Berwyn Mountains “UFO” mystery deepens

/Home/Aliens and UFOS/UFO History

Berwyn Mountains “UFO” mystery deepens
December 28, 2010
Steve Bagnall
Daily Post.co.uk

THE mystery behind the famous Berwyn Mountains “UFO” incident has deepened after a document revealed a major military operation was underway that night.

Dubbed the “Welsh Roswell”, on January 23 in 1974 locals reported hearing a huge bang, felt earth tremors and saw a brilliant light in the sky over the Berwyn Mountains.

Now a document from the Maritime and Coastguard Agency has surfaced, which reveals a military operation – codenamed Photoflash – was scheduled for that evening.

It involved about 10 military aircraft and a series of powerful flashes across the North Wales coast and Liverpool Bay.

The MCA letter said: “During the late afternoon and early evening of 23rd January 1974 there was an exercise from Jerby Range on the Isle of Man.

“The exercise was called ‘Photoflash’ and coastguards were advised to expect at least 10 aircraft taking part and at least 80 flashes around the Liverpool Bay area and the North Wales coastline.”

There is no more information from official sources on that specific exercise and why it was commissioned for that night.

Although a spokesman at the RAF Museum Research Department suggested photoflash operations were used for training exercises to illuminate the ground below.

Over the years theories have been out forward to explain the events at Berwyn Mountains.

One suggested there was a combination of events, a meteor shower combined with an earthquake – the epicentre of which was at Bala Lake – and misperception of poachers on the hillside with lamps.

But investigator Russ Kellett, who has been researching the Berwyn Mountains incident extensively, acquiring documents and witness accounts, is convinced UFOs were the focus of a military operation on that night.

He said: “The photoflash operation was used to light up the coast so they could see submerged craft in the sea.

“From my research, there were three separate craft that were flushed out of the ocean that night, military craft were involved and there was an engagement.

“I spoke to a fishermen who saw one come out near Puffin Island, his colleagues at the time told him to say nothing about it because it was considered bad luck, and he never spoke about it for years.

“I have correspondence with a group of men who told me they were moved on by military personnel on the roadside at Llandrillo where one of the craft came down.

“They said they saw aliens getting out the craft who were helping two of their own who were injured.

“They were then loaded onto the back of a flat back truck and taken away.

“The epicentre of the earthquake was at Bala Lake. That is where one of the craft came down.

“The other one smashed into the mountain side at Berwyn.”

Earlier this year files released showed the Government officially backed the meteor theory.

Then-junior RAF minister Brynmor John summed up the official position in a letter to North Wales MP Dafydd Elis Thomas in May 1974.

He wrote: “As suggested by the descriptions reported, it seems the phenomena could well have been caused by a meteor descending through the atmosphere burning up and finally disintegrating before it reached the ground.

“Such a hypothesis would also explain the absence of any signs of impact.

“It has also been suggested that at 8.32pm that evening there was an earth tremor in the Berwyn Mountains, which produced a landslide with noises like detonations. This latter aspect is however outside the field of this department.”

But the MoD’s conclusions did not convince many of those who witnessed the incident first hand.

One correspondent wrote in a letter preserved in the files: “That ‘something’ came down in the Berwyn Mountains on that night I am certain... It is certain to the minds of both my friends who came with me and to me that we were visited by an object that evening.”