CONTENTS

UFO Files: Black Box UFO Secrets

Missing Time: A Personal Account

2056 - Aliens Are Among Us!

Trimingham Radar Fault: The MoD Stance

The Thousand Oaks Incident - NEW

UFO Files: Pacific Bermuda Triangle

The Great British UFO Show 2

UFO Seen by Multiple Witnesses in Chicago

Book Reviews April '07

NEW - Two USAF Fighters Encounter UFO

The Great British UFO Show 2

Leeds Rugby Supporters’ Club, Headingley, Leeds

21^st – 22^nd October, 2006

Some say that ufology is a fringe subject. Some say that it is dead or on the wane. Judging from two sold-out days at The Great British UFO Show in Leeds, I’d say that ufology is alive and well and as strong as ever.

Over the weekend of 21^st to 22^nd of October, 2006, nine speakers would deliver lectures that would keep the audience spellbound with subjects ranging from political conspiracies to crop patterns and, of course, UFOs. From the UK, we had Tony Topping, David Shayler, Philip Mantle, Sacha Christie, Rob Whitehead, Alan Foster and Russel Callaghan. From overseas, Odd Gunnar Roed from Norway and Maurizio Baiata from Italy both provided excellent talks.

Each speaker was filmed and a DVD set of the entire weekend will be released through ufodata.co.uk soon. Thanks should also go out to Paul France, who took some amazing photographs of the event.

So, let’s get on with the show, as they say. First up on Saturday was Tony Topping. Tony hails from Selby, North Yorkshire, and he spoke openly and with great power about his experiences. From childhood, he has endured terrifying dreams and nightmares about being taken from his home. He believes dark forces are out there, manipulating our minds and perceptions of reality for some deep, covert objective.

He told of how he has suffered psychic attacks from unknown assailants and how he learned that children were needed by the forces behind them for some unknown purpose. The strain on his mind was so great that he became suicidal.

Tony showed video of black helicopters, as well as bright objects in the sky that he had filmed. He told of how, one day, near a canal in Selby, he observed a fighter jet chasing a UFO across the sky, after the object rose from a field, with a brilliant flash of light.

Tony went on to talk about a case from New Zealand where a man called Alec Newald was abducted by extra-terrestrials for ten days, returning dazed and confused. When he told the authorities about what had happened to him, he was contacted by the Royal Institute of International Affairs (the famous Chatham House group), but when Alec refused to cooperate with them, he was promptly jailed. A book of Alec’s story, Coevolution: The True Story of a Man Taken for Ten Days to an Extraterrestrial Civilization, is now available.

Tony has come to the conclusion that most UFOs are actually not from outer space, but emanate from either the poles or the interior of the Earth, perhaps both. He is certain that many come from beneath the oceans. He recounted Operation High Jump, that huge operation in Antarctica, led by US Admiral Byrd, which is barely known to the public, but allegedly cost thousands of lives when they encountered ‘something’ down at the bottom of the world.

Tony’s experiences, including contacts with extra-terrestrials, have had such a profound effect upon him that he now shields himself from personal relationships, fearing for the lives of anybody with whom he might become intimate. His website can be found at http://www.etlife.co.uk.

Former MI5 officer and whistle-blower, David Shayler kindly stepped in at very short notice when advertised speaker, Anthony Mallin, had to cancel his appearance because of ill health. He delivered a brilliant lecture and it was great to see him talking with our delegates afterwards. He had quite a crowd around him!

David spoke of how he came to be involved with MI5 in 1991, replying to a job advertisement, thinking he was going to work in the media. While at his post, he learned of an MI6 plot to assassinate Colonel Gaddafi of Libya. The operation went ahead without the permission of the Home Secretary, failed and many innocent civilians lost their lives. David became disillusioned with the way the security services operated outside of the law and left MI5.

David and his partner, Annie Machon, fled to France, where they lived for two years before returning to the UK and being promptly arrested. He was sentenced to six months in prison in 2002 and served seven weeks of that time before being released.

With his knowledge of how the security services go about their business, it is obvious to David that many so-called terrorist attacks are really ‘false flag’ operations, in which these secret agencies instigate atrocities and then blame terrorist groups. They may learn of plots by genuine terrorist cells and make them happen, perhaps funding and supplying the groups covertly or undertaking the attacks themselves. The bombing of the World Trade Centre in 1993, the devastating attack on 9/11 and the London bombings of 7/7 are all prime examples of false flag operations.

Another example that David covered was Gladio. This was a NATO, CIA and MI6 operation in Italy after World War Two that staged terror attacks and blamed communist activists. When it seemed that Italy would have Europe’s first democratically-elected communist government in the 1970s, Gladio instigated the assassination of Italian Prime Minister, Aldo Moro, and the blame fell on the Red Brigade.

David kept the audience spellbound and we cannot thank him enough for stepping up at such short notice.

After lunch, Norway’s Odd Gunnar Roed stepped onto the stage and gave a fascinating talk about unexplained tracks found in his home country in the 1990s. These huge gouges in the earth appear to have been created by something hitting the ground, scraping out huge furrows and then leaving again.

Studies by geologists have yet to find an explanation for them, but prosaic explanations, such as tracks left by heavy vehicles, have been discounted.

Some of the tracks end at huge boulders, weighing many, many tons, suggesting that some force shifted these great lumps of rock, seemingly with ease. What is inexplicable is that the tracks often pass through areas of foliage, yet there is no damage to the plants, except in one case, where bark was scraped from a tree.

Odd Gunnar explained that it had been suggested that something made of ice could have fallen from space (a mini-c0met, I suppose you could call it), broken up and created the tracks in impact, the ice then melting and leaving no trace. However, the tracks do not all lead in the same direction, as one would expect if something fell from the sky.

Whatever the cause of these enigmatic gouges in the earth, they are fascinating, but an explanation may never be found.

Odd Gunnar then presented a slide show of the famous Hessdalen Lights. He showed us his favourite photographs of the lights, which included long-exposure images that indicated they flashed on and off or pulsated. Many theories abound about the cause of the lights, but they are still essentially unexplained.

Our thanks go to Odd Gunnar for making the journey from Norway to speak at the conference.

UFOData Magazine features editor, Philip Mantle, gave a fascinating talk about the infamous Alien Autopsy. Philip was present right at the beginning of the AA saga, so he could speak first-hand about the real story behind the controversy.

He showed the autopsy footage in its entirety, explaining how Ray Santilli claimed to have come into possession of the film, what part he (Philip) had to play in getting it to the public’s attention and how it was released to the world to such fanfare and hype.

Philip also told the story of his and others’ investigations into the footage, how the props used in the film seemed authentic and even how professional experts were duped by it, how some investigators were led, by directions from ‘the cameraman’, to the crash site and how there are many that still believe that there is a grain of truth in the autopsy story. Despite Santilli knowing next to nothing about the UFO subject, he knew about the showbiz industry and his project was a masterstroke of ingenuity and attention to detail.

When Santilli and his partner, Gary Shoefield, came clean and admitted that they had created the autopsy footage, along with the ‘debris’ shots, Philip explained his small part in the Eamonn Holmes programme, Eamonn Investigates The Alien Autopsy, telling about his interview in a small café, a location that baffled him.

He talked about UFOData’s documentary, Alien Autopsy: A Little Bit Of This And A Little Bit Of That…, in which he and Russel Callaghan interviewed Keith Bateman and his staff. Keith explained how he was commissioned by Santilli to create some autopsy footage and the infamous ‘tent footage’ was the result.

Finally, Philip told of the impending legal action against Santilli. It seems that a case of consumer fraud is to be brought against him by several of the television companies that paid money for the alien autopsy footage. If it goes to court, there may be interesting developments, especially if Santilli has to finally produce some of the actual footage that he claims is genuine to save his bacon, so to speak.

The final speaker of the day was UFOData’s own roving researcher, Sacha Christie. Speaking publicly for the first time about her own experiences, Sacha did an excellent job and we are all very proud of her.

Sacha told of the night in Wales, ten years ago, that would change her life forever. She, her son and her friends were staying at a holiday cottage in Glyn Cyriog and one night, a light appeared in the sky. They watched as it hovered above them for a long time before another light appeared to land or hover just above the ground quite close to them. Everybody was remarkably calm, even though an apparently a genuine UFO incident was going around them. Sacha’s son, Louis, then tugged at his mum’s sleeve and said that something had reached out from the bushes and touched his leg. It was then that they decided to go back inside. Almost everybody else decided to go to bed, despite a large UFO hovering not far above their cottage, but Sacha ventured back outside.

She looked up at the round, glowing object, that reminded her of a mushroom, with spokes extending out from the centre to the edge, and called out to it, asking what it was going to do next. Then she heard footsteps and something tugged on the back of her jacket. She panicked and fled back to the cottage. The next day, Sacha, her son and her boyfriend left the cottage, never to return.

Afterwards, Sacha’s life changed completely. She became afraid of the dark and had to sleep with the light on. Animals became attracted to her for some reason, with birds and insects landing on her after avoiding other people. Her allergies to several things mysteriously vanished. Not everything was beneficial, however.

Bravely, Sacha went on to explain how she began drinking, became an insomniac and eventually resorted to drug-taking, losing a lot of weight. Sacha is grateful to the many friends she has made since becoming an active UFO researcher and although sharing her experiences with them has helped, it still took a great deal of courage for her to climb on stage and open up to a large audience. Thank you, Sash!

With the speaker line-up complete for the day, we had to rush around and get the room ready for the evening’s entertainment. Musical duo, Full Fat Funk, entertained the audience with a mix of tunes and, boy, were they loud! In between sets, bingo was played and hoots of ‘Conspiracy!’ resounded when Russ won. Fix!

Sunday’s events got underway with Rob Whitehead from LAPIS giving an entertaining talk about some of the UFO cases he has investigated.

Rob said that this was the first time he had spoken in front of an audience, but you wouldn’t have known. His talk was funny, insightful and honest. Rob calls a spade a spade and that can be refreshing.

Playing a video of orange lights that he was sent in by a member of the public, we saw them moving about the sky, seemingly making patterns that resembled constellations. The audience laughed when the chap behind the camera suddenly announced that, “The dog’s been sick!” The lights eventually moved into a roughly linear formation.

Rob then showed another video that he had taken himself, showing similar lights above St. Annes. Rob suspected that these orange orbs were quite close and, after sending somebody to investigate, found that they were lanterns released only a couple of streets away for a birthday party.

This year there have been many reports of these orange lights and the media has been gripped by UFO fever. The sad thing, Rob explained, is that they hardly ever ask reputable UFO investigators what these orbs may actually be. Thai lanterns, available for only a few pounds, have been the bane of ufology in 2006.

Moving on to a more inexplicable case, Rob covered the experiences of the Devereaux family from High Bentham, Lancashire, in 2005. This case was featured on the Sky One programme, The Real 4400, and Rob showed clips from that show. The family had been driving in their car when they saw a bright light in the sky. They experienced about an hour of missing time and the incident affected them all greatly.

The new website for the Lancashire Anomalous Phenomena Investigation Society (LAPIS) will soon be online at www.lapis.org.uk.

Alan Foster devoted his ninety minutes to the subject of crop patterns. Largely dismissed as hoaxes by many, Alan explained how many patterns have features that would be difficult to fabricate and cannot be the result of a few circlemakers stomping around with wooden boards.

Some patterns appear to have been blasted with microwave radiation, causing the crop to become almost fluid and causing stem nodes to burst from the inside. Sometimes the crop is not laying flat, but bent about a foot (30cm) above the ground. This would be hard to achieve with planks and string. Quite often, visitors to patterns have seen vortices of energy rising from within, sometimes accompanied by orbs of light. Alan’s slideshow of beautiful crop pattern photographs was augmented with equally lovely paintings by his wife.

Alan is firm in his belief that crop patterns are some form of communication from elsewhere. He presents a good case and points out anomalies in some patterns that would be extremely difficult to hoax.

Three of my favourite patterns were highlighted by Alan. These were the famous Chilbolton messages of 2001, where a variation of the Arecibo radio signal was found in a field next to the Chilbolton Radio Telescope, along with an image of a face that bore a striking resemblance to the Cydonia Face on Mars. My other favourite was the Alien Head formation of 2002, which appeared only a few miles from the Chilbolton glyphs.

The Alien Head pattern was remarkable in that a message was encoded into the design and that message was deciphered. Although it was cryptic, it sends a shiver down my spine every time I read it:

"Beware the bearers of FALSE gifts & their BROKEN PROMISES. Much PAIN but still time. BELIEVE. There is GOOD out there. We OPpose DECEPTION. Conduit CLOSING (BELL SOUND)".

Alan’s lecture was fascinating and illuminating and well worth getting a numb bum for.

After lunch, Maurizio Baiata took the stage and gave an enthralling talk about the work of Colonel Philip J. Corso. Maurizio is the editor of Italy’s best-selling UFO magazine, Area 51, and certainly knows his stuff.

Colonel Corso, who passed away in 1998 barely a year after his autobiography, The Day After Roswell, was published, was the head of the Pentagon’s Foreign Technology division in the early Sixties. He maintained that many technologies that we take for granted nowadays, such as fibre optics, lasers, integrated circuits and night vision lenses, were developed from alien systems recovered from the Roswell crash of 1947.

In interviews conducted by Maurizio and played for the audience, Corso claimed that rather than directly handing over alien technology to the private sector for development, his team basically planted seeds of ideas and then, over time, produced some of the alien stuff to help the research process. Of course, the inventors of these new technologies claim that back-engineering extra-terrestrial spacecraft had nothing to do with their research process, but remember that they were never told where the ideas or research samples came from.

Maurizio produced many documents that verify Corso’s movements during his active service and also several sketches, made by the colonel, of the aliens recovered from the Roswell crash. Maurizio made it quite clear, though, that nobody was to film or take photographs of the slides he presented.

Maurizio gave an animated talk and our audience enjoyed it immensely. We cannot thank him enough for making the trip from Rome to be with us this weekend.

To close The Great British UFO Show, UFOData Magazine editor and conference host, Russel Callaghan, talked about some of the problems with ufology today, especially in terms of the media.

There are some in the ‘UFO industry’ that want to own everything. They buy up videos taken by witnesses, forcing them to sign exclusivity contracts. They try to copyright common-use terms and threaten legal action when a certain word or acronym is used. More serious, though, is that they stifle debate because the evidence is not available for public scrutiny and examination. UFOData Magazine is about sharing information with the public at large, disseminating the evidence we receive with our readers and hoping that they may shed light on the subjects we cover.

Russel begged that if anybody ever filmed or photographed something strange, never to sign a contract granting exclusivity. Allow the footage or images to be used, but retain the rights so that you can do what you want with them.

With that out of the way, Russel went on to talk about UFO reports from airline pilots, playing clips from The History Channel’s excellent show, UFO Files. If eyewitness reports and radar traces from aviation professionals is not good evidence, then I don’t know what is!

He also showed footage from the Discovery Channel programme, Rocketships, of the famous ‘tether satellite’. The clip was actually shot from the Earth by somebody with a camcorder as the tether orbited, reflecting the sunlight and appearing like a Star Wars lightsabre drifting across the night sky. Amazing stuff.

Russel thanked everybody for attending, for those that gave such fantastic lectures and for those that helped out with the conference. He then slipped in the bombshell announcement that next year, the 60^th anniversary of the Roswell Incident, two of our guest speakers will be noted Roswell researcher, Kevin Randle and the only man who can definitely say that he has held a piece of the Roswell debris, Dr Jesse Marcel Jr. If everything goes according to plan, The Great British UFO Show 2007 will be an event not to be missed!

Everybody at UFOData Magazine would like to thank all of our friends and guests over the weekend for making the conference such a resounding success. See you next year.

Steve Johnson

MISSING TIME:

A Personal Account

Simon Murphy tells his own, bizarre story to friend and UFOData contributor, Steve Johnson

Simon Murphy (left) & Steve Johnson (right)

Introduction

Simon Murphy is not only a good, honest family man, but he is also my best friend. I’ve known him for the best part of twenty years and to say he’s as straight as a die is something of an understatement. He has known of my interest in UFOs for years, but doesn’t really share that interest. Last year, I dragged him to The Great British UFO Show, but he only went so that I didn’t look like a lemon going by myself. His own areas of interest lie in more earthly subjects, such as the Titanic, World War II and writing poetry.

He is also extremely sceptical and this shows in the interview near the end where he tries his level best to explain what happened to him in rational terms. This interview was conducted on Saturday, 28^th January, 2006. I have edited some portions of the transcript for clarity and omitted some information, such as descriptions of his home and his wife’s name, but what we have here is basically what he told me that evening:

Steve Johnson (SJ): When did this event happen?

Simon Murphy (SM): I was working at Zedmark (a local firm that specialised in refractories (furnace liners etc.) and heavy clay goods (pipes, roof tiles, bricks etc.) - SJ), so it would have been ‘94 or maybe ‘95. (See Note at the end of the article – SJ)

Yeah, anyway, as I was saying, I worked at Zedmark and I finished work, so it would have been about half past four/ five o’clock-ish.

SJ: What time of year was it?

SM: I can’t remember exactly, but it was dark outside, so it would have been autumn or winter. (coughs) Excuse me. Yeah, it would have been winter-time, but before Christmas, though, so it would have been autumn/November. Something like that. I walked home and it was about a ten or fifteen minute walk, so I got in probably just after five o’clock. I opened the door, walked in, nothing out of the ordinary. I went into the kitchen, put the kettle on, had a cup of tea. [My wife] was at work because she went to work at about twelve o’clock and didn’t get back until about nine. So, I was on my own, put the immersion heater on, made myself a cup of tea, er, had a cup of tea. I went upstairs about six o’clock-ish, ran myself a bath and stayed upstairs while the bath was filling up. So, the bath filled up, I turned it off, then I heard a noise. No, not a noise, more of a feeling. You know, when you think “something’s not right”, yeah. So I came back out because I thought I’d heard something or I had a feeling that maybe somebody had tried the door or something. So, I came down the steps [describes the layout of his living room into which the stairs open] and that’s when I saw my granddad. He was sat on the furthest cushion from me and I'm looking at him and I sort of remember thinking “This is weird”…

SJ: Your granddad had died?

SM: Yeah, my granddad had died probably twelve months before, maybe a bit longer. But when I saw him [on the sofa], he looked really healthy. He looked old, but he didn’t look ancient like he did just before he died. Anyway, he was sitting on the settee on the furthest cushion on the right-hand side of the settee and I noticed the depression in the cushion where he was sitting. And he just looked at me…

SJ: As though he was a real person.

SM: Yeah, as though he was a real person, a proper, physical being sat there. And then he turned and looked at me and smiled. (pause) And I just stood there and thought “This is weird”. But, it’s worthy to note that only a few months before, I had had that episode with my grandma. Shall I talk about that?

SJ: Please.

SM: Okay, prior to this incident, a few months before, which was the summertime, erm, maybe May/June/July time, I was working at Zedmark, it was lunchtime and I had my dinner and I made myself a cup of tea to have with my dinner and I nodded off. I had a dream about my grandma and I woke up with a start. I knocked my cup off and I was all like “Oh bloody hell” and that. Anyway, I thought, I’ve just had this dream and I'm a silly bugger and stuff. In my dream, she had been like “Are you all right, lad?” and I’d woken up, knocked my tea over and I was a bit shaken up, you know? So I picked my cup up and I never thought anything more about it, you know, I thought “fair enough” and just shrugged it off. I went back to work, doing my normal duties and I had to move a pallet of stuff. Normally, it’s not my job to, sort of, move pallets about because I didn’t actually have a license for driving the forklift, but there was nobody about and I knew how to drive the forklift, so I trundled off and got on the forklift. Now, if you can imagine the area, it’s a wide open area with concrete, but all around it is a large, grass area and the river runs just further down.

SJ: Long, wild grass…

SM: Yeah, with a few trees dotted about and stuff. Anyway, as I say, I was on the forklift, trundling past that area, past some parked cars and stuff and to the right was where I had to get my samples from, so I did that, got a pallet with some stuff on and reversed, starting to head back and [right in front of me] I saw a figure. It was a female figure in sort of a gown, like a white gown, but not like a funeral gown, like somebody might be buried in, but a flowing, large dress like a muumuu (laughs). You know, that kind of thing.

SJ: Like a nightie?

SM: Yeah. Anyway, as I said, she was just stood there in the grass. I eased off on the accelerator, so I was slowly trundling towards her and then I stopped. It took ages, but suddenly recognition kicked in and I thought “I know her. I do know her” and I was watching and watching her and then it dawned on me that it was my grandma. And we just stood there for ages and ages staring at each other. We made eye contact and then she smiled at me and I just carried on watching her. Then, I don’t know why, but I glanced away. I don’t know, I looked down at the steering wheel or something and when I looked back, she’d gone. So, I trundled to that area by the edge of the car park and got out and sort of had a good look because I thought, you know, she can’t have disappeared. But there was, what I took to be a depression where somebody had been standing in the grass, but there were no tracks to or from, as though somebody had walked there, you know. It was quite tall, you know, like scrubland grass, but there was a depression like where the grass had been trodden down, but I couldn’t see any paths off. And obviously, where I had walked, in the grass behind me, you could see where the grass had bent where I had walked…

SJ: How far was it to the depression?

SM: I’d say from the tarmaced bit to there, I would say that it was, like, thirty yards? So it was a fair way from the edge. There was a path further up, but there was no way somebody could have leaped there and then disappeared in the few seconds from me looking down and then looking back up. I’d have seen them because it was that open. Anyway, I just put it down to being a silly bugger. So, anyway, that was done and dusted and I thought at the time that maybe I had subconsciously wanted to see her and my brain created a heavenly image of her for me. You know, as if to tell me that everything’s great. I don’t know. Anyway, puzzled about it for a couple of minutes and went back to work. Anyway, this incident with my granddad would have been about three or four months after. As I said, I saw him there on the settee, saw the depression and, as I said, he looked healthy. My grandma had looked healthy when I saw her – oldish, but probably looking like she was in her early fifties. You know, she didn’t look like she did when she died or like when she was in her sixties. She looked like she had gone to an age like she was in her fifties and she looked nice and healthy and happy. And my granddad looked the same. He didn’t look like he’d gone back to like he was when he was thirty or in his twenties because I probably wouldn’t have recognised him as much. He looked like he had gone back to a time maybe ten or fifteen years when I was young, but I knew him, obviously. And he looked right good and healthy and, again, happy.

Anyway, I thought “Bloody hell, this is weird” and then (pause) nothing. I can’t remember. From that point on, I can’t say anything because I don’t know what I was doing. I don’t remember anything, nothing at all. I don’t remember walking anywhere, I don’t remember any sounds, I don’t remember any smells, I don’t remember any lights or, or any figures. Nothing, I have absolutely nothing there. Just a total blank. The first thing I remember is the fish shop down at the bottom of our road. I was standing there, on the corner. I thought “What am I doing here?” The fish shop was shut – I hadn’t gone to get myself some fish and chips (laughs). Anyway, I started walking back up the road. 

SJ: What was your physical state?

SM: Well, I didn’t notice at first. I had a t-shirt on and some tracksuit bottoms and a pair of trainers. No coat or anything and, as I say, it wasn’t over-warm. It was autumn time. So I started walking home (about a hundred yards or so – SJ) and then I noticed that I had dirt on my hands. I thought “Where has this come from?” I had soil and dirt on me and then when I looked down, I saw that my trousers were all ripped and I had scratches all over myself. It was like I had been fumbling about in briar bushes or something, you know, for some reason and the thorns had nipped me and cut me, or something like that. The knees were all ripped, as though I had fallen, and they were ripped up the side. They were not major, but I had cuts all over my legs…

SJ: I know the area in which you live and I can’t think of anywhere where you might have fallen in some bushes like that. There’s Caulm’s Wood way over the other side of the car park behind the chip shop, but it’s a fair way to go and have no recollection.

SM: Yeah. It’s not impossible, I suppose, that I couldn’t go there, because the timescale we’re talking about is between about six o’clock and when [my wife] got back from work, which was about half past nine. So we’re talking over three hours.

SJ: I didn’t realise it was so long, actually.

SM: Yeah. Anyway, I was all dirty and cut and my clothes were ripped. I felt okay in my head, apart from being confused, thinking “Where have I been?” but I wasn’t panicking, I felt quite calm. It was later when I felt a little panicked when I found out how much time had gone by when I looked at my watch at home. I didn’t have my watch on, you see. I’d taken it off when I’d run the bath, so I had no idea how long I’d been gone… It never occurred to me to question how long I’d been gone. I just knew that something had happened. I didn’t feel woozy or sick or wobbly, I just felt like “What the bloody hell’s happened?”, you know.

Anyway, I carried on walking and I passed a bloke, who was walking towards me on the opposite side of the street and he sort of looked at me, as though he as thinking “What’s happened to him?” I remember looking at him, but I didn’t engage him or anything. I don’t know why, well, probably because I thought “Look at the state of me. He probably thinks I'm a druggie or something!” So I thought, well, just go home. Anyway, he was the only other person I saw, there were no other people about, no cars passed me, which is unusual, because there’s a taxi rank up there. When I got [close to home], [my wife] actually drove past me. There were no cars parked on my side of the road, there were a couple on the other side, but anyway, she came up and I started waving at her and she totally ignored me.

SJ: You say she ignored you, but as you say, you were quite noticeable because this other bloke had seen you and your condition was such that he’d given you a good looking over…

SM: Yeah, that’s it, but he was the only other person I’d seen. There was nobody else about and I can’t remember anything about him, except that he sort of looked at me, as though… you know… but [my wife] totally ignored me. Anyway, I was walking up the middle of the road, because it was a bit of a cul-de-sac by now, and [my wife] got out of her car, turned around and then she saw me. And then she basically said to me: “What the f*** have you been doing?” I said: “What do you mean?” And she said: “Who’ve you been fighting with? What’ve you been doing?” And I just said to her: “I don’t know!”

She said: “Look at the state of you. You’re covered in mud, you’ve got dirt all over you and your trousers are ripped to bits.” I said: “You’ve just driven past me.” And she said: “Well, I didn’t see you.”

Genuinely, she might not have seen me. I could have just been another bloke and she might not have thought it was me, because you don’t always pay attention, do you? Anyway, when we went round the corner to the house, the front door was unlocked and slightly open. Like I’d left and not shut the door, only pulling it closed, but not locking it. Anyway, the lounge light was on, the kitchen light was on, the immersion heater was still on, erm…

SJ: It was a good job you’d stopped the bath…

SM: Well, I’d filled the bath, taken my watch off, stopped the bath filling and that’s when I thought that something was not right… and trundled downstairs. Anyway, we went in and I told her about what had happened, with me seeing my granddad and not remembering anything else. After that I went upstairs. The bath was still full, but the water was cold, so emptied the bath and refilled it back up and, erm, had a bath. And that’s basically it. That’s the story. There’s no more to tell that I can think of.

Then when we went to the UFO convention (The Great British UFO Show 2005 – SJ) and I heard him (Philip Mantle – SJ) talk about the green mist. Something triggered and I do remember, very vaguely, a green mist surrounding me. But I don’t know where. It wasn’t in the house and it wasn’t by the chippie, but I have basically no idea where I was. I don’t remember anything else, but when that green mist was mentioned, it did sort of trigger something and I do remember being in a green mist. It wasn’t a sci-fi green mist or billowing clouds, it was sort of like a fog, but with somebody, like, with a green lamp waving it about. It was just a hazy, diffuse mist with, like I said, this green light as if somebody had a lamp with a green filter on it waving it about and that was it.

SJ: Have you ever considered trying hypnosis to try and find out what happened?

SM: There was somebody at work that I mentioned it to, an old bloke, whose wife did hypnosis. Now, either she wasn’t very good at it, but I think I wasn’t receptive enough, because I didn’t really want to do it. I didn’t believe it and I didn’t want to be regressed, so it didn’t work. So, I did try it, but I don’t know if it wasn’t the right settings or… I actually felt quite uncomfortable and a bit fearful, so maybe I wasn’t receptive to what she was saying. I just didn’t want to know. But she did say, though, that there was something there in my mind that was blocking the efforts to try and do it, that I was blocking it. As you know, I’ve had experiences, but I'm still a very sceptical person, so I think my mind was thinking that it was all a load of rubbish. I don’t know.

SJ: But even the most sceptical person would want to find out why they had three hours missing from their lives.

SM: Yeah, three hours is a long time to have no memory of. I don’t know. Maybe the vision of my granddad made me have a brain lock or something and I went wandering off somewhere and I could have done. I could have fallen all over. I could have gone somewhere… maybe I thought I was going somewhere and ended up falling through some bushes somewhere. I’ve no idea.

SJ: But what you describe does fit in with other abduction reports. (Simon laughs) Like you said, the green mist reference at the conference triggered a memory and abductees have reported seeing long-dead loved ones just before an abduction experience, or furry little animals, stuff like that – things to set you at ease. It has been known, it’s quite common.

SM: But, I’ve never had it since. Maybe I am unacceptable. (we laugh, recalling Homer Simpson’s encounter with aliens when they spray him with rum and kick him out of their flying saucer)

Yeah, it is weird, but it’s something that I have never lost a night’s sleep over. It’s never haunted me, it’s never bothered me. It was just something that happened.

SJ: Well, that’s another aspect to so-called paranormal sightings. They’re called ‘incidents of high strangeness’, and they’re so weird that your brain just filters them out, it doesn’t let you worry over them. Like when people report seeing ghosts, they’ll often say that they weren’t frightened at the time, they only became frightened later when they were retelling the story. But at the time, you think “That’s odd!”, or words to that effect, and then carry on with what you were doing.

SM: Yeah. I never got a feeling of terror. When I appeared, or got there from wherever I’d wandered from, I didn’t feel panicked. There wasn’t something screaming out from inside my head asking what’s happened. I just felt calm. I can’t explain it. Since then, like I said, I’ve never lost a night’s sleep over it and I’ve never given it another thought really.

The only time I got upset was at the UFO conference when the green mist was mentioned and I became shaken and had to go outside for a bit of fresh air, but I think that was because it was so unexpected. But I don’t recall anything nasty happening to me. I’ve got no scars or anything and the scratches on my legs were nothing. I mean, for all I know, I could have walked back to where I thought I saw my grandma, because it’s all grass and overgrown there. Plus it’s all dark and there’s no streetlamps, so I could have been wandering about all over there and falling over and stuff.

The thing is, if I was wandering around for those three hours, surely somebody must have seen me. If I have no memory of it, then I must have looked lost or confused or something. But saying that, if I did look like that, would folk go near me? They’d think I was a nutter or a druggie or whatever. I can’t explain it.

***

Later, Simon told me about another incident that occurred sometime before his missing time event. One night, sometime after 10pm, he was driving in his wife’s car along a lane in the countryside that surrounds our town, when for about five seconds the rear section of the car was brilliantly illuminated from somewhere. He described the light as almost having substance; he could feel it on the back of his neck as though it was slightly pushing him forward. Thinking a car or truck was behind him, he glanced into the rear-view mirror, but the road behind was dark. The road ahead was also dark, save for the beam of his headlights. His dashboard was also not illuminated by the light, only the normal lights of the speedometer etc. Then the light went out and he continued his journey. He has no explanation for this and had almost forgotten about it until I interviewed him about his missing time experience.

Is Simon the victim of alien abduction, or did he witness something else of a paranormal nature and suffer from some sort of temporary nervous breakdown and went wandering off for three hours? Was it all in his mind? Where did he go? How did he get dirty and covered with scratches, with his clothes torn? Why did the mention of a green mist at The Great British UFO Show cause him to become so distressed that he had to leave the room and go outside?

As Simon has no internal need to truly find out what happened to him that evening, it will likely remain a mystery.

Note:

Simon said that the events took place in 1994 or 1995. I recall him telling me about seeing his grandmother at work. I even mention it in an article I wrote for my website (http://www.mercuryrapids.co.uk/articles2.htm#ournightofterror ). As the events of that article took place just after the birth of my son, I can positively confirm that the events of Simon’s missing time experience happened in the year 1992 – SJ

© Steve Johnson - 2005

UFO Files:

Pacific Bermuda Triangle

The History Channel’s excellent series, UFO Files, keeps on going from strength to strength. If they ever release a DVD box set of the series, not only will it be huge, but it will be a required purchase for anybody interested in this subject.

I digress, though. One of the latest episodes was entitled Pacific Bermuda Triangle and concerned itself with an area of the Pacific Ocean known as the Dragon’s Sea, Devil’s Sea or the Dragon’s Triangle. This is an area, on the opposite side of the world to the North Atlantic’s Bermuda Triangle, where ships and boats have vanished without a trace and numerous strange sightings have occurred for many, many years.

Covering an area of about half a million square miles, the Dragon’s Triangle is located south of the islands of Japan, reaches down to the isle of Guam and across to the island nation of Palau, east of the Philippines. Curiously, the northern tips of both the Dragon’s Triangle and the Bermuda Triangle lie close to the latitude of 35° north.

Bill Birnes, publisher of UFO Magazine, claims that the magnetic anomalies within both of these triangles disrupt compass readings by about twenty degrees.

Despite being less well-known than its western counterpart, the Dragon’s Triangle appears to have a more deadly history, with vessels disappearing on a far more regular basis. Since World War II, it has been estimated that over 1,500 vessels and hundreds of aircraft have vanished here.

The region gained notoriety after the publication of The Dragon’s Triangle by Charles Berlitz in 1989. Berlitz had brought the Bermuda Triangle to worldwide attention fifteen years previously with his best-selling book. For his 1989 book, Berlitz researched hundreds of disappearances and strange events in the Dragon’s Sea, citing ghost ships, compass fluctuations, UFO sightings and ships being transported hundreds of miles in seconds.

On the second of July, 1937, famed aviator, Amelia Earhart and her co-pilot, Fred Noonan, took off from Lae in Papua New Guinea. Their goal was Howland Island, some two and a half thousand miles distant. Barely eight hundred miles into the flight and with no warning, her plane vanished. Many explanations have been proffered for Earhart’s and Noonan’s disappearance, ranging from navigational error resulting in the plane running out of fuel and ditching into the ocean, to the pair being captured by Japanese soldiers and possibly killed or imprisoned for espionage, to abduction by UFOs. Whatever the cause of Earhart’s loss, hers is one of the most famous stories linked to the Dragon’s Triangle.

Another aspect of the mystery of the triangle is that of ghost ships. For centuries, stories have abounded of cursed vessels sailing without crews and the stories continue to this day. Ghost ships exceeding a hundred thousand tons have been reported. What happened to their crews is a complete mystery.

On the morning of June 11^th, 1881, a British warship, HMS Bacchante, encountered the legendary Flying Dutchman, deep within the Dragon’s Triangle. A young ensign, who would later be crowned King George V, reported in the ship’s log:

“The Flying Dutchman crossed our bows. She emitted a strange, phosphorescent light as of a phantom ship, all aglow. She came up on the port bow, where also the officer of the watch from the bridge saw her. But on arriving, there was no vestige or any sign whatever of any material ship to be seen, either near of right away to the horizon, the night being clear and the sea calm.”

In January, 1989, a Japanese whaling ship came within fifty feet of a small fishing boat. The boat was boarded, but no crew or cargo could be found. All that was found was the corpse of the captain, his hands still gripping the helm.