LAEG Page 321

General discussion about the Rendlesham forest incident

LAEG Page 321

Postby Wolf » Fri Apr 04, 2008 11:31 pm

Could this have been the patch? 81st Mission Support Squadron

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Postby AdrianF » Sat Apr 05, 2008 10:33 pm

Wolf, This is pretty similar to the patch that Larry Warren describes in "Left at East Gate".
I've searched a little on this, what would make them significant?

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Postby Wolf » Sat Apr 05, 2008 10:44 pm

The 81st Tactical Fighter Wing was the active Wing on RAF Bentwaters and RAF Woodbridge.

The majority of support Squadron under the 81st TFW were the 81st **** ie 81st SPS (Security Police Squadron),
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81st CSG (Combat Support Group) etc
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There were a exceptions to this ie the 581st AGS (Aircraft Generation Squadron - Woodbridge) for example and of course the flying squadrons - 78th, 91st, 92nd, 509th, 510th, and 511th TFS's (Tactical Fighter Squadrons) who at the time were all flying the A-10.

The 81st MSSQ (Mission Support Squadron) were under the 81st TFW providing administrative and people programs, ie HR, Education etc.

V/R

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Postby puddlepirate » Sun May 04, 2008 2:00 pm

Three patches, which for convenience I have put together here:

http://www.powfoto.com/patches.html

The first is LW's from LEAG - note the background

The second is from the F117a systems team (no idea if this is an official patch - can't imagine that a highly classified project would issue patches advertising their product but you never know. Interestingly, all the F117a patches I've come acroass feature the nighthawk bird somewhere in the logo.

The third is a shuttle mission patch. Note the similarity between the backgound and the shape of the central image of LW's patch.
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Postby Observer » Sun May 04, 2008 4:26 pm

Perhaps some body can explain the significance of all these patches in relation to the incident.

For the record, nearly all the F-117 aircraft are now grounded with just a handful still flying. Most were lost through crashes, plus they are no longer invisible to Russian radar and have been detectable since the 90's

Taken from an article in the 'Aeroplane'

Rendlesham was not a stealth incident.
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Postby Wolf » Sun May 04, 2008 7:53 pm

Observer - significance. As whatever patch LW saw was being worn in 88 and not in 80, then probably none at all. Its a case of removing another part of the puzzle. If we can do this with enough of the equation we will be left with a simple 1+1 scenario. But theres a way to go as yet.

Puddlepirate - You mean this patch which, was a morale patch for anyone that worked on the 117 project

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V/R

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Postby puddlepirate » Sun May 04, 2008 8:59 pm

Wolf - excellent. That is exactly it. The question is - would that have been worn in 1980? As I understand it, the project was deep black then so to wear a patch depicting a highly secret craft seems to be a contradiction.

Would I be correct in thinking that flight crew would have the 'nighthawk' patch, i.e the one with the bird and those simply involved in the project had the patch as shown in your post?

Robbins states in LAEG that Warren saw this patch at Bentwaters circa 1988 but what this means in relation to the Rendlesham incident I have no idea. It could be a red herring - but it does suggest that the F117 was being flown into Bentwaters/Woodbridge whilst it was still highly classified. The aircraft was unstable in all three planes - roll, pitch and yaw - and could not be flown manually. Although there was quadruple redundancy in the onboard control systems, could it be possible that radar tests on Orfordness and at RAF Bawdsey plus an F117 on a covert op, overflying the UK at exactly the wrong moment, fit in here somewhere?

Moving forward. Why would F117 flight crew - if flight crew wore this patch and not one of the others - be at Bentwaters if their aircraft was not. And if the Team Stealth patch was not worn by flight crew but by other personnel associated with the aircraft, then why were they at Bentwaters if the aircraft was not?

It would be interesting to know a bit more about the personnel who wore this particular patch - were they aircraft maintainers? Were they intelligence personnel whose role was to examine photographic images or other data? Were they weapons technicians? Or was it just something given to anyone who had anything to do with the project - from the project director to the most junior filing clerk?

As Wolf rightly says, all this might be nothing at all but it does need to be considered before being discarded as insignificant.

Observer - you said the incident was nothing to do with a stealth aircraft, presumably the F117. How do you know that to be true? Is there some evidence you could share with the rest of us?
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Postby Wolf » Mon May 05, 2008 12:34 am

I'm with Observer on this one, I don't think the 117 had anything to do with the event and neither does the patch.

http://www.faqs.org/docs/air/avf1171.html - note dates.

If a 117 had gone down there would have been a large amount of damage to the forest, and I think the Suffolk police and the Forestry commision would have noticed that. If a piece of control surface had fallen off then the fly by wire would not have been able to cope and you'd have also ended up with a hole in the ground. It wasn't nicknamed the 'Wobblin Gobblin' for nothing.

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Postby Observer » Mon May 05, 2008 1:46 pm

We have been down this road before and in depth. There was no air crash in the woods and that was said by many people who were there at the time. I have no reason to disbelieve them.

Ppulati said if any stealth aircraft or any other 'top' secret air craft were flying in or out of either base, he would have known about it. Take your disbelief up with those witnesses not me. They were there, you and me were not.
I aggree the badge ID by LW is a puzzling but all of them seen at some distance could be anything. You would have to be up close at talking distance before true badge ID could be established.
I realy think as Wolf said, its a blind ally.

Because Bentwaters was an emergency landing strip for the shuttle, NASA would deploy some of its ground crew to this base and others round the world for short stay familierisation and facility checks and procedure training with the base personel. Included in this squad were doctors, maintenance engineers and other scientists all would be wearing a NASA shuttle logo.

This was told to me by some one who worked at BW for 15 years.
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Postby puddlepirate » Mon May 05, 2008 1:49 pm

Fully agree. Not an aircraft accident. With regard to the incident the patches are an irrelevance - but they do reveal some background info which might be useful.

What intrigues me is why were 70-80 USAF personnel and their officers, plus senior officers in the forest at all? Why was a road block set up and who manned it? Why were floodlights needed? Also, I understand from other info on the web that in Dec 1980 the east gate sentry post was more like a single man sentry box than the guardroom seen in later photos.

The more I research the incident and the more I come across comments such as it wasn't this and it wasn't that.....e.g. it wasn't a hoax by the 67th ARRS, it wasn't an exercise involving UK forces, it wasn't the lighthouse, it wasn't an air accident involving an F117 or an A10, it wasn't an accident involving nuclear or classified weapons, it was nothing to do with events in Poland, it was nothing to do with Cruise missiles, it wasn't Cobra Mist or 3D radar....etc etc the more I'm led to believe the incident in the forest was a diversion - and as a diversion to draw security personnel off base, it was spectacularly successful. The only thing that is known and undisputed is that over three nights between 25th and 28th December 1980 a large number of US personnel were searching for something in Rendlesham forest. They used floodlights and senior officers were present. And the incident was of no defence significance.

Thus as far as I can see the only facts supported by hard evidence are:

a. a major search involving substantial numbers of USAF personnel was intitiated
b. UK and US governments knew what was going on because it was of 'no defence significance'
c. Some two weeks after the event, the deputy base commander of RAF Bentwaters sends a CC copy of a memo, not to his own command but to the RAF.
d. In response to an FoI request to the Dept of Defense in Washington, instead of replying with the truthful 'we do not hold that information', the DoD contact the MoD and the Halt memo is revealed.
c. Of all those involved in the activity in the forest and of all those who gave statements to the USAF after the event, only a handful of those witnesses have come forward to make public statements.

This makes me believe the event could be related to:

a. a joke perpertrated by locals looking for a laugh
b. a more serious diversion perpetrated by a group of persons keen to draw security personnel off base for some reason - and that could range from Greehham Common 'wimmin' type protestors seeking to gain admission to the base, to disgruntled USAF personnel out to make the SP/LE look foolish in order to get their own back for some reason.

As far as b goes it would not take many people dressed in dark clothing, running around the forest with red gels over the lenses of their torches, letting off fireworks and CO2 fire extinguishers and so forth to spark off a security alert. Especially at a major NATO base at a time when the Cold War was at its height. That doesn't explain the craft seen by JP or LW but it could explain the lights - and the bulk of the incident is about strange lights.
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Postby Observer » Mon May 05, 2008 2:12 pm

And the reason it was none of those senarios was because it was a serious crime with no British involvement.
The details are too hot and contentious like the drug posts from some of you recently, so i am not going to say any more.
I've been asked to keep this to myself, a couple of members know what i'm talking about but i strongly advise that it is not put on the forum and if it is i will deny all knowledge.

"You wouldn't believe me if i told you" Remember that phrase from an ARRS crew chief!!!
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Postby puddlepirate » Mon May 05, 2008 3:47 pm

Interesting. On that basis, no matter how much research is done or what questions are asked, the Rendlesham incident will never be resolved. At least, not by us. So that is it then. Time to move on to something else.

Incidentally, sometime in the early 1980's there was a rumour going around the fleet that there had been the equivalent of a bank robbery in one of the large US carriers, USS Nimitz perhaps - and nobody was caught. I have absolutely no evidence that the story was true and no doubt it was enlarged with each telling of it but it was certainly a pretty strong rumour at the time. So I guess if that can happen in a ship, then anything can happen ashore....
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Postby Observer » Mon May 05, 2008 4:14 pm

There are plenty of other Web sites dedicated to chasing UFO's if you want to 'move on' I have moved on but remain with this great forum for many reasons.
The Rendlesham Forest Incident Web site was set up initially as a UFO investigation and i suspect all of us including the sceptics joined the forum for that simple reason.
It took us getting on for 18 Months before the man made incident discussions started to dominate the forum. Now, UFO's are hardly ever mentioned except by some of the witnesses. They [some of them] not us are still convinced it was not of this world. They may well be right.

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Postby Observer » Mon May 05, 2008 5:18 pm

Re crime and robbery in the US Navy, on a History Channel doc some time ago, the US Navy had to admit that when the Captain did his ships tour [USN air craft carriers] he had an armed guard, and it was in case he got mugged or held held captive or was injured by other sailors. This is not b------t as those being interviewed said these very words.

Wow!

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Postby AdrianF » Mon May 05, 2008 5:37 pm

Hi
It seems to happen all too often with this case that someone will come forward to say that it wasn't this or it wasn't that without offering any real evidence to explain why. I have to agree with what Wolf said in his earlier post: "Its a case of removing another part of the puzzle. If we can do this with enough of the equation we will be left with a simple 1+1 scenario. But theres a way to go as yet."
This has worked to remove the Nighthawk from any involvement, though saying that I wouldn't completely dismiss the idea of related technology being tested at the time either. There are a few more of the manmade scenario's that might be similarly dismissed by looking at the details over time. If all the man made or mundane explanations could be eliminated then I guess it would be time for speculation.
More likely as one theory gets dissolved a new one will rear it's ugly head.

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Postby puddlepirate » Mon May 05, 2008 5:57 pm

But if it is indeed known that the incident was related to a crime and if it is also known that the DoD will never admit to that because of the embarrassment such an admission would cause, then there is no futher discussion to be had. The cause of the incident is known and to continue a debate about hypothetical UFO's etc (which they must surely be if the cause of the Rendlesham Incident is now known) is pointless.

It's like endlessly debating what hit the twin towers on 9/11 when it is known that two aircraft hit the towers......


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Postby Observer » Mon May 05, 2008 6:33 pm

Adrian
You make some valid points, and without being negative which seems to rear its ugly head more and more, there are other theories which have not been given as much attention as the ones we have almost beaten to death. This to my mind is moving on.

Its probably because these other theories have less supporting evidence, but still deserve more attention than we have given them in the past.

The ellimination process is a good way to either discount or file a theory for later investigation, but quite honestly, even aspects of elliminations are suspect in themselves.

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Postby Observer » Mon May 05, 2008 7:37 pm

We saw fit to discuss the nuke, stealth, shuttle, Russian Sat, death rays, you name it senario. The authorities would never own up to any of these yet we kept on blathering about them untill they were dead in the water. I guess we had to for ellimination purposes, but all as far as i'm concerned were futile attempts with outragous senarios.

The cause of this mystery is not known by me [as some people think] but i have been given some new info from a lady who was once in the USAF and now works in Europe where she simply said in a PM to me that we should be looking at a crime rather than some thing miitary or alien.
So there is something new to move us on. It could well be a red Herring but hey most have been so far, but give it some attention.

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Postby AdrianF » Mon May 05, 2008 9:31 pm

The cause of this mystery is not known by me [as some people think] but i have been given some new info from a lady who was once in the USAF and now works in Europe where she simply said in a PM to me that we should be looking at a crime rather than some thing miitary or alien.
So there is something new to move us on. It could well be a red Herring but hey most have been so far, but give it some attention.


Obs
I'm intrigued by this scenario, but it needs a starting point. A witness, documentation or somebody to come forward to either confirm or deny elements of it. At the moment it's just hearsay, or disinformation.

As for whether or not the patches sketched in Left at East Gate were significant, maybe Larry himself can chip in to this thread?

Cheers

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Postby puddlepirate » Mon May 05, 2008 10:44 pm

And the reason it was none of those senarios was because it was a serious crime with no British involvement.
The details are too hot and contentious like the drug posts from some of you recently, so i am not going to say any more.
I've been asked to keep this to myself, a couple of members know what i'm talking about but i strongly advise that it is not put on the forum and if it is i will deny all knowledge.

"You wouldn't believe me if i told you" Remember that phrase from an ARRS crew chief!!!


Observer - I am totally confused. One minute you categorically state it was a crime but for reasons of security you cannot reveal more yet you now suggest that might not be so. Was it a crime or not?
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