Yes and again thank you for highlighting those points.
In a final endeavour to piece the various parts together, I have set out a breakdown of what is accepted evidence from that foundational occurrence.
Beginning with Burroughs' recollections:
* Account #1 *
"We crossed a small open field that led into the trees where the lights were coming from...".
So, there's a small field and they start walking through this, towards the trees where apparently those lights are.
"...whatever it was started moving back towards the open field...".
Now the lights have left the trees? The lights are heading back for this open field?
"All three of us hit the ground and whatever it was started moving back towards the open field... we got up and moved into the open
field".
Although they move into the open field, there are no lights in this field.
"We got up to a fence that separated the trees from the open field...".
Now they have crossed the field and reached a fence at the end of it. The trees are behind this fence.
"...and you could see the lights down by a farmers house".
There are no lights in the trees, the lights are near the farmer's house.
"We climbed over the fence and started heading towards the red and blue lights and they just disappeared".
They go forward towards the lights and lose sight of them.
"Once we reached the farmer's house we could see a beacon going around so we went towards it".
They wonder what the beacon is and head in its direction.
This seems to equate pretty well, with what Burroughs explained to myself in correspondence:
"First of all everybody makes a big deal about the lighthouse...
Well if you read my statement I
described seeing several things before coming to a Farmers House then seeing a beacon mind you a beacon not the lights we saw before. We followed it for 2 miles and could see it was coming from a Lighthouse".
"I guess what im getting at is that to this day im not sure what it was we saw but i do know that it was not the light house".
"What i mean by that is we did follow a light not knowing what it was but we at no time did we feel that it was the object we first saw. We had lost contact with the object we first saw and wanted to see what the flashing light in the distance was".
So, what does the clearing have to do with anything and when/where did the lights, 'lift off'?
Burroughs also elucidates regarding this key aspect:
* Account #2 *
"As far as Penniston goes from the moment it happened he stated to both Cabansag and i that he thought that it was a structured craft not just light's.
One of the first thing's he stated after the light's lifted off and went up into the air and disapeared is we just saw a UFO.
Also all three of us were together when we came up upon the light's in the clearing".
At what point though, did they encounter those lights in a clearing?
There doesn't seem to be any mention of this in Burroughs... l've called it, 'Account #1' to easier distinguish between them.
Penniston's statement helps here:
"Left vehicle proceeded on foot.
Burroughs and I were approximately 15-20 meters apart and proceeding on a true east direction from the logging road. The area in front of us was lighting up a 30 meter area. When we got within a 50 meter distance. The object was producing red and blue light. The blue light was steady and projecting under the object. It was lighting up the area directly under extending a meter or two out.
At this point of positive identification I relayed to CSC, SSgt Coffey. Positive sighting of object... colour of lights and that it was definitely mechanical in nature.
This is the closest point that I was near the object at any point. We then proceeded after it. It moved in a zig-zagging manner back through the woods then lost sight of it".
It seems the clearing could only have been when they first entered the forest and that looks to tie-in with Penniston's sketch - at the bottom he notes, "us".
In Burroughs account, it would apparently be where:
"All three of us hit the ground and whatever it was started moving back towards the open field... we got up and moved into the open
field".
However, Burroughs refers to an open field, not a small clearing and Penniston refers to, "an area in front of us":
View attachment 39777
Penniston recalls an actual tangible object then moving back through the trees, before confirming, as does Burroughs, they simply lost sight if it.
Nothing whatsoever in these initial testimonies about either an object, or lights, rising up and taking off.
Does Cabansag's account assist...
"Due to the terrain we had to go on by foot...While we walked, each one of us could see the lightsu. Blue, red, white and yellow. The beacon light turned out to be the yellow light. We could see them periodically, but not in a specific pattern. As we approached, the lights would seem to be at the edge of the forest. ...As we entered the forest, the blue and red lights were not visible anymore.
Only the beacon light was still blinking.We figured the lights were coming from past the forest, since nothing was visible as we passed through the woody forest. We could see a glowing near the beacon light, but as we got closer we found it to be a lit-up farmhouse. We followed it for about 2 miles before we could see it was coming from a lighthouse".
It's an altogether more mundane tale and as for the reason, one can only speculate.
In essence, both Burroughs and Penniston portray the source of those enigmatic lights as capable of maneuvering through the dense forest and for an object the size of 9 feet on each of its three sides, how was that possible.
We can see from Penniston's sketch that the box-shaped, 'vehicle' depicted is... dare we say, 'boxed-in':
View attachment 39779
The alternative scenario... presumably it has to be a misperception of lights, which seemed to move in the darkness, as all three themselves maneuvered through the forest.
Whilst keeping in mind their experience would be challenging to recollect precisely, there remains zero evidence of any vehicle which had landed and which they observed taking off again.
In addition, of course, to the fact it was documented in real time by Buran and Chandler over the radio, plus confirmed by Penniston in his written statement, that he was never closer than 50 meters to an apparent structured object.
When I asked John Burroughs how Penniston's claim of examining a triangular-shaped craft at close quarters might be rationalised, he revealed,
"As far as the part about Penniston saying he examined it at his leisure, I believe that came out when he went under hypnotic regression".
(...)
"Also i feel some of Penniston story is being influenced by him going under hypnosis".
Although as I have previously evidenced that Penniston's later story seems to have existed before his, 'hypnotic regression', this issue also applies to Burroughs, as he further revealed:
"I will also add i to went under Hypnosis way before Penniston did. And in his defense if what came out while i was under is possible it would really shock some people".
Consequently, we face the dillema - which later additions are pre or post 'hypnotic regression'.
Unless categorically evidenced it was beforehand, then it has to be deemed inadmissible.
Was John Burroughs, 'Account #2', influenced... is that why we have such a determinable discrepancy?
I hope the seemingly definitive maps provided by Robert McLean will further help in our understanding of the overall context, even though the sourc(es) of our puzzling lights remains, like the lights themselves, rather illusive.