19 June
2009
Subject: Thread Re: English Channel Incident, April 29, 1957
Subject: Thread Re: English Channel Incident, April 29, 1957
| From:
Fran Ridge Sketchy but sounds fishy.
Date: Fri, 19 Jun 2009 21:11:22 +0100 From: Martin Shough <parcellular@btinternet.com> I've done a study of this one too. I have the complete Air
Ministry file containing official reports, some radarscope track
tracings (a rare bonus!) and quite a few press clippings. Intriguing,
possibly explained, but not quite. The Ministry proveably fibbed and
fudged this one to make the official explanation - 2 stray Hunter jets
on an exercise - sound more convinving than it really was Th reason was
the awkward press and parliamentary interest coming in the wake of the
RAF West Freugh incident a few weeks earlier (BTW that's another one I
have much more information on and I have a longish analysis based on
the Ministry file).
Incidemtally thewre was another radar case at Ventnor that
July which I have the file on (probable interference)
Date: Sun, 21 Jun 2009 10:41:59 -0400 From: Jan Aldrich <project1947@earthlink.net> Subject: Re: 1957 English Channel <>This is from NICAP/The Keyhoe Archives, NICAP did
write to
the Air Ministry and other officials concerning various UFO
incidents. I had a small file of such, but I have apparently
misplaced, but this is one of the items. I think this shows the virtue
of the RADCAT...sketchy information, no matter how much we dislike
vague reference do bring out new information.
Date: Sun, 21 Jun 2009 19:05:29 +0100 From: Martin Shough <parcellular@btinternet.com> Hi Jan
I assume this NICAP correspondence on UK events was via
Julian Hennessey? He did a lot and his name appears quite often in the
files. This one was never fully released, though, until recent years.
It's more intriguing than the headline story might suggest
because not only is the Hawker Hunter explanation fudged (speed about
30% faster than the top speed of a Hunter really was reported by RAF
radar, despite denials in Parliament), there was actually another
totally independent radar-visual sighting in the same south coast area
in an overlapping time frame, also involving two objects, this time
observed visually by multiple ground witnesses at Shanklin, IOW, as
"extremely bright metallic" and near stationary.
An amateur astronomer phoned RAF Ventnor at 8:00pm and
placed tham at 70degs up at 150deg (SE) at about 30,000ft. Ventnor
immediately checked with RAF radar at Beachy Head (Sussex - presumably
because the visual location was at high elevation from Ventnor and
inside the zenithal radar shadow cone). Beachy Head immediately
confirmed two contacts at 25,000ft.in the correct area. At the end of
the sighting Beachy Head radar was reporting only one object left.
Ventnor got on the phone to to the main witness who reported that he
now only had one object in sight. The match seems conclusive.
These objects were written off as probable balloons,
possibly from France, and the coincidence of two pairs of unknowns in
the same area at around the same time was put down to coincidence. This
is possible. Indeed it's possible that the IOW incident triggered the
interception incident, by way of Beachy Head reporting the pair of IOW
targets to RAF St Margarets who were the first to pick up the pair of
fast UFOs about 3/4 hour later. One can argue that St Margaret's was
thus primed to look out for pairs of UFOs and latched onto a pair of
Hunters for this reason.(except for the reported speed).
The timing and locations don't fit the theory that the same
two objects were responsible for both sightings, and the visual
observers did say that their objects resembled balloons - or at least
that the main object in 8x binoculars "appeared as a possible balloon",
with a second smaller round object appearing behind it. There was no
astronomical possibility - Venus was set in the west. But the object
got brighter and larger by a factor 2 during 75mins observation,
descending westwards down the sky to a point where it got confused with
Jupiter (which I confirm was due S at 44 deg elevation at the end of
the observation).
FYI I've attached a summary analysis in pdf. As is so often
the case, things are too complicated for a clear decision
http://www.nicap.org/reports/AnalysisR&RVSightings.pdf
Date: Sun, 21 Jun 2009 19:20:19 -0300 From: Don Ledger <dledger@ns.sympatico.ca> Hi Martin, I read your analysis of the 1957 channel event. Thanks for
posting it. I was looking for how far these targets might have
travelled during the duration of the event. The Hawker Hunter F4 only
had a 230 statute miles combat radius and that was clean. But that
wasn't uncommon for jet fighters back then. They were real fuel
guzzlers. If it was pushing it and carrying rockets even that
range would be decreased.
I see the whole thing seemed to kick off at 8:00pm local and
there is a 75 minute duration time for the sighting so the Hunter F4
was at the very end of it's fuel endurance at 75 minutes. At a cruise
speed [~75% of max.] bingo fuel was at about 30-35 minutes.
Don't know if this detail is important however for the
consideration of this having been a couple of Hunter F4s.
Date: Mon, 22 Jun 2009 11:52:58 +0100 From: Martin Shough <parcellular@btinternet.com> Hi Don
It hadn't occurred to me to think about the fuel radius but
you've got a point. 16 Hunters were supposedly in an exercise and 16
was the typical establishment for a fast-jet squadron so I'd assumed
they were all from 74 Squadron, RAF Horsham St Faith (re-equipped with
F4s just weeks earlier), which is where one of the mystery pair
reportedly returned. This is near Norwich in Norfolk (it became Norwich
International Airport in the early 'sixties) about 340 miles East of
Land's End. So a target that was lost off the radar still barrelling
westwards over the sea off Lands End seems very unlikely to be an F4
from there unless it was being repositioned to an airfield in the West
of England or Wales.
But thinking about it there's no reason why they all had to
come from 74 Squadron of course, indeed its probably more likely they
were 8-strong night flights from two different squadrons, so the second
squadron base could be anywhere. About 19 RAF squadrons flew Hunters in
1957. Maybe the Hunter that headed off West was from a base in the West?
The Hunter in question had to have been picked up by RAF St
Margaret's ROTOR radar (near Dover) in geo-ref squares NG and MG,
around the Gloucestershire area, then picked up by Ventnor heading SW
from LG into JF where it was also tracked by Hope Cove, which was a
ROTOR radar GCI site near Salcombe in Devon that controlled the
Javelins. The reports say that the "Hunter" went off the scope at Hope
Cove heading west. If Hope Cove had the relatively new Type 80 radar
the max range would have been 200 miles or more at the altitude of the
targets (44k). This would put the "Hunter" over the Atlantic more than
100 miles west of Lands End and still going balls-out. If so wherever
it came from it must have been near bingo having travelled around 300
miles from the point of first pick over the Oxford area at 44k. Where
was it going? One-way to S Ireland? Why? And there's no mention of such
an unusual factor in the documents.
On the other hand if Hope Cove still had the older Type 7 or
11 master radar (possible because max threat was considered to be the
East and SE and E coast radars got the first upgrades) then top range
might have been only about 100 miles, putting target loss not too far
west of lands End in a similar position to Ventnor's max range. A
Hunter from a West Country base might then be a possibility, and in
this case the Ventnor Track Tracing probably shows the final legs of
the track. It's confusing, but we still come back to the radar-measured
speed far in excess of a Hunter.
Date: Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:17:33 -0300 From: Don Ledger <dledger@ns.sympatico.ca> Hi Martin,
This might be a case of a Soviet Bloc fighter [Polish Warsaw
Pact perhaps] testing the waters, though I doubt that because in '57
the Soviets weren't building anything significantly faster than the
NATO countries. And again range has to be considered. Only the bombers
had the range. The F-86 had an operational range of about 800 miles
however but was still sub-sonic unless put into a dive for a limited
amount of time.
Would not the RAF or others have follwed this event through
to a logical conclusion for their own edification. After all they had a
bogey-a possible security threat, and there would be questions asked
what with Cold War nerves and all. I'd bet that there is more
documentation somehwere that shows all flights that could have been
culprits tracked to destination just to make sure it was just a damn
UFO and not something 'dangerous'.
From: Martin Shough <parcellular@btinternet.com>: There was a late newspaper article claiming that "the
object" was identified as a French Mirage, but giving no attribution.
Range would be less of an issue. But we'll probably never know more
than inferences based on fragmentary documentation. Vert frustrating.
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