1977 Broad Haven Class Said They Saw A UFO
For 40 years it's been a mystery in the small Welsh town of Broad Haven.A yellow, cigar shaped craft is believed to have landed in a field next to Broadhaven Primary School.
It was one of a wave of sightings in the area in 1977, dubbed the Dyfed Triangle.
A group of 14 children playing football saw the craft and a silver creature.
The headmaster, Ralph Llewellyn, thought their claims were just a practical joke, but the pupils stuck to their story and even handed a petition in to the local police station demanding the incident be investigated.
None of the teachers believed the children and so the headmaster separated them and got them to draw what they saw. There were slight variations, but what they drew was basically the same.
David Davies was one of the pupils and was 10 at the time and heard reports of pupils seeing flying saucers throughout the day, David still clearly remembers what the craft he saw looked like:
He explained:
It was pearlescent silver grey, approximately 40' long, torpedo, cigar shaped, with an upper domed section that covered the central third of the vehicle which was topped with red pulsating light. The sighting only lasted a couple of seconds. It popped up and then went back behind a tree.
But the sightings weren't just limited to the school children, and the area around Broad Haven soon became known for its UFO activity.
On February 17, 1977, the same craft was claimed to have been seen by some teachers at the school and by some dinner ladies, one of whom saw a creature make its way onto the craft.
On April 18, 1977, the owner of the Haven Fort Hotel in Little Haven claims to have seen an upside down saucer in a neighboring field with 2 humanoid creatures.
Many suspected that the military might have been involved, as there were a number of high security bases nearby.
Author Neil Spring recently attended a village meeting where they discussed new revelations that there had, in fact, been a military base nearby which could have been launching an experimental airplane.
However, members of that original 1977 class still maintain they saw a UFO.
There were no alien invasions or tales of abduction, yet a UFO sighting by a group of Pembrokeshire school children remains one of the most famous cases in Wales.
I was a natural born skeptic so after the bell rang I decided to go to the area that the children said they had seen it, he told BBC Wales.
Mr. Davies said he did not feel afraid, more in awe and wonderment, although he admitted he had a strange desire to run away.
David Davies said UFOs has been a subject which has gone on to dominate his life.
Mr. Davies described the days that followed as a wild rollercoaster.
It went crazy with the media and it was difficult to settle down and actually think about what we had seen.
2 months later, Rosa Granville, who ran the Haven Fort Hotel in nearby Little Haven, described seeing an object which looked like an upside down saucer and 2 faceless humanoid creatures with pointed heads.
She said so much heat came off it, her face felt burned.
There was light coming from it and flames of all colors. Then the creatures came out of these flames, that's what I don't understand, she said.
When she visited the field she said there was 2" of burned grounds.
Ms. Granville said the incident left her agitated and disturbed.
A number of theories have been put forward to explain the sightings.
Then, MP for Pembroke, Nicholas Edwards contacted the Ministry of Defence after being inundated with UFO sightings.
Flight lieutenant Cowan, an officer from RAF Brawdy, visited Ms Granville's hotel and examined the site, but could find no evidence of a landing.
He joked:
Should a UFO arrive at RAF Brawdy we will charge normal landing fees.
In his report, he mentioned the possibility that a local prankster was at work and the description of aliens fitted exactly the type of protection suit that would have been issued in the event of a fire at one of the local oil refineries.
This fits in with the account of businessman Glyn Edwards, who in 1996 revealed he wandered around the area in a silver suit in 1977 as a prank.
The National Archives also released files which examined UFO sightings across Wales, and the officials who investigated the Broad Haven sightings suspected pranksters.
There is general speculation in the neighborhood that a practical joker may be at work, wrote staff at S4, the government department that investigated sightings at the time.
It was also thought school children could have confused a sewage tank as a UFO, although many were from farming backgrounds and would have been familiar with the machinery.
More recently, a former U.S. Navy sailor said the figure in a silver suit was in fact a member of U.S. military personnel wearing their standard fireproof uniform and the UFOs were new Harrier jets flying over.
To mark 40 years since the sightings, a conference is being held in Broad Haven on Saturday, organised by Swansea UFO Network.
Organizer Emyln Williams said the case started worldwide interest.
Asked if he thought it was genuine, he said:
One child can lie, but can a whole class?
Over 40 years at least one of them might have come forward to say they made it up, but they haven't.
Mr. Williams said there were several sightings the day the children claimed to have seen a UFO, including at Hubberston School in Milford Haven.
That year there was so much happening. It is what we know as a UFO flap, he said.
Mr. Spring moved into a cottage in Broad Haven to get to the bottom of what happened
Mr. Davies said he had always been open minded to the theories which attempted to explain the sightings and at no time had he ever sensationalised his story.
So many people are ridiculed for saying they have seen a UFO, he said, describing his secondary school life as a misery.
I was beaten senseless purely because of what happened to me. It would have been so much easier to take back my story.
He admits UFOs has been a subject that has gone on to dominate his life. At one point I must have had the largest library of books in Wales on the subject.
The moment I heard of this small village plagued by UFO sightings, I was inspired to understand what really happened, Mr. Davies said.
His research uncovered a secret investigation by the military police.
Whilst the government was telling the public they had no records of any unusual activity in the area, privately, officials were so concerned about the UFO sightings in Broad Haven that they asked the military police to conduct a discreet investigation, he said.
Mr. Spring believes local pranksters were behind some of the sightings, but said people emulate what's happening around them and the pranks were inspired by events which had been sincerely reported.
My research showed that there were strange occurrences in Broad Haven long before the incident at the school and for a long times afterwards.
So you can take the children out of the story and you'll still have the story.