Nether Poppleton LIT's
Background
Having first appeared in the UK daily newspaper The Sun, video footage of two undetermined lights in the sky ( LITS ) and the following report, was again being treated as evidence of aliens visiting the earth by some ‘experts’
Newspaper Article
Closing time encounters of thirst kind
By ROBIN PERRIE
Published: 27 Jan 2009
BOOZERS rushed from their pub to see four UFOs overhead — and were then plunged into darkness when the power mysteriously cut out.
Landlord Keith Gelderd and his customers watched in amazement as the glowing, spherical shapes floated silently in the night sky.
Dad-of-one Keith, 53, said: “If I live to be 100 I’m sure I will never see anything like it again. At first there were two spheres hovering in the distance. When they started to move they made no sound.
“There were seven or eight of us watching. As they moved towards us two more appeared.
“They were all in a line, then one moved 180 degrees around the one next to it. As they left all the electricity went off and you could hear alarms. Then it came back on again.
“None of us was drunk. What were they? Flying saucers?”
Bricklayer Jason Mitchinson, 45, spotted the UFOs first outside the Lord Nelson in the village of Nether Poppleton, near York, last Thursday.
He said: “It was the strangest thing I’ve seen. They were an orange flame colour with an outer ring that glowed.
“They just cruised along. They stopped over the pub, then headed for Scarborough. When they turned it was tight, at 90 degrees, not like a plane.”
The pub is close to RAF Linton-on-Ouse, where Prince William did some of his flying training.
But the base said it had no aircraft flying that night and saw nothing as its radar was turned off. Police had no other reports.
Video footage can be seen at
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/ufos/article2175249.ece
UPIA Involvement
Contacted by a TV company in relation to the case the UPIA were asked to visit the location and discuss with witnesses at the pub the events which led to the footage being filmed.
The full visit by the UPIA would be filmed and appear on the Richard and Judy show on Tuesday 10th February from 6pm on the Watch Channel.
UPIA were given 24 hours to research this case, and our initial information consisted, as previously mentioned, of an article in 'The Sun' newspaper, wonderfully titled 'Close Encounters of the Thirst Kind', and some highly dubious and poor quality mobile phone video footage.
Not the best of cases to react too, but given the test of the UPIA’s character, we agreed to take part.
Pre Visit
With only 24 hours to spare before leaving for Nether Poppleton ( NP ), and having viewed the footage on many occasions, as well as hours of additional footage, not dissimilar to the NP footage. It became apparent that what was witnessed was some form of Balloon or UFOlogies current bane, the Chinese lantern.
So to acquire information regarding the area on the evening the footage was recorded. January 23rd 2009 from 1030pm.
Contact was made with the Landlord and witness of the Lord Nelson Pub, who offered basic information regarding his involvement.
Local News sources were called including, the York Press, Minster FM, BBC York and BBC online all reported no knowledge of the event.
Poppleton Villages Residents Association - Neighbourhood Management Unit. Poppleton Local Parish Council. Meteorological Office and the Sun Newspaper were also contacted, the Sun the only outlet not offering any information.
The Case
Upon arriving at the site, measurements and other information we gathered, and we proceeded to interview 4 of the 7 witnesses to the LITS.
The basics of the event were, at 1030pm, principal witness Jason Mitchinson, whilst smoking outside saw two balls of light travelling towards the pub in an Easterly direction. Slowing over the pub, he ran in to tell regulars, a total of 7 came out and watch the LITS travel silently in a South South Easterly direction. The ‘Golden Spheres’ were now 4 in number, in a straight line. Numbers 2 and 4 traversed and altered position.
The footage was recorded on a mobile phone and apparently one witness had contact details for a Sun reporter, who was immediately contacted.
During questioning highly questionable discrepancies in witness reports about crucial aspects of the case started to appear. Timescales involving the alleged power failure in the area coinciding directly to the lights halting over the head, to an hour later, to a minor flicker were our main interest at this point. Eon power were contacted, offering the information that due to weather conditions previously, workmen did perform an operation causing a short lapse of power locally, 45 minutes after the LITS were witnessed.
Comments in the bar from other regulars were offered claiming the witness to be a liar; these of course were discounted by the UPIA.
So over the following few hours, information was gleaned from as many sources as possible. 2 witnesses did not turn up and the landlord seemed to be revelling in the glamour of the event.
Pre Conclusion
Given all available details, witness testimonies, footage, similar footage, UPIA experiments regarding Chinese lanterns and the work of UPIA investigators Paul Reeves, Philip and Della Bordley, Kirst D’Raven and Steve Mera.
We were able to offer a pre conclusion to the event, that what was witnessed was indeed Chinese Lanterns. The witnesses would not however, accept this answer.
Jason in particular, now quite drunk became very abusive.
Post visit information.
Additional contacts were made to officialdoms, and Phil Bordley was able to find information extremely important to the case.
Meteorology
Location: York UK
Time: 21.00 Hours
Wind Direction: SE
Wind Speed: 10.1mph Gusting up to 20.4mph (9.1m/s) Force 2
Air Temp: 5.8C (42.4F)
Visibility: 5.0km: Overcast 250ft-8000ft
Pressure: 1015 MSL (mb)
Trend: Rising
Description: Dark, Overcast, Light Wintry Scattered Rainfall at 1.8mm
Tea Lights
So if our initial thoughts were correct and Chinese lanterns had been witnessed, given direction and average wind speed, we looked at what information could be acquired regarding their fuel source, the tea light.
Packaging details claim that most Tea Lights last 4-6 hours...
I'm sure that some last longer than others, depending on the type of wax or material used & the length of the initial wick. But a high percentage of Tea Lights are said to burn around 4 Hours. Therefore on an average of Wind Speed being 15mph and for a duration of four hours, the balloons could have had a maximum traversity of 60 Miles. Therefore due to Wind Direction being SE, puts them in a launch area of Scunthorpe / Lingston Upon Hull. Of course Minimum Traversity could be anything from a mile away.
Additional
Through the power of the internet, additional sources gleaned valuable information, proving the case; in the UPIA’s eyes was a hoax.
The first tad of information was from a York newspaper in 2008, note the users name and location:
AdmiralN, Nether Poppleton says...
4:27pm Mon 20 Oct 08
Maybe you could sue the council; I mean who knows what sort of damage a 5ft piece of tissue paper could do to a stone building :-)
Admiral N? The pub was the lord Nelson, Secondly an addition to the article online at the Sun website offered us final piece of information required.
Posted by: Becky9
I live in Nether Poppleton myself, and saw 2 lights to start with then another two, I can confirm that someone who lives near myself were letting off lit lanterns which were rising up into the sky (like miniature hot air balloons).
Added to the researched information, we were informed the Sun newspaper had paid a large sum of money both to the main witness and the person who videoed the event, and put a 4 figure sum behind the bar at the pub.
Also Cactus TV also paid a fee for the information and involvement, and put a free bar on at the pub on the UPIA’s day of visiting.
Conclusion
The UPIA were able to acquire a lot of information before and after the event. Given our findings, areas pointing to our conclusions were:
Discrepancies amongst witnesses reports when interviewed separately.
Large sums of money involving the media.
A witnesses direct contact to a Sun reporter.
The Suns high profile involvement in UFO related stories at that time.
Findings in local and national newspapers, directly associated to the area.
Contacts with Officialdoms, offering no basis to back witnesses claims.
Therefore, we believe the event witnessed was the now common Chinese lantern, we also believe that this event was preplanned by at least one witness, but others may have been privy to the plans, other witnesses had no knowledge, adding to the witnesses of the event. Money was earned by one witness in particular, who we believe to be the instigator of the reports. The Pub also made a significant profit from the period.
We believe this case was a sighting of Chinese lanterns, a hoax involving some of the witnesses
