Welsh UFO sightings from 1973. For sightings from other years please click HERE.
FSR
February
Newbridge
Flying Saucer Review Case Histories Supplement #14 (April 1973) published the following letter:
Dear Sir, I have two reports to give you. They both concern what could be the same unidentified flying object, but there was a gap of ten days between the two sightings.
Report 1: On Monday, February 12, 1973, at 1:15 p.m. my friend, Anthony Cooling, and I had just finished our dinners in school when we saw the UFO as we were walking around the Rugby pitch. I was the first to spot it. It was triangular in shape (as in the sketch) and was metallic in colour as it was shining in the sunlight. It was shaped like an arrow-head, but with an elliptical rear end. It was emitting no sound that we could hear, and there was no control behind it. We couldn't judge its altitude, but it wasn't all that high up.
The UFO was travelling in a northerly direction over Newbridge. At the time the wind was blowing from the West, so it is unlikely that it was a weather balloon. Also it was travelling far too slowly for an aircraft, and it gave me the impression of floating through the air. We pointed out the object to one of our teachers, and his first words were "Very interesting." We lost sight of the UFO at about 1:20 p.m. when it disappeared into some cloud, at which point I wrote down some details, and made a small sketch. We waited around for another 25 minutes but did not see the object again.
Report 2: On Thursday, February 22, at 12:45 p.m., my friend, A. Cooling, and I, and also two other friends of ours, Alan Hughes and Mark Gomulock, were standing waiting to go in for dinner. We were watching the aeroplanes passing overhead on flight path Green 1. As we were watching one aeroplane flying over us at a low altitude, the same UFO as before just appeared out of nowhere underneath the aeroplane. The UFO was very small compared to the aeroplane which was a four-engined jet airliner. The four of us watched the UFO hover below the aircraft for a few seconds, and move off in another direction.
The UFO couldn't have been a Vulcan bomber, which has a large triangular-shaped wing, because it was too small. Furthermore, aeroplanes are not allowed to fly that close to each other. The airliner was travelling along flight path Green 1 in a Westerly direction. The UFO then moved from beneath it and moved off at a very high speed, faster than any normal aircraft could accelerate, in a Southerly direction which again was against the wind which was blowing from the West at the time.
The four of us watched the UFO until it disappeared into some cloud, and the sun got in our eyes. We caught another glimpse of the UFO for a few seconds, but the sun was too strong for us to keep looking at it. Again I jotted down some notes and my friend and I who had witnessed the first sighting are sure that it was the same object. The time that the object disappeared was 12:50 p.m. I don't know if the gap of 10 days between the two sightings and the same time approximately has any significance - all I know is that I have never seen anything like it before.
Yours faithfully, Andrew Badham (Newbridge)
PRESS
February 23rd
Pontypridd
UFO was reported. The Pontypridd Observer of March 9th offered a potential solution:
Was this the U.F.O.? Was the "flying saucer" seen over Pontypridd on February 23 actually a parachute flare used by the weather forecasting authorities? A reader, who does not disclose his (or her) identity, has sent us such a parachute, which, it is claimed, was picked up on the mountains behind Merthyr Road that day. The sender feels that it is the solution to the unidentified flying object mystery. The parachute is attached wire with a ring, which has obviously been subjected to heat. But is the parachute the object several people claim to have seen in the sky?
PRESS
Spring
The following was reported in BUFORA V3/N10:
BAD LUCK SYMBOL. A mysterious "light" was described by Thurlow Craig, in his "Up Country" series in a Sunday newspaper. He and his wife were driving down a road in Wales, where they live, which according to local people is haunted by the ghosts of previous inhabitants of the area who were driven into nearby swamps by invading Norsemen and it is claimed that the screams and cries of the victims can still be heard. Mr. Craig's wife happened to look through their rear window and exclaimed: "What on earth can that be following us? It looks like a blue moon." On looking in his mirror, Mr. Craig saw the whole of it filled with blue light. His dog also became alarmed and jumped on Mrs. Craig's lap. Local legend has it that the light usually portends bad luck - unlike the object seen by President Amin! Mr. Craig drove off swiftly and so far only reports a slight accident later that afternoon.
PRESS
Sunday 8th April
Croespenmaen
The Western Mail of April 10th 1973 reported:
The little mining village of Croespenmaen, near Crumlin, does not have many visitors - but two strange ones have been reported there during the past six months. Six months ago about 20 people - including policemen - reported a flying saucer-shaped object in the sky. And on Sunday evening [April 8], Mr. Glanmor Bebb, aged 52, and his wife, June, of Maes-yr-Haf, watched a similar-shaped object for about 10 minutes as it hovered above an empty advance factory.
'It hovered and then flashed across the horizon faster than the eye could follow,' said Mr. Bebb, who is war-pensioned because of a hearing defect.
In September last year Mr. Robert Phillips, aged 24, a plumber, of Meadow Walk, Croespenmaen, saw a similar object like a flying saucer in the sky. There were many other reports of sightings at the time. Mr. Phillips watched it for about 30 minutes through a telescope. The sighting by Mr. and Mrs. Bebb was in a similar spot, in the north-west, towards the Brecon Beacons.
Mrs. Bebb said that the object she saw was hovering 300 yards away. 'I did not know what it was but it definitely was not an aircraft light or a star,' she said. Mr. Bebb added, 'I cannot stand glare but I was able to watch this object. It was like a dim light bulb.' He said he had reported the incident to Blackwood police.
Flying Saucer Review V19/N3 (May-June 1973) reported that the South Wales Argus of April 10th carried the same story, but with a few extra details:
'I don't believe in all this bull about space ships and all that,' he said. But when the object hovering near his home at Maes-yr-haf House swung away at high speed he ran to his home to alert his wife, June, he said on Tuesday. 'I had counted to four, and it swung away towards the horizon. My wife, June, and daughter Sarah, aged three, both saw what seemed to be a diffused light. But by the time they spotted it, it was nearing the horizon,' he said.
BAD LUCK SYMBOL. A mysterious "light" was described by Thurlow Craig, in his "Up Country" series in a Sunday newspaper. He and his wife were driving down a road in Wales, where they live, which according to local people is haunted by the ghosts of previous inhabitants of the area who were driven into nearby swamps by invading Norsemen and it is claimed that the screams and cries of the victims can still be heard. Mr. Craig's wife happened to look through their rear window and exclaimed: "What on earth can that be following us? It looks like a blue moon." On looking in his mirror, Mr. Craig saw the whole of it filled with blue light. His dog also became alarmed and jumped on Mrs. Craig's lap. Local legend has it that the light usually portends bad luck - unlike the object seen by President Amin! Mr. Craig drove off swiftly and so far only reports a slight accident later that afternoon.
PRESS
Sunday 8th April
Croespenmaen
The Western Mail of April 10th 1973 reported:
The little mining village of Croespenmaen, near Crumlin, does not have many visitors - but two strange ones have been reported there during the past six months. Six months ago about 20 people - including policemen - reported a flying saucer-shaped object in the sky. And on Sunday evening [April 8], Mr. Glanmor Bebb, aged 52, and his wife, June, of Maes-yr-Haf, watched a similar-shaped object for about 10 minutes as it hovered above an empty advance factory.
'It hovered and then flashed across the horizon faster than the eye could follow,' said Mr. Bebb, who is war-pensioned because of a hearing defect.
In September last year Mr. Robert Phillips, aged 24, a plumber, of Meadow Walk, Croespenmaen, saw a similar object like a flying saucer in the sky. There were many other reports of sightings at the time. Mr. Phillips watched it for about 30 minutes through a telescope. The sighting by Mr. and Mrs. Bebb was in a similar spot, in the north-west, towards the Brecon Beacons.
Mrs. Bebb said that the object she saw was hovering 300 yards away. 'I did not know what it was but it definitely was not an aircraft light or a star,' she said. Mr. Bebb added, 'I cannot stand glare but I was able to watch this object. It was like a dim light bulb.' He said he had reported the incident to Blackwood police.
Flying Saucer Review V19/N3 (May-June 1973) reported that the South Wales Argus of April 10th carried the same story, but with a few extra details:
'I don't believe in all this bull about space ships and all that,' he said. But when the object hovering near his home at Maes-yr-haf House swung away at high speed he ran to his home to alert his wife, June, he said on Tuesday. 'I had counted to four, and it swung away towards the horizon. My wife, June, and daughter Sarah, aged three, both saw what seemed to be a diffused light. But by the time they spotted it, it was nearing the horizon,' he said.
This sighting was also mentioned in UFO Research Newsletter V3/N5 in 1973; they noted that the probable explanation was an aircraft.
PRESS
Thursday 3rd May, 23:30
South Gower
PRESS
Thursday 3rd May, 23:30
South Gower
Mr and Mrs Bendle of Penclawdd were returning home after a meal with friends. Mrs Bendle explained:
"We were driving home with our friends on the Llanrhidian to Penclawdd road when we saw a glow in the sky. At first we thought it might be coming from the Baglan Bay works, but the glow seemed to be over South Gower, rather than Swansea. Then we saw a thin line of very bright light in the sky. At one time it seemed to be moving very fast, then it simply disappeared. We might have thought it was the effect of the drink except we had only had one bottle of wine between us and we certainly weren't feeling merry! A number of other cars also stopped to look at the light and no-one seemed to be able to give an explanation."
Swansea police and coastguard said they had had no reports of similar sightings and the only explanation they could give was that it could have been light from the Baglan Bay works reflected by the clouds.
Source: 'South Wales Evening Post' Monday 7 May 1973.
PRESS
May 1973
Llanidloes
Primary school headmaster Bill Hopkins was driving home one night in May when, as he approached the Red Bridge, an old railway bridge 2 miles out of Llanidloes on the road to Newtown, a girl stepped straight out of the hedge into his path.
"I braked hard. All I could think was 'I am going to kill this woman.' But there was no impact, I could see her face looking straight at me and it seemed to pass through the car. She must have turned around as I could still see her face in the mirror. I didn't bother to stop; I was really frightened I can tell you. ... It all happened so quickly. All I can remember is her face. It was so sorrowful and she was looking straight at me."
The press coverage prompted others to come forward with similar sightings. A few weeks later in early July, chef Adderrahman Sennah was looking for the road to Llanidloes, having got lost after driving his girlfriend home.
"I wasn't sure which way to turn when I came to the main road. Then as I approached a corner I saw the wall of a bridge and suddenly the head of a woman came out towards me. It came straight at the windscreen and passed through the car on the passenger's side. I was alone but I shouted 'I'm on the Red Bridge' and then drove straight home. I was really frightened and was shaking."
BUFORA
June 30th, 23:00
Mawddach Estuary, Merioneth
The following report was made to me personally and I publish it because it is typical of a number of sighting reports in various parts of the country - including Warminster - in recent months. Comments from out evaluation panel in the next issue.
The following report was made to me personally and I publish it because it is typical of a number of sighting reports in various parts of the country - including Warminster - in recent months. Comments from out evaluation panel in the next issue.
LOCATION: Between Bontddu and Barmouth, Merioneth, N. Wales.
DATE: June 30th, 1973. TIME: 23:00 - 23:30 GMT.
WITNESSES: Reyna Rushton, 23 and Timothy Tunnicliffe.
DETAILS: Six whitish-yellow lights were seen travelling above a river estuary towards the CADER IDRIS range of mountains: the lights in fact traversed the sky from N.W. to S.W., disappearing in the approximate position of Jupiter low in the south-east. They were around first magnitude and appeared singly at roughly five-minute intervals except for two which seemed rather brighter and travelled closer together. Brightness was constant: each light moved at approximately the same speed - an apparently slow movement as each was in view for several minutes. The lights seemed to move in a straight line. In this particular report the lights were seen against a clear sky hence height estimation was difficult, but reports of similar lights below cloud level have been made elsewhere.
From BUFORA V3/N12. V4/N1 published a follow up evaluation, attributing the sighting to Skylab debris. Skylab was the first US space station, launched in May 1973.
Summer, afternoon
From BUFORA V3/N12. V4/N1 published a follow up evaluation, attributing the sighting to Skylab debris. Skylab was the first US space station, launched in May 1973.
Summer, afternoon
St. Elfods Junior School, Abergele
Julie Dickson and her friend Jenny, both 9 years old, were sat at adjoining school desks near a large patio window. They saw a small metallic greyish silver craft, with a slightly rounded dome at the top, about 4 feet long came down into the playground, sit there for some seconds then fly up towards the main motorway behind the school, which is now the M55. They were so taken with the sight they didn't say anything until it was too late when they didn't, as they knew no one would believe them.
Awareness V26/N4 carried this full report on the family involved written by Margaret Fry:
Awareness V26/N4 carried this full report on the family involved written by Margaret Fry:
PRESS
September
Llandrindod Wells
The County Times and Gazette of Saturday 22nd September 1973 reported:
Firemen at Llandrindod Wells are still trying to work out whether or not they spotted a flying saucer above the town's lakeside on Monday night. Whatever they saw streaking across the late evening sky just before dusk, one thing is for sure, it has been officially logged as an unidentified flying object. The bright light was seen by a group of firemen taking part in an exercise with a hydraulic platform. They spotted the light when it was directly above them, and watched it for 50 seconds before it disappeared in a northerly direction.
'There was no defined shape, with light and no sound, and it was certainly going too fast for an aeroplane,' said one officer. 'Could it have been a satellite?' 'I doubt it, because according to the information none was visible at that time of night in this part of the world,' said the officer.
Just to make sure the incident would be recorded, the firemen told the police, who dutifully 'booked' it.
Late September, 02:10
Pensarn Beach, Abergele
A single white / yellow coloured oval object floated over the Irish Sea towards the beach, becoming brighter as it came closer. It was not particularly high and appeared to be c. 200 ft by 100 ft in size. It took about 30 mins to pass overhead, hover for some time over Abergele police station, then return to the beach.
This was followed by a sighting of three black oval objects, each several hundred feet across. They eventually merged together and changed colour. The three teenaged witnesses complained of a burning sensation on the skin of their face and hands in the aftermath, which lasted for two to three days.
SUFON
Autumn, 20:55
Gorseinon, Swansea
A family on holiday in Freshwater, Pembrokeshire, snapped a souvenir photo while out walking. When the picture was developed they noticed a UFO in the left hand corner for the first time. Randall Jones-Pugh forwarded the picture onto BUFORA for further investigation, though he noted "since I was the one who investigated this particular incident, I must confirm that I was quite unable to contact the person who actually took the photograph, so positive details are almost completely absent."
Here is the full account as written up by Margaret Fry for her book Who Are They?:
There were four UFOS involved in this very strange experience. Tim (pseudonym) was a young man at the time and his friends from school days, John and Alun (pseudonyms) whom he met from time to time but was not intimately friendly with. They were gathered together and discussed such things as ghost and Ouija boards on this occasion, after which they decided it might be fun to spend that summer’s night on the beach. They settled themselves down on a bench on Pensarn Beach, which was surrounded by a plastic and wood shelter. They had had not seen Alun for awhile, so they sat chatting to about 12 midnight when John and Alun fell asleep, Tim continued to take an interest in everything around him, the sea, beach area, there was a full moon and some stars visible, the night was very calm with the sky a dull light navy blue, no clouds anywhere.
Round about 2 am Tim noticed a single white/yellow cloud like oval in the distance over the Irish Sea. This then floated slowly towards the beach, it was not very high in the sky and seemed to him to be about 200 ft by 100 ft in size and as it came nearer it was bright white/yellow. It gradually passed right over them, and quite low over the beach, floating on towards the residential part of the town behind them and he wondered what it could be. There is a large park and fields towards the beach, unlike most seaside places the houses are at least a 1/2 mile from the sea. This unusual lit- up cloud then just stopped over Abergele Police Station, which Tim who had got up to follow it, thought quite strange. How could a cloud just stop floating and hover?
It then started coming back to the beach area which rather alarmed Tim, for it was now almost directly over and he tried to awaken his friend John, but he began to feel annoyed because there seemed to be two invisible pillars of some power that prevented him from doing this. Then he tried to awake Alun and the same force stopped him. So he started yelling, the cloud like thing then carried on out to sea, once it receded he was able to shake his friends awake. He told his friends, but they disbelieved him and said they wanted to sleep. He asked them to stay awake at least the next l0 minutes to see what would happen next. The whole sighting had lasted about half an hour.
In fact it was about 10 minutes later that John noticed three gigantic grey/black ovals coming from the direction of Rhyl down the coast line, they were drifting no more than 500ft up, judging by the width that spread over to the large Victorian buildings on the other side of the main road, they though them several hundred feet across. Alun who was sitting on the bench did not appear to notice, but these two watched these three Objects come steadily on until they passed them on the beach at an angle of 50 degrees. When they reached Pensarn railway station the leading Object stopped, and the one behind went right into it and merged, ditto the third one. Once they all merged they twisted and turned and seemed to churn up dull colours of green, blue, yellow and red. That went on for about l5 minutes, after which it stopped and went back to a very black cloud like Object.
The rest of the sky was by now fairly light with no clouds, as this thing started to drift again towards them on the beach. As this Object came towards them Tim and John got behind between the half shelter and the bench, whilst Alun sat on, he could not see anything and thought they were behaving stupidly. Then this Object came down very low over the shelter, so that it blacked out the sky and light, they were so afraid they prayed aloud. After a few minutes the Object receded and went up at an angle on the Pensarn/Kinmel bay side.
Alun had got up and was staring in the direction the craft was going, yet once it had gone he turned to the other two and said “Whatever is the matter with you two, I can’t see anything”. Tim made the comment to me, that this friend of theirs had always been very matter-of-fact and totally insensitive to paranormal feelings since they had been children, he just could not envisage such phenomenon as ghosts or anything out of the ordinary. They had never been particularly close friends he said. Yet it is interesting that they shared the effects of this experience.
For about 10 minutes after the Object left all three felt a burning of the skin on their faces and the tops of their hands. They were in such pain they at first thought of rushing into the sea, but then reasoned the salt water would aggravate the burning, so decided to use tap water to wash themselves. According to Tim they did not go immediately but talked and debated on the beach for another hour before walking to the Railway station. As the whole incident had taken an hour, this brought the time to about 4.10 am, naturally the Station was closed. They then walked back to the beach and fell asleep on the bench. About 6 am they were woken by the Police. They explained that they had just wanted the adventure of spending the night out and this was accepted in those happy drug free days in North Wales.
Now regrettably this lovely, mostly rural mountainous area has caught up with the rest of the British Isles, and no respectable person ventures on to Pensarn beach after dark, all sorts of unsavoury dealers meet there, there was even a murder reported in all the national newspapers a few years ago. Shortly after the Police left the three men walked to Bunties Cafe near the Beach, it was closed, they knew they would have to wait till about 7 am/8 am for the Cafe people to arrive. Then they decided to go back to the beach.
This is Tim’s story, given to me with the uttermost care and detail for he says it has been in his memory ever since, it will never go away. It is as clear today as it was at the time. He has carefully worked out the times of each section of the incident, which I would query although I am sure this happened as he relates. He worked out that the first UFO incident lasted 29 minutes, and so on, he felt he could account for all the time, but he says he did not know if he had a watch on!
I have considered these points:
- Abergele, Kinmel Bay, Rhyl etc, are all seaside resorts to the Irish Sea of course.
- John did not see the first cloud-like object, it seems though he was looking out to the sea when it was receding in the distance.
- The pillars of power; Tim said he sensed an intelligence coming from them, it was a power that seemed to him to be forceful and overpowering, but not frightening. When it receded and he was allowed to awake his companions, they naturally told him he must have been dreaming, but he is quite adamant he never went to sleep, except after they had been to the railway station and everything was locked up.
- When the three UFOS merged, the first one remained the same size.
- The burning effects lasted two to three days for all three young men. Why would they, when they were feeling burnt, debate for an hour before going to see if any place was open so that they could wash with tap water?
The first time Tim told me about this, he thought they went to the Railway Station at about 5.30 am and then straight on to Bunties Cafe, this seemed to me a more logical course of the events after the departure of the UFO. This would have seemed to imply that he could not really account for about two hours after the Object left. A couple of weeks later after giving it much thought, he came back and said no, this was not correct. They had debated for an hour and then went to the Station at 4.10 am. This again seemed illogical to me, for if your face and hands are burning, the first thing you would want to instinctively do, would be to wash the burning sensation away as soon as possible. Having read that other abductees have felt controlled by Alien intelligences, I wondered if the same thing happened to them, and he is not now really aware of the sequence of events after the UFO left. Maybe they were induced to fall asleep without realising how long this lasted.
I did of course ask why they had not simply gone home to wash. He said all their parents shut the doors at about midnight and after that would not let them in. Tim himself had very conventional strict parents and he would not have dared to go home at that hour of the morning, still less tell his parents about his strange experience. They did talk of this and the primary consideration was that they were afraid to walk along the unlit very long coastal road, which was quite a distance from their homes and the direction in which the last huge grey/black UFO had gone. I also asked what Alun’s reaction was to them all being burnt simultaneously, when he appeared to have seen nothing. He said they were so thunderstruck themselves they did not notice, but they did meet from time to time at other teenager’s houses, his own parents would not have his friends over. When they did meet, they did tell their friends about this experience. They did debate too as to whether they should inform R.A.F Valley at Anglesey, but felt too afraid that they would not be believed and it would cause them trouble.
They were round about 17/18 years of age when this happened and gradually over the years as they courted, then married they had lost touch. Since discussing all this with me, he felt he should try to trace John and would endeavour to do so. Until he came to me Tim had read no UFO books, he had seen a TV UFO programme. I asked him if it would help him to better understand what had happened to them if I lent him some carefully selected books. He said that would be very much appreciated, as he wanted to understand what it was all about. In my view helping these victims who come to us for comfort and advice is far more important than any research. Our first concern should be the witnesses, for without these people there would be no Ufology research. So did they have some missing time, it is very difficult to judge this after such a length of time, especially as it would not have occurred to the witnesses to make notes in 1973 when this happened. I think it sufficiently strange to include in this Chapter.
Further Tim did mention that he saw something very strange and unaccountable as a 12 year old boy on the marshes between Kinmel Bay/Rhuddlan, which is very flat land going towards the estuary that outlets at Rhyl harbour. It is rather dull scenery of flat fields surrounded by hedges, and he was looking for bird’s nests in the hedgerows that surrounded the fields, taking a very narrow track farmers use. He saw a very small strange looking Object in the centre of an enclosed field, which took up into the sky, it left a trail of fire similar to a fire rocket, with the same sound, as a child he thought this really weird and unaccountable! He does not now remember exactly what it looked like, it was less than a foot in size, but that was all he has ever seen prior to the beach incident. A further interview Tim told me he had seen a number of ghosts of dead relatives in his childhood, and experienced paranormal events some with his younger brother. On one occasion he and his brother had been put to bed when they saw their grandmother come into the room holding the hand of a man they did not know, they could see through them. They ran down the stairs to their parents, but he said his father had always been very harsh, and he yelled at them to go back to bed immediately. Yet his grandmother was very much alive at the time and visiting them regularly and normally.
I asked if he associated these events with what happened to him and his friends on the beach. He said he felt that UFOS and what we consider paranormal exist in the same dimension. I have expressed my feelings on this elsewhere in the book. Of course over the years I have read in Flying Saucer Review and other magazines from Australia, the USA and Britain, and had some personal reports previously of one person seeing something or having an experience, that someone close by has no idea of, it is most unusual though for the unaware person to have the same effects as the person undergoing the experience. Tim who did not want his name known would like to hear from other people or researchers who know of something similar.
Source: Who Are They? by Margaret-Ellen Fry.
SUFON
Autumn, 20:55
Gorseinon, Swansea
18-year-old Marion had just recently passed her driving test and was sitting in her D-reg mini, parked in the bus station, West Street, Gorseinon. She had passed her test in September, which has helped her date this event, and at that time regularly run her mother around.
She was waiting to pick her up her mother who was about to leave her bingo night at the Lido bingo hall and was due to finish at 9 pm (the hall was located where the Domino pizza shop is now).
As she sat there in the car, facing north towards the crossroads in the centre of Gorseinon, about 50 yards away, she suddenly saw something hovering over the High Street, just to the right of the crossroads, roughly behind the West End pub which is located on the corner of West Street and High Street (strangely, West Street actually runs south from the crossroads).
The object was hovering just above roof-height, directly over High Street. It was motionless and the area below it was lit up in white light, which shone down to the street below. Marion described the object as about the size of a bus, disc-shaped, just like the sherbet sweets called 'flying saucers', basically two domes joined together, with a central rim running around it. The body was dark and the only light on it was what was coming from below it, flooding the street with white light.
Marion got out of her car and stood there to see it better. She noticed a man, who was also waiting for collect someone from bingo had got out of his car too to look at the amazing spectacle in front of them. There was no sound coming from the object as it hung there just over the shopping street. As it was the late evening, there were no shops open.
After a little while, suddenly the light extinguished and the craft immediately starting moving to the right, horizontally and headed along High Street in an easterly direction and the two witnesses lost sight of it due to the buildings along the street. Marion said she had the impression that there might have been a second craft the other side of it, and mostly obscured by the one they could see, which also moved away at the same time.
After the craft had departed, the man turned to her and said something like, 'did you see that?' to which she replied, 'yes I did!'.
A family on holiday in Freshwater, Pembrokeshire, snapped a souvenir photo while out walking. When the picture was developed they noticed a UFO in the left hand corner for the first time. Randall Jones-Pugh forwarded the picture onto BUFORA for further investigation, though he noted "since I was the one who investigated this particular incident, I must confirm that I was quite unable to contact the person who actually took the photograph, so positive details are almost completely absent."
In BUFORA V4/N10 (Nov 1975) Omar Fowler wrote up a short report on the "interesting photograph" that had "been the cause of much speculation." He explained:
The photographer gave only brief details of the circumstances and the camera - a Kodak Instamatic. At the time the photograph was taken, no object was visible in the sky. Did the photographer miss the object in concentrating on the group? It seemed unlikely that a disc of such a size would not be seen and this gave prominence to another question - was it a hoax ? The group of people were distinctly arranged on the right of the photograph, which could have been a safeguard if a double exposure was to be attempted on the left hand area of the scene. However, it was decided that because of the difficulties involved, some other explanation must be sought.
As there had also been a suspicion that the object was a light reflection in the lens, we sought the opinion of an optical physicist, John Adams, BSc, FRMetsS who is a consultant to BUFORA. He commented that the lack of information was frustrating and in studying the 'saucer', he noted there was a lack of shading, although the light came from the left. It was too sharp for a cloud and the emulsion showed no sign of a defect. John also agreed that to 'doctor' an instamatic slide would be a difficult task and so the mystery deepened.
Finally the slide was submitted to the RAF Farnborough for a thorough examination. This produced the following response: The Kodachrome slide exhibits a relief image of the scene. Although this is present for all of the general scene, there is no sign of any relief in the region of the oval blemish. This suggests a fault in the film emulsion rather than a processing fault. This then appears to be the solution to the mystery-or is it ?
As there had also been a suspicion that the object was a light reflection in the lens, we sought the opinion of an optical physicist, John Adams, BSc, FRMetsS who is a consultant to BUFORA. He commented that the lack of information was frustrating and in studying the 'saucer', he noted there was a lack of shading, although the light came from the left. It was too sharp for a cloud and the emulsion showed no sign of a defect. John also agreed that to 'doctor' an instamatic slide would be a difficult task and so the mystery deepened.
Finally the slide was submitted to the RAF Farnborough for a thorough examination. This produced the following response: The Kodachrome slide exhibits a relief image of the scene. Although this is present for all of the general scene, there is no sign of any relief in the region of the oval blemish. This suggests a fault in the film emulsion rather than a processing fault. This then appears to be the solution to the mystery-or is it ?
Randall Jones-Pugh followed it up in V5/N4, suggesting that perhaps it shouldn't be written off as a case of mistaken identity in view of Major Donald E Keyhoe's book Aliens from Space perhaps having some significance in confirming that UFOs, although detected and tracked by radar, can remain invisible to the human eye,
BUFORA V4/N12 had a cartoon of it:
Wednesday November 14th
Llanerch
Thirteen-year-old Brian Jones of Llanelli saw a low-flying cigar-shaped object, yellow in colour at both ends and emitting some kind of fluorescent glow, with a bright red light in the middle. The object had hovered at a distance of no more than 250 metres from the witness, directly over the supermarket in Llanelli.
Source: The Welsh Triangle, Peter Paget, 1979.
BUFORA V4/N12 had a cartoon of it:
Wednesday November 14th
Llanerch
Thirteen-year-old Brian Jones of Llanelli saw a low-flying cigar-shaped object, yellow in colour at both ends and emitting some kind of fluorescent glow, with a bright red light in the middle. The object had hovered at a distance of no more than 250 metres from the witness, directly over the supermarket in Llanelli.
Source: The Welsh Triangle, Peter Paget, 1979.
Skywatch #26 (1978) carried a fuller report:
UFO OVER WALES IN NOVEMBER 1973
Reported to us by Brian Jones, one of the witnesses. He says:
I'd like to say I became interested in UFOs when I saw a cigar-shaped object moving slowly and silently directly over the roof top of a small minimarket shop in Llanerch, Wales. At the time of the unforgettable incident, it was going dark and my friend, Stephen Paynter, then 14 years old, also witnessed the object. (He was standing/walking several yards behind me as we were both on our way to the shop which was still open.)
As I crossed the road towards the opposite pavement near the shop, I noticed the object, approx. 100 feet long. It had 3 coloured lights, one yellow light at each end and one large red light exactly in the middle. In fact the yellow lights blended in with the street lamps and road lamps, which were on at that time of the evening.
As I watched the strange object move silently across, I had a feeling as if someone was watching me from inside the Cigar UFO. I also at the same time felt a very faint feeling go through me, like electricity.
There was also a woman putting a box of goods in her car, at the front of the shop, but she did not notice the object as she had her back to it. (I thought of shouting out to her but I couldn't, due to the astonishing sight of the UFO over the rooftop.) It was not an illusion as I took my eyes off it for a few seconds to look at the woman.
When the UFO finally travelled away over Lliedi River, and moved over a group of trees, I ran over to my friend to ask him if he had seen it. He said he had seen it. The object made no sound.
CONVERSATION
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Repost of comment on original post, left by anonymous at 10:31 on 16th December 2022:
ReplyDelete"I remember sitting on the window ledge looking up and feeling powerless as I vibrated with the currency of the ship that was floating above the edge of the house. It was a golden hue it was turning as if sand and oil mixing.
I was 8 1/2 then and I remember having no control over my muscles as I slunk from the window. I went to the back door to the back fenced in yard and watched a multi-dimensional portal being come through the garage door. My hound dog ran towards the fence and I noticed that this robotic figure with bright eyes was fiddling with the lock with the one in his hand. The dog's nose and the one touched and the dog let out a howl and gave up the soul a spark flew off the dog's nose and a loud Yelp Was Heard.
I opened up the back door and started to look at the dog who's had cubes come out of its mouth and tail area.
I remembered I had my rooster in the backyard. I started out and saw blast of white light coming from where the disc was floating. I saw the fence and the light shoot through the fence and take this bot back on the ship."