Robin Cole, Circular Forum and the Bridge Abduction Case

 Note: If Robin Cole or anyone who knows him could ask him to contact me I would appreciate it. 

The full report and images will be published in AOP Journal no. 5 as well as Beyond UFO Contact in January 2021

 *******************************************************************

   In 1996 I was in touch with Robin Cole who headed the Circular Forum group based in Gloucestershire and that in turn led to my involvement in the Gotherington Gargoyle case (The Case of the Gotherington Gargoyle, in Some Things Strange & Sinister). Knowing of my interest in CE3K reports, Cole asked whether I would be interested in looking at an abduction report they had on file. Obviously, my answer was “yes.”

 

   What I received was slightly shocking because, despite my reputation, I would not have expected to find the address, telephone number and percipient’s name unredacted.  As it happens it may just be that I am the only person who now has the full report.

 

   In-keeping with the report in the group magazine I identify the percipient as “Mr. X”.

 

   At around 21:40 hrs on the 15^th February, 1995, Mr. X was driving along the M50 and heading home from work when he noticed a bright object travelling at speed over the countryside. The object was heading in his direction but he lost sight of it as the road cuts through a hill at that point in his journey and a bridge blocked his view. Once he had driven under the bridge he was confronted by the object which was approximately 80 feet above the road but then descended to around 50 feet as he continued 250 yards from the bridge.

 

   As Mr. X strained to see just what the object was he describes himself as suddenly becoming “docile”. Then “a voice from within” told him to pull over to get a better look and he did so.  His next recollection was being in the middle lane in third gear and travelling at around 50 mph and a voice was telling him to “Keep going, there is no traffic, keep going.” Not much further along was the junction he would normally take but he pulled off of the road and got out of the car. He was unsure whether he had been involved in an accident of some kind but on checking his car was undamaged.

 

   On checking, he found that some 40 minutes had passed and he had no recollection of anything during that period. His journey home normally took twenty minutes but on this night it had taken just over an hour and on getting home told his son about the experience.  That was the end of an odd event until he started having vivid flashbacks and odd things upset him. While treating his wooden fence two slanted black knots in the timber frightened him and yet he could not understand why.  He was equally shaken by the motif of two black, slanted wings on his son’s motorbike.

 

   By 1996, Mr. X decided that he needed to contact someone which is when he contacted Cole. According to Cole; “We now have over forty pages relating to this case” yet the “full report” I was sent has only 15 pages which is 25 pages short of what Cole claimed. He did state that the late Tony Dodd had seen the report and a copy had been sent to Professor John Mack for his analysis and, at the time of the Circular Forum article a copy was in the hands of Nick Pope. However, as only 15 pages are available we are lucky that this includes Mr. X’s original account which adds much more to the report and I have left the spelling etc. intact:

 

      “…I left work at exactly 9.30 p.m. in the evening to go home…the journey

      which I take home is about 9.25 miles. I have been travelling this road for 7

      years. The same route every day.  This journey should take no more than 15

      minutes maximum.  It consists of 1.8 mile bypass to M50 at Ross-on-Wye,

      3.75 miles motorway M50 and 4 miles on the Newent/Gorsley B4221. I

      arrived at the roundabout at the M50 Travellers Rest end at approximately 9.40

      p.m.  It was dark but clear. I looked across the valley through a gap in the hedge

      towards Ponts Hill. On the far horizon about 10-12 miles, low down was a large

      bright light in an otherwise star less night sky.”

 

   The account now gets a little confusing as the continuation of Mr. X’s account refers to a previous sighting but then jumps slightly. I assume that the next part takes up the narrative from after Mr. X had lost sight of the object due to the bridge and then saw it above the road:

 

      “I don’t know whether this was a hole in the underside of the craft. There was

      no noise (not helicopter or plane). The light as bin the first sighting completely

      enveloped the craft.  It appeared flurescent a bit like aqn aura around the outside

      of the craft.  But it shimmered when you looked at5 it.  I only had a few seconds

       to see this and estimated that it was about 80 ft. above me and about 2 bus

      lengths wide (diameter). I am now fidgeting about in the car as the light is

      bothering me.  All of a sudden I hear a voice in my head saying   “Pull over and

      you can get a better look!”

 

     “I went from worrying about the light and being agitated to totally docile

      looking straight ahead not at all concerned about the encroaching light that

      was descending on me.  I looked along the hard shoulder for a safe place to

      stop as I had been told.  At this point the hard shoulder4 disappears and a small

      road runs underneath the motorway. A barrier with warning posts appears in

      front of me. A voice warns “Unsafe! Unsafe!” as I start to pull over.  I straighten

      up the car taking notice of the voice.  I am sure these voices are some sort of

      telepathy.  It’s as if they can see through my eyes everything that is going on,

      and are guiding me.  I am under some form of hypnotic control. I can see

      everything that is going on but I have to obey the voice.

 

     “From the bridge to this point it takes about 20-25 seconds everything is

      happening very quickly.  The craft has to descend between two rock faces

      and position itself above my car as well as fitting between the four lanes

      carriagway.  It is large but has fantastic control.  It is at this point I think I

      was abducted. It was as if I blinked my eyes and I was back again. The only

      thing I can compare this with is if you are watching a very good film and it

      jumps a frame. You notice something but because you are engrossed in the

      story it appeares continues.”

 

   I believe in that last line Mr. X meant “continuous” and I should also note here that a bus length is around 30-35 feet depending on the model so the object seen by Mr. X was approximately 60-70 feet in diameter.  In the 1994 Silbury Hill case Paul and Sonya also believed that entities were “using” their eyes to see things.  Mr. X continues:

 

      “I am now looking straight ahead on the same bit of road. The car is in gear

      now (5^th) I am doing about 50 m.p.h. I am still not bothered about the light. 

      Everything appears normal and another voice says; ‘Don’t stop now! Keep

      going. There is no traffic either side of the motorway. Keep going.’

 

      “I estimate it was between 5-10 seconds after this that I came out of the

      hypnotic state and the craft had gone.  They had released my mind. I

      exclaimed aloud ‘Where’s the light. Where’s the light.’ Not realising it was

      all over.  They had gone.  I continued driving as I was told but I was now

      completely conscious and in control. I noted there was no traffic what so ever

      as I had been told and I kept going.  When I reached the slip road at the

      Gorsley turn off (B4221) I stopped before turning on to the B4221 for Newent. 

      I put the hazard  lights on and got out of my car looked across the motorway

      at a small wood opposite.  I saw lights going down beyond the wood but could

      not swear that they were the same lights that had plagued me earlier.  Still no

      traffic.  I got back into my car. Put the hazard lights off put my seat belt on and

      then noticed my digital clock was reading 10-22 p.m. that meant that a 3.5 mile

      journey which would normally take 3-4 minutes took 40 minutes.  I remember

      feeling pleased when I saw the lights of a car coming from the Gorsley Golf

      Club. The first car I had seen since entering M50.  As the car passed I pulled

      out behind it but it turned right onto the motorway to Ross-on-Wye.

   

     “I continued home arriving at about 10-35 p.m. still wondering what had

      happened. The light still haunting me.  Which it does to this day.  I checked

      the car over and myself to see if I had been involved in any form of accident. 

      No damage to the car and no marks on my body.

 

     “The only explanation to the lack of traffic on the motorway and loss of

      Time would be if I had been taken when there was a lull in the traffic and put

      back there was a lull in the traffic 40 minutes being lost inside the craft for

      what purpose I do not know. My conclusion is I was taken by a F.F.O. similar

      or the same as described in my earlier sightings with its outer lights on.  This

      light acting as a type of strobe giving it a shimmering or pulsing effect, thus

      hypnotizing me, while taking  the car and myself up into its hull and then up

      into the sky and out of sight for 40 minutes to do whatever they had to do to

      me and then bringing me back to exactly the same spot on the motorway to

      continue my journey.

 

     “I think that U.F.O.’s are using motorways as easy access for abductions and

      now that the American Air-Force has gone its left the gate wide open for them

      to do what they want. Up until 1993 my first sighting where I saw two craft, I

      had never seen anything in 47 years of my life.

 

     “When I arrived home at about 10-35 p.m. my wife was in bed asleep so was

      my youngest son Stephen in his bed asleep. Andrew my eldest son was out

      with friends, Richard my mid son was laying on the settee watching T.V.

      (football) after the news had finished at 10-30 p.m. he was wearing his blue

      towling dressing gown. I hung my jacket up put my work bag down and went

      into the T.V. room to tell him about my incident with the light.  He was

      watching an action replay shot and asked me to be quite until he had seen it. 

      I then told him about this bright light and was bewildered at this time as to

      what it was. He can verify the time I got home about 10-35 p.m..

 

      “At no time do I remember stopping the car during the incident it

      appeared continues. Apart from the problem with the light (U.F.O.).”

 

   The interesting aspects of this account are what Ufologists tend to leave out because we read here what Mr. X was thinking at the time but also it shows that he was not “vague” afterwards. He notes that his wife and one son were asleep and that another was out with friends –he obviously checked this so he was “thinking straight”. He noted that Richard was watching a football replay on TV following the 22:00 hrs news and that he was wearing a blue dressing gown. He had also checked the car and himself for any damage or injuries.  Mr. X even managed to write out a sequence of events for the evening of 15^th February:

 

1)      Clock out 9.30 p.m.

2)      Walk to car park (2 mins)

3)      Drive to M.50 using by-pass (5 min 30 secs)

4)      Entre M. 50 9.40 p.m. approximately

5)      First gap in hedge light on far horizon

6)      Second gap light streaking across valley

7)      I go under first motorway bridge

8)      Craft descends on me

9)      Open window of car and look up at craft

10)  Voice tells me to “Pull over and you can get a better look’

11)  Voice warning “Unsafe. Unsafe” as I go to pull over. Barrier in way

12)  Voice again “Don’t stop now. Keep going. There’s no traffic either side of the motorway keep going”

13)  Drive to slip road and junction B4221 at Gorsley 10.22 p.m.

14)  Drive home to Newent arrive 10.35 p.m.

 

   One morning at 04:00 hrs in 1993, Mr. X had looked across the yard (from where he worked?) and seen the Moon as well as two “flying saucers” although this appears to0 have been just a sighting with no missing time. With regards to the flash-backs of the 1995 incident Mr. X recalled being observed by entities  but also of being in a laying down position in a white room –oddly enough, for no known reason he eventually repainted the interior of the house white.

 

   The remark about the US Air Force no longer present refers to local bases used by them closing down or being used as “stop over” airfields. As I found out in the 1980s in conversations with USAF personnel there their presence had never seemingly been of any concern to “UFOs” locally.

 

   It would be nice to know what the “40 pages” contained especially since it was stated that; “At one point we became very concerned for the “abductees” health and safety, as it seemed he was suffering from post traumatic stress disorder directly as a result of his experience.”

 

   Without the necessary details it is difficult to gauge whether this was incident was a psychological or physical event.  Circular Forum suddenly became defunct and it was impossible to track Cole down though I did come across him on a ghost forum in which the “ghost hunter” Elliott O’Donnell was discussed. I was told Nick Pope had the full report but when I contacted him he was unsure -“I get sent so many things” which sort of ended my attempts to find out more.

 

   Mr X was 50 years of age in 1996 and would now (in 2020) be 74 years of age if still alive. Unless someone has a copy of the full report Cole indicates went to Tony Dodd (deceased), John Mack (deceased) or Nick Pope this is another case we have lost.

South American CE3K Reports

 Taken from Contact! and a chapter lookjing at South American reports.

I fairness it has to be pointed out that APRO also never followed up on declaring reports to be hoaxes although it did “sort of” in the case of Carlos Alberto Diaz which the Lorenzens referred to in several works including their Encounters with UFO Occupants (Berkley, NY, 1976: pp. 230-235).  This is the account in its popular form from APRO Bulletin, Vol. 23 No. 5 (Mar 1975):

 

   Carlos Alberto Diaz a 28-year-old married man, father of one child and born in Ingeniero White, a district of Bahia Blanca, Province of Buenos Aries, Republic of Argentina. His work record indicates that since becoming an adult he was a clerk in a central store and for 6 years was employed in the mechanical traction section of Ingeniero White. During the past year he helped with the preparation of a football training school for the Huracan Club of Bahia Blanca and in his spare time augmented his income by working as a waiter at private parties.

 

   On the morning of January 4, 1975 he was finishing his shift as a waiter in the Holy Protective Society of the Naposta District in Bahia Blanca. Outside the door he purchased a copy of "La Nueva Provincia" (The Province News) newspaper and then had caught the bus to go home. He got off the bus several blocks from his home and started walking. His route was through a large and desolate railroad yard. The sky was overcast so when a brilliant flash of light momentarily blinded him, he assumed it was merely lightning from the approaching storm. Thunder did not follow, however, and he later described the light as not straight but "broken". After he regained his sight he was frightened and decided to run the rest of the way to his home which was now in sight but couldn't move — he seemed to have become paralyzed.  Diaz heard a humming sound which he compared to the sound of rushing air or wind. Although he tried to resist, he was pulled off the ground and when about 3 meters (8 feet) off the ground his vision faded and he lost consciousness.

 

   When Diaz regained consciousness he was inside a smooth, bright sphere which appeared to be semi-transparent plastic. There was no furniture or devices and the illumination seemed to come from the walls. Diaz said he was completely lucid and conscious, half kneeling and half lying on his side against several openings of about 3 centimetres in diameter (1-1/4 inches) in the bottom of the sphere through which issued air. He said he felt ill if he turned away from the openings and felt they served to keep him conscious. He estimated the "sphere" was 2-1/2 to 3 metres (about 7 feet. by 8 feet) in diameter.

 

   Three “creatures” resembling humans came sliding into the sphere; they appeared to be around 1.75-1.80 metres in height (approximately 5 feet, 10 inches) – their heads were half the size of a human head and completely devoid of features - no ears, nose, mouth or eyes. These heads were a mossy green in colour and the body was rather thin and covered with something Diaz defined as rubber - light cream coloured and very soft and the creatures were completely hairless. The arms of the entities were almost straight and very flexible and ended in "stumps" rather than hands and fingers.

 

   When the entities entered the sphere they immediately began pulling tufts of hair from Diaz's head though he had no idea how they did this with no hands but he insisted that each time they would reach out their arms and pull back and they would have some of his hair. Diaz also stated that this seemed to give them great pleasure as they would then jump up and down and wave their arms.

 

   Diaz reported that he had tried to resist the entities but to no avail and that during his struggles he had felt the softness of their bodies and ultimately noted they had "suckers" on their arms and assumed that was the method by which they removed the hair. One of them held him, another pulled his hair and the third apparently only observed. He noted that he had felt no pain as they pulled at his head and chest. The entities moved slowly but were very strong and seemingly tireless.

 

   After this ordeal was over, Diaz reported that his sight once again began to fade and he once again passed out. He remembers nothing else of the experience.

 

   Diaz woke up and found he was lying on the grass and had to close his eyes as the sun was high and shining into them; he felt ill and this illness stayed with him throughout the day. He was near a large, busy highway. He looked at his watch which had stopped at 03:50 hours, the time he last noted before his experience began. Next to him lay his bag containing work clothes and the newspaper he had purchased hours earlier. A motorist thought Diaz had been struck by a car and stopped and upon hearing Diaz' explanation of what had happened to him, the man offered to take him to the nearest hospital (Railway Hospital), where they arrived 25 minutes later at 08:30 hours. It was when he learned the time that he became convinced that he had been abroad an aircraft of unknown origin and in the company of extraterrestrials.

 

   For the next four days Diaz was confined to the Ferroviaro Hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina where he was questioned and examined again and again by 46 different doctors. The hospital's Director informed the Federal Police who also questioned him. Diaz's wife and other relatives were notified by telephone at 09:20 hours of his whereabouts. They had been extremely worried because he was seldom later getting home than 04:00 – 04:30 hours. They went to Buenos Aires that day and arrived at about midnight. It was noted that it is 785 kilometres (423 miles) from Bahia Blanca to Buenos Aires.

 

   The medical examination of Diaz yielded no evidence of physiological or psychological alteration in Diaz, except the illness he described as dizziness, upset stomach, the lack of appetite and the missing hair. During the 5^th January Diaz had only one cup of milk which had to be fed to him forcibly.

 

   According to the Lorenzens:

 

   “We are immediately struck by three similarities in the (Carl) Higdon and Diaz cases, namely: in both instances, the "creatures" had no hands or fingers and in both cases the witnesses suffered a loss of appetite after the experience and lastly, the entities in both cases "glided" rather than walking”.

 

   They continued:

 

   “As we have pointed out in this Bulletin in the past, we must consider the possibility of deliberate confusion in these cases of absolutely bizarre (to us) creatures and experiences. It seems likely in Higdon's case that he was under the influence (both he and his gun) of something when he went over the crest of that hill and saw the elk. In Diaz's case, he was rendered unconscious before his experience with the humanoids began. Was he also under some kind of influence? Obviously something unusual happened to him — the absence of hair in various spots on his head and chest attest to that. If we speculate that he pulled his own hair out, for whatever reason, we must then consider the fact that, outside of one interview with a magazine, he permitted no interviews with newspapers, radio or TV and was questioned by only one civilian UFO investigator — Mr. Romaniuk.

 

   “He obviously did not thirst for publicity or notoriety. Then we have the problem of how he got from Bahia Blanca to Buenos Aires in a matter of 4 hours and 10 minutes — a distance of 423 miles. In the United States, traveling on the best of the roads and breaking speed limits, the best that could be done would be something over 5 hours. Diaz does not own a car. We can rule out cars and of course, buses. That leaves only air travel. Did Carlos Diaz get a flight from Bahia Blanca to Buenos Aires? This will have to be checked. We must also check to make certain that Diaz was on the job and left at 3:30 - as he claims. We must also verify that he was, in fact, on the city bus and did get off at a point a few blocks from his home”.

 

 

   The Lorenzens went on to note that there had been other alleged cases of transportation of humans by UFOs in the past and concluded that:

 

   “Carlos Diaz's alleged experience appears to be one of the most credible of them all”.

 

   Unfortunately, in APRO Bulletin, Vol. 26 No. 2, Aug. 1977: p. 9, Roberto Enrique Banchs for the Centro de Estudios de Fenomenos Aereos Inusuales (CEFAI) of Buenos Aires and Richard W. Heiden declared that: “Carlos Alberto Diaz Was a Hoaxer”:

 

“Investigation revealed the following:

 

“1. The abduction site, on Daniel de Solier Street, is always busy, even at that time, yet Diaz said he saw no one around. Also, house-to-house inquiries found that no one in the neighborhood had noticed anything unusual, nor had any watch dogs acted up.

 

“2. The bus leaves Bahia Blanca at 3:30, and takes 25 minutes to get to Ingeniero White, whereas Diaz said he arrived at Ingeniero White at 3:30, only 25 minutes after leaving work.

 

“3. Finding the above discrepancies, it was realized that Diaz probably went directly to Buenos Aires; he could have taken the train. The train originating in Zapala passes through Bahia Blanca at 6:15 a.m. (the newspaper having come out at 2:45 a.m.), though it is often behind schedule. During the investigation, Train 142 making this run passed through Bahia Blanca at 7:07, arriving at Buenos Aires at 4:10 p.m.

 

“4. The records of the hospital guard show that Diaz arrived there at 5:30 p.m., not 4:15.

 

“5. Psychological assessments of Diaz found these characteristics, among others: rich imagination, quick intelligence (but without depth), inclination to exaggerate, good memory, occasional use of poor judgment, and maladjusted personality.

 

“We think that under these circumstances we have enough sound arguments of the inauthenticity of the episode, and are able to consider the case a hoax, made up by the witness himself”.

 

   Basically, the events could not have occurred as Diaz claimed. It is a long time since magazines such as Official UFO  (February, 1976, Page 12) mentioned the case and one wonders what Diaz is doing today since some “noted Ufologists” have spoken to him and that includes alien abduction ‘experts’ and they all seem to think that he was genuine and much maligned.  Well, he continued to go on to fake UFO videos and photographs and despite his being declared a hoaxer almost 40 years ago Ufologists do not care.  If you check on the internet there are very few if any –I have found one site that does— UFO fan sites that will even mention the declaration of hoaxing.

 

   With so many reports proving to be hoaxes or over exaggerated what are we left with?  The alleged UFO crash and retrieval of living and dead aliens at Varginha, Brazil in 1996 which, looking further into the report at the time, I could find no evidence of.

 

   Then we have the “Vampire of Moca” in 1975 or as the Reader may probably know it after it evolved: the Chupacabra.  I dealt with this in my book Some Things Strange and Sinister (UFO and even cryptozoological publications were not interested as they were vested in a continuation of the myth) and noted that I expected the craze to spread to Latino communities elsewhere –as it did but went on to be a term used by hoaxers and conmen out to make every mangy coyote, fox, raccoon and other animal into the legendary “goat sucker”.

 

CE 3K Reports from Portugal

 Part of the chapter from Contact! on Portugues CE3K reports

https://www.lulu.com/en/en/shop/terry-hooper/encounters-with-extra-terrestrial-entities/paperback/product-qwy7p8.html?page=1&pageSize=4

_______________________________________________________________________

 

   Bordering Spain and with a population of over 9,808,000 and covering more than 92,000 square kilometres including the Azores and Madeira, you might consider this European country to have produced a good number of UFO reports and CE3K cases. Sadly, although we know of some the problem has always been to get translations of these into English and distribute these more widely –it was why I began publishing the AOP Journal again in 2018.

   There have been some reports that have filtered through from Spanish investigators and the main ones all comes with an explanation other than genuine.  The problem is that some Spanish Ufologists seem to set out with less than open minds and I for one find it hard to accept “I heard it was a hoax” or “negative to discard, indicating as reference to a commonplace explanation” without some actual back-up data on why. We need to understand why a case needs to be discarded as much as we do why another seems to be genuine.

   I have also been told that there might be “some friction” between Portuguese and Spanish Ufologists so to get reports first hand from Portuguese investigators is important.  What follows are the paltry few reports I have found and that were published in the English language.

   In a 1983 listing of “negative humanoid cases of the Iberic Peninsula”, Spanish Ufologist Luis R. Gonzales Manso noted that the May, 1947, case in Castelo Viegas, Portugal, was “a negative to discard, indicating as reference to a commonplace explanation” but what the case involved or why it was considered a negative case I have no idea.

   At 15:00 hours on the 5^th May, 1954 at Fregim Amarante, a young boy was on a hill near the village tending his goat when he heard a whistling sound coming from a nearby hollow and ran to see what was causing it. On reaching the hollow he saw one dome-shaped object leaving the area headed towards a nearby river while a second rested on the ground. Both objects were a metallic colour, dome-shaped and had a metal ring on the bottom and a transparent section on top from which came a brown conical protrusion.

   As the first object left the boy had felt a wave of heat and inside the second object he could see two beings with large heads and large, wide apart eyes; both appeared to have ‘antennae’ on top of their heads and their mouths looked like round holes. They were wearing metallic blue outfits and appeared seated with one of them operating levers while the other looked out at the witness.

   Ground traces were later found at the site and to date I have found no details of how the sighting ended and I assume that this second object also took off.  Source: Ballester Olmos & Peri, Enciclopedia de Los Encuentros Cercanos con Ovnis.

   The reference for this next report is almost lengthier than the details of the report -A Descriptive Study of the Entities Associated With Type 1 Sightings, Vallee, J., Flying Saucer Review Vol. 10  no. 1, Jan.-Feb., 1964: p. 7:

   On the 24^th September, 1954, at Sierra Gardunha, two “aluminium men”, 2.50 metres in height were seen.  The entities made gestures inviting the witnesses to get into their craft. The offer was declined.

   That is it.  Vallee does what Vallee often does and gives no reference source like any credible researcher would and, of course, FSR does what FSR usually did and that was not really bother with that sort of thing: a serious publication would have insisted on references.

   On 27^th or 28^th September, 1954, the major newspaper Diario de Lisboa, of Lisbon, Portugal, published a reader's letter and/or an article based on it. Details are that ‘good’. The author claimed to be Cesar Cardoso and to have been driving in the Gardunha hills, near Almadesa, in the Castelo Branco region when his car engine stalled and he could hear a buzzing sound. Cardoso pulled up on the roadside and tried to re-start the engine but all he got were ridiculous noises and so he got out of the car to open the hood and check the engine.  The buzzing sound now became louder and looking up he saw a flying saucer or a sphere - depending on the newspapers apparently - which he was said gave off multi-coloured flashes and then landed without noise on a hilltop some 200 metres below his location.

   Cardoso specified that only the "poles" of the sphere were rotating and that the transparent equatorial part let him see moving shades inside: two silhouettes or men of approximately 2-2.5 metres in height then came out of the object. They looked like, according to the report, “aluminum men”, which I assume means that they were wearing all covering silver clothing. These entities then picked up grasses, flowers and brushes and collected stones which they put in a shining box.

   It was then that the entities saw Cardoso as well as three other people who had also been watching the display and began to approach them – emitting some sounds the witnesses did not comprehend before they then invited the people, by gestures, to go aboard the object; this offer was declined and the entities did not insist.  Both returned to the object and boarded it: the object then took off vertically and flew off producing a shower of sparks.

   The Diario de Lisboa apparently did not take the story at face value and quickly found out that the story had been made up by one Francisco Antonio Fereira who was actually the real Cesar Cardoso's nephew. He admitted the hoax in an interview which was published in the newspaper Diaro de Lisboa for 1^st October, 1954. The youngster apparently explained that he was a flying saucer buff who wanted to get the Press to pay attention to the flying saucer issue and also to… pay attention to the sorry state of the road in his remote village.

  The initial hoax story has been repeated internationally, ignoring the whole hoax part and so the report entered UFO books, the first time in Harold T. Wilkins’ book Flying Saucers Uncensored (p. 55) where the less than credible Wilkins expressed much scepticism on the story which says a lot.  Oh, but Wilkins did stick to form by giving two different dates for the report! From there it was picked up by Jacques Vallée for his "Magonia" catalogue, citing Wilkins as the source but omitting the negative feeling this author had about the story. Vallee said it was a genuine case by inference so other authors picked up on it –some adding various inaccuracies in entity size as well as the date: not one mentioned the suspicion or confession of a hoax.  The report is still widely used today.

   On the 13^th October, 1954, at Casteli Branco, two witnesses observed two entities in shiny clothing emerge from an (not described) landed object and gather flowers, shrubs and twigs.  The entities then re-entered the object which took off.

   The source for the above is The Humanoids, Neville Spearman, 1969: p. 44, edited by Charles Bowen gives no further detail. Not surprising since it is clear FSR did its usual bad research (if any) and did not notice Casteli Branco should have read Castelo Branco and that this was merely a repeat of the Cardoso report.

   We read of the encounter of Vitorino Laurenco Monteiro in The Humanoids (p. 31) and More on the Azores Landing, Gordon W. Creighton, FSR 27/6, June, 1982: pp. 11-12, 20 wherein we finally learn (this was noted in Vallee’s 1964 article) that the original account was in the 21^st November, 1954 edition of Ocorrencia.

   On the 21^st November, 1954, at Santa Maria Airport on the Azores Island, Vitorino Laurenco Monteiro was on duty as a security guard when he saw a bright yellow light travelling at a moderate speed over the south of the Island. As he watched, the object changed course and landed close by. Monteiro described the object as being bluish in colour, elliptical, 3 metres long and 1.5 metres high.  An opening appeared and Menteiro saw an entity emerge at which point he turned on an external light to get a clearer view. 

   The entity was described as appearing to be humanoid, of normal height and seemed to be –or look— around 35 years old and with fair hair and a slight beard but no moustache. Clothing was a dark yellow coverall with dark belt and long yellow boots with zippers at the side. When the entity reached Monteiro he shook the guard’s hand and gave him a couple of back-slaps and spoke, however, he could not be understood and so he returned to the object which then took off with a slight hum.

   It is said that there were witnesses to the UFO itself but not the entity.

   Carlos Sabine’s encounter was reported in Diario de Noticias of 12^th June, 1960 and then in Magonia no. 2, Winter 1979/1980.

   At around 03:30 hours on the 10^th June, 1960, at Algoz, on the Algarve, tailor Carlos Sabine was out walking his dog when he saw an object that he thought was a car.  Sabine then saw it more clearly and it was in fact a disc shaped object giving off unusually bright light and he decided to quickly hide.  From cover he watched six human-like entities move around the object for a while before re-entering the object which rose up at great speed.

   Deciding to flee the area, Sabine ran but the object re-appeared and illuminated the ground with an intense beam of light before leaving again.  Sabine’s dog had run off in terror and as for the witness: neighbours testified to his trustworthiness but they also testified to his state of terror that morning.

   It seems that nothing else is recorded until the 3^rd January, 1977, at Carapito, Beira Alta. References for this case are bulletin Insolito, CEAFI (Centro de Estudos Astronomicos e Fenómenos Insolitos), Portugal, Volume IV, no. 33, pp 14-17 and 26, June-July 1978 & Enciclopedia De Los Encuentros Cercanos Con Ovnis, by Vicente-Juan Ballester Olmos and Fernandez Peris, Plaza y Janés publishers, Spain, 1987.

   At around 21:30 hours a 24-year-old woman and her young sister were doing the washing next to their rural home when they saw a strange bulky figure, dark and motionless on top of a nearby hill which they said resembled an 8-foot-tall box with a round head on top and legs that appeared to thin out towards the bottom.

   There was a strange sound “resembling several dogs barking into a microphone” which seemed to emanate from the figure. The witnesses became frightened and ran to the house and locked themselves in the house; they then heard a sound as if someone was moving around outside on the sand path that encircled the house.

The sound then appeared to stop at the edge of a nearby pine grove.

   This affected the older witness to the point that she suffered a nervous breakdown. Ground traces were found as well as a small radioactive spot was found at the foot of the hill.

   There is a very interesting follow-up to this report by CEAFI in Insolito for June-July, 1978 that is said to take up several pages but apart from a couple of dubious online sources I can find nothing published in the English language.

   At around 00:30 hours, on the 4^th January, 1977, in Carapito, Guarda, Beira Alta, four hours after the sighting by the two sisters, a technician in an auto plant –in the report identified as C.A.C.M., was training his German shepherd dog in an area of pine trees when it began to behave oddly, remaining close to him.

   C.A.C.M. then noticed an object hovering some 10 meters from him and some 10 meters above the ground; it was a dark, metallic, ellipsoid shape with a dark dome-like protuberance. The diameter was approximately 6 to 7 metres and it made a noise similar to "radio static" or a "bip bip" tone.

   Standing close to this object the witness saw a humanoid silhouette that stood around 1.80 or 2 metres tall.  The object suddenly emitted a silvery “lighting flash” and then disappeared, as did the bulky figure.

   We have no way of knowing, until a translated version of the report is published (if ever), whether there was any reason to suspect missing time is involved. After the sighting, C.A.C.M. suffered from severe headaches and his dog “died with no obvious cause of death eight months later”.  I think that we can dismiss the sudden (?) death of the dog eight months after the event: I have owned cats and dogs and other animals since I was young and there does not have to be any obvious reason why one dies –and I assume no post mortem was carried out to find a possible cause.

   I can only hope that there was a full investigation of the incidents of the 3^rd and 4^th as well as a search for other reported UFO activity that day to back up events, especially since other than normal background radiation readings anything higher would have to be a normally unexplained anomaly.

 

Ufology -the "Feminine Touch"

 Back in 1995 I wrote an article entitled "UFO Investigation -the Feminine Touch" and there was sense behind it.

Ufology tends to be 96% male dominated. In UFO clubs the "little lady" was simply there to make tea and smile dutifully. Seriously, I went to my first meeting and found a good few women present. I thought that was great and started chatting to some of them only to find out that none of them were investigators. They were wives attending with their husbands or who simply wanted to hear what was going on. None of them apparently wanted to investigate UFO reports and one even told me; "Oh, I don't think the boys would put up with that!"

The problem was that female investigators were needed. A woman reports a UFO and she has to invite into her house one or two strange men and some women are trusting while others are evidently uneasy. I never presented a big concern since I grew up in a mostly female dominated environment -I even worked with women on a farm as a youngster. I've been told several times that I am relaxing to talk to which is okay, however, a female witness should at least be able to speak to another woman -I used to ask any female witness if they had a frind who could be present "for support".

And I rule out the "Oh, yes, I regularly receive messages from Caspian in Sector 7 of Venus" type who should never be pushed onto someone and there are male investigators who are just as bad but, you know...

The witness has to be relaxed and willing to chat with investigators and there may be things they want to mention but not in front of a man. 

I found that the biggest hurdle were the existing female investigators who did not want their positions as "the only girl in Ufology" that mattered status threatened. Do not underestimate how downright nasty those people can be.

I do not like the idea of investigators turning up with a male friend who's a hypnotist; that is not a situation that should be accepted.  I've known investigators take their disinterested wives along with them to avoid any problems. 

Sending a single investigator into certain situations can have unfortunate results. I always told people that they should work in pairs. For instance, an investigator who was going to work on the CE3K project with me in the 1970s was quite "nervy" at a meeting and then he told me that he had gone to talk to someone by himself. It seems that the room he found himself in was rather badly lit and grubby and he felt at unease as the person who had contacted the group told him that silicon based aliens were amongst us and until you got close you could not tell them from normal humans. At this point the person was gradually getting closer to the investigator...checking that he was not a "silicon alien" and what if he thought that he was?

The point is that from the moment the letter arrived with the group I was kept out of the loop and I was in charge (supposedly). Remember there were no cell phones, etc. I responded to all of this by saying: "And if he had decided you WERE a silicon alien and pulled a knife out what then?" I also pointed out that going alone to meet someone at night after reading what he had to say was "foolish."

Even at a UFO group meeting as everyone intermingled and chatted I kept my eye on one person who was "off". Eventually, this person approached me and said quietly: "I know you are not Terry Hooper. You are an alien android that replaced him. I'm watching you." 

UFO investigators can be called out day or night and find themselves in very shady areas and sometimes face-to-face with some very odd people. A two person team should be the norm and safety for witnesses and investigators be a better priority.

Warp Drive News. Seriously!

The Need To Be Honest About The Future of Ufology

We need to be very honest about Ufology. It is dead. Since 1947 the mindset has been that of a social club where people meet, hear the latest news and listen to occasional guest speakers while those in charge try to raise more funds. Yes, there were some really dedicated people but they either gave up for various reasons or succumbed to self-deception.

 

Carol Rainey, who was married to Budd Hopkins and assisted him in his work reported ("The Co-Creation of the Abduction Phenomenon", Spectrum Radio Network 11th February, 2011) how, if she "challenged" Hopkins on an aspect of a case he was far from happy. Rainey, obviously, also knew David Jacobs and it was at a dinner in Jacobs' home one day that he leant across the table to Hopkins and told him "We are the only two people in the world who know the truth of what is going on." Rainey's draw dropped and she did question that stance and the response was not good.

 

Hopkins and Jacobs, as far as they were both concerned, could not be challenged on their work and this begins to explain what went wrong with Hopkins work as well as Jacobs; neither man would accept criticism of their work or even allow peer review or analysis of alleged materials from alien abductions (powders, stained clothes or 'implants') there was always a reason why they would not cooperate on this aspect.

We also know that Hopkins left out some aspects of accounts (as with the book Unseen) and then cherry-picked data and even went so far as to redraw symbols allegedly seen during abductions. He believed that he was on the right track so to heck with everyone else.

 

Jacobs, as I have noted before, went so completely off the deep end that if he were a medical professional he could well be struck off for his actions –telephone hypnosis sessions alone are high risk but, you know, what the hell: he “knows” what he is doing and now that Hopkins is dead Jacobs is the ONLY man who knows the truth (the “David Vincent” syndrome –named after the character from the 1960s TV show The Invaders).

 

Researchers in psychology distinguish “belief superiority” from “belief confidence” (thinking your opinion is correct). Belief superiority is relative; it is when you think your opinion is more correct than other people’s.  The top end of their belief superiority scale is to indicate that your belief is “Totally correct (mine is the only correct view)”. Hopkins and Jacobs fall into this last category.

 

So why did no Ufologists challenge them and their techniques and lack of any oversight or peer review? Well, Ufology is a kind of hive mentality club: you agree with everyone else or you are out. In the 1980s, t5hrough the efforts of two long standing MUFON members (who left MUFON when things started going wrong) I was persuaded to (all expenses paid) attend a MUFO)N symposium and give two talks on UK CE3K/AE research and how to proceed when such reports were received.  No problem even though I do not like public speaking or stepping into even the shadow created by the lime light!

 

When I heard no more I asked what was happening because I needed to prepare material. “You upset a few people. Deal’s off” I was told. Before “orbs” and all the other “current raves” you have to remember MUFON was drawing in money, TV and a lot of publicity based on the Grey Abduction hysteria. Apparently “someone” (a well known UK Ufologist and author I am told) sent MUFON copies of some of my articles which question methodology and certain cases. No. MUFON was NOT going to allow that.

 

You see, if you are not “part of the hive” you do not get any time at a conference or speak anywhere. We have seen that corruption of ethics and any pretence at scientific research vanish as (without the permission of investigators or witnesses) MUFON sold all of its UFO reports to Robert Bigelow –just as John Carpenter had sold his confidential files. Then MUFON was hit by claims that it was rigging data to go with the lat4est trend, racist rants from some higher ups, not to mention sexism…oh, and child sexual abuse claims.

 

If all you see is the TV shows then you think MUFON is a slick hard core scientific organisation. MUFON died a long time ago.

 

Back-biting, in-fighting, Ufologists hoaxing other Ufologists or adding faked reports into the system making any serious study highly flawed and pointless. Ufology was never a science just as “Bigfootology” and “Cryptozoology” and around 96% of current paranormal research is and was not a science.

 

When I started working on my first book, Some Things Strange and Sinister” it contained almost 40 years of research into some cases. The UFO related cases outlined showed just how much lying had been going on. Noted American Ufologists admitting openly that reports used since the 1960s were well known hoaxes or fantasy stories from well known “personalities” but were these exposed widely to prevent any serious researcher using them? No. They continued to be used –including by the people who knew they were fake.

 

With the second book, Some More Things Strange and Sinister I delved into other cases –there were interesting cases to note in all fields including Ufology- and these were not debunking books. If you find an explanation for a report then you have to make that known to prevent serious researchers using it and every one of my books is fully referenced so everything can be double-checked which is the best peer review can be with these subjects.

 

When it came to the first book entirely dedicated to SETI, CETI and CE3K/AE –UFO Contact?- I decide4d to go straight for the proverbial jugular and hit certain “classic” cases hard. After 40-60 years of debunking there should have been enough pro-con material to reassess these cases. Fake then I’d show why by using facts rather than “Oh, well so-and-so said it was true.” I double and triple checked the cases put forward by debunkers (not sceptics who assess evidence but people just out to disprove everything by fair or foul means) and…most of it turned out to be fake evidence, twisted truths and worse. I had to then double and triple check that these were not Ufologists!

 

I could dismiss a lot Ufologists claimed –I am sick to my back-teeth of hearing about the Betty Hill “star map” which is pointless. I as sick of hearing “He passed dud cheques” (debunkers, even most Ufologists failing to point out that these payments were honoured by the person in question) or had a record for “parking violations” and when you consider the dirty and not-quite-legal things the debunkers got up to there were some pretty bad double standards going on.

 

I waded through all of this and concluded –based on testimony and secondary witness reports as well as other factors- that certain reports seemed genuine. “No, I’m not having that –I’ve missed something!” I said to myself. I checked, checked and checked again. Same conclusion each time.  I had to stick with the results.

Let me make it clear that we do NOT have any physical artefact from a UFO. As you might expect because it is hard to steal something in most of the situations described. Unconnected people observing a UFO over the area where a claimed encounter took place, physiological and psychological effects and even trace evidence has to have a cause. Someone walking down a quiet country lane or through a jungle is not going to come into casual contact with high doses of radiation. Something has to have been seen or encountered to cause psychological shock in a person or even post traumatic stress disorder.

I prefer cases where there are secondary witnesses if not to entities then to the UFO involved –something that says yes, something did happen. I prefer cases involving two or more people and, preferably, a report not messed up by some idiot using hypnosis and forcing their own beliefs onto a percipient. Not some person who keeps details to themselves and only releases little snippets as and when they like. The percipient must be protected at all costs but initial and final FULL reports must be published for perusal by any serious scientists to look at.  Any and all hypnotic sessions MUST be recorded and made available. If we can see that no one is misleading us or stacking the decks somehow then we have something we can look at and build on.

When I realised that there were seemingly genuine incidents I began to look at others. I checked as I normally do and came up wi8th various trends and findings that –it seems- no one else has in Ufology. I was working alone and not connected to any group (most of who would not cooperate anyway) and just ignoring the Grey (or which ever alien Jacobs currently claims is the real power behind things…until the next one is discovered) abduction phenomenon –I did assess the various aspects involved in UFO Contact?- and looking at the reports.

Everything I came across and added to is fully referenced so anyone can come along and say “Let’s see if this is accurate” and can do their own work.

Ufology cannot just sit on its collective backsides and say “Jacobs is handling this” because he is NOT.  A pinpoint of light in the sky is a pinpoint of light in the sky and not proof of extraterrestrial space craft or even “back up evidence” to someone’s claim of being abducted by aliens.

Although, if these objects and those on board them are not from Earth, it leaves only one real conclusion outside of wild and sometimes fantastical speculation; they are from another planet. However, on that subject I have to remain neutral because there is nothing to show us which planetary system or planet. In fact, I do not even thing extra terrestrial when I study these reports because that would mean the research would get tainted. If I believe Betty and Barney Hill or Travis Walton, Zanfretta or any other percipient it is because there is a strong case not because I believe in extra terrestrial visitors.

If a percipient is told a planet of origin, the planetary system and how far from Earth it is then that can be checked to a degree –is it an exo-planet in a system we know of for instance. Earth is currently (and very likely will not be for hundreds of years) not a threat to any superior extra terrestrial civilization so one might hope that one day someone asks one of these entities; “Where you from, pal?”

Ufology is currently in its death throws but is in denial because admitting that affects certain power bases and definitely the money coming in. Will it ever change or just fade out to become an obscure fringe subject –no one can answer that. It is up to the individual Ufologist.

Me? Well, I’m doing the work and the results are there to read by anyone and with no seriously established publisher being involved the reach is not as wide as I might hope. Would I accept funding to continue the work? Like a shot.

 

La Fenomenologia Hamanoide en la Argentina

One item I have in amongst the various CE3K/AE books is La Fenomenologia Hamanoide en la Argentina -The Hamanoid Phenomenology in Argentina compiled by Roberto E. Banchs and publihed in 1977 by the Servicia de investigaciones Ufologicas (Ufological Research Service).

It is a 60pp booklet cataloguing 46 CE3K reports from 1950-1975 and an evaluation of these. Sadly, it never got translated into English and my Spanish is pretty poor.  The booklet was published at around the same time period as the Webb and Bloecher 1973 The Year of the Humanoids and BUFORA publishing Ted Bloecher's papre presented at a conference titled Close Encounters of the Third Kind. 

At the same time my own paper on the subject was rejected by BUFORA as bing interesting but there was o little interest in the subject that it "could not justify the expense". To be fair that was BUFORAs standard response to anything like this. Howver, they did ask me to update the Bloecher HUM CAT (Humanoid Catalogue) UK section. I put the work in and heard no more...a year later I was told Bloecher was quite happy with the material that BUFORA took full credit for -my name was apparently removed from copies.

TRhis booklet will be added to the South America folder for posterity.

1900-1999 UK Reports Breakdown

 

Another day sorting the UK files out (yes, I know its Christmas Day but I don't do Christmas). Files are bulkier and last night...actually, it was 0120 hrs so this morning...I did a quick check of the reports.

Remember that these stats are not 100% complete and cover 1900-1999:

Explanation Number

Hoax 38

Worthy of Note 18 (highest rating)

Insufficient 96

Misidentification 1

Psychological 82

The Insufficent cases contain some interesting reports but not enough detail to draw any conclusion on. Considering that some of these were handled by UFOIN, BUFORA and even Contact UK 'investigators' this is pretty dire. It means that around 25% of the 96 reports could be mentioned but DO NOT provide even basic evidence.

Hoaxes, again, not surprising. Some of these were carried out by Ufologists including people such as Eric Morris (as I have the evidence and his "in your face" confession I can name him) and even some of those around Arthur Shuttlewood at Warminster but Shuttlewoopd was NOT a hoaxer.

Misidentification refers to the Gotherington Gargoyle case I investigated.

Psychological is an all-encompassing term here and cases include sleep paralysis and hypnagogic/hypnopompic states as well as semi religious contactee types and fantasy prone people. Just a casual glance should show any real investigator what is at play yet in many of these cases the "material" was good for books and articles so why spoil that?

From 1900-1999 only 18 Worthy of Note cases. This includes the 1994 Silbury Hill case although no physical evidence is involved but it was a multi witness case.

The problem is that UFO investigation was always a "club business" and those looking into CE3K/AE reports were either thinking from the very outset that the reportee was "a nutter" or, because no Contactee elements were present (ie tall, blue eyed, blonde haired space brothers) the report was a hoax.

When everyone jumped onto the "Its all psychical phenomenon" band wagon things got worse.

Remember that up to the 1990s there was still a BIG belief in frauds likle Adamski. There still is.

The Isle of Sheppey "Space Ape" case of 1979 I investigated and I even received confirmation from the RAF of an "unknown object" having been picked up by radar at the time -when I went to check the file, kept at a central report keeping point, the RAF letter was gone. I was told by the man overseeing the reports, Peter Tate that he had destroyed the letter "Its all Ufonutter stuff". This was the second time that he had destroyed evidence. I took all my reports back.

As far as I am aware my files are the largest in the UK dealing with CE3K/AE reports. It would be nice to get6 Ufologists to cooperate on the project but many who are interested in the subject only accvept Grey abduction cases -I was told by the Birmingham UFO Group boss that he gets 100+ new abduction cases each month.

If some of the older cases on file could be re-investigated we might learn more.

The possibiulity of that happening is probably zero.