A VETERAN air force chief has spoken out for the first time about the night he saw an alleged UFO at a Suffolk airbase.

Anthony Bond

A VETERAN air force chief has spoken out for the first time about the night he saw an alleged UFO at a Suffolk airbase.

Lieutenant Colonel Charles Halt was deputy base commander at RAF Woodbridge in December 1980 when patrolmen from the United States Air Force (USAF) claimed they saw a small, triangular shaped craft moving backwards through the woods before taking off. The incident has been dubbed Britain's Roswell and was documented by the Ministry of Defence.

A report by Lt Col Halt detailing what he and his men saw in the early hours of Boxing Day 1980 is already part of the National Archives.

But a video posted on internet site YouTube shows Mr Halt going into more details about the alleged sighting when he spoke at the National Press Club in America.

The retired Lieutenant Colonel tells the conference: “I have no idea what we saw that night but I do know with great certainty that it was under intelligent control.”

Mr Halt said when he heard that three USAF patrolmen reported seeing a strange triangular-shaped craft sitting on three legs he did not know all the details but “assumed there was a reasonable explanation” for it.

Two days later he said he was interrupted at a family Christmas party and told: “It's back”.

In the forest, he and two senior patrolmen discovered indentations on the forest floor as well as mild radiation and evidence of broken branches on trees.

He said: “We suddenly observed a very bright red orange object. It was oval with a black centre. It reminded me of an eye and it appeared to be blinking. It manoeuvred horizontally through the trees with an occasional vertical movement. When approached, it receded and silently broke into five white objects.”

He then describes how he moved out of the forest and observed “several objects in the sky” which changed shape from elliptical to round.

“One approached at very high speed and sent down a strange beam at our feet. It was more like a laser beam,” he said.

“Another object sent down beams of light into the weapons storage area. The whole time we had difficulty communicating with the base as all three radio frequencies we were using kept breaking up. This activity continued for about an hour.”

Secret Government files released for the first time recently delivered a damming verdict on the sighting.

The files indicated that because Mr Halt only filed his report two weeks after the sightings this prompted a lack of investigation by the British Government.

A briefing document from the time read: “Overall, we believe that the fact that Col Halt did not report these occurrences to MoD for almost two weeks after the event, together with the relatively low key manner in which he handled the matter (given resources available to him) and indicative of the degree of importance in defence terms which should be attached to the incident. He himself took all investigative action which was required.”

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