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Well. not necessarily. The two stars in the north, Vega and Deneb, would be directly over Bentwaters from their position, so they could have seen them as posing a threat to the weapons storage area. Note that they do not ever say on the tape, that any of these objects are directly over their heads, and they don't describe the beams as falling at their feet. This seems to have been a later interpolation.
 
... Note that they do not ever say on the tape, that any of these objects are directly over their heads, and they don't describe the beams as falling at their feet. This seems to have been a later interpolation.

Agreed ... I have yet to find anything in the transcripts or other immediate records claiming the mystery lights were ever overhead or the beams came from directly overhead.
 
Concerning Vega; this star is one of the spookiest of stars when you see it peeking over the northern horizon in winter. In summer it swaps places with Capella, which also looks odd on the northern horizon, and they both sometimes give rise to UFO reports, but at different times of year.
 
Pope didn't think much of the plasma theory nor, apparently, the MoD guy promoting it. But the incidents at Avebury and Stonehenge may well have been its starting points. What is especially interesting is the quasi-intelligent behavior of those plasmas. Graham Phillips' bizarre book The Templars and the Ark of the Covenant takes the idea a whole lot farther.
I bit of subject but in 1989 I had a dream that me and a friend were getting chased by UFOs and a week later in real life mode I was at that friends house and he had a book about dreams and what they stand for and the strange thing was it said if you dream about UFOs it means you are in search of the Holy Grail.
I found a brilliant website that links Nordic Blondes and Angels but for some reason I can't past it ?
 
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This map is of great value because even when checking some good sites I hadn't been able to find one pinpointing the exact location of Bentwaters base.
Isn't it just!

Likewise, it's the first time I have really examined Halt's tape evidence in conjunction with a map which details all the key locations.

You add:

HALT: They’re both heading north. Hey, here he comes from the south, he’s coming toward us now.
(End)

There's another critical element here -
the full transcript (from Ian Ridpath) reads:

HALT: And the ones to the north are moving. One’s moving away from us.

BACKGROUND VOICE: (indistinct, but includes ‘moving’)

NEVELS: Moving out fast.

BALL(?): This one on the right’s heading away, too.
(End)

So, that seems to be both Nevels and Ball(?) corroborating, in real time, observing moving aerial objects.

That's three witnesses who would have to be similarly mistaken, at the exact same moment?

Whether related, or otherwise, I have also pointed out the recollections of Randy Smith, on duty at Bentwaters Weapons Storage Area (WSA) during events:

"I only stayed in the tower for an hour or so and heard one of the guys with a turn on the binoculars say, 'Wow, it just took off'. Two of the craft left at a high rate of speed. The one remaining craft was still in position when I left the tower".

I can only highlight same! :dunno:
 
Here's a sky chart for RAF Woodbridge at 0300 GMT on 26 December 1980.

RAFWoodbridge-801226-0300UTC.jpg

SOURCE: https://skyandtelescope.org/interactive-sky-chart/

Miscellaneous Notes:

- As eburacum has noted, Sirius was basically opposite Deneb and Vega, and all three were near the horizon.
- Off hand, I don't recall any account of the incident mentioning the moon. It was waning gibbous; 5 days past full.
- Also in the southern sky were Saturn and Jupiter - just 6 days prior to their conjunction.
 
Agreed ... I have yet to find anything in the transcripts or other immediate records claiming the mystery lights were ever overhead or the beams came from directly overhead.

As previously mentioned, excepting Halt's tape, I have no other accounts on file re those beams of light.

To recap, it was during the 1997 interview with American journalist AJS (Salley) Rayl, where Halt expands on his account:

"We've crossed the farmer's field past his house and across the road, stumbled through a small stream and went out into a large ploughed field. Somebody noticed several objects in the sky to the north - three objects clearly visible with multiple-colored lights on them. The objects appeared elliptical and then they turned full round, which I thought was quite interesting. All three doing that. They were stationary for a while and then they started to move at high speed in sharp angular patterns as though they were doing a grid search. About that same time, somebody noticed the south, a similar object, it was round - did not change shape - and at one point it appeared to come toward us at a very high speed. It stopped overhead and sent down a small pencil-like beam, sort of like a laser beam. It was an interesting beam in that it stayed - it was the same size all the way down the beam. It illuminated the ground about ten feet from us and we just stood there in awe wondering whether it was a signal, a warning, or what it was. We really didn't know."

"It clicked off as though someone threw a switch, and the object receded, back up into the sky".

"Then it moved back toward Bentwaters and continued to send down beams of light, at one point near the weapons storage facility. We knew that, because we could hear the chatter on the radio".

RAYL: ...behind it. Psychological warfare? That was a theory that I think...

HALT: Well, I've discussed this with Jacques Vallee, who's one of the foremost UFO writers, I guess I should say. And he, in fact, he and I had lunch and talked for a long time and he said, "Well, you were the victim of a mind control experiment." I said, "Well, how do you explain this? The numbers of people involved. We're talking 40 to 50 or more people, on three different radio nets at different geographic locations. That's too hard to do, I think.

When the people clear over on the base are seeing these same objects; seeing the same beams of light come down and they're, you know, a mile or two miles away. Pretty tough to pull off, isn't it?" And he just shook his head on that".
(End)

I am going to have a look at another aspect - the enigmatic story of an A10 which was despatched to Ramstein AFB, allegedly to deliver related film (?) evidence.

Maybe that might help make some sense of it all...!
 
... I am going to have a look at another aspect - the enigmatic story of an A10 which was despatched to Ramstein AFB, allegedly to deliver related film (?) evidence. ...

If there was any perceived urgency to the mission an A-10 is a very strange choice of aircraft.
 
HALT: Well, I've discussed this with Jacques Vallee, who's one of the foremost UFO writers, I guess I should say. And he, in fact, he and I had lunch and talked for a long time and he said, "Well, you were the victim of a mind control experiment." I said, "Well, how do you explain this? The numbers of people involved. We're talking 40 to 50 or more people, on three different radio nets at different geographic locations. That's too hard to do, I think.

Vallee is a very switched on dude. I have come to the same conclusion as him.

Altering the minds of 40-50 people isn't difficult. In fact in some ways it's easier than 1 or 2.

And Halt making the point the witnesses saw the same phenomenom and had the same experiences - well this runs counter to the reported accounts from individuals. These accounts were fairly diverse. People in close proximity experienced different things. Sometimes subtly, but sometimes very different indeed...for example - some saw a craft, most didn't...one saw humanoinds, nobody else did. The personal accounts are far from the same.


This is not a criticism of Halt, but he, amongst others but more so, has built a fairly lucrative business around the fact he was part of a very important UFO sighting/contact encounter. Books, speeches, conferences, interviews...he has made a lot of money out of it. Others have as well, but he the most I would imagine.

And - on a human level it is probably easier and more comfortable to believe you saw a bunch of UFOs, rather than being the forced participant of some weird and unpleasant mind-altering/control experiment/test conducted upon you by those who are meant to have a duty of care towards you.
 
If there was any perceived urgency to the mission an A-10 is a very strange choice of aircraft.
The reason presumably was that A-10s were based with the 81st Tactical Wing at RAF Bentwaters.

If this flight to Ramstein HQ happened at all.

I certainly have references to it, however, I thought there were more than I can locate at present.

One example, from Randy Smith, previously mentioned and deployed at RAF Bentwaters Weapons Storage Area:

"The following night, I went on duty. At guardmount, Bob Ball was very serious, he's almost never serious, a very jovial person. He said, "I saw something last night, but I'm not at liberty to discuss it." And that was the "end". I later heard that the morning we got off our first midnight shift, an A-10 was scrambled and sent to Ramstein, Germany, by Lt. Col. Halt".

Still searching!
 
If this flight to Ramstein HQ happened at all.
I am closing this down as an unsubstantiated rumour and indeed evidence to the contrary.

Again from Salley's interview:

HALT: There was no video. There was no film taken that night to my knowledge. Now, it is possible that one of the young airman, back at a distance because they weren't allowed to approach close we're talking about the group that was back at the light-alls... Somebody may have had a camera back there, but I don't believe so because they were on duty and they would have had to go through guardmount. Somebody could have snuck a small, 35mm or Instamatic or something in their pocket. It's possible somebody may have had something, but there was no obvious overt video filming, etc., done that night. None.

RAYL: There was no official video or film taken.

HALT: None. No, nothing official. No.
(End)
 
...here was no obvious overt video filming, etc., done that night. None.

According to Halt :)


I'm convinced, after probably a decade of looking into this from so many different angles that we will never get the absolute truth. I am blessed to live about an hour away from the forest so get there when I can and love it.

Something did happen.

I don't think aliens flew about and landed in their spaceships.

I think a group of men were manipulated into witnessing something that appeared to them, in their mental states, very odd and very weird.

I suspect others within their organisation were responsible for that. I do not know fully why or fully how.

I think too much time has passed and the "truth" is so concealed that we will never get to the bottom of it. It is now a modern legend. And a great one.
 
I think too much time has passed and the "truth" is so concealed that we will never get to the bottom of it. It is now a modern legend. And a great one.
Precisely so. It has its own momentum now, with very firmly entrenched schools of thought, so even if more information is forthcoming there will be a large proportion of the interested audience who will reject it on principle.
 
Precisely so. It has its own momentum now, with very firmly entrenched schools of thought, so even if more information is forthcoming there will be a large proportion of the interested audience who will reject it on principle.

That's right.

And the "UFO" school of thought has made a good bsuiness out of itself. Probably less so now but people made money and names off it in the 90s.

But now...I think the "truth" is gone for good. It's an enigma and a mystery and a rabbit hole.

Whatever you want to find in it, you will find in it.
 
Well. not necessarily. The two stars in the north, Vega and Deneb, would be directly over Bentwaters from their position, so they could have seen them as posing a threat to the weapons storage area. Note that they do not ever say on the tape, that any of these objects are directly over their heads, and they don't describe the beams as falling at their feet. This seems to have been a later interpolation.
Do you mean by "later interpolation" that Halt quite deliberately made a totally false claim in his summary of the events? This is quite a serious accusation. Bear in mind also that there were others in the party who would have known he was lying and could have said so after his statement was made. Would someone in such a senior position, well aware of the need for accuracy in reporting such events, really do such a thing? It's one thing to accuse someone of mistaking stars for strange lights, but quite another to say that he intentionally falsified his testimony. Bear in mind that we have been poring over a few pages of transcripts from a recording of events in which Halt was making a variety of comments, some measured, some spontaneous. The tape alone can't answer all our questions. In interviews that I have seen Halt is very explicit about the light beams coming down just in front of the party. If it did happen, it must have been fairly disturbing and you couldn't reasonably expect him to be able to give a real time measured account of what was going on.
 
It's one thing to accuse someone of mistaking stars for strange lights, but quite another to say that he intentionally falsified his testimony.
Given that Salley Rayl's 1997 interview with Halt is so pivotal, delighted to say I have come across a transcript of the entire proceedings, properly formatted as a Microsoft Word .doc file (presumably will require either Word or a .doc file type reader installed)

It's 20 pages of fascinating material:

www.forteanmedia.com/Halt_Int.doc

I had quite forgotten Salley asked a couple of questions on my behalf!

It's perfectly conceivable that Halt, perhaps for the first time and during an exceptionallly thorough and lengthy public discussion, reveals much more precise details of events than previously - simply under these circumstances.
 
I'm convinced, after probably a decade of looking into this from so many different angles that we will never get the absolute truth. I am blessed to live about an hour away from the forest so get there when I can and love it.

I'm not too far away from it either which is why I've taken an 'on/off' interest over the years. My best friend married one of the USAF personel there but they left for the States a year or so before the 'event' and in any case he'd died by the time I'd heard about it. I'd have liked to have had some sort of discussion with him if only for more context. He claimed to be psychic and made predictions for me which did come true although that could have been clever guess work or just 'coincidence' all the same I'd have liked to have known what he made of it ... assuming he'd ever heard about it that is!

Sollywos x
 
I have unearthed an older reference to Halt claiing a light beam landed at his feet.

This is a question posed by UFO researcher John Powell to John Burroughs, way back in September 1991:

"Regarding the beam of light directed to the ground nearly at their feet, do you know if radiation readings were taken...".

Trying to ascertain the source of Powell's query...
 
Given that Salley Rayl's 1997 interview with Halt is so pivotal, delighted to say I have come across a transcript of the entire proceedings, properly formatted as a Microsoft Word .doc file (presumably will require either Word or a .doc file type reader installed)

It's 20 pages of fascinating material:

www.forteanmedia.com/Halt_Int.doc

I had quite forgotten Salley asked a couple of questions on my behalf!

It's perfectly conceivable that Halt, perhaps for the first time and during an exceptionallly thorough and lengthy public discussion, reveals much more precise details of events than previously - simply under these circumstances.
Now that is a brilliant piece of evidence. Halt answers pretty well all the questions that have been raised, could they have been seeing stars or the lighthouse, the very precise descriptions of the lights/objects sighted, and the extra detail about the object that moved in and around the trees. I've pdf'd the Word document and will attach for anyone without Word or similar. Interesting also that it seems Halt eventually seems to have convinced Vallee to reassess his mind control experiment theory. Thanks so much for sharing this vital document!
 

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I don't think he is lying; I simply think he has become confused between his memories of these objects as seen through the 'scope, and as seen through the naked eye. He remembers that the objects sometimes looked larger, and sometimes smaller; and that they appeared to send down 'beams'; this has evolved into a false memory of an object directly overhead, sending down a beam to his feet. There's no mention of that happening on the tape.

Instead, the object in the south remains in the south, and slowly gets lower, while the objects in the north remain there, and presumably these are the ones which appear to beam down towards Bentwaters. All the stories have become more elaborate over time, but that always happens.
 
I don't think he is lying; I simply think he has become confused between his memories of these objects as seen through the 'scope, and as seen through the naked eye. He remembers that the objects sometimes looked larger, and sometimes smaller; and that they appeared to send down 'beams'; this has evolved into a false memory of an object directly overhead, sending down a beam to his feet. There's no mention of that happening on the tape.

Instead, the object in the south remains in the south, and slowly gets lower, while the objects in the north remain there, and presumably these are the ones which appear to beam down towards Bentwaters. All the stories have become more elaborate over time, but that always happens.
If you had an experience like that, possibly the most dramatic and extraordinary of your entire life, would you seriously misremember such vital elements of it? I think not. No, I really can't accept the "false memory" theory, and reading this new account (not that new , of course) makes it seem very implausible.
 
Yes. Every UFO witness account includes some false memory elements, even my own; so we need to refer to the earliest evidence available. This event is unusual in that it was recorded at the time, so we can discriminate between things that were remarked upon as they happened, and those that were remembered later.

By the time Rayl interviewed Halt, he had already recounted this event numerous times, including to Vallee, who may have inadvertently introduced elements to the story, and Powell and Rayl may also have influenced the witnesses too. Unfortunately this is inevitable.
 
Yes. Every UFO witness account includes some false memory elements, even my own; so we need to refer to the earliest evidence available. This event is unusual in that it was recorded at the time, so we can discriminate between things that were remarked upon as they happened, and those that were remembered later.

By the time Rayl interviewed Halt, he had already recounted this event numerous times, including to Vallee, who may have inadvertently introduced elements to the story, and Powell and Rayl may also have influenced the witnesses too. Unfortunately this is inevitable.
Every memory includes a certain amount of distortion and addition, but in this case you are suggesting, in effect, that all of the acccount we have just read in his own words is false, aside from -- what? -- that Halt went out with a group of men and saw stars that they all misidentified as lights flying about, some in and out of the trees, lights overhead shooting down beams of light at the witnesses' feet, strange lighting effects on a farmhouse, etc. That's not "some false memory elements," that's more like the entire story is false, and I can't agree with that.
 
I have unearthed an older reference to Halt claiing a light beam landed at his feet.

Trying to ascertain the source...
This is the source.

So, in fact, Halt does not elaborate on his story as related to Salley Rayl.

The same claims re a pencil-thin beam of light seemingly hitting the ground in close proximity to Halt and others in the forest and beams being observed elsewhere on base, including near the Weapons Storage Area are featured in Halt's 1991 interview.

Unsolved Mysteries with Robert Stack - Season 4, Episode 1

 
They saw the lights moving around due to autokinesis - which often creates 'sharp; angular movements'. They saw the stars change shape and brightness, and emit beams, thanks to the Starscope. They saw the light in the south emit colours, and move gradually towards the horizon. They saw two lights in the north. All these things check out with the account on the tape.

Note that the object in the south is described as staying in the south, and getting lower; it does not pass overhead and travel to the north on the tape, so it cannot have been the object shining beams down towards Bentwaters. There were only two lights on the tape in the north, not three, probably another false memory.

I don't know what the red light was, which burst into innumerable white lights; I think this may have been unconnected with the lighthouse, and had some other cause - but I may be wrong.
 
The same claims re a pencil-thin beam of light seemingly hitting the ground in close proximity to Halt and others in the forest and beams being observed elsewhere on base, including near the Weapons Storage Area are featured in Halt's 1991 interview.
Do we have any other witnesses to these beams? Col. Ted Conrad didn't see them.
Conrad: Lt Col Halt’s report of more lights both on the ground and in the sky brought quite a few people out of their houses at Woodbridge to see what was there. These people included myself, my wife, Lt Col Sawyer (the Director of Personnel), his wife, and several others listening to my radio and looking for the lights Halt was describing. Despite a sparkling, clear, cloudless, fogless night with a good field of view in all directions, we saw nothing that resembled Lt Col Halt’s descriptions either in the sky or on the ground. This episode ended in the early morning hours of [28 December 1980].
 
Do we have any other witnesses to these beams? Col. Ted Conrad didn't see them.
Well, had there been some unusual atmospheric distortion that night of what were in fact just stars, would not Conrad, and his wife and others, have seen this kind of thing as well? But they saw nothing resembling Halt's description. Autokinesis is a relatively minor phenomenon -- it wouldn't have produced the dramatic show that Halt described. This implies that the area in which the objects/lights were being observed was relatively small, and certainly the light seen moving in and out of the trees must have been small to be able to move through the forest.

Now I've had a chance to scan the excellent Unsolved Mysteries episode, which I'd not seen before, the complete mismatch between the things seen by the witnesses and "misremembering sightings of stars distorted by atmospheric factors" seems obvious. No way can that explain what the witnesses reported.
 
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Do we have any other witnesses to these beams? Col. Ted Conrad didn't see them.
As mentioned, not one single corroborating account I have come across... so far!

That's a great point you make about Conrad.

If Halt did see a pencil-thin beam - whatever the cause of his observation - in close proximity, is this related (my emphasis):

HALT: Now we’re observing what appears to be a beam coming down to the ground.

Speculative, I know!

However, what we do have in the documentary is Bobby Ball confirming Halt's assertion those three aerial objects operated as if carrying out a coordinated grid search.

Just another profound optical abbreviation, exactly the same one which Halt was having, at the exact same moment?
 
As mentioned, not one single corroborating account I have come across... so far!

That's a great point you make about Conrad.

If Halt did see a pencil-thin beam - whatever the cause of his observation - in close proximity, is this related (my emphasis):

HALT: Now we’re observing what appears to be a beam coming down to the ground.

Speculative, I know!

However, what we do have in the documentary is Bobby Ball confirming Halt's assertion those three aerial objects operated as if carrying out a coordinated grid search.

Just another profound optical abbreviation, exactly the same one which Halt was having, at the exact same moment?
I'm wondering if the description of the light beam "coming down to the ground" is connected with the light phenomena discussed by Vallee where witnesses report phenomena that look like light beams but behave somewhat like solid objects?
 
He remembers that the objects sometimes looked larger, and sometimes smaller; and that they appeared to send down 'beams'; this has evolved into a false memory of an object directly overhead, sending down a beam to his feet. There's no mention of that on the tape.
The fact that Halt does confirm an object is coming from the south towards him, states it has sent down a beam of light down to the ground, must surely imply it was somewhere overhead.

That he doesn't actually say at this exact moment it was now directly above is perfectly understandable and does not preclude this having occurred.

Surely, the argument is that Halt simply later clarifies in more detail what transpired?

For example, I am a keen birdwatcher and last year whilst outdoors, made a quick voice note on my mobile app re an unusually large number of crows at my nearby rookery, mentioned they were now in flight and heading in my direction, then cursed because one of them had shat on me.

Although I might not have recorded for the record, how they were directly overhead at that precise moment, I could have explained this later...
 
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