Great Balls Of Fire - 24.02.99
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)
All pictures, drawings and text are copyrighted and if you want to use any of this material you should contact us at:
Now just before I start, I must just stress to you all, I do not believe in leading witnesses. They must tell me what they have seen in their own words,
without any provocation from me. Investigating UFO's is serious stuff and it's hard enough to get proof for some of our cases, let alone make it up! If I,
or any of my colleagues were to lead a witness, where would serious UFOlogy be today?
It seems strange that almost 50 witnesses have seen something and yet the MOD, RAF Waddington, Humberside Police and Humberside Airport has not. As the MOD
states, "We have looked through our sighting report files and can confirm that we received no other reports of "UFO" sightings for 24th February from
anywhere in the North of England, and we are satisfied that there is no corroborating evidence to suggest that the United Kingdoms airspace was breached
by unauthorised military aircraft."
Sean Tierney
Monday 22nd February 1999, had millions of people across the United Kingdom and mainland Europe looking up towards the skies. They could see a once in a
lift time event, Venus and Jupiter merging during a unique planetary alignment. This triggered scores of "UFO" reports as the two planets became one to
produce a dazzling night time effect. Two days late however, and with both planets still clearly visible, My family and I witnessed another unusual sight
in the night sky and as you'll hear, we were not the only ones.........
We, My son Sean, My girlfriend Vicki and I arrived at my son, Sean's, school, Archbishop Thurstan, on Wednesday 24th February 1999, for an parents evening.
The School is positioned in the East part of Hull, on the Greatfield Estate.
It was a clear cold night, with a 3/4 moon lighting everything around, you could clearly see the Plough and Orion's belt, there was not one cloud in sight.
I turned around to the Northwest and pointed out the conjunction of the Planets to my son, I also told him that it would be another eighty three years
before they would line up like this again.
Vicki shouted, "Sean, look at that!" I immediately turned round and looked up and said, "Its just plane", Vicki replied, "Not that, this!", and pointed
lower down. Sure enough there were two balls of light, slowly moving from our right to our left. I then looked behind me, the planets were still in the
same place, so nobody can say we mistook them for what we were seeing now. I glanced down at my watch, it was 6.24 PM.
While Vicki, Sean looked at the balls of light, I searched the skies for clues. I could see three high-flying passenger jets, the navigation lights, the
fuselage and the wings were all visible. I could make all this detail out on these craft so high up, but I could not hear or see anything between these
balls of light, which are much lower down.
The one on the left was in the 9 o'clock position, while the other one was about two to three inches away from it, in the four o'clock position. Both balls
were a bright white headlight, type of colour, the one on the right had a reddish glow on the right hand side of it, a bit like a crescent of a New Moon.
There was no noise, no jet stream, nothing. We could not make out if these lights belonged to one or were two separate objects. At one point it seemed to
rise up and then move off to the left, heading in a Northerly direction. We watched it for a good six minutes before we lost sight of them, due to the
brightness of some street lights nearby.
Vicki and I, have been Investigators with the Hull UFO Society for about six years now, and what we saw that night was not planets, meteors, balloons or
aircraft.
When we got back home, my answer machine was flashing, sure enough somebody else had seen what we ourselves had just witnessed. The witness lives in the
Marfleet Lane area of Hull, which is about 5 minutes away from Sean's School. The witness states, "We saw two UFO's, 600 - 1000 ft up, we saw them from
Hedon Road moving towards Greatfield, (Which is were we where.) Tower Grange Police Station, (Which is were we saw it heading.) and then we lost sight of
them heading up towards the Hornsea area."
The next day I joined a phone in on Radio Humberside,
I told them about the previous nights sighting's and what we had seen. No sooner as I had been on
the radio and replaced my handset, my phone did not stop ringing for the next 3 hours.
The first caller was from Pathian Road, again, on the Greatfield
Estate, he and a couple of neighbours who also witnessed this thing at 6.30pm, heading off in a Northerly direction.
As soon as I replaced my handset, it rang again, this time it was a lady who was driving home from Safeways, with a friend via the Hedon by-pass, She saw
it at 6.30pm and said, "It was not a plane, but it looked like the light in front was towing the light behind!"
My next witness was from the Cleethorpes area, she describes, "Two diamond Shapes with blue lights on the underside of it." She also informs me that she,
"Had a 35 mm camera, and decided to try and take some pictures of the object."
Well, here are the photographs she took.(Right) As you can see nothing seems to have come out except a couple of strange coloured shapes. I'll tell
you more about these later.
My next caller was from Grimsby, he saw the same two balls of light with one difference, the gap between the balls of light was not measured in inches,
but he compared it to the size of two double decker buses. This witness confirms the time of the sighting at 6.26pm and also confirms the flight path of
the object from Grimsby to Cleethorpes and then onto Hull.
The calls kept coming in, but from now on, they all seem to have a slight twist to them as the time varies to ours. This does not mean to say that they
have not seen something, whether it's the same object as ours or not, only time and a good bit of investigation will tell.
"9.00pm" said my next caller from Easington. He described the same two lights, "Moving slowly from West to East, with about a 1½ - 2 inches gap between
both of the lights. They were both yellow whitish in colour, no flashing lights and they seemed to move around the coastline. It was very strange indeed!"
Back to Cleethorpes again, a man phoned me to say, "Two helicopters or planes, Orange - Yellowy in colour, were moving about 1000 ft in the air. I also
saw what I can only describe as portholes, 10 or 12 of the things, but this still could not be a plane because the portholes appeared to be in the wings
of the object!"
My next caller was from Flamborough, She told me that her husband and herself had seen the very same object, objects, two weeks earlier. They described,
and I quote, "Two lights moving towards us, no sound was audible and there seemed to be nothing joining the two lights together. Further out over the
Humber, we could clearly see a military plane in the distance, we could make out all of the features of this aircraft so far away, but not on the Balls
of light. It was very strange indeed!"
A caller from Willerby, in Hull tells me, "At 6.30 - 7.00pm, I witnessed four lights moving from West to the East in very close formation, they were about
1 - 2 inches apart. I took my pair of binoculars, they are 7 - 15 times magnification, all I could see of the lights was a distorted glow, even with full
magnification!"
Over at Patrington, a young lady says, "I witnessed two white lights in the sky 3 - 4 weeks ago, they were very low down. The strangest thing was that
there was no noise! It was a beautiful clear night, and before you say anything, this was nothing to do with the planets conjunction."
Across to Bricknell Avenue in Hull, "It was 9.15pm, what I saw was massive. There was no sound and at first I thought it was a balloon. It was white and
round in shape, almost disc shaped. I'd estimate it to be about as big as a bus. It was approximately 1000 ft in the air and travelling about 40 m.p.h.
I witnessed it for about 2 - 3 minutes."
Meanwhile over at Thorngumbald, my next witness told me, "I was out jogging at about 9.10pm. It was a clear night, and as I was running, I was looking up
at the stars. As I looked up, I happened to see something moving, 200 - 300 yards above my head. I stopped and looked up at it for about five minutes.
There was no shape to it, no sound, no flashing lights, NOTHING!"
"This object was not a plane, blimp, nor helicopter, it was just moving too slowly. I then started to get scared and ran off, glancing backwards
occasionally. From What I could make out the lights were green, red, but mainly a non - flashing, blinding white light. It was about 80 - 100 ft across
from light to light. It moved off in a Southerly direction and at one point it seemed to backtrack on itself as though it was searching for something!"
"At 6.45pm, I saw a couple of strange objects through my binoculars" A Cleethorpes man reports. "I thought it was a Chinook helicopter or something
similar because I could make out several, of what I thought were windows, there seemed to be a row of white lights, apart from the end one which was
green in colour. The only thing is, it seemed to be travelling too slow to be an aircraft of any kind, and there was virtually no sound, apart from a
slight hum. That's the thing I can't understand, helicopters are very noisy and so are planes that travel at that kind of speed!"
A call from a very nervous professional person describes, "I was in my car on the way to work approaching the Ganstead roundabout, on the outskirts of
Hull, at about 9 - 9.10pm, I could see it was a clear night, when I happened to see two white lights about 3 inches apart, moving very slowly. The lights
were like a bright light bulb in brightness. They seemed too far apart to be a plane and there was no flashing lights. By the time I drove off the
roundabout, pulled up and got out of my car, the object had disappeared!"
At about the same time, another witness, over two miles away in the Hedon Road area, stopped her car, got out and describes seeing, "Two lights moving,
very slowly, very low down. There was no sound or vapour trails. It was about 9.10 - 9.15pm, we could see one red flashing light and three or four white
non flashing lights on the side of the object, we thought that these were windows! The white lights looked to be about as bright as a cars dipped
headlights. It seemed to be moving towards the Thorngumbald area."
As soon as we received these sightings, Vicki and I sent out Sighting Report Forms, with Stamped addressed envelopes to all the witnesses. Now all we had
to do was wait for all this information to come back to us. In the meantime, I wrote several letters off to RAF Waddington, Humberside Airport and the
Police to see if we could rule out the possibility of aircraft. Whether or not we would get replies is another thing!
A week or so later, I had a reply from RAF Waddington. They tell me that, "I have checked with our Air Traffic Control and unfortunately they have nothing
logged, (Not that they'd tell us anyway!) Although they operate a 24 hour shift system, they are not controlling unless they are notified of air traffic
in our air space. We always log any reports that we receive, and they are passed onto the Ministry Of Defence "UFO Desk". We have forwarded a copy of
your letter to them, so they should acknowledge your letter. They will check known aircraft movements in the area, generally to eliminate all
possibilities, and investigate any other factors that may be relevant."
Meanwhile, sightings were still coming in even after I'd sent all the witness forms out. A phone call from a young lady in Hull, who did not want to fill
out a sightings report form, confirms, "I saw two balls of whitish coloured lights, hovering just above the rooftops on Wednesday 24th February at
6.45pm. The balls of light were at the twenty five minutes past eleven kind of angle, they were headlight in brightness, there were no flashing lights,
it was a very clear night and I could see, what I thought to be a helicopter above it. This sighting had nothing to do with the planets conjunction, as
that was behind me!"
Not all callers believe that they have seen a UFO, extraterrestrial or not! Some of the callers were confusing the sightings with the conjunction of the
planets, while others were convinced that the sighting was "Two Anti Collision lights on a plane", says a caller from Priory Road, Hull. "The lights were
very low down over the other side of the river", claims an Aviation Freak, ( His Word's Not Mine!), "Both lights were one and the same craft, a
helicopter, I think, about 1000 - 1500 ft high." When I asked him about there being no noise connected to any of the sightings, he replied, "There would
have been noise, no one would have heard it because of the noise from the city!" If that is so, Why is it everyone can hear the Police helicopter and other planes?
Another explanation for these sightings, according to a caller from Barton-on-Humber, "Is that the two lights were that of Two F117 Stealth Aircraft
lying in formation!" But if that was so, according to several witnesses statements, "The object, objects were moving very slowly" I think if these lights
were any type of aircraft, it was certainly travelling too slowly to stay air born and it would have fallen from the sky.
On the 4th March 1999, I had a reply from Humberside Airport. It states........ "Dear Mr Tierney, I refer to your letter dated 2th February 1999. Humberside
ATC were not working any traffic in the areas you indicate between 18.20 and 18.30 hrs on 24th February 1999."
Here is a couple of more calls from Hull, "It was a clear night and while we were out looking at the planets, two strange balls of white light moved from
the west to the east, very slowly. It was definitely not a plane, helicopter, shooting star or even the MIR Space station."
This next sighting was seen a day before ours, "It was Tuesday 23rd February", my next witness tells me, "I saw two car headlight type, white balls of
light. They were each about the size of a two pence piece, spread apart by about 2 - 3 inches. There were no flashing lights that you would normally
associate with aircraft. The strangest thing was that the two lights were in the six o clock position, then they seemed to rotate anticlockwise to the
quater past nine position. They entered a cloud and I lost sight of them. There was no noise and I was looking towards the East. It's the strangest thing
I've seen in my life!" This witness did not want to fill out a sighting report form and again wished to remain anonymous.
Yet another anonymous caller describes, "Two white balls of light heading towards the East, very slowly, there was no noise and there was nothing visible
in between the lights, it was moving very slowly, so slow in fact, I thought it might fall from the sky! One more detail which I think cannot be explained
away as a plane, helicopter or blimp, is how the object turned from a 90 degree angle to 180 degrees, so fast and smooth, it defies a logical explanation!"
About two weeks after the sighting I had a phone call from the Humberside Police Sergeants, He said and I quote, "All we do is log all sightings reported
to us. They are then passed on to the MOD, I can give you their telephone number if you want it?" I replied, "I already have it!" I also asked him, "Did
you know we have had over 40+ sightings of this "UFO" from all over the region now, everyone cannot be wrong!" "Oh well!" Said the Sergeant, "It's been passed on now, so
they'll deal with it." This was the way the telephone conversation ended, to me, he seemed "Programmed" in what to say!
The very next day I received this letter from the Ministry Of Defence, it reads: "The MOD examines any reports of "Unidentified Flying Objects" it receives
solely to establish whether what was seen might have some Defence significance... It continues... Unless there is evidence of a potential threat to the
United Kingdom from a external military source, and to date no UFO report has revealed such evidence, we do not attempt to identify the precise nature of
each sighting reported to us."
"We believe that rational explanations, such as aircraft lights or natural phenomena, could be found for them if resources were diverted for this purpose,
but it is not the function of the MOD to provide this kind of aerial service, it would be an inappropriate use of Defence resources if we were to do so."
"With regard to your particular observation, I have looked through our sighting report files and can confirm that we received no other reports of "UFO"
sightings for the 24th February from anywhere in the North of England, and we are satisfied that there is no corroborating evidence to suggest that the
United Kingdoms airspace was breached by unauthorised military aircraft."
I wrote back to the MOD on the 17.3.99 asking more questions,
Dear Gaynor Smith,
Thank you for your letter dated 8th March and thank you for your quick reply. I think though, you may have just responded a bit too quick! The two balls
of light, I wrote to you about was seen over 9 different towns on the night of the 24th February 1999. Several witness described seeing two diamond shaped
craft, travelling silently side by side, while others just witnessed either two or four lights, depending on where they were at the time of the sighting.
If it is of no Defence significance and nothing entered our airspace, so you tell me, then how come all these witnesses seem to have seen the same object,
either lights or a structured craft?
Since the night in question, I have had 40+ witnesses now come forward, most of them willingly filling out sighting report forms, while a few other members
of the public just phoned to tell me about their sighting. How can 40+ people be wrong? That is, 40+ people who don't know each other, 40+ people who live in
different regions of the county, only I know the full picture of what everyone has seen.
RAF Waddington informs me that they have checked with our Air Traffic Control and unfortunately they have nothing logged. Although they operate a 24 hour
shift system, they are not controlling unless they are notified of air traffic in our air space.
A letter from Humberside Airport also informs me, Humberside Air Traffic Control were not working any traffic in the areas I indicated.
I did receive a reply from the Police, not in form of a letter, but a phone call, he would not tell me where the Police Helicopter was on the night in
question, all he said was, "We log all sightings, then send them on to the M.O.D."
So lets look back at what we have now. Nothing reported from RAF Waddington, Humberside Airport also reports nothing, the Police are very vague and there
is you telling me that "We received no other reports of "UFO" sightings for 24 February from anywhere in the North of England, and we are satisfied that
there is no corroborating evidence to suggest that the United Kingdom s airspace was breached by unauthorised military aircraft."
A couple of things I'd like to point out, Whose to say the United Kingdom's airspace was breached by unauthorised military aircraft, it could have been a
UFO, not necessarily the saucer type!, of some kind. Secondly, how could you receive any calls about this sighting anyway, nobody knows your address let
alone your phone number, I don't think it will come under M in the phone book, do you?
Here is the Ministry Of Defence's reply:
"Dear Mr. Tierney,"
"Thank you for your letter of 17 March."
"Firstly, you have stated that you do not think it surprising that the MOD did not receive any 'UFO' reports from the North of England on 24 February as
our answer phone number is not widely known. You may wish to know that reports from members of the public of sightings are often made to Police stations,
RAF stations and air traffic control centres and are then forwarded to this office. Members of the public also telephone this office direct to report a
sighting but more often than not the reports come from the other sources."
"Regarding your quote from my first letter 'there is no evidence to suggest the UK's airspace was breached by unauthorised military aircraft', I would like
to reiterate that the MOD examines any reports of 'UFOs' it receives only to establish whether what was seen might have some Defence significance. This
means we are concerned only if there is any evidence that the United Kingdom's airspace might have been compromised by hostile or unauthorised foreign
military aircraft."
"Although this office is the MOD's nominated focal point for 'UFO' reports, it is not constituted as a 'UFO' information bureau. We look at reports as part
of our normal duties to seek to establish whether a sighting might represent something which is of Defence concern. The MOD is not aware of any evidence
which might substantiate the existence of extraterrestrial craft or life forms and no threat has been discerned which has been attributed to a 'UFO'."
"Yours Sincerely"
"Gaynor South"
Just when I thought it couldn't get any stranger, a call, my 48th concerning this case, comes from a woman in Bridlington, who tells me, "On Wednesday
24th February, at 9.05pm, I saw what I can only describe as "Two Diamond Shaped Shadows", they seemed to be integrated. They were very big, there were
about 4 to 6 lights between the objects. At first I thought it was an aircraft, but these were that close together, they were almost touching. I
telephoned the Coast Guard to see if he saw them. He replied, "I saw nothing as I was looking the other way!"
Here are several other witness drawings from the same night............
If this is so, then how come I have witnesses from Grimsby, Cleethorpes, Hull, Withernsea and Bridlington, all not knowing each other, all seeing an
actual structured "Diamond Shaped Craft". As for most of the witnesses seeing just "Balls of Light", they might have been looking at the same "Diamond
Shaped Craft", but where too far away to see the structure or even witnessed it on the wrong angle to see the detail of it/them.
Just before I finish, let me take you back to the photos taken from the witness in Cleethorpes. On Monday 8th March, we took the negatives to
a friend of ours and manager of a camera shop, he looked them over and noticed the discoloration and told us, "This can only happen in one of two ways;
the first is by x-ray radiation, the type found in x-ray machines, Hospitals, Airports, etc. The second and most likely cause, I think, is that someone
has opened the back of the camera at one time, which in some cameras, resets the counter to zero. The person has then taken pictures until the film
seems to wind back prematurely, the back is then opened again, and as the light floods the film, the image is polluted and you will get an image like
this."
"The blue and pink one, is, I'm afraid, an exposure of the grips on the bottom of the negative. I'm sorry, I was really looking forward to
seeing these photos, but I'm afraid it's all down to over exposure, if there was something there, the image has been lost." A second opinion from another
independent photographer also confirms the exposure of the negatives.
So it looks like we may have lost the photographic evidence, but who needs it! While it is nice to have video and photographic evidence, alongside
sighting report forms, it is not as strong as people from opposite sides of the county or even world, sighting the very same object, especially on the
same night!
As long as people are willing to come forward and have their say, the truth cannot be hid away.
Remember:
Look Up To The Skies,
See Something,
Report It!!!
© Copyright
Click the links below to see more case investigations from your local, friendly UFO Society.........
The Scarborough Sighting - 15.02.01
The Transparent Triangle - 04.09.99
Great Balls Of Fire - 24.02.99
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Sean Tierney |
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