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Tuesday, September 23, 2008

RAF officer breaks 37-year silence on UFO radar mystery

RAF officer breaks 37-year silence on UFO radar mystery

IT IS a close encounter of the official kind. A former RAF officer has claimed that UFOs are real and may have invaded UK airspace, branding official resistance to such theories as "stupid and arrogant".

Wing Commander Alan Turner MBE was sworn to secrecy after he tracked a series of unidentified objects soaring over southern England at incredible speeds.

Turner, 64, a former head of air traffic control at RAF Lossiemouth, insists it is "stupid and arrogant" to rule out the existence of extra-terrestrials and is open to the suggestion that he witnessed craft from another world.

The incident, which has baffled and haunted Turner for decades, took place at RAF Sopley on the south-west coast of England in the summer of 1971.

At the time he was Duty Military Supervisor and had the responsibility of monitoring the skies on radar screens for potential Soviet incursions.

On the day in question, Turner and his 13 colleagues were alarmed by a sudden and unexpected development.

He said: "I can clearly remember people shouting: 'What the hell is that?' I got to a console and people were loudly telling me to look to the east of Salisbury Plain.

"Twenty miles east of the eastern extremity was a series of returns, or radar blips, which were appearing in that position. There were five of them initially. Then six and then seven all following the same track.

"They were tracking south-east, each exactly six to seven miles apart and moving at exactly the same speed. At about 40 miles from the point they appeared on radar, they disappeared, to be followed almost immediately by a replacement at the point of origin.

"The objects were about 3,000ft above ground level when they first appeared and climbed so rapidly that, by the time they disappeared from radar they were in excess of 60,000ft.

"To climb to such a height in only 40 miles was beyond the ability of almost any fighter aircraft at that time."

In a bid to solve the mystery Turner diverted an RAF Canberra jet, which was returning from West Germany, to intercept the intruders.

"When the pilot got within a mile or so of one particular blip, he reported, in a very agitated voice, that his radar had picked up something on his port side that was 'climbing like the clappers'. Neither the pilot nor his navigator made any visual contact with whatever it was."

Within days, Turner was summoned into the Squadron Leader's office and questioned by two men, who wore civilian clothes and were not identified, about the incident.

"I, along with all the others who were in the room on that day, were told in no uncertain terms not to relate what we had seen until cleared to do so."

Turner, who was awarded the MBE in 1984 and retired from the force in 1995, has been assured that there were no training operations, classified or otherwise, going on at the time and there were no weather balloons or probes in the area.

"I have no idea what they were, but I certainly wouldn't rule out the possibility that they were UFOs. There is certainly a chance that we have been visited by extra-terrestrials," he said. "It is terribly arrogant and silly to think that we are alone in the universe."

"I have spoken to three ex-Air Force mates, who held senior positions, and they have seen similar things, but did not report them as they felt their personal integrity would be questioned. That is why I kept quiet for so long, but I know what I saw."

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He said that the craft were equally spaced and shot from 3,000ft to 60,000ft at almost 300mph.

He revealed that every UFO would suddenly vanish from radar after a few seconds, and be replaced by an identical vessel moments later.

According to him, six military radars and operators at Heathrow spotted the UFOs east of Salisbury Plain, and filed reports on the unexplained phenomenon in 1971.

The RAF chief even drew a map charting their flight in between key sites like RAF Lyneham, Wilts, and the aircraft navigation transmitter at Brookmans Park, Herts.

However, staff members were instructed to “never speak about the incident again”, when the Ministry of Defence visited the RAF three days later.

Turner, who was a radar supervisor at the now disused RAF Sopley base, Dorset, in 1971, further said: “I instantly knew this wasn’t a convoy of military planes. The only craft with that rate of climb were supersonic lightning aircraft but they wouldn’t have been able to hold such a perfect formation. They also make a lot of noise. No one heard a thing on the night in question.”

Labels: Alan Turner, Brookmans Park, Dorset, Heathrow, Lossiemouth, Lyneham, RAF, Salisbury Plain, Sopley, UFO

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Saturday, January 05, 2008

The truth is out: X-Files go public: UK

British UFO 'sightings' investigated by a secret branch of the MoD are soon to be revealed and officials are braced for a torrent of inquiries

Without warning, the orange UFO swooped toward them. The crew of the RAF Vulcan bomber banked hard and radioed they were being chased across the Atlantic by a large mysterious object. The incident was classified as a UFO sighting and the details were immediately locked away.

Now, 30 years later, the extraordinary encounter is among thousands of previously secret cases contained in the government's 'X-Files' that officials are to release in their entirety.

The cases, many from a little-known defence intelligence branch tasked with investigating UFO claims, will be published by the Ministry of Defence to counter what officials say is 'the maze of rumour and frequently ill-informed speculation' surrounding Whitehall and its alleged involvement with Unidentifed Flying Objects.

The public opening of the MoD archive will expose the once highly classified work of the intelligence branch DI55, whose mission was to investigate UFO reports and whose existence was denied by the government until recently. Reports into about 7,000 UFO sightings investigated by defence officials - every single claim lodged over the past 30 years - are included in the files, whose staged release will begin in spring.

The decision to release Whitehall's full back-catalogue of UFO investigations was taken last month after the Directorate of Air Space Policy, the government agency responsible for filtering sensitive reports, gave its permission to publish the biggest single release of documents in MoD history. Now the government fears a repeat of the unprecedented demand and the website crash experienced by the French national space agency in March when it released its own UFO files. Government IT experts are believed to have drawn up contingency plans to avoid a repeat scenario when Britain's dossiers are finally made public.

Among the first tranche of UK cases will be the official government files into the famous Rendlesham incident, dubbed 'Britain's Roswell' after the US incident when a flying saucer is said to have crash-landed in the New Mexico desert 60 years ago. On a foggy night in 1980 several witnesses reported a UFO apparently landing in Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk. Statements claimed the craft was covered in markings similar to Egyptian hieroglyphics and aliens emerged from it.

Another case reported to the intelligence branch DI55 - Britain's version of the 'Men In Black' - chronicles a series of reports sent to RAF Scampton, Lincolnshire, by the crew of a Vulcan bomber on exercise over the Bay of Biscay early on 26 May 1977. According to documents seen by The Observer, five crewmen, including the captain, co-pilot and navigators, watched 'an object' approach their aircraft at 43,000ft above the Atlantic. The mysterious craft then appeared to turn and follow their precise course from a distance of four miles.

Initially, the crew said the object resembled landing lights 'with a long pencil beam of light ahead' but as it turned towards them the lights suddenly went out leaving a diffuse orange glow with a bright fluorescent green spot in its bottom right-hand corner. Then, according to signals sent back to Scampton, the crew noted a mystery object 'leaving from the middle of the glow on a westerly track... climbing at very high speed at an angle of 45 degrees'.

The Vulcan's navigator recorded interference on his radar screen from the direction of the UFO which continued for 45 minutes as the plane headed back to Britain. On return to the UK, the camera film from the aircraft's radar was examined by RAF intelligence. They found a 'strong response' from the direction of the sighting. The UFO was captured as 'an elongated shadow' of a 'large-sized' object travelling at a similar height to the Vulcan. An intelligence report sent to the MoD the same day says the crew 'were unable to offer a logical explanation for the sighting'.

Although hailed as the complete disclosure of the UK's UFO files, questions are likely to remain over whether all available information will be made public. Despite the Vulcan sighting being investigated by DI55, no details remain in the file indicating what they found or what became of the radar film.

The disclosures are more likely, claim some experts, to lend credence to the theory that such UFO incidents were, rather than alien visitations, military activities such as missile launches, testing of prototype aircraft and other activities during the Cold War.

David Clarke, a lecturer in journalism at Sheffield Hallam University and author of Flying Saucerers: A Social History of UFOlogy, said: 'Something was definitely going on, but really these files show that the government did not know either. This release will be a source of disappointment or vindication for some, and embarrassment for others.

Clarke, who has lodged hundreds of FoI requests, recently discovered that the government was considering destroying the 24 files created by DI55 because they were contaminated by asbestos. Not only were the UFO records polluted, but a total of 63,000 files estimated at between six to 12 million pages - most of them classified as secret - were facing the same fate. Having admitted the existence of the problem to Clarke, the MoD opted to instigate a £3m project digitally to scan the files before they were destroyed. Scanning of the 24 contaminated UFO files owned by DI55 was completed last year, although it is understood that names of officials in the reports will be removed.

Although the government remains reticent to discuss its intelligence work on UFOs, it is known that DI55 has been hot on the trail of flying saucers since the Sixties. Experts admit that they work closely with the security services MI5, MI6 and GCHQ to collect and assess evidence of potential threats to Britain.

The decision by the UK to open its files could lead to the US government following suit. A group of former pilots and government officials recently urged the Pentagon to reopen investigations into claims of UFO sightings.

UFO claims

1980 Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk. US servicemen claim to have seen an alien craft and its landing site.

1984 Minsk, USSR. Aeroflot pilots say they are pursued by a glowing shape.

1989 Bonnybridge, Scotland. Fire crew report objects rushing towards them before veering away at the last moment.

1990 Brussels, Belgium. Two F-16 fighter pilots recount being engaged in 75-minute mid-air chase with a UFO.

Labels: Bay of Biscay, Belgium, Bonnybridge, Brussels, David Clarke, Directorate of Air Space Policy, Lincolnshire, Ministry of Defence, Minsk, MOD, RAF, Rendlesham, Scampton, Scotland, Sheffield Hallam University, UFO

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Tuesday, November 27, 2007

UFO report – RAF did send fighters up

A UFO spotter from Felpham has appealed to anyone else who saw the objects to contact him. Leo Lindsay and his wife, Rosie, watched from a bedroom window.

Mr Lindsay has since had unofficial confirmation from the Ministry of Defence that two RAF planes were sent up to investigate the phenomenon.

"The RAF don't do that unless there is a real reason," he stated. "I can't believe no one else saw the objects. I would estimate they were each about the size of a house.

"Anyone walking along Felpham seafront at that time would not have been able to miss them. I hope they will let me know on 01243 855728."

Mr Lindsay estimates the objects must have been above Felpham seafront in a beautiful light blue sky with white puffy clouds. He was looking out of a bedroom window in his home in Roundle Avenue at about 6pm on October 4 when he saw 'two round football-shaped objects' coming over the trees high in the sky.

He went downstairs to tell his wife. He watched as the objects changed to become 'multi-faceted diamond shaped discs which moved further apart'.

The fighter planes appeared on the scene ten minutes later. Two aunts staying with the couple also saw the incident.

Labels: Felpham, Leo Lindsay, Ministry of Defence, RAF, Rosie Lindsay, UFO