Wanting to believe
NIGEL WATSON gets an early look at a new 10-part series devoted to the UFO mystery
UFO Conspiracies is the title of the latest TV series that aims to separate fact from fiction and to determine if extraterrestrials are visiting us. It is hosted by Craig Charles, probably best known to FT readers for his role as Lister in the Red Dwarf comedy SF series, and space journalist and astrophysicist Sarah Cruddas. It is set in an investigation hub (a studio) from where the presenters speak to witnesses and experts via a large TV screen. (It’s a shame they don’t actually go outside and check any of the facts for themselves!) Craig is the show’s UFO-believing Mulder, while Sarah plays its moderately sceptical Scully.
I had a chat with Sarah Cruddas, who told me that looking at the stars and space exploration have always been her passions. As for UFOs, she feels the subject has long been stigmatised in the scientific community, and that scientists have tended to avoid it for fear of damaging their careers. Now, after the discovery of exoplanets that orbit virtually every star – much like our own Solar System – it’s much less controversial to argue that there might be intelligent life out there. Furthermore, there are credible UFO witnesses, like military and civilian pilots, who have seen some very exotic things in the sky.
“It’s healthy to be sceptical,” Sarah says, “and we should take a scientific approach to this subject. The Universe is full of mysteries and things we do not know about, so we should be open-minded about UFOs and whether they come from outer space or not. We know so little.
“In the series, Craig is the enthusiastic believer while I look for more scientific evidence for these claims. To find out what is going on, we look at 10 major UFO cases and speak to the witnesses and experts about them.
“We have come a long way over the years since the Kenneth Arnold sighting in 1947 and obtaining evidence for the existence of alien life out there is a matter of when, not if. Even the discovery of very simple life on Mars would change our expectations of more advanced life out there. SETI research is advancing – but will aliens regard us in the same way we regard ants? We cannot even communicate with dolphins, so contact and communication with aliens could be incompatible with us, or would have to be conducted through using maths or other methods that we cannot imagine now.”
The 10-part series features 60-minute episodes on such cases as the Phoenix Lights, Rendlesham Forest, the Alan Godfrey abduction, the Falkirk Triangle and the US Navy leaks. Episode Two, for example, deals with sightings by pilots and looks at why Ireland is a UFO hotspot. The twin themes are neatly combined in the sighting by three separate commercial pilots of a fastmoving light off the west coast of Ireland on 9 November 2018. Similar sightings made by pilots in other parts of the world are also taken into consideration, including the video footage obtained by US Navy pilots in 2004 and by a Chilean coastguard helicopter on 11 November 2014. Ted Roe, of the National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena (NARCAP), claims that encounters like these are not uncommon, but that pilots usually only report such incidents when they retire and no longer have to fear ridicule or other allegations that could ruin their careers.
Ufological talking head Nick Pope pops up and categorically states that such cases remain firmly in the ‘unidentified’ category, even after thorough investigation. Two videos of alleged UFOs over Ireland are followed by an interview with Chris McMurray of the Northern Ireland UFO Society (NUFOIS), who agrees that such incidents cannot be explained. Astronomer Dr Eamonn Ansbro holds nothing back: he says his analysis of UFO data shows that a superior species is operating craft in Earth orbit as part of a surveillance operation!
Adding a sinister government cover-up spin to these sightings, the presenters speak to ‘Simon’, a former NATO air traffic controller, whose image is blurred-out. He wants to stay anonymous because the military is not keen on people revealing information about UFOs, and he reiterates the point that if pilots do speak about them, there are consequences for their careers. Simon thinks there is alien life out there, but rather frustratingly admits he has no evidence for that statement.
Craig and Sarah appear stunned by this evidence and by the experts they talk to, and like them they cannot think of any logical explanations for the sightings, even if there is not enough solid evidence for them to say for certain that we are dealing with extraterrestrial visitors. Yet I would argue that these cases have been rationally explained by David Clarke in this magazine ( FT409:4851) and by the likes of Mike West on his metabunk.org website – but there’s no doubt that including such insights might spoil things for the show’s target audience.
Despite such caveats, the series works well as a beginner’s guide or introduction to the subject, and the presentation is enhanced by dramatic music accompanying suitable video clips and visuals; FT readers might find some of the cases a bit familiar and remain unimpressed by experts astounding us with the idea that ET might be lurking out there and that ‘they’ don’t want us to know what is really going on... In this manner, though, UFO Conspiracies keeps the mystery of the subject glowing like an orb in the night sky to entertain believers and the credulous.
UFO Conspiracies begins on Sky History, 11 January 2022 at 9pm.