Sgt. Bobby Ball recalled something which Halt did not mention, that the objects appeared to be searching for something, "to me it looked like a grid search, like they were boxing off an area and looking for something. That was the thought that hit me right away and it's stayed with me over the years." Searching for what exactly? The bases' nuclear stockpile perhaps?
Halt managed to capture this amazing moment on audio tape. The men are clearly stressed and sound in awe:
Lt. Colonel Halt: 3.15: Now we've got an object about ten degrees directly south...
Sgt. Nevilles: There's one to the left
Lt. Colonel Halt: 10 degrees off the horizon, and the ones to the north are moving, one's moving away from us.
Sgt. Nevilles: It's moving out fast
Lt. Colonel Halt: They're moving out fast.
Sgt. Ball: There's one on the right chasing away too.
Lt. Colonel Halt: Yeah, they're both heading north. H..h...here he comes from the south; he's coming in toward us now!
Sgt. Ball: Shit.
Lt. Colonel Halt: Now were observing what appears to be a beam coming down to the ground!
Sgt. Ball:...Colours...Shit.
Lt. Colonel Halt: This is unreal!
John Burroughs (see 25/26 Dec. page) was sleeping, but suddenly woke up. He thought the UFO might have returned, and the thought was obviously troubling him. He explained exactly what happened when he returned to the forest on the documentary "Unsolved Mysteries: Bentwaters UFO", "I woke about about 3[AM] in the morning. For what ever reason, I thought something may be happening. I don't know why, I just woke up and thought something had come back. it was a gut feeling. I went ahead and got up, I went back to the base", (John Burroughs lived off-site). John Burroughs made his way to the into Rendlesham forest, into the area where the vehicles were parked.
"All of a sudden, a couple of blue transparent lights appeared in the sky. One of them broke towards us. Passing the light-alls, they came on. It passed through the open window on the truck, going off into the distance, and the light-alls went out... the only time the light-alls were working when I saw them was when the light passed them. I have no idea what caused the light-alls to come on and off like that, apart from the blue light flying past."
It was now 4AM on the 28 December. The men were cold and tired. They had even managed to stumble into a ditch, so they were also muddy. The object(s) were now thousands of feet up in the sky, there was little anyone could do. They decided to return to base. Halt made a final note for his tape, explaining that the objects were still beaming down lights to the ground:
Lt. Colonel Halt: 3.30: And the objects are still in the sky, although the one to the south looks like it's loosing a little bit of altitude. We're turning around and heading back toward the base. The object to the...the object to the south is still beaming down lights to the ground.
[Break in tape]
Lt. Colonel Halt: 0:400 Hours one object still hovering over the Woodbridge base at about 5-10 degrees off the horizon. Still moving erratic and similar lights beaming down as earlier.
The photos which Nevilles had taken of the landing site came out fogged, according to the bases' photography lab. Although Halt suspects that the photos were swapped for some blank/blackened photographs and handed back to him deliberately.
Source: outer-space-guests.blogspot.com
