E.T hunters swarm to the Northwest
UFO-hunters will hit Altrincham in their hundreds for a seminar on the unexplained next month. Here, stuart Miller tells Simon Donohue how he yearns for a close encounter.
By Simon Donohue
The Manchester Evening News
5-23-06
HE approaches from the sun, blinding us further with his luminous yellow jacket and commands our attention while taking a good look at our faces.UFO-hunters will hit Altrincham in their hundreds for a seminar on the unexplained next month. Here, stuart Miller tells Simon Donohue how he yearns for a close encounter.
By Simon Donohue
The Manchester Evening News
5-23-06
"I need to take a look at your cards," he demands inexplicably, before adding, "Sorry, wrong gentlemen!"
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"Yeah right," I say to Stuart Miller, Cheshire's foremost commentator on the ongoing search for extra terrestrial life. "That guy may look like a city centre construction worker, but I've seen The X Files!"
Like Mulder and Scully before us, Miller and I sit at pavement café where we can watch for men in dark glasses and discuss plans for a major gathering of ufologists.
Stellar Cast
To those interested in the unexplained, the speakers who will address the conference on Ufology And The Paranormal at Altrincham Masonic Hall represent a stellar cast.
Nick Redfern's book, Body Snatchers In The Desert, was the "most realistic explanation of Roswell"; Neil Morris will provide the truth of Ant and Dec's Alien Autopsy film; while Paul Kimball will assess the career of Canadian ufological icon Wilbert Smith.
These are the type of men who wear the fact that they have suffered special branch surveillance as a badge of honour.
On the other hand, Miller, 53, a father of four daughters, who lives in Bowdon and publishes the extra terrestrial e-zine, uforeview, is disappointingly down to earth.
"I have been interested in UFOs since my mid-teens, but didn't take an active interest until 10 years ago," says the man so tall he'd terrify ET.
"There is no question that intelligent extra terrestrial life exists," he adds without fear of ridicule. "If you just look at it from a mathematical point of view, there has to be something out there."
Coffee and tea arrive in pots so large they could easily conceal surveillance equipment.
E-Zine
Unfazed, Miller presses on, telling me that he came to publish his own UFO e-zine after providing book reviews for the now-defunct UFO Magazine.
Each edition of uforeview is "read" by 20,000 people, but Miller would still like to see it published on paper.
"Every couple of years there are reports that fewer people are interested in ufology," he says. "It really winds us up when people say there are fewer sightings of UFOs. That's complete and utter rubbish."
Even so, Miller just happens to be pushing tickets at a time when the men in white coats seem to have produced conclusive proof that flying saucers don't exist.
Electricity
A request made via the Freedom Of Information act revealed that scientists working for the Ministry Of Defence on Project Condign had concluded that it was not alien saucers which have been buzzing the British countryside but "plasmas of gas" illuminated by charges of atmospheric electricity.
"I'd say that nothing has yet been fully explained," insists Miller between sips of latte. "The real issue is whether intelligent life extra terrestrial has been here. There is evidence that ET has visited us at some point. It is an old adage in UFO circles that the volume of evidence, if transferred to a criminal case, would be enough to secure a conviction."
Miller believes the British authorities have softened their attitude towards UFO hunters.
But the Americans are different, he says, and particularly since September 11. What do they have to hide?
"I think Orson Welles did the world an enormous disservice when War Of The Worlds was broadcast live on American radio, causing mass panic," adds Miller. "There is a fear that there might be panic if proof of extra terrestrial life was provided." Given that possibility, why are the people who read uforeview committed to proving the existence of other life forms?
"To just look inwards at ourselves, here on this planet, is to have a very restrictive point of view," Miller suggests.
"People these days treat ufology much more seriously and are less inclined to laugh.
"My wife and daughters are sceptical but they do not treat me as some idiot who would embarrass them."
Even so, Miller, who believes in a higher being if not a God, says he imagines that non-human life forms might already be here.
"Perhaps they have revealed themselves to us in ways which we would be most comfortable with," he adds, "either through our own minds, or from somewhere above this planet."
Dream
He answers the most important question with almost religious zeal.
"No, I have never seen a UFO myself," he says. "But it is my dream to meet an intelligent being from another planet.
"If the authorities do have proof of life on other planets, I can think of no good reason why they shouldn't tell us. I think it is man's right to know."
We part and I return to the office. Once again, a man in a luminous jacket crosses my path.
He could just be a builder enjoying a lunch break. But maybe, just maybe, he's one of the few who do know more than they're letting on.
More . . .
See Also: Posturing Poseurs By Stuart Miller
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