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Post by snapper on Aug 3, 2012 15:17:19 GMT -5
Hi Frank A substantial amount of research time has been spent on investigating electro-magnetic emissions affecting vehicle electrics. I think BUFORA also did some work on the topic. The following is for info: Source: www.emcuk.co.uk/awareness/Pages/InterferenceExamples/RadioSusceptibility.htm"Ken Yard of the Radiocommunication Agency described recent problems with the introduction of the TETRA services to the UK. Interference from this source to car alarms and immobilisers had caused over 12,000 call-outs on roadside recovery services in the last year alone.
He said that the problem was partly caused by TETRA base stations but the main cause was poor quality receivers (in the car system) with insufficient rejection of out-of-band transmitters. He hoped that this situation could be avoided with the new 868MHz band for car keyfobs.
In a similar way, high power radar pulses from the Fylingdales military base trigger the immobilising devices of many makes of cars and motorcycles - BMW, Mercedes and Jeep among them. Many have had to be towed out of range of the base before they can be restarted.
The RAF admits it is a problem but says it is down to the car manufacturers to change their frequencies. However, Jeep claims this is not possible because of government restrictions.
North York Moors National Park car park attendant Bill Peirson said that Jeep Cherokees, Mercedes cars and vans, and BMWs seemed to be worst affected by the radar. "As soon as the alarms go off, I go over to the owners and explain it's probably the Fylingdales radar that's caused it” The above is interesting and relates to the RFI because of the work being done with radars at Bawdsey and Orfordness at the timeI (not sure about Orfordness. The site was supposed to have been closed abrubtly circa July 1973 when work on Cobra Mist ended). Re West Drayton / Suffolk Police - oh dear. I should have gone to a well known chain of opticians.....!! Researcher or what! It has to be accepted that something happened because there would be no Halt memo otherwise. That's another puzzle - why on earth did Halt write that memo? It seems unecessary somehow - unless it ties in with the activity in the forest as mentioned in the statement by BTDT (the aircraft maintainer), which cannot be dismissed out of hand. Halt's career after the RFI is worth looking at. It suggests he did a good job as the Deputy Base Commander and subsequently gained further promotion and greater responsibility. That seems to be at odds with what might be expected to happen to the career of an officer who claimed to have seen beams of light shining down on to the WSA in the middle of the night; sends a memo about odd lights and creates a potentially controversial tape recording......and leads a squad on a wild goose chase over farmer's fields. There aren't many officers who gain promotion after that. I'm inclined to believe that by pure chance, several totally unrelated incidents occured almost simultaneously but were taken as a single event by the various witnesses. Perhaps one of these incidents required a major cover up that exists to this day. Not sure that any of this contributes to a time-line, or even several time lines but somewhere amongst all of this there has to be a pattern.
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Post by Frank on Aug 3, 2012 17:09:03 GMT -5
Hi Snapper, Thanks for the info on radar interfering with car immobilization and alarm systems. These systems often use the 868,3 MHz (Europe) or 902-928 MHz (America) frequency band. I guess you’re not really into ‘ufology’, since anyone familiar with scientific publications on UFO’s is not surprised at all by the reported effects in the RFI. We already know since the 60’s that a self luminous glow, EM effects (including vehicle malfunctions), and radiation are common ingredients of the UFO pattern. The luminous glow reported is probably an atmospheric plasma: www.nicap.org/ufology/ufochap3.htmThe EM interferences, including stalled vehicles and radio interference are also quite common: www.nicap.org/ufology/ufochap5.htm (another example: www.nicap.org/papers/92apsiee.htm)And radiation was already detected in the 50’s: www.nicap.org/rufo/rufo-15.htmThis is one of the reasons that to me, the RFI is very recognizable as a classic UFO case - I have no reasons to doubt the many corroborating stories of witnesses on the base, in the forest, plus the civilian witnesses. If you’re interested in a down-to-earth, high quality, and serious book on UFO’s and science, I can recommend www.amazon.com/Unconventional-Flying-Objects-Scientific-Analysis/dp/1571740279
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Post by observer on Aug 4, 2012 6:01:02 GMT -5
Hi snapper,
RAF Woodbridge was once considered as a U-2 base mainly because it was very secluded. A couple of trial missions were flown there but it never came to any thing. The RB-57 was also considered for ops out of Woody, but again it never happened.
One comment made by, Don't know who, said "it was coming in from the East" which seems certain high ranking Officers were expecting some thing. May be this was why they had such interest in the radar returns.
Its also worth bearing in mind that a Prototype F-117 Have Blue was in the UK for radar trials with the newly invented 3-D radar, guess where, RAF Bawdsey just down the coast from Woody. The Americans were desperate to find out just how effective the stealth tech was against 3-D radar. Was an F-117 part of the RFI?, Did part of the nose/cockpit section come down in the forest. It explains some of JP's descriptions of said object and another comment was, its one of ours from the future, Think of a 19 year old looking at that in a dark forest at night, he would freak out for sure and think alien craft.
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Post by snapper on Aug 5, 2012 12:38:12 GMT -5
I'm not overly interested in ufology per se. Many odd sightings have a rational explanation and the topic is mostly derided by mainstream science (with the exception of Hynek) because of the lunatic fringe. This is a pity but the situation is unlikely to change, publicly at least, any time soon despite the fact that several UFO events have been witnessed by highly credible persons including airline pilots, military pilots, police officers, sensible and very creditable civilians. Also incidents such as Kecksberg and the Belgian triangle cannot simply be brushed aside as Chinese lanterns or weather balloons and of course EMI and the effects of powerful radars are a known phenomenon.
Through a couple of the key witnesses either changing their story or embellishing their testimony with astonishing new claims, the RFI has lost much of the credibility it once had. My view is the RFI as we currently know it, is dead. What is not dead however, is the fact that something must have happened or Halt would not have ventured into the forest, made a tape recording or written a memo. Also, I tend to believe much of LW's account - with the caveat that in December 1980 he was an impressionable 19yr old airman fresh out of basic training.
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Post by observer on Aug 7, 2012 6:51:30 GMT -5
Snapper
Re impressionable 19 year olds fresh out of training school.
Another factor were the movies 'Close Encounters' and 'Hanger 19' which were playing on the Ipswich cinemas over that Christmas. They were going in their droves to see them.
If you carefully read the testimony and descriptions from our likely lads, you can't help noticing a close similarity to some of the scenes out of the movie Close Encounters. Halt's description of light beams shining down to earth almost at their feet is a scene out of Close Encounters, is a good example, there are numerous other scenes very similar.
Look at the movies and then make your mind up, I could be wrong, perhaps they were all coincidental, but other people have also seen the similarities.
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Post by snapper on Aug 7, 2012 13:42:46 GMT -5
Hi Obs. Thanks for the heads up on the movie titles. I. along with just about everyone else on the planet with access to a cinema or TV, have seen CE3K but I've not heard of 'Hangar 19' . I assume it must be based on UFOs or similar. Given the average age of a USAF airman was and probably still is, between 19 - 23 yrs then I agree, it is entirely possible if they saw these films they could well be sufficiently influenced to believe that anything unusual had to be linked to aliens and/or alien craft.
Trying to make sense of the events in Dec 80 is made more difficult by the story endlessly spinning off at a tangent. That's why I prefer to ignore much of what has been said and look instead at the bigger picture. Included in that are the issues over radar experiments at Bawdsey; what happened to the Cobra Mist radar techies after that project was abruptly closed in July '73 and while the effects of radar on vehicle electrics is known, are there any reports of similar problems with aircraft electrics? If so, then fly-by-wire aircraft might be at considerable risk should they run into high powered radar emissions.
Also, with reference to your comment re 'black ops' and possible British involvement, It's an interesting thought. Of course, the 'black op' in question might not have been a military op as such but could have been a highly classified operation to test something at a time when the chances of the test being observed by prying eyes was much less. Something like that would fit with the need to check radar films and perhaps not only the radar films at Watton. Maybe it wasn't what was on the film that was important, but what was not. After all, in the military world the invisible is frequently far more important than the visible.
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Post by Frank on Aug 7, 2012 16:16:31 GMT -5
Young and impressionable? Yes some of them were: Bustinza to Larry Fawcett: “ I just couldn’t believe what was going on. I thought I was in a dream world or something.” “It was like, when something like that’s happening right before your eyes, you want to try to keep track of everything, but it’s hard because everything is happening so fast.” To Georgina Bruni: “ Colonel Halt later tried to tell us it was our imagination.” Bustinza to Ray Boeche about the object he saw: “ There was a red light on top and there were several blue lights on the bottom. But there was also an effect maybe like a prism … with rainbow lights on top, scattered about .. [and] several other colors of light. It was weird … It was a tremendous size. It even surprised me that it was able to fit into the clearing. A tremendous size -- and I use the word 'tremendous' carefully. It was a round, circular shape. I hate to say like a "plate", but it was thicker at the center than it was at the edge.” Nevels about the computer illustration based on Burroughs’ sketch: " It looked very close to it, very close. I saw it and I got excited about it – ‘there, somebody finally drew something that made sense to what I’d seen.’ " I think Bustinza and Nevels are describing the same object. Bustinza and Nevels can both be heard on Halt’s tape and also both remember Halt was with them when the object had landed. On Halt’s tape and memo the object is simply described as red and sun-like. This corroborates with Burroughs’ sketch, in which Burroughs wrote that the orange/white conical beam and accompanying blue lights came out when the object was ‘sitting in one place’ - when it was moving only the red/orange sphere was visible. On Halt’s tape we can hear Halt and others saying that pieces seem to be falling/shooting off the object. Maybe at that moment Halt was talking into his memo recorder or radio about contacting the electronics division to possibly ‘get parts from another world’. Halt was probably convinced that the pieces falling/shooting off could be collected later to be investigated by the electronics/research division. Bustinza told Fawcett: LF – How about the beings? AB – To tell the truth, I remember seeing the craft. I remember Colonel Halt talking, and I remember looking to who he was talking to and I couldn’t see nobody. LF – You couldn’t see nobody? AB – I couldn’t see what, I mean, who he was talking to, and for a minute there I thought everybody there was going crazy here or something, you know. And I do remember him saying he would contact the electronics division, which would be CRF, I think it was, the call letters for the group. And they would possibly have to get the part from another world. And I just looked at, I couldn’t hold my, you know. Who are you talking to, what are you talking about, you know?This interpretation of a ‘young and impressionable’ Bustinza may have transformed into a rumor circulating on the base that a UFO had landed and the (deputy) base commander had helped to repair it ..
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Post by snapper on Aug 7, 2012 17:31:11 GMT -5
HI Frank - that demonstrates very clearly what I mean about the RFI as we know it. In his memo Halt simply states: "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 glowing particles and then broke into five separate white objects and then disappeared. Immediately thereafter, three star-like objects were noticed in the sky, two objects to the north and one to the south, all of which were about 10 degrees off the horizon. The objects moved rapidly" i He doesn't mention a landed object at all, only a light moving through the trees. So on the one hand there is a senior officer stating he has seen only a light and on the other there are airmen who were part of his squad claiming to have seen an object on the ground, in a clearing. It doesn't make any sense at all. Therefore, I am inclined to believe* what a senior officer wrote in an official memo to what one of his squad claimed to have seen when interviewed some time later. Then we have what Penniston said in his witness statement after his first night encounter (note - JP later stated the published statement was attributed to him but was in fact a sanitised verision put out by Wing Intel. Apparently his original, handwritten statement was four pages long (source: www.therendleshamincident.co.uk/james-pennistons-witness-statement-1981/): "When we got within a 50 metre distance, the object was producing red and blue light. The blue light was steady and projecting under the object. It was up the area directly extending a metre or two out. At this point of positive identification I relayed to CSC, SSgt Coffey. A positing sighting of the object…1….Colour of lights and that it was definitely mechanical in nature. This is the closest point that I was near the object at any point." No closer than 50 metres but was able to draw a top (oblique plan) view of the craft and later claimed to have touched it and so forth. Need I say more? *there are other issues with the memo, particularly who the action addressee was (it was only CC RAF) and the fact that an FoI request to the US DoD resulted in the DoD passing the request to the UK MoD when the usual response would be 'we do not hold any information... etc etc'. That begs the question why did they do that? Did the DoD know the MoD had a copy? And given it was only an unclassified memo of no particular importance, why was it not routinely destroyed in accordance with standard procedures and retention periods?
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Post by observer on Aug 8, 2012 13:36:36 GMT -5
Hi There are numerous theories being banded around and have been for many years. Some have been quite convincing and others down right ludicrous with many falling some where between the 2 extremes.
The lights in the sky as explained by Ian Ridpath cannot be ignored, but I have always felt there was some thing else going on.
I colleague and myself from the old RFI forum came to the conclusion several years ago that one of our theories was on the nail, but no forum members including ourselves recognized any connection so it was by passed and on to another subject. In retrospect and after talking to new experts a couple of years ago who asked to remain anonymous I compiled a short list.
I now have 3 favorite theories, I have actually had the beliefs for several years but I will offer up one but I won't tell you in which order it comes from my 3.
The RFI revolves around 'Stealth Technology', radar and associated sciences. Quite a bit of research brought me to this near conclusion, but mostly it came from a very prominent crop circle expert.
Obs
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Post by Frank on Aug 8, 2012 17:34:32 GMT -5
I’m well aware of the inconsistencies in the RFI, Snapper. The difficulty is: Believing the statements of senior officers over the stories told by excited airmen seems logical, but if there is a cover-up, the senior officers would be part of it.. So who to believe?
The story of the release of Halt’s memo is in YCTTP – it also includes Moreland’s cover letter in the appendix. Halt’s memo was directed to the RAF liaison officer (Moreland), hence the ‘RAF/CC’, and Moreland sent it to DS8 plus a copy to the senior RAF liaison officer at Third Air Force, from where it was released in 1983 under the FOIA. Someone must have known that a copy was still available there, and that it could be obtained via the senior RAF liaison officer. Maybe the same person who gave CAUS the witness statements with his personal comments on them, signed with ‘H’?
The big question is: Was this a personal action by Halt to get the truth out, or a cleverly orchestrated release of disinformation by the USAF?
Note that Nevels was a senior officer, too, by the way. That is why I think the interview with Nevels is so important (see link in reply #17 above – definitely worth a listen!).
Since the binary code affair I do not have much confidence in the (later) stories told by Penniston. To me this resolves the inconsistencies of the first night: All original witness statements suddenly match if you leave out Jim’s later ‘revelations’. His three-view drawing also surfaced years later.
Observer, I have seen these speculations on the old RFI forum about cover-ups of all kinds of tests with secret military technology or even a military accident. The problem I have with that is the civilian witnesses who saw similar things as reported by the military witnesses, and at the same time heard the military vehicles in the forest. So whatever that technology or accident was, it must have looked like lights zapping across the sky and in & out the forest.
Who knows? Maybe we have technology that can do this. But the impressions of Ball, Cabansag, Nevels, Halt, Penniston, and Bustinza are all the same: We do not have technology that can do what they have seen. So this must have been very impressive secret military technology, even to senior officers like Halt, Ball, and Nevels.
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Post by observer on Aug 9, 2012 8:22:31 GMT -5
Snapper
I got the title wrong, I think the movie was called Hanger 9.
Cheers
Obs
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Post by observer on Aug 9, 2012 8:46:31 GMT -5
Hi Frank
You make some good points, but it boils down to who you believe or want to believe. I had pals on RAF Woodbridge base, one was the engine shop crew chief and another was a flight line crew chief both ARRS ex NAM Vets. Both were based at Woody during the period in question. They both say that JP, LW, JB and all the others should be ashamed of themselves for telling this load of horse crap and should be court Marshalled for bringing the USAF into disrepute. This is their words not mine. One now lives in Florida very near a retired USAF General who was also based in the UK, and he says they are just in it for money and fame and should be ashamed.
I thought it worth posting this as its the opposite point of view from retired ex USAF NCO's based at Woody, which is only fair.
Obs
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Post by Frank on Aug 9, 2012 13:08:14 GMT -5
Hi Obs, I can imagine your pals think that way, and to a large extend I agree with them. Small things can easily turn into big stories. A nice example of this can be heard in the interview with Nevels, in which he tells something like ‘ a woman told on the internet that I was brutally tortured, and that is NOT true!’ Well, we - as former forum members – both know how this rumor came into existence and how it is rooted in random noise and a vivid imagination of one of the forum members.. A lot of the RFI without any doubt came from the rumor mill, and most people who heard of the RFI primarily heard these outrageous stories spread by some of the witnesses who in turn must have picked them up at the base from ‘impressionable 19 year olds’. But just like you I think there must be ‘something’ at the core of all this. And strangely enough, the most probable answer is ‘simply’ a UFO that was not even identifiable by USAF personnel spending several hours in the forest over several nights. All witnesses, Moreland, even Conrad and Williams agree on this. The USAF labeled it a UFO from day one (when they called the Suffolk police). These things happen.. Not very often, but often enough to intrigue many people. Like this one, that is available on the official NSA website of the US government (the story starts at page 4, and reads like incredible science fiction): www.nsa.gov/public_info/_files/ufo/routing_slip_ufo_iran.pdf(Don’t forget to look at the distribution list on page 3..) And they are even investigated by courageous scientists, like in the Hessdalen case. www.hessdalen.org/pictures/description.shtmlThe descriptions of the Hessdalen phenomena that you can find here are an amost one-to-one match of what was reported in the RFI.
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Post by snapper on Aug 9, 2012 19:55:04 GMT -5
Well. like I said. What we are being told is a pile of horse crap and should be ignored. Look deeper and think about the bigger picture. Whatever happened didn't origniate at the twin bases, nor outer space for that matter. Look at the evidence. The answer is there.
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Post by observer on Aug 10, 2012 3:14:46 GMT -5
Hi Frank and snapper
I think we are all some where in the same ball park on this. I have always said explanations lie else where. I fully understand if other members have different views but that in its self is a good thing when doing research, as collectively it gives us a bigger picture.
One word to the UFO believers. I would love this incident to have been a genuine alien visit, but there is not one shred of evidence to say it was.
Why is it that UFOs only seem to visit at night and why is it that they always shine lights during the night time visit. Hey you guys, I'm over here. This leads me on to one theory that the lights seen in the forest were to attract attention and possibly a lure! which thus leads me to a another sub theory that it may well have been a prank. Frank, PM me and remind me of your old RFI forum status. cheers Obs
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