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The Transparent Triangle - 04.09.99

Below are a list of Case Investigations which the Hull UFO Society have investigated over the years. They give full details, barring the witness details, of UFO sightings, case notes, witness statements, witness drawings and offical letters from the Police, Airports, RAF bases and of course the MOD. (Ministry Of Defence)

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Hull UFO Society

This sighting was spotted by a group of UFO investigators, namely us! We were out on Official HUFOS Skywatch on Saturday 4th September 1999, at a farm, in a little village called Skeffling.

It was an accident how we ended up there because we were going to Flamborough Head. A fellow skywatcher, Darron Railton, received a call out to repair a tractors windscreen in Skeffling He was upset about letting everyone down as he was giving Darren Parr, a lift. We all decided that we should go with Darron, then after the repair, make our way to Spurn Point, another favourite place for Skywatching, which wasn't very far away.

While Darren repaired the windscreen, some of us assisted him, while others looked skyward. it was a brilliant clear night. The only light pollution was from Darron's halogen lamp, but around the back of the van, it was dark. Even with the glow you could still see every single star.

At exactly 1O.OOpm, I spotted what I thought, was four stars moving together in formation. I realised that with looking directly overhead your can get disoriented, which gives the impression that the stars are moving. I look down to the ground to gain my bearings again. Nevertheless, when I glanced back up, I noticed that there was not four stars moving, but there were only three stars, moving together, in formation. There was one at the front and two at the back. I couldn't believe my eyes, I shouted to the rest of the group, there were ten witnesses in all, "Hey guy's, Check this out, there's a triangle formation right above us, moving very, very slowly!" (Or I said something similar to this anyway!)

Straight away they all stirred in awe. Darren quickly killed the light, this triangle was huge. As seen from the ground and through the naked eye, the distance between the two rear lights measured about an inch and the distance from the back lights to the front light measured approximately 1½ - 2 inches. There was no noise, it was a pretty clear night, although a few Cirrocumulus or Sirrus clouds did start to appear. These clouds are estimated, according to some weather books, to be at around 18,000 to 50,000ft. Apart from this you could practically see every star in the Universe, even the Milky Way was entirely visible. There appeared to be no flashing lights, as a couple of my friends caught the object-s in their binoculars, I tried to capture the object-s on my camcorder, but to no avail.

The object-s looked to us as though there were just very dull stars, moving in formation. Not long after watching this, the front light moved to the tight slightly, while one of the back lights dropped back slightly which gave the impression that it was turning in a clockwise direction, Heading in a South - Easterly direction. If the estimation of the cloud cover is correct, then this puts the object-s at over 50,000ft, which is, if I'm not mistaken, Quite High! This sighting, I think, started near a star constellation called Draco, heading in a South - Easterly direction. I did video a plane lower down to the horizon, at about the same time as this sighting, moving in a North - Westerly direction, while one of my colleagues, I think it was Mr. Parr, saw a plane moving in an Easterly direction, again low down to the horizon.

One thing we did think about was if these object-s are one and the same object, I think we are talking about something huge. The only thing to discredit the one object theory is that we witnessed a couple of star's actually passing between our mysterious Triangle.

The next morning I wrote out the usual letters to Humberside Police, Humberside Airport, RAF Waddington and the M.O.D. While Darren Parr turned his attention to the Internet. On Sunday 5th September, at 7.22AM!!! (Well, Darren was excited, after all it was his first sighting!) Darren placed this report onto a UFO bulletin board, in a hope that we may attract more witness. "Three lights were observed flying slowly in a distinctive formation over East Yorkshire at 9.57pm last night (Saturday 4th September 1999). There were seven adults and two teenage witnesses to the sighting, details of which will be publicised later in the week on this news group. If anyone else saw this formation of lights at or about the same time (Or any other sighting you would like to report), would you please e-mail details to me."

Here are those e-mail's in full, as we received them. As with all cases, peoples names will be changed, unless they specify different.........

On Monday 6th September 1999, Darren received an e-mail from France. "I am in Bretagne at Rennes, France. I have seen three light in space, triangular formation, slox, (I think he means Slow!), speed, going North to South, Saturday near 23h40, at Rennes. After research today I find information with an astronome, (Again, I think he means, Astronomer!), a specialist in tracking satellite in Belgium, this formations called NOSS - Naval Ocean Surveillance System."

Searching through the Internet for more information about the Navel Ocean Surveillance System, was pretty simple. Here is some, of the information we gathered about this satellite......................

The program itself was code-named - Parcae, White Cloud. The NOSS performed wide area ocean surveillance, primarily for the Navy. White Cloud was used to determine the location of radio and radar transmissions, using triangulation. Each NOSS launch placed a cluster of one primary satellite and three smaller sub-satellites, that trail along at distances of several hundred kilometre's into low polar orbits. They were first launched on 14.12.71, while they saw their last launch on the 11.2.88. The strange thing we all found out about these satellites was that they only, (So it says here!), had a life span of 3 to 5 years!!!

We have two problems with this being the explanation for our sighting.............

The first thing is the dates.

The NOSS should not still be up in orbit working, It should have died out way back in 1991 - 1993. The second thing is, we are out on official HUFOS skywatches and sometimes unofficial ones, six or sometimes twelve times a month, sometimes more. We know what we are looking at most of the time, whether it be a star, a planet, a satellite, MIR (When it was up) and now the Space Station. We are out there come rain or shine, any days, any times, there are no ground rules for a Skywatch. So it seems very strange, don't you think, that we, The HUFOS Skywatch Team, have never in our entire time of Skywatching, ever seen anything like this before. It was the talk of the night for the next several weeks or so.

By strange coincidence, we had another e-mail from France. This e-mailer, gave us dates and times from the NOAA satellite. His message read, "If you have seen this tree light in triangular formation it's seem to be military satellite here you will find more information about NOSS satellite."

Here are some of the satellite images he sent to us..............

Most of us here, believe that these are just images of natural gaps in between the clouds.

So even though we have these fascinating satellite photos, we don't think that they portray the object-s we witnessed on Saturday 4th September 1999.

And so to the official responses to my letters. The Police have responded by saying, "I am sorry but I am unable to assist you with the identification of your sighting. Yours Sincerely, Chief Inspector R. K. Monkman." Very Helpful as always!

A response from R.A.F. Waddington had me in fits of laughter more than anything else, "Thank you for your letter regarding your latest sighting. I am sorry we are unable to offer any explanation. As I explained to you in April, when there is no flying on evening or weekends, our Air traffic staff would only be watching their screens if they had been asked for Air Traffic Assistance. For us to see a UFO it needs to be on a Monday to Friday, doing 500 feet in a nice orderly circuit over the airfield, and preferable call us up to ask for a talk down landing! J.A.Wheeler, Executive Officer for Officer Commanding." Do you ever get the feeling that you are not taken seriously?

The reply from the M.O.D. didn't fair any better. "Thank you for your letter of 5 September in which you have asked for information regarding a sighting of stars moving in an unusual manner. As you are aware, the Ministry of Defence examines any unusual sighting reports to establish whether there is any evidence that the United Kingdom's airspace might have been compromised by hostile or unauthorised foreign military activity. This is obviously not the case in this instance, therefore you may wish to contact your local observatory as they may be able to offer more information concerning the incident. I have looked back through our sighting files and I can confirm that the Ministry of Defence did not receive any 'UFO' sighting reports for the 4 September from the Humberside area. I am sorry I cannot be more helpful on this occasion. I have returned your stamped addressed envelope. Yours Sincerely, Gaynor South." At least I'm getting a nice collection of stamped addressed envelopes!

A couple of days later, I contacted a local Astronomical group. I spoke someone called Tony, when I explained what we had seen and what the MOD suggested he replied, "I'm sorry but we don't have a local observatory, as for the object you have seen I can give you no explanation as to what it could be. I did think when you left the message on my answer machine that it might have been Iridium flares, but now I know all the details, there is no way it could be. It sounds to me like we are talking about something outside of our atmosphere though. Although we do go out on sky watches ourselves, we have never seen anything like that what you have described to me. We've seen a couple of satellites travelling almost in pairs, but it is very rare to see these, as most only cross paths occasionally." I thanked him for his help and he said that he would, "Mention the sighting at our monthly meeting, to see if anyone else had seen it." I also asked him if we could hold a Skywatch with him and his group at a later date. He agreed and said "I'll look forward to that!"

Not long after this, Darren sprang a couple of more e-mail witnesses on me. As always, here in there entirety is those e-mail's: "Last week (Saturday 4th Sept 1999.) I was out in the garden, about 10.30, with six friends. OK, so we had several beers! But we were watching the skies for satellites, and saw quite a few. White lights moving across the sky, irregular triangle fashion, moving from West to East. Everyone saw them and everyone was confused as to what they were. Anyone know of any such arrangement of three satellites in such a formation? They looked to be quite a way apart, but they were travelling at exactly the same speed." That e-mail, Darren found on the Internet with no place of origin. While this one was sent to Darren, it came from the Scottish Borders: "Ref. to your sighting Saturday 4th September 1999. We were enjoying a warm September night sitting in our garden gazing up at a cloudless sky, trying to identify some of the easier constellations and counting the satellites that were crossing over, I think that we reached about twelve."

"At about 10 o'clock my wife exclaimed, "What's that?" The rest of us quickly turned our attention to a red/orange formation of lights passing North East/South West. I cannot be sure if it was a formation of different sources of light or one large object, I personally feel that it was the latter. the light formation was triangular in shape, it had an intensity of light not unlike neon lighting, but with a soft plasma feel to it. The triangular shape seemed to be flexible as it moved along its flight path. I would estimate that the angle above the horizon would be about 35-40 degrees, visible for 3-4 seconds."

"My wife said that it seemed to appear at a point rather than move into the field of view, the rest of us were a fraction of a second later in making the observation There was no sound and it disappeared behind the roofs of some nearby houses. There were four adults in the observing group, we all agreed that it wasn't natural, weather and tried to run through as many possible scenarios but nothing could provide a satisfactory answer. Hope this report is of interest to you and that you may even have an earthly answer."

On Wednesday 6th October 1999, I received yet another call about yet another Transparent Triangle! Geoff, from North Hull informed me, "I was stood in my girlfriends back garden at about 10.00PM. I was looking up to the stars, as you do, when I noticed three stars moving in formation. The back way faces Market Weighton and these three objects were definitely moving towards the Clough road direction. It wasn't moving very fast, I'd say about the speed of any normal satellite you can see in the sky most nights. The object, at arms length, I'd say the back too were about an inch apart, while the distance between the back two to the front one, I'd estimate it to be about, two inches. There were no flashing lights or any noise coming from the object either, which I found very strange. I called to my girlfriend, who was sat in house watching television. As she came out, I just pointed up. She couldn't believe her eyes, at what I was showing her. In fact, she came over in goose bumps and said, "It makes me feel all creepy, I'm going back in!" She went back indoors as I continued to watch in awe, I must have seen it for another good few minutes before I lost sight of it over the tops of the houses. All night I just couldn't get it out of my head, I thought there must be someone I can contact to let them know what I had seen. The next day I contacted the Hull Daily Mail and they in turn put me in touch with you."

Here is the witnesses sketch of their encounter.... I thought it very strange that someone else had described this sighting in such a way it mirrored ours in every detail, no sound, three stars moving as if one, the exact size of the object and most amazingly of all, it was travelling in a South - Easterly direction.

On the 11th October 1999, two friends of ours, Billy and Tony popped over to my house for a drink and a Skywatch in my back garden. I was a bit reluctant to go outside as I've just had my new computer delivered, but nevertheless, I did. We were all having a laugh and a joke when I spotted the Transparent Triangle again. A quick look at my watch told me it was exactly 9.30pm, I screamed at the other's, "Look up there, it's back!" Billy and Tony looked up, sure enough it was back. I ran in, quickly garbled something at Vicki and grabbed my camcorder. As I ran back outside, Tony and Billy could just see the object as it started to dim. I sat on a chair, turned my camcorder on and started to record. I could see nothing in the view finder so all I could do was hope I caught it on tape. When we lost sight of the object/s, we reviewed what we had seen. My compass revealed, that once again it was heading in a South - Easterly direction. I looked on my star chart and realised that I first saw it moving from the star constellation known as Pegasus, it was moving slowly and silently again and it was very high up. The size of the object matched our other sightings perfectly, there was no difference between any of the sightings. This leads me to believe that this is not a one off occurrence.

Could there still be some kind of secret military satellite system still in use up there? But as I have said before, why haven't we or for that matter any astronomers noticed it before? Or if they have, why have they not seen it more often?

A call from a lady, who I'll call B, witnessed the exact same thing at 2.00AM, on 12th October 1999. "It was one of those night's were you can't get to sleep and while me and my husband were waiting for Jerry Springer to start, I decided I'd go for a look at the stars. It was pretty clear and there was plenty of stars about. I noticed, what I thought was a faint satellite, travelling in a Easterly direction, I think, slowly above me. As I stared, I thought, that is no satellite! It was three lights, in a kind of triangle formation, I'd say the back two were about ½ - 1 inch apart, while the distance to the front one was about 2 inches. I ran and got my binoculars, looking through them, the image appeared to be upside down. I looked up again with normal eyesight. The object/s were moving ever so slowly, I must have seen it for a good 10 minutes. There was no flashing lights or noise, the object/s moved, as if in relation to each other."

Darren, also passed this e-mail onto me a couple of days later, "I had received a call from a salesman in Liverpool who claimed to have seen three white star light objects in the sky, as he describes them as being in an isosceles triangle. The date was Tuesday 5th October and the time was approximately 10.00PM. They appeared to be very high in altitude and appeared to be moving "through" the constellation of Cassiopeia and onto Pegasus. The witness called me because he thought they might have been satellites and wanted to know what type of satellites fly in formation."

Since compiling this report, I have had a couple of emails from America. This was their response:

"Hello guys in UK; Wanted you to know of previous sightings, East/West coast of US previously in 1997 and l999.

I hope you find this information interesting and useful...........

A few years before this a rash of sightings occuned and was viewed by both East and West coast observers. The West coast sighting were reported to news groups.

One correspondent produced TLE (Two Line Element) used to track satellites which all of us used to monitor and insure what we saw were not satellites. Well, the these TLEs did matched most observations, and they came from NASA but were not listed in the publicized database covering 24000 orbiting objects (Downloaded From The Internet).

Earlier this year, a NBC UK special played NASA video which showed the triad as viewed from the shuttle (Again NASA Video). The triad again overflew Sacramento/CA. On one of these passes the above report was generated. I personally viewed the group on one of these passes from in Sacramento; during that observation, two vehicles remained in fixed positions while the third move around relative to the group. They were NOT tethered as per the report by Dr Sky's posting or the previous comments reported to our private group by our NASA interface (White Cloud Type Satellite). The same observation was made by observers to the news groups, that is, relative movement"

Peter B. Davenport, Director
National UFO Reporting Center

Here is the second e-mail from National UFO Reporting Center, again in America:

Gentlemen,

I recently received a communication from Mr. Roger Scherrer, in which he included your message regarding the three lights you have witnessed on several occasions in the night sky over the UK.

I cannot be certain, of course, but I believe that you may be looking at what our Center has come to assume are three satellites flying in formation. We believe they are part of a U. S. Navy project, which is designed to enhance the resolution of the imaging process we presume they are designed to perform.

I believe you will find in the database on our web site a number of similar entries by witnesses in the U. S. We have received many such reports from seemingly qualified observers, who have found the formation to be noteworthy, since it is seen on subsequent nights, and the lights are in the same formation.

Your message indicates that one, or more, of the three lights you have observed seemed to shift position in the formation. If that is, in fact, the case, obviously the objects are not satellites. However, we have heard similar reports from other witnesses, which suggest to us that this aspect of a sighting may be a result of mistaken perception, based on various conditions.

In closing, a similar phenomenon occurred during July and August 1996. At that time, a well known journalist and astronomer from the Toronto (Canada) Star, Mr. Terence Dickinson, investigated the phenomenon, and was able to identify it as a U. S. Navy project with satellites flying in formation. I only assume that what witnesses have observed recently is due to a similar project. The project in 1996 was called the "NOSS" Project; I do not know what the acronym stands for.

If you have any further questions about the phenomenon, please feel free to contact our Center at your convenience. Conversely, if you discover an alternative explanation for the phenomenon, we would be grateful if you would share your findings with us.

Thank you for you interest in the matter!

Cordially,

Peter B. Davenport, Director
National UFO Reporting Center

Here is yet another email from someone who has witnessed the Transparent Triangle on the South coast of England, in a place called Havant, which is in Hampshire.

Anthony contacted me to find out about the sighting we had witnessed. He had been told that we witnessed a triangular formation of lights travelling across the sky from a Northwesterly direction heading Southeast. On the 15.04.01, he filmed a triangular formation crossing the sky at around 9.50pm as they were moving from North to South. He managed to film them for over 4 minutes before they went out of view, throughout the sighting they did not deviate at all from the formation. He sent me some stills from the video footage of the formation that he witnessed.........

So now it looks as if we are at a dead end again, Satellite or not Satellite, what do you think?

What do you make of these e-mail's, coincidence or what?

Was this the same object seen by all the witnesses on the same night?

Did the Transparent Triangle travel the full length of Great Britain then make its way to France? Was this the same object seen in America?

As far as we can tell the NOSS project is finished unless of course the government is telling lies......... and that won't be the first time, Will it?

Only time will, hopefully, tell! I hope you all enjoyed this report and as usual, I'll keep you updated on any further sightings or updates.

Here are a few more links to find more information about the NOSS............