I have long suspected that the Rendlesham incident, 10 years earlier, was a cover story for something else. Perhaps a nuclear missile falling off a plane and into the forest.
...To do so is to be pretty certain that something more than a lighthouse was behind the story.
Well, going off-topic; re. the Rendlesham Forest sightings (thread
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/rendlesham-forest-ufo-incident.13457/) there
were other factors- Colonel Halt's questionable actions, the failure to interpret a radiation monitor's output appropriately, several other things- but there is no reliable evidence of any type of cover-up of a dramatic physical cause.
If a store or component had been lost from a USAF aircraft from RAF Woodbridge or RAF Bentwaters, it is inconceivable that Col. Halt, deputy base commander at Bentwaters, would be unaware.
Had a bomb or missile been lost, it is again inconceivable that UK authorities would not be informed. Accidents happen, and the Thatcher government was highly supportive of US foreign policy. The USAF would have no authority to independently conduct retrieval operations outside of its bases in the UK (notwithstanding any hypothetical agreements about final handling).
Had someone been seriously injured or killed by a falling store, or a lost store later detonated, the fact that the USAF had contacted Suffolk police to
report a UFO sighting would not go down well.
However, the fact that local police were contacted- and attended, and documented their findings- suggests (as the PCs suspected) nothing dramatic was going on.
RAF Woodbridge hosted arguably the best possible unit for rapidly retrieving a sensitive lost store from a wooded area, the 67th Air Rescue and Recovery Squadron:
External Quote:
The 67th ARRS operated Lockheed HC-130H/N/P Hercules fixed wing aircraft, and heavy duty HH-53 Jolly Green Giant helicopters, and was assigned an air rescue and special operations mission.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Woodbridge.
The HH-53 would have been capable of lifting any store carried by the A-10s of Woodbridge and Bentwaters, or indeed any single store carried by F-4s or F-111s, also stationed in the UK at that time. For instance, the B-61 nuclear bomb, which F-111s could have been tasked to carry, weighs approx. 715 lbs/ 324 kg. See
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikorsky_MH-53.
There is no indication that the unit, or its personnel, were involved in any way with the "UFO" events.
No-one found any indication of an impact site or a clear-up; no unusual movements of heavy vehicles in the forest was recorded: the areas of the supposed sightings, and Halt's expedition, were accessible to the public at all times.
No police or military cordon of any sort.
A small number of Suffolk policemen and a local forestry worker who visited the site at the time/ shortly after saw no unusual signs; the forester explained some trees had axe-marks indicating they were due to be felled, so presumably he or his colleagues had been working there not long before, and would be familiar with the environment.
