Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 20/11/2019 In late September 2019 I gave a talk and ran a live UFO investigation desk at an event known as the Supernatural Fayre. Towards the end of the day a man named Alan Darcy provided details of a UFO sighting he had experienced back in the mid 1990’s. Sighting Details On a day in either June or July of 1996 when he was 31 years old Alan visited his parents’ house in Wythall, Worcester with his wife and two daughters (precice location unknown at present). It was around 7-7.30pm in the evening and the weather was bright, sunny and still with a clear blue sky. One of them looked up and noticed a cigar-shaped silver coloured object in the sky through the window. They pointed it out to everyone else present. The object was completely stationary. There was no discernable noise, although the witnesses were viewing it from inside the house. It looked cylindrical but with rounded off ends. At first they thought it must be an aircraft coming in to land and travelling towards their location but they soon realised this was not the case. After watching it for about 30-40 seconds Alan went to find his parent’s binoculars while everyone else continued to observe the UFO. He returned a few minutes later and the object was still present. Looking through the binoculars Alan got a closer view of the object. It was chrome silver in colour all over with no discernable markings, lights or windows. Everyone continued to watch it for a number of minutes. Then suddenly the UFO shot off horizontally to the left extremely fast and was lost from sight! It was gone in less than a second. They were all astounded by what they had just witnessed. Sighting Analysis This is a very impressive sighting due to the movement the object was seen to perform. If it had remained stationary for the duration of the sighting I may have suggested it was some kind of large inflatable such as a solar airship or distant silver coloured blimp. However it could not have been this due to the manner in which it suddenly left the area at an extreme speed. It was stationary at first so was not an aeroplane, and Alan was able to see it clearly through the binoculars and confirmed it was not a helicopter or drone. I have investigated many reports of similar objects to this. The manoeuvre it performed suggested it was under intelligent control and exhibited advanced propulsion capabilities. Although no occupants were seen, I feel that due to both it's appearance and manouvering capabilities observed there is a high likelihood that this was a genuine sighting of an ET craft. Copyright Dave Hodrien 2019

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 07/11/2019 In late September 2019 I spoke at the Supernatural Fayre in Worcester, a single day event involving market stalls and speakers. For the remainder of the day I ran a live UFO investigation desk. One of the cases which was reported to me was a sighting by Nigel Webster, one of the Chairmen of Spectral Ghostseekers, a paranormal investigation group based in Birmingham. The group also have a big interest in UFOs, and have attended numerous BUFOG meetings. Sighting Details On the 13th April 2019 Nigel, other Chairman of Spectral Ghostseekers Paul Southey, and two friends Tim and Jason drove to Castle Ring, an Iron Age hill fort at the South East edge of Cannock Chase. Nigel had previously been recommended the location as a good place for a sky watch due to the amount of UFO activity reported in the area over the years. It was a clear and dry night and quite warm, which unfortunately meant there were lots of gnats in the air. They stood on the top of Castle Ring for a number of hours. Nothing unusual was seen in the sky, and they decided to set off home around 1.30am. The men walked back down to the car park at the base of Castle Ring. Tim back in his car and headed off. Nigel, Jason and Paul then stood at the open boot of their car packing away their equipment. At the far end of the car park is the base of the path which leads up onto Castle Ring. To the left of this is some trees and bushes. Nigel and Jason happened to be looking in this direction while Paul sat on the back seat of the car taking his boots off. Suddenly they both saw a glowing orb of light flying on a descending arc extremely fast. It looked quite small, perhaps a couple of feet across and appeared to be sparkling around its’ edges. Nigel remembered it being a pale green colour, but Jason remembers it being white. Both the men in tandem exclaimed “Look at that!” Paul immediately looked up but by this time the orb had come right down and seemingly entered the bushes. Whatever the object had been it was completely silent. Nigel and Jason both told Paul what they had just seen. He was a little disappointed that he had just missed seeing the object considering they had just finished a sky watch. A couple of days after the incident Paul asked both Nigel and Jason to independently draw what they had seen. It was from these drawings which they discovered that the colour they recalled the object being didn’t match, but other than this the drawings were identical. Unfortunately these drawings appear to have been lost. Sighting Analysis This is an intriguing sighting. Obviously when speaking with Nigel I asked him if he considered whether the object could have been a small meteorite. He said he does not think this was what it was as usually meteorites are just seen in the upper atmosphere burning up not at close proximity. Also there was no sound of any collision with the ground or signs that this had happened. He wonders instead whether the orb was perhaps an earth light. However these are quite rare in urbanized areas and Castle Ring is just North of the village of Chestall. It was a clear night so it could not have been ball lightning. Due to its appearance and small size it does not look like this was any form of manned craft. However it also moved far too fast to be a lit inflatable. If it was not a meteorite (a notion I feel cannot be entirely ruled out) then it seemed to be a ball of energy of some kind. Whatever it was it clearly took place as it was witnessed by both Nigel and Jason. Copyright Dave Hodrien 2019

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 02/11/2019 Paul Southey is one of the Chairmen of Spectral Ghostseekers, a paranormal investigation group which has been running for 11 years. In recent years his group have been interested in the subject UFOs because of the cross-over between the world of ufology and the world of ghosts – the paranormal activity often reported by experiencers following ET contact. On Saturday 28th September I was invited to speak at a paranormal-focused market day known as the Supernatural Fayre. In addition to my talk I also ran a live UFO investigation desk. Spectral Ghostseekers have attended numerous BUFOG meetings in the past, but this gave Paul the ideal opportunity to discuss a fascinating sighting he and a friend experienced at Rendlesham Forest, the location of the infamous series of UFO incidents in December 1980. Sighting Details Paul and his friend Tim visited the forest in Tim’s car on Friday 7th September 2018. It was a warm and sunny day. As it was their first time at the forest they parked on the visitor’s car park and walked the UFO trail which leads to various locations linked with the events from 1980. At around 4.45pm they were walking along one of the trails on their way back to the car when they suddenly both heard and felt a very strong sub-bass frequency. The noise lasted for several seconds and was quite loud and the vibrations could be felt in the air. It stopped abruptly and both witnesses were puzzled by what had just occurred. They initially thought that it must be a HGV on a nearby road, but Paul checked their location on his mobile phone GPS and they found they were nowhere near any roads. They waited for about 10 minutes to see if the sound would occur again but it did not, so in the end they continued their journey back to the car. After dark at around 10.30pm they returned to the forest. Tim parked in the car park a little further up the road and made their way to the fence at the edge of Capel Green, the farmer’s field in which a UFO landing took place back in 1980 that was witnessed by numerous military personnel. They spent several hours sky watching at the location. It was a very clear and still night, with the stars fully visible overhead. Only distant aircraft and satellites were observed. At around 12.45am a low mist began to appear so they decided to call it a night. They walked back to the car and left the forest with Tim at the wheel, heading West along Woodbridge Road towards the hotel they had booked for the night. They purposely drove slowly at around 20mph in the hopes of yet seeing something unusual. It was very dark as there are no streetlights on that stretch of road. In the distance ahead of them they suddenly noticed what at first appeared to be bright white car headlights coming down a hill. However they were positioned quite high above their position at an angle of about 30 degrees. Paul said to Tim “That’s a big hill!” Tim turned to him and said “There’s no hills around here, that’s why it’s an army base!” Puzzled by this Paul asked “So what’s that light?” Tim provided a written statement which covers what happened next. “As soon as we spotted it, it moved from a stationary position above the road quickly down and to the right putting itself behind a clump of trees. The road curved gradually to the right and we sped up to try and catch up with the light. As we came around the curve in the road the light came back up above the tree- line and moved quickly back cross the road dropping down to the left and behind more trees. We could see its glow through the trees before it dropped out of sight completely. We took another bend in the road at roughly 40 mph and caught sight of the light as it crossed from left to right in front of us again, before dropping behind the treeline to our right. It appeared to have moved back away from our position during this time and was maybe a quarter to half a mile away and dimmer than when we first saw it. Paul had by this time got his phone camera primed and was hanging out of the passenger side window. He managed to get a few seconds of footage as it passed back across the road from right to left and again further distant than when we had last seen it. That was the last we saw of it.” Below is the footage which Paul took on his phone: Transcript of the video: P: Oh what if that was a meteorite coming down or something? T: Hmm? P: What if that was a meteorite? T: No chance. P: I can’t even tell which side of the road that was coming down you know? There it is! Got it! I’ve got it on my camera. Shit, it’s gone behind the fucking thing! T: It’s moving. P: It is, but far ain’t picking it it up. The light is clearly visible on the video but Paul says the footage does not do it justice and it looked far brighter to the naked eye. In order to discount the idea that the light had been caused by a reflection of their own headlights Paul decided to retrace their route. He turned the car around and began driving back down towards the turn off to Rendlesham Forest at around 15mph, with a view to then turning back round to see if the light would come back. By now it was about 1.30am. About 60 yards before reaching the turning for the forest they noticed an old man coming towards them on the opposite side of the road riding a bicycle. He was wearing what looked like a dark blue jumpsuit and was cycling very slowly. The bicycle the man was riding appeared to be very old-fashioned and had a very small light strapped to the front of it. Both witnesses stared at him through the car window thinking “Why is he on a dark country lane with only a single light on at one thirty in the morning?” As they drove on past, the old man never acknowledged them he was just staring straight ahead. Witness drawing of the man on the bicycle: When they reached the forest car park Tim once again turned the car round and started to drive back along Woodbridge Road. Unsurprisingly they did not see the white light again. But what was far more confusing was that the man on the bicycle had completely vanished. They drove for several miles along the road but there was no sign of him. This was of course particularly spooky due to the type of bicycle he had been riding, and both men wondered whether they had encountered a ghostly apparition. Below is Tim’s recollection of the cyclist: “Around a half mile from the car park we suddenly saw an old gent dressed in an old boiler suit and riding a very old- fashioned pushbike coming down the road towards us. I slowed even further to around 10mph, and he passed us on the opposite side of the road without even glancing at us. This struck us as odd, but given what we’d seen 15 minutes earlier it didn’t register as how odd immediately. We carried on to the car park, turned round immediately and headed back. The journey time back to the same spot where we’d seen the old gentlemen took around two minutes. There was no sign of him along the road, despite carrying on for several miles.” The following day they drove back along Woodbridge Road to look for hidden turn offs which the man could have used. While there were no side roads for a number of miles, there were numerous forest paths which he could have conceivably decided to use (although you would have to ask why). Paul also E-Mailed a local UFO group and reported the sighting. They responded saying that other people had also reported seeing something. Paul never received further details of these other sightings, but it appears that there may have been additional witnesses. Sighting Analysis It’s fascinating that what sparked Paul’s interest in going to Rendlesham Forest were the links between ufology and the paranormal, and when he went there he may have seen a UFO and a ghost on the same night! The white light observed and apparently filmed by Paul was interesting. Although it was far too distant to confirm as something anomalous, the extremely fast manoeuvre it was seen to perform suggests it was something highly unusual rather than a normal aircraft or LED balloon. It was also too prominent to be a drone, this is something which was considered by Paul in his discussion with me. It is a shame that these extreme manoeuvres were not caught on film as this would have made the video footage more compelling. The encounter with the elderly cyclist is very spooky. While it was of course possible for a local man to be out cycling in the middle of the night, the way in which he vanished without trace is both intriguing and un-settling. Could this really have been an apparition haunting the road that leads down to the forest entrance? Or was it just someone out after dark who decided to then leave the road along one of the numerous paths at some point giving the appearance that they had vanished? Maybe there have already been other sightings of the cyclist we are yet to learn about, or will be other sightings in due course. Only time will tell. Copyright Dave Hodrien 2019

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 28/10/2019 On Saturday 28th September I was invited to speak at the Supernatural Fayre in Worcester, a day of paranormal-themed stalls and speaker lectures. After my talk I spent the remainder of the day running a live investigation desk, where I invited attendees to share their UFO experiences. It was here that I met Paula, who shared details of a fascinating multiple witness sighting from her childhood. Sighting Details When she was 7 years old Paula went to Parton Manor Infant School on Dinglewell, Churchdown. The school is still there today but Paula says a lot of buildings have been built on the grounds and it looks different to how it did in the past. One day in early summer of 1975 before breaking up for the holidays she was playing in the school playground with her friends. Paula cannot remember whether it was morning or lunch time break. It was a very pleasant sunny and still day. She looked up into the sky to her right and was amazed to see a domed-disc shaped object. It was roughly 500 feet off the ground and appeared to be a couple of miles from her location. It was about the size of a small aircraft, Paula estimates about 30 feet in diameter. The object was chrome silver in colour and reflecting the sunlight. The main body of the UFO was a flattened disc shape, but on the top was a curved dome. There were what looked like some thin windows or slits near the base of the dome. It was completely motionless at first, and was sitting at an angle of about 10 degrees. Paula immediately assumed it was a craft due to its appearance. She pointed it out to her friends shouting “Wow look it’s a UFO!” The 20 or so children in the playground all looked up and also saw the object. They ran to the fence at the edge of the playground to observe it. They were just tall enough to see the object over the top of the fence. Everyone was excited at what they were looking at. The UFO hovered silently for about 6 seconds. Then suddenly without warning it instantly accelerated and shot away at a diagonal to the right. It was lost from sight in about a second. There was no trail or smoke left behind it. Everyone was in awe of the situation and just stared at each other open mouthed. Some of her friends had smiles on their faces, others appeared to be in shock. Paula cannot remember whether she or anyone else told the teacher about what they’d all seen. However she does recall telling her parents about it in the evening. Her father dismissed it saying “Oh I don’t think so.” She wonders if there may have been other witnesses elsewhere as it was such a clear cloudless day, and as it was warm it is likely there would have been other people out and about. Sighting Analysis This is a stunning daylight sighting with many impressive aspects. It is rare for there to be so many witnesses, and how everyone reacted certainly proves that it was physically there in the sky. Even though the witnesses were all children (as far as Paula remembers) the shape of the object, apparent size and incredible manoeuvring capabilities displayed mean that mundane explanations can be discounted. It was clearly not a normal plane or helicopter, and the instant acceleration and speed that it left the area means it cannot have been a blimp, kite or inflatable of some kind. It instead appears to have been a solid metallic object under intelligent control. I find it quite likely that this was a genuine sighting of an extra-terrestrial craft. I have investigated numerous sightings of objects with a very similar appearance to what Paula reported. This incident has some similarities to the infamous 1994 Ariel School sighting in Ruwa, Zimbabwe, although in that case the UFO actually landed and a being was also observed which communicated with the children. As far as Paula is concerned no communication went on with her encounter. As to why the craft was there at that time in broad daylight we will probably never know. Due to the time of day and weather it is certainly possible that there may have been other witnesses. There is even the possibility that these other sightings were reported but as Paula was a child she may not have seen the relevant news items or newspaper articles. Copyright Dave Hodrien 2019

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 31/10/2019 For reasons of anonymity pseudonyms have been used for some witnesses Encounters with the mysterious Men In Black are statistically rare it the world of UFOs. However they have sometimes been reported to grill witnesses for information about things they have seen. The main focus of this report is a night of UFO sightings, and a related incident involving possible MIB which occurred many years later! Sightings Back in 1992 James was 18 years old and lived on Mayfield Road in Moseley with his parents, grandmother, sister Karen and pet dog Duke. Duke had arthritis in his hind legs but was still active, so James would regularly walk him around the local neighbourhood during the evening. The incident took place on 14th November. At the time James had an interest in UFOs and ran an online blog page named Paralnoia, which is no longer active. He documented what took place on the page, which is the reason he recalls the precise date it happened. He was out walking Duke. They were walking along Highfield Road which leads directly off Mayfield Road. It was about 7pm and a very pleasant still evening. Due to the time of year it was already fully dark. The stars were visible overhead. Suddenly Duke became agitated by something and began whimpering. Simon looked around to see what was causing this agitation. He happened to glance up into the sky. As he did he saw what appeared to be a bright white comet with a tail shoot across the sky in front of him from right to left in a curved arc. It moved slower than a meteorite, and appeared to be a few hundred feet up rather than out at the edge of the atmosphere. It travelled with quite a slow and deliberate movement. But this was not all he saw. As the comet-like object began to move away to the left it seemed to pass behind something invisible in the air. For a split second it illuminated the curved edge of a second large aerial object which was not visible to his naked eye! After this had occurred the dog immediately seemed to recover and stopped whimpering. He thought to himself “That’s really weird! I’ll go back to the house, get my binoculars out and have a look to see if anything’s there.” He quickly walked Duke the rest of the way three times as fast as usual. Within 5 minutes they were back home. There was nobody else in at the time. Duke would usually remain downstairs in the house as climbing up the stairs caused him pain. So James left him downstairs and went up to his bedroom. He grabbed his binoculars then opened the big bedroom window which had a view to the East. Highfield Road was to the right of the view. He looked to the left in the direction of Birmingham International airport and scanned the sky for normal aircraft. As he looked back to the right in the direction he had seen the comet-like object and the other invisible object he noticed two white orbs of light in the distance. They were in close proximity to one another but appeared to be darting back and forth, disappearing and reappearing, and curving around each other in erratic movements. They looked completely different to how a normal plane’s navigation lights would appear. James is not sure whether one light vanished or whether they merged but suddenly instead of two lights he was looking at a single white light which was travelling in his direction. At this moment he heard Duke start to whimper again and begin to climb the stairs. This is not something he would normally do because of the pain involved in doing so, it was clear that he was highly concerned and wanted comforting. As the light began to get closer he was able to observe it with his naked eye rather than through binoculars. He thought to himself “Right, is this an aeroplane?” The light continued approaching his location. James thought “Oh shit! This is getting really really close!” The object came to a halt above the tree at the base of the back garden to his house. It appeared to be several hundred feet up. It was now possible to make out what it actually looked like. What had initially appeared as a glowing light was now an oval-shaped disc with a curved top but a flat base. It was chrome silver in colour but was giving off a slight orange glow. James believes this was probably down to the streetlights reflecting on its surface. It appeared to be about the size of a medium jet - James estimates about 100 foot across. James also noticed that the atmosphere in the room had become very still, the air itself felt heavy. He also believes he felt a slight static charge all around him. He stood there transfixed by what he was observing, trying to take in as much detail as possible. He looked at the UFO through his binoculars to see if he could make out any markings or windows but there appeared to be none. Unfortunately he had no camera at the time and this was long before camera phones. He knew that what he was looking at was clearly not mundane. He decided to try and communicate audibly with the UFO. He said out loud “I can’t tell what you are, can you show me something?” At this moment, seemingly in response to his request, the object began to rotate slowly in a clockwise direction! This continued until the flat underside of the object was now facing the sky. After about 30 seconds of it hovering motionless it once again began moving slowly in his direction, but at a slower speed than before. James estimates it moved about 20 mph. It travelled on a straight and level course. As it passed over the house he lost sight of it through the window. James quickly ran downstairs and out onto the front drive to continue observing the object. He found it had completely vanished from sight. However he was greeted by his 16 year old sister who had just arrived home. She immediately exclaimed “Oh my god have you just seen that light over the house?!” James responded saying “I’ve just seen it up close. I think I might have seen a UFO!” He then queried whether Karen had actually seen anything, to which she responded “Well I wouldn’t have said I’d seen a light if I hadn’t seen anything.” She then went on to say that she had seen a light, then a bright flash and it was gone. The fact that his sister reported seeing a light rather than the oval-shaped metallic object is interesting. This was possibly due to the fact that she observed it at distance only, or that it was catching the light in such a way as to appear to be glowing. However it seemed that his sister had not only seen the object too but may have also witnessed it leaving the area! It was now just past 8pm. James went back into the house and up to his bedroom for another look out of the window to see if there was any further activity. He remained there a few minutes and saw nothing out of the ordinary. He then decided to find the number for the University of Birmingham Observatory and give them a call to confirm that there were no astronomical anomalies in the area which could potentially have accounted for some of what he had seen. He managed to get in touch and said to the man on the phone “Hi there. I think I’ve just seen something unusual in the sky. What I want to work out is whether there was anything unusual at the time such as rare aircraft or astronomical anomalies.” The man quickly dismissed him saying “No there isn’t anything around here, you’ve probably just seen Sirius.” James was slightly annoyed at this response as what he had seen was clearly not a star in the sky. But he simply said “OK, that’s fine” and ended the call. The following morning he checked the news, and scanned through all the local newspapers to see if anyone else had reported seeing anything, but there was nothing. James was mystified why there appeared to be no other witnesses (at least any that had come forward) as he had seen three separate objects across two sightings. An Unexpected Visit By 2005 James has moved into a house on Wyndham Road in Bearwood with his girlfriend Carol (now wife). One Saturday afternoon James was downstairs while Carol was doing housework upstairs. He heard a knock on the front door and went to answer it. He was greeted with the sight of a man and a woman. They were both wearing smart black suits with long black trenchcoats. The man looked to be in his late 50s. He was about 5 foot 8 inches tall. He had grey hair which looked a little unkempt considering the smartness of the clothing he was wearing. He was clean shaven. The woman looked Swedish, with blonde pulled back hair and blue eyes. She was taller than the man, about 6 foot 1 inch. She was carrying a black holdall bag. James’ first thought was that they were police and he was in some sort of trouble. This made him naturally guarded. The man began the conversation by saying “Hi there Mr Brody, we’d like to talk to you about something you reported some time ago. Can we come in?” His voice felt a little stern and direct. James thought to himself “Right I don’t know these people but clearly they know my name.” However he decided to honour the man’s request and responded “Ok, come on in.” James took them through to the living room. He asked them if they wanted to take off their jackets but they responded “No, that’s fine.” They both sat down alongside one another on the sofa, and James sat down in one of the armchairs. He then continued the conversation saying “Ok then, I’m not quite sure what you want to talk about?” The man responded, saying “Well we understand that you reported that you saw something in the sky.” James was surprised by this and exclaimed “Oh! Right ok!” The man continued “We want to talk about what you saw. You saw a number of things.” At this James was immediately suspicious of the people. They not only knew his name, but were also aware that he had seen multiple things that night, despite the fact that he had not informed anyone of this. On the night of the incident he had Birmingham Observatory if there were any atmospheric anomalies, but he had not gone into any detail about what he saw. The man then asked “Would you mind us asking you some questions about what you saw?” James responded saying “Ok, I agree I’ve seen a number of different things.” Then the man said “The first thing you saw – was it a comet?” This really surprised him as the first thing he had seen that night was the comet-like object. He gave the man a really puzzled look. At this moment the lady opened the holdall bag and pulled out a black ring binder. She then opened this up. The binder appeared to be full of A4 card pages covered in clear plastic film. She began flicking through the pages. James was not able to see these pages in detail but believes that they had on them various photographs of UFOs, mostly in colour but a few in black and white. When the lady had reached a particular page she lifted the binder up to show him, saying “Did you see this?” There on the page was a single colour photograph. It was the comet-like object he had seen! The image was of good quality. Behind the object was just dark sky, there were no reference points. But what bothered James the most was it was exactly what he had seen. The angle of the shot was exactly how he remembered seeing it from his memory of the incident, almost like a snapshot of his vision had been taken and turned into a printed photograph. As soon as James saw the picture he knew something was very wrong with the situation. He realised that he did not know who these people were, and didn’t know whether he should be guarded or not. He didn’t feel particularly threatened by them but neither did he feel secure. He responded to the lady’s question by saying “Yes it is – who are you?” She replied “We’ll get to that in a minute.” She then once more flicked through the binder to another page, before showing it to him again. James almost anticipated what was going to be on the page. Sure enough there was the oval-shaped object with the flattened base. This time the image was a little lower in quality, but it was still clear enough to see. The object was filling up most of the image, and there was just dark sky beyond it, but once again the angle was exactly how he remembered it hovering at the end of his back garden before it had started to rotate. It was as if someone had been there next to him in the room and taken a photograph. The lady asked “Did you see this?” James was quite confused by what was taking place and simply replied “Yes.” She then asked “Did you interact with this?” James wondered what she meant by this and asked “What do you mean, did I talk to it?” The lady clarified her query by asking “Did you speak to it?” Again James replied “Yes.” She then asked him “What did you say?” James said “I asked it to show be something and then it rotated.” The lady then asked “Did it do anything else?” James replied “No, it rotated and that was it.” However the lady’s questions continued. She asked “Following on from there have you had any problems with electronics, any sort of telekinesis or any increase in paranormal activity?” James could not really think of anything dramatic but responded “There has been occasional experiences but nothing sort of major. Sometimes I think I’ve seen something out of the corner of my eye, occasionally objects seem to vanish then appear elsewhere. But nothing I could say 100% I’ve seen. I did go through a couple of years of setting off shop alarms and metal detectors at airports but that has stopped.” In a very matter-of-fact way the lady simply replied “Well that tends to go after a while.” James was still not happy with what was happening so said “Right, I’ve told you all the information that I want to share with you. Could you now please tell me who you are?” At this the man started talking again, saying “We are an investigative group that review sightings. You obviously think you’ve seen something. It’s something we have past experience with. Thank you very much for your assistance.” This did not feel a satisfactory explanation so James continued “Are you able to tell me any more information about who you are? You’ve come into my house, you’ve asked for some very specific information, I’d like some more information about you.” At this moment the man and lady appeared to sidestep the question. They looked at each other and then the man said “Right it’s time for us to go.” They got up off the sofa. James showed them to the door. They stepped outside and without saying anything further to him walked down the drive and off along the road together until they were out of sight. Looking back at the incident James realises there’s so many questions he should have asked them. But he was completely disarmed by the situation as it was so bizarre. There are clearly many issues with who the people claimed to be. They said they were from an investigative group looking into UFO incidents. But they knew far too much about James and what he had seen. They knew his first and last name, and where he was living, despite having changed address since the incidents occurred. They knew he had seen multiple objects. They knew the appearance of what he had seen. The fact they knew these details is intriguing in itself, but there is a possible explanation. Back in 1992 James did contact Birmingham Observatory on the night of the incidents. He cannot remember whether he gave them his name but it is conceivable that he did. A UFO investigation group could have contacted the observatory and asked about historical calls they had received which may been related to UFOs. There may have been other witnesses who they spoke with confirming what things were seen in the sky that night. They may have assumed that James saw the same objects and then performed research to work out his current address. This scenario seems unlikely but is of course plausible. However the photographs the lady had of the objects are a side of the story much harder to explain. It is possible that these photographs were ones they had received from other witnesses they had previously spoken with. But the fact they were taken at an angle exactly how James recalled seeing them from is deeply puzzling. He saw nobody else in the area at the time when he had the sighting of the comet-like object. And obviously there was nobody there alongside him in his room when he had the second sighting. There are other very suspicious aspects to James’ meeting with the man and woman. Their conversation about the second UFO James saw from his bedroom window suggested that they were aware he had communicated with it. It was almost a leading question, like they knew that he had tried interacting with it by speaking to it. This is not information they could have gained from speaking with anyone else, including other potential witnesses. They also seemed very unwilling to give out information about who exactly they were. If they really were a UFO investigation group surely they would have provided him with details that he could contact them with in case he wanted to provide them with further information? Yet he never found out the name of their group or any way of keeping in touch. Similarly, if this were the case then the photographs would have to have come from other witnesses – and if so why would they not discuss these other witnesses with James and explain where the photographs had come from? There have been many cases involving the Men In Black where they appear to have either grilled witnesses for information directly, or have monitored them from afar, seemingly in a way to learn more about what has happened to them rather than warn them off speaking about it to anyone. Looking at all of the details of what took place I believe that this could be one of those cases. There are too many unusual aspects to what occurred here. We can only speculate as to why they would have been asking about the incidents 17 years after they took place, perhaps what happened was significant in some way. And perhaps the photographs were really from James’s mind, extracted and put down on film via unknown means. However one argument against this suggestion is that the second photograph was not as high quality as the first. If they had been extracted in some way surely they would have both been of the same quality? This is just one of many questions that currently remain unanswered. While Carol did not actually witness the two visitors herself she still remembers the incident. Here is what she recalls about what took place… “I don’t have a direct recollection of the two people as I was upstairs at the time, however when I did come downstairs, my husband seemed very puzzled as to what had just happened. I know the visitors had been there for around 30 minutes and as I understand it they were very interested in talking about James experience although there elements that I know he hadn’t discussed with anyone else. We spent some time discussing who we thought they may have been and it wasn’t until sometime later that we considered that they may have been the MIB. I know it initially concerned James as he said they knew some very intimate details. We also wondered if they would return but to my knowledge there hasn’t been a follow up visit”. Daughter’s Guardian In the autumn of 2007 James and Carol moved to George Road, Five Ways. Carol was heavily pregnant with their daughter Nicola at the time, who was due to be born in the third week of January 2008. It was the evening of 20th December. James and Carol were relaxing in the living room alongside one another on the sofa. All of a sudden James noticed that the air around him had become very cold. It was so cold that it was possible to see his breath. He pointed it out to Carol saying “Look at this, you can see my breath!” He looked around the room for anything which could be causing a draught such as an open door or window but there was nothing which could account for it. He decided to swap places with Carol on the sofa to see if she could feel it to. However when she did this the cold air seemed to follow James. The side of the sofa he was previously sitting on now appeared normal, but he could still feel the cold air around him. He got up off the sofa entirely and walked to the other side of the room. Again the cold air followed him. It quickly became apparent that it was focused around him specifically, not the location in the room. James was standing up near one of the corners of the room when he and Carol noticed a small pinprick of intensely bright white light appear down by one of the walls. It slowly increased in size until it was as big as a 50 pence piece. Then it suddenly vanished. As it did so every single electrical device in the room containing a battery went dead! There was no sound but they soon realised that their phones, the laptop and camcorder had all lost their charge! James rang up his friends with an interest in the paranormal to tell them about what happened. When he told them they asked him if Carol was alright. He wondered why and they suggested that perhaps the activity he had just experienced was some kind of warning. At the time James did not dwell on this too much, but on New Years Eve Carol went into labour early and had to get an emergency C section during which Nicola was almost lost. After a number of days Carol and Nicola came home from hospital. Nicola was still quite poorly with Jaudis. They had prepared a nursery for her along the landing from their bedroom. James also purchased a baby monitor to keep an eye on her while she was in there. Soon after they returned home James and Carol were in their room and Nicola had been put down to sleep in the nursery. A short while passed and Nicola started to cry. As she began James looked over to their open bedroom door and noticed something. Out on the landing, floating about 3 feet off the ground was what looked like a small bubble. It was about an inch in diameter and did not appear to be giving off any light, but appeared to be energy of some kind rather than a physical object. James got up off the bed and walked towards it. As he got closer the orb moved left down the landing out of view. He walked out onto the landing and looking to the left he saw the orb again, this time hovering outside the door of the nursery. He began to walk towards it and again as he got close it moved left, disappearing through the door to the nursery. When he went inside there was no sign of it. He picked up Nicola to comfort her. This was not the only time this orb was seen. James says that for the period of several weeks while Nicola was recovering fully it appeared on many times when she started to cry. It would not appear every time, but most occasions it would occur. It would always appear in the same location and height off the floor, but was clearly intelligent as it would only move whenever he approached it, like it was leading him into the nursery. It was not just James that saw the orb, Carol confirmed that she could see it too, but would try to ignore it. James was more interested in what was happening and as it was repeatable he attempted to capture the orb on his Sony HD camera using normal photographic mode and infra-red mode. Unfortunately the orb would not show up on camera, either video footage or still photographs. Nor would it show up on their mobile phone cameras. This perhaps suggests that it was some kind of psychic phenomenon which was only visible directly. In total James estimates it occurred about 20 or so times over 3-4 weeks, after which it was never seen again. He feels that it may have been a lost relative looking after his new daughter in the vulnerable early weeks of her life. The Figure The summer of 2010 was very warm, and therefore James and Carol only had their thin duvet cover on the bed. One night James woke up with a start around 2am for an unknown reason. In the corner of the room was a cupboard against which was leaning a number of carrier bags filled with second hand clothing. He looked across the room at this corner. Standing there was what appeared to be the sillouette of a tall humanoid figure. It appeared to be 6 foot 5 inches tall and had no features, it was just a dark grey coloured shape, but one which appeared solid. Its arms were down by its side. James put his head under the duvet cover for 5 seconds and then looked again. The figure was still there! He knew now that he was fully awake and that there was something physically there in the room. He thought to himself “I’m going to get up and confront it.” But before he did that he wanted to wake Carol up to gain confirmation that it was definitely there. He reached over and tried to gently wake her up without causing too much noise. It took a couple of attempts but in the end she stirred. While keeping his eyes on the figure he asked her “Carol, can you see that in the corner?” She lifted her head to look towards it. At that exact second the figure faded away before his eyes! As it went he heard the sound of the bags collapsing. He got up out of bed and walked over to where the figure had been. As expected the carrier bags had fallen flat on the ground. The figure was nowhere to be seen. In the following days James wondered if the figure would make a return. To attempt to capture physical evidence of its presence he put talcum powder on the floor in the corner of the room in an attempt to obtain footprints. However this was the last he saw of it. Orb Videos In May 2011 James attempted to capture paranormal activity on camera in his living room. For two consecutive days he set up a camera and invited any spirits present to show themselves. On both videos he managed to capture some small orbs which darted across the frame. In the first video shot on the 24th May James specifically asked for two orbs to appear together on camera. Shortly after asking this an orb appears, closely followed by two more. Here is the video footage: Below are three stills of the orbs seen in the footage ringed in red: Transcript of the first video: "OK then thank you for coming forwards before now. What I need is 'cause people will say this is going to be dust or something like that there so do you think you could show two orbs together on the screen, in front of me so I can say that it's really happpening?" "OK I think I got that. Do you think you could do that again for me? Two orbs?" (First orb appears) "Wow! Thank you so much!" (Two more orbs appear) "Thank you." James filmed a second video in the same location on the following day in an attempt to capture further activity. In this video many orbs are seen passing the camera. A particularly visible one drifts across the screen while James is asking for activity to occur: Still of the orb which passes across the camera at 35 seconds into the footage which James specifically takes note of: Transcript of the second video: "OK then thank you for coming forwards before now. What I need is 'cause people will say this is going to be dust or something like that there so do you think you could show two orbs together on the screen, in front of me so I can say that it's really happpening?" "I'm a bit disappointed that the other camera didn't really pick anything up, so I'm not sure really that anything has actually happened, so um...is there anything you can do for me?" "Anything in particular?" "Do you think you can maybe move something for... (Orb drifts across camera) Ok. Ok thank you for that." "Anything else? Do you think you can maybe show yourself?" While these could be evidence of paranormal activity, I feel that they could just as easily be dust drifting past the camera. None of the orbs perform any manoeuvres which would designate intelligence, and there is no sign that they are self-illuminated. It is interesting that the orbs in the first video appeared a short time after James asked for something to occur, and that for the previous 37 seconds there was nothing observed, but this could just be coincidence. Make of the videos what you will. Conclusions The sightings that James had back in 1992 and subsequent visit by apparent MIB are fascinating and hard to explain. What could the comet-like object that he witnessed have been? Was it actually a bright meteorite that happened to pass across the sky and led him to catch a glimpse of the UFO which was cloaked and in most circumstances invisible to the naked eye? Or could it have been a craft of some kind, perhaps returning to meet with the other cloaked craft? It is unknown if this cloaked object was the same as the oval shaped UFO seen a short while later, but It seems probable that it was due to the proximity of the sightings in both time and location, but there is no way of verifying this. Also if it was cloaked initially then why make its presence known later on? The oval shaped object was clearly not a mundane aircraft or other aerial object such as a balloon. Due to its characteristics and manoeuvres, including the apparent direct interaction James had with it, I find it very likely that this was a genuine sighting of an advanced ET craft. As for the individuals who turned up at James’ door many years later, there are too many unusual aspects to the incident to merely explain as ufologists researching an old case. I feel the evidence certainly points towards a visit by the MIB. Perhaps they were interested in the direct interaction James had with the craft and wanted to see how it affected him, but it is a mystery as to why they would wait so many years before speaking with him. While the more recent paranormal activity experienced by James may be completely un-related to his previous experiences, there is the possibility that his direct interaction with the oval-shaped craft may have triggered heightened senses, which in turn led to paranormal activity in his proximity. Most experiencers of ET contact also report activity of this nature so there may be a connection. I hope that James will keep in touch regarding any further experiences he has. If so this report will be kept up-to-date. Copyright Dave Hodrien 2019

Ian gave an absolutely fascinating talk last week, covering his UFO sightings and other paranormal experiences, a psychic investigation in Ireland and details which suggest he may have found the definitive location of an ancient temple built by the Knights Templar! He had way more to discuss which he did not have time to go over, so I've decided to invite him back for a second time to continue his talk on Thursday 14th November. The previously planned Derrel Sims implant documentary screening will be postponed till a later date.

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 17/09/2019 Note: For reasons of anonymity pseudonyms have been used In August 2019 I was put in touch with an 83 year old man named Lester. He has a heart condition and wanted to get his various UFO experiences down on record while he still has time. Over two extensive phone calls we discussed four fascinating experiences from his life which have taken place in a variety of places. UFO Over Westcott Lester first got interested in the subject of UFOs back in 1962. He informs me there was a UK wide UFO flap at the time which he recalls reading about. This also happened to be the year of his first UFO sighting, when he was 26 years old. At the time he lived in Quainton, Buckinghamshire. He worked at CBS Records on the Western outskirts of Aylesbury, several miles away. Five miles West of Aylesbury is Westcott Rocket Propulsion Establishment. Until the mid-1990s the establishment designed and developed rocket motors used in British guided missiles and research vehicles. Lester would regularly hear the roar of rocket engines being tested while at his work place. One bright and clear summer’s day Lester was relaxing in the canteen and glanced out of the window. The surrounding area was quite flat and it was possible to see for miles to the North, including a veiew of Wescott in the distance. Above the establishment he noticed a light grey coloured object hovering motionlessly in the sky. It appeared to be about 800 feet off the ground. Due to the distance it was hard to determine the shape or size of the object. He had some binoculars with him and decided to take a look, but even through these it was hard to see it clearly. Sadly he did not have a camera, but it was probably too far away to pick up anyway. Fascinated by what it could be, Lester watched the object for about 6-7 minutes. During this time he called a couple of his work colleagues to also observe it. They briefly watched it before leaving to do other things. Then suddenly without warning the object shot away at an incredible speed to the West. As it went it flew on a level and straight course. It moved like a bullet and in less than a second had vanished from sight! Lester was astounded by what he had witnessed. He knew the object could not have been a rocket as they were incapable of hovering at a stand-still, and it left the area at such a speed that it clearly was not a helicopter. He believed he had witnessed an alien craft, one which had been possibly checking out the rocket testing facility. This experience made him question things more and further increased his interest in the subject. Reflections By 1966 Lester had moved into a rural cottage situated between the villages of Steeple Claydon and Verney Junction. The lane on which he lived had a gate which led to a field. This field was about 600 feet long and beyond it was a small spinney about 80 yards in length. At the northern edge of the spinney was Claydon Brook. One day in summer time Lester went out for a countryside walk by himself. He walked up the field and across the spinney. As he neared Claydon Brook he noticed something unusual reflected in the water. It looked like a row of rounded windows or portholes. He thought to himself “What the devil’s that?” He looked up into the air to where he felt the object making the reflection should be but there was nothing there. When he looked back into the water the reflections were still there. At this point he began to feel anxious like he was being watched by something. Something invisible to his naked eye but showing up in the water’s surface and about 30-40 feet across. He quickly turned and began to walk East along Claydon Brook in the direction of Verney Junction. He did not want to remain in the area any longer. Looking back at the incident Lester is still adamant that there was something there. He informed me that he used to enjoy shooting, and has a keen eye. He knows what to look for in the air, as well as in water and marshland. Coloured Orbs On a summer’s day in the early 1990s Lester had driven to Dorchester to go shopping. It was a clear and sunny day with only light cloud in the sky. He had parked in the Northern “Top o’ town” car park and was making his way back to the car. He was about to cross Bridport Road which runs alongside the Southern edge of the car park when he looked up into the sky. There he saw about 5-6 orbs. They were a mix of colours including blue, green, red and white, and appeared to be self-illuminated rather than reflecting the sunlight. The orbs were darting around one another very rapidly, performing turning movements in the sky, almost like juggling balls. There seemed to be no restrictions in the way that they moved, as if they were without mass. However they appeared to move with intent rather than how balloons caught in the wind would look. Their colours did not change or dim in brightness. It was hard to judge their precise height and therefore size, but they seemed to be at quite a high altitude, which would have made them quite large. Lester says it really was an astonishing sight which stopped him in his tracks. After a few seconds another young man came walking by. He pointed the orbs out to the man. The man looked up and then just shrugged and went on his way. Lester was perplexed at his apparent disinterest. He continued to watch for about 10-15 seconds but then decided to cross the road as it was quite busy and he didn’t want to get in anyone’s way. Sadly he had no camera on him at the time. After crossing the road, which took no longer than 10 seconds, he looked back up and was surprised to find that the orbs had completely vanished! He could do nothing more but head back to his car. He has mentioned the incident to numerous people since, but not heard of anyone else reporting the same objects. Silver Cigar Around 2004 Lester owned a small Suzuki camper van. He would regularly drive to Wales to camp for the weekend at various locations. It was the August bank holiday and he had decided to drive to camp at Bird Rock, a rocky outcrop near to Llanfihangel-y-Pennant in North West Wales, which rises to a height of 258 metres above sea level. It is named Bird Rock because of the Choughs and other bird species that nest there. It was about 3pm that he arrived at the plateau of the rock and parked up. The plateau was quite open with only a few hawthorn bushes around the edge. There was a stunning view of the surrounding area in all directions. It was a lovely afternoon with a clear blue sky. Lester got out of the van to take a look around. He looked to the North West towards Barmouth Bay. In the distance he noticed an object hovering in the sky over the bay. It appeared to be at an altitude of about 6-7000 feet. The object was metallic silver in colour and was completely motionless. Lester estimates it was about 200 feet in length with squared off ends. There were no windows, portholes or other markings visible. The surface of the UFO appeared to be highly reflective. As he watched he realised the object appeared to be emitting rings of vapour that spread out around it like smoke rings. The vapour was clearly coming from the object. He stared at it, fascinated by what it could be. Lester informed me that during the war he used to have aircraft recognition books, so had a good eye for known aircraft. He had a pair of binoculars in the van door at the time, but says that every time he went to retrieve them to take a closer look at the object something stopped him and he heard a voice in his head say “Don’t do that!” After a short while the vapour seemed to stop being emitted. Then roughly 300 yards behind it Lester noticed what appeared to be a solitary cloud forming from thin air. He watched on as the cloud got bigger and bigger. It then stopped growing and began slowly moving towards the UFO. At the same time the UFO began moving towards it. They appeared to clearly be connected. After about 20 seconds the UFO and the cloud reached one another. The UFO entered the cloud and was lost from view. A moment later the cloud vanished near instantly. Both it and the UFO were gone! In total Lester had watched the UFO for 17 minutes. He informed me that “it was an astonishing sight”. There was nothing else he could do other than relax, so he poured himself a cup of coffee. In the following days he did tell a couple of his friends about the incident. He also informed a UFO group who advertised in Nexus magazine, but never heard back from them. Conclusions Lester has had a number of fascinating UFO sightings throughout his life, and I am happy that he has chosen BUFOG as a way of preserving the details of these experiences through this extensive case report. The incidents he has witnessed have been varied, but have each had stunning aspects which are hard to explain. They have all appeared vastly different to any known aircraft. Some have performed incredibly fast but intelligent manoeuvres. Some have vanished in plain sight or only been invisible to the naked eye but clearly present. These aspects suggest that Lester has witnessed genuine ET craft as opposed to misidentification of mundane objects, a suggestion he is only too happy to take on board because of his background and knowledge. I’ll end this report with Lester’s own thoughts which he passed on to me during one of our discussions… “What it amounts to is this - not so much where these things come from but what are we? There’s something going on with humans that seems to be recognised by whoever these visitors are, maybe they bred us and are farming us. Maybe something else entirely. We have to question ourselves in order to understand what is taking place here.” Copyright Dave Hodrien 2019

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 07/09/2019 Introduction Richard Freeman is a renowned UK-based cryptozoologist. He is the zoological director of the Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) and has published a number of books on the subject. In August 2019 he came to give a talk at BUFOG about a number of well-known cryptids (animals whose existence or survival are disputed or unsubstantiated) from around the world, and his various expeditions to attempt to obtain evidence of their existence. After his talk Richard stopped overnight at my house as his train home was not till the following morning. We got chatting and he informed me of a number of experiences which fitted more closely with Ufology and ET contact than with cryptozoology. He gave me permission to write down these experiences and document them in this report. Knocks on the Wall In the early 80’s Richard lived in a house on Cedar Road, Camp Hill, Nuneaton with his grandparents. His earliest unusual experiences happened in 1983 or 1984 when he was 13-14 years old. They began one night after he had gone to bed around 10-11pm. He was lying down with the light off but had not yet dropped off to sleep. He suddenly heard a tap tap tap-tap sound of knocking on his bedroom wall, coming from the adjacent room. It sounded like someone knocking on the wall with their fist. The room adjacent to his bedroom was just used as storage. It contained a wardrobe and some book shelves. Richard got out of bed and went to check in the room. As expected there was nobody there. He returned to his room and got back into bed. At the time Richard was aware of cases of poltergeist activity and wondered if that was going on. He decided he would attempt to communicate. He knocked twice on the wall. To his astonishment he got two knocks back in response! He then began knocking different numbers of times, and each time got the same number of knocks back. For an unknown reason he wasn’t scared of what was taking place. After several minutes he stopped getting a response to his tapping on the wall and so settled down to sleep (Which you may feel is strange in itself – I certainly wouldn’t be able to sleep after something like this had taken place!) The following night once again he was lying in bed and the tapping started again! Like before he began communicating with whatever it was, and each time it would copy the number of knocks on the wall. Richard informs me that it repeated like this every night for the period of about two weeks. The tapping would always start around the same time and always in the same location. On one of the nights he tried asking it questions out loud. He asked it basic mathematics questions and would get the correct number of taps in response. For example he asked it what two times three was and got back six knocks on the wall! Richard does not know why he did not take this much further, for example getting it to respond with one knock for yes and two for no. If he had done this he may have been able to ask it detailed questions. After this particular time period he never heard the knocks again. He was certain that whenever it occurred the adjacent room was empty and it was not someone playing a prank on him. If the knocks had always started with Richard, it could be suggested that it was just caused by echoes within the wall, but this was not the case, nor does it explain the knocks given in response to questions. Richard is adamant that nobody was playing a practical joke. The fact that it happened night after night for a period of time tends to back this up – if it had occurred only once or twice this would be plausible (not that there was anyone else living there besides his grandparents). Levitating Grey Around the same time as the knocking sounds (Richard cannot remember whether prior to or after) he had what would be described as an alien visitation. He woke up in the early hours of the morning. When he rolled over in bed he saw a being hovering in the air alongside the bed. It was about two feet away from the edge of the bed and in a lying down position at the same height as himself. The being was completely unclothed. It had a slender frame and smooth skin with no wrinkles visible. Its arms were very long and thin, and positioned along its side. There was no genitalia visible. It had the general features of a Grey but with a number of unusual aspects. Firstly its skin colour was bright pink like peppermint rock from the seaside. Its eyes were very large, oval in shape and brown in colour. The being’s chest had human-like nipples. Its feet were rounded and there were no noticeable toes. He stared at the being, frightened by its presence. It slowly turned its head to look at him. It then stretched out one of its arms and put it round his shoulders. Suddenly he jolted up in bed. He was fully awake and the being had completely vanished. It took him a while to settle back down. Richard feels that this incident was probably a hallucination brought on by hypnagogia rather than ET contact. While some of the aspects of the experience such as the odd colour and features of the being and the unusual position it was in, it is still interesting that it had the general appearance of a Grey. In addition to this, as you will see later in this report, this is not the only time that Richard has had encounters of this kind. Red Orbs Sighting Richard’s first UFO sighting took place in the autumn of the same year as the poltergeist activity. It was a clear and still evening with only light cloud in the sky. Richard was walking along Cedar Road from his grandparents’ house to his mother’s house. It was quiet and there were no cars on the road at the time. He happened to glance up at the stars and noticed two glowing red orbs of light in the sky. They were situated slightly to the left of his location at an angle of about 75 degrees. The orbs were positioned diagonally from one another. It was hard to accurately judge how high they were, but Richard believes they were about 2000 feet up. Due to their apparent height this would have made them quite sizeable. The orbs were cherry red in the centre with a red glowing haze around their edge. The brightness was constant, there was no flickering which you would tend to see with a flame. They were completely stationary. Richard stared at them in fascination for about 10 seconds wondering what they could be. Unfortunately he did not have a camera on him. Suddenly an arc of blue electricity passed from the higher orb to the lower one. A couple of seconds went by and then another arc came down from the lower orb, seemingly down to the ground, although this was lost from view behind the local housing. Within a second of this both the orbs instantly vanished from sight! Mystified by what he had seen, he continued walking to his mother’s house. He does not recall whether he mentioned the incident when he arrived there. He did mention it to a number of his friends at school. Another Visitation Several years went by without any further unusual events. But in 1987 Richard would once again experience a night-time visitation. For an unknown reason he woke up in the early hours. Looking across his bedroom past his pet snake’s vivarium he noticed that the bedroom door was open. He immediately thought to himself “That’s strange, I thought I closed that.” He then noticed a shape which should not have been there. Peeping around the door was a Grey very similar to the one he had seen before. The only difference was that this one was a tan brown colour rather than bright pink. The being was partially hidden by the door, he could just see the side of its face with a single eye, and one long arm which the being had positioned up in the air stretched out above it. A moment after he looked at it the being made a shocked noise and then quickly retreated from view behind the door with a waddling motion. It appeared that it had noticed Richard looking at it and it did not wish to be seen. Immediately just like before Richard jumped wide awake. He felt dazed and the Grey was nowhere in sight. However the bedroom door was still open. Richard once again puts the incident down to a hypnagogic hallucination. This could the case, once again the being was in an unusual position with its arm up in the air. But it is interesting to note that the door was clearly ajar even after the experience ended. While it could have drifted open of its own accord, or perhaps been opened by Richard getting up in the night, this may instead point to the experience physically taking place. Pixie Led By the late 90s Richard was fully involved in the world of cryptozoology. He also had an interest in the mystical, including ancient monuments of the UK. It was late autumn in either 1999 or 2000 and he had gone to Dartmoor with two friends Phil and Alison, and another friend of Phil’s. They were there to check out Grey Wethers - one of the most well-known stone circles. It was dusk by the time they arrived, so due to the time of year must have been mid-evening. The weather was not great, it was a little drizzly and windy, with cloud cover overhead. Grey Wethers is not alongside any public roads, in order to reach it you have to park and walk by foot. They parked at the side of the B3212, the closest main road to the stone circle. They then began walking North West towards its location. Between them and their destination was a number of grass covered fields edged by low stone walls. As they entered one of these fields something unusual started to take place. Richard and his friends somehow all became confused and lost. They began wandering about in all directions looking for the gate to the next field. This seemed to go on for quite some time, at least half an hour, as Richard noticed it was becoming dark. The situation felt strange, almost dream-like. He thought to himself “Why are we all wandering around and can’t find the way out?” As they walked around they occasionally spoke to one another about the situation but were relatively quiet. Suddenly across by one of the walls Richard saw a circle of small pale blue-white lights appear, roughly 25-30 feet from his position! It appeared to be about 5 feet across and just above ground level. His friends were further away at the time, and he drew their attention to it by exclaiming “Look at that!” They stood there wondering what it could be. They were not frightened, just puzzled by its appearance. After about 30 seconds all of the lights suddenly blinked out. Then several seconds later they all reappeared, but this time they were in the shape of a figure with arms and legs by its side and a dome shaped head! After a few more seconds the lights disappeared again. At this point Richard knew something really unusual was taking place. He thought back to Dartmoor folklore stories he had read about pixies (piskies) and how they were known to lead travellers astray. He recalled in these stories that one of the ways to break the curse was to turn your jacket inside out. Without really thinking this would actually have any effect at all he took off his coat and turned it inside out, asking his friends to do the same. For an unknown reason none of them questioned what he was asking them to do, which later on felt odd. As soon as they did this the dream-like state seemed to dissipate and they immediately noticed the gate to the next field in the stone wall. They walked over to and through the gate, and could then see the circle of stones in the distance, lit up a bonfire some other people had lit. At the same time they noticed the sound of guitars and drums being played. It felt strange that they had not heard these while in the previous field as according to Richard they should have been able to. They soon arrived at the stone circle and stayed there a while. They did not mention the bizarre incident in the field to the other visitors, just simply smiled at them on their arrival. After a while it started to rain so they decided to return to their car. They took a different route back to it rather than re-trace their steps through the fields. Richard never really discussed the incident with his friends again after that evening to any great extent. They have now moved elsewhere and he has lost contact with them, but he often thinks back to the strange series of events that occurred that night. Was there really something to the stories of people being pixie-led? In these stories people would often find themselves mysteriously dis-oriented and would lose track of time and direction, just as Richard reported. Here is a link to a page on the Legendary Dartmoor website about the Pixie Led phenomenon: http://www.legendarydartmoor.co.uk/piskie_led.htm What occurred in the field made no sense, as obviously in this situation the logical thing to do would be to walk to the wall and then walk along until the gate is found? But for some reason nobody present thought of this, they just started walking back and forth aimlessly. Richard confirmed that they had not drank any alcohol or taken any drugs. The orbs of light which were seen are a fascinating mystery. They were off-road and there was no farming machinery around which could have been responsible for what they saw. No machinery would make that pattern of lights in the first place, nor would the lights have changed shape in the way that they did. The bizarre shape the lights formed after vanishing for the first time is very interesting indeed. Was it, as Richard interpreted, a humanoid figure? Or was it merely reminiscent of one? If it was a figure this certainly suggests that the lights possessed intelligence, maybe this display was done on purpose to show the witnesses that they were sentient. And what of the way in which things seemed to go back to normal after Richard got everyone to put their coats on inside out? Surely this could not have actually had an effect on what was taking place, and it was just coincidental? There are so many unanswered questions to what happened here, but for those who believe in pixies I presume the answers are already clear… Glowing Orbs In January 2015 Richard went on an expedition to Tasmania for a number of weeks in an effort to track down the Tasmanian wolf (Thylacine), a carnivorous presumed by mainstream science to have become extinct in 1936. In modern times there have been many reported sightings of this elusive creature, and Richard travelled to Tasmania with his Australian friend Mike in order to try and capture evidence of the species’ continued existence. It was the final evening of their trip before their flight back to England. They had been un-successful in capturing footage of a Tasmanian Wolf, but Mike had arranged for them to spend the night at a farmhouse on the edge of Bronte Lagoon, Bronte Park. The daughter of the family who lived there had apparently had an encounter with the wolf. Mike also claimed to have seen unidentified glowing orbs of light in the woodland south from the house on numerous previous occasions when the weather was clear, and was aware that the family had also seen them. After arriving and settling in they discussed the sighting of the Tasmanian Wolf with the daughter. After this the conversation then turned to the lights. The farm owner said that the lights would appear most nights and they had seen them on many occasions. He said that on one occasion one of them had come in close to the house and hovered outside over a window box. In the morning when they checked the window box they found that the plants had shrivelled up and died. Richard hoped that he too would get to see the lights. Around 10pm once the sun had fully set everyone went outside to look for the lights. It was a clear night, with only partial cloud cover. Suddenly about 60 feet South of their location directly over the chicken coop one of the orbs appeared! It looked like a glowing white fairy light. It was hovering about a foot above the coop, which meant it was about 4 feet off the ground. It was completely stationary and the brightness It was only present a short while. Before they began moving towards it to get a closer look it went out. But then further away at the edge of the woodland several other lights came on amongst the trees. As they continued to watch the lights go out and others appear. They would sometimes appear next to the tree branches, other times they would be in mid-air. Richard had seen both glow worms and fireflies on numerous occasions before and was convinced that these were something else entirely. Richard had his camera equipment with him. Unfortunately the normal cameras he had did not have a good enough zoom on them, and it was not dark enough to use the night vision camera he had with him. He attempted to capture footage of the lights in the woodland but because it was not pitch black the footage came out over-exposed and un-watchable. They decided to approach the lights in the wood. As they began to get closer the orbs would always vanish, but then others would appear further into the trees. It felt almost as if the lights were leading them South through the woodland. Eventually they came out from the trees at the Northern edge of the lagoon. Across the far side they could see a small lighthouse. They wondered if the light from this was somehow reflecting off the trees and causing the phenomenon. They felt that this probably wasn’t the explanation, but wanted to be sure, so walked back to the farmhouse. They then set off in their car to drive round to the other side of the lagoon. When they arrived at the lighthouse it immediately became clear that the orbs of light could not be caused by it. The beam was not far too localised and was not shining in the right direction to catch the woodland on the North side of the lagoon. However while they stared back across it they then saw a much larger orange orb of glowing light appear in the woodland! It looked at least as big as a beach ball and was hovering in the air. Richard and Mike jumped back in their vehicle and quickly drove back to the farmhouse. On route they lost sight of the orange orb because of the layout of the road. As they arrived they realised the orb was no longer present, and the smaller white orbs were now nowhere to be seen. When they spoke with the family, they confirmed that they too had seen it through the trees, however they described it as red in colour not orange. Everyone stayed up a while longer hoping to see more lights but no more appeared that night. Richard purposely woke very early before the morning light in an effort to see them again but they did not make an appearance. Once everyone else had woken up he and Mike said goodbye and set off for the airport. Looking back at the incident Richard feels certain that there was some kind of intelligence behind the lights rather than them being a natural phenomenon such as earth lights. He feels that it was a display of some kind put on for them because they were watching. Conclusions Richard has had an impressive number of varied fascinating experiences, especially when you consider that these are in addition to his experiences involving cryptids. Clearly some of these experiences have links with ufology, from his sightings of unexplained aerial objects to his encounters with Grey-like entities, although I’m sure Richard would not consider himself to be an alien contactee. If you would like to learn more about Richard’s cryptozoological work, the website for the Centre of Fortean Zoology can be found at http://www.cfz.org.uk/ Copyright Dave Hodrien 2019

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Craig Lowe Release Date: 14/02/2008 I am part of a paranormal forum and after seeing something I couldn't explain other members suggested emailing you with the details: I was in Birmingham town centre today and at 11:30 am this morning I was on the bus on the way home. I was at the back of the bus and facing backwards as they were the only seats available. I looked out the window and above a tall building there were four white objects. At first I thought they were seagulls soaring, then I realised they had no wings so I thought of balloons. The objects were in a kite formation and perfectly motionless which made me wonder about them. There was a slight breeze so if they were balloons they should have moved. The bus moved on and I lost sight of them. As it moved on, I caught sight of them again and watched as one object at the top of kite formation moved slowly and smoothly under the left side object. Then I lost sight of them completely as the bus moved on. The objects were slightly ovoid in shape, no idea of size as I don't know how far away they were. If anyone was in Birmingham town centre this morning around this time, if you saw what these objects were and could let me know I'd be grateful as I am baffled. Copyright Craig Lowe 2008

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Craig Lowe Release Date: 12/02/2008 UFO sighting in Bubbenhall nearly wrecked our car, say couple. STRANGE sightings of a spinning orange object shooting from the sky have been reported by a shocked Warwickshire couple. Terrified Cliff and Carol Sheldon say the flashing orange mass nearly smashed into their car in Bubbenhall on Monday night.They say it was cylindrical in shape, and about half the size of their Vauxhall Corsa. The down-to-earth couple from Stretton-on-Dunsmore say they have always been sceptical about UFOs. But the grandparents of five are in no doubt about what they saw. Their claims have been backed by a Warwick University professor with an interest in UFOs. He said they may have seen a meteorite, also known as a shooting star. Cliff, aged 63, who has recently retired from his garage business, Manhattan Motors in Earlsdon, Coventry, said: "I just saw a great big thing spinning round with lights on." Carol was panicking saying: "That might explode - go, go, go!" It was a clear night and I thought "Blinkin' 'eck, what's that?" It could have been something burning. There is no doubt that it was real, and we are genuine." Carol, aged 58, described a flat round structure "like a giant dinner plate" that was flashing orange. She said: "I put my fingers in my ear and thought it was going to explode. We were both terrified and shocked. It was moving very fast and we thought it was going to hit the car. It looked like it must have come down in the fields nearby. We reported it to the police although I don't suppose they believed us. But there is no way you could make something up like that." Their UFO sighting was at 9pm on Stoneleigh Road in Bubbenhall, though nearby Coventry Airport reported "nothing untoward" on the night in question. But Dr Jack Cohen, a professor and scientist from Warwick University who researches UFOs, said: "It's more likely to be a meteorite than a flying saucer. My guess is there are two or three a day coming down in England. It's not unreasonable that one could have come down close to someone." A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said: "We do from time to time get people reporting this kind of thing to us, particularly if they want to check military aircraft movement. But we're not aware of anything reported to us that would corroborate that claim from Monday night." Source The Coventry Telegrapgh Copyright Craig Lowe 2008

Birmingham UFO Group Case Report Author: Dave Hodrien Release Date: 12/01/2008 For reasons of anoymity pseudonyms have been used In late 2007 BUFOG received an E-Mail from a lady named Paula who wanted to report a sighting she had earlier in the year. She informed us that she had been trying to tell people about my sighting ever since it happened and unfortunately she had only found one person so far who has belived her. She said that people either think she is lying or nuts, and clarified that she was neither. She informed us that she is an open minded person and that she had previously investigated her sighting from every possible angle before commiting herself to reporting it. Paula confirmed she is used to taking a sensible approach to these things because she is a researcher in paranormal investigations. She also mentioned that she thought she had another sighting of the same object a few weeks ago. Sighting Details Whilst out shopping on 24th January 2007, Paula something very odd in the sky to the South/South East. It was about 11:30/11:45am and she was leaving the Fort Retail Park near the Jaguar plant at Castle Vale, Birmingham. The sky was very clear and atmospherics allowed for excellent visability, in fact the moon was visible in the sky. The object was metallic grey, highly reflective and stationary at around 500-700 feet altitude, and she estimated its size at around 90 feet long by approximately 20 feet high, rounded at either end with two potruding bands about a quater of the way from each end. She believed the object was not an aircraft or an helicopter as it was perfectly still and there was no vapour trail. There were aircraft in the sky at a higher altitude which were leaving a vapour trail and also a light aircraft which seemed to be heading toward it. At this point the object seemed to wink out. Around a mile further on Paula again caught sight of the object in a slightly different position in the sky. She then lost sight of the thing all together due to the direction in which I was travelling. She felt certain the object was not a weather balloon or airship because it was stationary and on that day there was quite a strong wind blowing. She was able to observe the object properly because although she was in a moving car she was not the driver. Paula mentioned that as she has lived in the area for many years she is familiar with the various flight paths to and from Birmingham International airport. I is also perfectly aware of what commercial aircraft look like and familiar with their habits on approach and take off, so she's not likely to have mistaken a commercial jet for the object she saw. Copyright Dave Hodrien 2008