The X Factor 10

8/14/2019 The X Factor 10

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t was ike looking in amirror. They rvere both 1.8metres tall, and had the

- sameweight, build andfacial features. It is what yourr'ould expect of identical twins.Bu t th e similaritieswent muchfr.u-ther han that forJim Lewis andJim Springer.Apart from their olvn sharedname, both of th e Ji m Twins' ha dmarried women called Linda, onlyto divorce them and both marry\\'omen called Betty. Subsequentresearchuncorrered ountlessother remarkable similaritiesbefir,een he nvin brothers.

But one mystery remained. \{rhvdid they haveso much in common.when - since hey were born 39yearsago - they had lived

completelv ridependent ives,having been separated t birth?

Tl-re irrksbenr'een denticalnvins bror,rghtup together areoften cause or mild amazement,brrt a lelv chal lengeour viewsonlife. Orie misht reasonably askwhynlo indir-iduals, born at the sametime. and shar ing he samegenet icmaterial, should not also have thesanre ersonal i ty rai ts n common.It seems hat when identical twinsare separatedsoon after birth andmeet,vears ater to find thev haveled strikingly similar lives, theimplications are not onlyintriguing but also potentiallyrevolutionary.

Such casesof separated twinsare very rare, especiallyasadoption practiceshave improved

A Reseorch nlo twins hos implicotionsfor medicol knowledge. The resultsoJstudies qt 5t Thomos' Hospitol in .,London (inset)moy help to preventdiseqsessuch os osleoporosis,diobetes ond heort conditions.

over the years.Only 68are known worldwide.

ln Br i ta in n 1979. wo otherident ical winswho had beenseparated t bir th were beingreuni ted af ter 34 yearsapart .\{4ren they met researcherDr TomBouchard of the Universiw of , ri:.i,Minnesota. USA. Bridget Harrisonof Leicesteran d Dorothy Lowe of


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Burnley, Lancashire, both woreseven ings, had two braceletsonone wrist and a watch and a,bracelet on the other.' They soon found out that they,had both stopped taking piano.lessonsat the same age, both had alcat called Tiger and while one ofitheir sons was named RichardAndrew, the other was namedAndrew Richard.

Strangest of all, in 1960,Dorothy and Bridget had bothkept a diary. They had both chosenexactly the same brand and colourof diary and had even left the samedays blank during the year.

Today, scientists around theworld are studying identical twins,not only in an effort to understand

what makes them so

similar in behaviour andappearance, but also to cast ighton the forces that shape all humanbeings and the powers that we mayall be prir,y to.TWI N F EAR.SDown through the ages,and acrosscultures, the 'strangeness'of twinshas caused people to fear them.Some native American tribes killedtwins at birth, a course of actionalso followed by lnuits inGreenland and aboriginals inJapan and Australia. Sometimesthe mother was also killed, or atleastsubjected to a purificat ionritual, since it was believed shemust have had sex with two menfor two children to be conceived.

Attitudes towards trr-insandtheir parents have moved onconsiderably since this time, butour understanding of their specialpowersremains ncomplete.

The most influential study oftwins in modern times is beingconducted by Dr Tom Bouchard.Since 1979,Bouchard hasinterviewed and tested hundredsof identical twins in one of thelargest research programmes ofits kind.

Bouchard's testsusually take aweek to complete and involvepersonality assessments ndmedical examinations. Bloodsamplesare compared, fingerprintstaken, allergies evaluated,even{ Twins Andrew ond SlevenRofheryboth developed he some rqre medicolcomploint. Doctorssoy there is nogeneficreqson why fhe l8-yeor-oldsshould hove been offected onddescribe t qs q million o onechonce.


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sametime, 650 kilometres a\4iayin California. i:::'.:''

Martha Burke of Californiaas f she had been cut in two' ,dayin 1977,asaburningtore acrossher chest andabdomen.Hours later ,shediscovered that her twin sisterdied in an aeroplane collision-,halfiatav cross he world.

Even more horrific is the casefour-mon h-old iden ical nvinsSamantha and Gabrielle Connolly.On 8 October 1983, their mother'

intimate sexual histories compiled.At the end of over 50 hours oftesqng, Bouchard's team will knownearly everything there is to knowabout the twins, from their tastesin food, literature and music to theway they walk, talk and sleep.

Bouchard's work may suggestthat a person's character is shapedmore by genetic factors than socialones,bu t it seems here is anotherfactor involved.EMBRYONIC SPTITThe work of RichardJ. Rose,Professor of PsychologyandMedical Genetics at IndianaUniversity,USA, has shown thatthe degree to which identical twinsare actually identical is linked tohow early the embryo in the wombsplits nto two. Rose ound that theearlier an embryo splits, the lessalike in personality identical twinswill tend to be in the future. Thisconclusion suggests hat

environmental factors will have arole to play in forming personalityand shaping what happens to us.

Despite the wealth ofinformation from this study andothers, the phenomena associatedwith identical twins are still notfully understood. For example, whydo such similar things happen toseparatedtwins at the same time?

InJuly 1975,Nita Hurstsuddenly felt an agonizing pain inher left leg and witnessed bruisesspreading spontaneously up theleft side of her body. The mysteryaffliction became clear when shelater discovered that her twinsister.Nettie Porter, had beeninvolved in a car crash at the very

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Somewhere in the .',lireg:on of I O to 15 percent of us qre wolking:',,i:oround thinking we cilii:jisingletons when in,fuwe/re only the big

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Linda discovered that both had ' : '' :suffered cot deaths despite beingasleep n dif ferent beds ondifferent floors of the house. , :,-,,,

,: .11.1,,.i.,:::These'psychic' connections-.,::between twins are proof to so*ii!.people that all human beings sharthe abiliry to develop and useextra-sensory erception (ESP).

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to each other, they did no betterthan ordinary brothers and sisters.But when the twins chose theirown images, hey scored higherthan non-rwinsibl ings.IN THE STARSEven more radical is the view thatour fates rest with the position ofthe stars on the day we are areborn. Dr SuzelFuzeau-Braesch,director of the National Centre forScientific Researchat Orsa\,', earParis, has surveyed the astrologicalbirth charts of twins. Since thel' areusually born within minutes ofeach otheq twins will have verysimilar birth charts.

Two short character.descriptions, summarizing thesesmall astrological differencesbetweeneach set of rwins,weresent to their parents, who had tochoosewhich description bestfitted which twin. Chance woulddictate an equal number of right

and wrong responses. ut, out of21 8 parents, 153 matched thedescriptions to the right fivir-rwell over the 109 expected o getit right. Despite he similarin'ofthe charts,parents vereable tomatch th e fine differences o eachof their nr-ins.

\\het1-rer or lroi astrologv provesan insight into tl-re haracters nddestiniesof nlins is a side ssu eofresearch n t].ris rea.Scientistsgenerallr' emain perplexed byeven he biological similaritiesbeh\:een hr,ir-rs.or example, it isknor'r'n hat twins are more likelyto have symmetrical teeth and beleft-handed than singletons. But itis not known why this should beor what it means.

Every day, though, technologicaladvancesare helping the scientistscome closer to an understandingof the complex area of twins.AJready.hanks o rhe increasinguseof ul l rasound o moni lor

A one-yearstudy on rwinsand ESPat Bristol University n the early'1990s,however.provided noconclusive esultsbeyonddemonstrating hat rwins had aremarkableabi l i ry o th ink al ike.When the researchers rovidedthe s).,rnbolsor twins to 'transmi('

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l f.Iembrvos, it is knorvn that twi nningis far more commor ) than rvaspr-eviousl,v hotrght. At least one incieht L, f a l l nal l l l : r l p lcqrrarrcicsbegin as trvins, even though onlvabout one-tenth of these actr-rall yrnake it t lrrotrgh to birth

Because there is considerableelidence thirt one fir ' in ca n sufferintcnsc sui l t rr 'hen the other twindies. this thlorr's a u'hole new li ghtol] the sense of loss sorne singlepeople feel t l-rrougl'ror-rtheir l ives,as i f pz,rrt f them is not there.

Plofessor Charles E. Boklage, aclerelopr.nent biologist at the EastC.nr-o l in irUniversity School of\ Iecl ic ine, USA, conservat ively33

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estimates hat around 10 to 15 pe rcent of people may have had atrr'in that died in the womb.

Ir r a smzrll roporti on of cases,iclenticalnvins do no t completelvseparate n the rvomb.Th e mostf:unousconjoinecl,or 'Siamese',nr'ins vere Chang and Eng Bunker,rrho toured rvith Barnum an d

.1RreWe qre reollyone PersoJl...we knowexoctly whqf eqch otheris th inking.becouseweore iust one lwin/ : .^+^ ^- l F,^J^ .L^Dl in, Twins! r ,

Bailey'scircus n the USA in th e1800s. hel ' l 'ere born in 1811 nThailand, then calleclSiam.

Today, conjoined tu'ins ikeChang and Eng. rvho u'ere.joinedat the chestbv a thick band oft issne, ould be separated ysurgery. But evelr thor-rgh he twinsspentall of their 63 r'ears ogether,they'both married ar-rclatherecl 21children between hem. Thel rvereluckr,', ince fen' conjoined nviussrrrvi r belond ir t far tcr ' .ctocK oF rrFEProfessorLuigi Gedda's clock oflife' theory is one of the f'errscientific attempts made to explainthe nvin phenomenon. Gedda,of

{ BridgerHqrr isonqndDorothy Lowe didnot know theywere twins unfilthey met, oged34. Bolh goveeoch other reddybeors ot theirreunion ond hqvesince given eochother identicolbirfhdoy presenls.

15.000 airsof tn rrsbetween195:and 1978 and came to thecorrclusiorr hat errcodedwithin us

the Gregor Menclel Institute ttt ...,Rome, Italr', studied more than .:-*

al l is a genetic blueprint for our ' .lives - the so-called 'clock of life'. .: ,Gedda found that this is especiallytrue for twins, and may account forthe many uncanny similaritiesbetween hem in their lives. lA DESIGN FOR I IFEBut, despite the ach'ancesmade,.:urr rarel l i r rghe seclets f ourgenes. Gectda's heories remainhighl,v controlersial. \\hile it mdyieasilvexplain u'h1'theJim Twinsboth suffered heart attacks andhaemorrhoids - evenwh y they areboth healy smokers- it is not soclear why they should marry ' , -\vomen with the same name orchoose a hol idal a l the samebeach in Flor ida.

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srrch as (he name given lo a pel or ' -a hol idal dcst inat ion be part oIan 'i r rd iv idual 's l r repr intof l i fe?Fornow t'wins remain a conundrum ,lfor rvhich scientistscontinueto search ol arrarrswer.

Might thcre be a force with in " 1" . 'each of us lhat d ictates everylh ingl iom the pc,ple rrhor

r oto hemomerrhat- : ; ; ' : i l i t ;Corr ldseemirrgl l arrdomchoices :J. , : '

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COMPI.]TE,RSOnr SIMPIE RRoRAN cAUsECOMPUTERS O TURN FROAA AAN'SBESTFRIENDTO WORSTENEMY. SOUR INCREASING EPENDENCENCOMPUTER ECHNOTOGY ISCUIOTO?

looming. he instructs he on-boardstrategicsystem o send a warning: " i r . l -" ^ *"'b'-rlll l signal,expecting a positive eplylgnar, expecung a poslt lvewithin a couple of seconds.

Unfortunat.ly, a programm ngglitch ha s remained buried withinthe F-22's omputer system. heforeign plane has responded

I$#$*Flll+;,".r plane is on patrol. A foreigncraft comes nto view and the pilotof the F-22needs o verifywho itis . As the clock ticks round tomidnight, the new millennium

immediately, but the computerdoes not recognize this and isalreadyarming the weaponssystems. he Year 2000 s abour robegin with a bizarre and horrif icinternat ional ncident .MITI.ENNIUM BUGIncredible though il may seem.this is not a storyJine from aLlollywood disaster movie - it is acatastrophewaiting to happen.With the millennium fastapproaching. he world is facingan enormous - and potentiallydisastrous technologicalproblem. Dubbed the'Mil lenniumBug' (or 'Bomb') , this problem

concerns the inability of computerprograms that work on a six-digitdate system i.e. 01-01-97) orecognize the change in century.

Unless corrected by the timethe year 2000 comes around, manycomputer programs will record theyear as 00' - the star t of the 20thcentury, instead of the 21st. Theresult could be that over 80 percent of computers around theworld go ha;nvireor close downautomatically. At worst, theMil lenium Bug could t r iggeranunintended missile aunch, as nthe scenario above.

The strong possibility ofsuch an incidentoccurr inswas made clear inDecember 1995when amessage, riginating fromthe office of the USSecretary of De fense,waspublished on the Internet.It warned the US Na\y toensure that all relevantpersonnel knew about theYear 2000 problem and that'corrective actions, f notcurrently under way, shouldstart now.'

It is not us t the USmilitary that is worried.Businesses nd governments

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arolrnd the rvorld have set upproject teams o tackl e theproblem. \ ' i th computersused nvirtually e\reryaspect of modernlife - in manufacturing, banks,hospi tals swel l as he serviceindustr ies the overal lef fecro[the Mil lennium Bug could becataclysmic.

I t hasheen esl imaled hat tofix it could cost more than f400bi l l ion. whi le doing nolhing could.according to Simon Reeve,co-aulhorol rhe Mi l lenniumBnmb,'destroyentire economies'.Worsestill, it could put the lives ofmillions of people at r isk.

The Millennium Bug hasbecome a programming e rrordue to the march of time. In th e1950san d 1960s,when fe w peopleforesawthe massive nfluence thatcomputer technologt' r'vouldhaveon our lives, computers werehulking monsters that ran slowly,performed few tasksand hadlimited memory space. Shorteningthe year by two digits freed upexpensive space,and became

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standard practice by rhe1970s.Bu t this is not th eonly area whereprogramming errors havecome to lisht.

The rapid developmentof technology has shrunkthe size of computerswhile at the same timeincreasing theircomputing power by aphenomenal factor. Acomparison wasmade byAlex Trotman, head ofFord Motors worldwidein March 1996: If ca rdesign had developed asfast as computers, aFord would be aneighth of an inch

long, and go 3,000;:,.nt*...miles an hour

on a teaspoonful of petrol.'At such a rate of development

it is hardly surprising that errorshave occurred - and are stillbeing made. In particularj manyexperts eel that programmingstandards for software - theinstructions which enablecomputers to do different taskshave not kept pace with theengineering standards orhardware - the physical structureof the computer itself.LETHAI ERRORS

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difficulties. The ambulance tooktwo and three quarter hours toarrive at the Swan's home. Theirdaughter died on route to hospital- something that probably wouldnot have happened ifa back-upsystemor the old manual meansof dispatching ambulances hadstill been in place when they hadmade their emergency call.

Where engineers can see hereare potential dan'gersahead inIetting computers take over, thesvstemsdeveloped are oftentermed 'safetycritical'. Forexample, transport is one sucharea where safety s a priority. Inthe thousands of aeroplanes thatdailv fly around the world,comDutershave become essential33 ri,

The problem withcontrol softwqre isthot people write itSteveCollins,Sofety-crificolystems xpert

components. All use software withsafety-criticalprogramming, whereat least one back up system andsometimes smany assix - arerrsed o double-check perat ions.

such systemsare vital in aircraft,such as the Airbus 4320, 330 and340, and Boeing 777 which are'flr'by wire'. This means that whenthe pilot moves one of the flightcontrols, the computer calculates

how much various parts of theplane have to be adjusted to makethe right manoeuvre.

Still, despite vearsof testing anduse. there have been at least fir'emajor accidents nvolving planesrvhose fly-by-wire systems havegone wrong. In fact, 1996 was oneof the worst yearson record foraircrashes, nvolving the lossofhundreds of lives. Some of thedisasterswere due to on-boardcomputer systemsbreaking down.

Concern is running high amongexperts. Mike Hennell is technicald ector oI softr,vare-testigcompany Liverpool Data ResearchAssociates.' I 'mparticularly

A Theofficiol explonolion for theEurotunnelire in November1995 wosorson. Bul some experls cre concernedthot the funnel'scompulerizedsofetysyslemmoy hove olso beenot fqult.concerned that some planes havefour engines being controlled byident icalsofhvare, ' ennel l pointsout. 'This is madness. here needto be different approachesdilferen computer chips. differentprogramming languages nd so on- so rhat i f one system -ails heydon'r a l l fa i l . 'tOW STANDARDSHennell's commen ts underlinewhat SteveCol l ins managingdirector of Real Time Associates,a company inVolved n developing'safety-criticalsystems has known ,'for some ime: that standards ndworking pract icesn this crucialarea of computing can be woet-ullyinadequate.' ncreasingly. offtvareis the weak ink in the f inalproduct. ' Col l ins says.

However,Hennell. wh o oncewent to court to try to stop heAirbus A320 from taking offbecauseof his concerns about itscomputer programming, s nowmore worr ied about the impact of

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{ { l* .'We don't reolly

) lnodequotecomputer controlswere o moiorfoctor in theChernobyl disosteron 27 April 1986.Public concernoboul fhe sofety ofSizewell B (insef)eventuolly forcedNucleor ElecfricUKto moke chongesio lhe sofeiy-conhol softwore.some nuclear installations.

A particular focus of concernin the UK has been the SizewellBnuclear power plant in Suffolk. In1993, the software responsible forshutting down SizewellB in theevent of an emergency wasrunthrough over 50,000 tests. t failedmore than half of them. TheNuclear Installations Inspectorate(NII) said this was entirely due tofaults in the testing equipment,but compounded general fears byrefusing to release results of earliertestsor asking for a re-test.

That there were problems withthe Sizewell B software is hardlysurprising, considering that it ismade up of well over 100,000 inesof code. 'Any piece of softwarelonger than 20,000 ines is toocomplex to be tested exhaustively,'saysBrian Winchmann, an experton safety-critical software from theUK's National Physical Laboratory.

AJl the while, t hough,computers and their programmesare becoming more complex, and,therefore, lesseasy o test.At thesame time, the accident rate due

to technologv failure contrnues torise. The onlv ansrver,accordingto Ste\,eCollins is for softwarewriters to improve the quality oftheir work. 'Until writing softwarefor control s)istems ecomes aproper science, ather than aquick way of making money, thenwe are all at risk,' Col lins warns.ATARMING INCREASEIn fact, a number of expertsbelieve that computer bugs arevirtually ever).rvhere. n 1995,Programming Research,a safety-crtitical systems ompany, ranchecks on millions of lines ofcode for governments andorganizations across he globe.They discovered that even safety-critical software contained, onaverage,one glitch in every 55l ines.The companyest imatesthat roughly ten per cent of theseerrors will lead to 'catastrophicfailures'. With technologybecoming increasingly complex,and eve r more dependent oncomputers, he margin of E::lerror s ikely o expand. ff i

underslond whqt we'redoing, so i t 's impossib lefor onyone to soywhqt is sofe'Mike Hennel l ,

Director f SofiworeTesting ompony-=---,

goeswrong here, the death tolllrom the worst air crasheswouldpale nto ins ign i f icance as rheIong-term victimsof Chernobyl

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nersunr.rymorning in the 1960s, ocal'hunter.l Nicolas Mondongo .wasstandingon the bank of the Likouala-

w au;-Herbes River, amid the vastswamplandsof the People's Republic of theCongo, when he experienced a very closeencounter o[ the cryptozciologicalkind.Suddenly, o his astonishment, small headborne upon a long slenderneck broke th ewater surface ik e a living periscope.

Mondongo stood petrif,ed as.a massivecreature emerged, evealingan enormous,sturdy body with srriooth, reddleh-brownskin, four bulky legs, and aivery lengthy,powerful ta i l . This extraordinary animal,approximatelynine metres ong, remainedin view for at least three mi nutes beforesubmerging out of sight igain. ' ,If science confirmg the existence of thisaniriral - known locll ly as the mokele-mbembe - it may well be one of the"great-est zoological d iscover ies of al l t ime.

Although its description does yrotrecall any known living creature. itcorr,esponds precisely with ttrat of arnedium-sized sauropotl dinosaur!HIDDEN tIFELiterally translated as the study of hiddenIife', cryptozoology is specificallydefinedas he investigationof unidentifie d animalsthal are apparent ly wel l known to theirIocal human neighbours,but which haveyet to be discovered nd formally describedby scientists.

Few people doubt that many species oftiny insect or other i nconspicuousanimals.may still await discovery, but some mightconsider t unlikely hat, n the 20rhcenlury,

"'therecould alsobe large.spectacularanimalsremaining undetected. One notablecryptirzOological iceptic was palaeontdlogistGeorge Gaylord Simpson, who claimed:'The many new'animals being discovered

A The swomplqnds ofthe Congo ore iust thesort of ploce thot newonimols, unknown loscience,moy be found.For over 2OOyeori ohunlers, missionoriesond explorers in theregion hove reporledseeing o beosl knownlocolly os themokele-mbembe.A Joponese film creweven purported tohove filmed it (inset,mognified).

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nowadays are rarely very novel... it issigni f icant hat the dates or increasinglynovel discoveries end to recede in time.'

Yet thip,issimply not true. As Karl Shukerrevealed n his book The Lost rk: NewandRpriisrouerednimals oJ he 20th Ccniurl'. animpressive ist of dramatic creatures hithertounknown to science has been steadi lyunfolding throughout rhe 1900s.

These include the okapi . Zaire 's short-necked orest giraf fe, discovered n l90l :mountain gorilla (1902); komodo dragon,the world's laigest izard (1912);coelacanth,a large lobe-finned fish believed'to havebeen ext inct for mi l l ions of years 1938):Flecker's ea-wasp1955) megamouthshark(1976);giant, tube-dwelling,sea-wormswithhuge,scarlet tentacles (1977); Queen ofSheba's azel le 1985);VuQuangox ( 1992):bondegezou,a tree kangaroo (1994); plusmany'new'whales. olphinsand porpoises.

An d these are just a handful of thiscentury's freshly-found anirlals. Clearly,therefore, there are plenty ofprecedents foruncovering major new species oday.MYTHS AND MISTAKESSome mystery beastsare evidntly imaginary,fantastic animals - just like fire-breathingdragons. Certain others are hoaxes,*ormisidentified known species like th.rnermaid-like ri of New Ireland, near New

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Guinea, shown in 1985 to be the dugong -,a familiar sea-co\\. ut lhere are alsosevera{hundred t1'pesof m1'sterious, nidentifiedbeastsepolred from around the world. thatmay ndeedbe ralid new species t illeludingscient i f ic etecr ion.Thesecan be groDpedinto lour categor ies.

The first of these are prehistoric survivors.Karl Shuker's book In Searchof PrehistoricSuru.iaors s devoted to this category -mystery bdasts (including the mokele-mbembe) that may be undiscovered livingrelativesof creaturesbelieved to have diedout in prehistoric times.

Take, for instance, the Loch Nessmonster, reported by eyewitnessesor many

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*t: it:::tliE;ttf] i-'-dltls:t_l!:

#L*'*.H.*}*+.+,f;e,*=**:5_T-r!;;*:'"'*'*centuries. Their descriptions,

coupled with sonar and underwaterphotographicevidence. uggesl "hatts st i l lunidentified species s up to 9 metres long,with a very slenderneck and smal l head.aburly body, two pairs of diamond-sMpedflippers, and a long tail. This description isremarkably imi lar o that of a plesiosaura large aquatic reptile that officially becameextinct around 64 million years ago.

Plesiosaur-like eastshavebeen reportedfrom olher freshwater akes around theworlcl too. and als o from many oceanicexpanses.where they comprise the ' longneck' categoryof seaserpenl.

A very different kind of aqu4ticprehistoric survivor s rypif ieclby the migo.a serpent inewatermonster nhabit ingLakeDakaraua n New Br i ta in and f i lmed by aJapanese elevision rew in January 1994.' ; "s t t re-

. There is more sworn :evidence for the seo-serpenl'sexisfence thqn q court of low. wou'ld,,need to prove onyoidinory coseDr Berncird euvelmons,oologistn{

The fi lm shows a very elongated beastmeasur ing about I I metres. undulat ingvert ical ly s t swims cross he lake.This ishighll significanl . ecadse he only creaturesof compaiable size hat could move..like hisrverea group o f s pecializ& whales knownaszeuglodonts. h ich supposedly ied outaround 25 mi l l ion yearsago.

Severaleminent anthropolbgists, such asProfessor Grover Krantz from WashingtonState Universiq', believe that the tall, hairyman-beastseported l rom North America(the Big Foot or sasquatch) and theHimalayas (the yeti) are shy modern-daydesc'endants f a giant $sian primate calledGigantopithecus, which rhysteriouslybcameext inct about 300.000 earsago.

In the early 1990s,explorer Ivan Mackerleled an expedition to the Gobi iri search ofone suchcreature the al lergorhaihorhai .of Mongolian death worm. Allegedlyresemblinga fat. dark red wormomeasuringup ro l . l met.es tong. * i$r poi , - r r . iproject ionsat both ends of i ts body. thedeath worm spends much o[ the vearhidden in the desertsands,but occasionalh'fests upon the surface.KILTER WORMThe N{ongolian death worm is greatlyfeared by the region's nomads, because tcan squir t a corrosivepoisor{ .and can ki l lhrrmansand livestock ia a strangeprocessresembling electrocution. Therecent Gobi expedition failedto unearth the death worm.

Peruvian zoologistDr PeterHocking scurrent lypursuingtwo mysdq/ing types of bigcat, one of them striped andthe other marked wirh f inegrey speckles. reputedlylurking in Peru's remoteriinforests. Neither the catsnor their skul ls matchesan)recognizedspecies.

'' The. iatzelworm has beenreported for centuries fromthe AIps of central Europe, butsciencehas st i l l to examine aspecimen.Eyewitnessesiken

f There hove beenhundreds ofsighrings of rhecreoture known osBig.Foot. n 1967,film wos foken ofthe beost of BluffCreek, olifornio.Sceplics nsisi tholthe so-colleddpemon is reclly omqn dressed inonimol skins.EP

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the creature to a one-metreJong serpentinelizard with two small front less.Freakish mystery ir"utt. -oy well benothing more than abnormal ndir idualsofknown species. Th e enigmatic.h{orpedjackals of Sri Lanka seem to be normaljackals that fbr some undefined reasonbeara small horn at the back of their head."-',EQuallll Fu-jian's elusive blue tigers are,probably just an unLrsualgenetically-based

colour var ietv f the- rdir rary iger.Such mvsterv beastsare known species

erlcountered outside their normaldistr ibrr t ionarrsc. rsrral l \ompr is ing xol icanimals that har,e escaped from captivity.## .u

The vyorld's greof deserfsqnd neqr- l imi t less oceqnsqre the qreqs wherespectoculqr new speciescould sfi l l be conceoledDr KorlShuker, ryptozoologist

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This wo.uld seem to be the explanation for-krequeff i reporfs ol 'big cars ' resembl ingpumas or black panthers stalkins th ecourr tryside i n Br i tai r r . cont inerr tal Europe.and Austral ia.HIDING FROM SCIENCEEven if we assume hat many of the mvsterl'animals on f i le real ly are urrdiscorcredspecies,ho w can we explain the secr-et ftheirluccess n eluding scientificscmtinv forso long?

There are still unexplored regions of ourworld and it is from theseareas hat reportsof unfamiliar beastshaveemerged. A primeexample is Vietnam - for so ong a war zonewhose rnountain forests rvere off-limits toscient ists. These Areas are now beingintenseh'explored and, during the 1990s,have eiealeda rer i tableslampede f largi . .ne\ \ ' narr)mals.nclr rding he Vu Quarrgox.the hoi-vgoat, and severalhighly novel deer.

The dense ainforestsof New Guinea andthe Mato Grosso, the Congo's fbrbiddingswamplands, the battle-torn coul]tries ofCambodia and Rwanda, the drug-traffickers'jungle strongholds iu Colombia, as rvell asthe world's largest akesand vastoceans,arethe areas where explorers mav f i r rd &-*lasci r rat ing l le\v crea[ures. il E


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CONTRACT

NEW EVIDENCEN THEDEATHOF WPC YVONruTFlrrcnrR uecEsrsTHAT HERKIttER WASnruMl6 oR CIAAgsAsstN. nvtoGuvarrRE-EXAMINES HECASE

embassy - the Libl'an People's Bureau.And later, intelligence sources revealedthat they had intercepted a mes-sage rom Gaddafi 24 hours priorto the shooting, authorizing offi-cials inside the Bureau to openfire on the demonstrators. Publicoutrage ensured he exprr ls ion fLibyan diplomats iom Br i ta in.

Eighteen months later . on 5April 1985, th e 'L a Belle' dis-cotheque in West Berlin wasrazedb1z terrorist bomb. One US ser-viceman and a ) oung Turkishwoman were killed outright, and?30 people injured. PresidentRonald Reagan claimed to have

o:i:.txT:#i,:i::.i-li:T;\ , ---.V normally serene StJames'sSquare nx London. The ll-rouncl burst, from aSterline automatic assaultweapon, felled anr*b.*. of Libyan demonstrators protest-tng against their leader, Mu'ammarGaddafi, outside the Libl'an embassy'Killed outright was \4bman Police

, Constable (\ ?C) Yvonne Fletcher.I shell-casingson the first floor of the


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TTTBITBMODnATIIMargaretThatcher.Ref lect ing the cont inue-,publ ic host i l i ty againstLibyans. hatcher orderedlarrnchof F- l l l bombers roma US Air Force base in Eastfurgl ia. Asleep in a Bedouin

Gate barracks as the bombersslr l lck. Gaddafi escapedtent inside Tr ipol i 's Golden

injr r r r .His nr 'osons. owever. :rvere badlr r'r 'ounded, an do:5o

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h s I 5-nron h-old adopreddaughter vas i l led. ;DYNAMITE DOCUMENTS .:+

r r l i r ius. .Urhoughhe rras i r ing in Austral iaat thc t ime, Vial ls had heen residenr nBritain rvhen Fletcher \\iasmurd.ered,work-. liirrg for the Hughes Tool Company - an ,organization that often fronted for CIA ',orgarlzauon tnat olten lronteo tor LIA .personnel. During his research, Vial ls , 'r :.:

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In 1992.Br i t ishaurhor and researcherJoe 'Vial ls was rummaging around in his oldf i les ooking for mater ia l or a book he was


20/31

t were dynamite ' .Theythe existence of what

to be an 'ultra low-Tool Company

at 8 St James'sSquare.t to the Libyans,Bureau.

t rue conspiracy heor ist ,began to wonder if there

a link between the secret,possibly ClA-operated. officeand the death of Fletcher.

. Scrutini zing a BBC film takenI t- T--. . ' in StJames'sSquareat the time of the mur-der, Vialls theorized that the fatal shot had

from the Hughes bui ld ing. He washe possessedamning evidenceof

r Br i t ish-US ntel l igence onspiracy o ki l lFletcher, but, in every respect exceptIfialls' was wrong. However, his beliefBr i t ish and US intel l igence were

Fletcher's murder is now borne outvidence.

R.EOPENING THE CASEVialls had sent a letter to Cha nnel Four! - i r ' . , . - ' -:;::r:: Television in London, who considered thei^ f^--^ t i^- ^^-. ; -^ ; -- --^ , ,^h t^ ran, , i -ainformation convincingenough to requiredetai led invest igat ion. Execut ives at

Four contacted Fulcrumtions, a highly regarded documen-

company, who set about a com-sive invest igar ion. The alarming. 'of their meticulousesearch ere

in the Channel Four Television

inquest. Knapman refused tl.re ilm makersaccess o the autopsy findings. despite therequest being routed through X'onneFletcher's mother. Receirirrg advice fromProfessor Bernard Kri eht. a leadingBrit ish consultantpathologist,Fulcrum re-submit ted their reqrrr . l - not ing i t con-formed to requirements of the Coroner'sAct - and the report u'asdtrlr. eleased.AUTOPSY CONFIRMATIONImmediateh'. a nnmber o f incon sistencieswere evident. Foremost was the originalf indings of the pathologist, Dr Ian West,who rvrote in his autopsy report: 'Theangle of the builet wound track indicatesthat [\{?C Fletcher] was shot in the backby a person situated at a considerablyhigher 1er,e1...he track would indicatethat she had been shot from the upperfloors of an adj acent building [to theLibyan People'sBureaul .'

Dr West noted that the bullet's entrytrack was at an angle of 60"-70". Duringlater evidence given at the inquest, Westchanged his mind. Now he agreed rvithpolice investigators that the bullet hadcome from the first floor of the Libvan

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programme Dispalrhesn April 1996.Fulcrum first attempted to compare

Fletcher's original autopsy with the officialinquest report, and contacted coroner

ul Knapman, who presided over the

A The corner of5t Jomes3 Squoreoutside rhe Libyonembossy (inset,building on left)oppeored ro ployhosf to o Libyoncivi l wor in 1984.New evidence,though, suggests hotfhe 'profesterg' werepoid by the ClA.


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People's Bureau - signifying an entrywound of only 15'. This unusual revisionwas o prove vital.

Fulcrum then had a number of expertsexamine the evidence in the nvo reports,including Hugh Thomas, a former ChiefConsultant to the British Armv inNorthern Ireland - and an acknol'ledgedexpert on gunshot wounds. Thomas statedthat Dr West's estimony at the inqi.rest vas'rubbish', concluding that the updated sce-nario West painted for the coroner was'impossible'. Backtracking over the post-rnortem report, Thomas was conrincedthat the bullet that struck \APC Fletchermust have come from the upper floors ofan adjacent building. Totalling five floors,the Libyan building simply did not have ahigh enough elevation for the fatal shot.TUMBTING BUITETForensic examination also showed the bul-let 's energy was depleted and the roundwas 'tumbling' as it hit the police officer.The tumbling effect and the 'terminalvelocitv' (the velocity of the bullet as itstrikes its target) are consistent with theuse of silencers. Significantly, these effects

are even more pronounced following theremor,al of part of the bullet's propellant,slorving ts speed and, equally importantly,creating a less audible discharge. The lat-ter is a knorvn technique of British SASsnipers. Th e damage caused by a bulletdoctored in this rr'av s horrific. The tum-bling bullet tears throush the bodr,, rip-ping tissueand vital organs bevond repai r.\{lhoer,er shot \\'onr-reFletcher rras arvare twas a de ath shot in everv sense.

The automatic rveapon used inside th eLibvan Bureau - a 9 mm Sterling sub-machine gun - was not silenced. The sharpsounds of its 11 rapid-fire rounds being dis-charged were caught on BBC videotapeand analysed by an audio expert for theDispatchesdocumentary. An additional

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_9o.s )s oroved rhqt 12shofs hod beenfired in st Jomes3r':-Squore, nol I I, ,. .

V Theof Fletcherbeing hi t

os rhe officiolconcluded.ouiopsy(inset) olsohow thewos fired -; "-] j lpositionhigher hcn ,thot discussed in theofficiol inquiry.

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22/31

was also analvsed. It oroved to belmportanl . laKen Dy an amateur.

t the sound of a'duller ' gun-ds after the Libyan gunman

The evidence was rrefutablebullet had been fired.

team next learned thatand US Intel l igencewere running a

rveillanceposl on the upper floors:James'sSquare.nvo doors away romLibyan People'sBureau. Tom Peile, aer security off icer at number 3,

:aled that as many as 40 intel l igencewere active at lhe surveil lance post

weekspr ior to the shoot ing.illance techniques included read-

ne and telex traffic, the use ofmicrophones o pick up con-

and, where possible, physicallyibugs' inside the Bureau itself. InMI6, MI5, CIA and the Special

had human 'sources within thewho were providing regular

r. Signi f icant ly. MI5 knew thea. cache of guns sealed in a

on the f i rst f loor of the Bureau.were al l 9 mm cal ibreweapons lhe'alibrebullet that killed Fletcher.

TETTIGENCE PRESENCEand knowledgeable source

The X Factor that the fatal shot:rainly came from 3 St James's- location of the secret MIS,/CIAlc e post. Th e operation was engi-

areate public outrage that wouldned the existing 'soft' view of

by the Ltr l t rshgovernment.

A A memoriol stonein 5t Jomes's Squoremorks the spol otwhich Yvonne Fletcherfell. As she loy dying,her fionce, ConstobleMichoel tiddell,crodled her in hisorms. She died 9Ominufes loter inhospirol. lronicolly,the slight 25-yeor-oldWPC hqd been fooshort to loin thepolice, but hod beengiven specioldispensotion becouseof her drive ondenthusiosm.

The XFactor was also told that the archi-tects of the plan \{ere concerned thatdeaths of Libyan protesters by Gaddafi'sown assassinwould not be enough to out-rage the British public. Consequently, anadditional target was chosen that rvascer-tain to inflame public opinion. YvonneFletcher was the sacrificial lamb.

By 1984,Reagan-administration nsidersbelieved victory in the forthcoming elec-tions relied on the downfall of Gaddafi.However, US officials found no appetite onthe part of their NATO allies to sr.rpportUSmili tarv action against Libra. \\- i th thekil l ing of Fletcher. he British attitudes toLibva hardened. and the governmentallorved US bombers to flr' from Britishbases an option previouslvunthinkable.SHOOT TO KItL POLICYIn a House of Cornmons debate n the sum-mer of 1996, the British government dis-missed the nerr' facts disclosed about theFletcher shooting. \\'hy? It would appearthat thev do not nish to address he unpalat-able fact that elements within Britain's ownsecuritv serrices are out of control.

Four vears after Fletcher's death,another atrocity was to occur which againinvolved Libya, Britain and the US -th e bombing of Pan Am flight 103over Lockerbie, Scotland. This case also;t*i,rut*ffilitT"i'$In the next isszz, INSIDE STORY n uesligates heCIA's role in the Lockerbiedisaster, and the realreason Pan Amflight 103 was bombed.

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ffiX#K0r tffiRTCHRND WISEMAN IS THEMEDIA,S PARANoRMAL SCEPTICOF THE MOMENT. BUT THERE ISA MORE SERIOUS SIDE TO THEAcADEMIC'S RESEARcH INToPSYCHIC CI-AIMANTS

he concrete campus of the University ofHertfordshire is an unlikely place to find oneof the IIK's foremost research centres into the

iffi par.rnormal. But it's a location that, since thePerrott-Warrick Research Unit was set up in 1992, themedia has beat a regular path to, in search of thedown-to-earth comments of Richard Wiseman.The 3O-year-oldpsychologist became known to TVviewers in the summer of 1996 with his regular spot ontlre BBC's Out Of This Wmldprogramme. Wiseman'srole as the debunker of psychic claimants upset manypeople, but the mild mannered academic remainsunrepentant. fle's all for raiiing the standards oftesting psychic claims and to this end has publishedtwo books outlining guidelines for such research andsits on the investigation committee of the Society forPsychical Research (SPR). His latest book, Deceptionand Sef4eception: Irwestigating Psychia, is a collection ofhis ovr'n research fiodirtgr.

In his spare time Wisemano an Associate of the InnerMagic Circle, likes to entertain himself and others withmagic tricks. In facto it was his childhood interest inmagic that set him on the trail of fake psychics.ssW @ I wasabout sevenwhen I began with those littleboxed magic setsyou can get - I used to boreeveryone at school with it. I think it was thoseexperiences,when you have a simple trick and yourealize that you can fool people, that made me think,'I wonder what's going on inside people's heads thatthat can happen. '

Did you olwoys think much of thepqronormql wqs iust trickery?I'd watched the Arthur C. Clarke showsas a kid andwondered whether the things I sawwere real or morelike the tricks I wasperforming. But I didn't reallythink too much about t .When did you consider it more seriously?At university, I studied psychology.At the end of thecourse, I wanted to concentrate more on this area ofparanormal deception. That's when the University ofEdinburgh was advertising a Ph.D position in thepsychologyofdeception and parapsychology.So I didthat for four years.Whqr did your reseqrch involve?It was ooking at the psychology that magicians use tofake psychic ability - how they get an audience to lookin a certain place at a certain time, make certainassumptions or misremember the trick. Civen thatthat's how you can cheat, how can you test somebodywho claims to be psychic so they can't do those sorts ofthings, so you can seewhether they're genuine?Whqt psychic clqims did you exomine?We tested the SORRAT fSociety or Research onRapport and Telekinesis] group in America, who arebest known for the 'Mini-Lab' phenomena. They takea fish tank, turn it ups ide down so it's a sealed,clear


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box, put some objects inside, and film it while the'spirits' allegedly move the objects around. It's reallyhokey stuff.

Their claim was that if we sealed up a deck of ESPcards, sent them across o SORRAT, he spi rits wouldwrite down the order of the cards. So we thought:how would a magician get into these without showingany signs of tampering, and how would you blockthat. In the end, we encapsulated the cards n about500 grams of resin with chemical traces n it so that itcouldn't be melted down and

whether somebody else has got to it? Well, you canuse sealingwax, envelopes,all this kind of stuf f. Butthe fact is that there are manuals out there on howto get into envelopes so they don't show any signsof tampering. The CIA releasesuch a manual calledFlapsand Seals. cientistswho did the other studies,suspect,ust didn't know about that sort of literature.Whot hoppened ofter you got your Ph.D?I moved down to the University of Hertfordshire to

set up a research unit, similar tothe one in Edinburgh, but doingthings differently in that we wouldtake a slightlv more scepticalstanceto the paranormal. Wervouldalsoexamine claims opsvchic abiliq'.

couron r Demereo clownancl # .sreconstituted. ,!'esent the cards & 6F =-across.They came back a monthlater, the spirits having writtendown their guesses.Out of 25 cardsthey had only got eight right, whichis what you would expect by chance.

How did SORRATeqcl toyour conclusion?They were fairly annoyed. They had

If psychic owersexistatall - and it '.then t'.nd it's a big if -'sa small abilityL?tywhich)ou wouldn'tnotice n eaerydry lfeHow mqny of these clqims::= F hove you exqmined since?Well, here are only a fewpeople

done similar testswith scientistswho hadn't gone tosuch lengths to seal the decks, and SORRAI alwaysmanaged to guess hem correctly. They said maybe theresin stopped the spirits seeing nside the deck.Do you think some pqrqpsychologisfs hovepoor stondqrds for their tesfs?Sometimes. I think things have changed fairlyrecently, though. \A4ren I was doing the SORRATstudy,which was n 1991, there wasn't a huge amountof understanding of deception and magic techniquesamong most paiapsychologists.For example, how doyou wrap up a deck of cards so that you can tell

who can produce sufficient anecdotal evidence oftheir powers to convince me that they are even worthinvestigating. And there are even fewer of them whoare prepared to be tested properly.5o who hqs come forwqrd?We tested Chris Robinson, the psychic detective, andCarol Everret, the psychic diagnostian, lvho claims tobe able to tell what's wrong with you just bv looking atyou. We went to India and tested a couple of the localgurus. We've also ooked atJavtee, the psl'chic dogwho knows when his owner is coming home - thebiologistRupert Sheldrake'spet project, as t were.

Hqve ony convinced you thofthey hove psychic qbiliries?- No. The pattern is always he same.j lir"t come along with anecdotali er"idence. Arhenvou rule out self] deception, other deception and put! them to the test. heir experiencesf look pretty ordinary. That's why I'm

very much convinced that if thereare psychic powers, they are notlarge. They are not the sort ofthings that people can produce ademonstration of and you go, 'Oh,wow, that's absolutely ncredible.'Whof obout the results ofpqst porqnormql fests, bySPRmembers for exqmple?The problem is knowing that what'swritten down is what actuallyhappened. You're trusting the


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memory of the people who wrote these reports. As amagician, I know that people easily misremember atrick you have performed. It's the same with thereports into psychics. did a retrospective study intoEusapia Palladino, who was supposed to be one of thebest physical mediums at the turn of the century. Shewas nvestigated by the SPR n an incredibly detailedway. The report's about 250 pages. A/hen looked atclosely, hough, it's not as good as people think it is. Ifthat's the best evidence, 'm not convinced.Whot oflrqcfed you to investigote Swomis?It was the fact that these are living claimants whoseem to able to do something extraordinary. I metProfessor Erlendur Haraldsson from the University ofIceland. who's done a lot of work with the Indianmystic Sai Baba, and he told me he'd seen a lot ofstuff that couldn't be explained away as magic tricks.He asked if I'd like to go with him and test SwamiPremananda under more rigorous conditions.Whqf wqs fhis Swomi doing?Premananda was materializing objects in his handsduring religious services rings, trinkets, that sortof thing. I sawhim materialize things informally,and it was very impressive.As o mogiciqn, couldn't you tell whether hewos using sleighr-of-hcnd or not?Magicians don't know the answer to everything.They'll go to magicians' conventions and be fooledbecause here are new techniques coming out all thetime. It was the same with the Swami. To rule outsleight-of-hand as much as possible, the procedure wecame up with was o examine his hand, wash t, placea clear plastic bag over and seal it round the wrist andthen ask him to materialize an object inside the bag.

How did the Swomi's tests go?Every time the bag wasplaced over Premananda'shand, he didn't produce anything. As soon as the bagcame off, he started producing things again. Weconcluded it was probably fraud, becausewhen welooked back at a video recording we'd made, his handalwayswent out of view before objects materialized.On TV, yovtre presenfed qs q sceptic.Howdo you feel qbout being cost in this role?I personally quite like it. I don't want unbalancedprogrammes going out. For the most part, the publicbelievewhat they see on TV and if they're only beingtold one side of the story I think that's unfair. I'm notsayingthat they should be told these things aren'tparanormal, just that both sides should be presentedso that the public can make up their own mind.Whor do you recommend if people wqnf fotesl psychiccloims?It should be done under conditions that are fair tothe claimant and which don't preclude cheating andself-deception. We're pushing people to consult withmagicians or security experts as the appropriatesource of expertise. We also suggest unninginformal pilot studies,videotaping them, showingthe tapes to the claimants, asking what they think.Simple things like that improve the quality ofresearch in this area.Are more people qpplying fo do reseqrchwith you qt Herffordshire University?More people know we're there, so we get a lot moreapplicants,which is fine. I think people should beinterested in these things. But what we want is goodevidence and investigations n this area because hat'sthe only way to work out if there's anything to it. tr S


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\1hat they had seen. These were broadly:imilar. Stuart drew a silver-wedgeshapedcraft u'ith streaks along the side. Captain\\-ilIs thought it was ess concrete and drewir more as a seriesof lights, but agreed thatit rtas still wedge shaped. The similarityclecided the two men - thev would file an;rir missreport. The Civil Aviation AuthorityC-\\) would then have to find out what

had nearly knocked them out of the sky.INVESTIGATIONThe case gained instant notoriety. \A4rileboth Wills and Stuart declined to gi ve inter-rierr's at first, the story was leaked to thepress.Even as the CAA struggled to get toerips with the incident, the tabloids werehar-ing a field day.Th e CA A investigated every possibleexplanation for the near collision, bu tcor-rld find no answers. Eventually, theybegan speculating about UFOs - mention-ing, possibly or the first time in an officialair miss report, 'extraterrestrial activity'. Acautionary note added:'Fascinating thoughit may be, it is not within the lair miss]group's remit and must be left to thoserihose interest lies in that field.'

The fact that the CAA was entertainingthe possibility of UFOs was ike a red rag tothe media. Many took it as an admissionthat the plane had encountered aliens.

L'nfortunately. A 5061's eputat ionmayriell be unjustified. There are many natu-rally occurring phenomena that can be mis-taken as some kind of intelligent alien craft,and this could have been the case in the\Ianchester near collision. The pilotscould, for example, have observed a bright

v Sighrings of fheUFO involved in fheBA 506l neor-misswere olso reportedfrom lhe ground. Areconslruclion of thecroft ollegedly seenby Monchesterstudenl Mork Lloydmqintoined fhetriongulor shope, butdiffered in size.According ro Lloyd, itwos obouf 'the size ofWembley Slodium'.

fireball meteor, known as a bolide. The illu-sion of an alien craft is createdwhen spacedebr is enters the earth 's atmosphereandburns up. Invariably these strange ights arehigh in the the atmosphere.and thereforeout of radar range, even though theyappear to be close by. From what is knownfrom eyewitnessdescr ipt ions of var iousother f i rebal l events. he accounts iven bythe exper ienced BA 5061 pi lots c loselymatches hat of a bol ide s ight ing.MID.AIR MYSTERIESStrange, naturally occurring phenomenahave a long history in UFO sight ings.During World War II there were thousandsof aircraft in flight over Europe and thePacific on bombing raids and reconnais-sance missions, and there were dozens ofsightings of strange lights that appeared todog Altied aircraft. The US Air Force gavethem the name 'foo fighters' after a comicstrip cartoon figure. \A4rat they did notappreciate until later was that the Axispilots were seeing them too. These glitter-ing lights littered the skies as if they wereobserving the battles, yet never interfered.After the war had ended, US military air-craft continued to report a number ofencounterswith UFOs. Indeed objectsverylike the foo fighters - small lights only halfa metre or so in diameter - continued to be


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seen to this day. It is barely appreciatedeven by UFOlogists that these sightings stillcontinue, and the possibility of naturallyoccurring phenomena is also routinelyoverlookedby the military.MITITARY

'IAADNESSNot all UFO encounters can be explainedaway as atmospheric anomalies, and insome situations he military are prepared torespond with force. In August 1956, therewere two separateUFO encounters over theUKwithin a week. Radar systems crossEastAnglia detected a strange object movingbetween Bentwaters and Lakenheath. AUSAF transport plane fllng at 5,000 feetsaw the object - a smudgy yellow light -from above. Two RAF Venom fighters werescrambled and intercepted the object aboveEly. To this date, the crew remain adamantthat they had a clear radar target of a sta-tionary object which, try as hey might, theycould not lock on to.

A few days later, Flight Officer WilburWright was one of twoJavelin pilots over these a between the Isle of Wight andBournemouth when they were ordered tobreak off their practice mission o intercept

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a target picked up by a secret radar sitenearby. They quickly l ocked on to theobject and then saw t with their own eyesa bright disc reflecting the sun and sitting

pletely disappeared. Was this a genuinesighting, or yet another example of bizarreatmospheric phenomena?

There have been other similar cases hatdeny rational explanation. In September1976, an Iranian Air Force Phantom rr'as

seen by manypeople on

sent o intercept a UFO on the out- ,--"-skirts of Tehran after it was -rnn-,.&

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look for unusual radar targets beingtracked at Wellington Airport. John Cordy,an air traffic controller. stated that the tar-gets were unlike any he had ever seenbefore. Captain Vern Powell took his Argosy ,:into the area and sawa strange light which:paced the aircraft forjust over 19 km along-.:the coastbefore disappearing.

This sighting, and others in the area,attracted the attention of an Australian TV,channel. They contacted one of theirreporters. Quentin Fogarty. who happenedto be on holiday nearby. After the TV com-pany gave him the details, Fogartyjumpedat the chance. He began his report byinterviewing the UFO witnesses,and then

{ Foofoge shor byQuentin Fogorty on3(F32 December1978 showed oformofion of up tosix UFOs.Thesebrighr lightsoppeored lo hqve odomed'cobin 'ondon eslimoted lengthof 3O mefres. Moreimportontly, NewZeolond rodor (inset)olso confirmed lhepresenceof UFOs.

V A Brirish Airwoyspromofionol videounintenfionollycopfured o UFO,opporently 'ployingtog'with o Concorde.The behqviour of theUFO - especiolly itsexfreme occelerqfion- suggesled il wos o'foo fighfer'.

The first officer... lookedup in time fo see q dorkobiecr pqss down rhe sideof fhe qircroff ot highspeedi if wqs wedge-shoped wirh q block stripeBA 506l Pilots' eorMissReoort

dfthe ground. The pilot noticed a smallobject eject from the glowing light andjudged that he was under attack.Instinctively, he powered up his computer-controlled equipment and prepared toIaunch an air-to-air missile. As he pressedthe button to fire ilhat might have been thefirst shot in an inter-planetary war, all powerdrained from his aircraft. The object thenreturned into the UFO and the Phantom'spower returned to normal.

In cases uch as hese, here appears ittlealternative to suggest that some sort ofintelligent craft with superior abilities toour own 'primitive' defences is evident.Natural phenomena new to science, whilenot ruled out, seem ess ikely than in casessuch as the foo fighter type of sighting.PROOF AT LAST?Despite the rising number of mid-airencounters, the 'big case' which marriedthe credibiliq' of public sightings to pilottestimony and radar trackings was still miss-ing. The world waswaiting for first class ilmfootage of the UFO phenomena, and thisideal was inally fulfilled in December 1978above New Zealand's south island.

In the early hours of 21 December, thecrew of a Safe Air cargo plane were asked to

persuaded Safe Air on rhe night of 30-31December to let him fly the same route. .However, Fogarty and the new Argosy erw:.iheaded by Captain Bill Startup did notexpect what happened next. l' l

Once agai n, radar picked up UFOs and,:,strange lights flew alongside the plane..'Let's hope they're friendly,' Fogarty wrylycommented as the uni ient ided' l ightsdanced nearby, filling the TV camera lens.

The film evidencewa sextensivelynvesti-gated by optical physicistBruce Maccabee,who flew out from Washington to NewZealand.to study the case. Maccabee was

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convinced that something truly inexplica-ble was recorded. and the case is widelyregarded as one of the most convincinc'examples ol UFO realiry.

Ilowever, there ale those who disagree.Sceptics have attempted to prove that theUFOs were many things, from stars andplanets to moonlight shining off a cabbage{S rBThey've tested our defenceslo see if we con withsfqnd qninvqsion.. . dt some time in thefufure we cqn expecf UFOsrobecome increqsingly hosfile

CI A nformont,s old oJournolist orrenSmitha\ ', ,patch. The air crew, who flew the route on

a re gular basis. profoundly disagree.Fogarty also remains completely baffled asto what he encounteredon that n ight .

So do the UFOs s ighted n these c loseencounters represent a physical threat? Inevaluating the Manchester Airport case heCAA appear to have thought this was possi-ble. But they were also aware that this casewas far from unique.FRIEND OR FOE?

_9To

t'A Luminous oblecrswere sighted ondphotogrophed in themiddle of oformqtion ofTqhikowo Ki 36reconnoissonceplones n 1942.Nicknomed'foofighrers' by rhe US,the stronge lightsolormed ondconfused enemy ondAllied forces olike.Alien inrelligencewossuggested, butmodern science nowrhinks i r con explointhese phenomeno osnolurol occurrences.

craft rvasable to fly on to Schipol, Holland,u'here it made an emergency landing. Ahole rvas ound in the tail fin where some-thing had passed ight through. It wasnot abird strike, as metallic frasments were dis-covered here.The C-\\ rr-ereunable t o solve this case.Thinking that some kind of military tech-nologl might har-ebeen involved the MoDn-asbrought in. and l'as equally mystified.Thev even speculated hat spacedebris re-entering the atmosphere from earth orbitcould hale protoked a million-to-one freakcollision.The truth is that somet hing struckthe aircraft ar-rd t snrrived. The next timean aircraft might not be so luckv.GtOBAt SIGHTINGSClose encounters have also been recordedaround -\uglst 1984 br aircraft crew overTasmania. Brazil. France and Russia, andthere are doubtlessmanv more unreported.The rise n mid-air encoLlnters as reachedepidemic proportions and mav rvellbe con-sidered alarming bv anvone planning totravel br-air.

Numerons airlir-reshave been involvedand, rvhile most prefer their pilots no t totalk about the episodes for fear of under-mining passenger onfidence, no airli ne ismore prone than any other. As such,despite the commercial interests of air lines,and despite the ridicule about little greenmen that inevitably attaches itself to thesestories, ve simply have to take mid- -e:*#Hdffi'*mIn the next issue, UFO FILE inaestigates hestrange sightings reported ry l,lASA astronautsreturningfrom manned spau flights.

The prospect of a col l is ion is not merelv. . *::r.rl.al. In August 1984,a KondarrTrislanderon a cargo light from Stansteadto Amsterdamwasstruck by an objectwithsuch orce that it lost an engine.The air-


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