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The Moody Blues 1967 UFO Close Encounter

Paul_Exeter

Paul_Exeter

Justified & Ancient
Joined
Jan 9, 2012
Messages
3,836
I feel this deserves its own thread, especially as The Moody Blues have been mentioned on this forum a number of times over the years. This UK blues/rock band have existed in various incarnations since 1964 and sold over 70 million albums worldwide:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Moody_Blues

I became aware of this encounter from Philip Mantle's 'UFO Landings UK':

https://www.amazon.co.uk/UFO-LANDINGS-UK-Philip-Mantle/dp/B08B7PNYTX

Which in turn led me to the source article in the Flying Saucer Review Vol 36 92) from 1991:

http://www.ignaciodarnaude.com/ufologia/FSR 1991 V 36 N 2.pdf

It is a fascinating encounter experienced by all five members of the group (as they were in '67) following a gig and whilst travelling south along the A6 in the early hours of the morning. As they watched the illuminated 'fat cigar' object land silently in a nearby field they were experiencing classic 'Oz factor' weirdness, with no other traffic or noise at all. Then intrigue suddenly turned to fear and they made a hasty exit. The report includes a sketch of the object and this is one case where you can argue the primary witness isn't in it for the fame or money.

I feel this report needs to be more widely known as there are five, sober witnesses involved and the details provided. Woulds be interested to know what forum members think
 
Yes, a group witnessing an UFO is very rare !

You have people backing up your story.

The only other group sighting was Travis Walton event.
 
Paul_Exeter said:
Which in turn led me to the source article in the Flying Saucer Review Vol 36 92) from 1991:

http://www.ignaciodarnaude.com/ufologia/FSR 1991 V 36 N 2.pdf
Click to expand...

Awkward to access, so I've copied the article here:



Screenshot 2022-11-28 at 3.30.05 AM.jpg
Screenshot 2022-11-28 at 3.30.16 AM.jpg
 
Really fascinating sighting.

I've found a reference to Mike Pinder talking about what is probably the same experience, albeit remembered a bit differently, on a podcast. Hard to link to it directly but if you go to the website

http://www.carasbasement.com/

And look up the May 27th, 2009 episode under 'episodes / archives', you'll hear Pinder talking about it from about 7 minutes 5 onwards.
 
EnolaGaia,

Again your group sighting was interesting.

Was wild life your study at Michigan State ?

The UFO stories told on this web site enforces the paranormal events that has happened to me over the years.

Simply UFOs and spirits are real.
 
charliebrown said:
EnolaGaia,
... Was wild life your study at Michigan State ? ...
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No. The MSU campus included a vast set of land, including fields and wooded areas. Our dormitory was near one of the woodlots that extended along the shore of the river running through campus. The woodlot had trails running through it. My friends and I would occasionally take flashlights and hike through the woods at night, sometimes deliberately seeking nocturnal wildlife.
 
EnolaGaia,

Did you or anyone in your group experience any missing time on your night hikes in the MSU woods ?
 
charliebrown said:
EnolaGaia,
Did you or anyone in your group experience any missing time on your night hikes in the MSU woods ?
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No. I didn't, and none of my friends reported any lost time effects.
 
It would have been interesting to find out where on the A6 the MB's incident occurred. If it was an evening gig and bearing in mind they were following their truck I doubt that they would have got much further than 80/100 mile ish from Carlisle by 1.30am. The little convoy would have had to go through Kendal, Carnforth, and Lancaster to get that far and the A6 is a laborious route at the best of times even more so back then. Possibly it was in the North West of Lancashire?
 
PeteS said:
It would have been interesting to find out where on the A6 the MB's incident occurred. If it was an evening gig and bearing in mind they were following their truck I doubt that they would have got much further than 80/100 mile ish from Carlisle by 1.30am. The little convoy would have had to go through Kendal, Carnforth, and Lancaster to get that far and the A6 is a laborious route at the best of times even more so back then. Possibly it was in the North West of Lancashire?
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Absolutel, it would be very interesting to find out if that field still exists as one theory is that they experienced a future time-slip and watched a flying car from our 2022 near future landing. After all, the craft wasn’t especially alien, a pulsing red light is used by all earthly air traffic and no aliens were sightedf. What we do have, however, is the unusual silence and absence of cars, people and wildlife.
 
Note that Mike Pinder describes the sighting as happening on the way back from Manchester, so could not have happened on that section of the A6 (if he is correct). One candidate for a tall mast on the way from Manchester to London could be the Emley Moor transmitter, assuming they went over the Pennines to join the A1.
 
Likely put them in my neck of the woods, Morecambe Bay, a UFO hot spot
low flying test area, Warton and Salmesbury, seconds away by fast jet, and
one of the main nuclear bunkers just across the fields, Weeton army camp
Springfield Nuclear, and no doubt a few I don't know about or have forgot
most of which have no friends and don't take kindly to visitors.
 
eburacum said:
Note that Mike Pinder describes the sighting as happening on the way back from Manchester, so could not have happened on that section of the A6 (if he is correct). One candidate for a tall mast on the way from Manchester to London could be the Emley Moor transmitter, assuming they went over the Pennines to join the A1.
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Pinder, judging by a handful of interviews mentioning it, seemed to think it took place in 1966, not autumn 1967, and on the M6 not A6.

One thing I did note is that Denny Laine left the band in early 1967, so Pinder's date seems more likely than that given by Graeme Edge - if Edge is correct that Laine was present.
 
Either that night's gig location or the year needs to be clarified / corrected ...

According to this fan-compiled listing of Moody Blues gigs / concerts in the Sixties:

https://concerts.fandom.com/wiki/Moody_Blues_Concerts_1960s

... the Moodies didn't play Carlisle in either 1966 or 1967, and they didn't play Manchester in 1967. They are listed as having played in Carlisle in January and August 1965 (which would explain the alleged presence of Laine).

Laine's exit from the Moody Blues is cited as occurring in October 1966.

According to this listing the Moody Blues appeared along with Laine's new group (Electric String Band) in London on 19 May 1967.
 
Note also that Clint Warwick was said by Edge to have been present. It appears he left the group even earlier in 1966 than Laine, though I suppose all this depends on whether Edge's recall of the other people is accurate.

This interview with Pinder suggests that the incident was August 1966, and identifies Warwick as the person who ran off back to the car.

Have you ever seen a UFO?

Pinder: Yes, I have. The original Moody Blues had an encounter in the north of England, August of 1966, off the freeway at night. It was a beautiful red light that was following us, but we thought it was the light from a radio-station tower. We were doing about 120 miles an hour, which was legal at that time, in a '64 Chevy Impala. I looked in the back window after a half an hour, and 60 miles later and this light was still in the same place. I began to get suspicious, so we pulled over.

We hadn't seen a car for hours, and there was no moon out that night. The red dot disappeared behind some trees and there was this big, open field on the other side of the freeway. We're looking down over this pasture and see what looks like this big harvest moon sitting in the bottom of this field. It started moving slowly towards the freeway, coming toward this gentle hill. As it got bigger and bigger, it grew more gold in color and started glowing. It was quite large, and as it got close to the fence, it started to turn around and there appeared to be two of them, one behind the other. They separated, and, gosh, these things were 80 to 120 feet wide. As they came up the hill, they turned from round to elliptical. So it was like two giant eyes, in a sense. The next we knew, Clint Warwick [the Moodies' original bassist] panicked and got back into the car, so we scuttled back. As we sped away, I could see the two lights becoming one again. It turned into a dark red and slowly moved across the freeway behind us and disappeared behind the tree. When we got back to London, we were three hours late. So it was a little bit like the interrupted journey. I'll never forget it. None of us will. Screed: Did you tell anybody?

Pinder: We reported it to the press. It was a two-liner thing, "Moody Blues See UFO in Northern England." That was it.
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I have extreme doubts about the date, the location, the names of the other witnesses, and the sobriety of those witnesses (this is a group that later became associates of Timothy Leary, after all).

Apart from that, it's a great tale.
 
BS3 said:
Note also that Clint Warwick was said by Edge to have been present. It appears he left the group even earlier in 1966 than Laine, though I suppose all this depends on whether Edge's recall of the other people is accurate.

This interview with Pinder suggests that the incident was August 1966, and identifies Warwick as the person who ran off back to the car.
Click to expand...
Don't think the various recountings tally really. The sections of the M6 at Carlisle and Penrith were not completed until 68 to 70 although they could have been on the Preston bypass which was opened in 58. Travelling at 120 (following their equipment truck?) because it was legal suggests the M6 although not having seen any cars for hours is doubtful even back then. I doubt though that a 64 Impala would achieve those speeds and certainly not on the A6 which they must have used to get to the Preston bypass. The "from Manchester" bit is confusing - I doubt that they could have got past Manchester by 1.30 if it was a late gig. No reason really for them to cross the Pennines I wouldn't have thought.

I think it's a question of misremembering details rather than anything else but it would have been fascinating to establish exactly where the encounter took place.
 
Just to give a bit of context to timings and places, it's about 90 miles from Carlisle to the Preston Bypass and on the M6 it takes 1.5 hours if no delays. On the A6 which is the route they would have taken from Carlisle it's probably 3 hours or more in modern traffic conditions. I doubt it would have been much different on the A6 in the 60s even in the early hours of the morning.
 
PeteS said:
Travelling at 120 (following their equipment truck?) because it was legal suggests the M6 although not having seen any cars for hours is doubtful even back then. I doubt though that a 64 Impala would achieve those speeds and certainly not on the A6 which they must have used to get to the Preston bypass. ...
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For a '64 Impala to hit 120 mph it would require a V8 engine (327 cu. in. or larger). A '64 327 Impala's theoretical top speed was 122 mph with the factory governor disabled. If the Chevy had one of the optional big-block (400+ cu. in.V8) engines 120 mph could have been feasible, provided the highway accommodated traveling at such speeds.

In light of how many other alleged facts are jumbled, I suspect the 120 mph claim is an exaggeration. Cruising at 120 kph (circa 74-75 mph) would have been no problem.
 
I hesitate to bring this up, but could the MB's have been on any mind altering substances? I'm not being a prude, I used to indulge back in the day, and I know how easy it is on 'shrooms or acid for one person to suggest something and everyone else 'tune in', as it were.

I've been clean myself since a bad trip in 1982. Apart from the odd line of coke, anyway. De riguer when concluding a deal in certain countries. That or indulging in horizontal negotiations with possibly not entirely willing partners. The coke was the lesser sin, as to refuse all incentives would be to illustrate bad faith.

I recall well being with my then boss in a dubious night club in St. Pete's where I spent my time talking to a gorgeous young lady who had lost her husband in the Russian invasion of Afghanistan while the boss was ogling the pole dancers. When I refused to accept the freebies offered - I was married and I take that seriously - she spent the time telling me her life story and how she had to do what she did in order to support her two kids. And then she showed me things you can do with sprayed whipped cream that under no circumstances would I have told my wife about. No intercourse took place.
 
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BS3 said:
... This interview with Pinder suggests that the incident was August 1966, and identifies Warwick as the person who ran off back to the car.
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In this interview Pinder is quoted as claiming the car had been traveling at (up to? ... ) 120 mph. In the earlier-cited podcast interview he mentions the car's speed as being only 85 mph.
 
Cochise said:
I hesitate to bring this up, but could the MB's have been on any mind altering substances? I'm not being a prude, ...
Click to expand...

Edge is quoted in the Willsher article as claiming the Moodies were sober and not using any psychoactive drugs at the time of the incident. Pinder's earlier-cited podcast interview makes no mention of the fellows' state(s) of mind.

There's another thing I noticed ... Edge claimed the guys got back in the car and took off immediately after viewing the glowing object in the field(?) beyond some trees. In contrast (?) ...

In the podcast interview Pinder refers to their arrival back in London being "three hours late" and mentions nobody remembering what happened between the time they stopped the car and the time they got back in the car and took off again.

Was Pinder alluding to "lost time" that Edge didn't mention?
 
If it was he M6 not the A6 then I could believe 120 for most of the
run down Shapp.
 
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