According to the National UFO Reporting Center, UFO sightings across New York City are up 31% from last year and a whopping 283% from 2018. There have been a total of 46 reported sightings so far in 2020 – there were 35 alleged sightings in 2019 and a dozen in 2018.

As for the UFOs that have been witnessed this year, Brooklyn has had the most sightings with 12, while Manhattan is close behind with 11, Queens reported 10, Staten Island had 8 sightings, and the Bronx was less active with just 5 reports.

Two of the most interesting sightings occurred in the Bronx and on Staten Island this past summer. According to the Bronx witness, in the late hours of June 8^th, an individual saw 30 objects that were “flying in a perfect line, in perfect synchronicity” and that they “looked like a bunch of moving stars”. This observer made it clear that “I don’t drink, or take any drugs whatsoever. I’m not a UFO conspiracy theorist.”

As for the Staten Island sighting, in the early morning hours of July 21^st, an individual noticed an “oval” object in the sky that “looked and sounded like a helicopter”. However, the object then “sent a surge of heat/radiation through my body,” the witnessed claimed, adding that they “honestly thought it was the government putting something into the air with everything going on during these times…”

Another report included a person who looked “out the bathroom window of my 2nd floor home” and noticed “orange/metallic” orbs that were “standing still over the Canarsie/Jamaica Bay area,” on the night of September 15^th in Brooklyn.

And earlier this year, on February 21^st, an individual in Manhattan claimed to have seen six UFOs dancing around the Statue of Liberty.

In an interview with The Post, Peter Davenport who is the director at the National UFO Reporting Center, stated that while the reports are usually lacking quite a few details and the witnesses don’t normally give their names, he has no doubt that they’re telling the truth about their encounters. “I believe we are being visited routinely by these things we call UFOs,” he said. He even revealed that he has had “five sighting experiences”.

When The Post asked him why he thought aliens would want to visit our planet, he responded with, “You are going to have to talk to the aliens. I don’t know what these creatures are up to. What their objective might be in being here.”

I’m not sure why they would want to visit us during these crazy times. With everything going on in 2020, if the alien was smart, it would want to get as far away as possible from this planet.

With all of the successes SpaceX has had recently – even the recent explosion upon landing of a Starship SN8 was spun into a success — it’s easy to forget the company had a number of significant failures on the road to stardom. One of those was a SpaceX 9 Falcon rocket explosion during a prelaunch test in September 2016 – an event whose video showed a mysterious UFO near the rocket … a UFO that even CEO Elon Musk could not rule out as a possible cause. While the explosion was eventually traced to the rupture of a helium-filled pressure vessel, the UFO was never explained – leaving it open to conspiracy theories. Those conspiracies came back recently when a video taken the day before the SN8 explosion – on December 8 when the launch was delayed for a day – shows a glowing orb over the ill-fated rocket. Are these connectable dots? If so, who or what is monitoring SpaceX’s failures?

“UFO STOPS LAUNCH”

The video was first uploaded by the LabPadre YouTube channel which covers SpaceX’s Boca Chica, Texas, live launches and testing. However, the UFO seems to have been spotted first by YouTuber A.I. Food, who uploaded it on December 11 with the above comment. It needed quite a bit of zooming to see and that made it difficult to determine just how close the UFO was to the SN8. UFO Sightings Daily posted a longer video on December 17 which had the obligatory red circle around the UFO but still didn’t put it in perspective next to the rocket. Nonetheless, it was enough for the site’s Scott Waring to add his usual “This UFO is 100% aliens” analysis.

“Orb Over SpaceX Rocket Launch, Camera Guy Zooms In, Stops Launch!”

Interestingly, Waring thinks this shows that the “aliens” support Elon Musk, even though the same rocket exploded on landing the following day … just as the Falcon 9 exploded in 2016 with a UFO overhead. That certainly doesn’t sound like support. On the other hand, UFOs were also seen during the SpaceX launch on May 30 taking astronauts to the ISS – the historic first launch of NASA astronauts on a commercially built spacecraft. Show of support or just debris and fertile imaginations?

Although Waring denies the possibility, the most recent orb could certainly be one of the drones that are used to monitor SpaceX launches, seen at such a distance that the pixels can’t be formed into a discernible shape. That fact that this and the other UFO appeared within 24 hours of the rocket on the pad being lost could certainly suggest something more than coincidence. Could it be an ironic payback to SpaceX for causing so many false UFO sightings with its nighttime launches and those annoying trains of Starlink satellites?

Aliens expressing their approval or disproval? Space debris? Drones? SpaceX rivals spying? Whatever it is, it accomplishes the one thing Elon Musk craves … publicity.

Just four years after he left his post as CIA director and three years after the now-famous release of the Tic Tac UFO videos taken by US Navy pilots, John O. Brennan sat down for an interview to discuss these sightings, other unexplained sightings and, most interestingly, alien life forms. Brennan is promoting his new book, “Undaunted: My Fight Against America’s Enemies, At Home and Abroad” – a title which obviously does not include “enemies from outer space.” Brennan attempts to address those issues on the Marginal Revolution podcast hosted by Tyler Cowen. While Cowen is gracious enough to provide a transcript and both audio and video links to the podcast, Brennan’s comments on UFOs and aliens deserve special focus.

John O. Brennan

“I’ve seen some of those videos from Navy pilots, and I must tell you that they are quite eyebrow-raising when you look at them. You try to ensure that you have as much data as possible in terms of visuals and also different types of maybe technical collection of sensors that you have at the time. Also, I believe, it’s important to reach out into other environments and find out, were there any type of weather phenomena at that time that might have, in fact, created the appearance of the phenomenon that you’re looking at? Were there some things that were happening on the ground, or other types of phenomena that could help explain what seems to be quite a mystery as far as what is there?”

Eyebrow-raising? The reactions by the pilots, the ufology community, the media and the public to the Tic Tac videos and pilot testimonies seemed a little stronger than that. However, it’s important to keep in mind that Brennan spent 25 years in the Central Intelligence Agency, including stints as daily intelligence briefer for President Bill Clinton, deputy executive director and director of the newly created Terrorist Threat Integration Center under President George W. Bush, and director of the CIA during the final four years of the Obama administration. In other words, Brennan knows how to give briefings and his answer to Tyler’s question on how he would have handled the videos as director reflects that.

“Also, I believe, it’s important to reach out into other environments and find out, were there any type of weather phenomena at that time that might have, in fact, created the appearance of the phenomenon that you’re looking at? Were there some things that were happening on the ground, or other types of phenomena that could help explain what seems to be quite a mystery as far as what is there?”

It would have been beneficial to have had Brennan handling the disclosure of the Tic Tac videos since he’s asking questions that were not revealed when they were leaked nor after the government reluctantly confirmed their existence. Brennan assures Cowen that he would not have made up his mind in advance or discounted any unusual possibilities before analyzing all of the data. While he obviously no longer has access to that kind of data, he still offers his theory on what they might be.

“When people talk about it, is there other life besides what’s in the States, in the world, the globe? Life is defined in many different ways. I think it’s a bit presumptuous and arrogant for us to believe that there’s no other form of life anywhere in the entire universe. What that might be is subject to a lot of different views. But I think some of the phenomena we’re going to be seeing continues to be unexplained and might, in fact, be some type of phenomenon that is the result of something that we don’t yet understand and that could involve some type of activity that some might say constitutes a different form of life.”

In other words, he has not ruled out “It’s aliens!” and opens the possibility that we’re seeing a different life form that current technology is unable to recognize or interpret. He doesn’t dismiss the videos as examples of advanced Earth enemy technology (something the rest of his book shows he knows something about) or leaks of U.S. advanced technology that is being secretly tested on potentially unsuspecting military personnel. Instead, he draws a refreshing conclusion not often seen in the intelligence community.

“I just want to leave my mind open as to what something might be, but who knows what these things might be?”

For someone who spent 25 years in a job that required him to give the most powerful person in the world just the facts, no matter how distressing they may be, John O. Brennan sounds like a person who can be more open now since he no longer has the fate of the world hanging on his analysis. Unfortunately, that’s as far as he went on the subject of UFOs and aliens in this interview.

It sure would be nice to get him back into the secret files for one more look.

One of the weirder alien abduction cases happened at a rather unassuming place for such an incident. Back in the 1960s there was a girl’s summer camp along the edge of Lake Champlain, in the U.S. state of Vermont, called Buff Ledge. In its heyday it was a popular place that attracted numerous young people who came to widen their horizons by experiencing nature and engaging in all manner of outdoor activities such as camping, hiking, fishing, boating, water skiing, and horseback riding, among others. On August 7, 1969, two of the camp workers, a 16-year-old maintenance man named Michael Lapp and 19-year-old water ski instructor Janet Cornell, were enjoying a bit of peace and quiet at the boat dock, watching the sun dipping below the horizon. At the time the swimming team staying at the camp had gone off to a meet, and so it was quiet and relaxing until something caught their attention in the sky. And so would begin a very strange alien abduction encounter that has never been adequately explained.

Buff Ledge

They saw a bright light up in the fading light of twilight, which they at first took to be the planet Venus, as it was motionless and perfectly round. Yet as they looked upon this celestial show, the light began to move, and even odder still it began to drop rapidly and sort of flatten out into a disc-like shape. Michael’s first stunned reaction was to blurt out “Wow! Venus is falling!” but it was quite clear at this point that this was not Venus. Whatever it was continued to drop, then levelled out and seemed to head directly towards them, revealing itself to be a saucer shaped metallic object of some sort as it drew closer. As the two looked on, there allegedly would be three smaller lights that detached from the larger object, and these lights would fan out to go shooting out across the lake as the main saucer took off into the night at breathtaking speed. These smaller lights then engaged in a physics defying display of aerial acrobatics, performing flips, loops, zig-zags, sudden stops, hovering, tight turns, and abrupt vertical dips and rises. The two teenagers looked on, almost mesmerized by the bizarre show, yet this sense of wonder would soon turn to fear as the three lights started moving right towards them. Things would only get weirder from there.

As the objects approached, they formed a triangular formation, after which the two in the rear flew off to leave only one remaining, issuing forth a horrible sound like “a thousand tuning forks” as they did. The remaining object then did some aerial maneuvers, shot straight up, and then came down to plunge into the lake, where it remained for some time before emerging once again and hovering right in front of the now terrified teenagers. The object was now very close to them, so close, in fact, that they could see through a transparent dome into the interior of the craft, where there sat two “childlike creatures” with large eyes, oversized bald heads, and long necks. The two teens stared as the creatures stared right back for a few moments, after which a beam shot directly at them, causing them to dive for cover. This light washed over them almost like “a liquid,” and was incredibly bright, creating an odd, X-ray like effect that allowed them to see the bones within their hands. After this, there was blackness.

The next thing they remembered was waking up on the dock. Evening had fallen and the object was now high in the air, looking like a moving star to speed off and vanish. Janet seemed to be in some sort of trance, but he was able to shake her out of it and get her back to camp, where they found that the swim team had long ago returned. The two witnesses decided to just sort of forget about what they had seen, and when the summer camp ended they went their separate ways without mentioning the bizarre incident again. Yet in the following years Michael was plagued by potent, vivid nightmares which he could never really remember the details of, but which would leave him terrified and in a cold sweat. He seemed to remember flashes of the faces of those creatures he had seen at the lake during these dreams, and a connection formed in his mind that caused him to seek out help. He decided to contact the Center for UFO Studies, where he met investigator Walter Webb and began the next chapter of his bizarre odyssey.

Webb decided to try regressive hypnosis on Michael in order to help him dislodge any repressed memories of the event from the depths of his mind. Over several hypnosis sessions Michael would remember more and more of what had transpired, in the process painting a very strange picture, indeed. According to Michael, the beam of light had not merely knocked them out, but had lifted him into the air and into the UFO, which then moved up through the atmosphere above the Earth. Through the dome he saw the chasm of space, in which hung the looming presence of some sort of immense mothership. Once aboard he says he had seen Janet lying next to him, the two of them on examination tables of some sort and flanked by those otherworldly entities. He could now see them up close, and would say of his memory of them, “The aliens all looked alike, child-like, and had those large eyes, a mouth without lips, no ears, and two small openings for a nose.” They apparently had greenish-blue skin, and for fingers they had three wet digits, with which they operated an array of what appeared to be medical equipment. Michael would remember watching on as the aliens scraped Janet’s skin, pulled her hair, pinched her, shone a light into her eyes, and seemed to withdraw blood. During all of this, the aliens supposedly sent a telepathic message that they meant no harm.

The memories dredged up by the hypnosis were so jarring and revelatory that Webb contacted Janet. Although a decade had passed since that fateful night, it would turn out that she had been having similar nightmares, and Webb managed to convince her to undergo hypnosis as well. Janet agreed, and although she was not able to remember quite as many details of the lost time, she nevertheless gave a report amazingly similar to what Michael had given. In the meantime, Webb would go out to Buff Ledge to investigate for himself, finding several witnesses who recalled seeing strange lights in the sky at around the time Michael and Janet had been abducted, further adding corroborating testimony to the case. He even managed to find to other members of the same camp who also claimed to have been abducted earlier that summer. Webb would end up spending 5 years investigating the case, before compiling his findings, as well as transcripts from the hypnosis sessions, into his 1993 book Encounter at Buff Ledge. His final conclusion was that both Michael Lapp and Janet Cornell were telling the truth, or at least truly believed they were.

Although Webb’s book is now out of print, the encounter at Buff Ledge has gone on to be much discussed within ufology. It is a striking case in that these two individuals, who had had no contact for 11 years, had managed to produce two nearly identical stories under hypnosis, as well as the fact that there was so much corroborative testimony. It has been pointed out that this could have been a hoax dreamed up as a prank by these two kids, but they didn’t say anything about the encounter until a decade later when Michael’s persistent nightmares had driven him to seek outside help. Was it a hoax that they retroactively made, merely saying that this all happened back in 1969? If so, why? What would they have to gain from this? It is all a very strange and somewhat frightening case that leaves us wondering. Was any of this real or not? What happened out on that lake? The Buff Ledge encounter has gone on to become one of those odd cases that seems very promising and intriguing, yet ultimately evades true understanding and answers.

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“The truth is that I was surprised by that object, and I cannot specify what it is. It seems suspended in the sky, and at a relatively low height.”

If you’re interested in UFO sightings and believe the “truth is out there,” you’ve probably heard or read plenty of testimonies which sound something like that one, along with blurry photos similar to the one accompanying this testimony. It would be easy to write this one off as just another balloon/bug/bird/bad photo except for one thing … this testimony comes from a farmer in the Argentine department of Uruguay – just across the Uruguay River from Uruguay, a country with far more UFO sightings than Argentina, a country whose Air Force has conducted UFO investigations since at least 1989 and issued a report in 2009 stating that it still had “about 40 unsolved cases” out of the estimated 100 per year it receives and reviews. Perhaps the truth is out there around the Uruguay River, where farmer Jorge Burgat had his recent encounter.

“There are no differences in the photos that I took through the windshield, with others without the glass in between.”

Uruguay is a beautiful country — do extraterrestrials feel the same way?

Elonce.com, Radio Mitre and other local media sources reported on the photos taken by Jorge Burgat, a “producer and rural contractor” heading home to Colonia San José del Monte in Entre Ríos in the Uruguay province near the river that separates Argentina and Uruguay. (See the photos here.) Burgat said he took multiple photos from both inside and outside his farm vehicle of the sky to record the weather conditions since he works in many locations. He claims he did not see the object in the sky when taking the photos, only when he reviewed them at home, and defended the quality and condition of his camera and his intent.

The local media picked up the photos after he posted them on Facebook, where they were reposted by FM Riel. The comments ranged from UFO to drone to dirt on the lens to plenty of nonsensical suggestions – in other words, no one had any idea what it was. How about the Uruguayan Air Force?

“The Air Force will not publish a “Blue Book” containing the results of these thirty years of investigations, but El País, by decision of the command, agreed to records and testimonies.

Although the Air Force commission that studies the case has been in operation for a few decades, the UFO phenomenon began approximately in 1947 in Uruguay when the worldwide enthusiasm for the sightings rose.

Although it is not Roswell, New Mexico – an emblematic place on the subject of extraterrestrials – Uruguay is a place classified as conducive to sightings of unidentified objects, acknowledged Colonel Ariel Sánchez, an Air Force officer with 33 years of service active and that since 1989 integrates the commission on UFOs and currently chairs it.”

Why are UFOs attracted to farm country?

In 2009, El Pais was allowed to review the cases up until that time in the Air Force files. While the identities of those making the reports were redacted, the details were not, and El Pais describes a wide variety of unidentified objects, cases of alien abduction, missing time, mutilated animals and the like. Again, 40 of the approximately 2,100 specific reports were unable to be explained. When asked to comment, Colonel Ariel Sánchez had this to say:

“The commission was able to determine modifications to the chemical composition of the soil where landings were reported. The phenomenon exists. It can be from a phenomenon that occurs in the lower part of the atmosphere, the landing of an aircraft of a foreign air force, even the extraterrestrial theory. It can be a surveillance probe from space, in the same way that we send a probe to explore distant worlds. The UFO phenomenon exists in the country. I insist: the Air Force does not rule out an extraterrestrial hypothesis based on our scientific analysis.”

As far as this El Pais report is concerned, Uruguay is a UFO hotspot deserving of Air Force investigations. As far as Colonel Sánchez is concerned, “Air Force does not rule out an extraterrestrial hypothesis.” As far as Jorge Burgat is concerned, he photographed something near the Uruguay River that neither he nor anyone else has explained satisfactorily.

Is it time to admit that the truth may be out there over the Uruguay River?

(Note: this story has been updated from a previous version to show that the UFO was spotted in the Uruguay department in Argentina, on the Uruguay River across the border from the country of Uruguay.)

The small mining town of Dalnegorsk, Russia is a rather bleak, stark, and frigid place. Indeed, the name Dalnegorsk literally means “far in the mountains,” and the unforgiving landscape here is fitting for such a name. It is a remote, rugged place of near perpetual cold, just a speck on the map and unknown to most of the outside world. Yet this forgotten place has one claim to fame, as it was once supposedly the site of a UFO that crashed to earth, which would then spawn stories of conspiracies and cover-ups, as well as usher in a whole series of UFO phenomena and strangeness.

In the cold, dark morning hours of January 29, 1986, hundreds of locals had their attention drawn skyward by an unusual sight. Streaking across the sky was seen a glowing reddish ball, travelling in a parallel, controlled manner at a speed of around 120 mph, described as being about the size of “half of the moon’s disc” and with a metallic surface like “hot stainless steel.” The object was obviously no meteor, as it appeared to slow down to a speed of only around 50 mph as it approached Izvestkovaya Mountain, also called “Height 611.” It was thought at first that this was perhaps something from the military base nearby, but whatever it was did not make the slightest sound as it flew over at a height of around 700 feet. As the villagers looked on in astonishment, the object suddenly jerked and dipped sharply, before plummeting to earth behind the trees and hitting the mountain beyond in a ball of flame, producing a blindingly bright flash, yet there was oddly no expected boom of an explosion. For several hours the glow of what looked from a distance like a forest fire could be seen emanating from where the mysterious object had gone down, yet no one dared approach.

Dalnegorsk, Russia

It would not be until a few days later that anyone would arrive at the remote site to actually check it out, when a team from the Academy of Sciences came to investigate the odd reports. They discovered a circular spot in the forest that had obviously been charred, and to their amazement there were numerous shards of metal, mesh fragments, beads, and an anomalous black film over everything. There were some odd magnetic readings at the site, an unidentifiable chemical odor lingering everywhere, and a certain charge to the air like static electricity, yet no abnormal radiation was detected. Some reports say that those who examined the area experienced various health issues such as nose bleeds, headaches, nausea, and blood pressure fluctuations, and inexplicably all photos taken of it would later come out completely blank. Samples of the materials were gathered and things would get stranger still.

Scientists allegedly found that the beads were composed of lead, silicon, gold, nickel, and iron, but when melted down their composition anomalously changed into such elements as titan and molybdenum. The mesh-like material was found to also have many oddities. For one, its structure was bizarre to say the least, made of microscopic twisted fibers of carbonic and metal threads only 17 micron wide, beyond anyone’s capabilities to make at the time. Some of the fragments featured an incredibly high density of gold inconsistent with the surrounding area. The mesh also proved to be well-nigh indestructible, unable to be damaged by soaking in strong acids or solvents, and only able to be cut with the hardest diamond cutting tools. Scientist were apparently dumfounded by all of this, but rather than explain it as aliens it was thought to perhaps be from an American satellite or aircraft displaying some unknown advanced technology, although the United States would later deny having anything to do with it. In later years some of these fragments made their way to the United States, and some would even be displayed. One such exhibit of some of these alleged fragments was shown at the National Atomic Testing Museum in Las Vegas, and the description at the exhibition reads:

Three Soviet academic centers and 11 research institutes analyzed the objects from this UFO crash. The distance between atoms is different from ordinary iron. Radar cannot be reflected from the material. Elements in the material may disappear and new ones appear after heating. One piece disappeared completely in front of four witnesses. The core of the material is composed of a substance with anti-gravitational properties.

In the days after the Dalnegorsk, the area, and in particular Height 611, would allegedly become ground zero for intense waves of UFOs sightings, with dozens of subsequent instances mysterious objects in the sky. On some occasions the objects were reported as hovering over the mountain and illuminating the forest below with beams, as if looking for something, and such reports would carry on all the way into the following year beyond, given by people from all walks of life, including traditionally reliable witnesses such as doctors, policemen, and military personnel. In some instances, people even claimed to have found more of the mysterious fragments in the area, as well as patches of a strange oil-like substance.

Although it is all a rather spectacular tale, the Dalnegorsk incident managed to be sort of brushed under the carpet, hidden away by what was then the Soviet Union, and it was not until years later that outside ufologists would begin uncovering the tale and making its existence known through articles and TV shows such as a notable segment on a 1995 episode of Sightings. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be much remaining in the way of corroborating evidence, and the vast majority of the supposed material from the crash has gone missing over the decades. While it is all very intriguing and seems promising on some levels, with plenty of eyewitnesses and potential physical evidence, we are forced to relegate it to the files of other cases that have been lost to history, with no way of proving them true or not, one way or the other. What happened at that cold, lonely mountain? We may never know.

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A man who investigated the famous UFO crash in Roswell, New Mexico, wrote his private thoughts in a journal that has now been revealed for the very first time. And what he wrote is pretty mind-blowing.

Jesse Marcel Sr. was an intelligence officer with the 509^th Bombardment Group at Roswell Army Air Field. He was the first person on the scene of the Roswell crash back in July of 1947 and he led the investigation. While the government claimed that the object was just a weather balloon, Marcel Sr. had always stated that the debris from the crash site was “not of this Earth”. He passed away in 1986 and now his grandchildren (Jesse Marcel III and John Marcel) are telling his story based on his notes in his private journal.

In an interview with DailyMail.com, Jesse Marcel III stated that his grandfather “was made to be the fall guy” and that he had been “ordered” to stay quiet about what was actually at the crash site. And throughout the years, his story never changed as to what he witnessed.

The debris field was initially discovered by W.W. “Mac” Brazel who was bringing his sheep to a stream for a drink and that’s when he noticed the crash site. In fact, it was his sheep that brought Brazel’s attention to the site as the animals wouldn’t walk near it. So whatever had crashed there, the animals didn’t want to go anywhere close to it. At that point, Marcel Sr. was brought in to investigate the scene.

Jesse said that the government’s claim that the wreckage was a weather balloon was “preposterous” as his grandfather would have easily recognized it because he had experience working on them. “He had examined the debris in the field and determined it was not made by human hands,” Jesse stated.

As for the material found at the crash site, Marcel Sr. wrote in his journal that he tried to melt or even warm up the material by holding a lit lighter next to it but nothing happened. And after the debris was transported over to the Roswell base, he attempted to drill a hole in it but the blades of the drill broke as soon as they made contact with the material. He told his grandkids that the material was light but strong.

Another interesting fact written in his journal was that some of the beams had “alien writing” on them and that “there were glass fibers and fiber optics that may have been from the computers on the ship,” as stated by John, adding, “When my grandfather came home with the debris, our dad looked through it with a shining light and saw a purple light inside with a symbol of a seal balancing a ball on its nose.” Jesse added “My grandfather said ‘you might be the first person on Earth to look at alien writing’.”

As for whether or not there were aliens on board the craft, Marcel Sr. stated that he never saw any extraterrestrials at the site but he did mention that there were several other crash sites around that same time and that other investigators claimed to have seen the life forms.

Jesse finished off by stating, “The big thing about our grandfather is that this put him under a lot of pressure,” adding, “He felt he was the right person who was at the right place at the right time and he was very lucky to be that guy – even after all the pressure.” (Pictures of Marcel Sr. and the debris from the crash site can be seen here.)

More information on Marcel Sr.’s journal will be detailed in a three-part series called “Roswell: The First Witness” which will be aired this Saturday on the History Channel. I know that I’m looking forward to watching that series.

When, shortly before 9:00 p.m. on the night of December 29, 1980, Vickie Landrum, her grandson, Colby, and Betty Cash exited the restaurant where they had just eaten a fine Texan dinner, they couldn’t imagine what was just around the corner. As they headed towards the town of Huffman, Texas, they were terrified by the sudden sight of an unknown object in the sky. Worse, it was descending on a flight-path guaranteed to ensure it landed on the road they were on.  As they got closer, they could see the aerial thing appeared to be in flames and shaped not unlike a diamond. It reached a perilously low level of around twenty-five feet, something which ensured a screeching of brakes and the car brought to a shuddering standstill. The interior temperature of the car suddenly reached intolerable levels. The three jumped out of the vehicle and could only stare in awe and fear. Then, out of the blue, around two dozen, double-rotor helicopters were on the scene, clearly intent on caroling the UFO. Or, perhaps they were escorting it. Cash was sure they were Boeing CH-47 Chinooks. They watched as both the UFO and the helicopters left the area and were finally lost from sight.

Within days, all three fell sick: nausea and vomiting were at the forefront. Betty Cash was the one affected most of all – which may be explainable by the fact that she was the one member of the group who got closest to the object. Her hair started to fall out, her skin was covered with pustules and blisters, and the nausea got worse. Despite attempts to force the US Government to come clean on what went down, there was nothing but denial after denial from the authorities. The case is a puzzling one, with some UFO researchers believing the three encountered a real UFO, while others suspect they were unfortunate enough to cross paths with a top secret, nuclear-powered, prototype aircraft that was in deep trouble and that had to be retrieved as quickly as possible.

Interestingly, this was the same time-frame that things were going down in Rendlesham Forest, England. An official U.S. Air Force document, dated January 13, 1981, states (in part): “Early in the morning of 27 Dec 80 (approximately 0300L) two USAF security police patrolmen saw unusual lights outside the back gate at RAF Woodbridge. Thinking an aircraft might have crashed or been forced down, they called for permission to go outside the gate to investigate. The on-duty flight chief responded and allowed three patrolmen to proceed on foot. The individuals reported seeing a strange glowing object in the forest. The object was described as being metallic in appearance and triangular in shape, approximately two to three meters across the base and approximately two meters high. It illuminated the entire forest with a white light. The object itself had a pulsing red light on top and a bank(s) of blue lights underneath. The object was hovering or on legs. As the patrolmen approached the object, it maneuvered through the trees and disappeared. At this time the animals on a nearby farm went into a frenzy. The object was briefly sighted approximately an hour later near the back gate.”

Also of interest is the following. As Captain John E. Boyle of the U.S. Air Force informed me in 1988: “In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the 67th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron stationed at RAF Woodbridge [provided] standby rescue coverage for the American space flights. Of course, they were never needed to provide emergency rescue actions, but at the time, the unit was trained and available to rescue astronauts with their HH-53 and HC-130 aircraft. In early 1988, the 67th ARRS was re-designated as part of the 39th Special Operations Wing, their primary mission changing from that of rescue to supporting U.S. Special Operations forces. Their secondary mission remains that of search and rescue and they would provide any assistance necessary in future space missions [italics mine].”

It should be noted that RAF Woodbridge stood right next to Rendlesham Forest. Could there have been a connection between the events in Texas and those in the U.K.? If nothing else, it’s an issue worth looking into – and particularly so with the 40th anniversary just a few weeks away.

Back in May of this year Lisa Hagan Books published my book, The Rendlesham Forest UFO Conspiracy. It’s a book that suggests the strange events that took place in those English woods in December 1980 had nothing to do with aliens, but everything to do with secret, military experiments. Taking into consideration the fact that this December is the 40th anniversary of the famous event, I figured that at least a couple more new books on the subject would surface. I wasn’t wrong. In September, Rendlesham to Redemption: A Story of Transformation appeared. The author is Steven R. LaPlume. He was one of those involved in the controversial affair. I haven’t seen LaPlume’s book yet, but I will be reviewing it soon. There is, however, yet another new Rendlesham-themed book that I’m focusing on today. The title of the book is: Weaponisation of an Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon.

The author is John F. Burroughs. If you know your Rendlesham history, you will know that John – along with Jim Penniston and Charles Halt – was one of the key figures in the whole story. In other words, this is a book that – if you have an interest in the Rendlesham Forest saga – you will definitely want to read. In fact, I would say the book makes for absolutely essential reading. A month or so ago, me and John discussed the idea of me doing a review of his book to coincide with its publication. John thought it was a great idea. So did I. As a result, and in no time at all, John sent me a PDF of the manuscript. I read the whole book – absorbed, I have to say. John’s book is a definitive page-turner. Whatever your thoughts on the 1980 incidents are, you are most assuredly going to want to read this one. With all of that now said, let’s get onto the content of the book.

I must say that you may be surprised by some of the things that John has to say, and particularly so in relation to what did – or what didn’t – occur. But, we’ll get to all of that shortly. As the book begins, we are treated to a good, solid introduction to John’s life and his career in the U.S. military – and also how he came to be at the Royal Air Force Bentwaters base on the night(s) that his life was changed. John makes it very clear that he is not entirely certain of what happened to him. In his very own words, John says: “Penniston and I cannot be sure our memories are accurate. We can be certain that we think they are, but between the likely power of the real phenomenon to alter reality and the effects of sophisticated debriefing techniques, we can’t be sure that what we think happened, did.” There’s no doubt that is a brave statement for John to make. And particularly so, because much of what John has to say relates to secret, government experiments of the type I present in my own Rendlesham book. Indeed, John makes it clear that in the area there was “very exotic EW [electronic warfare] and radar technologies at play in East Anglia at the time.” John expands on all of this: “What did we encounter? Advanced technology developed in a special access program project intended to produce altered-perception of reality in the enemy?” Whatever the answer, John explains that what he personally encountered was not a “terrifying experience.” Rather,  he makes clear, it was an “inexplicable experience.”

Photo by Nick Redfern

John also notes the long history of secret experimentation that has taken place very close to Rendlesham Forest, such as the legendary “Shingle Street” affair, the development of secret radar-based experiments, the work of a certain British Telecom facility, and “classified weapons used for deception and perception management.” That’s to say, John is treading on undeniably controversial ground, to be sure. Even more controversial are the following words from John: “Young airmen were subjected to truth serums combined with hypnosis. Some were handed their statements pretyped and told ‘this is the story you will tell when asked.'”  The stories of Larry Warren and Adrian Bustinza become parts of the sensational story, too. Certain words and names – such as Cobra Mist, Marconi, Harold Puthoff, Kit Green, the Berwyn Mountains, Ball Lightning, Plasmas, Tesla, Lasers, Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, Acoustic Mind-Control, and Project Condign – will soon become familiar to you as you dig further into the pages of John’s book. There’s way more, too. A man named Ron Haddow – who you can find more about at this link, and who worked for the U.K. Ministry of Defense for years – becomes one of the players, as does a certain Ralph Noyes. The latter being a man who knew a lot, but preferred to keep his mouth shut on certain, sensitive topics. Noyes, too, spent years working for the U.K.’s M.O.D. I could go on and on, such is the sheer body of fascinating material that, to some degree, places the whole affair in new light.

It’s perhaps apt for me to end the review with the following statement from John. He says that his primary goal, today, is, and I quote: “Helping my fellow veterans get the kind of support they need and deserve for their service to our country’s ideals if they can’t get it because, like me, they were a pawn in a highly classified game.”

• Weaponisation of an Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon will be available on December 16 in Kindle version.