A story by Sebastian Hamilton in the Sunday Times (London) of January 18, 1998, suggests that former Home Secretary Michael Howard may have been visited by a UFO shortly before last year's general elections in England. If so, it appears that reports of the UFO sighting were altered to say the event happened miles away from Howard's residence, instead of directly above it.
Howard, a Tory (conservative) party member, lost his job as Home Secretary when the Labour Party swept the elections. However, his possible UFO encounter is only lately coming to light.
Local UFO researchers, a news reporter who witnessed the UFO, and even a secretary for the Tory party agree there is good reason to believe a huge triangular UFO hovered directly over Howard's residence in Kent on the night of March 8, 1997. But the Tory party apparatus took pains to change and squelch the reports.
"In a case worthy of the X files, the claims were apparently covered up by a conservative party media machine desperate to avoid embarassing headlines and cartoons," the Times said.
Sarah Hall, a journalist for the Folkestone Herald newspaper, saw the UFO at 3 am that morning while driving her car.
"She heard a strange humming and stopped her car. Ahead of her she saw a huge triangular craft hovering over a field... 'It had a large dome at one end and lots of bright lights around the side, and looked quite shiny. I had no idea what it was. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up,'" she said, according to the Times. "'After a few seconds, it shot off and stopped 500 meters away. It moved and stopped four times before flying away.'"
The same craft was seen the same night at about the same time, hovering directly over the nearby residence of Home Secretary Howard, according to local UFO research Chris Rolfe. "This tallies in with an unofficial account that I was given by two firemen," Rolfe said.
According to the Times, no less than eight separate reports were filed that night regarding a UFO of that description in the general vicinity of Howard's residence.
Witness and news reporter Sarah Hall wasted no time writing up the story for her paper. But when her story appeared in print, she was shocked to see that the reported location had been changed, "relocated several miles away. I don't know how it happened. I've asked but no explanation has been given," she told the Times.
When Hall made inquiries to the Conservative party, they complained to her paper about the stories, and the stories had to be stopped, the Times says.
But there was evidently talk of the incident inside Tory party circles. Party press secretary Sheila Gunn indicated that "she was aware of reports of an UFO sighting, but the Tories had managed to keep them out of the national press."
But now, the Times says, the unusual case has been taken up by Mark Watts, the Labour MP for Kent East, who is asking the European parliament to investigate. "There have been so many sightings from reliable witnesses -- people can't be suffering from mass hysteria. I was amazed that the story never went further," Watts is reported as saying.
Original file name: CNI - UFO STORY CHANGED
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