Rendlesham Forest…, A Christmas Story from 1980 - Can We ‘Let it Be’?

reply to post by IsaacKoi



Are you able to offer up any conclusion that Pike comes to in that book Isaac?

reply to post by mirageman

They can't even do that in Star Wars
But then again that was a long time ago in galaxy far, far away.

I didn't finish my thought there. I was thinking millennium falcon turning sideways in between the asteroids.

mirageman
Not all the witnesses believe the Rendlesham incident accounts to anything at all.

A couple of years ago, Lt Buran, who was the shift commander at Central Security Control on the first night, posted the following comments on Jim and John’s Rendlesham FaceBook page. Another colleague, Kevin Conde (well known for the prank with the floodlights) also chimed in. The original postings can be seen here
www.ianridpath.com...
but I offer some insightful excerpts.


Skip Buran
I was the shift commander the first night. Then SSgt Penniston had every opportunity to report everything as it happened. There was no pressure to do otherwise. There was no panicked call for assistance, no incredulous description of an unknown object, nothing. They went, looked, and came back. No one was traumatized by the event. No one requested medical help. The Suffolk Constabulary constables who responded also found.....nothing. Folks, this is a non-event, and is being blown way out of proportion by people who may have self serving motives.

On the first night I dispatched MSgt Chandler to the back gate to collect weapons, SSgt Penniston and I think Amn Cabansag to take a look. I had them leave their weapons on base w/Chandler. I made it clear that it was a British concern, but I was worried that a small aircraft may have crashed in Rendlesham. This was the ONLY reason I sent USAF SPs to what was thought to be the scene. When nothing was found, I had them come back and write statements. Those are reproduced everywhere, as you know. I considered the matter closed.


Kevin Conde:
Besides the well known names like Warren, Pennsiton and Halt there were others there. There was a whole squadron. I worked for Bruce Englund. Bobby Ball was the security flight chief opposite me. I was almost certainly the Woodbridge patrol or the LE flight chief the night of Halt’s expedition. All I remember was the laughing about the people seeing UFO’s. It was not treated seriously at all.

You can throw all the rocks, make all the claims you want, belittle the non-believers until you are blue in the face. It does not change the fact that it was a non-event when it happened, and the stories of the believers are the ones that have morphed over time.

If the USAF did not make a big deal about it, it was because they were appalled that a Light Colonel would be so nutty as to take a bunch of security troops and some guys from disaster prep on an extended walk through the woods in a foreign country. IN THE DARK. We wouldn’t do that in the United States due to the Posse Comitatus Act. Something we LE troops were briefed on every six months. If we would not do it in our own country, why the hell did we do it in a foreign country so every newspaper in the UK could ridicule the nut case yanks?
The higher command carefully ignored it in the hope that it and LtCol Halt would just fade away.
If Skip Buran says it was nonsense that night it was. If Bruce Englund even refuses to discuss it, probably because he knows it is only opening a door to let true believers nit pick every comma....
I’ve been a cop my entire life. I’ve never ceased to be amazed at the things people do or what they will believe. I’m a firm believer that the eye witness is often the most unreliable. I routinely say things to the effect that “you can make this stuff up.” Why is that that otherwise normal humans always want to take the most unreasonable explanation for the most mundane things.

---------------------------------------------

DISCLAIMER: I offer the above quotations purely for information and make no judgement as to their accuracy.

reply to post by ianrid


Skeptics often refer to Armold, or to Conrad, Buran, or Conde.

But these people were not there at the right place at the right time, just like Thurkettle. They can give their opinions like anybody else but cannot contribute any eye witness testimony.

The primary witnesses are most important here, since they are EYE-witnesses. Unfortunately they are not useful to the skeptics because they all agree that something strange was going on:

Ed Cabansag:
“It was cone-shaped – egg-shaped, with lights running around its belt from left to right.
They were blue, white and red lights, flashing, sometimes rapid, sometimes slow. Then we saw flakes of metal coming from it.”
“No one was talking…. But it was not from Earth.”

John Burroughs:
“The lights were red and blue the red one above the blue one and they were flashing on and off.”
“All three of us hit the ground and whatever it was started moving back towards the open field.“

Jim Penniston:
“There was a red light that was blinking on and off and a blue light that was being for the most part steady and projecting under the object, extending a meter or two out.”
“It was definitely mechanical in nature.”

Adrian Bustinza:
“There was a red light on top and there were several blue lights on the bottom. But there was also an effect maybe like a prism … with rainbow lights on top, scattered about .. [and] several other colors of light.”
"It was gone in a flash, almost like it just disappeared. When it left, we were hit by a cold blast of wind which blew toward us for 5-or-10 seconds.”
“At that time I thought we were dealing with an extra-terrestrial visitation.”

Monroe Nevels:
“We saw this object sitting in the farmer’s field about 200 yards away. It looked kind of yellowish orange like very hot. And every once in a while I would see something shoot off that looked like molten metal. As we jumped the fence it disappeared.” “We were in awe about where did it go and what did it do? And I looked up and saw the lights. There was very rapid movement, no sound whatsoever. I could blink my eye and they were gone, and there was no sound.”
“I don’t know where it was from. We cannot go that fast and we have absolutely nothing that is that quiet. Where is the technology coming from? It had to be from somewhere.”

Charles Halt:
“A red sun-like light moved about and pulsed. It appeared to throw off glowing particles and then broke into five separate white objects and then disappeared. Immediately thereafter, three star-like objects were noticed in the sky. The objects moved rapidly in sharp, angular movements and displayed red, green and blue lights. The object to the south beamed down a stream of light from time to time.”
“I believe the objects that I saw at close quarter were extraterrestrial in origin.”

Bob Ball:
“We saw .. flying objects containing .. maybe other people or another life form.”
“Right now I do believe that UFO’s exist. Up until that point I’ve been skeptical. Now I believe there may have been someone else there.”

reply to post by Guest101


that is a nice set of testimony but it still adds up to nothing no matter how cool it sounds. People can "see" and "remember" the same things. Again, I don't know if what they are saying is a false memory, a real memory based on misperceptions,a lie or even the exact reality since there is no way to discern between them.

what is lacking is something real, tangible and unambiguous.

Further information

Richard Sommerfelt’s Story


Rick Sommerfelt arrived at the twin bases in 1977 and was assigned to the E.M.S. Aircraft Structural Repair shop .On Dec 27th 1980, he was working at the very East End of Woodbridge base as part of the New Years holiday skeleton crew.

The crew were busy fixing an aircraft which had to be airworthy by daybreak. Sometime between midnight and 1:00am there was a power black out. They stepped outside just as a Security Police Captain arrived ordering them to close down their activities and file towards their evacuation point.

Explaining that there were procedures in place, and equipment was spread out around a fully armed aircraft with live ammunition, Sommerfelt insisted that his supervisor was contacted. Ten minutes later his flight chief arrived with the SP Captain and he was told to shut down by removing as much equipment as possible but given just a few minutes to do so.

To cut a long story short the crew grabbed their personal effects and ended up at the Secure Area Entry Point for a very carefully conducted roll call. They were the informed they were being evacuated and to leave for home immediately out of the front gate at Woodbridge. People were being placed on leave until further notice.

Everyone rushed to their vehicles, however Sommerfelt had a problem. With it being the holiday period and working late shift he had not filled up his car and did not have enough fuel to get home via the front gate through Woodbridge. It seemed no fuel was available on base (and being 1980 not in the local villages at such a time).


Special permission was granted for Sommerfelt to leave through the East Gate and the details were radioed to the guards on station. He drove along the perimeter road and was carefully ID’d at the East Gate. He was then told to drive out to the end of the road, turn left, and do not stop for any reason, just drive cautiously past the people on his right, and to keep on going for his own good.





He drove through a line of military vehicles, trucks and a blue staff car with a white roof. There were lots of Lightalls set facing the road and blinding anyone trying to see into the forest. USAF Security Police were gathered together in random groups talking. Several men were smoking. For half a minute or so he became a involved on the periphery of the East Gate incident.

About 5 days later, in the New Year, everyone was recalled to work. There were rumours of all sorts of strange things going on and some of personnel had suddenly been reassigned to other locations.

Sommerfelt never heard any whispers about a broken arrow (lost nuclear weapon) and theorizes that the 67th ARRS may have been in the skies that night attempting to track, retrieve or capture some “hardware” that had perhaps come down nearby.



There was a also a C-5 (one of the largest transporter aircraft in the world) parked at Woodbridge for some time during this period and Sommerfelt thought maybe the evacuation was ordered to airlift something out without too many witnesses. Or it could have all been a massive diversion whilst another operation was conducted elsewhere.

Sources: www.tinyurl.com...
Full source : www.tinyurl.com...


Of course this testimony doesn’t prove there was anything alien or even a UFO landed in Rendlesham Forest. However if the account is accurate then it does suggest that personnel, deemed non-essential to operations, were evacuated from Woodbridge whilst something was going on out in Rendlesham forest involving a number of American servicemen.

It also coincides in with the questions from Lord Hill Norton asked in Parliament (see page 2 of this thread ) asked about any evacuation plans on 27th Dec 1980 concerning Highpoint Prison in Suffolk and Hollesley Bay Young Offender Institution.

mirageman
Are you able to offer up any conclusion that Pike comes to in that book Isaac?

It will probably be easier for me, and better for everyone else, if I just finally get around to writing to Pike to get his permission to upload his out-of-print book. I'll do that at the weekend (and postpone finishing my long thread on Steven Greer yet again...).

IsaacKoi
...I'll do that at the weekend (and postpone finishing my long thread on Steven Greer yet again...

).

You're the Godfather of Ufology, Sir Isaac, so what do you expect from us? You got knowledge/study aids/connections, we needs 'em.

We suffer as well, you know...your Greer thread is eagerly awaited. In the meantime we get goodies. Thank you.

IsaacKoi

It will probably be easier for me, and better for everyone else, if I just finally get around to writing to Pike to get his permission to upload his out-of-print book. I'll do that at the weekend (and postpone finishing my long thread on Steven Greer yet again...

).

To quote yourself - "All the best" with that one Isaac.

Andrew Pike seemed to have become rather disgruntled with the whole project by the time he was due to retire. He was concerned about losing money (understandably- what would be the point?) on publishing a re-print of his book and refused to issue an electronic "e-book" around 2009/2010 due to copyright issues from what I can gather ( I may have misinterpreted). More than that I think he had become as frustrated as all of us with the polarised views of researchers and refusal of the main witnesses to try and resolve some of the issues in the case.

However we are now 4 years down the road, technology has advanced, and even if a "free" issue of "The Rendlesham File: Britain's Roswell” is refused I am hoping he may consider a self published 'Kindle' version for a reasonable fee.

Although my guess is that this case will simply keep growing like an earlier one from 1947 until the day we decide to use binary code to converse with our ancient ancestors.

reply to post by Guest101

Guest101
You are misled by the 3D perspective.
Look for some images of regular tetrahedrons from different perspectives and you’ll see. (A regular tetrahedron is a 3D shape with equidistant triangles on all sides).

Look for instance at the picture below. The bottom triangle looks exactly like the triangle formed by the twigs but is in fact an equidistant triangle (note that the twigs are not exactly on the same spots as the landing marks):

krottbrand.bplaced.net...

In the landing site picture you also see that the sides of the triangle are roughly twice the length of the men. This corresponds to the 12 feet (3,6 m) mentioned in the 1984 CNN documentary (see above). This is no surprise, since the man in the light suit is witness 2, while witness 1 is behind the camera.

Using the men as a relative guide for length in the photo as you suggested: Red and white "C" is the average between A and B to account for perspective. C laid end to end, comes up short. That would mean the line farthest away from the camera would possibly be longer than 12 feet using that method. This is also assuming both men are 6 feet, which is above the average height for men in the UK of 5'9". In that case, that line would be longer than the 12 feet suggested. This is also skews the triangle away from it's claimed perfect 12 foot spacing.

=====================================================================

In order to make that 17 degree angle on the right and supposed 12 foot lengths between the points as part of an equilateral triangle, the photographers view point would be at an extreme and odd angle. Given the limited space of the forest, I don't know how likely that would be. The perspective is screwed up on different axes. The terrain could play a part in that too of course, but it seems to be slightly uphill, rather than downhill.

reply to post by Ectoplasm8


Thanks for your effort!

The man in the light suit is Verrano, an American. Don't know how tall he was.

The sticks are probably at the outside of the triangle. If you look at the photograph, you'll see a dark spot at each stick in the direction towards the center of the triangle. Maybe you should retry your exercise using these dark spots instead of the sticks? This may also lead to a more acceptable perspective of the photographer.

reply to post by Guest101


I found a nice website where you can drag a tertrahedron to watch the bottom triangle from any angle.
Just drag it so that the sides of the triangle are parallel to the sides of the triangle formed by the dark spots and the general shape matches. Then measure both triangles to check if all sides have the same size ratio. It matches if you use the dark spots on the ground that lie towards the inside of the triangle.
The length also equals twice the length of Verrano.

Here's the 'tetrahedron-tool' : www.mathsisfun.com...

Timeline of the Rendlesham Incident


There is a a fairly comprehensive timeline of the Rendlesham Incident contained on the old bentwaters1980 boards :

Link to original content

Although the author has put a great amount of work into it they don't seem to have contained any details (even a username other than guest)to credit it too. However they have indicated "... here it is to use and share for anybody still interested. "

So I've also copied and pasted it into a pdf document for anyone who wants a more permanent copy.

PDF link

I'll post up some other free information sources in a day or so and then it's probably time to draw this thread towards a conclusion (if that's possible ).

However if anyone wants to add what they think really happened (or didn't happen) or have any further interesting information to offer then please do.

reply to post by Guest101


Is it my imagination, or just the grainy quality of the picture, but Verrano and the police officer don't appear to be focused on the area marked out?

reply to post by Ectoplasm8

It’s always looked to me as though daylight is visible between the trees in the distance, which is consistent with this site being no more than 50—100 metres from the eastern forest edge. Hence north is to the left, so to match Vince’s sketch to the picture you would need to turn his drawing 90 degrees to the left. It looks as though Vince paced out the distance between the two sticks on the far side, where the PC (Cresswell) is standing.

As has been pointed out, the sticks are placed on the outside of the marks, so the distance between the sticks might easily be half a metre greater than the distance between their centres. Vince's sketch suggests he paced out the distance between the inner edges.

There was a programme shown on the History Channel that gave the dimensions as 9.8 ft (=3 m) between the sticks but I don’t know where they got that figure from. They certainly got one of the stick positions wrong.

PS: Link to Vince's sketch
www.ianridpath.com...

Guest101
reply to post by Guest101

 

I found a nice website where you can drag a tertrahedron to watch the bottom triangle from any angle.
Just drag it so that the sides of the triangle are parallel to the sides of the triangle formed by the dark spots and the general shape matches. Then measure both triangles to check if all sides have the same size ratio. It matches if you use the dark spots on the ground that lie towards the inside of the triangle.
The length also equals twice the length of Verrano.

Here's the 'tetrahedron-tool' : www.mathsisfun.com...

Here is what I tried the other night. If you have Excel, you can paste this image and play around with the 3D tool and get similar results and lay it over the photo. I got it to match pretty close and then tried it with a right triangle and came close also. I concluded that there just wasn't enough information to determine either way. Anyway, I think you can get it to fit if you work it a little. Just to be clear, I don't think it means anything.

reply to post by ianrid

Here's a better quality picture with the indentations a little more noticeable. Although the exact position of the one on the far right is questionable. It still makes a smaller version of the odd "triangle".


It does fit within Vince Thurkettles drawing. Seeing as the bottom oval appears to be drawn straight-on, I assume the top and right oval shapes were drawn taking in account angles of perspective. Making the top and bottom line (left and right in photo) north facing indentations farther away. That's making an assumption with his drawing though.


The History Channels picture below is at least a little more symmetrical. But, like you said, it wasn't even on the stick. It gives an example of how these shows make mistakes though and they shouldn't be taken as gospel.

ZetaRediculian

Guest101
reply to post by Guest101

 

I found a nice website where you can drag a tertrahedron to watch the bottom triangle from any angle.
Just drag it so that the sides of the triangle are parallel to the sides of the triangle formed by the dark spots and the general shape matches. Then measure both triangles to check if all sides have the same size ratio. It matches if you use the dark spots on the ground that lie towards the inside of the triangle.
The length also equals twice the length of Verrano.

Here's the 'tetrahedron-tool' : www.mathsisfun.com...

Here is what I tried the other night. If you have Excel, you can paste this image and play around with the 3D tool and get similar results and lay it over the photo. I got it to match pretty close and then tried it with a right triangle and came close also. I concluded that there just wasn't enough information to determine either way. Anyway, I think you can get it to fit if you work it a little. Just to be clear, I don't think it means anything.

With infinite space you can make it work. But, when you have space limitations in the forest, it wouldn't be as easy.

Ectoplasm8
Here's a better quality picture with the indentations a little more noticeable. Although the exact position of the one on the far right is questionable. It still makes a smaller version of the odd "triangle".

That triangle spanned by the dark spots corresponds nicely with the verbal testimony of Verrano (the guy in the light suit) and Gulyas (the guy behind the camera).

It is a projection of an equilateral triangle with sides that match twice the length of Verrano, i.e. 12 feet or 3,6 m.

The only official document that gives any indication about the location of this site is the Suffolk Police Report that states the police was directed to a location 2 miles east of East Gate. There are several patches of forest east of the farmer’s field, and like Ian pointed out light does seem to be visible between the trees.

Bruni interviewed Thurkettle and asked him why he waited six weeks to visit an alleged landing site.

Thurkettle: “I was excited for about two weeks after the two men visited me. I was expecting something to happen but nothing did. After about four weeks one of the guys working in the forest asked me about a burned area out there and if I’d seen it.”

So six weeks after the incidents Thurkettle went out to see if he could find this 'burned area'. Bruni asked Thurkettle how he knew this was the site.

Thurkettle: “I didn’t. I assumed it was because of the military vehicle marks and the Pepsi cans. And of course there was a ring of sticks. No I never saw the burnt area.”

reply to post by Guest101


I would love to know if Thurkettle was visited by Andrew Pike investigating plasma physics back in 1980. Both of their stories seem to fit but can either of them ever confirm it?

Perhaps Ian (Ridpath) could ask Vince if this was a possibility and rule out plain clothes detectives, secret service and men in black stories.

As for the 'landing site' the Police Officer is allegedly a guy called Brian Cresswell who was 'well above 6ft tall' according to Georgina Bruni. However he was rather defensive when she tracked him down. His reply on the telephone was.

I know what I saw, I know what I did and I'm not giving you any information.

www.tinyurl.com...

He apparently phoned back and apologised but did not offer any more information about the incident and terminated the call.