Sunday 16 December 2012

I'm still here but broadband still really poor!

Again - Apologies to all out there who follow my posts. I've had a frankly very frustrating and baffling time trying to get my BT broadband speed up to something vaguely usable. This means I'm lucky to be able to reliably access my posts let alone compose one.

As of today, my download speed is still a very meagre 287kbs - which is roughly a 60th of what it could potentially be with the deal I'm on!

I'm still waiting for a stable line so that I can demonstrate to my suppliers (BT) that the speed needs to be re-adjusted upwards.

It's times like these that make me think the vast majority of us are still 'children playing in the dark' when it comes to the technology now available to us and the increasing reliance we place on others - particularly large multinational corporate technology giants - that are allegedly 'in the know' about that technology.

It reminds me of an Armstrong and Miller TV sketch where a time-traveller - Alexander Armstrong - is sent back in time to tell Faraday - played by Ben Miller - about the technological wonders the future had in store. Only problem was that Armstrong's character was a last-minute (and uninformed) replacement for the boffin who was supposed to have been sent back - but who was 'Too fat to fit in the [time travel] pod'.

This led to (in my view) a funny and embarrassing exchange where Armstrong's character quickly revealed his absolute lack of (even basic) knowledge on the physics (and history) front when questioned by Faraday.

Anyway - here it is:-



Okay - so it's not likely to make everyone laugh, But I could see the point behind the sketch.
I expect a good 90 per cent (at least) of humanity today won't know how the everyday technology they use works, at least to the point that they could successfully build it themselves (and this includes myself!).

Makes me wonder what E.T. would think about that if they were observing us. Don't expect they'd be too impressed!

Tuesday 20 November 2012

Broadband issues

Just a quick note to say I've been experiencing broadband connection and slow speed issues over the last couple of weeks and am slowly going through all the possible causes.

So I'd rather not make any posts until this is fixed.

Am now seeking help from BT - my service provider. There appears to have been an ongoing problem in the part of town I'm in so am hoping it gets fixed soon.

Thanks,

Jonathan

Saturday 3 November 2012

UFOs invading Indian airspace?

This fascinating story is emerging on the net and rather than repeat it, I've included a link to an article about it in the Kashmir Times.

If true (and don't forget this is a newspaper article like any other), it would suggest that over the last few months the Indian military have reported, to their own authorities, regular incursions into Indian airspace by "Unidentified Luminous Objects" which - after some considerable analysis by both their own military and scientific experts, so far appear to rule out conventional man-made, atmospheric or astronomical phenomena. Another older story also referred to in this article - and more bizarre still - is the supposed 2004 encounter between a scientific expedition in the same region and what is described as "...a fourfoot tall robot-like figure..." which "...rapidly became airborne and disappeared."

What strikes me about this is - if it's true - the level of involvement by various military and scientific bodies in a country constantly on the alert, given its emergence as a nuclear superpower and that it borders with another superpower - China. This article by the Diplomat is just one of many for example that shows the growing tensions between the two countries.

In view of the above, the Indian military will - aside from constantly monitoring their border with China - presumably have considerable experience of conventional military technology so, as the Kashmir Times article explains, be looking out for and already be able to identify man-made (especially Chinese) craft including military drones.

It'll be interesting to see if any more comes out of this story (and I find it far more tantalising than the - literally - 'damp squib' that is the Baltic undersea object story). For example, it would be remarkable (but unlikely) if a similar record of events emerged from an equally baffled Chinese military.

 However, it's likely this will just get forgotten in favour of more mundane news events...

Tuesday 23 October 2012

Conspiracy Road Trip: UFOs

On Sunday night I watched my recording of the BBC's Conspiracy Road Trip: UFOs from last week.

I wasn't expecting much from the programme - and wasn't disappointed in that regard.

It was another example of the lazy programming over the last few years which seems to be a hallmark of British television allotted to the subject of UFOs. Andrew Maxwell - an Irish comedian (why him as presenter?) who has occasional flashes of comic genius - and whose star must be on the wane (judging by this show), led a group of five British people, each of whom claimed their own UFO encounter, on a road-trip through American (why not British?) UFO hotspots to effectively discredit their experiences. The climax (or should it be debacle?) was their collective experience of Area 51 which ended up being that of spending three hours lying flat on a floor with guns pointed at their heads for having trespassed onto the outskirts of the infamous military base - go figure.

The 'contactees'

I think it was no coincidence that one of these people (called Scott) had been chosen presumably because of his penchant for wearing a tin-foil skull-cap under his beanie hat when out and about and his conviction that earth was shortly to be invaded by aliens. I had a hard time believing that this chap wasn't a plant to make the programme marginally more interesting for it's one hour run-time. Stooge or not it seemed like he'd watched M Night Shyamalan's Signs more often than is healthy.

The other four 'contactees' ranged from a long-time UFO investigator from Shropshire called Darren; a wide-eyed young male bar worker called Ben - claiming to be a witness to a classic night-time lights sighting; an attractive but vulnerable looking* lady (and there's a point to me mentioning this later) called Brigitte - who claimed to have seen a classic saucer-shaped UFO over a US freeway; and another more ballsy and eloquent lady - Franky - who claimed an alien/other-dimensional vision.

The 'experts'

After listening to each person's claimed account of their experience, Andrew Maxwell attempted to debunk it by introducing them to an 'expert' offering a contrary viewpoint. Seth Shostak was the first who - quite rightly - asked for photographic or film evidence of Brigitte's encounter, which she couldn't provide.

But hang on? Seth Shostak is an astonomer isn't he? Yes he participates in SETI (which I happen to be a subscriber to through SETI@Home), which means he's considered the possibility of intelligent extraterrestrial life out in the cosmos much more than your average person in the street - but since when has he seriously studied the phenomenon of UFOs?

Another 'expert' was (if I'm correct about this) scientist and biologist P.Z. Myers who appeared to state - if I understood correctly - that it was statistically highly improbable (not impossible mind you) that another species from outside earth could - through natural evolution - develop humanoid facial features akin to our own like the ubiquitous 'grey' aliens supposedly had. But - wait a minute? Turn that on its head and there are thousands of species on this planet - apparently unrelated to humans on a genetic level - that have two eyes, a nose and a mouth. Am I missing something?

Yet another 'expert' was psychologist Michael Shermer, publisher of The Skeptic magazine who whilst correctly pointing out what the initials UFO actually stood for (and that anyone with an enquiring mind shouldn't bother to enquire further on any UFO origins - some chance!) - went on to patronise the contactees by advising them that humans were - as a whole - fallible creatures often prone to convincing delusions. Fair enough - but that would presumably mean his own world view was just as fallible wouldn't it?

The wildcard

In a rather strange deviation from the pattern being established so far in the programme, the group was then introduced to former airline pilot and wildcard in UFO circles - John Lear - who, it appeared on the surface, was a bit of own goal for Mr Maxwell - but this might have been for calculated comic effect - in that he (John Lear) banged on not only about aliens being studied at Area 51 but also about his (frankly implausible in my view) theory concerning a city on the moon.

The dubious book author

Finally, the contactees were introduced to author Annie Jacobsen , who's faced a lot of criticism for various long stretches of the imagination in her book Area 51: An Uncensored History of America's Top Secret Military Base including those concerning a story that one of her sources may have been citing elements strangely similar to those in science fiction writer James Blish’s short story "Tomb Tapper". In the programme, Ms Jacobsen effectively stated that the CIA/military use UFO conspiracies as disinformation to conceal their greatest military secrets. Fair enough again - I'm sure all the Superpowers engage in routine disinformation campaigns. However, that doesn't automatically rule out the E.T. hypothesis (E.T.H.) still being a possible explanation behind some UFO encounters.

Just to add insult to injury, Jacobsen then regurgitated (from her book) an old chestnut concerning the crashed Roswell disc being a Stalinist Russian device carrying deformed or mutilated human passengers in 'spacesuits'. Other versions of this story cite children having being found aboard - again an element possibly pinched from the science fiction story referred to above. Jacobsen claimed she had a reliable but anonymous 'source' to confirm this. But this story is no more plausible than the E.T.H. - and what if her 'source' is feeding her disinformation?

My conclusion?

In my view, the arguments put forward by the sceptics were just as flimsy as the evidence for the five contactees' encounters. Where were the representatives of MUFON, NARCAP or even BUFORA? Where was Fife Symington III, Leslie Kean, Nick Pope or any of the speakers at the recent Secrets of Area 51 event (you could see this event's logo in the background at one point suggesting that Andrew Maxwell and co. were at the National Atomic Testing Museum during filming)?

None of the above people were on hand to give a balanced appraisal of these claimed encounters (or at least make the five people on the show not feel completely humiliated) - and I think I can guess why. Where they did rope in one 'ufologist' - author and UFO investigator Christopher O'Brien - half-way through the programme, it was only in an attempt (ultimately fruitless) to make his theories appear more outlandish to the contactees than their own.

At the end I couldn't decide whether Andrew Maxwell's own crisis of conscience at putting Brigitte - whom I presume he liked because she was 'attractive and vulnerable-looking'* (I told you there was a reason I mentioned it earlier) - through a polygraph test, only to intervene and stop it, was genuine, ill thought out, or just patronising.

Actually - I did decide.

We never got to find out whether Brigitte would have passed or failed. But the results wouldn't have mattered anyway. If she genuinely believed she'd seen a flying saucer - even if in reality she hadn't - I doubt that a polygraph test would have revealed anything significant either way. Maxwell was convinced she would fail (an arrogant assumption to make) and so wanted to 'protect her belief system' (another arrogant assumption) and consequently protect her supposed 'fragile state'. Just how patronising can one Irish comedian be towards a grown woman?

Of course it was never the programme makers' intention to give credence to anything these people said or had apparently experienced. Even if they had, that's not how it came out in the final edit. And each individual had probably been hand-picked just as they would have been for an episode of Come Dine With Me, Coach Trip, or a myriad of other 'reality' shows, with the point being for the relevant, casual audience 'demographic' of this type of show to indulge in voyeuristic schadenfreude.

So - given the attention deficit, dumbed-down programming like this that many appear to accept - we're unlikely to ever see a quality documentary exploring this subject in-depth on British television anytime soon, where:-
  • credible witnesses in the military and civil aviation, the police and other emergency services of different countries worldwide come forward and are interviewed; 
  • individuals such as Stanton Friedman, Leslie Kean, Timothy Good and Nick Pope have been shown to be writing about the subject rationally and with rigor (and for far longer than I suspect Andrew Maxwell has been bothered about the subject); 
  • sceptics have an opportunity to have their say but also be roundly challenged by opponents including those named above;
  • documentary evidence such as MOD case files and other hard evidence - including radar, radio, photographic and film records, imply a significant number of UFO incidents that still remain unexplained to this day;
  • and whether we like it or not, the same documentary evidence points - in a number of cases - to something or someone (not necessarily E.T.) with apparently very advanced technology penetrating (and causing many potentially lethal near-miss incidents in) the airspace of the UK, US, China, Belgium, France and Sweden to name but a few.

Ho-hum.

Guilty as charged?

Anyway the full programme is below if you haven't already seen it. Let me know what you think...



Friday 12 October 2012

Secrets of Area 51 revealed?

I'm sure all of you will have noted the recent event "Area 51: Myth or Reality" that took place at the National Atomic Testing Museum, which is affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution. The publicity running up to it rather misleadingly claimed that the 'secrets' of 'Area 51' were to be revealed.

Obviously such publicity promised much and delivered virtually nothing, so whilst there wasn't any earth-shattering news to come out of this event, it was a milestone for having the Smithsonian - a respected U.S. establishment - host an event of this type.
Publicity image from the National Atomic Testing Museum
It was also notable for having five respected speakers with military backgrounds and/or impressive credentials who willingly and candidly spoke about their take on the UFO phenomenon - and this being outside of any pro-ufologist forum such as that of the Disclosure Project. The speakers were retired US Air Force Col. Robert Friend; retired US Air Force Col. William Coleman; retired US Air Force Col. Charles Halt; former UK Ministry of Defense UFO investigator Nick Pope; and retired US Army Col. John Alexander.

Several online articles, including one posted by the Las Vegas Sun give a good rundown of the speakers and their comments so I won't repeat them here.

Concerning Area 51

Area 51 itself is in the news yet again because of a BBC film crew that recently tried - and failed - to enter the base, according to various articles, the most comprehensive of which is the Daily Mail's.

At the BUFORA 50th anniversary conference, a member of the audience asked one of the speakers whether they had any insider knowledge about the old chestnut that is the alleged reversed engineering of alien spacecraft at Area 51. I have to say I groaned inwardly when I heard this person ask the question (a question that was frankly naive). The speaker rightly answered that they had no knowledge on this. Why would they anyway? It is highly unlikely that a representative of a volunteer UFO investigation body in Britain would have come into possession of genuine, privileged information about Area 51, let alone whether this information contained the 'smoking gun' about E.T.

As it is, if you believe the hype about what goes in in Area 51 then this place is perhaps - bizarrely - one of the worst kept military secrets in the world. Look at it another way however (I'm sure I'm not the first to say this) and we may be observing a great smoke and mirrors operation in effect. In my view,  Area 51 very usefully serves to divert attention away from genuine ongoing USAPs or black projects elsewhere in the U.S. (or perhaps in other friendly countries) which - if they are being carried out in the interests of national security - should of course remain heavily protected from unfriendly powers.

Given the continuous satellite surveillance by all superpowers - and other interests over the globe, not to mention an increasing army of 'Google-earthers' out there,  any such activity would have to be based either underground or in very ordinary looking facilities at an unremarkable location so as not to attract unwanted attention. Such a location, or locations could be housed in existing military - or even civil - facilities but known to only a select few with the highest compartmentalised security clearance. And given the Americans have had nearly 70 years - since the Second World War - to perfect how to hide their greatest military secrets, I'm sure they're now very good at it.

As for strange lights/activities observed by those over the years who claim to have skirted - or even penetrated - the perimeter of Area 51 (a rather foolhardy thing to do in my opinion considering the threat of deadly force to interlopers - the BBC film crew were let off lightly in my view), this could all be part of the 'show'.

Of course I claim no privileged knowledge on this subject. It just seems to me to be a simple and logical conclusion to reach about this now world-famous area.


Thursday 4 October 2012

Another school running a 'UFO crash drill'?

Ok so I recently posted this about a few instances of schools running 'UFO crash drills' and - what d'you know? Another one pops up in the news!

Here's the link to the article in the (presumably Sheffield) 'Star'

This time it's a 'rocket' but the event is staged in much the same way as previous events.

It makes me think that someone, most probably a fast-streamer Civil Servant - or an 'HEOD' as they're now called - in the Department for Education thought conducting such activity across schools in England would be a wheeze. Either that or school heads are just copying each other's ideas.

But recently allowing this kind of thing into school activity does seem rather strange, even if it is done under the guise of increasing an awareness of 'science' amongst pupils.

So who first planted the suggestion of doing this at all at the first school and why?

Monday 24 September 2012

Undersea Mystery in Baltic: Update

At the 50th Anniversary BUFORA Conference, Clas Svahn from Sweden representing the AFU (the final speaker for the first day) was asked whether he had any knowledge about the Baltic sea underwater object(s) discovered by the Ocean X Team, given that the Ocean X Team is also Swedish. 

Clas replied (and I'm paraphrasing here) that he had been in touch with the Ocean X team and there was nothing new to report other than what is already in the public domain. However, he did confirm that, from what he had been advised, the object(s) are indeed made of stone or rock - as opposed to being metallic - which, in my view, would certainly end speculation about any form of 'craft' having been discovered (unless our E.T. or pan-dimensional friends can fabricate vehicles from stone of course!).

He went on to explain that there would be no fresh news released for the time being because the Ocean X Team appear to be tied into a deal with a television company, who will most likely have exclusive rights to any broadcast about the undersea object(s).  Consequently, any release of information prior to the TV broadcast would compromise the deal. Clas said that it is likely that any such broadcast will be later this year.

This makes perfect sense to me - and I think it increasingly likely that this will be a huge anticlimax. All the same, Ocean X - and whichever TV company they are apparently working with - will still milk this for all it's worth to them.

Clas - if you happen to read this post and anything I have reported here is inaccurate, I would be more than happy to correct it.


Sunday 23 September 2012

BUFORA's 50th Anniversary Conference

Yesterday I attended the first day of BUFORA's 50th Anniversary Conference at the Holiday Inn, Kings Cross, London. 

BUFORA Logo

It's the first time I'd attended an event of this type, so I went pretty much with an open mind as to what to expect. Having given presentations myself and attended numerous seminars in my former (Govt) capacity I was able to look at these speakers with an experienced and critical eye. On the whole - and the usual minor technical upsets notwithstanding, I'd say it was was a good experience for anyone not very conversant with the whole UFO subject, as well as a happy and familiar experience for those with much more grounding in it. The main speakers (detailed below) gave good presentations, each of which centred on different aspects of the UFO phenomenon. In fact, I would go as far as saying that one speaker especially easily matched some university lectures I have seen for quality of content and professionalism in presenting. It seemed to me that attendance at the event was good. It appeared to peak during the middle of the day with something like up to 70-80 delegates (at a guess) packed into the small conference room.

BUFORA is run by a hard working and dedicated group of volunteers who genuinely want to find the truth behind the persistent enigma of the UFO phenomenon, irrespective of whether what they find fits in with popular public perception or not. It is clear that they are definitely not sensation seekers and are professional and unbiased in their search for explanations behind UFO incidents. It is a testament to their serious commitment to 'Ufology' that BUFORA has lasted half a century whilst other similar such groups have appeared and vanished over a (sometimes much) shorter timespan.

What impressed me was their broad consensus that the majority of UFO cases they had investigated had conventional explanations (which I agree with), and that they possess a wealth of hard data and experience to support this. This of course makes those few cases where all the usual explanations are ruled out more compelling, but I liked the assertion that - as more than one of the speakers pointed out - just because we don't yet have definitive answers to such cases, we shouldn't automatically turn to the E.T. hypothesis for a solution.

It is apparent too that BUFORA have, over the years, garnered respect amongst other agencies/communities involved to a lesser or greater extent in the UFO phenomenon such as astronomers and civil aviation professionals. It is also worth noting that they gather witness testimony from civil aviation and military personnel (in confidence of course) in addition to members of the general public.

Consequently, I would strongly encourage anyone with a serious interest in UFOs to check in and register with BUFORA. And I say this in my blog without having had any financial incentive from them to do so.

And so to the speakers 
(please scroll to the relevant bio in the BUFORA link provided for the first four speakers)

Lionel Beer

Lionel Beer was a founder member in 1962 of BUFORA. He shared some interesting anecdotes about BUFORA's beginnings and some of his personal experiences, as a precursor to the other presentations. Of note was his meeting with none other than Dr. J. Allen Hynek with photographic evidence to prove it.

Heather Dixon

Heather Dixon's presentation was a good overview of the fallibility of human memory and recall in terms of witness testimony - and how we do not yet fully understand the workings of the human mind to be confident, especially when attempting to explain UFO encounters or 'high strangeness' events generally. For example, she touched on hypnagogic and hypnopompic stages of sleep which can leave a witness in an 'altered state of reality' and vulnerable to experiencing things that may be subjectively, as opposed to objectively, 'real'. It could be argued that many - but not necessarily all - abduction cases could be explained by this altered state of consciousness, especially if there is no external evidence i.e. multiple witness testimony or other physical evidence available to investigators. What was also made clear in her talk was the unreliability of regression hypnotherapy as a form of witness testimony, which is still open to debate and which is why BUFORA has a policy of not using it to gather evidence.

John Spencer

In my view, John Spencer's presentation was the most engaging. John covered the growth of the modern UFO phenomenon from the days of the Kenneth Arnold sighting to the present and how media reportage, cinema treatment and patterns in UFO encounters often mirror world events or influence public perception. An example cited was George Adamski's alleged encounters with the 'Nordic Aliens'. To paraphrase John, the benevolent 'Nordics' gave advice about the dangers of atomic weapons (very much an issue at the time of Adamski's alleged encounters) but did not appear far-sighted enough to mention other significant threats to humanity such as global warming. In other words, many of these 'close encounters' involved aliens telling various humans about issues that were hardly prophetic and already widely known. What was also interesting was John's theory about the Americans' recurrent theme of 'dual identity' in life or 'hybridisation' in their UFO encounters. He noted that a sizeable number of US abduction cases featured aliens seeking insemination with human DNA to create some new hybrid race, and that this reflected recurrent themes of the hybrid human/alien, human/robot, human/mutant, human/vampire etc. in the majority of American science fiction and fantasy, something which - interestingly - is not so prevalent in British SF and fantasy.

Jenny Randles

Jenny joined the conference by video link and also gave an engaging talk about how important it is to not jump to conclusions about a given UFO event until one has as much available evidence as possible. She then cited a classic case where film evidence of a glowing UFO orb subject to multiple witness sightings was in fact a rare - but not unknown - 'ball' of superheated fuel from a test fighter plane experiencing engine trouble and engaging its afterburners to rectify the problem.
Consequently, she explained that serious investigators have to be mindful of and rule out a huge variety of conventional explanations before a case ceases to be one of an Identified Flying Object (IFO) and subsequently becomes a UFO. In fact, Jenny said that BUFORA tend to use the initials 'UAP' (which can stand equally for Unidentified Atmospheric Phenomena - as for Unidentified Aerial Phenomena) when engaging with external agencies such as the police, military or CAA, as a way of engendering confidence and being an effective disassociation from the stigma attached to the initials 'UFO'.  I don't think their organisation's name would have quite the same ring to it if they called it BUAPORA though!

Given the above, Jenny has co-authored a book about supposed UFO encounters that ended up having conventional explanations, called 'The UFOs That Never Were'. I plan to get my hands on a copy as soon as I can.

The Reverend Lionel Fanthorpe

Lionel was a reasonably well-known UK household name in the nineties having presented Channel Four's Fortean TV. He is a colourful and charismatic character, most notably being an Anglican priest, keen motorcyclist and a 3rd Dan martial arts instructor. He and his wife Patricia have decades of experience in the paranormal world and do not devote themselves exclusively to just the UFO phenomenon.

In his very stimulating talk, and in addition to sharing some fascinating anecdotes, Lionel laid out his - and his wife's - six key theories concerning explanations for the hard core of inexplicable UFO encounters, in that they could be:-

1. 'time ships' - vehicles or devices from the future with technology far in advance of our own;

2. 'dimension ships' - vehicles or devices that have crossed over into our universe from a parallel one;

3. 'extraterrestrial' visitors - as in visitors from another planet;

4. vestigial ancient technology - as in devices from hitherto unknown or long-vanished former human civilisations;

5. secret Government/military experiments; and

6. psychic or psychological phenomena which is as yet not fully understood.

Clearly number 3. is the most popular theory and more recently there has been an acceptance of the first two, which - unsurprisingly - has developed in line with cutting edge thought in the mainstream scientific community. Number 5. is popular with conspiracy theorists of course and I imagine number 6 is in the list because of Lionel's own experience.

I found theory 4. to be something I hadn't seriously considered before. There are more than a few 'ancient alien' proponents who believe humanity was given advanced technology by extraterrestrials thousands of years ago - but not many of these appear to consider the possibility that humans, through their own ingenuity, might have already achieved advanced levels of technology during the 200,000 years it is currently estimated we have been on the planet (as Homo sapiens or humans). A big problem with this theory however is that one would have expected some archaeological evidence to support this, given that we are still unearthing dinosaur fossils that are far older by several tens of millions of years.


Clas Svahn board member of the AFU

Clas Svahn was given the longest slot of the conference by far (it felt something like 90 minutes without a break) which was asking an awful lot of the delegates in terms of attention at the end of quite a long day. I suspect that this was less his doing and more to do with BUFORA giving him such latitude because: a) he had travelled the furthest of all the speakers (from Sweden) to be there and b) it became apparent that the body he represents (AFU) has given a great deal of support to BUFORA, and the relationship between the two bodies is a strong one.

Clas talked about the history of the body he represents and the frankly staggering amount of work his group of volunteers undertake in recording and documenting UFO cases worldwide since the start of the modern UFO phenomenon - which I applaud. What also stood out for me was that they have a very good working relationship with the Swedish military, which still has its own 'UFO desk' (unlike Britain) and which uses the AFU's database to record their own UFO incidents. 

Clas then gave delegates a fascinating insight into the long-standing 'Ghost-rocket' phenomenon in Sweden which is too extensive to elaborate on here. Please follow the link for a general explanation.

All in all, BUFORA staged a very good event for those interested in the UFO phenomenon.  Long may their good work continue until (perhaps one day) the whole mystery is comprehensively explained.



Friday 21 September 2012

Why are schools running 'UFO crash drills'?

Just today I noticed the following article

Pupils investigate UFO crash site 

which - bizarrely - refers to pupils of a school in Somerset being allowed to get involved in the 'investigation' of a mock 'UFO Crash site'. This is allegedly with the assistance of local police whilst extra theatricality is provided in the form of an 'MI5 operative' and 'scientists' being present (presumably teachers and local volunteers) at some point during the day

Leigh UFO and meteor sightings (From The Bolton News)
Now whilst this is a great way to engage young minds with what is probably a fun and exciting event (wish my school had done something like this when I was a nipper!) why stage a crashed UFO event, rather than recreate a more earthly crime scene of some kind?

Doing the usual internet trawl reveals that this has generated quite a few results, which I guess is no bad thing in terms of publicity for the school. What's more this isn't the first time this has been done. Another such article on a separate exercise is Pupils Investigate UFO. Others go back to at least 2008. (Note: these articles are helpfully referred to by other net authors - I can't claim the credit for having initially spotted them)

It begs the question - why UFOs?

It could just be a case of a subject matter being one that is most appealing to a young generation brought up with the likes of Dr Who and recent releases of films like Men In Black 3. These exercises may also all be the brainchild of one or a small number of individuals as a way of stimulating pupils across the UK.

But is the apparent trend more than that?

If - as some experts on the E.T. hypothesis behind UFOs believe - there is some gradual disclosure process being carried out by The State in various countries (a theory I remain open-minded about), then one could argue that one aspect of this could be the act of engaging the youngest minds of our society.

However, there only seem to be a handful of exercises like this that have taken place in the UK so far. It would be interesting to see if other countries do something similar with their own children. To date they don't appear to have happened with any frequency to suggest anything other than coincidence. In other words - it doesn't look like it's part of any 'grand plan' so far...




Monday 10 September 2012

Douglas Trumbull's response concerning UFOTOG

Dear All,

I've been away...

My apologies for not posting for some time. There's no excuse for this other than my having visited family and friends during the Summer and being involved in other personal pursuits.

Douglas Trumbull's response re: UFOTOG!

I can now report however, further to my earlier posts
Still no news on UFOTOG and An open email to Douglas Trumbull about UFOTOG that - after a gentle reminder - Mr Trumbull has very kindly sent a comprehensive response to me concerning his project.

For any doubters out there I have attached the full response as a JPEG (in addition to the full text) below.

As you can see I had subsequently asked Mr Trumbull if there was any part of his response he would prefer me to exclude - but have not heard back from him so far. So Mr Trumbull - if you are reading this - I hope you will forgive me if I publish your email to me in full, as I felt I could not wait longer to share its contents with readers of this blog. In any case, I judged that there was nothing sensitive in its content that warranted exclusion or (more importantly) that Mr Trumbull would object to my   
publishing.

Note that the UFOTOG project is effectively shelved until such time as sufficient funding can be found for it. I'm sure this news will come as a disappointment to all. BUT - if anyone out there thinks they may be able to significantly financially support Mr Trumbull's project then I'm sure he'd like to hear from you!

Here is the screen capture of the email as a JPEG...


...and the full text of our latest exchange:-

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Sent to me by douglashtrumbull@gmail.com - 5 September 2012 20:16 U.S. local time]

"Hi Jonathan,

I apologize, but UFOTOG is not a priority project with me right now.

To answer some of your questions:

I have invested heavily in the UFOTOG project for many years, yet have not been able to find financing to actually hit the road and do the real research. Therefore no real research has been attempted, which could require very expensive equipment and sensors, as well as a dedicated crew to work in the field for months or years. I created the UFOTOG demo film for the purpose of raising significant money to make an intensive long term study, hopefully resulting in a feature length IMAX type documentary of the REAL THING.

Whatever that is, I do not know, but what I do know is that even if we got amazing and scientifically valid, peer reviewable, data and imagery, who do you reveal it to? The police? The military? A government agency? Don't think so. But I would want people like Stephen Hawking or Michio Kaku to comment on what we find.

Nevertheless, recent interest has been shown by some "reality television" producers, but they have a significant financial inability to pay for the expensive equipment needed. They only budget for the production, not the science. So I am not confident that anything will happen. Shows like UFO HUNTERS is what they want and expect, and that is of no interest to me.

There has been no data collected, thus no secret data or images to release.

I am very passionate about the project, and may feature elements of UFOTOG in some upcoming sci-fi film projects, and maybe that will spark some interest in moving the project forward with the funding required. Real science is expensive, but there may be money for fiction. Go figure.

I will not give up on this.

All the best,

Doug"


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[Sent by me to douglashtrumbull@gmail.com - 6 September 2012 01:00 London time]

"Dear Doug,

Thank you so much for your swift and comprehensive response to my last email. Thanks too for the clarification concerning UFOTOG which I appreciate will now be shelved for the time being.

If you are happy for me to do so I would like to publish your response in my blog. If there are any parts of this email exchange you would prefer me to remove I am more than happy to do that (so long as it's not the whole exchange!).

I can empathise and understand only too well the difficulties in securing funding for research - especially where it may be the subject of controversy. For example, in my last (UK) Government role I worked in higher education policy and am wholly familiar with the challenges now faced by established universities seeking research grants in the face of dwindling Govt support.

If there is any small part I can play to assist let me know. I am attending the annual BUFORA conference in a couple of weeks and - if you like - I can spread the word about UFOTOG there - although I strongly suspect that a) most of the delegates will already know about your project and b) you'll have much better contacts than I have!

It's remotely possible that one or more of my readers - all of whom will be sympathetic to your cause - may have useful contacts or information to further assist.

I agree that in the (what currently sounds unlikely) event that sufficient funding were to be found and peer-reviewable data was gathered, respected figures in the scientific community such as Stephen Hawking or Michio Kaku would be best placed to comment on it and lend credibility to any findings of note.

Even then getting such data peer-reviewed would be a significant challenge - especially in terms of engaging a group of eminent scientists or aviation experts - whom one would want not to be strongly biased either way on the subject of UFOs or UAP.

You mention UFO Hunters. I've watched one or two online trailers and was very quickly turned off. Sensationalist programmes like this can't even get the basics right and pander to the lowest common denominator. And I don't see any change in such programming coming any time soon.

It would be a great shame if all the effort on your part to date came to naught.

But you should know that there is an increasing number of people out there who - like me - are sick and tired of all the amateur and largely faked online footage and yearn for a true professional to show us what on earth (or off-earth perhaps?) is going on in our skies.

I know if I had several million pounds/dollars in my account I'd be investing in UFOTOG but alas...

In the meantime, I wish you all the best with your other projects and hope that a ridiculously wealthy and sympathetic benefactor comes knocking on your door soon.

All the best to you too,

Jonathan"









Monday 13 August 2012

E.T. doesn't appear at 2012 Olympics. Hardly a surprise


So - no unearthly revelations at all surrounding the 2012 Olympics. Hardly surprising.


It was a wonderful and superbly managed event watched by billions (myself included for both the opening and closing ceremonies) and at no point did E.T. make an appearance.

Yes there was that brief fuss about what was most likely a video of the Goodyear blimp or a nearby helicopter but nothing to make any hardened sceptic's jaw drop.


 Now we can all move on safe in the knowledge that conspiracy theorists will have to claim another major event (sporting or otherwise) to be ripe for an E.T. hijack...

Tuesday 31 July 2012

'UFO' over 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony?

My wife is very into sports generally (I'm not bothered on the whole) so of course she's been excited about the 2012 Olympics. So - being the generous soul that I am - I decided to record the whole 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony for her, at the same time as watching it live with her last Friday.

My indifference about sport aside, I have to admit I was very impressed with the whole ceremony and how smoothly it ran and was also quite roused by the monumental and historical event unfolding before our eyes. It also gave me a great sense of respect for all those involved and pride in what they had achieved for Britain and for London.

But I digress, because a tiny part of me was hoping that something truly unusual might happen at this event which - as far as I'm concerned - never actually came to pass.  Given that roughly a sixth of the planet's population was watching an event that celebrates human cohesion, good will and competitive spirit, one would have thought this might be a good time for E.T. to make an appearance.

You see, I hadn't failed to notice that there have been, in the past few months, a number of headline-grabbing articles about people placing wild 1000-1 bets on a 'UFO' or more specifically an alien spaceship appearing over the 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremony.  Unsurprisingly, Nick Pope has been asked about and has commented on the possibility of E.T. making an appearance at this event. One angry punter having made such a bet now wants his money back from William Hill for what he claims is a 'flying saucer' in the ceremony's video footage as below.


Even more bizarrely, claims have been made about the 2012 Olympics being a platform for the infamous 'Project Blue Beam' conspiracy which I won't elaborate on here (simply because I personally think it's a load of rubbish).

Now Goodyear are already saying that this is likely to be one of their unbranded blimps being used by an NBC camera crew (unbranded because they are not official sponsors of the games). If what they say is true, then the object in question is not a UFO.

My money's on it being an airship or blimp. To me it looks like the lit up cabin on the underside of the main structure of an airship and it's seems to be moving at the right speed. But - as with a lot of such sensationalised footage - it's really too blurry to be sure.

Anyway, there's still a fair bit of the Olympics to go - including the Closing Ceremony - so who knows what else might pop up?






Saturday 14 July 2012

Tony Blair and the UFO files

Just a quick reference to the most recent BBC News article on the British UFO files

Tony Blair's name is used as a headline grabber and I'm unashamedly using it here too.

This comes hot on the heels of Dr David Clarke's article "MOD Files make UFOs history" about the release of the ninth set of MOD UFO case files.

Look through the MOD files published to date and you will not see any revelation about UK Government cover-ups, (as there is unlikely to be one) but you will find some fascinating and as yet unexplained cases such as the 'UFO over Manchester' incident video I posted a couple of days ago.

As Nick Pope discusses in his book 'Open Skies, Closed Minds', the MOD's intention when recording accounts of UFO activity (something they now no longer do), was always to assess whether there was any threat to UK airspace. To this day the MOD's conclusion, after almost 60 years of gathering data, appears to be 'no'.

However, one could argue - as Nick points out to some degree in his book - that 'no threat' strangely allows for numerous accounts of UFOs or UAP that:-
  • have near misses with military aircraft; 
  • have near misses with passenger aircraft sometimes carrying hundreds of people;
  • routinely emerge, unidentified, in UK controlled - and sometimes restricted - airspace with no clear motive, largely unchallenged and vanishing as quickly as they appear; 
  • behave in a way that strongly suggests intelligent control; and
  • still to this day - after decades of recorded accounts - exceed speeds or manueovers that can be performed by any current civilian or military aircraft.
Hmmm...





Thursday 12 July 2012

UFO sightings by civilian pilots

In a previous post, I promised to highlight select and relatively recent incidents which, to me, definitely fall into the as yet unexplained 5-10 per cent category of UFO sightings - and which are all the more interesting because of the involvement of experienced civilian air pilots.

I wanted to find events that had occurred relatively recently, by which I mean the last twenty or so years, as events that go further back than this become ever harder to corroborate or usefully explain (which I will expand on in a future post).

The three incidents I have selected are below in date order of the event itself with the earliest first. All involve British civil aviation pilots. A short video accompanies each and I have given a brief summary as the video in each case is self-explanatory.


 UFO sighting over Manchester near miss
January 1995

 

Perhaps the most impressive incident of the three in my view. This is a rare example of a 'near miss' event with a UFO or UAP actually being filed for investigation by the UK pilots involved. It was investigated by a representative of the Joint Airprox (An amalgamation of 'Air' and 'Proximity') Working Group or JAWG, which is an independent body tasked with investigating 'near miss' incidents in terms of air safety and which is not normally associated with UFO investigation. After a thorough investigation, the JAWG could not reach any conclusion about what the pilots claimed to have seen. The MOD retained records of this incident which are available to view on the national archives site. Both Nick Pope and Dr David Clarke feature in the video and - coming from opposing camps about the UFO phenomenon - seem to both agree that this is an unusual and compelling case.    


 

 

Lufthansa + British Airways UFO Sighting
November 1995

 

Both German and British pilots observed a cylindrical UFO or UAP over Long Island, New York which they appeared to agree was not a natural phenomenon. What makes this especially interesting is the actual recordings of the comments made by both German and British pilots. Thinking this might be military in origin, civilian air traffic control (at Boston) made a call - also recorded - to 'Giant Killer', a call sign used by controllers responsible for military and restricted air traffic, which in turn confirmed that they had no military flights in the vicinity of the Lufthansa and British Airways planes. Another civil aviation incident also features on this video.


 

 

The Guernsey UFO
April 2007

 

Ray Bowyer  - a civilian pilot of a small passenger plane - and his passengers, saw what they claim was not one but two 'mile-wide' UFOs during a flight over Guernsey. These were not only seen by another plane in the area but were allegedly captured on radar - although local air traffic control didn't appear to confirm or deny the source of the radar return.


 

 

 

My understanding is that all of these remain unexplained to this day

Such encounters are particularly compelling as civilian pilots should, on the whole, be rational, experienced and highly-trained professionals who are expert witnesses where routine air phenomena are concerned.  In addition, they would not normally be prone to making observations or statements that could jeopardise their jobs or status amongst their peers.







Tuesday 10 July 2012

The garden party, the ex-policeman and UFOs

Now that Summer is finally here (yeah right!), I have been grabbing what time I can in my own back garden.

Maybe because of this, my thoughts turned to a party my wife and I went to one Summery Saturday afternoon a few years ago - when I would still be slaving away in some Whitehall office or other during the week. It was hosted by a friend and colleague of my wife's who was also reasonably well known to me. As parties go, it was a bit of a lacklustre affair with poor attendance. But the weather was nice and we could languish in our host's hundred foot long garden, the bottom of which was lost in dense trees.

There was the usual party conversation but the real highlight of the event for me however, was when we were introduced to the father of the host's boyfriend. He was a retired former policeman whom I'm guessing was in his seventies at the time we met.  He lived in South Africa and was visiting his son for the Summer.

I found out that he had worked on - if I remember correctly - the training manual for SO19 (as he called it - now SCO19), the firearms unit of the Metropolitan Police, which was interesting enough in itself. BUT when the conversation somehow turned to UFOs (probably my fault but only in jest) he quite earnestly said "I saw a UFO once".

Well the other party guests might as well not have been there, as I recall spending the remaining hours of the party talking with this genial, gently spoken and articulate man about his on-duty encounter with something that, to this day,  he - and another colleague on patrol with him - cannot explain. We also chewed the fat about various theories concerning UFO phenomena in general. The more we talked, it seemed to me that he was quite well informed on the subject and could relate anecdotes about other colleagues having had similar experiences some of which may very well have ended up on the PRUFOS database.

I wish I could remember more details of the encounter he described (sorry folks) and had had the presence of mind to write some of it down on returning home - but alas I didn't think to do so at the time and didn't think I would be writing about this online some time later either.

I came away hoping I hadn't taken up too much of his time but having genuinely enjoyed our discussion - and feeling quite privileged. I suspect that he'd enjoyed talking about it just as much as I had and was glad to share his experience with (what I hope) is an open-minded cove like myself. Part of me did wonder at first whether this was a gentle wind-up, as coppers generally have a wicked sense of humour but I think this chap was being earnest. My wife thought so too and she's a good judge of character.

I think it's fair to say that meeting and talking to this man - and one or two others - sowed the seeds of my move to start this blog, which has been a long time coming. It made me realise that there are potentially hundreds - if not thousands - of credible witness sightings by professionals not only in the police but also in other emergency services, the armed forces and in aviation. Most of these individuals will have had close encounters which have never been recorded,  because of their fear of ridicule by their peers and how this would affect their careers. It's such a shame that many - like this man I met - feel they can only really open up when they have ceased working in those professions.

I wonder sometimes that if the true number of sightings and encounters by such professionals were ever actually known, whether the mainstream scientific community and our Government would treat the subject more seriously (at least openly). But even then I suspect not.

I do think however, that only the inexplicable appearance of something manifestly not faked and 'not-of-this-earth' at a globally broadcast event like the 2012 Olympics for example would be enough...


Wednesday 27 June 2012

Undersea mystery deepens in the Baltic - Update 30 June 2012

Another article posted by UFO Sightings yesterday reveals more titbits of information about the undersea object or objects - as there are now allegedly two that have been discovered. Right-angled 'corridors' in the main object; what is being described as a staircase; and even a hole in the shape of a 'gothic' church window in the second undersea object found (lancet or ogee arch presumably?) also now feature.

If the latest is to be believed this is proving more bizarre by the day and the Ocean X Team are milking the hype on this for all its worth to them. Still all seems too good to be true somehow...

Original Post

I've been following the developments of this story for months now and guess it's time to add to its growing online coverage.

Three of the increasing number of online articles covering the findings of the Swedish Ocean X Team so far (which I'm now guilty of adding to!) can be found at Digital Journal, the Mail Online and TNT Magazine.

The strange object, supposedly resembling the Millennium Falcon in shape (see pic right supplied by the Ocean X Team) and which is on the floor of the Baltic sea, is described as anywhere between 18 - 60 metres across, depending on which report one reads (60ft is roughly 18 metres which may be behind the confusion). It also allegedly has a 'trail' of up to 200 metres on the sea-bed leading from it.

As with anything like this, I would treat the whole story with caution until the whole thing comes out in the wash (pardon the pun). I mean have you looked at the Ocean X Team's website logo and the over-use of the courier font? Remind you of anything?

It's annoying that various news articles are already tagging this incorrectly as a 'UFO' - given that the unidentified object is under the sea and is clearly not 'flying'. By using the initials 'UFO' some observers already appear to be drawing their own conclusions (not me thus far) that this might be a crashed ET vehicle - either that or it just cynically generates more hits to their sites. The recent updates suggesting that electrical equipment fails within 200m of the object just adds fuel to the fire - given that such phenomena has been a supposed by-product of many 'close encounters' with UFOs or UAP.

It'll be interesting to see how this pans out in the next few weeks as another dive is planned in that time-frame. I can't help seeing an anticlimax looming but I'd love to be proven wrong...

Tuesday 26 June 2012

An open email to Douglas Trumbull about UFOTOG

UPDATE 10 September 2012

See Douglas Trumbull's response to my email to him about UFOTOG here 

In my earlier post I speculated on why there had been no news for some considerable time about the ambitious and exciting UFOTOG project being led by Mr Trumbull.

I decided to see if he would like to explain for himself why things have gone so quiet on this project - my email to him was as follows:-

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Sent to douglashtrumbull@gmail.com - 15 May 2012 16:47 London time]

"Dear Mr Trumbull,

This is just a quick query from a long-time admirer of your very impressive work in the movie industry.

I am the British author of UFOScrutiny, a relatively new blog which aims to give an informative and impartial overview of the subject of UFOs from an (anonymous) ex-Govt official's viewpoint.

I was especially interested to see information online about your UFOTOG project which, in my view, promises to be a very welcome and rigorous field study of the UFO phenomenon using state-of-the-art technology. I personally can't think of anyone better qualified to lead this ambitious project.

I'm sure I'm certainly not the first to ask but - for the benefit of visitors to my blog - I wondered if you would be so kind as to let me know if there is any update concerning how UFOTOG is progressing, or whether it has in fact been temporarily shelved in favour of other projects?

I do appreciate that you will be very busy and will understand that a response will only be forthcoming if time permits.

Any update you could provide would be very much appreciated. May I also reassure you that I will only publish any response, or extracts of a response online with your express permission.

Yours sincerely,

Jonathan Niven
UFOScrutiny"

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So far (just over five weeks) there has been no response but you never know...




Thursday 21 June 2012

UAP or USAP?

Well the (wet) Jubilee weekend is long gone and my more rural re-location for the event did not bear any fruit at all in terms of unusual aerial phenomena - when the clouds cleared away that is. Ho-hum.

Anyway - readers of my blog will have most likely heard of the increasingly used UAP as a replacement for the effectively stigmatised 'UFO'.

But how many will have heard of the initials USAP?

USAP stands for 'Unacknowledged Special Access Program [sic]' and a description of this and its precursor - the 'SAP' - can be found here.

Now it is pretty well documented that SAPs and USAPs exist and that these cover a variety of 'above top-secret' projects operated by US military-technological concerns. Of course, ongoing projects are shrouded in secrecy, which is understandable from the point of view of protecting the operating country's national security interests. One could argue that the US is perhaps being the most tolerant concerning public speculation (mostly on-line) about the content or aims of such SAPs or USAPs. Either that, or such public speculation serves its purpose in that it diverts attention away from other super-secret projects, or as they are also often called - 'black' projects.

I have yet to see many (if any) articles simply speculating about what my own Government does in terms of equivalent projects, or even what other countries such as Russia and China could be up to.

BUT there is no doubt that such projects do exist in and of themselves. The generic acronyms employed in the US are SAPs or USAPs but there could be other - as yet undiscovered - names for such projects elsewhere in the World.



Once one accepts that these projects do exist then speculation about what might be going on under these begins to abound.

I should point out that I have no privileged information on any such projects - and even if I were to possess such information - I certainly would not be divulging it online.

However, if you follow the threads of information on the net and in other media, you can glean certain key characteristics that these projects possess, namely:-
  • they generally have unlimited funding; 
  • individuals within or authorised by Government to oversee them are very few in number;
  • their emphasis is on maximum plausible deniability;
  • those working on projects are compartmentalised so that they don't have a holistic overview; and
  • disinformation is frequently employed (often unknowingly by participants) to protect the true nature of such projects.

In view of the above, it can be easy to see why even military and civil aviation professionals may be taken aback when confronted with an experimental or advanced USAP aerial vehicle as discussed in my earlier post 'Bogey or friendly'.

Not having any pre-existing knowledge of even one of the many - and I'm sure there are many - USAP or equivalent projects, these professionals may very well turn to less earthly explanations for UAP they have seen once the usual astronomical or meteorological explanations have been discounted.

It would of course be unreasonable (and unscientific) to rule out all the various unexplained sightings and incidents as just unwitting eyewitness accounts of yet-to-be-confirmed USAP vehicles.

And there is also the possibility of sophisticated fakery which - on rare occasions - can fool some 'experts' such as radio-controlled airships made to look like flying saucers*.

But then - once one discounts astronomical or meteorological phenomena, USAP or equivalent vehicles and fakery what does that leave you with?

*I dimly recall what I think was one specific (possibly BBC) television programme devoted to just such a project but - unfortunately - a net search hasn't turned it up yet as it was some years ago. If anyone happens to know the programme I mean and what it was called let me know.


Friday 1 June 2012

Calm down dear. They 'probably' come in peace

I shall shortly be away to another part of the UK to see family over the Jubilee weekend so - despite having said earlier that I would return to more blogging after finishing my latest appointment - I will in fact not be able to blog until later next week. I will be in a more rural area than London though so shall be intently watching the skies...

So the absence of posts won't be for much longer. In the meantime, with my recent mixed success at gaining access to the Open Minds site I have managed to see some of their latest articles at the time of posting.

I found the following amusing
http://www.openminds.tv/jill-tarter-comments-on-hollywood-aliens-943/.

Children stumbling in the dark?
There seem to be plenty of eminent scientists out there who think they have a handle on what E.T. would do if ever in contact with little old Earth. Stephen Hawking for example suggests that we shouldn't assume a super advanced non-terrestrial species would be benevolent and equates the encounter between them and us as something akin to "...when Christopher Columbus first landed in America, which didn't turn out very well for the Native Americans."

On the other hand, SETI astronomer Jill Tarter suggests that if E.T. visited Earth, “that would mean they would have technological capabilities sophisticated enough not to need slaves, food, or other planets.” She then offers her theory that “If aliens were to come here it would be simply to explore.”

Well my view on this is twofold:-

1.  IF they exist - and that's a big 'if' - THEY ARE ALIENS who may, as the word 'Aliens' suggests, be so utterly different to us as to be incomprehensible in terms of their intentions or motives. There simply is no point speculating about what such visitors' intentions are until they are actually here; and

Allen Telescope Array, SETI
2. IF they exist - and assuming for the moment that just one non-terrestrial species out in space is at least as advanced as us technologically if not more so - then logically it follows that it is already too late for us to concern ourselves about whether we should even engage in 'first contact'.  We have been broadcasting into space (first by radio and then latterly by other means) continuously for roughly the last ninety years. Any advanced non-terrestrials out there will pick up our transmissions in due course (assuming they don't perceive it as just 'noise').

Proponents of the E.T. hypothesis for UFOs will of course argue that they've already heard and are here...








Saturday 19 May 2012

Will Smith, his son, The President and E.T.


The recent news about Will Smith and his son Jaden asking President Obama about the existence of E.T. - and the President's unsurprisingly neutral response - is certainly generating a lot of media interest. But then again this can't hurt in terms of boosting media attention to the upcoming Men In Black 3 movie.

Go to Open Minds (which only appears to be intermittently working for me at the moment so I can't include the direct link) and the BBC radio/vid feed here.

The Graham Norton Show on BBC One also had Will Smith as a guest last night where he talked about the same event. Access via BBC iPlayer.

Mr Smith is claiming he has privileged information from President Obama on the matter of extra terrestrials - but then he is a tease...

Sunday 13 May 2012

Open Minds site down?

Have just noticed that the Open Minds site - www.openminds.tv - appears to be down.

NARCAP was out of commission not so long ago - now this one. Is it me or are a number of UFO/paranormal sites just having a bad year?

Update (sort of)

As of today (19 May 2012) I was going to state that the Open Minds site is up and running again - having read their Will Smith article at least once - but access still seems to be intermittent (for me at least) at the moment.




Tuesday 8 May 2012

Anonymous to leak secret UFO data?

An apology

Firstly I want to apologise to all visitors to my humble blog out there who may have noticed an absence of posts in the last few weeks.

There is no reason for this other than that I have been lurching from one poorly-paid (and very time-consuming) short-term Government contract to another. I have some free time coming from the end of this month, when I plan to return to posting more regularly.

(Anonymous Logo)
Anonymous reveals truth about UFOs : Will they? Won't they?

I've noticed the interesting article originally posted by IT World earlier today but flagged in the news section of Open Minds - the latter being one of my preferred sites to follow.

The article's worth a read if only to smile at the possible irony that hacktivist group Anonymous may itself have been the subject of - as yet unconfirmed - 'trolling' concerning rumours that the group is supposedly due to release secret Government UFO/ET files.

My money's on no one in the group having anything of note at all on the subject. I would however, be amongst the first to say I was wrong if - by some stretch - there was an element of truth to the rumours. I'm not holding my breath though, given that this could just be trolling or a ruse by the group to further raise their own profile - in which case it has worked to some extent!






Wednesday 18 April 2012

NARCAP is live again

After a brief period of being off-line the NARCAP web site is live again. Thanks to Roger for advising via comments started from the original post here that it is back.

The explanation features in the Facebook plug-in on the left of the landing page as follows:-
"Aloha Everyone, the website is down pending some changes in the hosting... will be up soon.... thank you for your patience...." posted on 12 April 7:07 NARCAP local time

Tuesday 17 April 2012

Life confirmed on Mars?

I am back working for a Government Department for a couple of weeks (the old security clearance still comes in handy) and - no - it's still not MOD or Home Office.

Consequently, my ability to blog over the next fortnight will be limited.

This is just a quick post on an article that has been doing the rounds in the last few days. Not directly concerned with the UFO phenomenon but possible confirmation within the mainstream scientific community (based on NASA data) that extraterrestrial life may not only exist but may have been discovered in our solar system as far back as 1976.

Open Minds which I regularly follow - and which I link to from this Blog - has posted the following article on this http://www.openminds.tv/scientists-believe-nasa-data-confirms-life-on-mars-922/.

However, it was not that long ago that there was an infamous 'false start' in terms of allegedly ground-breaking science i.e. the (now disproved) discovery of a 'faster-than-light neutrino'.

I guess it will be a case of watch this space (pardon the pun)...



Wednesday 11 April 2012

Bogey or Friendly?

On Easter Monday I was watching the UK Freeview channel Quest which was taking a predictably light-hearted approach to the UFO phenomenon in one of their 'weirdest UFO sightings' programmes. The programme makers used the British comedy actor Mark Williams to narrate it in a mildly sarcastic tone for example. Well - no surprises there. This sort of material is typical of the UK media's treatment of the subject, which usually means little or no departure from conventional or mainstream thought, even on an alleged 'independent' channel which, after all, relies on its subscribers and advertisers to operate. Also guilty is the BBC with their 2010 programme "I believe in UFOs" presented by Danny Dyer. Why choose the star of films such as The Football Factory to present such a programme (answers on a post-card please)?

There is no 'cover-up'!

Interestingly, the Quest programme makers did give Nick Pope (former MOD spokesperson on UFOs) perhaps 10-15 seconds of airtime - if that - to offer his denial of any 'cover-up' of a UFO conspiracy especially in the context of some lobbying of Westminster by the Scottish town of Bonnybridge's Councillor Billy Buchanan concerning events in the Falkirk Triangle (see Bonnybridge and other online articles for the 'Falkirk Triangle' for background). For what it's worth, I agree with Nick Pope that it is unlikely, given my own knowledge of how Government operates, that there is any 'cover-up'. Our Government simply wouldn't be very good at it if nothing else - hence the expression "Cock-up before Conspiracy" as coined by Sir Bernard Ingham (apologies to those overseas in advance if this expression is a bit lost in translation!).

Black Projects

However, whilst I'm aware that this plays firmly into the hands of many conspiracy theorists, there is some merit in the theory concerning military, industrial or technological 'black projects' (which I will explore in another post) and which may have resulted in testing of advanced craft in our airspace - without any mainstream knowledge of our Government or even that of our allies in the U.S.

Blue on Blue

Such a theory could only be proven by hard evidence of something akin to a 'blue on blue' incident between a conventional military vehicle and a black project vehicle. To those unfamiliar with the term 'blue on blue', I first encountered its use by colleagues of mine working for the Police and Home Office, to refer to two separate agency operations inadvertently targeting the same criminal activity.  Consequently, the Home Office regularly has to cross-check their field enforcement activity in advance with the Police and other enforcers to avoid this very scenario. This term and the scenarios it can be attributed to have even more serious connotations when applied to military activity, as it is normally used in the context of 'friendly fire' incidents.

So - imagine a patrolling military plane or helicopter (could be UK, could be US) that encounters a craft in UK airspace which is also tracked on radar but which does not conform to any known civil or military aircraft design and does not respond to any requests for identification. Add the unknown craft's ability to manoeuvre in ways which are beyond that of known civil or military technology and you have the beginnings of an intriguing UFO case. The key word in this paragraph is 'known'.

The object may well be designated as a UFO but may subsequently prove to be a black project vehicle that is yet to be revealed to mainstream civil or military experts and which - therefore - remains 'unknown'. This is what happened on a number of occasions with early sightings of the Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit - also known as the Stealth Bomber and the F-117 Nighthawk (pics below with Spirit left and Nighthawk right).


Often these projects only become 'known' many years or decades after their inception and are so restricted in terms of security, that a larger part of the military community in the country of origin of such a project won't know it exists. BUT it is worth keeping in mind that black projects at least, do exist.

Such encounters as described above, could perhaps be regarded as a 'blue on blue' (or perhaps 'blue on black'?) but only after subsequent confirmation that a given 'bogey' was in fact a 'friendly'. With this in mind, one begins to get an idea of how even military reports of strange craft in the sky - let alone civilian reports - could be open to interpretation.

The ET Hypothesis?

Now whilst a proportion of UFO sightings could fit the above scenario, an increasing number of experienced civilian and military aviation professionals are reporting craft that behave in a way that could be said to be hundreds of years more advanced than conventional or mainstream aircraft - and not just more advanced by decades. This is when the 'extraterrestrial hypothesis' - in its broadest sense - comes into play.

I hope to cite a couple of classic cases that - in my view - fit this hypothesis in later posts.