Twas the night after Christmas.....

[Wolf]

And all around the forum, not a sound could be heard.... not even a mouse

During all the investigation that has been done off forum has anyone got any gauge regarding any attendance by base medical teams or by the PJ's at the scene of the 'incident'.

V/R

Wolf

[SouthyR1]

Im with you on that one wolf, been checking for any new posts ever day, but no one seems to be posting, maybe the weekend will bring us some joy!!!

Andy

[redsocks]

This is because people now realise how much BS the witnesses are trying to spin us, JB this is not going to do you no good for your retirement book but quite simply people arnt that stupid!

Redsocks

[AdrianF]

Okay
Moving on..

Sort of on the subject of Christmas.. Christmas Lights... 'Light Alls'
Does anybody know exactly what kind of lighting system 'light alls' would have consisted of. Ian Ridpath has a link on his website to a company selling generator powered work lights. I was wondering if anyone has any additional knowledge of the types of lights on issue at the time?
Do the malfunctioning light alls have a part to play in all this?

Adrian

[AdrianF]

I've sort of answered my own question.
The light alls were probably metal halide type light carts. Maybe someone can confirm this?
If this is the case it might explain the light alls malfuctioning, the cycling when they malfunction is described on Wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_halide

During my quest for this info I came across this http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=92396&highlight=tank
Now I have got to get me one of these!! I haven't stopped laughing since I came across this. Camping in the forest could suddenly become a lot more fun with one of these beauties

Enjoy

Adrian

[AdrianF]

Quote:
"Now we're observing what appears to be a beam coming down to the ground!"


Or maybe a beam coming up from the ground ?

Silvertop, the same thought did cross my mind too.
Read the whole thread there, especially the last post. Maybe the idea of a practical joke is a possibility? I've always thought this was unlikely due to nobody coming forward to claim it, but seeing this in action does make you think.
There is a link on that forum to one of these lights doing it's business
http://www.big-boys.com/articles/mosulbombs.html

Adrian

[Observer]

Hi all

I'm back after a break, Interesting theory re the pencil thin beam from one of these spot lights.
I suppose it could have been a pratical joke. Halt says one beam came right down to where he was standing which suggests that if the beam was being projected from the ground upwards he must have been almost standing on the lamp unit???
I think you need to look at what might have had these spot lamps in the air, helicopter? No body heard one. What could carry these lamps without making much noise, Airship? They all said they heard a humming noise which could have been the electric motors on an air ship.

Did the US Navy who had ships in the North Sea at that time decide to put one over on the USAF as a Christmas joke. They were great rivals and were always plotting against each other. The US ships would be very aware of how close to the coast Woodbridge was and its exact location.
With this senario in mind, it could quite as easily have been some other force. Or was it a NATO plotted exercise to test the USAF for airfield defence. Were Navy Seals landed to carry this out? It was only a 4/5 mile trek from coast to forest.

Obs

[AdrianF]

I read a post somewhere on here recently about a red filter being found in the forest after the events. Does anyone know if this was fact or just rumour?

Adrian

[Observer]

Hi Adrian

Re the red torch filter, it was me who posted this some time back on the forum.
My friend and his son who lived in Woodbridge town and who had several US airmen as friends all went out into the forest some days after the event, [although it was not public knowledge at that time, but the grape vine was in full swing on basses] found in the undergrowth down one of the logging tracks a USAF issue flash light with a red filter over the lense. He kept it as a souvenir and still has it.

Obs

[AdrianF]

Thanks Observer
Nice little souvenir. So lets say some jokers on base took one of these xenon arc lights from a chopper, took out a torch with a red filter into the forest and decided to have some fun. Maybe they dropped the torch while laughing so hard. It's possible I suppose. Thing is where or who are they??

Adrian

[Observer]

Hi Adrian

Yes its possible that this is what happened, but bare in mind the orders that all aimen were under.

From my friendships with several servicemen and their families i was told several times that any problems or unservice like activity off base on British territory or involving British locals would cause a disiplinary action and none that i knew would risk playing about or causing trouble off base.
They also took a very dim view if British Police had to come on base for enquiries. Airman involved were usually posted State side straight away and this did happen now and again, usually from trouble in Ipswich pubs on a Saturday night. Most i gather from being started by Brits, Nothing new there then.

Obs

[Wolf]

Does anybody know exactly what kind of lighting system 'light alls' would have consisted of.

USAF Light all


V/R

Wolf[/img]

[AdrianF]

Thanks Wolf,
Good find. That's a serious generator they are sitting on.

Adrian

[IanR]

You can also see a couple in the distance on a runway on this page
http://members.aol.com/thudeur2/bitburg.htm
Search down for the phrase "NF-2 portable light carts", which seems to have been the more official name for them.

Ian

[AdrianF]

Thanks Ian and Wolf

If the light alls were of the Mercury Vapour type then the 'cycling' effect might not have been very significant. I will look into this a little more over this week.
Happy Easter

Adrian

[Deep Purple]

To me the shot posted looks more like a laser than something out of a floodlight with the blue colour. The other shot shows the "lights alls", they look like they are intended more for ground illumination than and aircraft search light.
I would imagine they are similar to the " Night Sun" lights used on helicopters, which when shone look like a search light, but are clearly recognisable as such. The Night Suns I think are about 8.5 million candle power. we use a 3.5 million candle power light on the boat ( The ferries cant say they didnt see you) but within about quarter of a mile this has spread out enough to cover a block of flats, but it still looks just like a search light and has no intense colour. When I have used laser markers at night it is a totally different light and you can see the narrow colour beam of light in foggy conditions.
Interestingly I was flying into Gatwick last night and as we approached over the Isle of Wight probably at about 20,000 ft and you could clearly see the beam on the Needles lighthouse projecting out a number of miles on this clear and frosty night. When we were at crusing atltitude of 36,000ft we could clearly see the ground lights etc.
Perhaps the questions are, did the beam appear like a search light or a laser light, how far did it appear to go up into the sky?
The thread again mentions the whole thing could be a hoax, and it could be but someone is paying the hoaxers to shut their mouths and cooridinate things and if this is the case the most likely reason would be to maintain a ufo story to cover black projects--- probably aircraft or UAVs---- just disinformation

[Observer]

Light alls or whatever you want to call them were designed to 'flood' an area with light such as scenes of an accident or other incidents that required the area to be illuminated. This is what Halt wanted to do when he requested the light alls. We had similar lights on our traffic patrol vehicles [Range Rovers] to light up an RTA at night. The light alls were wide angle lights not pencil beam lights.
I saw them in use once at RAF Bentwaters being used by the base fire dept. Now it may be possible that the lenses on the light alls could be focussed for long range like you can on some domestic hand held torches but i don't think so.
I think the light all subject is taking us down a blind alley.

Did they have lasers in 1980 that could throw pencil thin beams for hundreds of feet? I have my doubts.

Obs

[AdrianF]

I originally crashed Wolf's intriguing line of questioning because I wanted to know what kind of lighting the light alls used.
The light alls along with a few other parts of evidence, have been used by some people over the years as just that... "evidence". This case is complicated enough as it is, if we can identify what is and what isn't significant then maybe it will be easier to focus on the important aspects.

The light types used were either Metal Halide or Mercury Vapour, both from what I have been informed shut off at the end of their life, only to re ignite shortly after, though Metal Halide more so. We've all seen street lights or bathroom tubes do this. I think it's fairly safe to assume that this is probably what was behind the light alls malfunctioning. Make of it what you will.


The Xenon Tank Arc Lights were just a cool find, if you had seen this light in the forest without knowing what it was, it would have been very interested to find out what it was. Then probably, you would have found the guys with the huge power source, operating the thing.

Adrian

[Observer]

Adrian

Your last comment about the xenon lights is exactly my thoughts.

If some body was shining these lights from the ground up, there would have been a pretty hefty power source and people operating the lamp/s in the forest. Absolutely no body from that time has even hinted that this may be the cause of the light beams.

If you can include a helicopter or some other 'aircraft' or even a blimp into the senario equipped with this sort of search light system then the case is solved, but no body is owning up to the possibility and in most cases are adament that nothing was flying/hovering over the forest.
JB was categoric that no helicopters were flying on the nights in question.
But LW said there was on one of the nights/days but i feel he meant after the event.

Here's the puzzle, the duty crew in the Bentwaters tower some 2/3 miles away said a large indisinguishable object with lights on it was hovering/stationary over Rendlesham Forest for quite a long time.

No, these thin beams of light were shone down to earth from the sky, and we must look at how this was achieved.
I have a theory, but later

Obs

[AdrianF]

Adrian, I'm not sure what you a pushing towards. Are you thinking that the lightalls themselves may have been responsible for the strange lights seen on the early hours of the 25th Dec '80? If that was the case I would love to know what they were being used to illuminate.

St.

Silvertop, I'm suggesting that the light alls malfunctioning probably played no part in the events at all, nothing new there. I thought that if it could be demonstrated why they might have been malfunctioning, then this part of the evidence could be eliminated from the enquiry so to speak.

Adrian