Inside The 1977 UFO Sightings In Broad Haven, Wales
It is easy to dismiss UFO sightings that are claimed by a single person, or even a small group of people. In the case of solo encounters, skeptics point to fabrication, delusion, or simple misidentification. Groups can also be written off, perhaps citing a trick of the light or collective hysteria. But when multiple sightings occur in a small area within a short period of time, the story tends to stick in the imagination.
As has been the case for two sightings that took place in Broad Haven, Wales, all the way back in 1977. The encounters — reportedly with a craft containing humanoid creatures that had seemingly landed on Earth — gained national attention, and the BBC interviewed many of those involved. The story also included an investigation by the military, which was ultimately unable to find any evidence to prove the existence of what locals in what became known as "The Welsh Triangle."
A school full of witnesses
Two alien craft sightings occurred in Broad Haven between February and April 1977. The most famous among them happened on February 4, when a total of 14 children at a local school claimed to have seen a 50-foot-long metallic spaceship shaped like a cigar flying around the perimeter of the schoolyard. Some of the children also claimed that the object landed, and silver creatures emerged and began to explore the terrain around the landing site (per WalesOnline).
The children tried to report the strange things they saw over the course of their school day, but teachers didn't take them seriously. Instead, they asked their pupils to draw what they had seen, and each in turn drew a silver object roughly the same shape. At the time, BBC Wales Today spoke to several of the children about what they saw and asked whether it could not have been something else, like a helicopter. One child says no, reasoning that since the land beside the school is private property, no helicopter pilot would land there. In 2017, another one of the children, David Davies, spoke to the BBC about the "cigar-shaped" craft. "My sighting only lasted a couple of seconds. It popped up and then went back behind a tree," he said.
Speaking to WalesOnline, ufologist Emyln Williams shot down some of the proposed explanations. "Because of the trees, a helicopter wouldn't have landed there and it would have been noisy," he said. "Some people think it could have been a military jet that landed there, but again that would have been really noisy. Farm machinery was also suggested, but again that's unlikely because a lot of the boys were from farming backgrounds and were very familiar with that." Indeed, the children seemed assured in their accounts and genuine in terms of how much or how little they saw. "One child can lie, but can a whole class?" Williams asked. "Over 40 years [have passed,] at least one of them might have come forward to say they made it up — but they haven't."
Further sightings
Another Broad Haven local, Rosa Granville, says she saw a UFO craft land in a field next to her hotel in April 1977 . Like some of the schoolchildren, Granville claims she watched the newly landed creatures begin to explore their surroundings.
Her recollections sound like something from a horror movie (via the BBC): "There was so much heat — I was by the window — my 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. I shouted 'Hello, what are you doing there' — they looked faceless. I couldn't see their features". But after calling on other people to come and witness the bizarre sight, she returned to find the craft and the creatures were gone. According to Granville, the next morning there were "2 inches of burned grounds." She was left shocked, stunned, and in dire need to convince people of what she had seen.
Fact or fiction?
As the BBC reports, Rosa Granville contacted her local member of Parliament about the sighting, who then reached out to the Ministry of Defence. Flight Lieutenant Cowan, an officer from the local air force base RAF Brawdy, was assigned to investigate the case, but he found no evidence of the strange visitation that Granville described. In a report, Cowan dryly joked: "Should a UFO arrive at RAF Brawdy we will charge normal landing fees and inform you immediately".
The sightings, however, have remained a local legend. In the years since, skeptics have put forward a number of prosaic explanations, including that the UFO the children saw was the top of a sewage tanker truck, and the silver creatures were firefighters. One person who came to be closely associated with the UFO sightings in Broad Haven is a man named Glyn Edwards. In a 1996 Western Mail article, businessman Glyn Edwards took credit for the alleged hoax, saying he was a prankster who in 1977 had walked around the area in a silver suit. Nevertheless, the children who were there that day stand by their accounts.