The Rendlesham Forest Incident.
December 27th – 29th 1980.
Twenty five years ago something amazing happened in the forests of Suffolk. Witnesses and researchers tell us that for three nights USAF servicemen observed, investigated and encountered what is possibly the best evidence for the existence of alien spacecraft not of this world.
The obvious likening to The Roswell Incident is unavoidable but where Roswell was confirmed and denied in the same day back in 1947 The Rendlesham incident was documented by the Deputy base commander Lt Col Charles Halt on both an official memo and the actual events of one of the nights was recorded on a pocket ‘Dictaphone’ recorder.
These are not the claims of friends of friends or I heard he saw incidents but hard evidence that is out there in the public domain. The document was acquired through the American freedom of information act and the tape came from an active serviceman of the time.
It was some three years after the events that Sunday tabloid newspaper The News of the World ran with the headline ‘UFO LANDS IN SUFFOLK’ and that’s Official. and the events of Christmas week 1980 where jet propelled into the UFO history books.
Of course the UFO Community had knowledge of events long before the newspaper published its sensational headlines and some serious research and lobbying had been carried out. Researchers such as Brenda Butler and Dot Street along with Bufora big wig at the time Jenny Randles were hounding the MOD and Police amongst others for information.
The
story is well known in UFO circles but the very basics of the claims are
that on two possibly three nights between 26th-29th
December 1980 Military security staff observed strange lights in the skies
above Rendlesham Forest, The forest separated RAF Bentwaters and RAF
Woodbridge, both very active bases during the heady days of the cold war.
Greenham common well known for its peace campaigners and nuclear weapons is
also not very far from this area.
After observing the lights on night one base staff were amazed to see similar activity on a second night. They informed Deputy Base Commander Halt that ‘They were back’ and permission was given to leave the base and investigate into the forest.
The ‘Halt Tape’ was recorded on this night by Halt using a small pocket memo recorder.
Link to Transcript:
http://www.ufoevidence.org/documents/doc660.htm
Courtesy ufo evidence.org
The dramatisations by television documentary makers report that jeeps and trucks towing ‘Light Hauls’ powerful mobile floodlights were deployed into the forest and we are told that these floodlights would not operate reliably, diesel generators would cut out etc.
The reports go on to describe a frightening encounter with something unknown and at one point something actually touched down in the forest just yards from the military personal.
This is described in chilling detail on the actual tape recording made that night.
Now encounters such as this are ‘as rare as hens teeth’ and take UFOlogy into area far above speculation and second hand tales and as such you would expect researchers to jump at such Holy grail of an opportunity. This they did and there are several good books and a handful of documentaries produced about the case.
Of course the debunkers, the sceptics and others who would counter the claims also came out in full swing to play down the claims and generally ridicule those who believed in the ET Hypothesis.
When it comes down to numbers you will find many thousands in favour of this being an ‘Unknown Event’ and also happy to accept the testimony of those who were there and accept at face value official documentation that is on record.
But the debunking community is based around a handful of ‘usual suspects’ who go out of their way to knock and ridicule witness testimony and the integrity of all involved.
They should though be allowed their say.
It is up to researchers to present the evidence in a way that can’t easily be countered and ensure that those who knock and ridicule are starved of the ammunition that gets fired at the negative.
For instance.
It is on record that a Russian Cosmos satellite re-entered the earths atmosphere on the 26th Dec 1980. some sceptics use this as evidence that that is what was seen by the airmen on the ground.
Debris re-entering the atmosphere is governed by the laws of physics. As it enters the upper atmosphere it gets hot and starts to burn, leaving a fiery trail in its wake. It does this once quite quickly and it’s gone.
So to claim this happened on three nights would be silly but journalist and sceptics are happy with the answer and put it forward to ‘Solve’ the mystery.
Link to video clip
This clip shows the Orford light in the background as the servicemen would have seen it.
http://www.ufodata.co.uk/media/VT.zip
Courtesy http://www.ianridpath.com and BBC TV
We are also told by a forestry worker who the BBC at the time used as their ‘expert’ that all that the servicemen saw was the light form Orford Ness lighthouse. Hello these guys spent their days looking after Nuclear Weapons and had the welfare of the western world in their hands. They were highly trained, highly skilled people not someone who could fantasize over a Lighthouse who’s light was visible every night of the year.
One television production ‘Strange but true’ hosted by veteran presenter Michael Aspel actually showed the revolving light of Orford Ness appear to be in sync with comments on the Halt Tape, something like ‘There is its…. There it is again….’ But on closer inspection of the programme it was obvious that the filmed footage of the lighthouse had been slowed down to sync up to the Halt Tape.
Once again the debunkers cry ‘Told you so’. Please let’s have a fair playing field.
Even if the light did happen to sync up with the tape don’t forget the pocket recorder was battery operated, the tape would have been transferred at least a couple of times from the original micro cassette, different tape player vary in playback speed, only slightly but enough to drop the accurate sync claimed on the film.
The MOD have also been criticised for not taking the reports seriously. Having checked with military radar at RAF Neatishead to see if any unknown traffic was recorded on the nights in question they were told that Radar Cameras had been switched off on the nights of the events. This seems to have been accepted as OK. The fact that the Russians or anyone else could have paid a surprise visit to our Nuclear bases unannounced does not bear thinking about.
But this answer given to the MOD does not fit in with the comments of a RAF Radar operator who worked at RAF Neatishead at the time.
The interview was conducted by Graham W.Birdsall and myself for a production of UFOs Hard Evidence, you can download an MP3 version of that interview on our downloads page on the website.
There many pages across the internet devoted to the events of December 1980 some are well researched professional pieces, some are not. There have also been several books written on the events.
Left at East Gate Larry Warrens and Peter Robbins
You Can’t Tell The People Georgina Bruni
Skycrash Jenny Randles, Brenda Butler, Dot Street
Open Skies Closed Minds Nick Pope
Many of those involved in the UFO subject believe that The Rendlesham Forest Incident involved the ‘Real McCoy’, Nick Pope who fronted the MOD’s UFO Desk in the early 1990’s and still works for the Ministry spent time during his Airstaff 2a tenure researching the incident remains convinced that something ‘not of this earth’ was involved at Rendlesham.
Having read the books, studied the players and chewed on the known facts I too remain convinced that something extremely important happened that Christmas in Suffolk England, something Extraterrestrial.
The story starts like all good UFO mysteries, in denial. As the truth trickles out it is still denied it took over 20 years but when the UK introduced it’s ‘Freedom of some information’ Act the trickle began to flow but still we only see the tip of the iceberg in years to come those brave souls who dare
to poke and prod the corridors of power might just find the Holy Grail…
Such is the interest these days that the forestry Commission has set up a UFO walk through the forest.
In the following article Richard Davies a forestry worker at Rendlesham is interviewed by BBC local radio reporter Mark Murphy.
What do you think happened at Rendlesham forest back in 1980 - a UFO sighting?
Report courtesy BBC News Online Where I Live
"I think the briefest way to put it and I must stress this is a personal opinion and not an official one, is that something fell off something. We don’t know what. It is debatable whether we will ever know certainly in our lifetime, but I suspect there was some form of security alert directed in the line of military hardware of some kind or another, that had to be covered up," said Richard Davies.
Over the years there have been all sorts of stories and rumours - all sorts of different things have been said to have gone on here in the forest from aliens landing to crash landing, to bits falling off satellite’s. It’s prompted interest from around the world and still to this day.
"Yes it’s not that long ago that we had a film crew from Japan over here recording this as one of the big 10 internationally and of course nowadays this is acknowledged as one of the big two, with Roswell being the other one," explained Richard.
Once a year you get guides out and have a troop through the forest - an opportunity for people to see where this thing is suppose to have happened. Also throughout the year enthusiasts come and have a look as well and just sit and watch to see if even today anything is going to happen.
"Yes there is quite a number of folk who come particularly at night time to see if there are revisitations and we’ve had plenty of stories from them about alien interaction during the night hours," said forester Richard Davies.
This means that people are convinced that there are still things happening to this day. What is your view?
"I’ve always held the point of view that I believe there is actually terrestrial life. I don’t think this was a case of a visitation. It’s even possible to accept the fact within what I’ve just said that there maybe other visitations here, but I don’t think it has any direct relation to what happened on that night," said Richard.
We are just approaching the sight where the crash landing is supposed to have happened and it’s just inside the trees here inside this little clearing, so we’ll just walk through and see what we can find. Could it have been somebody messing about for instance with torches or flares or something?
"I think the consistency of what people have seen over here through the years does actually rule that out.
"The other thing you have to bear in mind is that the crop we’re walking through at the moment is a young crop that was replanted after the proceeding crop had been felled, and that was starting with trees getting on 70 or 80 foot tall - whereas at the moment we’re in a dense young plantation of stuff about 10 or 15 foot tall, so it would have been a very different atmosphere down here at the time.
"It would have been probably less peaceful than it is now because of the ability of the wind to blow through and the noise that would have been going on in the crowns of the trees would have destroyed that peace to a fair extent," continued Richard.
What about the people who use to serve here at the air base. Do you ever see those people coming back to revisit the scene of this incident?
"I think I’ve now twice known ex-USAF people come on these walks and they’ve always got something interesting to say," noted Richard.
And what sort of people come on the walks - enthusiasts, people who just have a passing interest or real believers?
"Well strangely enough everything, you’ve more or less covered the range. Because we do have those people, especially the early walks we did, who were very much on the investigative side of looking into the UFO incidence. I think it’s more those people who think well that’s a nice thing to hang a walk onto.
"But I don’t think I’ve done a single walk and we actually do them twice a year and I’ve been doing it for six or seven years now - I don’t think I’ve done a single walk where there hasn’t been at least one person who passionately believes in this as being a genuine UFO sighting and at the same time one person who thoroughly and is heartily sceptical about it, which puts me in a difficult situation," explained Richard.
What about you and your colleagues. You work the forest day in, day out - it’s a big place. Have you seen anything out of the ordinary?
"Given the fact that personally, I am rarely out at night here, certainly during the daytime and in the evenings and in the early nights going home from work - I’ve never seen anything and I can also say that my wildlife ranger who does work in far more night time situations than I do, has never been back and reported anything but I wouldn’t necessarily say that that excludes everything because you just don’t know do you."
Close to the site where the UFO incident is meant to have happened is a tree which has markings that look like an alien face.