In a secluded Suffolk forest 40 years ago, one of history’s most well-known alleged UFO sightings took place. What exactly happened, and can we ever be certain? Late in December 1980, Vince Thurkettle was chopping wood in Rendlesham Forest when a car drew up. Two suit-clad, about 30-year-old men, emerged.
One of them, with a clear English accent, said, “Good morning. Do you mind if we ask you several specific questions? Security staff from the United States Air Force (USAF) stationed at RAF Woodbridge in the area had initially reported viewing bright flashes in the nearby woods on December 26 and 28.
Unrecognized guests asked Mr. Thurkettle, an employee in the forestry industry if he had been out the night before. I replied, ‘No,'” he says. I responded, “What?” “when they questioned me about whether I had ever left the residence or witnessed anything.
Oh, there have been reports of certain red lights inside the woods, they said. We’re just inspecting,” they said, and the 2 of them respectfully but firmly questioned me 20 or so times. They seemed like journalists to me. “They abruptly replied, “Oh well, good enough. There likely isn’t anything in it. “I decided to buy the newspaper articles daily for the next few days to see what was happening, but of course, there really is nothing,” he said.
However, the incident was covered on the main page of Headlines of the World five years later. It announced, “UFO LANDS IN SUFFOLK, And This is OFFICIAL.”. The narrative was centered on a letter sent to the Ministry of Defense by Lt Col Charles Halt, the deputy base commander of RAF Woodbridge (MoD). It discussed a sighting of what appeared to be a Space ship in the woods and was made public by the United States government.
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Rendlesham Forest Incident
The Rendlesham Forest incident was a chain of incidents of strange lights that were noted in late December 1980 close to Rendlesham Forest in Suffolk, England. These spottings were connected to reports of UFO landings. The incidents took place close to RAF Woodbridge, which was utilized by the US Air Force at the time (USAF). Lieutenant Colonel Charles I. Halt, the deputy base commander, and other USAF personnel reported seeing what they defined as UFOs. This incident was one of the most well-known identified UFO incidents globally and is also the most famous alleged UFO incident to have occurred in the United Kingdom.
It has been likened to the American UFO incident at Roswell and is occasionally referred to as “Britain’s Roswell.” According to the UK Ministry of Defense, the incident did not represent a threat to the country’s security, and as a result, it was never looked into as a security issue. The Orfordness Lighthouse, a lightning bolt, and bright stars, according to skeptics, are all examples of night lights that could have been mistaken for the objects seen.
What Happened that Day?
On December 26, 1980, at about 03:30 (Halt mentioned it as December 27 in his letter to the UK Ministry of Defence), a protection security force near the RAF Woodbridge east gate noticed lights that appeared to be dropping into the neighboring Rendlesham Forest. Astrophysicists have linked these lights to an item of natural wreckage that was catching fire as a meteor over southern England at that point. As per Halt’s letter, when service members went into the woods to examine what they originally believed to be a felled aircraft, they discovered what they characterized as a bright metal object with colored lights.
The species on a local farm erupted in a flurry as they tried to reach the entity because it showed up to be moving through the forest. Sergeant Jim Penniston, a member of the service members, later stated to have come across a “craft of unknown origin” while in the woods, but while this was not made publicly available at the time, other witnesses have not corroborated his claims.
The Orford Ness lighthouse, which is located some distance away on the coast, was the only light source that local police could see when they arrived at the location shortly after 4:00.
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Service personnel visited a slight cleanup near the eastern edge of the woodland after dawn on December 26 and discovered 3 small imprints on the surface arranged in a triangle, along with burn marks and splintered wood on surrounding trees. The local police were sent out once more at 10:30 to check the imprints, which they believed might have been made by an animal. Georgina Bruni released a photo of the alleged launch site considered the morning after the initial spottings in her book You Can’t Tell the People.
Two Days Later
In the early morning of December 28, 1980, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Halt, the deputy base commander, and many service members toured the location, reported as 29 December by Halt. They used AN/PDR-27, a typical U.S. military radiotherapy survey meter, to take radioactivity measurements in the triangle of depressions and the vicinity.
During this investigation, the same flashing light that the witnesses had seen the first night was visible across the field to the east, nearly parallel to a farmhouse. Within the same line of sight, the Orford Ness lighthouse is also discernible farther to the east.
Afterward, 3 star-like lights were noticed in the sky, 2 to the north and 1 to the south, about 10 degrees above the horizon, according to Halt’s document. The greatest of these, according to Halt, floated for 2 to 3 hours and occasionally appeared to shoot down a flow of light. These stars-like lights have been accounted for by astronomers as bright stars.
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