Showing posts with label Joe McGonagle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joe McGonagle. Show all posts

Monday, May 18, 2009

Weird '09
Wiltshire's Premier UFO
&
Paranormal Event

Weird 09
Weird '09, Wiltshire's premier UFO and paranormal Events

Is to be held on 29th 30th August 2009

We are proud to present a stellar line-up of distinguished speakers, from the UK and the US, who will share with you their expertise and experiences in ufology and the paranormal.

With lots of new, never seen or heard material being presented by the speakers for the very first time at Weird '09.

Speaking live will be:

  • Nick Pope

  • Paul Devereux

  • Joe McGonagle

  • Dr. Peter McCue

  • Malcolm Robinon

  • Mike Oram

  • Kevin Goodman

  • Hayley Stevens

  • Nick Redfern

  • Brian Allan

And hosted by Ross Hemsworth from 'Now That’s Weird' Radio and TV shows.

Recorded interviews with Dr. David Clarke and Steve Dewey will also be shown.

Weird 09 will be held over two days at the Athenaeum Theatre in the small town of Warminster, once the UFO capital of the UK, and possibly the world, with over 5000 sightings reported over a ten year period.

Warminster nestles in the beautiful rural countryside of Wiltshire, within easy striking distance of important ancient monuments, including Stonehenge, Avebury, West Kennet Long Barrow and Silbury Hill. The impressive Iron Age hill forts of Battlesbury and Scratchbury are also close by.

You will also be able to join the annual Warminster Sky Watch at the fabled Cradle Hill and participate in a paranormal investigation over the weekend.

Tickets are £15 PER DAY OR £25 for a weekend pass and can only be bought on the official web site and no where else.

Please Note: Special Care Baby Unit Weird '09 will be raising funds for the Swindon Great Western Hospital SCBU.

The funds will be raised during the conference and will take the form of raffles for exclusive UFO and paranormal items donated and signed by our guest speakers. Donation points will also be available.

Speakers are free for interviews in the press room at the venue on the day if you wish to arrange this please contact:

press@mystical-county.org.uk

Thursday, June 26, 2008

British Ufologists Quick To Look into Aerial Police Chase of UFO

Helicopter Chasing UFO
By Joe McGonagle
6-20-08

     Gary Anthony, Dave Clarke, and myself are onto this already.

The MoD UFO department has told me that they have no knowledge of this event, though I enquired about the date provided in the newspaper article (7th June).

Dave Clarke has spoken to the Police and they informed him that the event took place on 8th June at 00:40. They also told him that they did not attempt to pursue the object and that it was not saucer-shaped but shaped like an aircraft.

Dave has already been asked to participate in radio programmes for BBC Wales and the British Forces Broadcasting Service!

The Police would not say who they reported the incident to, just "the appropriate authorities". We suspect that this will definitely include the Civil Aviation Authority, and either Counter-Terrorism and UK Operations or the flying complaints section of the Provost and Security Squadron of the Royal Air Force.

'The Telegraph' appears to have plagiarized the story from 'The Sun' if 'The Sun's' claim to exclusivity is to be believed, so I doubt that any contact with The Telegraph would achieve much. The Sun doesn't name it's source, but I have emailed them just in case, requesting that my message be passed on to the source. As yet I have had no response (and I don't really expect any).

Several routes are being explored, some using the FoIA and some taking a more journalistic approach.

I suspect that there are a few issues here. Firstly, according to the South Wales Police (SWP) press office, the 'saucer' description was a fabrication; they used the term 'unusual aircraft'.

That being so, and if the proximity to the helicopter is more or less as described, an AIRPROX report should have been generated. It also seems probable that a report will have been made to the RAF Provost
since it took place over or near a military airfield (which was reportedly closed for operations other then the police helicopter). This may be where any confusion has arisen within the MoD, since DAS (the UFO desk) would not necessarily be aware of the P&SS report at the time. A report may also have been sent to Counter-Terrorism and UK Operations which has absorbed the function of the Air Force Operations Room.

This leads me to another point - the confusion over the date.

The newspaper articles refer to the event having occurred on the 7th June, but the SWP say it was at 00:40 on the 8th June. Generally speaking, the police work in local time, which is currently an hour ahead of GMT. The military and the CAA generally operate in GMT. This leads me to suspect that the leak to the media originated from the CAA or the military, since the event would have been recorded by them as occurring at 23:40 GMT on 7th June.

Another curious detail in the Sun article is "They [the air crew] reported it to senior officers, who passed on the report to Britain’s UFO investigators".

If, as it appears, the event was not reported to Britain's 'official' (MoD) UFO investigators, it may be that it was reported to one or more civilian investigators.

I am also intrigued by the anonymity of the source of the report. It is as if they realised the inaccuracy of the details provided to the press, and didn't want to be directly associated with the exaggerated reports.

Another factor which requires attention is how it disseminated so quickly - The Sun published it's 'exclusive' on 20th June. It appeared in the Telegraph, and the Metro on the same day, and by 10:00 it had world coverage. This suggests to me someone behind the scenes, feeding the story to the media, exaggerating the details and remaining anonymous.

This could take some unraveling, it will be interesting to see what spins out of it all.