This topic having come to prominence, I noted preceding
remarks on issues which I may be able to illuminate:
On 10/7/03, Tim Finger wrote:
>If this case was indeed a prank why did they see fit to
>cut down all the trees in the general area?
>
>Secondly any prank involving american military personel
>who were likly to be armed being lead through a forest
>in the dark while being fooled into beliving there own
>safety may be at risk would be very foolish indeed.
Kevin Conde's stunt had nothing whatsoever to do with
security police being led into the forest.
It's a fundamental, to be expected, misunderstanding;
there were separate incidents which encompass our pivotal
'UFO' case... Britain's 'Roswell'.
Incidentally, that forest area at the end of east gate
road was already earmarked for/subject to active logging
- IIRC, three logging companies were working in
Rendlesham forest.
>any prankster would need to leave something obvious to
>be found later on to show that it was a prank or as in
>this case the joke is compleatly lost on there
>pray,making it no prank at all no matter how you look at
>it.
Surely the most enduring hoaxes are those in which the
perpetrators have no intention of ever confessing!
Aside from which, as we shall see, Kevin had zero idea,
until more recently, how glorious his practical joke had
perhaps proven to be.
On 11/7/03, Desperado wrote:
>I don't beleive either were caused by alien visitation,
>but to give any credence to Mr Conde's evidence in the
>light of the facts in simply absurd.
Which facts are those...?
>The likelihood that the Rendlesham incident was faked by
>a piss-pot helmeted cop flashing his headlights is about
>as likely as Roswell being the result of a discarded
>cigarette butt.
>
>I don't doubt for a moment that he did flash his
>headlights through the forest....
Kevin, in fact, never claimed any such thing.
>...(these rent-a-cop types need something to fill their
>time - they do f#ck all else) but what makes him for a
>moment assume that anybody took any notice of him?
Perhaps because I consequently highlighted significant,
supportive, evidence?
>Hey, Mr Conde, if you're out there, why not log onto the
>board and explain to us all how you managed it all. We'd
>all love to hear it.
If I had been a FT message board subscriber at that time.
it wouldn't have been a problem; Kevin readily made
himself available and at my invitation subscribed to the
'UFO Research List' [UFORL], where he answered any
related questions.
Then again, perhaps not so inviting on the FT forum if
you're already depicted as a 'piss-pot helmeted rent-a-
cop'!
On 16/7/03, Taras wrote:
>Personally I'd go with the "it wasn't a UFO, but this
>guy is just out for his 15 minutes" theory.
It's not remotely a credible theory given that:
- Kevin's story was first confided to myself on 5 April,
2001.
- During July, 2001, Tracy Williams, Director of the
regional BBC East, 'Inside Out', local news series, asked
if I could assist with a feasible 'Rendlesham forest UFO'
documentary.
- It was in early 2003 - some 2 years after my first
contacts with Kevin and Tracy - that I was satisfied,
from our discussions, why Kevin's testimony had evidently
resolved key aspects and _only then_ did I agree to act
as a consultant to the program's producer, Clive Dunn,
see:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/insideout/east/series3/rendlesham_uf
os.shtml
[This URL will 'wrap around']
To recap and summarise the overall, factual, background
[extracting from my own, various, publications]:
_The First Incident _
At around 3:00 a.m. on Friday 26 December, 1980, three
members of the 81st SPS, Staff-Sergeant Jim Penniston,
Airman First Class John Burroughs and Airman Ed Cabansag,
noticed some unfamiliar lights in the forest, due east of
the 'east gate', or 'back door' entrance to RAF
Woodbridge.
They received permission to investigate, off-base.
It was claimed/rumoured they had seen a 'UFO'.
_The Second Night's Events_
On the night of Saturday 27 December 1980, there was a
belated officer's Christmas party, during which the
Deputy Base Commander, Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Halt,
was alerted to yet another 'UFO' sighting in the same
forest vicinity.
As he recalled in a 1997 interview, "...it had been, how
shall I say, the centre of a lot of activity and
controversy within the police squadron and they seemed to
be more focused on UFO activity than their primary duty".
Halt decided he would, "put the whole thing to rest" and
assembled a team of five other officers. He also took
along his microcassette recorder, to make any necessary
notes.
They entered the forest near east gate and in due course
one of the officers noticed a distant flashing light.
Using a 'starlight scope', or 'starscope', night-image
intensifier, Halt documented on his tape recorder:
"It looks like an eye winking at you. Still moving from
side to side. And when you put the Starscope on it, it
sorta has a hollow centre, a dark centre, it's like a
pupil of an eye looking at you, winking. And it flashes
so bright to the Starscope that it almost burns your
eye".
Looking back towards east gate, Halt then described some
puzzling 'beams of light', seemingly being directed
downwards from unidentified aerial craft; "Now we're
observing what appears to be a beam coming down to the
ground".
The light beams were visible for an astonishing 45
minutes, from 3:15 a.m. until 4:00 a.m., with Halt
finally recording, "0400 hours. One object still hovering
over Woodbridge base at about five to ten degrees off the
horizon, still moving erratic and similar lights and
beaming down as earlier".
These were the events subsequently reported by Halt in a
memo to the Ministry of Defence.
When the 'Halt memo' become public knowledge, its
contents catapulted both the UFO story and its inherent
witnesses to celebrity status.
_The First Incident [Analysis]_
Penniston has been the only source of an alleged
encounter with a small, triangular-shaped, craft.
It's a story demonstrably grown with the telling and
factually challenged when I uncovered the original
witnesses statements written by Burroughs, Cabansag and
Penniston, at Halt's request.
As I revealed in a related article:
A remarkable tale and one which appeared to defy
rationalisation.
And so it might have remained, however, the discovery of
formerly undisclosed and critical documentary evidence
now seems to cast considerable doubt on these claims.
Set in context for the first time are the unpublished,
original witness statements written by Burroughs,
Cabansag, Penniston and Chandler.
These prove the nearby lighthouse played a much more
significant role than was ever realised, for despite
Halt's protestations that the base personnel would never
be fooled by this landmark, Burroughs, Cabansag and
Chandler's testimonies confirm the patrolmen chased a
'strange light' through the forest for two miles, before
recognising they had been following the light from its
beacon.
In his formal statement, submitted to Halt, Burroughs
wrote, "We got up to a fence that separated the trees
from the open field and you could see the lights down by
a farmers house. We climbed over the fence and started
heading towards the red and blue lights and they just
disappeared. Once we reached the farmer's house we could
see a beacon going around so we went towards it. We
followed it for about 2 miles before we could see it was
coming from a lighthouse".
Cabansag concurs: "We stopped the Security Police vehicle
about 100 meters from the gate. Due to the terrain we had
to go on by foot. We kept in constant contact with CSC.
While we walked, each one of us could see the lights.
Blue, red, white and yellow. The beacon light turned out
to be the yellow light".
"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. After we had passed through the forest, we
thought it had to be an aircraft accident. So did CSC
[Central Security Control - James] as well. But we ran
and walked a good 2 miles past our vehicle, until we got
to a vantage point where we could determine that what we
were chasing was only a beacon light off in the distance.
Our route through the forest and field was a direct one,
straight towards the light".
Whilst Penniston's initial, cursory, account doesn't
mention the beacon light episode, a more significant
anomaly is that opposed to his later description of
circling the object at close range, touching it,
photographing it and documenting this all in such detail,
in his typed statement he confirmed, "we got within a 50
meter distance... this is the closest point that I was
near the object at any point".
[END OF EXTRACT]
Halt confirms why, because of the holiday period, he did
not ask for those statements until early January, 1981.
Alas, by that time he had already become embroiled in the
'UFO' sightings, sans any knowledge that Orford Ness
[Orfordness] lighthouse had so deceived Burroughs, et al.
Can we, correspondingly, rationalise his 'UFO'....
_The Second Night's Events [Analysis]_
Again extracting from my previous articles:
Halt was asked about the assertion he had been deceived
by Orford Ness lighthouse and replied:
"First, the lighthouse was visible the whole time. It was
readily apparent, and it was 30 to 40 degrees off to our
right. If you were standing in the forest where we stood,
at the supposed landing site or whatever you want to call
it, you could see the farmer's house directly in front of
us. The lighthouse was 30 to 35 degrees off to the right,
and the object was close to the farmer's house and moving
from there to the left, through the trees".
Here, as never before, Halt provides specific details of
the perspective he believed to be accurate. When he
states, "If you were standing in the forest where we
stood, at the supposed landing site or whatever you want
to call it, you could see the farmer's house directly in
front of us", that's correct and the Orford Ness
lighthouse is in a direct line of sight, east, towards
the coast.
However, when he claims, "The lighthouse was 30 to 35
degrees off to the right", that seems to be
consequentially incorrect; the Shipwash lightship was
"off to the right", the lighthouse was straight ahead,
where Halt observed the 'unidentified light' to be.
His comment that "the object was close to the farmer's
house", again places the light source in the line of
sight to Orford Ness lighthouse, whereas he believed the
lighthouse to be much further south.
[END OF EXTRACT]
Anyone can still verify that, from Halt's documented
location, the 'lighthouse' which was "30 to 35 degrees
off to the right" [Shipwash lightship having since been
decommissioned] has now spookily disappeared...
Equally prominent, is that there remains a 'strange
flashing object', precisely where Halt's principal 'UFO'
could be seen over twenty years ago.
It's called Orford Ness lighthouse.
Kevin's sole participation relates exclusively to a prank
staged at east gate and which, astoundingly, seems to
coincide with Halt's tape-recorded observation - from
within Rendlesham forest - of those mystifying 'beams of
light'.
This is the raw evidence for Kevin Conde's first
realisation of his possible involvement with the late
December, 1980 infamous 'Rendlesham forest UFO' incidents
and contact with myself:
Dear Mr. Easton,
I'm a retired USAF SMSgt. Last night I had some time on
my hands, and was surfing the net looking for Web sites
on airbases that I had served on during my USAF career.
One of those bases was RAF Bentwaters. I was amazed to
find a couple of Web sites describing a UFO incident at
Bentwaters during my tour. Shocked actually, when you
consider what I know about these so-called incidents! One
of the web sites had an article by you.
I was a Security Policeman at RAF Bentwaters/Woodbridge
from mid 1978 to mid 1981. I arrived at Bentwaters as a
SSgt, and departed as a TSgt. I was a law enforcement
specialist. While there I worked as a patrolman, desk
sergeant, assistant flight chief, flight chief, training
NCO, and QA evaluator.
During the time that of incident I will recount occurred,
1st Lt. Bruce Englund was my Flight Commander. He figures
into one of the accounts you investigated. I also
remember a Lt Col who was a bit of a cop buff, and used
to ride along with the law enforcement patrols on a
regular basis. As I remember he was either the Vice Wing
Commander, or worked for the Wing Commander. He must be
the Lt Col Halt mentioned.
I can provide copies of my APR's (Airman's Performance
Reports) if asked, to validate the dates and positions in
which I served at RAF Bentwaters.
[...]
There were two incidents that I was personally involved
in.
Both occurred on the back gate of Woodbridge. This gate
was open during the day, and for brief periods during the
night for shift change. Woodbridge was mostly housing,
and we would open the gate during shift change so folks
could come and go between home and job during shift
change.
The gate sits out at the end of the runway at Woodbridge.
It is isolated, dark, surrounded by woods, and a little
lonely.
[...]
Cops have a tendency towards practical jokes. Practical
jokes are a tradition in the Security Police that at
times approaches the status of high art.
It was during an exercise, so I was not alone, as was
normal for the Woodbridge Law Enforcement patrol. As I
remember there were three of us.
Like I said, the back gate at Woodbridge is out all by
itself at the end of the runway. Just before you got to
the gate there were a couple of revetments surrounded by
high dirt berms. These berms would hide anything in them
from the gate guard's view.
It was dark, and a little foggy. I shut off my headlights
and drove my patrol car into one of those revetments. We
stuck several military issue flashlights out of the
windows, pointing upwards. We simply pointed the
flashlights upwards and rolled up the windows to hold
them in position. These military flashlights come with
several different color lenses in a screw on compartment
on the end of the light. These lenses come in red, amber,
blue, green and a white opaque color. Most of us carried
spare flashlights with us, so we could stick several
flashlights out the windows with different colored
lenses.
Leaving my headlights off I turned on the overheads
lights, which on American cop cars are red and blue. We
then proceeded to drive the car in slow circles while
making weird noises over the PA system. Remember, there
was a light fog, which was the key to the joke's success,
as each light appeared in the fog as a moving beam of
light.
[...]
This incident occurred right after Christmas.
This happened more than 20 years a go. I don't remember
the specific date, but it would have been right about
then.
I went back to Flight duty about 6 months before I left
Bentwaters. I left sometime in the summer of 1981. My
Shift Commander was Lt Englund, and the Security Flight
Chief at the time was MSgt Bobbie Ball (Bobbie was known
for how shiny his boots were, even in the mud and rain).
If I left QA six months before I left Bentwaters in the
summer of 1981, and my Shift Commander was Lt Englund,
and the Security Flight Chief was MSgt Ball, then my
incident is right in the ball park.
The Time. I had someone with me on patrol - that was
unusual on Woodbridge - not exactly a hotbed of crime.
The only time we had multiple folks in an LE patrol was
during alerts - exercises.
The joke would have had to have happened late - after all
the initial patrol duties like relieving the main gate
for chow, and getting the first round of building checks
done, and before things began to pick up again, and we
got bored and started looking for a way to cause trouble.
I can not say for sure, but I would guess between 1:00
and 4:00 AM.
Were there other UFO hoaxes? I don't know of any, but it
is entirely possible. It was a good stunt. Someone else
could have repeated it. In fact, most good cop practical
jokes did get repeated. We had some classics - sending
someone out for 100 feet of flight line to rope off an
area. Sending someone out for a gallon of prop wash to
clean patrol car windows with, sending someone to the
emergency room for a box of fallopian tubes for the
breathalyzer, etc.
We used at least three flashlights pointing upwards
rolled up in the windows of the patrol car. These lights
were red, blue, green, and possibly amber. The patrol car
itself had the American style square red and blue
emergency rack on top with revolving high intensity red
and blue lights. It also had bright white alley lights -
these are lights that point to the side in order to light
up buildings as you drive past them at night. It also had
a bright white spotlight that I pointed as close to
straight up as I could. I had everything except my
headlights on.
The flashlights, which were green, and maybe amber, where
nowhere as bright as the red, blue and white emergency
lights, which really lit up the night.
I don't know if I'm helping clear this up or just adding
to the stew, but I'll do all I can to help.
The only UFO incidents that occurred during my tour were
ones I participated in. The only alien that landed was
Mrs. Conde's little boy, Kevin.
This is the truth, the details are the best I can
remember after more than 20 years, and I'll take a
polygraph on that.
[END OF KEVIN'S COMMENTS]
From my previously published comments:
Science writer, Ian Ridpath, has a copy of the base
weather report for the night of Halt's excursion and it
does record low-lying fog.
In 'UFO Crash Landing?', Jenny Randles documents a
witness, Sarah Richardson (only 12 at the time), who
reportedly watched enigmatic 'light beams', when Halt was
making a similar observation.
If it correlates with Kevin's east gate hoax, directly
adjacent to the runway, then we should find the witness
observed at least three multicoloured 'beams of light' in
that location.
Jenny writes:
At the time, she was at her mother's home in Woodbridge.
It was between 1 and 3 am into Sunday, 28 December.
"From (Mum's) house you could see the river and the
forests and the bases. You could hear the revving of the
engines. You became familiar with all the spotlights and
other activity.
This night was different. Three bands of light appeared
over the woods to the side of the runway".
"They were star-like and they were bright, coloured red,
blue and yellow".
[...]
"...the oddest thing was the colour changes. Blue, green,
yellow and so on".
She claims they were present for two hours, until well
after 3 or 4 a.m. Then they just 'shot straight off'.
[END OF EXTRACT FROM JENNY'S BOOK]
Or perhaps were just switched straight off...
Jenny also notes that on the same night, local garage
owner, Gerry Harris, claimed to have observed near east
gate and apparently emanating from within the forest,
"three separate lights" which sometimes "moved around in
circles".
My personal conclusion about Kevin's prank remains
unaltered; if his hoax, or a copycat exercise, wasn't
responsible for those 'beams of light', it would be an
exceptional coincidence.
Perhaps we should keep in mind that accompanying 'UFO'
sightings are now evidenced as easily explicable and not
likely ETs would coincidentally be taking a blatant
interest in the mundane east gate/runway area.
[END OF EXTRACT]
I have since verified that the base was categorically on
'Alert Status', as Kevin recollects, when his ruse
purportedly took place.
It's also two years now - April 2002 - since I was first
contacted by John Burroughs.
Although John's inclusive story has yet to be publicised,
I can say he has confirmed:
"As far as the part about Penniston saying he examined it
[the 'craft' - James] at his leisure, I believe that came
out when he went under hypnotic regression".
"As far as the lighthouse goes, the statements that
everybody made such a big deal about were first made
available by Col Halt during the filming of 'Unsolved
Mysteries'."
"One thing I can say from what I have pulled off of the
internet about Halt and Penniston is that their story's
sure changed a lot since 'Strange but True?'. Also I feel
some of Penniston story is being influenced by him going
under hypnosis".
"Anyway I have went over many of the articles that you
have written from talking to witness over the years.
First of all everybody makes a big deal about the
lighthouse, including you, how it was being held back.
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".
In short; yes, Burroughs, Cabansag and Penniston did
notice 'alien' lights, as seen by them from the east gate
sentry point that morning, they did investigate and could
never resolve what they were, ultimately trekking two
miles through the Suffolk countryside before
discovering...
Note my FT [152] article, online at:
forteantimes.com/articles/152_rendlesham.shtml
Link is dead. See (much) later post for how to access the MIA article.
Hopefully further setting our essential 'UFO' tale in
context; Penniston claimed that both Burroughs and
himself had resultantly been given six days authorised
leave:
"I could have been out of the loop. If it was within six
days after the first night, there's a very good chance I
was out of the loop because we were given six days off...
we were pretty shook up".
"After the debriefing, Airman Burroughs and I were put on
authorized break for six days, so we drove home to
Ipswich. I dropped Airman Burroughs off, then went home,
changed clothes, and drove back to Woodbridge".
This never made sense. They had reported seeing some
unidentifiable lights, not even on base, ended up chasing
a coastal light and that justified being given almost a
week off duty?
"You saw scary lights in the woods!? Oh you poor dears,
that must have been frightful... take some time off and
come back when you're not so traumatised...".
Like Penniston's proclaimed, circa twenty minute,
examination of a landed craft, it evidently just never
happened.
At least not according to Burroughs, who states that
Penniston was already scheduled to take post-Christmas
leave.
Burroughs also confirms that on 29 December, after a
mandatory three-day break, he was back on duty, as
scheduled.
It's a fact now definitely endorsed by others, especially
Sergeant Alan Cohen, who was the Law Enforcement Desk
Sergeant at that time.
During 2003, he wrote to myself: "I remember Kevin Conde.
Good hard working man. As I recall, my flight chief for a
short period of time. When you found Kevin, you found a
gold mine. He was sharper and smarter than everyone. He,
in my opinion, rated right there with two other flight
chiefs that I worked for, TSgt Dale Combs and TSgt Dan
Koehler".
As for 'UFO' hoaxes, Cohen confirms, "Of everything I
have read I would believe Sgt Kevin Conde. I was not
aware of this practical joke, but I can tell you that we
did this kind of stuff all the time".
Perhaps more significantly, he verifies the alert status
which was a backdrop to Kevin Conde's hoax:
"The base was under alert at the time. This meant that we
were on 12 or more hour shifts".
About the first thing Cohen said was how he remembered
John Burroughs frequently being posted to east gate
during that late December period, adding:
"I don't believe we were on alert until after Christmas.
We don't do boxing day. The alert probably started on the
26th. I would have to say it lasted until the 30th or
31st. If you remember there was many things going on in
and around Europe at the time. There was the Poland
thing, the Iranian hostage crisis was coming to the end
and the IRA were bombing heavily".
And so it goes...
Any related questions, I would be pleased to address as
time permits.
James Easton.
E-mail:
[email protected]