The
following article was provided by Peter MCcue. who has
a longstanding and active interest in psychical research
and UFO phenomena. He worked for many years as a clinical
psychologist, and his qualifications include a Ph.D.
from the University of Glasgow, awarded for research
on hypnosis. He has written numerous articles on anomalous
phenomena, and he remains open-minded about their nature.
Published
in UFO DATA Magazine,July/Aug. 2007, pp. 44-51.
STRANGENESS
IN SUFFOLK:
ONGOING
PHENOMENA IN RENDLESHAM FOREST
by
Peter
A. McCue
In late December
1980, Rendlesham Forest in Suffolk became the setting for one
of Britain’s best-known UFO cases. But there are conflicting
versions of what happened, and the case remains a focus of controversy.
Irrespective of what did or didn’t occur there in late
1980, the forest is reportedly the setting for ongoing anomalous
phenomena (UFO sightings, ‘missing time’, poltergeist-type
effects, etc.). I live in Scotland, a few hundred miles from
Rendlesham Forest, which limits my opportunity for on-the-spot
investigation. However, I visited the area in March 2007 and
met some of the people who’ve had unusual experiences there;
and I’ve been in touch with other witnesses since then.
There are parallels
between what’s reportedly going on in Rendlesham Forest
and a long-running case involving a wood or forest near the city
of Cluj-Napoca in Romania.1 This hotspot has
been referred to as both the ‘Hoia-Baciu Wood’ and
the ‘Hoia-Baciu Forest’. I don’t know
which of these designations is more accurate, but the area has
allegedly been the setting for a wide variety of manifestations,
including: the appearance of low flying structures or shapes
(often invisible to the naked eye, but caught on film or photographs);
spots of light at night (white or coloured, stationary or flying);
physical effects (radioactivity, magnetic anomalies, etc.); unusual
marks on the ground; biological effects on plants and animals
(including humans); and sightings of humanoids. A chemistry lecturer
called Dr Adrian Patrut has apparently written a book about the
case.2 I tried to contact him by e-mail, to obtain
further information, but I’ve had no reply.
Rendlesham
Forest
Rendlesham Forest
is predominantly coniferous. Lying to the east of Woodbridge,
and close to the North Sea coast, it was planted by the Forestry
Commission between 1922 and the late 1930s on what was formerly
heath or agricultural land. The forest is criss-crossed by tracks,
firebreaks and roads. It lies on comparatively flat land. The
1: 25,000 (2½ in. to a mile) Ordnance Survey map number
212 (Woodbridge & Saxmunden) depicts the area. The
term ‘Track 10’ appears in this article. I’ve
used inverted commas, because the track isn’t currently
marked with a number, although people interested in UFO-related
matters continue to refer to it as ‘Track 10’. Its
location can be seen in Figure 1.
Fig
1 Rendlesham Forest
To the north of the
forest is the site of a former air force base, RAF Bentwaters.
The forest itself is largely bisected by the runway of another
former air force base, RAF Woodbridge. In the 1950s, the United
States Air Force (USAF) took over the two bases. They were officially
closed some 14 years ago, following the end of the Cold War.
But the Woodbridge installation, or at least part of it, is still
under Ministry of Defence control. In her informative book You
Can’t Tell The People,3 Georgina Bruni
states that the base is used by the Army and police for helicopter
training. And according to Brenda Butler (see below), it’s
been used for the training of troops prior to their being sent
to Iraq.
|
|
Photograph 1
|
| |
|
|
|
|
Photograph 2
|
Photograph 3
|
Incidents
before and after December 1980
Strange
lights were allegedly seen in the Rendlesham area during the
late 1800s (see Bruni, op. cit., pp. 404-405). In the twentieth
century, there were reportedly sightings of lights or UFOs prior
to the controversial events of December 1980. For example, Bruni
(op. cit., pp. 367-368) cites a witness called F. W. Sone, who’d
been a security policeman at the Bentwaters base. One day in
1973, around 3.00 a.m., he allegedly saw a light hovering over
the main runway. Shortly after, spotlights from fire/rescue trucks
were trained on the hovering light, which appeared to be about
100 feet in diameter. It was silent, and suddenly disappeared
about five minutes later. The following year, while on duty in
the nuclear weapons storage area at the base, Sone reportedly
witnessed another incident. A UFO appeared twice, and two F-4
fighters were sent to intercept it. But as they approached the
object, it became smaller and suddenly disappeared, only to reappear
in another place. And that allegedly went on for 30 minutes.
Bruni’s
book also describes ghostly phenomena that were reportedly experienced
by USAF personnel (although none of the accounts appears to have
been given to her by a first-hand witness). For example, a James
D. Hudnall, who’d been a security guard at the Bentwaters
base in the mid-1970s, told her that a colleague of his called
Andy had been on duty in a high security area one foggy wintry
night when he spotted three figures heading towards the security
tower. A patrol vehicle was alerted and entered the area. But
when its headlights shone on them, the figures disappeared. A
search revealed nothing. Later that night, Andy heard footsteps
ascending the metal steps of the tower, although he wasn’t
expecting visitors. When he opened the trapdoor and shone his
torchlight down, he saw nothing. He closed the trapdoor and resumed
his watch. But very soon after, he heard footsteps again, which
were louder than before and getting closer and closer. The airman
went for his gun and stood ready. The trapdoor swung wide open
and then slammed shut, but there was nothing to be seen.
Bruni
(op. cit.) indicates that there have been UFO sightings and other
anomalous events in the area since December 1980. For example,
she states that an Ipswich couple saw a “huge spaceship” one
evening in 1996, the sighting occurring between Woodbridge and
Eyke (p. 379).
The
December 1980 incidents
The
first book written about the 1980 events was Sky
Crash,by Brenda Butler, Dot Street and Jenny
Randles.4 It relates that Butler became friendly
with a USAF security officer in 1975. He was apparently
working at the Woodbridge base, and he soon realized that
Butler was interested in UFOs. In early January 1981, he
told her that a UFO had crashed in Rendlesham Forest several
days before (on 27th December). He claimed that
he’d been on security patrol and had been called
out to the forest, and that he’d witnessed a meeting
there between the Base Commander and some alien creatures! However,
Butler’s informant was apparently referring to Col.
Gordon Williams, the officer in overall command at Bentwaters/Woodbridge,
rather than to Col. Ted Conrad, who had the potentially
misleading title of ‘Base Commander’ – see
footnote 5. It should also be noted that Butler’s
informant subsequently changed his story and denied having
personally witnessed a meeting between Williams and some
alien creatures.
A
memorandum, dated 13th January 1981, came to light
in 1983. Written by Lt-Col. Charles Halt, the Deputy Base
Commander at Bentwaters/Woodbridge,5 it referred
to “a strange glowing object” that had been
sighted in the forest in the early hours of 27th December
1980. The object was described as metallic in appearance
and triangular in shape. As patrolmen approached, it reportedly
manoeuvred through the trees and disappeared, although it
was seen again, briefly, about an hour later. According to
the memorandum, indentations were later found where the object
had been seen on the ground, and radiation was subsequently
detected there. The memorandum referred to further UFO sightings,
on the night of 29/30th December, and claimed
that Halt himself was one of the witnesses. But the document
made no reference to the sighting of alien creatures. (N.B. Halt
has since acknowledged that the dates in the memorandum
are slightly wrong: the initial sightings apparently
occurred during the early hours of 26th December,
and it was during the night of 27/28th December
when he allegedly witnessed phenomena himself.)
Georgina
Bruni argues that it should no longer be disputed that a craft
of unknown origin landed in the forest (op. cit., pp. 363-364),
and she concludes that time travellers from our future, or beings
from “another dimension”, were involved (op. cit.,
p. 406). Others have interpreted the events in more prosaic terms.
For example, it’s been suggested that the flashing beacon
of the Orford Ness lighthouse (to the east of the forest) was
mistaken for a mysterious object. The alleged incidents occurred
close to NATO bases during the Cold War. The authors of Sky
Crash consider thepossibility that something mundane occurred,
which the authorities wanted to conceal from public attention,
and that UFO stories may have been concocted to cover up what
happened.6
Reports
of ongoing phenomena
I’ve
given the real names of most of my informants (with their permission),
but ‘Valerie Wilson’ and ‘Laura’ are
pseudonyms. I thought it best to safeguard their anonymity, because
I’ve mentioned Wilson’s children, and Laura is associated
with the family, and is still in her teens. For ease of expression,
I’ve been sparing in the use of ‘distancing’ terminology
(‘alleged’, ‘reportedly’, etc.). But
I can’t guarantee the historical accuracy of what I’ve
been told, although I’ve no reason to believe that any
of the informants has lied to me. The ages I’ve given for
them should be regarded as approximate. These informants aren’t
the only people who’ve allegedly had unusual experiences
in Rendlesham Forest. Three individuals who said they’d
provide me with written accounts of their experiences have failed
to do so. And for all I know, there could be a good number of
other people who’ve had unusual experiences in the forest.
Brenda
Butler
Brenda Butler, a
former nurse, lives near the Suffolk coast. She’s declined
to divulge her age, but she reports a long history of unusual
experiences, including anomalous phenomena in her present home.
Her first UFO sighting occurred when she was 5. She believes
she’s been abducted by aliens on several occasions, and
she says that she played with them as a child. She has
three scars that she believes may be related to her contact with
aliens, and she’s spoken in a “weird language” at
times. She informs me that someone turned up on her doorstep
in 1984, stayed for three months, and then retuned for a further
week. The visitor slept in a nearby caravan rather than in the
house itself. Mainly, he appeared in human form. But on three
occasions, she saw him as a “reptilian”. She told
me that he was able to discern her thoughts telepathically, that
he knew what was in books without having to read them, and that
he sometimes appeared unexpectedly before her. He ate only vegetables
and sweets, and didn’t appear to wash or use the lavatory,
although he always looked clean.
To
Butler, Rendlesham Forest is a “very magical place”.
She’s been visiting it since 1979. She has doubts about
whether the December 1980 incidents involved anything exotic,
although she believes that extra-terrestrials and beings from
another dimension are involved in the ongoing phenomena.
She’s taken numerous photographs in the forest, initially
using 35 mm film, and more recently with digital cameras. Many
of the photographs have been taken at night. ‘Orbs’,
misty patches, and streaks of light or colour can be seen in
many of them. Generally, these features weren’t evident
to the naked eye when the photographs were taken. In addition,
Butler has had numerous unusual experiences in the forest over
the years, including: sightings of UFOs and apparitions (e.g.
of small monk-like figures); ‘missing time’; her
watch stopping; stones dropping down beside her (which have been
either hot or, less often, warm); and her surroundings appearing
temporarily different from normal.
Many of these experiences
have occurred when she’s been with someone else (or with
more than one other person). For example, she reports that during
a visit to the forest in about 1998, she and an American called
Woody saw a helicopter chasing a large white light. Two smaller
lights came out of the larger light and then went back into it.
And other strange things occurred. For instance, the couple experienced
a few hours of missing time, and, for a while, the local the
topography appeared to be different from normal. On another occasion,
in the same general area (the eastern part of the forest), Butler
noticed a 6 foot tree at a spot where there’d been no tree
about a week before. But when she returned some 10 days later,
the tree wasn’t there!
Peter Parish
Peter Parish, 48,
works as a groundsman at a school, and lives not far from Rendlesham
Forest. He recalls childhood experiences of feeling pinned down
in his bedroom. During these episodes, he felt as if he were
being visited, although he didn’t actually see any ‘visitors’.
(These sound like experiences of sleep paralysis, which
isn’t uncommon in the general population.)A few years ago,
at Brenda Butler’s home, he had a similar experience, although
on that occasion he subsequently saw, or hallucinated, a rotating
blob of fluorescent green material that resembled antifreeze
liquid. The sighting seemed to last about 20-30 seconds. (Butler
informs me that other people have had apparitional experiences
in her house.)
Using a digital DVD
camcorder and an ordinary digital camera, Parish has captured
moving images in the forest of what he and Brenda Butler call “rods”.
Having seen them on DVD, I would say they look like moving hairs
or pieces of cotton thread. I wonder whether they could be photographic
artefacts rather than things in the environment, although Parish
believes they are external forms of some kind. He’s also
caught what he believes are larger images of rods. To me, their
shape is reminiscent of pictures of the DNA molecule. To Parish,
they resemble pieces of flexible piping, and he describes them
as having membrane-like ‘wings’, one on each side,
which vibrate as the rods move. I’m not sure what to make
of them, but I wonder whether they could be magnified, and perhaps
distorted, images of airborne bracken fibres. Interestingly,
Parish thinks that rods are more in evidence when the bracken
in the forest is high.
On two occasions,
Parish has filmed a yeti-like form or shadow in the forest at
night, although on neither occasion did he actually see a yeti
with the naked eye. Also at night, he’s filmed a shadowy
form, which he refers to as an “ET”. Again, though,
he didn’t see it with the naked eye. I’ve seen two
of these sequences on DVD (the one featuring the ET, and one
of the sequences featuring a yeti-like form), and I wonder whether
they show Parish’s own shadow being accidentally cast by
a moving light source behind him (e.g. a companion’s torch
beam). But that’s only conjecture, and I understand from
Parish that a woman from Blackpool allegedly saw a yeti-like
figure in the forest in the daytime about four years ago.
One evening in January
2002, while he was living in a flat that was formerly part of
RAF Bentwaters, Parish saw an Army helicopter flying very low
over the flats, seemingly chasing, or being passed by, a bluish-white
orb-shaped light that was heading east. And in about 2002, from
Woodbridge, he saw a Sea King helicopter being followed by an
orb of light. He’s also had UFO experiences in Rendlesham
Forest itself. Around midnight or 1.00 a.m. one windless, starlit
night, about four years ago, he was looking down ‘Track
10’, from the road that runs past its western end, when
he and Brenda Butler heard a whirring noise, as if some sort
of craft were flying towards them from the trees ahead. There
was a bright flash in the forest, and then the noise resumed
and came closer. They felt wind swirling around them and noticed
the trees swaying. Nothing was visible, and the noise moved
away in the direction of the Woodbridge base. On another occasion,
but during the daytime, he saw a light brown object shoot up
from ‘Track 10’ into a tree. It resembled a
stick of French bread and appeared to be about 20-30 inches long
and 4 inches wide.
Very warm stones
have sometimes landed beside Parish in the forest, and this has
occurred during the day and at night. It happens in warm weather.
He’s experienced it on his own and with others. He states
that if there’s a group of people, it has to be reasonably
small, and its members need to be open-minded, if the phenomenon
is to occur. The stones are always smooth, and he’s sometimes
seen them before they’ve hit the ground. In his experience,
they land without bouncing, although if they’re picked
up and then dropped, they bounce normally. At one point, an elongated
stone landed on its end in his presence. And one evening, a stone
landed on the roof of his car, without rolling off, while the
vehicle was parked near ‘Track 10’.
Parish has elicited
the stone falling phenomenon by asking questions. Standing alone
at the western end of ‘Track 10’ one night, he asked,
out loud, “Are you from another dimension?” A stone
then fell down beside him. He asked, “Can you drop a stone
on the track in front of me where I’m shining the torch
beam?” That duly happened. And when he asked whether a
stone could be dropped on the road behind him, one obligingly
fell there!
On about two or three
occasions, Parish has been among quite densely spaced trees in
the eastern part of the forest when a stone has landed near his
feet, but without his hearing a preceding sound of something
falling through the branches overhead. At one point, he was on ‘Track
10’ when a stone landed on the ground between his legs.
He had a rucksack on his back at the time, so it’s hard
to see how the stone could have come from above.
When he’s been
with Brenda Butler, Parish has sometimes had brief visions of
small monk-like creatures. But these sightings have occurred
less often than the incidents involving falling stones, and he
states that that the figures are seen by only one or two people
at a time. One night in April 2002, he was with Butler and some
other people near the eastern end of ‘Track 10’ when
he saw a human-shaped shadow passing him, going to the left.
At first, he mistakenly thought it was one of his companions,
John Hanson. The figure walked over a deep hole in a path in
front of Parish without falling over. And after that, he and
Butler saw a round light moving about in a nearby birch tree.
At one point, some
symbols came into Parish’s mind while he was meditating
in the eastern part of forest. Two or three days later, he was
in the forest when he got a ‘message’ (mental impression)
telling him that something was on the left, not very far away.
About three days later, he and Brenda Butler were in that part
of the forest (i.e. the eastern part) when they came upon a stone
on which some of the self-same symbols had been scratched. On
one occasion, after he’d been meditating with Butler in
the eastern part of the forest, Parish discovered that two-and-a-half
hours had passed, although it had only seemed like half an hour
to him.
Valerie Wilson
Valerie Wilson, 38,
hails from London but now lives in Suffolk. Like Brenda Butler,
she reports a long history of anomalous experiences. When she
was 6, she had an out-of-body-experience; and she saw three humanoids
in her bedroom when she was 11. She’s seen UFOs over her
present home and has experienced phenomena within it, such as
sightings of “reptilians”, “greys” and “shadows”.
For many years, she’s experienced electrical disturbances.
She writes: “I touch the switch to turn on lights and fuse
the whole house. I do this at friends’ homes. Street lights
flicker or switch on or off when I approach them or walk under
them. I leave the doctor’s room to allow them to get my
details up on the screen as their computer crashes in my presence.
I give static shocks to people when they get in my car…”
Wilson explains that
her partner has also experienced unusual phenomena. For example,
she states: “[He] had two days of missing time with me
when I was 18 years-old. He [saw] a blue globe of light (much
like a plasma ball) appear in the centre of the kitchen when
we lived in London… In Suffolk, he has had a UFO beam
light at his face…” And she reports that her
three children have all experienced paranormal activity. For
example, regarding the eldest, who is 18, she writes: “[He]
has been a target for Reptilian interaction. He catches them
in his room, even with the bedroom light on at night. He knows
when they are going to come. He dreams of trips around the cosmos
in craft. His friends have all witnessed UFOs while spending
time with him out at night. [He] was with eight friends when
a Mexican-hat-shaped craft followed them home…”
Given that so many
unusual things have happened to her elsewhere, it’s perhaps
not surprising to learn that Valerie Wilson has also experienced
phenomena in Rendlesham Forest. One night, in about August 2006,
she was sitting in her car there, in a picnic area next to a
campsite, when an “entity”, about 2½-3 feet
tall, fell on to the bonnet! Startled, she dived into the back
of the car. The entity remained on the bonnet for two or three
minutes. On another occasion, about 11.30 p.m., while she was
sitting on a bench near the eastern end of ‘Track 10’ with
some companions, she turned on a tape-recorder. When the tape
was played back, clicking sounds could be heard, although she
hadn’t heard them while the recording was being made. On
a couple of occasions, she saw red lights high in some trees
north of the B1084 road. On another occasion, south of the B1084,
she heard a noise like the “satisfied purr” of a
big cat.
Laura
Laura, 16, is the
girlfriend of one of Valerie Wilson’s sons. She told me
that she was with her mother and their dog in Rendlesham Forest,
probably just before Christmas 2006, when a stone rolled along
the ground near them. Her mother picked it up, and it was burning
hot. From what Laura told me, I think they were probably on ‘Track
10’ at the time.
John Hanson
John Hanson, 61, is a retired
police officer with an interest in UFO phenomena. Although he
and his partner, Dawn Holloway (see below) live in the Midlands,
they’ve
made repeated visits to Rendlesham Forest. Hanson has seen ‘orbs’ there.
In the company of others, he and Holloway have sometimes been
in the forest at night when a thud has been heard, followed by
the discovery, on the ground beside them, of a smooth, rounded,
and hot pebble. And Hanson reports that he was struck lightly
on the back by a stone on one occasion.
As noted above, unusual features have
appeared in photographs taken in the forest. Hanson raised this
with a friend of his, a professional photographer. The latter
was very sceptical, and advanced numerous explanations. Then,
much to his surprise, the friend captured photographic anomalies
during a visit to the forest with his wife. According to Hanson,
when the couple arrived home, “some random photos [were]
taken outside the house…[and] they
noticed [it] was covered with orbs.” I tried to
contact Hanson’s friend, by e-mail, to obtain further details,
but I’ve had no reply. Anomalies
have shown up in photographs that Hanson himself has taken in
Rendlesham Forest.
Dawn Holloway
Dawn Holloway, 52, captured
an ‘orb’ with
a non-digital camera in daylight conditions in Rendlesham Forest
some years ago, although she didn’t see anything strange
at the time. At that stage, she and Hanson didn’t see the
anomalous things that Brenda Butler reported seeing. But on one
occasion, Butler asked them whether they could see light around
a tree. At first, neither of them could, but then it seemed to
Holloway that the tree was shimmering with light, although Hanson
still couldn’t see it. On their next visit to the forest,
Holloway saw what looked like a light in a tree close to a track.
Butler indicated that she could see it, too, although Hanson
and the other people present couldn’t. However, it showed
up in a photograph that Hanson took. Holloway explains that as
Hanson looked more intently at the tree, he saw it as well. She
states that after that visit, she and Hanson began to see ‘orbs’ with
the naked eye intermittently, and that Hanson captured a great
deal with his digital camera. Holloway confirms that stones have
sometimes landed on the ground when she’s been in the forest.
She describes them as having been “quite warm”. She’s
touched about three or four of them.
Don Ramkin
Don Ramkin, 45, has
a longstanding interest in the paranormal and has been visiting
Rendlesham Forest for several years. During his initial visits,
he didn’t see or photograph anything unusual. But since
then, he’s had a variety of unusual experiences in the
forest, and he’s captured anomalous photographic images
there. He tends to visit the forest in a group of four, including
Brenda Butler. He states that he and Butler have concluded that
unusual activity is more likely to occur if there are just four
of them.
Ramkin has seen anomalous
lights or illuminated objects in the forest. One incident occurred
when he was walking down a track, at night, with five or six
others. He and John Hanson were at the rear, walking parallel
to each other, some distance apart, and chatting. An object resembling
a bright golf ball shot out of the trees ahead of them on the
left at an angle. Ramkin notes: “it…zipped between
myself and John…just above our heads, seemed to twist,
[and] then, taking another trajectory, shot into the trees to
the right, behind us.” It made a rasping-like noise.
Judging from its high-speed manoeuvres, Ramkin infers that it
was being guided or had intelligence. I spoke to John Hanson
about the incident. He doesn’t specifically recall it.
However, if it happened as described, it’s possible that
he wasn’t looking in the right direction at the time.
On one occasion,
about half an hour before it got fully dark, Ramkin
saw a silent black triangular shaped craft flying in the direction
of Orford Ness. It appeared to be at a high altitude and above
a field rather than over the forest itself. He’s had other
unusual visual experiences in the area, including sightings of
apparitional figures.
He reports that he
and his companions have had their clothing tugged and that they’ve
been prodded; and he relates that he distinctly felt someone
or something unseen holding his right hand on two occasions.
And on three occasions, he’s felt a grip around his left
wrist. (If I’ve understood him correctly, all of these
incidents involving tactile impressions have occurred at night.)
One night, Ramkin
and two companions, including Brenda Butler, were sitting on
a bench near the eastern end of ‘Track 10’ when he
heard someone whispering in his right ear. He asked Butler
what she’d said, but then he realized there was no one
sitting to his right. Butler explained that no one had spoken.
Ramkin then heard more whispering.
Ramkin has been present
when stones have fallen in the forest. They’ve usually
landed near him and his companions, and, if located, have been
found to be “very very warm”. He notes that they “can
be pure white [and] almost polished”, unlike any stones
that he and his companions have normally come across in the forest.
He states that he’s personally witnessed two stones land
and roll; and he also mentions an occasion when a plastic toy
elephant landed at the base of a tree.
One night, Ramkin
and a companion were walking down a forest track when they heard
a loud rushing and crashing sound from some trees to their right.
In his torchlight, Ramkin saw a deer running fast. It fell, but
got up and ran off. Ramkin writes: “…I panned my
torch round…and suddenly saw two pairs of yellow eyes
looking back at us. I thought, as did [my companion], that it
was foxes, but my heart began racing as I realized that we were
wrong. As we began to walk, these two creatures walked, and when
we stopped, they stopped, but I kept hitting their eyes with
the torch [beam], so I knew where they were...I caught a glimpse
of the shoulder blades going up and down and it dawned on me
that this was a big cat encounter.”
Comments and conclusions
Brenda Butler has kindly given me a
CD containing a large number of photographs she’s taken
in Rendlesham Forest, including the three photographs reproduced
here. Many of them show apparent anomalies, and I sought an opinion
on several of the pictures (including Photographs 1-3) from Dr
Steven Campbell, a former cell biologist, who now works as a
professional photographer. He comments:
The
image meta data shows that all of the images except [Photograph
1] were taken with an Olympus Digital Camera and processed
with the same software (v574p-76). An internet search for that
software number suggests that the camera could have been a
C300 Zoom. These very low resolution files have also been
highly compressed, and therefore suffer pronounced JPEG artefacts.
There is also colour noise due to the small sensor
and high amplification [arising from] the fact that the pictures
were shot at 400 ISO. The streaks can be explained technically
by the fact that the exposure is 2 seconds long. The background
has been illuminated by the flash for a very brief period and
therefore appears still. The long exposure then allows
the visualisation of a bright object moving in front
of the camera. Part of the lateral stretch of the streaking [in
Photograph 2] is almost certainly due to camera shake and is
very similar to an effect seen in firework photography. This
lateral handshake stretch is particularly obvious on the right
streak. There are very faint 'ghost' images of the fence
posts in [Photograph 3], which might have been due to [the]
double exposure effect already noted. In this case, they could
have been caused by the residual light in the sky as revealed
by image processing. The only intriguing point about the
images is the fact that the light streaks in [Photograph 3]
give the appearance of weaving in and out of the barbed
wire. However, the discontinuities in the streaks clearly
cast doubt on this interpretation…
[Photograph
1] was taken with a Hewlett Packard digital camera…The spots
appear to be out of focus rain drops. Image processing
suggests more are there than is first apparent. The variation
in bright spot size is consistent with the fact that rain
drops are said to vary in size from 0.2 mm in diameter to 6
mm. However, size variations in this image could also
be explained in terms of different planes of focus.
There
is no evidence from the meta data of sophisticated image processing
software being used, such as Photoshop.
By way of an informal
control experiment, I took some digital photographs at night
in two wooded locations not far from my home. Although I didn’t
see anything unusual at the time, the camera recorded some ‘orbs’ at
one of the sites. These were presumably normal artefacts, and
bearing in mind Steven Campbell’s technical comments, I
suspect that the same is true of many of the apparent photographic
anomalies recorded in Rendlesham Forest. However, it might be
premature to conclude that there’s no mystery concerning
the photographic anomalies captured in the forest. Don Ramkin
notes: “[When] I first started going [there] and was taking
endless photos and not getting a single thing, I complained that
my camera was crap and that I’d wasted my money buying
it. So Brenda [Butler], who was getting orbs and streakers, said, ‘Let
me try.’ ” According to Ramkin, she took a photograph
with his camera, and straight away two orbs appeared in the frame.
Once Rankin had “become tuned in with the forest”,
as he puts it, he found himself “getting everything he
hoped for and more.” And he writes: “Since
then, we’ve had people with us who have expensive cameras…and
get nothing, and I’ve asked to try, [and have] taken a
photo with their equipment and got orbs, mist, etc.” Furthermore,
he reports that when he’s in the forest, he sometimes gets
a headache feeling across his forehead, and that at such times, “I
guarantee that if we take photos, there will be orbs or mist.”
One might be tempted
to regard Rendlesham Forest and the surrounding area as a hotspot
or ‘window area’ for strange events. But without
reliable comparative data, it’s probably impossible to
say for sure whether that’s the case. If a randomly selected
area with a similar size, population, etc., were closely studied,
it’s possible that just as many accounts of strange events
would come to light. However, in the light of the aforementioned
reports, I suspect that the locality is a hotspot.
I don’t know whether Laura is
a regular visitor to Rendlesham Forest, but all of my other informants
have made multiple visits. A desire to experience phenomena is
no doubt part of their motivation. Accordingly, some of their
experiences may have been shaped by expectation, suggestion and
imagination. In respect of nocturnal visits, darkness and sleep
deprivation could, of course, be conducive to perceptual errors.
Furthermore, if incidents aren’t noted down very soon after
they’ve occurred, they could be recalled inaccurately.
(Regarding events involving more than one witness, I’ve
noticed two or three discrepancies in the testimony, although
generally speaking there seems to be a fair amount of consensus.)
Without there necessarily being anything
paranormal involved, some people may be especially prone to anomalous
experiences. For example, someone with a marked tendency to become
very focused on one particular thing, to the exclusion of everything
else, might lose track of time in certain situations. And someone
with a predisposition to confuse internally generated imagery
with external perceptions might be particularly susceptible to
hallucinations in a forest at night. Furthermore, if sights and
sounds are ambiguous, as they might well be in the dark of night,
a person’s interpretation of them could be influenced by
the pronouncements of his or her companions – if the peer
group deems an ambiguous event to be paranormal, that could induce
a waverer to place a similar interpretation on it.
The above are necessary notes of caution.
However, this case includes physical manifestations, so it can’t
be convincingly explained away in purely psychological terms.
The phenomenon involving hot or warm stones is particularly noteworthy,
since it features in the testimony of all of the informants apart
from Valerie Wilson.7 A sceptic might conjecture that
one of the informants has been using trickery to fabricate the
incidents. However, it appears that none of them has been consistently
present each time the phenomenon has occurred. (Peter Parish
reports that it’s happened when he’s been on his
own, and Brenda Butler tells me that it’s occurred in his
absence.) In itself, that doesn’t rule out trickery. For
example, a hoaxer could employ accomplices, or there could be
a conspiracy involving more than one of the informants; or a
sustained hoax may have been perpetrated without the knowledge
of any of the informants. However, I rather doubt whether these
incidents involving stones are attributable to hoaxing, not least
because the perpetrator(s) would have had to spend a considerable
amount of time carrying out the pranks. Equally, I think it’s
unlikely that six of the seven informants have lied about these
events. On balance, therefore, I think these incidents involving
stones are probably genuine poltergeist-type manifestations,
and that some of the other phenomena may also be paranormal.8
It’s possible that the lights
seen by Brenda Butler and Peter Parish in the vicinity of helicopters
were produced by military equipment rather than by something
exotic. Alternatively, the sightings may have been paranormal
hallucinatory experiences. Peter Parish and Brenda Butler’s
joint experience of hearing something making a whirring noise
is puzzling, particularly given that they didn’t actually
see an aerial object. Was it some sort of disguised military
craft operated by the Army at the Woodbridge base, or could it
have been an exotic or paranormal phenomenon? With regard to
the smaller lights or objects that have reportedly been seen
in the forest, an explanation in terms of military technology
seems quite unlikely to me.
If some of the phenomena in this case
are genuinely paranormal, who or what is producing them? Arguably,
the most parsimonious explanation is that the manifestations
are being created, unwittingly, by the witnesses themselves.
The process may operate via unconscious telepathic ‘networking’ (which
could help to engender collective hallucinations), with the physical
effects (including some of the photographic anomalies) being
produced by psychokinesis. (I’ve discussed the notion of ‘psychic
internets’ in the July/August 2007 edition of this magazine.) Brenda
Butler may well be unusually ‘psychic’. She’s
certainly been a very frequent visitor to the forest over the
years. Therefore, she could be playing a particularly prominent
role in unconsciously catalysing or generating phenomena in Rendlesham
Forest.
This
article was first published in the July/August 2007 issue
of UFO DATA Magazine. After
it appeared, Brenda Butler received some communications
from people who had seemingly misunderstood the article
as suggesting that she had faked photographic
anomalies. The
article DOESN’T say that, and I certainly don’t
believe that she has faked photographs. As stated, while
I accept that many of the photographic anomalies discussed
above may have arisen from factors such as camera shake
and long exposure times, I don’t think we can rule
out a paranormal element.
Acknowledgements
I’m grateful to Brenda Butler for her permission to use
Photographs 1-3 in this article. I’d also like to thank
her and the other informants for providing testimony and answering
my queries. I’m grateful to Steven Campbell for his photographic
advice.
1 See http://www.lemmingworks.org/weblog/?cat=28&paged=2 .
Photographs of a disc-shaped UFO that was reportedly seen and
photographed in the area in 1968 can be seen on http://www.ufologie.net/htm/picamaro01.htm .
2 See http://www.pflyceum.org/50.html .
3 You Can’t Tell the
People: The Definitive Account of the Rendlesham Forest UFO
Mystery by Georgina Bruni (Pan Books, London, 2001).
4 Sky Crash: A Cosmic Conspiracy by
Brenda Butler, Dot Street & Jenny Randles (Grafton Books,
London, 1986). (First published by Neville Spearman Ltd in 1984.)
5 The terms ‘Base Commander’ and ‘Deputy
Base Commander’ are potentially misleading, since they
could be taken to mean, respectively, the commander and deputy
commander of the whole operation at the twin bases. In fact,
though, they refer to the commander and deputy commander of a
department known as the Combat Support Group, which was basically
concerned with housekeeping, security and policing matters (see
Bruni, op. cit., p. 27).
6 See
also http://www.rendlesham-incident.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=299 .
7 However, although several witnesses
have testified to this phenomenon, it may be generally little
known in the area. I’ve spoken on the telephone to Nigel
Turner, the Recreation Ranger at Rendlesham Forest. He said that
he wasn’t aware of any of the forestry workers having such
experiences with stones.
8 The
falling of hot stones has been reported in some poltergeist cases.
See, for example, the discussion of the 1709 Canvey Island (Essex)
case in Poltergeists by Alan Gauld & A. D. Cornell
(Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1979, pp. 211-219).
Continued:
Rendlesham part 3
