We have 3 seperate accounts, from Warren, Bustinza and Battram, of an object amidst ground fog.
Did that never actually occur?
Having gone over Battram's account again, I came across correspondence from some years back with Airman Kenneth Green:
(Beginning of correspondence)
My problem; there is a testimony which refers to the 'UFO' incidents occurring during an alert/exercise.
It's the published account of Airman Greg Battram, interviewed by Larry Fawcett.
GB: I was in the Air Force up to this point a little over a year. I had been in England about two months.
LF: OK, you were stationed at Bentwaters or Woodbridge?
GB: At Bentwaters.
LF: Were you attached to the Eighty-first Police Security Squadron?
GB: Yes.
LF: What was your job there, Greg?
GB: I was in the planning and program section.
LF: Go ahead.
GB: We had an alert over there for exercises and things about once or twice a month. And during those times, all the back-office people would go on a security post, additional posting and stuff out there. So, the night we saw the UFO, we were out there on duty, on one of these exercises, and it was nighttime.
Nothing going on but we all still had to be there, and we were driving around on Woodbridge base on a perimeter patrol, and we saw some lights up in the sky, and it looked a lot different from any other aircraft we had ever seen.
We watched them for a while and then they disappeared... in a clearing of a forest and that's when we saw the object or whatever. We thought it was a fire at first.
[NOTE: The original transcript reads: "We watched them for a while and then they disappeared. A short distance from where they disappeared is a clearing and a forest and that's when we saw the object or whatever. We thought it was a fire at first".]
When we saw that, we thought, oh boy, we could have some problems out here, so we called Central Security Control and told them we wanted to go out and see what it was.
They said go ahead and they would notify the base fire department and the British authorities. So we took off out the back gate, there at Woodbridge, and headed toward the forest.
LF: Who was with you, Greg?
GB: I can't remember the names of those guys. Three other guys in the truck.
LF: OK.
GB: We got out there and parked the truck on the side of the road and went walking in toward the clearing. Just as we got about fifty yards away, we started to feel the hair on our necks and arms and stuff stand up.
LF: Yes.
GB: And it felt really strange. And we could hear a thrumming kind of sound.
LF: A what kind of sound?
GB: A thrumming noise coming out of the forest, from the direction of that object. It had a ground fog all around it.
LF: OK.
GB: We couldn't really see a distinct shape, but there were alternating colors in it and the whole bit. It was really strange. The closer we got, the worse the static electricity feeling got, and we just said, 'Fuck', and we turned around and took off.
[...]
[END OF TRANSCRIPT EXTRACT]
If, as Battram relates, the 'second' incident happened during a training exercise, it's a significantly different context.
From my reading, Battram was one of those 'back-office people', in the 'planning and program section'. He was only on patrol duties because an exercise was taking place.
Battram adds:
"Then we went back to the perimeter of Woodbridge and stuck around there. We could see some activity over there but that was it. And then we got off at the other end of the base there and got involved with exercises and horsing around and stuff.
Never did see any more from that point on. The next day was when we heard all the silly stories and stuff. Oh! Sounds like ---- city!".
[END OF TRANSCRIPT EXTRACT]
He further recollects:
LF: And this incident was in December, right?
GB: Yes.
LF: OK.
GB: It seemed like a week before New Year's. Something like that, it seemed real close to it.
LF: Were there any other sightings after that, Greg, that you heard of?
GB: The stories went on for a while like they did before that night. We heard a lot of stories about people seeing lights at night and strange things. We thought they were all on dope.
LF: Yes.
GB: That's why it was strange that night, because it was the second night we had been out on this alert. I had thought the night before, now I get to see if these guys are really high or if they're really seeing something. The night it happened, it was like - Holy shit! there must be something in the water.
[END OF TRANSCRIPT EXTRACT]
If, "the second night we had been out on this alert", does that imply the "alert" was something specific?
Three nights earlier, the inaugural 'UFO' incident had occurred.
(End of my correspondence)
This brings us back to the question of what initiated the second night's events and my post #1,023.
Is this related and does it explain Bustinza's account (and Warren's) of a, 'UFO in ground fog' that second night (leaving aside their respective story of Halt conversing with object's occupants!).
If the second night's adventures did actually occur during a base exercise (although that would seem unlikely during the Christmas holiday period), then it brings Kevin Conde's hoax aspect back into the frame.
Although initially recalling this occured, "just after Christmas", Kevin subsequently had doubts because he remembered it occuring during an exercise.
If Battram's story is taken as, 'conceivable', then do we have another sighting of, 'unfamiliar lights' descending into the forest, at the outset of our second incident?
In essence, this would appear to be the only testimony we have re the onset of events resulting in Lt. Bruce Englund alerting Halt of a, 'return visitation'?