The Disappearance of Renee and Andrew Macrae

                                                            Photo by MJ Duford on Unsplash

At the time of writing - 12th November - it is the 49th anniversary of the disappearance of Renee and Andrew Macrae.

There is nothing more frustrating and tragic in the world of true crime than an unsolved disappearance, murder or injustice, especially when a child is involved. The continued anguish for the family and friends of those lost must be absolutely unbearable. This is exactly the scenario here.

Renee Macrae was a Scottish woman who disappeared on 12 November 1976, aged 36 along with her 3-year-old son Andrew, it became the United Kingdom’s longest-running missing persons case and is still unsolved. Recently, in September 2022, William (Bill) MacDowell was found guilty of the murder of Renee and her son. Their bodies have never been found.

Renee lived in Inverness, Scotland and was married to Gordon MacRae, although the couple had separated at the time of her disappearance. They had two sons, 9-year-old Gordon and 3-year-old Andrew. On Friday 12 November 1976, Renee left her home in her BMW car with her sons. She dropped Gordon at her estranged husband’s house and turned towards Perth, saying she was going to visit her sister in Kilmarnock. Neither Renee nor Andrew have ever been seen again. Later the same night, a train driver spotted a burning car in an isolated lay-by on the A9 which turned out to be Renee’s. When the police reached the vehicle, it was burned out and empty except for a rug, stained with blood matching Renee’s blood type.

Despite an extensive search, no further trace of Renee and Andrew MacRae was found, it was concluded that they had been murdered and their bodies hidden. Interestingly, witnesses who had been on the A9 that night reported seeing a man dragging something they thought was a dead sheep not far from the car. Renee was reported to have been wearing a sheepskin coat when she disappeared. Reports also told of a man with a pushchair near Dalmagarry quarry.

As police investigated, more details of Renee’s life emerged. In 1971, Renee began an affair with a man named William (Bill) MacDowell, who was married with two children and worked for Gordon MacRae as an accountant and company secretary. Nobody knew about the affair except Valerie Steventon, Renee’s best friend. Valerie revealed that Renee had not been planning to visit her sister that night, but had actually intended to visit MacDowell, who was Andrew’s biological father. Renee had told her friend about the affair in the spring of 1973, when she had been pregnant with Andrew. According to Steventon, “Renee was completely besotted by Bill”, and he had told her that he had a job in Shetland and had found a house where they could live, which turned out to be untrue. When questioned at the time, MacDowell admitted the affair but denied any involvement in their disappearance. A week after, he was interviewed by journalist Stuart Lindsay and claimed that Renee had called him twice since she went missing. 

During the investigation, DS John Cathcart coordinated the search and after eight months there was a breakthrough. While excavating Dalmagarry quarry he was hit by a strong odour after removing a layer of topsoil. Convinced it was the bodies, Cathcart continued digging, infuriatingly he was told by a superior officer to stop as the bulldozer they were using had to go back to the contractors due to short funds.

With no progress or new lines of inquiry, the case was wound down two years later. However, a 2004 Grampian Television documentary, Unsolved renewed an interest in the case and the investigation was reopened. That same year, Chief Constable Ian Latimer launched a cold case review, which led to £122,000 being spent on an excavation of Dalmagarry quarry in August. Over the course of three weeks, 20,000 tons of earth was excavated and 2,000 trees were removed, but no sign of Renee or Andrew were found. As of August 2006, £250,000 has been spent re-investigating the case.

In recent years, interest has focused on the bodies having been buried under the A9, which was in the middle of upgrading at the time of the disappearance. When retired Inverness motor mechanic Brian MacGregor commissioned a 2006 scan of the road, a geophysicist identified a possible trench with ‘anomalies’ consistent in size with human bodies and Andrew’s missing pushchair … without a hint of interest it seems, a spokeswoman for Northern Constabulary said that after studying aerial photographs taken by the Royal Air Force during the construction of the A9, they were satisfied the bodies were not buried under the road.

In October 2006 Northern Constabulary named a suspect in a report to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, but the Crown Office declared there was insufficient evidence to go to court. MacDowell had never wanted to speak to the media in the years since the disappearances, but broke his silence in a 2004 interview and insisted that he did not murder Renee.

In October 2018 it was reported that Leanach quarry, near to Culloden Battlefield, was being searched by Police Scotland in relation to the case.

During the investigation, police investigated 123 possible sightings of Renee or Andrew, including a similar woman and child seen with a man with a ‘handlebar moustache’. All of these were apparently followed up and eliminated.

Further details more recently emerged of a suspect who had fled to America the day after being interviewed by police. James Taylor claimed that his late friend Sandy Thompson, a senior officer who worked closely with Renee’s contacts and had carried out fieldwork investigating the case, had been sure she was murdered and buried on the A9 near a flyover. Taylor reported his concerns to Police following an appeal for information to mark the 40th anniversary of the case, claiming that Thompson spoke to a foreman in the roads department who had said someone had dug up a section of the A9 on the day Renee disappeared. Taylor recalled: “Sandy said he knew right away when the man looked at it that the woman was dead, that was where she was buried and this man knew far more about it than he was telling.” The man fled to the US the next day before returning to Scotland after the case had gone cold.

Eventually, in 2022, William MacDowell was convicted of the murders of Renee and Andrew MacRae and of attempting to pervert the course of justice following a trial at the High Court of Inverness. Statements were read from witnesses in the case who had since died, including a man named Dennis Tyronney, who had told police that MacDowell had offered him £500 to kill Renee and Andrew MacRae in an acid attack. The trial also heard that MacDowell had removed and burned the boot floor from his Volvo two days after the disappearance. In September 2022 he was found guilty of both murders and was sentenced to a minimum of 30 years in prison. He died on 15 February 2023, aged 81 less than six months into his sentence, without ever revealing where the bodies were disposed of.

An article dated 4th November 2025 in the Strathspey Herald stated that murder detectives have no plans to investigate the stretch of the A9 where experts say the bodies could be buried.

Enquiries are ongoing.

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References:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-64655571

https://www.scotland.police.uk/what-s-happening/news/2023/august/renewed-appeal-to-locate-the-bodies-of-renee-and-andrew-macrae/

https://www.strathspey-herald.co.uk/news/police-say-no-plans-to-search-for-renee-and-andrew-macrae-wh-418437/

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy0yyx5v72xo

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Renee_and_Andrew_MacRae

The Unluckiest Date in Aviation - July 17th, a dark day to fly.

There are certain dates in the year which seem to bring coincidences, synchronicities and bad luck, July 17th is one of those dark days for the aviation industry, both military and commercial. More air crashes and incidents have occurred on July 17th over the years than on any other date, including the infamous TWA Flight 800 and MH-17 flights. Settle in for an exhaustive (exhausting?!) run-through which makes the mind boggle, and I have missed out so many smaller incidents!

1935 - Iran

A ‘Douglas DC-2-115E’ named ‘Maraboe’ owned by KLM Royal Dutch Airlines crashed on take-off from Bushehr Airport, the 12 people on board (4 crew and 8 passengers) escaped unhurt before the plane caught fire.

1943 - Incidents involving United States Navy and Army Air Force.

• U.S Navy ‘Consolidated PBY-5A Catalina’ aircraft took off from Henderson Field to undertake an anti-shipping search amd patrol operation, at 1am the port engine caught fire and the airplane landed in the sea just off Vella Lavella Island. All 13 on board survived.

• U.S Navy ‘Consolidated PBY-5 Catalina’ disappeared over the Gulf of Mexico during a military exercise, it was never found and is classed as missing with 8 personnel on board.

• Grenada - ‘Douglas C-53 Skytrooper (DC-3)’ owned by the United States Army Air Force suffered a mid-air collision with a Douglas C-47-DL (DC-3) also owned by the USAAF. The wing of one aircraft collided with the fuselage of the other, locking the planes together resulting in the crash and loss of 10 lives.

1945 - India

• ‘Consolidated C-109 Liberator Express’ aircraft owned by the United States Army Air Force was reported missing after taking off from the Jorhat-Rowriah Airport. The plane was part of the 1330 Army Air Base Unit, Air Transport Command and had 4 crew members on board at the time of its disappearance, no explanation was ever given.The wreckage was eventually found decades later on October 22, 2007 at an elevation of 8227 feet.

  Mindoro Island, Philippines

• A ‘Curtiss C-46D-10-CU Commando’ aircraft owned by the USAAF crashed transporting cargo. The airplane hit a mountain on the north-western tip of Mindoro Island in bad weather conditions, 8 crew were lost.

1946 - Ecuador

A ‘Curtiss C46-D-10-CUD-Commando’ scheduled passenger flight crashed on approach 1,6 km from Cuenca Airport killing all 30 people on board. After attempting to land, the pilot carried out a ‘go-around’, the aircraft didn’t gain enough height and tragically crashed into a hill.

1950 - India

Indian National Airways airplane ‘Douglas C-47A-90-DL (DC-3)’ crashed en-route to Srinagar Airport during turbulence roughly 10km from Pathankot. All occupants 22 were killed.

1951 - Egypt

An R.A.F ‘Vickers Valetta C.1’ was destroyed after an issue with a propeller forced the crew to make an emergency belly-landing, all crew survived.

1953 - USA

A U.S Navy operated ‘Fairchild R4Q-2 Flying Boxcar (C-119F)’ just after take-off from Milton-Whiting Field, where it had stopped to refuel while transporting Reserve Officers' Training Corps students from summer training in Texas. Tragically 44 of the 46 persons on board were killed.

1955 - USA

Braniff International Airways owned ‘Convair CV-340-32’ crashed on approach to Chicago-Midway Airport killing 22 of the 43 people on board. The crew had requested a weather report which stated half mile visibility, the Convair descended too low and collided with a sign, then crashed through the airport boundary fence in flames and came to a stop.

1958 - Argentina

• A ‘Douglas C-47A-75-DL Skytrain’ crashed on take-off at Río Cuarto Airport following an engine failure, no fatalities were reported.

  Dominican Republic

• 2 people were killed when a ‘Curtiss C-46A-60-CK Commando’ plane crashed on take-off destined for Miami. It was reported that the aircraft stalled while climbing.

1960 - Jamaica

A Cuban Aviation owned ‘Vickers Viscount’ aircraft was hijacked after leaving Havana, when the captain (!) drew a gun and forced the co-pilot to divert to Jamaica. He claimed political asylum as a "refugee" from the Castro Government. Nobody was hurt in the incident.

1963 - Laos

An Air America ‘Curtiss C-46F-1-CU Commando’ cargo plane crashed into a hillside in fog during a supply dropping mission in Northern Laos, all 6 crew died.

1965 - Japan

Japan Maritime Self Defence Force owned ‘Lockheed P2V-7 Neptune’ aircraft crashed into the ocean 70 miles southeast of Tokyo following a fire on board, all 11 crew perished.

1967 - USA

United States Air Force ‘Boeing KC-135R Stratotanker’ crashed on take-off after the plane over rotated and stalled. 1 of the 5 people on board died.

1968 - Cuba

A‘McDonnell Douglas DC-8 plane was hijacked after leaving Los Angeles International Airport bound for Miami, Somewhere over Texas, the hijacker pulled out a hand grenade (later proved to be a fake) and a pistol and demanded to be flown to Cuba. The aircraft stopped to refuel in New Orleans before continuing to Cuba. No casualties.

1973 - Norway

A really lucky escape for the 60 people on board the ‘Convair CV-640’ which landed/crashed at Tromso airport. It is reported that the plane landed heavily, bounced and came to rest nose-down with it’s landing gear partially collapsed … just 15 meters from the end of the runway!

1980 - United Kingdom

62 passengers and crew avoided disaster when the ‘Convair CV-640’ they were travelling on from Spain to Exeter, emergency landed a few miles short of Exeter airport near the village of Ottery St. Mary in Devon. Luckily the pilot knew the area and managed to find a safe landing site in a small grassy valley. On landing the fuel tanks were empty. The cause of the incident was found to be a combination of unreliable fuel gauges and the crew’s belief that they had enough fuel on board.

1983 - Cuba

Another hijacking! This time the 107 occupants of the Delta Airlines Boeing 727 en-route from Miami to Tampa were subjected to three hijackers brandishing knives and aerosol cans, a flight attendant was held with a knife to her throat otherwise there were no casualties. The plane diverted to Cuba as requested, where the three were taken into custody.

1994 - Martinique

6 people were killed when an ‘IRMA/Pilatus Britten-Norman BN-2B-26 Islander’ belonging to Air Martinique, lsf Trans Island Air crashed into a hillside on approach to Fort de France-Lamentin Airport.

1996 - TWA Flight 800 USA

Trans World Airlines’ Boeing 747-131 headed for Paris, carrying 230 people exploded just after taking off from JFK International Airport killing everyone on board. The body of the plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean near the coast of Long Island. An extensive investigation concluded that the probable cause was a center-wing fuel tank explosion, likely ignited by an electrical spark.

Kenya 5 crew members killed when a ‘de Havilland Canada DHC-5D Buffalo’ operated by the Tanzanian People's Defence Force crashed after take-off from Nairobi. The plane had been damaged and repaired a month before but it isn’t known if that was a factor.

1997 - Indonesia

28 of 50 persons on board the ‘Fokker F-27 Friendship 600’ died when it crashed on approach to Bandung-Husein Sastranegara Airport. After smoke was seen coming from an engine the crew attempted an emergency landing but the aircraft clipped roofs and a wall of a housing complex and crashed into a field.

1998 - Eritrea

Air Sofia, lsf Ukrainian Cargo Airways owned ‘Ilyushin Il-78’ cargo plane crashed on approach to Bourgas Airport after colliding with a hill killing all 10 on board.

2000 - United Kingdom

• CityFlyer Express flight 8106 was hijacked en-route to Gatwick Airport from Zurich. The hijacker was armed with a large pair of scissors and held a flight attendant by her hair with the blades to her throat. He apparently was upset over having failed to obtain asylum in Britain. He claimed to have a bomb and threatened to detonate it if not granted asylum. During the planes descent, the pilot left the cockpit, convinced the man to release the flight attendant, and calmed him down. The plane made an emergency landing at Gatwick and went to a remote area of the airport, where the hijacker was detained. No casualties.

• India

  A ‘Boeing 737-2A8 Advanced’ aircraft operated by Alliance Air crashed after losing control on approach to Patna Airport killing 55 of the 58 people on board plus 5 on the ground.

 2002 - Nepal

4 occupants of the ‘de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter 300’ owned by Skyline Airways died when the aircraft crashed into a hill shortly after take-off in bad weather.

2007 - Brazil

All 187 passengers and crew plus another 12 people on the ground were killed when the ‘Airbus A320-233’ operated by TAM Linhas Aéreas crashed while landing at São Paulo-Congonhas Airport. It overshot the runway colliding with a building then burst into flames, the crash became the worst aviation disaster in the country’s history.

2014 - Ukraine - Flight MH17

Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, was travelling over Ukraine on it suddenly disappeared from radar.

All 283 passengers (including 80 children) and 15 crew were killed.

The plane was brought down after being hit by a Russian Buk missile over eastern Ukraine, an investigation by the Dutch Safety Board (DSB) concluded in October 2015.

2015 - Greece

A Canadair CL-215-1A10 firefighting plane was in service near Faraklo when it had technical problems and was forced to land sustaining substantial damage, there were however, no injuries.

2023 - Poland

A ‘Cessna 208B Grand Caravan’ operated by Skydive Warsaw crashed into a hangar during part of a training flight - 1 of the 3 people on board died as well as 5 people on the ground.

Scores of aviation incidents happen every year of course, but there is a strangely high amount that occur on July 17th. Lets hope this year passes without incident, and we remember those lost in tragedies of years gone by.

Photo by Fotis on Unsplash

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The Phoenix Lights UFO

Hi folks, 

Here's an 'on this day in history' blog post covering the Phoenix Lights event in 1997. I like to hark back to historical events on the day they happened, it connects us with our past...and who doesn't love a real-life X-File?! 

There have been numerous and varied UFO sightings and recorded incidents throughout time, many in the last decades, some are well documented, however few are witnessed by huge groups of people at the same time. But on the evening of March 13th 1997 that is exactly what happened, thousands of people saw unidentifiable lights in the skies over Arizona and Nevada.

The Phoenix Lights were two separate events, the first occurring roughly between 7.30pm and 8.45pm which featured a huge, triangular or V-shaped formation of lights - the number of which varies depending on individual reports. The lights were said to “cruise across the sky” from southwest Nevada, over Phoenix, Tucson and towards southeast Arizona. The second event happened a bit later that evening with reports at around 9.15pm onwards, this set of sightings involved a line of stationary, glowing orb-shaped objects which appeared in the sky over the Sierra Estrella mountain range.

One famous witness of the lights, actor Kurt Russell was flying in to land at Phoenix Sky Harbour International Airport when he saw the V-formation and reported it to air traffic control. However, despite thousands of such reports, no official investigation was ever conducted. The reason so many witnesses saw the Phoenix Lights is due to the fact it was a clear night with no moon, and people were already watching the skies as the Hale-Bopp Comet was visible at the time.

The widely accepted explanation (by sceptics and officials) is that the lights were from military operations being carried out that evening. The first V-shaped formation of lights was said to be a group of A-10 Thunderbolt jets flying in formation as part of pilot training programme called ‘Operation Snowbird’, this does make sense, although the statements of some witnesses describing a ‘set-square’ type shape, solid, with lights imbedded into it should not be discounted. The second sighting of the stationary orbs was put down to a flare-drop exercise from another set of A-10 jets.

Being a more recent sighting, there is quite a lot of decent photography and video footage from that night in 1997, a search on Youtube will bring plenty of results for example. Whether it was planes, flares or something else, it is always worth glancing up at the night sky in case a spectacle is occurring above our heads!

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The Great Molasses Flood of 1919 - Disaster hits Boston.

January 15th 1919 was an unseasonably mild day, by lunchtime, Boston’s North End was full of people out enjoying the weather as well as lots of workers going about their business. At around 12.30 - 1.00pm a low rumble could be heard, many assumed it was a train or heavy vehicle, but a few minutes later the ground shook and the rumble turned into a roar. 

Disaster struck when a massive 50 foot tank of industrial grade molasses burst, sending 2.3 million U.S gallons of thick, sticky liquid through the streets at terrifying speeds of 35 miles per hour killing 21 people and injuring 150 more. The wave was reported at being around 25 feet high at it’s peak.

When the flood happened, it had such speed and energy that it moved buildings from their foundations, knocked the elevated train tracks down, lifted trucks and vehicles, throwing them into walls and suffocated people and horses where they fell.

The Elevated Train Tracks. Wired article, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Heroic rescue efforts happened immediately, cadets from the ‘USS Nantucket’ which was docked nearby, nurses from the Red Cross and the Boston Police department hurried to the scene to be met by an unimaginable task. The viscous and sticky nature of the molasses made getting to victims incredibly difficult. As well as drowning in the liquid, people had been thrown long distances, crushed by falling buildings and had been injured by large pieces of debris which had flown through the air. Conditions grew worse as night fell and temperatures dropped which caused the often foot-deep molasses to thicken, trapping people further where many asphyxiated. It has been noted that if the tragedy had struck in the warmth of summer the death toll would likely be much lower due to the liquid being thinner and able to spread much further away from the site.

The clean-up operation was an incredibly difficult job. Molasses had coated everything in its path making the removal of debris and damage nearly impossible. Salt-water from a fire boat in the harbour was used to break down the sugar syrup and sand could help soak some of it up. As well as the site itself, molasses had been tracked further away by vehicles and people involved in the rescue effort and clean-up so a vast area of the city had to be attended to. It was said that all of Boston was sticky - roads and pavements, subway train seats, shops, hospitals, payphones and people’s homes. Boston’s North End was ‘brown for months’ and residents reported the sweet smell for years after.

The molasses tank before it ruptured.The Bostonian Society, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The disaster happened at the Purity Distilling Company, 529 Commercial Street, where a huge amount of molasses was stored at the harbourside plant, unloaded from ships ready to be transferred to the Purity ethanol plant in Cambridge, Massachusetts and other distilleries. The molasses could be fermented to produce ethanol - a key ingredient in alcoholic drinks and munitions. It seems that several factors contributed to the tank rupture and the following disaster:

Firstly, the unseasonably warm weather. Temperatures has risen from well below freezing the night before, a fresh, large load of molasses had been delivered by ship the previous day which had been warmed to aid in transferring it, one theory is that the thermal expansion of the older, colder liquid already in the tank led to the tank bursting. Others speculated that the levels of fermentation inside the tank led to it failing.

It also seems the tank wasn’t fit for purpose from the day it was built. It was constructed quickly in 1915 to meet the increasing demand for industrial alcohol (distilled from molasses) to make dynamite and explosives for World War 1. Local residents knew it leaked, in fact local children would take cups and buckets to fill from the drips. When complaints were made, the Purity Distilling Company painted the tank brown to disguise the leaks. As well as questions about the integrity of the rivets used to hold the panels together, the steel body of the tank was not thick enough to safely hold that much volume and weight. A 2014 investigation found that the steel was half as thick as it should have been, and the chemical composition of the walls made them liable to cracking. Basic safety tests such as initially filling the tank with water to identify any leaks prior to use had not been done. U.S Industrial Alcohol who owned the tank was ultimately found liable.

In the aftermath, 119 people brought a class-action lawsuit against USIA who initially claimed the tank had been blown up by anarchists against the making of munitions, but this was disproven and the company’s responsibility was established after three years of investigation and hearings. The lawsuit is seen as a milestone in improving modern corporate regulations.

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Back to Blogger!

Hi all, after a brief foray with Substack I have decided to bring Moonlit Myths back to Blogger where I feel it belongs. I was always happy here, it's simple and friendly so why stray you ask? Well, a lot of people I follow on the socials have Substack accounts where they write newsletters, it was the place to write for a while for both celebs and non-celebs, but it's shiny gleam has worn off a bit with public opinion. I will stay there to read stuff, and I have some lovely subscribers gained from my own promotions, so will be keeping the account open with occasional updates, but this will once again be 'where its at' as the kids used to say. 

Substack has some good points such as helping to build an audience through its app and social media type platform, but to be honest I have never found much engagement from it. I post regularly on my own socials - Bluesky, Threads and Mastodon (now I have remembered that I had an account there) with often healthy likes, shares and comments, but when I post the same content on Substack there is nothing ... tumbleweed ... deafening silence. Life has enough rejection so why put myself through it?! 

Blogger has been sitting quietly in a corner, carrying on doing it's thing for so many years - a bit like me, so here we are again. To all those who say "blimey, is Blogger still a thing?" I shout a hearty "YES".

Over the coming days / weeks I'll be bringing some articles over from there to here so get back on track then keep an eye out for new, exciting things!

Take care, folks.

The Howden Moor Incident

An incident that has the plot of a classic sci-fi film, but the events of March 24th 1997 are very real to those involved and it is well-documented. Was it simply a coincidence of unrelated happenings, or a wider cover-up by authorities? It looks like we will never know, but it is a fascinating tale from the Sheffield area of the U.K.

The first call came in to police at 10.15pm on the night in question, soon followed by many more - reports ranging from a triangular-shaped U.F.O being chased by jets, loud booming noises and a low-flying aircraft heading towards the hills, either way there followed a bright flash and loud explosion.

The police, kind of surprisingly, took these calls very seriously, and a major search of the area was quickly mounted involving the police helicopter, mountain rescue and the fire service ,with the local hospitals being put on standby to receive multiple casualties from a crashed airplane. They contacted the R.A.F and were told no aircraft were missing and there had been no military craft flying in the area and an exclusion zone was put in place by the R.A.F over the search area so there would be no interference from other aircraft. The search covered approximately 40 square miles … nothing was found.

The next morning the police set up a special phone line to take calls from the public, it was soon inundated by reports, again of low-flying aircraft and military jets chasing something. Theories included an aerial drugs drop gone bad and even a ghost plane that is said to haunt the moors. Following a T.V documentary called ‘Mysteries’ which aired in October 1997, the police issued a statement which read:

“No explanation was ever found and we remain open-minded about what was behind the sightings.”

On March 28th 1998 the incident was brought up in - of all places - the House of Commons. Edinburgh seismology department confirmed that two sonic booms had been recorded that night at 21.52pm and 22.06pm, the R.A.F denied any supersonic aircraft being in the area at the time stating it was illegal to break the sound barrier over land in the U.K.

The fruitless search and subsequent investigations cost the U.K taxpayers tens of thousands of pounds which some have speculated was the reason the military denied all knowledge. Some believe there was a cover up and that a triangular craft was indeed being pursued by Tornado jets, one of which crashed in a reservoir - the R.A.F did set up a 10 mile exclusion zone around the reservoir which seems odd. It has also been reported that there were secret, low-flying military operations in the area at the time, and that a jet may have gone supersonic creating the sonic booms. Logically speaking it is unlikely that the R.A.F would conduct such maneuvers so very near to a major built-up area, but who knows.

The mystery remains, questions go unanswered, but whatever happened that night, it was seared into the memories of the witnesses. Extraterrestrial activity, a simple accident that inexplicably left no wreckage or a military cover-up? We’ll never know.

Photo by Albert Antony on Unsplash

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Dark Times - Fantasy Matters

 Since November we have had some very dark times - my lovely Mum passed away very unexpectedly and it left a huge void and a lot of shock. Fantasy and sci-fi helped enormously as a way to escape my brain and thoughts, reading and watching - namely the final season of The Expanse (I have since started reading the first book in the series), Merlin...again and season 2 of The Witcher.

 I didn't realise before how important the genres were - I mean they have always been my go to, X-Files has been a near-obsession in the past especially when it first came out, Buffy and a whole host of other great shows, but the actual importance of escapism and creativity with few of the 'real world' issues. Money, politics, celebrity, competition to name a few, are issues in today's society that fuel depression and feelings of inadequacy. In the realm of fantasy, sci-fi and other worlds, values like loyalty and friendship play a far greater role and this, I think gets forgotten. So read your favourite sagas, watch the shows and films if it helps you get through the day...and bugger what anyone else thinks!

Oddly, social media in the form of Twitter and Instagram helped, the people I follow as Moonlit Myths have an intrest in history, crime, high strangeness, paranormal and other fascinating subjects, and although I don't post much, reading through my timeline and looking at their posts makes me feel slightly less alone...so thank you. Facebook however is the last thing I have wanted to look at, and this will continue.

Take care.