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Jenny Randles – Supernatural Pennines

Bill was a truck driver but his career since the experience has been put in jeopardy because he has had 'mini-black outs' (during one of which he rammed a car on the M62 without recalling how it happened). He ascribes these to his ‘alien contact’, but it is noteworthy that PC Alan Godfrey experienced mini-time lapses during his life, too, when no UFOs were seen.

That winter morning Bill had a delivery to Hollingworth, near Oldham, and drove the route from Burnley through Heald Moor, into Todmorden and right through this hyperactive window zone. It was icy so he drove cautiously. At around 6.15 am he was close to the county border (still just in Lancashire) just before the village of Portsmouth. That is on the same Burnley road where Godfrey later that year came to be 'abducted' but about 2 miles further out of Todmorden.

At this point the road cuts through a cliff edge on one side and slopes to a railway line through the Calder Valley on the other. There is a lay-by on the road here.

As he drove towards it Bill heard a loud hum like an electricity generator and saw an object in the lay-by like a tortoise shell with three beams of misty red light emerging from the side. Next to it were two beings, one of whom was bending over.

Thinking at first that these were workmen - perhaps- gritting the roads before the morning rush - he slowed down to a crawl. Moving past the object at very close proximity its total strangeness now became obvious - as did the fact that these were not gritters. The light rays were fuzzy and laser-like.

The bracken on the cliff edge glowed curiously. And the colour of the rays varied in a strange way depending on the angle at which he looked at them. Of the 'men' one seemed to be wearing a uniform and the other a silver one-piece suit. But Bill had no time to take in more details because 'as if drugged or hypnotized' his mind started to fog over.

As he 'inched' past the spot, time stretched out like elastic. Peter and I drove past the spot and even going very slowly, we did not take more than seconds to do so, but Bill says he took 'minutes'. However, as he was drifting past his truck suddenly drained of all power and the headlights cut out. As there are no street lights near here the road ahead was plunged into darkness. But the vehicle engine (diesel powered) continued to operate. Bill told us that he thought the fact that it lacked a spark plug was the reason it operated normally when a petrol-driven engine would have failed. He was sure there was an electrical 'draining' effect'.

The very next thing Bill recalled was a sudden 'jolt' and regaining consciousness (still feeling fuzzy-headed) at an unknown spot further along the road somewhere on the edge of Todmorden itself (very close to where the Godfrey abduction was to occur). The truck was stopped, the lights were back on and the engine was still running but there was absolutely no sense of discontinuity in time or space.

Bill's mind gradually cleared as he drove on but he only vaguely registered that the sky was now growing light (as it ought not yet to be doing in midwinter). Also someone was present to collect a package he was to drop off in Todmorden. This prearranged delivery was in fact the reason he took the back road (a route through Bacup would have been more direct) but he had been told to expect no staff on duty that early. 

Continuing to Holingworth in broad daylight he arrived at 9.10 a.m. (checked against a clock, as he was not wearing a watch).

All of this seems to mean, he estimated, that he lost about two hours during the 'moments' that he 'crawled' past the lay-by. Needless to say that is difficult to explain.

 After his return, Bill was unusually tired and slept deeply. He experienced vivid dreams reliving the event but would not be persuaded by UFOlogists that he ought to be hypnotically regressed – commendably telling us ‘You cannot be made to remember things that you do not remember.'