Rendlesham Forest UFO case
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Was the Rendlesham Forest sighting due to a prank that got out of hand?
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ON OTHER PAGES
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In the summer of 2003 a former USAF military policeman at Woodbridge, Kevin
Conde, claimed on television and in the press that the Rendlesham Forest UFO
case was sparked by a practical joke he staged in his police car to frighten
the guard at East Gate. “It was fertile ground for a practical joke, and practical jokes are a tradition
in the security police,” Conde explained.
He made his claims in interviews with BBC TV and the Daily Mail, a newspaper ironically better known for promoting UFO sightings than
questioning them.
“I drove down the taxiway in my car. I stuck the spotlight on, after sticking red
and green lenses on it. I then drove round in circles, in the fog, with the PA
loudspeaker going, flashing my lights.
“It wasn’t a UFO, it was a 1979 Plymouth Volare [a standard-issue American police car].”
Conde returned to the US shortly after the incident and never heard about the
famous UFO case until many years later.
As Conde’s claim has been widely repeated I shall discuss it briefly here, although it
does not form part of my explanation.
Firstly, although there is no reason to doubt that Conde pulled the stunt he
describes, there is considerable doubt over when it occurred. Conde himself
cannot remember the exact date, but from his description of the circumstances,
including the weather conditions, it seems that it did not coincide with the
Rendlesham UFO sighting. Neither is it established that the guard he was trying
to scare was one of those on duty at the time of the UFO sighting.
Conde says that he drove along the Woodbridge runway, whereas the lights
reported by the security guards were in the forest. Additionally, Conde was
evidently not aware when he made his claim that the sightings stretched over
two nights and involved lights that were nowhere near the air base.
However, Conde did provide one significant clue when he noted: “It was a good stunt. Someone else could have repeated it. In fact, most good cop
practical jokes did get repeated.”
Hence, although it is unlikely that Kevin Conde’s hoax was directly responsible for the Rendlesham Forest UFO, it remains
possible that someone else repeated the stunt, this time outside the base,
which could account for some of the unusual coloured lights seen in the forest
by the guards at East Gate on the first night. But unless the real (presumed)
culprit comes forward, this must remain speculation.
Page added 2004 September 18
► Read Conde’s original statement sent to James Easton and myself in April 2001, over two years before his claim
was reported in the press.
2010 update – Conde speaks out
In 2010 November Conde left a series of public postings on the Justice for the
Bentwaters 81st Facebook page run by Jim Penniston and John Burroughs in which
he openly criticized the Rendlesham witnesses for their ever-developing
stories. Conde said: “I was almost certainly the Woodbridge patrol or the LE flight chief the night of
Halt’s expedition. All I remember was the laughing about the people seeing UFO’s. It was not treated seriously at all. It was a non-event when it happened, and
the stories of the believers are the ones that have morphed over time. If the
USAF did not make a big deal about it, it was because they were appalled that a
Light Colonel would be so nutty as to take a bunch of security troops and some
guys from disaster prep on an extended walk through the woods in a foreign
country. The higher command carefully ignored it in the hope that it and LtCol
Halt would just fade away.” For the full original exchange, including contributions by the equally
skeptical officer in charge on the night in question, Lt Skip Buran, see
here.
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