn

From my perspective, the official cover-up and the ways
to control it seem as effective as ever up to the Fall of
1987. Both the Kentucky and Ohio incidents, described in
Part I, which involved civilians, show that anything goes,
from trickery to threats, to keep the facts hidden.

Then, throughout 1988, like the burst of dawn, some¬
thing changed. Whether or not the iron lid had loosened,
more people, and concerned people, suddenly became
more vocal. Of concern were the implications of MJ-12,
the meaning of abductions, the flap of low-level UFOs in
the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, the Gulf Breeze
affair, and what was said and left unsaid on the TV doc¬
umentary, UFO Cover-Up? Live about alien-human rela¬
tions by two disguised informers, “Condor” and
“Falcon.” (The identities of both “birds” are known to
me. Condor was an Air Force officer stationed at Wright-
Patterson AFB in September 1985, during which time he
called me on several occasions. Expressing interest in my
research and my sources, he claimed to know a colonel
with sensitive information relative to my work, but his
proposal for me to meet with this source fell through and
I heard no more. Later I learned that he confided with a
member of the Fund for UFO Research and after that with
Bill Moore, etc.)

Yes, things have changed: this is reflected in my volume
of mail and the phone calls I get at all hours. Is the cover-
up, then, in a “calculated” countdown from ten to a three,
two, one, and lifting?

Frankly, I do not think the time is right for a sudden
formal announcement of alien “visitors” by the world
powers, which would have unpredictable effects on soci¬
ety. If the press were suddenly to wake up and demand
the bottom line on all the UFO happenings in the MJ-12
files, or were to confirm the horrors described in an ex-

182

THE UFO REPORT

pose of the alleged secret Project Grudge Report #13, re¬
leased by a former Air Force officer. Bill English, then we
would have more to worry about than just the stock mar¬
ket.

But maybe the cover-up is loosening a little because of
new pressures, or guilt, or leaks, or the fear of more Fal¬
cons and Condors. Maybe we are being spoonfed in var¬
ious ways, and the masqueraded Falcon and Condor are
only doing their job. But, while the media still sleeps,
amid all the UFO “noise,” I have seen a change on my
thermostat. For whatever reason, I am suddenly getting
more C/R input.

Pennsylvania, 1965

Thanks to the in-depth research of Stan Gordon, Director
of the Pennsylvania Association for the Study of the Unex¬
plained (PASU), the Kecksburg crash/retrieval case of De¬
cember 9, 1965 may now find recognition as a classic in
the annals of ufology. Considering the number of wit¬
nesses tracked down by the PASU group, it may even rank
with Roswell.

As Case B-2, the incident was originally reviewed in
Status Report II by Clark McClelland, but at that time,
save for knowing that something had crashed and was re¬
trieved, there was some uncertainty about the nature of
the object. The Air Force, of course, explained it away as
a meteorite; others suggested space debris. Gordon, how¬
ever, accepted neither explanation as more information and
Freedom of Information Act data surfaced. In the spirit of
cooperation, he kept me informed.

Then in 1987, by good fortune, Stan met “Pete,” who
showed up at a PASU UFO exhibit at a local mall. Having
feared ridicule for twelve years, he finally decided to tell
his story. It began at the age of nineteen, as a fireman,
when his unit in a nearby village was summoned by the
Kecksburg authorities to help in the search for something
that had crashed in a wooded area—possibly an aircraft.
But the shocker came, he said, when the crash site was
located. Instead of an aircraft, they found something else—
a large acom-shaped object embedded deep in the ground.

UFO Crash/Retrievals

183

Armed with Pete’s new information, Gordon published
the full Kecksburg story in the final quarter issue of Pur¬
suit, in which he reports the UFO’s flight pattern across
several states, tells of the first-hand experiences of local
residents who saw the “fireball” crash and of others who
witnessed the sudden, incursive “take-over” by the mili¬
tary to perform the retrieval operation. According to Gor¬
don, many of the local citizens viewed the action as
constituting a state of martial law, and he comments,
“Many were influenced enough by their contacts with mil¬
itary or local authorities to the effect that they refused to
discuss what they saw or were told, even to this day.”

Before being chased from the crash site by the retrieval
team, Pete and companions had a close-hand look at the
semi-submerged mystery object. To them, it appeared that
the object had descended at about a 30° angle and had
broken tree limbs and knocked down a fifteen- to twenty-
foot-high tree before impacting. The trench was about
twenty-five feet long and at the greatest depth was about
seven feet. It was puzzling that there were no signs of fire.
The size of the acom-shaped UFO (which had no windows
or seams) could not be determined because of its sub¬
merged position, but it was estimated to have been about
seven feet high and wide.

In trying to give a better description of the craft, Pete
said that it gave him the impression of a deflated beach
ball pushed in, and toward the bottom there was a ring or
bumper-like structure about eight to ten inches wide that
seemed to cover the circumference of the object. He said
that on this bumper, which was raised up off the surface,
was a writing that looked like Egyptian hieroglyphics. He
remembered the characters of broken and straight lines,
dots, rectangles and circles. As a machinist for twenty-
five years and familiar with metals, solid and liquid, he
observed, “Never in my life have I seen the color of that
metal in any shape or form.”

Pete said that he will never forget the excitement on his
return to the Kecksburg firehall, which had been set up as
a command post. It was swarming with military person¬
nel—mostly Air Force—and a lot of equipment was being
carried in. Soon guards were at the front entrance and the

184

THE UFO REPORT

firemen, before being dismissed from the building, were
told to use the outside toilets.

There is much more to Gordon’s article, like his learn¬
ing later that Air Force records showed that NORAD’s
Space Detection and Tracking System (SPADATS) did not
have any space junk re-entering Earth’s atmosphere that
day. Thanks to Gordon, I was privileged to interview Pete
on the basis that I would not use his name. Once this was
agreed, Pete gave me his complete story, confirming Gor¬
don’s version.

I asked Pete about the hieroglyphics, wondering if they
could be Russian. “No way!’’ he said. “I’m of Russian-
Polish descent and can read Russian. It was not Russian,
nor American.” He added, “I’ll stake my life on it: the
object was not man-made.”

New Mexico, 1947

The crash and recovery of an “alien” object near Ros¬
well, New Mexico, in July 1947, so well-documented by
Bill Moore and Stan Friedman and others, is a case that
should cause skeptics to think twice before they impugn
the existence of UFOs or the plausibility of the extra¬
terrestrial hypothesis.

Though most of Roswell’s first-hand witnesses were
civilian, the overall evidence supporting this “nuts-and-
bolts” incident is massive, and of significance, ironically,
is the report that news of the UFO’s discovery at the base
slipped out in an “uncleared” press release by the PIO,
1st Lt. Walter Haut. Had it not been for a fast and effective
cover-up, the full story, once in the public domain, could
have re-written what we know as history. Having been
informed, perhaps mankind in his philosophical and geo¬
political pursuits would have chosen a wiser course.

Except for rumors, the truth about Roswell did not sur¬
face until 1978, when the late Jesse Marcel told a NBC
radio newsman, Steve Tom, in Chicago, about his official
role as the intelligence officer assigned to the crash site to
retrieve the scattered debris. On April 7, 1978, Tom called
me and linked me up with Marcel in Houma, Louisiana,
to get his story first-hand. This led to other calls to Mar-

UFO Crash/Retrievals

185

cel, and upon learning that we had both served in the 5th
Air Force during World War II, in the same combat areas
in Leyte, Philippines, we developed a feeling of camara¬
derie and talked about meeting together for a UFO dis¬
cussion in the near future.

Marcel confirmed that the debris he combed from the
crash site on the Brazel ranch was not the remains of a
balloon and that he had observed on a fragment of metal
beam a row of symbols looking like hieroglyphics. (See
Status Report II, case A-10, and the foregoing Kecksburg
case.)

Regretfully, I never got to meet Jesse Marcel. Stan
Friedman did conduct an interview which appears in The
Roswell Incident (see Appendix), and the following extract
is a statement by Marcel that left some questions unan¬
swered:

“. . . that afternoon, we loaded everything into a B-29
on orders from Colonel Blanchard and flew it all to Ft.
Worth. I was scheduled to fly it all the way to Wright
Field in Ohio, but when we got to Carswell at Ft. Worth,
the general nixed it. He took control at this point, and
ordered me not to talk to the press under any circum¬
stances. I was pulled off the flight and someone else was
assigned to fly the stuff up to Wright Field ...” [Au¬
thor’s italics]

My status reports do pay ofl\ Thanks to one reader,
John August, in Hawaii, I got the “missing link” referred
to by Marcel as his replacement who flew the Roswell
remains to Wright Field. August followed up his initial
phone call with a letter, dated Labor Day 1988, which
states in part:

“. . . Confirmation of the Roswell crash reached me
through a Maui resident, who claimed that her father,
Captain O. W. Henderson, flew the retrieved spaceship
from Roswell to Wright Field on a B-29. According to
Henderson’s wife who was reached by phone, a news
officer reported the incident but it was quickly quieted
down. On February 17, 1981, the story appeared in the

166

THE UFO REPORT

tabloid. Globe, and Henderson admitted to his wife and
daughter that the story was true. The crew, she said,
were little people with exceptionally large heads.

... At the time, Henderson was stationed with the
509th Bomb Group at Roswell ... an elite group for
which all involved required high-security clearances.
Besides being a highly decorated pilot during WWII,
with over 30 combat missions, Henderson was in charge
of the movement of all passengers and freight trans¬
ported by air for organizations participating in the
atomic bomb tests and the Manhattan Project ...”

Enclosed, as a result of August’s attentive spadework,
were copies of photos showing Captain Henderson and
flight crew, and a letter of commendation for an “excellent
job accomplished” from Carl Spaatz, Commanding Gen¬
eral, AAF, forwarded to Colonel William Blanchard,
Commander, 509th Bomb Group.

For verification, August footnoted his letter with Mrs.
Henderson’s address and phone number. Calling her on
October 1, 1988, I explained my work; asked many ques¬
tions to which she cordially responded, and got approval
to publish her name in this report. She said that her hus¬
band, known as “Pappy” among his buddies, passed away
in 1986, and stated unequivocally that he transported the
Roswell wreckage to Wright Field and kept the secret
faithfully until 1981. She remembers Jiis comment, “I’ve
been dying to tell you for years, but couldn’t. It was top
secret.”

When I asked Mrs. Henderson if her husband had ever
described the object he transported, she replied that all he
said was that “It was strange,” avoiding details.

Avoiding details, it seems, goes with the business of co¬
vert work if one must talk at all. And so it was with an¬
other source who revealed some information about his
stealthy activity at Roswell in 1947.

The source, Bev, is British; her father a former Ameri¬
can serviceman, a staff sergeant who took up residence in
England following duty in the Pacific theater, World War II,

UFO Crash/Retrievals 187

and notably with the 509th Bomb Group at Walker Field,
Roswell. According to records, he was at Roswell during
the same time as Major Jesse Marcel and Captain O. W.
Henderson.

Bev, referred to me by Timothy Good in 1988, is, by
the tone of her letters and phone calls, sincere in trying
to verify her dad’s alleged participation in the Roswell re¬
trieval case. She sent me copies of all his military records,
which confirm his assignment at Walker Field in Roswell,
such as medical records, one with orders “cut” for hos¬
pitalization at the base for both him and Jesse Marcel, and
his pass to the base’s Non Commissioned Officers’ Club,
dated July 1947. [These records are also in my files. I have
had several meetings with Bev, her sisters and mother, and
am convinced that they are telling the truth—Editor.]

As a child, Bev recalls her dad talking about his hush-
hush work at Roswell, and whenever he described the non¬
descript bodies, her response was to giggle. The subject
never came up much, she said, until she was a teenager.
Once, she recalls, he had read a feature story in a news¬
paper about a UFO crash and, looking grim, he told her
about his experiences of standing guard where the wreck¬
age was stored and during the retrieval of the bodies, and
cautioned his family to keep it quiet lest he get into trou¬
ble. According to Bev’s letter, she recalled the following:

“. . . he stood guard once outside a hangar where a
crashed saucer was stored. He couldn’t see anything as
it was all packed up and ready to be flown out to Texas
the next day. . . . We disagree on the number of bodies
he saw. I’m sure he said two, but one of my sisters said
three ... All available men stood guard duty around
the site where a crashed disc had come down and they
couldn’t understand why [the bodies] had to be kept
cold, as there were trucks of ice . . .

Although he and others were told they would get into
trouble if they saw too much, they did look under the
cover and saw two small dead bodies. He said they were
like us, but not like us. They were smaller than a nor¬
mal man with large heads and slanted eyes. He also said
they looked yellowish, a bit Asian. . . .

188

THE UFO REPORT

I remember when I got older and asked for more in¬
formation, he got angry and said, ‘That’s all I know and
I shouldn’t have told you that much.’ Whenever he
talked about it, he always looked worried. ...”

His last words, according to Bev, were about Roswell,
before he died in hospital in February 1986.

Fort Dix-McGuire AFB, 1978
When I last made contact in January 1987 with Jeff Morse,
the former “Blue Beret” who lifted the lid off the Ft. Dix-
McGuire affair, I felt that my chase for more supportive
information, at least through him, had ended, and I was
back on the treadle of the proverbial squirrel’s cage.

As agreed, Morse met with Dick Hall, his brother Wil¬
liam, Dr. Bruce Maccabee, and myself in a busy mall near
Washington, DC. Over lunch, he openly answered any
questions about the incident, but grimaced over the tan¬
gled and costly prospects of his current legal pursuits in
Federal Court involving an incident of harassment (see
MUFON UFO Journal, June 1987). On departure, he said
he planned to return to his work overseas. I wished him
well and thought of the seven years I had spent investi¬
gating his case. There has been no word from Morse since,
but his words that day left the four of us believing that he
was telling the truth about the ill-fated alien interloper.

Since I presented Morse’s story in Status Report IV at
the MUFON Symposium in St. Louis in 1985, there was
a spark of hope in 1986 of getting a new source as a
backup; a former master sergeant who was stationed at Ft.
Dix in January 1978. According to Pat Marcattilio, a MU¬
FON investigator in New Jersey, the source, “Mr. S.,”
whom he knew at a place of previous employment, told
him that he heard the rumors about the incident and, in
his own time, tried to round up the facts. But he got no¬
where and learned that all records, tapes, etc., had been
destroyed. He was also advised to stop snooping. When
Marcattilio later tried to get more details from “Mr. S.,”
he said, “He seemed very nervous and refused to talk
about it.”

UFO Crash/Retrievals

189

In September 1988 a new source with convincing cre¬
dentials called me about the incident. As a MUFON state
section director in New Jersey, presently serving as Vice-
President of the Air Force Association, he had been an
intelligence officer with the rank of major at McGuire
AFB in January 1978. Although not a witness to the re¬
trieval operations, he had been in a key position to put the
twos-and-twos together enough to give credence to the
story told by Morse. His letter of September 6, in part,
follows:

... I attempted to recall as best I could the report of the alien
being shot on the base back in January 1978. My job was
Deputy Director of the 21st Air Force Intelligence 438th Mil¬
itary Wing Intelligence. In this dual role, we were responsible
for briefing both the 21st Air Force Commander, who con¬
trolled all military airlift aircraft in half the world over to
India, and the Wing Commander at McGuire AFB.

I remember walking into the 21st Command Post and most
people were talking about an incident that had occurred on
the base during the night. The report was that an alien, a short
little guy, had died from a gunshot wound. No one seemed
to know where he came from or what he was doing on the
base. At first it was treated as a joke and that the Security
Police must have meant an alien from another country, like
Mexico.

Usually, I would brief the Commander, Major General Tom
Sadler, on anything important that occurred during the night.
We were concerned about acts of terrorism, hijacking, and
Soviet movements that could be a threat to our aircraft. Nor¬
mally, if something was felt to be important, I would either
brief the General in a stand-up briefing in the Command Post,
or if it was classified above “Secret,” in his office.

. . . Later in the morning I was told that Intelligence would
not brief the General on the alien; that the Security Police
Commander or a Liaison Officer was handling it. Later in the
day I saw the officer, who was a Lt. Colonel (name unknown),
coming out of the General’s office. He looked tired and some¬
what under pressure. He said “Hello.” I expected the Lt.
Colonel to fill me in on the situation, but he avoided saying
anything . . . Assuming this was an alien, I wonder how he
got lost from his craft?

190

THE UFO REPORT

The answer to my source’s question comes from still
another officer, allegedly on the scene in early January
during a phase of significant UFO activity over the two
large military compounds. During this phase, I was told,
one of the craft had malfunctioned and crash-landed. One
survivor of the crew, lost and starving, managed to reach
the outer perimeter near a guard post at Ft. Dix and was
shot by an MP. My source said that the interloper, mor¬
tally wounded, was later found dead at McGuire. Here
(relying on Morse’s testimony), the “alien” was retrieved
from an abandoned airstrip.

The Lt. Colonel who briefed General Sadler (referred
to by the intelligence officer in his letter) had been previ¬
ously identified by Morse as his commanding officer,
whose name was made known to me. His name, rank, and
serial number, as well as the officers who interrogated
Morse at Wright-Patterson AFB following the incident,
had all been authenticated by the National Personnel Rec¬
ords Center, St. Louis, in 1985.

Also of interest is a letter of September 12, 1985, from
the New Jersey State Police, in response to a letter from
Robert Bletchman, an attorney in Manchester, Connecti¬
cut, asking about accessibility to their records of alleged
involvement in the incident. They replied:

“ . . . Please be advised that it has been, and continues
to'be, the policy of the New Jersey State Police, that
the records, radio logs and other documents maintained
at our stations are privileged and are to be kept confi¬
dential. We further advise that we do not consider them
to be within the public domain in conjunction with gen¬
eral disclosure, etc. ...”

This information should answer those who queried the
State Police about its involvement and were told that they
have no such records.

For me, the evidence collected over eight years of in¬
vestigation into this case may not prove that UFOs are real
or extraterrestrial, but it does show that such incidents, if
true, would be difficult to explain to a benighted public.
Thus, the cover-up.

UFO Crash/Retrievals

191

Norton AFB, 1973

John Lear, an airline pilot who is MUFON State Director
for Nevada, undaunted in his pursuit of people, anywhere,
to get UFO facts, has lectured extensively and broadcast
on radio and TV in Las Vegas. Listening on one occasion
was “Mike” (real name withheld on request), who sur¬
faced in September 1988 to tell Lear his first-hand story.

Admittedly troubled by his experience, Mike explained
that in 1973 he had been an Air Force photographer sta¬
tioned in Hawaii, following duty in Vietnam. His prime
duty there was processing gun-camera film. One day,
he said, he was notified that his security clearance had
been ungraded, and several weeks later he and another
photographer in his unit were flown for a temporary duty
assignment to Norton AFB in California.

Lear’s letter to me, dated November 21, 1988, recount¬
ing briefly his interview with Mike, is paraphrased as fol¬
lows:

On landing at Norton, Mike and his companion were taken
by Air Force vehicle with windows blacked out on a two-
hour drive. During the drive, Mike was told by the driver,
“So you guys are going to photograph the UFO, eh?”

The vehicle came to a halt on a platform which was
then lowered into a large underground installation. Es¬
corted to a briefing room, they were told that they were to
photograph a flying saucer and the autopsy of three dead
aliens. Ordered to disrobe, they were issued white smocks
and combat boots for security purposes. Mike was then
escorted into the installation where he saw a disk-shaped
craft about thirty feet in diameter, contained in a heavy
net suspended from a large crane.

Mike was boosted into the opening of the disk (there
were no stairs or ramp) and proceeded to crawl inside. He
was shocked, he said, to find that the inside looked to be
about ten times the size of the outside. “I could have
thrown a football as hard as I could and not hit the other
side,” he commented. Disoriented, Mike poked his head
back outside to check the size, which appeared to be about
thirty feet in diameter as before. Once inside, he met two

192

THE UFO REPORT

persons similarly clothed who showed him what they
wanted photographed. He shot many photos of control
panels and various other fixtures, and was later asked to
photograph the exterior from different angles and dis¬
tances.

Mike was later taken to a room in which there were
three dead aliens. He described them as approximately five
feet tall, with almost normal human heads, except that the
eyes were more rounded. The skin texture was like baking
dough, and very white. Before the autopsy the aliens had
been dressed in blue uniforms, like flight suits.

As the initial incisions were made for the autopsy, Mike
saw green fluid and black innards. At this time he became
ill and called for the other photographer to continue the
assignment. Later that day they were driven back to Nor¬
ton, where they spent the night before being flown back
to Hawaii the next day. About two months later Mike’s
companion disappeared, and neither Mike nor his family
have heard from him since.

The year 1973 brings to mind Case A-2, Status Report II,
where three humanoids were examined at Wright-Patterson
AFB. While the head sizes described in each case differ,
and the body heights also differ by a foot or so, the de¬
scription of the skin is strikingly similar. According to the
sergeant in Case A-2, who stood guard in the underground
facility, the color was “off-white or cream.” Both observ¬
ers, it should be noted, were admittedly traumatized by
the sight of alien bodies, which could account for visual
differences of anatomical sizes and heights.

Suspicious Deaths

For those of us in research who wonder or worry about
the rigors of the cover-up, so effective for a long time,
there is the suspicion that the reason for it must be com¬
pelling; in fact, so compelling that it may explain why it
is maintained at any price—even at the price of sudden
death for those having sensitive information who may talk
too much.

Evidence of such thinking finds support in the recent

UFO Crash/Retrievals

193

disclosure of a retired police officer, with twenty-two years
of service, in an eastern state. Through the co-operation
of John Ford, head of the Long Island UFO Network, I
first received word, on August 5, 1988, that his source had
information concerning a crashed disk and the recovery of
seven bodies in a western state, which in some way also
involved the FBI.

Fulfilling Ford’s request for a notarized statement, en¬
suring his source’s anonymity, I then received his video¬
taped interview with him. After viewing this, which firmly
established the former officer’s credentials, I reached him
by phone for his first-hand story.

It was in 1973, he said, that he was joined by two FBI
agents in a special three-day training program for cadets
on “behavioral science” at the police academy. One eve¬
ning, after a long day’s work, he and the two agents went
out to dine and relax, and the subject of UFOs came up.
To his surprise, one talked about a crashed disk in Colo¬
rado and the recovery of bodies. “What he said next,”
added my informant, “I could tell by his ‘body English’
[body language] that he was disturbed.” His concern was
the means used to ensure the cover-up, stating that a doc¬
tor, who had been called upon in the night for urgent med¬
ical needs, died suddenly of “cancer” three weeks later.
At that point, according to my informant, he observed that
the talkative agent was booted under the table by his com¬
panion. The subject was dropped and nothing was said
about the FBI’s role in the affair.

Sudden and accidental death stories I have heard before.
Never finding any substantiation, I relegated them to a
quirk of orchestrated propaganda; probably a scare tactic
to intimidate potential whistle-blowers.

Reports of suspicious deaths, darkly and deeply linked
to UFOs, persist, however, and continue to cause specu¬
lation. Word comes from Gordon Creighton, editor of the
informative Flying Saucer Review, who notes a possible
deathly tie-in with the U.S. “Star Wars” program. He
wrote to me in November 1988 as follows:

“ . . . here in Britain 22 scientists have recently either

taken their o ^ * : ves or died in very strange or myste-

194 THE UFO REPORT

rious circumstances. And it seems that most . . . were
engaged in British work on behalf of, or related to, the
U.S. ‘Star Wars’ program. The British government, it
seems, was trying to hush it up. But press statements
here say that the U.S. government had put our govern¬
ment on the spot and demanded a full inquiry. So, quite
clearly, it is either the Russians or THEM ...”

As many researchers have surmised, “Star Wars,” os¬
tensibly conceived as a defensive system against Russian
missile attack, may have had from its beginning a “defen¬
sive” UFO connection. Whatever the case, a “mock test”
in September 1988, of an earth-shattering warhead—much
like “Star Wars” in reverse—was conducted at the Tono-
pah Test Range in Nevada. Announced as a proposed
super-weapon designed to destroy Russian underground
command centers dug in solid rock down to 1,000 meters,
some UFO analysts believe that the real target is not
Russian but another adversary deep down in cavernous
installations in Nevada and New Mexico.

According to the Pentagon, the proposed earth-
penetrating warhead is “urgently needed.” According to
the rumor-mills, an alien race—the “grays”—in their for-
tressed underground laboratories, are genetically experi¬
menting with the human race. Even more ominous, rumors
say that their intransigence today may lead to new perils
tomorrow.

It is beyond the scope of this paper to speculate on all
the sinister machinations attributed to the alien super-race,
but news of the British death syndrome and my awareness
of other suspicious deaths and disappearances, allegedly
connected to UFO crash and retrieval events, must be
reckoned with. They may, indeed, have at least a periph¬
eral pertinence to fears, causing suicide, or extreme se¬
curity measures to maintain a monstrous cover-up.

At the time of writing (December 1988), I have four
other sources with UFO crash/retrieval information not
included in this report. Most, as far as I know, are in
positions to throw strong light on the humanoid factor and
other phases of retrieval operations, which could confirm
information already cited in my previous paper. But at this

UFO Crash/Retrievals

195

stage, and in some instances being dependent on inter¬
mediaries, I find the material to be either too fragmentary,
or too sensitive, to even hint at as to its nature.

Literature by Leonard Stringfield
Retrievals of the Third Kind, revised edition, July 1978,
MUFON, 103 Oldtowne Road, Seguin, Texas 78155^4099.
UFO Crash/Retrieval Syndrome, Status Report II, 1980,
MUFON.

UFO Crash/Retrievals: Amassing the Evidence, Status
Report III, 1982, available from the author: 4412 Grove
Avenue, Cincinnati, Ohio 45227.

The Fatal Encounter at Ft. Dix-McGuire: A Case Study,
Status Report IV, 1985, available from the author.

UFO Crash/Retrievals: Is the Cover-up Lid Lifting? Status
Report V, 1989, available from the author.

Inside Saucer Post. . . 3-0 Blue, 1957, available from the
author.

Situation Red: The UFO Siege, Doubleday & Co., 1977;
Fawcett, 1978.

The Gulf Breeze (Florida)
UFO Encounters

DONALD WARE

Donald Ware became interested in UFOs when he
witnessed the highly publicized lights over Washing¬
ton, DC in July 1952. He served for twenty-six years
in the U.S. Air Force as a pilot, teacher, staff sci¬
entist, test manager, and programs manager, and
flew F-105 Thunderchief jets for seven years, includ¬
ing 125 missions during the Vietnam war. His Air
Force decorations include the Distinguished Flying
Cross and Meritorious Service Medal. He obtained
a B.S. degree in Nuclear Engineering from the Air
Force Institute of Technology in 1970.

After retiring from the Air Force in 1983, with the
rank of Lieutenant Colonel, he joined the Mutual
UFO Network that year as a field investigator and
state section director, and was appointed state direc¬
tor the following year. In addition to UFOs, he has
an active interest in ornithology.

In July 1988 I was Donald’s guest at his home in
Fort Walton Beach, Florida, where he introduced me
to a number of his team of investigators, including
Charles Flannigan and recently retired USAF Col¬
onel Robert Reid. We visited many of the sites where
UFOs had appeared, and I was introduced to several
key witnesses, including Ed and Frances Walters,
who impressed me with their sincerity, courage, and
strength of character.

For copyright reasons we are unfortunately unable
to reproduce any of Ed’s remarkable series of pho¬
tographs, which were published in his book The Gulf
Breeze Sightings (William Morrow & Co., New

196

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters

197

York) in 1989. These photographs have generated a
great deal of controversy, as do all photos which
show a structured craft, rather than a fuzzy blob.
Yet Dr. Bruce Maccabee, a U.S. Navy optical phys¬
icist who has devoted much of his time to studying
them, is convinced of their authenticity.

The Gulf Breeze UFO encounters have involved many
people and produced over sixty photographs of objects
that appeared to be under intelligent control. Between No¬
vember 11, 1987 and May 1, 1988, one couple had twenty-
two encounters, including eighteen separate photographic
sessions, and through most of this period they maintained
a close co-operative association with several highly trained
investigators. The resulting photographs and related ex¬
periences were reported by the national media.

The primary investigation was run by the Florida divi¬
sion of the Mutual UFO Network, Inc. (MUFON), of
which I am State Director. I appointed Charles D. Flan-
nigan as State Section Director for Escambia and Santa
Rosa counties, where most of the encounters took place.
Flannigan is the chief investigator for Northwest Florida
MUFON Case #15 involving most of the photographs. He
has been involved in UFO research since his daylight en¬
counter with two convex disks in 1952.

When it became evident that this case would receive
national attention, three internationally known UFO in¬
vestigators, were brought into the investigation. These were
Walter H. Andrus, Jr., MUFON director; Dr. Bruce S.
Maccabee, MUFON consultant in photo analysis; and
Budd Hopkins, experienced researcher of UFO abduction
cases. Other investigators who contributed significantly to
the on-scene investigations were Gary A. Watson, presi¬
dent of the Pensacola Board of Realtors; Robert E. Reid,
a recently retired Air Force Colonel; and Vicki P. Lyons,
part-time school teacher and co-chairman of the local ab-
ductee support group.

The town of Gulf Breeze (see Figures 10:1 A, IB) is
rather unique in that it is like an island community, sur-

198 THE UFO REPORT

rounded on three sides by water and on the fourth by a
wooded park, the Live Oaks Reservation. As a bedroom
community of Pensacola, the population of fewer than
3,000 is rather prosperous and well educated. A large
population of retired military people residing in the area
probably contributes to the apparently broadminded per¬
spective of the people. A 1987 Gallup poll showed a direct
relationship between education and acceptance of extra¬
terrestrial intelligence. Consequently, i/the purpose of the
photographic sessions was for large numbers of people to
see the pictures, this was more likely to happen in Gulf
Breeze than most other places.

Between 1983 and 1987 many people of Gulf Breeze
and the neighboring communities had been exposed to the
UFO subject through my forty-three lectures, seven news¬
papers articles, six television appearances and four radio
programs. These emphasized three points: that UFOs have
been here for a very long time; some UFOs are controlled
by a more advanced intelligence; and, a select few in our
government know a lot more about UFOs than they will
admit. Because of this publicity, I was notified the day the
first picture appeared in the weekly Gulf Breeze Sentinel.

The First Encounters

In 1987, Florida MUFON received several UFO reports
from Florida locations outside the Gulf Breeze vicinity,
but these did not involve photos. On January 1, a lady
reported red lights hovering low over Highway 6 in north-
central Florida. On January 8, a couple reported a large
vertical cylinder above their house in Lakeland. On
June 15, 16, and 17 many witnesses reported UFOs near
Ocala, and following one three-hour series of sightings by
many witnesses including two police officers, fourteen
dogs in the neighborhood were reported missing. On July
23, several people saw six spherical objects make 90° turns
over West Pensacola during daylight hours. On August 5,
a huge silent, circular object with colored lights stopped
100 feet above a witness near Gainesville. On October 19,
a lady reported a UFO hovering beside a bridge near Ar-

Harold

200

THE UFO REPORT

Figure 10:IB. Map showing places of UFO sightings with inset
showing location of area detailed (from a “Tribune” map by
Vaughn Hughes).

cadia in daylight and close enough to see beings through
a window. And, on November 25, a lady in Destin re¬
ported the apparent temporary abduction of her five-year-
old son.

November 11, 1987

It was November 11, 1987 when the Gulf Breeze encoun¬
ters first attracted attention, and they would continue
through most of 1988. About 02:30, Mrs. Zamitt, wife of
a retired Navy Captain, was awakened by her dog and led
outside where she observed a silent, hovering object shine
a “pathway” of bluish light onto her dock. Several blocks
to the north, at 08:15 on November 11, Jeff Thompson
observed a circular object with two rows of dark spots and
a small dome on top hover silently 350 to 400 feet away.
As two Air Force jets flew directly toward the object at
low level, it quickly moved up about 200 feet, and just
before the jets arrived, the object departed straight up
“very fast” as a flash of light appeared to engulf the whole

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters

201

Figure 10:2. Ed’s composite drawing of the “Type-1” vehicle
which he photographed many times between November 11, 1987
and May 1, 1988.

object. The jets immediately turned north over East Bay.
Thompson described the object as being approximately
thirty feet in diameter, about fifteen feet high with a dull
silver top, light tan middle portion, and a dark beige bot¬
tom.

The next reported sighting was at 17:00 that day by
Charles Somerby and his wife, Doris, as they walked their
dog about five miles to the east. They described a circular
grayish object with bright white lights on the bottom and
a dome light on top. Sunset that day was at 16:55. They
said the object seemed to drift like a balloon toward the
west (which was against the wind).

Then, at about 17:05, ten miles to the west, a 41-year-
old father of two teenagers, Ed Walters, saw a light ap¬
proaching through a window of his home office. Curious,
he stepped out of his front door and realized it was a very
unusual object. Ed is a builder who often uses a Polaroid
camera in his work. He grabbed his camera, went to the
front porch and took a picture. He stepped down one step
and took three more pictures as the object approached.
Then he went into the house for a new pack of film and

202

THE UFO REPORT

took a fifth picture from the porch. The object changed
course toward him, and as he walked into the street for a
close shot, he was frozen in a blue beam. During the ap¬
proximately ten seconds while in the beam, Ed described
the following physical sensations:

(1) Eyebrows and eyes would not move;

(2) He could not expand his chest;

(3) He felt like he was going to die;

(4) He could breathe, barely, but there was a nasty
smell like ammonia; and

(5) He started to pant when breathing became diffi¬
cult.

The beam lifted him three feet off the ground and as he
tried to scream a voice in his head said, “Stop that! You
will not be harmed. Be still. Stop that! We will not hurt
you. ” He also received a mental image like someone was
flipping through a book showing him dog pictures! Then
he was dropped to the street, and the UFO departed as a
distant airplane flew past. A few minutes later, Ed’s wife,
Frances, reported a smell like ammonia and cinnamon
coming from Ed. Photo 1 shows an object partially behind
a pine limb thirty-seven feet away, decreasing the possi¬
bility of a double exposure.

Four later sightings that day were reported. An anon¬
ymous couple wrote to the Gulf Breeze Sentinel that they
saw a silent object bob up and down at about 17:30. They
were afraid it might “zap them up’’ if they got out of
their car. Linda Lube said that at 17:50 she saw some¬
thing that looked like “it was from another place.” Di¬
ane Hansen reported that her seven-year-old daughter
saw an object at 19:30 with “different colored light fall¬
ing down from it.” A Pensacola executive reported an
object that arched downward with a bright white light
that lit the entire wooded area around his home at about
21:30.

The events of November 11, 1987 are just some exam¬
ples of the kind of activity that continued around Gulf
Breeze for many months. Ed and his wife decided to give

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters

203

the five original photos to the editor of the weekly Gulf
Breeze Sentinel, Duane Cook, while pretending to be only
an intermediary rather than the photographer. Ed was
known by the editor for his large charitable contributions
in support of high school activities and the youth of the
community, so Cook decided to publish the pictures. Cook
was quite surprised to learn that his mother, Doris So-
merby, had seen the same object a few minutes before the
pictures were taken.

Personal friends of mine who live in Gulf Breeze noti¬
fied me on November 19 when the pictures were pub¬
lished, and the investigation started. As soon as Ed was
suspected of being the photographer, these friends, who
co-incidentally were long-time friends of Ed and his fam¬
ily, provided an excellent character reference for Ed. The
investigative team had three major concerns throughout
the investigation. These were: protection of anonymity for
those who desired it; getting all the facts while helping to
minimize the stress level in Ed’s family; and encouraging
responsible reporting of the events so that other witnesses
would be encouraged to come forward.

Ed’s Further Encounters

November 20, 1987, 16:00 hrs

Ed heard a “humming” sound in his head while sitting in
his home office, which reminded him of a sound he heard
while in the beam. His family left the house and he was
alone. At 16:45 he heard a sound like air brakes . . .
“Whoosh,” followed by an unintelligible voice with in¬
credible consonants. Then at 16:58 an object, like before,
“came down with incredible speed like it knew where it
was going.” A deep computer-like voice said, “Be calm.
Step forward. ’ ’ Ed took picture 6. A female voice told
him in Spanish that photos were prohibited, but he then
took pictures 7-9. Photo 7 showed the object partially
behind a small cedar. Then he got a flashing of “disgust¬
ing” nude women pictures in his head before the object
departed. (Ed understood Spanish because he had spent
five years in Costa Rica.)

204 THE UFO REPORT

December 2, 1987, 03:00 hrs

Ed was sleeping peacefully when he heard a humming
sound, but he assumed it must be his swimming pool.
When the “hum” was followed by the sound of a baby
crying, his brain could not justify this since there were no
babies in his household. He became wide awake. He then
heard a conversation in Spanish between a male and fe¬
male that made little sense. He quietly slipped out of bed
with his 38-caliber pistol and, picking up his camera, went
out back and took photo 10 of the same type vehicle.

At 03:30, while back in bed, he heard his Spitz dog
bark just once. He went to the French doors and raised
the blind, finding himself “eyeball-to-eyeball” with a
large-eyed being peering in through the window. The be¬
ing had a partially transparent helmet, shields in front of
his body, and a silver rod in his right hand (see Figure
10:3). Ed jumped back and saw the creature run. He then
went out back in pursuit, and as he moved from under the
roof an 18-inch-diameter blue beam “nailed” his right
foot to the wooden deck. After struggling with his foot
trapped, he slowly pulled his foot out of the beam, went
in for his camera, and took photo 11 of the object shining
the blue beam into the school yard behind his house.

December 5, 1987, 05:45 hrs

Ed woke up normally and saw a UFO twenty to thirty feet
above the field behind his house. He got his camera and
took photo 12 as the object moved higher.

December 17, 1987, 01:00 hrs

Ed was awakened by a sound like a waterfall, both in his
head and his ears. He got his camera, went outside and
got photo 13 of an object quite close. This appeared to be
the same object which would later be designated a “T\pe-
1” by Dr. Bruce Maccabee, the primary photo analyst.
The light emanating from the bottom ring was changing
from orange to pale orange repeatedly. Ed thought the ob¬
ject was having some kind of trouble, as a grayish-looking
smoke or fluid was falling from the bottom, and he could
hear something like liquid hitting the ground. After mo-

5

206

THE UFO REPORT

and distant, it would later be intensely illuminated, re¬
photographed with high quality film and pushed to show
great detail in a blow-up. There was sufficient light re¬
flected from the ground to make the entire vehicle visible.
Bob Oechsler, a MUFON State Section Director from An¬
napolis, Maryland, managed this effort.

After about three minutes, the light source on the bot¬
tom of the vehicle became brighter and it took off, flying
very fast directly toward Ed. His wife had joined him with
a new pack of film. He took photos 15, 16 and 17. Photo
16 was taken when the object was nearly overhead, and 17
(from the new pack) showed the object close to the roof
of the house. The image was twenty-two millimeters wide
on the Polaroid picture. There was some confusion about
the sequence of these photographs. This confusion would
lead eventually to hypnotic regression that indicated Ed
had been take on board, while his wife had somehow been
incapacitated with no memory of the abduction.

December 22, 1987, 17:15 hrs

Ed heard a hum in his head which lasted nine or ten min¬
utes. When he looked out the back and front of his house,
he saw no object. The next day Ed speculated that this
humming might have been associated with the three UFOs
photographed by “Believer Bill,” whose nine colored
prints were put in the Gulf Breeze Sentinel drop box at
08:00 on December 23. The toy “Hot-Shot” camera that
exposed the film was also provided. A public appeal in
the January 21, 1988 edition of the Sentinel for “Believer
Bill” to provide the date, time, and location of his sighting
was answered. He said they were taken at about 17:15 on
December 22, near Shoreline Drive, which is just on the
other side of the high school from Ed’s home. Two of the
nine grainy photographs showed two identical Type-1 ve¬
hicles.

December 23, 1987, 05:55 hrs

Ed told investigators that he went out of his back door to
turn on the pool pump when the sky was just beginning
to lighten in the east (sunrise was 06:39). He saw three

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters 207

UFOs that appeared to be over an apartment complex just
beyond a row of trees. All were at low level. While he
was in the house getting his camera, he said one moved
to a higher level. He took photo 18 showing three similar
objects. “As soon as I lowered the camera,” he said, “the
top one brightened and went up faster than I could raise
my head to follow it.” A second or two later the other
two did likewise. He got the impression they had waited
until he took the picture.

December 27, 1987, 20:15 hrs

A close family friend, Patrick Hanks (pseudonym), aged
twenty and a junior college student, had visited Ed’s home
on. numerous occasions during the latter part of Decem¬
ber, hoping that he would be present if the object reap¬
peared. When he . rang the bell on December 27, he was
greeted by Ed’s wife who quietly announced, “It’s here!”
Patrick walked straight through the house to the family-
room window where he simultaneously observed Ed by
the pool and the object hovering perhaps 500 feet away.
Ed came into the house for his camera, and at the instant
Ed’s face indicated that he saw Patrick, the UFO blinked
out. This sequence of events implies that the UFO reacted
to Ed’s thoughts. Patrick Hanks’ account was later re¬
corded by Charles Flannigan.

December 28, 1987, 20:00 hrs
Ed was sitting on one of his porches writing in his UFO
log book, with his back toward the pool when he observed
a glow over the field in his peripheral vision. It came to¬
ward the house with no humming noise present. Since he
was out of Polaroid film, he got his Sony Model CCD M8
camcorder. He sneaked around the bushes in his back yard
and tracked the vehicle for one minute and thirty-eight
seconds. It passed behind a tree fifty feet away and an¬
other about 100 feet away. Then it “blinked” out in two
frames (1/ 15th of a second), while a schoolyard light was
readily visible. Bob Oeschler would later do a detailed
computer analysis of each frame and said that something

208 THE UFO REPORT

on the bottom of the vehicle was cycling 7.5 times per
second.

January 6, 1988, 17:10 hrs

Ed heard a hum for approximately one minute. He went
to the front and back of the house, but observed nothing
unusual. The next day Ed made a full disclosure of the
above events—except that involving Patrick Hanks—to the
MUFON investigators.

January 12, 1988, 17:10 hrs

While at home, Ed heard a hum of short duration. He
excitedly called my home, hoping that an investigator
nearby could respond. My soon took the call in my ab¬
sence, and he later told me that one of my friends was
very excited. Ed observed nothing unusual then, and a few
minutes later he remembered that he needed to check the
power meter installation at one of his houses scheduled for
inspection. So at 17:25 he drove seven miles east of Gulf
Breeze to highway 191-B. When he was about one-half
mile south on the deserted black-top road, the object came
over his pickup truck and emitted a white flash through
the windshield that partially immobilized his forearms and
hands. He managed to stop the truck on the left shoulder.
His hands and forearms were stinging, like many pin¬
pricks.

The object then moved very fast to a point 180 feet in
front of the truck and hovered two or three feet left of the
double yellow center-line and three feet above the ground.
He tried reaching for his shotgun behind the driver’s seat,
but could not feel it due to the lack of sensation in his
fingers. After retrieving the camera from the floor, he took
photo 19 of the Type-1 object through the windshield. The
glow emitted from the bottom of the object illuminates the
road very distinctly in the photograph. Ed said the object
brightened up and came toward him. With his camera, he
slipped out of the truck and clumsily tried to crawl under
the pickup for protection from the object’s white flash.
Before he could get completely under the truck, the white
flash struck the back of both legs from the knees down.

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters 209

The object then hovered a bit closer over the road in front
of him. As he peered between the front wheels of the
truck, he tried to take another photo, but he apparently
did not have the camera aimed at the object.

The object then started to tum or rotate. To Ed’s amaze¬
ment, the blue beam deposited five aliens on the road, one
after the other, less than a second apart. All five aliens,
each wearing a shield and carrying a silver rod as before,
started walking toward him. A thought flashed through his
mind: “If they can’t get me with the white beam, they are
sending aliens after me.” This prompted Ed to get back
into the truck. He tried to start the engine, grinding the
starter motor in his excitement because it was still run¬
ning. He shifted the automatic into reverse, made a hur¬
ried U-tum, and departed the area rapidly.

January 16, 1988, 02:00 hrs

Ed was awakened by a very soft hum, but of a higher pitch
than the previous experiences. He took his camera to the
semicircular front driveway and stood beside his pickup
truck scanning the sky. He saw a red glow in the southern
sky about the size of a star, which became larger, and in
about ten seconds a UFO was nearly overhead. It looked
entirely different and has been designated a Type-2 vehicle
by Dr. Maccabee. It was not as thick vertically as Type-1
and had a thin reddish “veil” hanging below the lighted
ring on the bottom. The underside of the body looked
blue. When Ed lifted the camera to take a picture, he
heard a very loud hum with the same tone or pitch as on
previous occasions. A bright white UFO “winked” into
the sky. It hovered close to the reddish one, and Ed
snapped photo 20 showing both objects. Then the red ob¬
ject moved to the east and disappeared, followed imme¬
diately by the white one.

January 21, 1988, 22:30 hrs

By this time, Ed and two of the investigators had two-way
radios. All-night stake-outs were being conducted nearly

210

THE UFO REPORT

every night by Bob Reid and Gary Watson. On this night,
Bob Reid was in his van across the field from Ed’s house
near some apartments with his camcorder ready. I had
asked Ed for a negative of a particular photo for the MU-
FON UFO Journal, and Ed told Reid, by radio, that he
would walk over and deliver it so Reid could take it back
to Fort Walton Beach. Halfway over, while walking
through the woods to skirt the intervening fence, Ed heard
a hum and got very excited. He saw a starlike object in
the southern sky (beside Sirius), but Reid, still several
hundred feet away in the dark, was watching what turned
out to be an aircraft’s landing lights to the north. The
pinpoint of light that Ed recognized as a UFO blinked out
before Reid could locate it. (Perhaps the UFO occupants
did not want to be photographed by the investigators. Ed
had no camera.)

January 24, 1988, 17:30 hrs

While at home, Ed heard a faint hum. He immediately
called on the two-way radio to see if an investigator was
present. When he did not get a response, he got his Po¬
laroid and camcorder and drove to the Sentinel office to
have Duane Cook accompany him for verification. They
drove east in Ed’s truck in a light rain, followed by Dari,
the newspaper’s business manager, and her friend Ann.
Dari said that “Ed looked like he was in a trance.” While
driving, Ed told Cook that he felt as if his face was falling
off, the hum was in his right forehead, and that he felt like
they wanted him out of the truck. Ed said, “They are
communicating with me,” and added that he received the
following message: “In sleep you know. ’’ Ed was being
video-taped all the while showing great stress.

After reaching a deserted part of the winding Tiger-
Point-East Road going south off highway 98, Ed stopped,
and he and Cook got out. (Ed felt, at that time, that the
aliens had on November 11 somehow given him the ability
to hear them, but that their mission had been interrupted.
He wanted to give them the opportunity to remove that
capability, and he wanted someone else to record it.) Ed
was standing in front of the truck being tormented by pain

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters 211

in his head and stomach. Cook scanned the sky but saw
nothing in the dark misty rain. He got back in the truck
with the video camera still running. Ed expressed his dis¬
pleasure at the hum, and he had earlier asked the aliens to
get rid of it. The torment and hum stopped. Ed thought it
was over, but as he was about to open the truck door, he
said, “Oh s-, there it is.”

Ed raised the camera about 55° and snapped photo 21.
This picture shows the railing on top of the truck and
parallel light streaks going vertically from the UFO bright
spots to the top of the picture. The UFO was gone after
the camera flash. The total time it was visible was prob¬
ably two or three seconds. Cook’s view was blocked by
the truck roof, and the ladies, parked around a bend in the
road, had a tree between them and the object’s location.
They did, however, report seeing a flash, thinking it was
just the camera, but later recalled some light coming from
above the road. Photo 21 is important because it appears
to show the object motionless for most of the time the
camera shutter was open and then depart vertically before
the shutter closed. This departure, in a fraction of a sec¬
ond, indicates acceleration well above 20 Gs.

January 26, 1988, 21:30 hrs

Two days later Ed was taking a shower when his wife
called to him, “It’s back.” She then got the camera, ran
to the kitchen door and took photo 22, showing their Spitz
in the foreground. The dog had been nervously looking
back and forth between her and the UFO. Ed, still drip¬
ping wet, came onto the back patio with a towel wrapped
around him. With the memories of the 24th still fresh in
his mind, he shook his fist at the UFO while his wife took
photo 23. The pictures show a Type-2 object. The main
difference is what appears to be a “wave” in the “red
veil” hanging below the bright bottom circle, such as is
often seen in the aurora borealis. Also, there appears to
be a tinge of blue at the bottom along with the red and
some bright yellow-orange. The “windows” are thin and
triangular shaped, unlike the round or squarish ones in
previous Type-1A and IB images.

212

THE UFO REPORT

February 7, 1988, 20:30 hrs

Ed’s wife was out by the pool feeding the dog when a blue
beam was seen coming down from a UFO above the house.
It struck the ground between her and the house, and she
screamed. After her twelve-year-old daughter looked and
saw the beam, she ran to the front office and said, “Daddy,
Mommy needs you.” While Ed got his camera and ran to
the kitchen, the daughter held the back door open for her
mother who was coming around the beam toward the back
door. As Ed was about to exit, the beam came down im¬
mediately in front of the doorway partially blocking it.
Ed backed up and got a picture of his wife ducking
around the approximately eighteen-inch-diameter beam to
enter the door. The beam appeared brighter on the outside
than the middle, and it seemed to rotate clockwise (look¬
ing up). The dry leaves in the spot where the beam first
struck indicated that the beam caused a vortex action.

Following this event, the family began to think the crea¬
tures were entering the house. Every creak, whether a nat¬
ural house noise or not, caused concern. After a while,
they went to the garage and climbed into the van where
they spent most of the night. This last photo was not given
to the investigators immediately, because Ed wanted to
avoid publicity involving his family. However, on May 21,
1988, he was persuaded to allow the Pensacola News Jour¬
nal to publish a cropped version in full color on the front
page.

February 26, 1988, 21:30 hrs

Ed was given a Nimslo 4-lens sealed camera provided by
Tom Deuley of the San Antonio MUFON group. I asked
Ed to please use the camera on the next opportunity so he
could convince the skeptics he was not photographing a
small model at close range. After eighteen days with no
photographs, Ed was feeling much pressure. However, the
next night he and his wife went to the secluded Shoreline
Park area where they took exposures 25-34, each with
four images. This was designated a T^pe-3 object (Figure
10:3), and it looked entirely different from the others. It

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters

213

Figure 10:4. Ed’s drawing of the "Type-3” vehicle he photo¬
graphed on February 26, 1988 at 21:30 hrs. This was drawn
before the photographs were developed, showing it to be only
three feet long.

was a horizontal cylinder with a bright light on the rear
and three rows of lights down the side. A few days earlier,
Ed had reported seeing this light pattern while driving
down Florida Route 87 toward Navarre, but he thought it
might be an airplane. The object later proved to be only
about three feet long at a distance of about forty-seven
feet.

After Ed made drawings of what he saw, the investiga¬
tors decided to make a media event out of the opening of
the sealed camera. Walt Andrus was again invited to Pen¬
sacola to manage this event. The first frame contained a
signed letter assuring that the film could not be switched,
and the second was designed to test the sensitivity of the
film. The small images that appeared as the reporters
waited were almost identical to Ed’s drawing. (If he had
this to do over we would put a diffraction grating on the
two inner lenses.)

March 7, 1988, 18:00 hrs

While eating dinner, Ed heard a hum in his head, lasting
only five to eight seconds. He told his wife and continued
eating. Later that night, while in bed, he heard another
hum. He wanted to go out and use the new Polaroid Sun
600 LMS camera he had bought that day, but his wife
persuaded him to stay in bed.

214 THE UFO REPORT

March 8, 1988, 17:45 hrs

While his wife was fixing dinner, Ed again heard a hum.
This time he took his new camera out back without telling
her. It was raining a little. Soon he saw a glow between
the pine trees, and he took photo 35. As he lowered the
camera it was gone. This photo again shows the object
departing vertically after providing a clear image and be¬
fore the shutter closed. (Perhaps their motive system is
keyed to the camera flash.) If a constant acceleration is
assumed and the vehicle left the frame in 1 / 10th of a sec¬
ond, about l/3rd of the shutter open time, then the accel¬
eration was about 150 Gs.

March 17, 1988, 20:05 hrs

The investigators were anxious to determine the precise
size of the objects, so Dr. Maccabee designed a self-
referencing stereo (SRS) camera rig. Ed mounted two new
Polaroid SUN 600 cameras on a heavy tripod two feet
apart. A parallax reference point was fixed on a broom¬
stick four feet in front, so as to be visible by both cameras.
These cameras automatically flash and eject the film each
time the lever is activated. On March 17, Ed and his wife
were in the Sentinel office discussing with Cook the UFO
sightings reported by others. About 16:00, Ed heard a
hum. They got excited, but Ed decided not to pursue it.
He went home, and after Cook and Dari finished work on
the paper, they went to Shoreline Park. After a while, they
called Ed and talked him into coming over with the SRS
camera rig. Ed had promised to call Peter Neumann,
WEAR-TV manager, and Buddy Poliak, a close friend,
when he went out, so Cook called them on his car phone.
When they arrived, Ed asked Neumann to open and insert
two new film packs. Test photos of those present were
made. Carlos Hill and a young friend showed up. The
cameras were set up in a secluded part of the park to avoid
unknown people, and the time passed with a cold wind
blowing.

At about 20:00, Ed had not heard a hum for about an
hour. Cook and Poliak suggested there might be too many

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters

215

people around. All but Ed and his wife left. Neumann and
his wife went home, but the rest did not go far. According
to Ed, about forty-five seconds after they departed he heard
another short hum. Then, three or four minutes later, the
object appeared in the direction opposite where Poliak and
the other had gone. Ed swung his cameras around and
fired both, although not simultaneously. These were la¬
beled 36L and 36R showing a Type-1 object well over 100
feet distant. Three or four seconds later the object de¬
parted. Ed’s wife said they had to lean forward in order to
see it. Cook, Poliak, and the other two saw the flashes and
returned in time to see Ed watching the pictures develop
in the illumination of his headlights. At this time, Brenda
Poliak, a Gulf Breeze councilwoman, was coming to the
park to find her husband. On her way, she saw a UFO
twice, once at the apparent time and location it was pho¬
tographed. Ed immediately sent the photos to Dr. Mac-
cabee for photogrammetric analysis.

March 20, 1988, 20:45 hrs

Three days later, Ed heard a hum while at home. He
grabbed the SRS camera rig and went to the back yard.
While waiting, he heard a voice in his head that seemed
to say, “Zeehaus, Zeehaus . . . sleep and know. ” In a few
minutes, the UFO appeared to the north. He viewed it
clearly through the right lens and took photos 37L and
37R. The left camera did not flash simultaneously with
the right, but it was within a fraction of a second. The left
photo showed an obstruction between the camera and the
bright light that appears to be the bottom of a T\pe-1
vehicle. Daylight photos from the same location show the
obstruction. Analysis of the photos also shows divergence
rather than convergence, indicating the object was moving
to the left at several miles per hour. Possibly, the instabil¬
ity in the broomstick caused by activating the cameras one
after the other was also a factor preventing accurate dis¬
tance measurement. Consequently, Ed spent much time
practicing the activation of both camera levers simultane¬
ously.

216

THE UFO REPORT

April 21, 1988, 22:30 hrs

Ed and his wife, at this point, had not received a full
analysis of the Nimslo camera photographs, so there was
still some disagreement as to the size of the Type-3 object.
Ed, almost constantly looking through the camera lens on
February 26, thought it was a large distant object, while
his wife, who constantly viewed it with both eyes, thought
it was a smaller object rather close. On April 21 they were
out for an evening walk in the neighborhood when the
Type-3 object flew nearly overhead, stopped briefly at what
appeared to be sixty feet away, and then moved out of
sight toward the school yard. They both measured its an¬
gular size to be one inch at arm’s length, indicating it was
a small object, not large enough to carry the aliens pre¬
viously witnessed.

May 1, 1988, 01:10 hrs

At Dr. Maccabee’s request, Ed had stabilized the parallax
reference of the SRS camera rig to provide more accurate
measurements of the vehicle size. He and his wife took
the cameras to Shoreline Park on several nights after their
daily duties were over, but found nothing to photograph.
He had been asked to photograph the UFO with the SRS
cameras while his wife photographed him and the UFO
with the camcorder. (Some critics are hard to satisfy!)

The next night Ed went alone, as his wife was acting
as chaperone on a school trip. At about 23:30 he set up
the improved SRS camera rig along with a set of coded
poles, each 60° around an arc ten feet from the tripod
center. This would provide a second set of parallax ref¬
erences and more accurate distance calculations. He waited
in his van for nearly an hour and a half. At 01:00 he got
a short hum and manned his cameras. At 01:10 a bright
UFO popped into view toward Pensacola Beach, and Ed
flashed both cameras simultaneously (photos 38L and
38R). He looked up and saw the Type-3 object to the right
of the bright one, but when he looked back through the
right lens he did not see the objects. When he looked up
again, the large bright one was about thirty feet above his

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters 217

head. At this point he said he got a “white out” in his
head.

Ed thought that the next instant he was lying face down
on the beach, disoriented and with a sore head. After
picking himself up, he saw his cameras twenty feet away,
and as he walked to them noticed that it was 02:30. He
was missing about one hour and fifteen minutes. He sud¬
denly had great concern for his daughter, grabbed his cam¬
eras and two of the six poles, and rushed home. After
seeing her sound asleep, he sat on the floor in front of her
door until 06:00. When he went to the bathroom and
turned on the light he saw a dark reddish mark between
his eyes, and another on each temple. There was “black
smelly stuff” under the three longest fingernails of the
right hand. He wrapped his hand in a towel and slept until
11:30. The black stuff was frozen in ajar and later found
to have a silicon base, but the black impurity has not been
identified as of this writing because the processes available
near Gulf Breeze would be destructive-analysis processes.
The next day the investigators could easily see the three
reddish marks, and there was a bump on the back of Ed’s
head.

This last set of Ed’s photographs is probably the most
revealing. The SRS system worked as Dr. Maccabee had
hoped. The photos show the Type-1 object to be about 475
feet out over the water with a bottom light 14.8 feet in
diameter. It was also about 14.8 feet tall. The Type-3 ob¬
ject was 132 feet away and about 2.5 feet from the “tail”
to the right-most portion of light. Since this object was
similar to the object photographed with the Nimslo cam¬
era, it appears to be about three feet long, which is con¬
sistent with analysis of the Nimslo camera data.

Time-regression hypnosis of the May 1 event was done
by Dr. Dan Overlade, a highly experienced clinical psy¬
chologist. It appears that Ed was captured by a group of
aliens like those he saw on January 12. They used their
wands like our police use stun guns, and during a struggle,
apparently projected telepathic images of his daughter, as
if to distract him. After being subdued, he found himself
lying in an empty room where the bright, white light
seemed to be coming from no particular source, but from

218

THE UFO REPORT

the air molecules. When Ed had an aggressive thought
as the leader came in, a blue beam came from the ceiling
and hit him in the head. Almost immediately he got the
smell of ammonia and a stinging in his throat. (Perhaps
the energy in the beam disassociated the hydrogen from
the oxygen in the moisture of his breath, and the hydro¬
gen re-combined with the nitrogen of the air to form am¬
monia.) The beam physically picked him up and set him
on a bench where his emotional memories were appar¬
ently transferred to immature aliens. Further time-
regression hypnosis indicates Ed was on board a UFO
when he was seventeen, twenty-five and thirty-three years
old, and each time a similar “emotional transfer” was
accomplished.

Other Events

On December 17, 1987 a liquid fell from the UFO into the
school yard, and some was apparently caught in a plastic
butter container. The liquid, mixed with dirt and algae,
was determined to be diluted seawater by Pioneer Labo¬
ratory Inc., in Pensacola, and by the Guadalupe-Bianco
River Authority in Texas. For an unknown reason the fluid
in the plastic container bubbled for nearly a month.

The same night the UFO had been photographed near
the ground in the school yard. Nearby, the grass died in a
circular area fourteen feet in diameter, and it did not grow
back in the spring. Extensive tests by the Florida Coop¬
erative Extension Services three weeks later could not de¬
termine the cause, but they suggested that exposure to a
short-lived toxic chemical or to an energy source could
have killed the grass. An investigator from Mobile, Ala¬
bama, was previously provided funds by MUFON for the
Alabama Forensic Sciences Department to do a soil sam¬
ple analysis, but he refused to provide the report to the
investigative team. Another visiting investigator, Dr. Willy
Smith, said he definitely could smell petroleum products
at the circle, although the other investigators could not.
The extensive testing showed no petroleum residue.

* * *

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters

219

On January 13, 1988, at about 08:30, two men in an un¬
marked white American-made sedan came to Ed’s home
and knocked on his door. They wore civilian suits and
visually exposed large pistols under their coats. One of
them said, “Are you Ed Walters?,” to which he replied
in the affirmative. They introduced themselves as agent
McKathy and agent-of Air Force Special Security Ser¬

vices. Agent McKathy said, “We have a Material Seizure
Warrant. We understand you have some photographs of
UFOs. It is against the law to withhold them.” They came
in and looked around his office. He told them he had given
the photos to the Miami Herald reporter, Dave Barry. Ed
said, “If you call Dave he’s going to say he does not have
them; because, he told me he would deny having them.”
One man said, “You know if you are lying to us you are
in big trouble, because this is a Material Seizure War¬
rant.” Then they left.

On February 18 and 23, 1988, Ed submitted himself to a
polygraph examination by Harvey McLaughlin, Jr. The
purpose of the examination was: “To verify the authentic¬
ity of the photographs, personal sightings, experiences,
and general information supplied by Mr. Walters concern¬
ing his experiences with UFOs since November 1987.”
After over five hours of working with Ed, the examiner
stated his opinion: “With the information that is available
to this examiner at this time, it is felt that Mr. Walters
truly believes that the photographs and personal sightings
he has described are true and factual to the best of his
ability.”

Later Michael Kradz, of Dector Counterintelligence and Se¬
curity, Inc. inGlenBumie, Maryland, processed two of Ed’s
tape-recorded interviews with a psychological stress evalua¬
tor (PSE-101). He said Ed “ . . .is being truthful about what
he saw and what he did, and does not show any reactions to
cause this examiner to doubt his answers.”

Also, psychological tests given Ed by Dr. Dan Overlade
prior to his ten hours of regression found no evidence of
any psychopathologies. These tests included the Wachsler
Adult Intelligence Scale (Revised), the Minnesota Multi-

220

THE UFO REPORT

phasic Personality Interview, the Thematic Apperception
Test, the Draw-A-Person Test, and the Rorschach “inkblot
test.”

Ed and Frances Walters have documented their story for
a book entitled The Gulf Breeze Sightings, published in
1989.

Shortly after the Gulf Breeze UFO encounters got their
first publicity, three low-level radar vehicles were moved
into the area: a ship named the Jan Tide, an Army Divi¬
sion Air Defense vehicle, and a NASA long-range tracking
ship. Several witnesses reported fighter planes or light
fixed-wing aircraft coming directly toward a UFO at low
level. Also, strange helicopters were seen orbiting the
school yard where the circle of dead grass had been found.

Other incidents indicate some kind of government
knowledge of some of the UFO activity.

On November 21, 1988, an eighteen-year-old boy re¬
ported that he and his friends were evicted from a public
national seashore area east of Pensacola Beach by the Air
Force Security Police. The boys were told they could not
stay there because there was an incident in progress. At
20:45, about thirty minutes later, James Larkin saw a UFO
low over the trees about two miles north of where the boys
were. Some investigators wonder if there is a connection
between these two incidents.

Several of the sightings of late 1988 were north of Na¬
varre toward the Eglin AFB reservation. For example, in
early December 1988, Annette Spear and her children re¬
ported a row of red lights, each appearing slightly larger
than the full moon, moving toward the reservation as if
they were attached to a large silent vehicle. A helicopter
also seen in the area at the same time must have been
aware of this object.

Other photographs submitted to the investigators by in¬
dividuals, or by the Gulf Breeze Sentinel, show objects
that have not been identified. These include:

the nine photos of December 23, 1987, showing the

TVpe-1 objects reported by “Believer Bill”;
two prints from a 35-mm camera showing Type-1 ob-

The Gulf Breeze UFO Encounters 221

jects that the anonymous photographer, “Jane,” said
were taken in June 1986;

a roll of 110 film with five photos of orange balls taken
by “Mike” at Pensacola Beach on April 2, 1988 (one
glowing ball appears to be about twelve and a half feet
in diameter);

two 35-mm negatives taken on April 6, 1988, by
“Milli,” showing orange ovals that appear to be glow¬
ing or reflecting sunlight some distance up (the image
was only 0.001 radians);

eight suspicious photos later submitted by “A Be¬
liever,” which were probably faked.

Most other sightings near Gulf Breeze are too numerous
to include here, but a few will suffice. A neighbor a few
doors from Ed saw a glowing object the size of a saucer
at arm’s length, over the school yard just before Christmas
1987. Ed’s neighbors across the street had a close encoun¬
ter of the third or fourth type on April 1, 1988, that lasted
two hours, and they reported later sightings in 1988. On
December 2, 1987, Pat McClellan, with his wife and
daughter, saw a UFO jump from one spot to another and
fly silently close overhead before it departed, with a mil¬
itary plane close behind. On February 12, 1988, two ladies
in Cantonment saw a boomerang-shaped object with many
lights fly low and slow overhead. A visiting investigator,
Paul Norman, said he interviewed a lady who reported an
object that approached her and her friend rapidly three
times, before it dived into the Gulf, on March 10.

Mr. Truman Holcomb [who struck me as completely
sincere when I met him in July 1988— Editor] reported a
close sighting of the Type-1 vehicle shining a blue beam
across Highway 98 on April 28, as well as another sighting
later in the year. On July 8, Dr. Fenner McConnell and
his wife, Shirley, saw a Type-1 vehicle hover near the wa¬
ter beside their pier for two or three minutes as they were
about to go jogging at 04:54. (They had earlier sent out
535 invitations to a “UFO Watch” party to be held two
days later at their home, but they were afraid to tell their
guests about their sighting. Their annual party is a major
social event in Gulf Breeze. Several investigators have

222 THE UFO REPORT

suggested this event seemed to be more than a coinci¬
dence.)

July 8 was also the day of the abductee support group
meeting in Pensacola. Since UFO investigations by news¬
papers, TV, and MUFON were generally accomplished
without ridicule, twelve people were encouraged to tell
MUFON of their experiences involving missing time or
extremely strange dreams. Some of these people were hav¬
ing trouble coping with their experiences. MUFON estab¬
lished a support group, including abductees, investigators,
and a clinical psychologist to help reduce the fear of the
unknown. Dr. Overlade has been quite successful in both
recovering blocked memories and in relieving stress. In
December 1988 his regression techniques were reviewed
by a distinguished group of his peers at the Ericksonian
Congress in San Francisco. This review of Dr. Overlade’s
video tapes increased his confidence in his procedures and
also gave the review group some food for thought.

In February 1988, WEAR-TV of Pensacola made a thirty-
minute documentary, The Sightings, with Mark Curtis as
interviewer. On October 5, Gulf Breeze was featured on
an NBC Unexplained Mysteries program. Then on Octo¬
ber 14, the two-hour production, UFO Cover-up? Live,
was broadcast from Gulf Breeze, Washington DC, and
Moscow.

The Gulf Breeze sightings and photographs are proof of
alien visitation, in my opinion. The level of technology
demonstrated indicates that they can come and go at will
and can reside in a variety of places; the bottom of our
oceans, inside major high-altitude ice fields, in Earth or¬
bit, on the Moon, or even on Mars.

The increasing national media coverage of the UFO
phenomenon, spurred by the Gulf Breeze encounters, may
cause many more abductees to gain the courage to talk
about their experiences. Perhaps some will seek help in
understanding what happened to them. Investigators and
psychologists around the world should work together to
provide this help.

Appendix

Some Major UFO Organizations

Australia

Australian Center for UFO Studies
P.O. Box 728, Lane Grove, NSW 2066.

UFO Research Australia
P.O. Box 229, Prospect, South Australia 5082.

UFO Research Queensland
P.O. Box 111, North Quay, Queensland 4002.

Victorian UFO Research Society
P.O. Box 43, Moorabbin, Victoria 3189.

Canada

Canadian UFO Research Network
P.O. Box 15, Station “A,” Willowdale, Ontario, M2N
5S7.

Centrale de Compilation Ufologique de Quebec
CP 103, Drummondville, Quebec, J2B 2V6.

UFO Research Institute of Canada
Dept. 25, 1665 Robson Street, Vancouver, British Colum¬
bia, V6G 3C2.

Ufology Research of Manitoba
P.O. Box 1918, Winnipeg, Manitoba, 3RC 3R2

United Kingdom
British UFO Research Association
16 Southway, Burgess Hill, Sussex, RH15 9ST.

223

224

THE UFO REPORT

Contact International (U.K.)

11 Ouseley Close, New Marston, Oxford, 0X3 OJS.

Essex UFO Research Group
95 Chilbum Road, Great Clacton, Essex, C015 4PE.

Plymouth UFO Research Group
40 Albert Road, Stoke, Plymouth, PL2 1AE.

Surrey Investigation Group on Aerial Phenomena
Durfold Lodge, Plaistow Road, Dunsfold, Surrey, GU8
4PQ.

Scottish UFO Research Group
129 Langton View, East Calder, West Lothian, EH53 ORE.

Quest International

18 Hardy Meadows, Grassington, Skipton, North York¬
shire, BD23 5DL

United States of America
Citizens Against UFO Secrecy
3518 Martha Custis Avenue, Alexandria, Virginia 22302.

Fund for UFO Research
P.O. Box 277, Mount Rainier, Maryland 20712.

J. Allen Hynek Center for UFO Studies

2547 West Peterson Avenue, Chicago, Illinois 60659.

Mutual UFO Network

103 Oldtowne Road, Seguin, Texas 78155-4099.

UFO Reporting & Information Service
P.O. Box 832, Mercer Island, Washington 98040.

Pennsylvania Association for the Study of the Unexplained
6 Oak Hill Avenue, Greensburg, Pennsylvania 15601.

The Crop Circles

Center for Crop Circle Studies

The CCCS was founded in 1990, with Professor Archie Roy,
BSc, PhD, FRAS, as president. The main objective of CCCS is
to conduct well organized research into the crop circle phenom¬
enon, both in the U.K. and overseas, and to publish its data and
findings in CCCS publications and other serious outlets. CCCS

Appendix 225

is very conscious of the fact that the crop circles occur almost
invariably on private land owned or cultivated by the farming
community, and encourages its members and affiliates to adhere
to a strict Code of Practice, agreement on which has been reached
with the National Farmers Union.

For further details, send a stamped addressed envelope (U.K.
only) to: CCCS, do SKS, 20 Paul Street, Frome, Somerset,
BA 11 1DX.

Some UFO Journals

Flying Saucer Review

Edited by Gordon Creighton, MA, FRGS, FRAS, with an in¬
ternational team of consultants, FSR is arguably the leading jour¬
nal on the subject of UFOs, and is taken by many governmental
bodies and institutions, including the Chinese Institute of Sci¬
entific & Technical Information and the U.S.S.R. Academy of
Sciences.

For subscription details, send a stamped addressed envelope
to: The Editor, FSR Publications Ltd, P.O. Box 162, High Wy¬
combe, Buckinghamshire, HP13 5DZ, U.K.

Fortean Times

A quarterly journal devoted to news, notes, reviews and ref¬
erences on all manner of strange phenomena, continuing the work
of Charles Fort (1874-1932). Write to: Fortean Times, SKS, 20
Paul Street, Frome, Somerset, BA11 1DX, U.K.

International UFO Reporter

Published by the J. Allen Hynek Center for UFO Studies, IUR
is one of the two leading UFO journals in the U.S.A. Address
inquiries to: International UFO Reporter, 2547 W. Peterson Av¬
enue, Chicago, Illinois 60659.

Journal of UFO Research

A bi-monthly Chinese-language journal with the world's lar¬
gest circulation, devoted to UFOs and science. Write for details
to: Paul Dong, P.O. Box 2011, Oakland, California 94604.

Just Cause

Edited by Barry Greenwood and published by Lawrence Faw-

226

THE UFO REPORT

cett (authors of Clear Intent), this journal is essential reading for
those interested in the U.S. Government cover-up. Write to:
CAUS, P.O. Box 218, Coventry, Connecticut 06238.

MUFON UFO Journal

Published by the Mutual UFO Network (the world’s leading
UFO organization), with a staff of reporters and columnists sec¬
ond to none, the MUFON UFO Journal has established itself as
one of the finest magazines on the subject in the world. Write
for details to: MUFON, 103 Oldtowne Road. Sesuin, Texas
78155^1099.

Northern UFO News

Edited by Jenny Randles, this journal is always packed with
fascinating reports that are seldom published elsewhere. Write
to: NUFON, 37 Heathbank Road, Cheadle Heath, Stockport,
Cheshire, SK3 OUP. U.K.

Quest International

Edited by Graham Birdsall, Quest International is a popular
journal, featuring articles by a wide variety of international con¬
tributors. Slides, audio and video tapes, etc., are also available
from this organization.

Send a large stamped addressed envelope to: Quest Publica¬
tions International Ltd, 15 Pickard Court. Temple Newsam,
Leeds, Yorkshire, LS15 9AY, U.K.

Bibliography

Berlitz. Charles and Moore, William: The Roswell Incident, Gra¬
nada, London 1980.

Blundell. Nigel and Boar. Roger: The World’s Greatest UFO
Mysteries, Octopus Books. London.

Butler, Brenda, Street. Dot and Randles. Jenny: Skyer ash, Graf¬
ton Books. London 1986.

Conroy, Ed: Report on Communion, William Morrow, New York
1989.

Delgado, Pat and Andrews, Colin: Circular Evidence, Blooms¬
bury Press. London 1989.

Devereux, Paul: Earth Lights, Turnstone Press, Wellingborough
1982.

Appendix 227

-and Thomson, Ian: The Ley Hunter’s Companion, Thames

& Hudson 1979.

Dong, Paul: UFOs over Modem China, P.O. Box 2011, Oak¬
land, California 94604.

-: The Four Major Mysteries of Mainland China.

Fawcett, Lawrence and Greenwood, Barry: Clear Intent, Prentice-
Hall, New Jersey 1984.

Fuller, Paul and Randles, Jenny: Mystery of the Circles,
BUFORA 1986.

Good, Timothy: Above Top Secret, Sidgwick & Jackson, London
1987; Grafton Books, London 1989; William Morrow, New
York; Macmillan of Canada.

Hall, Richard: Uninvited Guests, Aurora Press, New Mexico
1988.

Hind, Cynthia: UFOs—African Encounters, Gemini, P.O. Box
768, Harare, Zimbabwe.

Hopkins, Budd: Intruders, Random House, New York 1987.

Howe, Linda: An Alien Harvest, Linda M. Howe Publications,
P.O. Box 3130, Littleton, Colorado, 80161-3130.

Hynek, Dr. J. Allen, Imbrogno, Philip with Pratt, Bob: Night
Siege, Ballantine Books, New York 1987.

Meaden, Dr. G. Terence: The Circles Effect and Its Mysteries,
Arletech Publishing Company, 54 Frome Road, Bradford-on-
Avon, BA 15 1LD, 1989.

Noyes, Ralph (editor): The Crop Circle Enigma, Gateway Pub¬
lications 1990.

-: A Secret Property, Quartet Books, London 1985.

Randles, Jenny: Abduction, Headline, London 1989.

Shuttlewood, Arthur: Warnings from Flying Friends, Portway
Press, Warminster 1968.

Spencer, John and Evans, Hilary (editors): Phenomenon, Futura,
London 1988.

Steinman, William: UFO Crash at Aztec, America West Distrib¬
utors, P.O. Box K, Boulder, Colorado 80306, or from Su-
sanne Stebbing.

Story, Ronald (editor): The Encyclopedia of UFOs, New English
Library, London 1980.

Strieber, Whitley: Communion, William Morrow, New York
1987.

-: Transformation, William Morrow, New York 1988.

Stringfield, Leonard: Inside Saucer Post . . . 3-0 Blue, 1957.

228

THE UFO REPORT

-: Situation Red: The UFO Siege, Doubleday 1977 and Faw¬
cett 1978.

Vallee, Jacques: Confrontations, Ballantine Books, New York
1990.

-: Dimensions, Contemporary Books, Chicago 1988.

Walters, Ed and Frances: The Gulf Breeze Sightings, William
Morrow, New York 1990.

Services

Books on UFOs

Those requiring books on UFOs which are not currently
available in bookshops should write, enclosing a large
stamped addressed envelope, to: Susanne Stebbing, 41
Terminus Drive, Heme Bay, Kent CT6 6PR, U.K., or
Arcturus Book Service, P.O. Box 831383, Stone Moun¬
tain, Georgia 30083-0023, U.S.A.

UFO Newsclipping Service

The UFO Newsclipping Service will keep you informed
of all the latest United States and world-wide UFO re¬
ports, many of which are carried only in local newspa¬
pers. For subscription details, write to: Lucius Farish,
UFO Newsclipping Service, Route 1, Box 220, Plumer-
ville, Arkansas 72127.

U.K. Newsclippings

For those requiring U.K. newsclippings only, a service
is provided by CETI Publications in association with Quest
Publications International Ltd. For subscription details:
CETI, 247 High Street, Beckenham, Kent, BR3 1AB,
U.K.

Appendix 229

Computer UFO Network/UFO Reporting &

Information Service

CUFON was established in the U.S.A by Dale Goudie
for the purpose of providing other UFO researchers with
quick access to sighting data and locations, as well as doc¬
umented Freedom of Information material.

Connect at 300 or 1200 bauds, eight data bits, no parity,
one stop bit: U.S.A. (206) 721-5035, from 8 p.m.-8 a.m.
PST. The UFO Reporting & Information Service func¬
tions from 8 a.m.-8 p.m.

Mutual UFO Network Amateur Radio Net (U.S.A.)
80 meters— 3.990 MHz, Saturdays, 10:00 p.m.
40 meters— 7.237 MHz, Saturdays, 8:00 a.m.
10 meters—28.460 MHz, Thursdays, 8:00 p.m.
10 meters—28.470 MHz, Sundays, 3:00 p.m.
All times are Eastern Standard or Daylight.

Index

Adams, James, 22-23
Aerial Phenomena Research
Organization (APRO), xi
Air Defense Operational Center
(ADOC), 5

Airborne Early Warning and
Control System (AWACS),

5

Andrews, Colin, 59, 60, 66, 68,
76, 78, 83, 91-93
Andrus, Walter, xii, 197, 213
Army Air Corps, 66
Auchettl, John, 146, 151, 154,
167

August, John, 185-186
Avebury Stone Circle, 72, 79-80

Banks, Leslie, 66
Barium gas tests, 124
Barron, Ray, 8-9
Barry, Dave, 219
BBC, 51, 106
BBC Television, 76
“Believer Bill,” 206, 220
Bell, Melvyn, 67-68
Bentwaters/Lakenheath case, 38
Bentwaters/Woodbridge case,
35-58

Birmingham Daily News, 23
Birmingham Evening Mail, 23
Blake, Gordon, 16
Blanchard, Col. William, 185,
186

Bletchman, Robert, xii, 190
Boast, Mrs., 52
Boeche, Ray, 40, 56
Boshears, Bill, 177

Botero, Gen. Oscar, ix
Bowles, Joyce, 71
Bradford Telegraph & Argus, 31
Brannan, Margaret, 23
British UFO Research

Association (BUFORA), 43,
70, 223

Bruce, Lt.-Com. Henry, 64
Burrows, William, 3
Burtoo, Alfred, 153

Cambridge News, 103
Carswell AFB, 185
Celtic Crosses, 91-94
Central Television, 20, 74
Challenger (space shuttle),

175

Channel 7 TV (Adelaide), 154,
155

Chase Post, 25-26
Cheng Gang, 138
Cheng Jingchun, 138
Chinese Academy of Sciences,
141

Chinese Air Force, 138, 140-
141, 143
CIA, viii-ix

Circles Phenomenon Research
(CPR), 60, 65, 72, 74, 88
Citizens Against UFO Secrecy
(CAUS), 56, 224
Clark, Insp. Roger, 23
Clarke, Fred, 19
Coffey, Chris, 175
Commission for the Investigation
of Anomalous Atmospheric
Phenomena, 131

231

232

THE UFO REPORT

Committee for the Scientific
Investigation of Claims of
the Paranormal (CSICOP),
46-47

“Condor,” viii, 181, 182
Contact International, 223
Cook, Duane, xii, 203, 210-211,
214-215
Com Circles:

Allington Down, 86
Beckhampton, 72, 80
Bratton, 64, 65, 67-68
Charity Down, 66, 70, 92-93
Cheesefoot Head, 64, 66, 67
Chilcomb, 71
Childrey, 62
Corhampton, 64, 65
Headboume Worthy, 71
Hungerford, 91
Longwood Estate, 66
Oadby, 74-76, 80
Rupert’s Circle, 80
.Silbury Hill, 79-82, 85-86
Upton Scudamore, 68-70,'77,

. 78

Wantage, 74
Warminster, 68
Westbury, 73-74
Yatesbury, 72-73
Coyne, Lawrence, 151, 167—

168

Crash/Retrievals:

Aztec, 170

Brown County, Ohio, 170,
179-181

El Indio-Guerrero, 175-176
El Yunque, 170
Fort Dix-McGuire AFB, 171,
188-190

Kecksburg, 182-184
Kentucky, 177-178
Kingman, 170
Mexico, 175-176
1963 case, 174-175
Norton AFB, 191-192
Roswell, 170, 184-188
St. Geniez, 176-177

Creighton, Gordon, 193-194,
224

Curtis, Mark, 222
Cutler, Robert, ix

Darbyshire, Cyril, xii, 121
Davidson, Alan, 20
Davis, Kathy, 109
Dector Counterintelligence and
Security, Inc., 219
Delgado, Pat, 59-60, 93
de Trafford, George, 93
Deuley, Tom, 175, 212
Devereux, Paul, 87
Ding Zhipeng, 138
Discovery (space shuttle), xi-xii
Dodd, Tony, 18-19
Dowsing, 88-89
Dragon Project, 88
Dulce (New Mexico), 172
Dvujilniy, V. V., 130

Earth Mysteries, 60, 61, 87-89
Edwards, Mr., 26
Eglin AFB, 220
Eisenhower, President, viii-ix
Emenegger, Robert, viii
Empress Lady, 162
English, Bill, 182
Eucla Police Station, 161
Eucla Roadhouse (sighting), 164
Exon, Senator, 54, 56

“FACT,” 131
“Falcon,” viii, 181, 182
Fan Chengliang, 136-138
Fan Nanjia, 138
Fawcett, Lawrence, 38
FBI, 193

Federal Court, 188
Financial Times, vii
Flannigan, Charles, 196, 197,
207

Florida Cooperative Extension
Services, 218

Flying Saucer Review, 87, 97,
193, 224-225

Index

233

Ford, John, 193
Ford Motor Co., 166
Forrest, Barbara, vii
Fort, Charles, 45
Freedom of Information Act

(FOIA), 34, 38, 40, 48, 182
Freeman, Mary, 83-85, 86
Friedman, Stanton, ix, 184
Fund for UFO Research, ix,

181, 224

Gallup Poll (1987), 198
Gamer, Paul, 25, 29
Gehlen, Willi, 70-71
Gendarmerie Nationale, 177
Gille, Dr. Jean, 176
Gladkov, Pasha, 125-126
Goddard Amateur Radio Club, xi
Godwin, Sgt. Steve, 23
Good, Timothy, 2-3, 6, 38, 39-
40, 45, 66, 120, 187
Gordon, Stan, 182-183, 184
Grankin, Y., 124
Greenwood, Barry, 38
Griffiths, Sgt. Stuart, 23
Guardian, 43
Gulf Breeze encounters:

Aliens, 203-204, 205
Communications, 202, 203,
204, 210, 215
Harassment, 219
Hypnotic regression, 217-218
Laboratory tests, 218
Missing time, 217
Physical effects, 202, 203,

204, 208, 210-211, 217-
218

Polygraph tests, 219
PSE tests, 219
Psychological tests, 219-220
Stereo camera tests, 214-217
Video film analysis, 207-208

Haines, Dr. Richard, 155
Hanks, Patrick, 207, 208
Hall, Mr., 64
Hall, Richard, 172, 188

Halt, Col. Charles, 38-58
Hami Television, 136
Hansen, Diane, 202
Hanson, Mick, 5-6, 29
Harris, Harry, 48
Haul, Lt. Walter, 184
Henderson, Capt. O. W., 185—
187

Hendrickx, Pieter, 102
Henley, Graham, 149, 151
Hill, Carlos, 214
Hillenkoetter, Vice-Adm., viii-ix
Hill-Norton, Lord, 51
Holcomb, Truman, 221
Holloman AFB, viii
Hopkins, Budd, 109, 114
House of Commons, 33, 38
Hudson, Mrs., 75
Hues, Roger, 85
Hynek, Dr. J. Allen, 101, 132-

133, 224, 225

Jamison, Dr. Benton, 39-40
Jan Tide, 220
Jiang, Ahmed, 138
Johnson, Ted, 10
Johnstone, Michael, 174
Jones, Mr., 15
Jordan, Raymond, 174
Jordan, Thomas, 14
Journal of Meteorology, 60
Journal of UFO Research, 133,

134, 144, 225
Ju Hang, 138

Karandashov, G. B., 123-124
Keyhoe, Maj. Donald, xi, 145,
179

Kingston, Isabelle, 89-90, 93-
94

Klarer, Elizabeth, 109
Klass, Philip J., 154-155
Knowles, Faye, 12, 146-168
Knowles, Patrick, 12, 146-168
Knowles, Sean, 12, 146-168
Knowles, Wayne, 12, 146-168
Kradz, Michael, 219

234

THE UFO REPORT

Larkin, James, 220
LBC radio, xi
Lear, John, 191
Lee, Mr., 15
Leningrad Television, vii
Lexington Broadcast Service
(LBS), xii

Ley lines, 86-88, 90
Liang Yong, 138
Liberation Daily, 140
Lindbergh, Charles, xi
Lobo, Isabel, 115, 116, 118
Long Island UFO Network,

193

Lorenzen, Coral, xi
Lorenzen, Jim, xi
Lu Feng, 142
Lube, Linda, 202
Lucas, Roy, 72
Lyons, Vicki, 197

Maccabee, Dr. Bruce, 188, 197,
204, 209, 214, 215, 216,
217

McClellan, Pat, 221
McClelland AFB, 175
McClelland, Clark, 182
McConnell, Dr. Fenner, 221
McConnell, Shirley, 221
McDonaldson, Annette, 11-13
McDonaldson, Clare, 11-13
McGuire AFB, 188-190
McKathy, Agent, 219
McKinley, USS, 176
McLaughlin, Harvey, 219
Magee, Judith, 146, 151
Majestic-12, viii-ix, 175, 181
Mao Xuecheng, 140-141, 143
Marcattilio, Pat, 188
Marcel, Maj. Jesse, 184-185
Marlborough Times, 82, 85-86
Marsden, Jane, 9
Martin, Richard, 85
Meaden, Dr. Terence, 60, 62-
63, 67, 72

Medellin Airport (sighting), ix-
x, 117

Melbourne Flight Service, 168
Menwith Hill, 3
Mi Xiuchun, 138
Miami Herald, 219
Michell, John, 87
Miller, Normal, x-xi
Ming Aijun, 138
Ministry of Defense:

Annual reports, 33
AS2, 4, 5-6
DI55, 4-6
DS8, 35

Official attitude, 4, 7, 31
Rendlesham Forest case, 38,
39, 44, 54, 55, 57
Monika, 161-162
Moore, William, ix, 181, 184
Moran, Bill, 14
Moreland, Sqdn.-Ldr. Donald,
52, 55

Morgan, Col. Sam, 48, 49, 56
Morozov, V. F., 126
Morse, Jeff, 188-189
Moxunova, Liudmila, 121-122
Mozambique Airlines (sighting),
ix, 114-119
Mutual UFO Network

(MUFON), xii, 109, 155,
171, 173, 174, 188-189,
191, 197, 198, 206, 208,
212, 218, 222, 224, 225

National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA):
Ames Research Center, 155
Challenger tragedy, 175
Discovery recording, xi-xii
Goddard Amateur Radio Club,
xi-xii

Goddard Space Flight Center,
xi

Gulf Breeze investigations,

220

Public support for, 170
Upper atmosphere tests, 118-
119

National Archives, ix

Index

235

National Personnel Records
Center, 190

National Security Agency
(NSA), 3, 6
NBC, 222

Neumann, Peter, 214-215
New China News Agency, 138—
139, 140
New Era, 89-90
New Jersey State Police, 190
New York Times, ix
Norman, Paul, 221
North American Aerospace
Defense Command
(NORAD), 3, 184
North Atlantic Defense Ground
Environment (NADGE), 5
NATO, 5

Norton AFB, viii, 191-192
Noyes, Ralph, 66
Nullarbor Plain encounter:

Comparisons, 167-168

Debunking attempts, 149-151

Fishing boat sightings, 161 —
162

Laboratory tests, 149, 150,
155-157, 167

Medical and psychiatric tests,
165

Mistreatment of witnesses,
166-167

Physical effects, 156, 157,

165

Police report, 157-161

Tests on car, 154-156

Oberg, James, 141
Observer, ix
Occam’s Razor, 45-46
O’Donnell, Vivienne, 9
Oechsler, Bob, xi-xii, 206, 207-
208

Onizuka, Ellison, 175
Orford Ness lighthouse, 44-45,
54

Overlade, Dr. Dan, 217, 219,
222

Pangallo, Frank, 146, 154
Pavlov, Pavlik, 124
Pavlov, V., 123
Paynter, Bill, x

Pennsylvania Association for the
Study of the Unexplained
(PASU), 182, 224
Pensacola News Journal, 212
Pentagon, xi, 39, 49, 56, 174,
194

People’s Daily, 141
People’s Liberation Army, 138
Petres, Allen, 14, 29-30
Philips Laboratory, 155
Ping Xiaojun, 139
Pinotti, Dr. Roberto, 107-108
Pinto, Capt. Simplicio, 114-118
Pioneer Laboratories Inc., 218
Poliak, Brenda, 215
Poliak, Buddy, 214-215
Portsmouth Journal, 96, 97, 101
Powell, PC Michael, 23
Pristavko, V. I., 126
Project Grudge Report No. 13,
182

Quest International, 1, 102,

226

Randles, Jenny, 45, 49, 109
Ratsch, Donald, xi
Reagan, Nancy, xi
Reagan, Ronald, x-xi
Redditch Weekly Mail, 23
Rees, John, 27
Rees-Mogg, Lord, xii
Reid, Col. Robert, 196, 197,

210

Remotely Piloted Vehicles
(RPVs), 7, 31, 47
Rhodes, J. S., 14
Ridpath, Ian, 43, 48
Rieffel, Olivier, 176-177
Robson, Mrs., 16-17
Robson, Darryl, 19
Rodion, Alexei, 122
Rollright Stones, 88

236

THE UFO REPORT

Roswell, New Mexico, 170,
184-188

Royal Air Force (RAF):
Bentwaters, 35-58
Brize Norton, 30
Flying Complaints Flight, 6
Fylingdales, 3

Provost and Security Services,
6

Rudloe Manor, 6-7
West Freugh, 38
Woodbridge, 35-58
Royal Navy, 5
Russell, Pauline, 13

Sabanin, Elvira, 126
Sabanin, I. A., 126
Sadler, Maj. Gen. Tom, 189,
190

Salisbury Plain (pagan rites),

90

Sawyers, Mark, 151
Scotsman, Mr., 15-16
Seligman, Michael, xii
Sentinel, Gulf Breeze, xii, 198,
202, 203, 206, 210, 220
Shandera, Jaime, ix
Shanghai UFO Research
Association, 142
Shartle, Paul, viii
Shuttlewood, Arthur, 68, 69
Sider, Jean, 177
Silbury Hill, 78-87, 89-90, 91
Simms, Joan, 70
Sleptsova, I. Y., 123
Smith, Ian, 24-25, 29
Smith, Dr. Willy, 113, 218
Somerby, Charles, 201
Somerby, Doris, 201, 203
South Yorkshire Police, 6
Spaatz, Gen. Carl, 186
Space Detection and Tracking
System (SPADATS), 184
Spear, Annette, 220
Spenceley, Ivan, 20-21
Sprinkle, Dr. Leo, 119
Stationary whirlwinds, 62-64

Stealth aircraft, 7, 10-11, 47,

103

Strategic Defense Initiative
(SDI), 7, 124, 194
Strieber, Whitley, 109

Taylor, “Busty,” 91
Teasdale, John, 30
Thompson, Sgt., 19
Thompson, Jeff, 200-201
Thompson-Noel, Michael, vii
Thunderbolt, A-10 (aircraft), 11
Tom, Steve, 184
Tonopah Test Range, Nevada,
194

Tornado and Storm Research
Organization (TORRO), 60
Truman, President, ix
Turner, Enid, 30
Twining, Gen. Nathan, ix

Ujva, Pavel, 129-130
United Kingdom Air Defense
Ground Environment
(UKADGE), 5

United States Air Force (USAF):
438th Military Wing
Intelligence, 189
509th Bomb Group, 186, 187
Air Defense Command, 169
Bentwaters/Woodbridge, 35-58
Gulf Breeze, 200-201, 219
Kecksburg, 182-184
Kentucky, 178
Ohio, 180

Security Police, 35-58, 189,
220

Special Security Services, 219
Statistics, 96
United States Army, 220
United States Navy, 96, 145,

176

Valentich, Frederick, 168
Valine, Dr. Jacques, 103
VARIG Airlines (sighting), x
VASP Airlines (sighting), x

Index

237

VC-10 (aircraft), 30
Victorian UFO Research Society
(VUFORS), 145, 146, 156,
162, 223

Visse, Leon, 176-177

Wagoner, Gen. Paul, 3
Walters, Ed, 196-197, 201-220,
221

Walters, Frances, 196, 202-203,
206, 211, 212
Watkins, P. T., 18
Watson, Gary, 197, 210
WEAR-TV, 214, 222
Weekly World News, 172
Wescott, Dr. Roger, ix
Westbury White Horse, 73, 77
White, David, 26-27
Wild, Dianne, 25
Williams, Gen. Gordon, 54
Woolley, Dr. Richard, 62-63

Woomera Test Range, 150
Wright-Patterson AFB, 175,
181, 185, 186, 190, 192
Wu Wanjun, 138
Wuxi Aviation Bureau

convalescent hospital, 139

Xinjiang Airlines (sighting), x,
134-138

Xu Yongchang, 138

Ya., A., 123
Yorkshire UFO Society
(YUFOS), 1, 223, 226

Zamitt, Mrs., 200
Zhang Gaofeng, 138
Zhang Yunhua, 142
Zhang Zhengyong, 139
Zinchenko, Vitya, 122
Zou Dongjiang, 138

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