This Paranormal Life - #263 Aliens Abduct Man's Trousers - The West Lothian UFO

Episode Date: May 17, 2022

How far would you go to get a new pair of cool jeans? Asos? Your local shops? What about another GALAXY? That is potentially exactly what one extraterrestrial did back in 1979 Scotland in what would, surprisingly, become one of the UK's most convincing UFO encounters ever recorded. Time for Rory and Kit to investigate!Support us on Patreon.com/ThisParanormalLife to get access to weekly bonus episodes!Buy Official TPL Merch! -  thisparanormallife.com/storeFollow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTubeJoin our Secret Society Facebook CommunityAdvertise on This Paranormal Life via Gumball.fmResearch by Amy GrisdaleEdited by Louis BlatherwickIntro music by www.purple-planet.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Can dogs see into human souls? Is sleepwalking a form of demon possession? Answers to these questions and more on this episode of This Paranormal Life! Hello! Yo, yo, yo! And welcome back to This Paranormal Life. This is the weekly comedy podcast where every Tuesday we investigate a different paranormal tale and try to decide by the end of the episode whether it's truly paranormal or not. Oh, yeah. As always, you're joined by me, Kit Greer-Mulvena,

and my co-investigator, Rory Powers, who's sitting across from me. How are you doing today, Rory? Hello, everyone. Welcome. Welcome to the podcast. Before we started recording today, we were actually joking about how, hey, look, you never know which episode is going to be a banger. Sometimes it just doesn't work out the way you thought it would. Sometimes a case can unexpectedly be great and turn out to be one of your funniest episodes yet.

And we were talking about how it all depends on how you set yourself up for the episode. That's the thing you can control is if you have a nice big coffee beforehand or a relaxing beer, you know, to get the jokes kind of flowing. So all liquids. Basically all liquids in every form possible.

Before this episode, we ate an entire full English breakfast. All the trimmings, all the accoutrements, double of some things. To maybe our non-UK-based listeners, imagine opening your mouth and pouring a bin bag full of lard directly down your gullet

and expecting to do an award-winning podcast. And you know we're freaks over here, our American listeners. We had hot beans. Hot beans. We had hot beans! No award-winning anything was ever done post-hot beans. Do you think James Cameron, right before he hops on the set

of an award-winning blockbuster movie, has some hot beans? There's no way. Brad Pitt never said, can we pause this scene for just a second so I can eat my hot beans? So all I'm saying is, hey, maybe just set your expectations low for this week because I'm 80% bean at this point. We did follow it up by cookies.

Sure, I ate a cookie because I thought maybe it would soak up some of the beans. Our diet has been atrocious, but maybe, look, maybe we'll go full circle and we've made some sort of sick f***ing witch's brew in our bellies. Eye of newt, bean of hot, f***ing cookie of oatmeal. And it all will blend together into this like crazy paranormal concoction where the pupils in my eyes dilate and we just record the greatest episode of this paranormal life, 2.0, we've ever recorded. I will say that it might actually help put us in the mindset of the particular place we're going to for today's investigation.

Namely, Scotland. It was the 9th of November, 1979, in West Lothian, Scotland, just shy of an hour outside Edinburgh by car. in West Lothian, Scotland, just shy of an hour outside Edinburgh by car. Forestry worker Bob Taylor was 61 years old, not far off retirement, which as we know from countless action movies, Rory, is a very dangerous place to be.

It is. The character always dies one day from retirement. Personally, when I get to that age and I'm one day from retirement, I'm not going to leave the f***ing house. Nevertheless, on the 9th of November, 1979, Bob Taylor woke up early, stretched, and headed out the door,

thinking he might be getting a little old for this s***. Regardless, he was off in his Forestry Commission van with his red setter, Lara, sitting eagerly in the front seat. Don't get too attached to Lara. It was a crisp morning with frost in the air, but bright and sunny. Lara was also one day from retirement, so that thing has seconds to live.

And Lara did just eat an out-of-date tin of dog food. It was unusual Scottish weather, needless to say. A crisp morning. He was headed to Deckmont Woods on the edge of a town called Livingston. That morning he'd been tasked with monitoring the progress of freshly planted trees and checking for pesky livestock that had strayed away from their fields to nibble on the saplings. He parked up in a lay-by at the edge of the busy M8 motorway at around 10.30am and let Lara out of the van. He couldn't have walked more than a few metres when he was hit by a powerful odor.

No, he thought. Lara hadn't done her biz that quickly. This was an acrid smell of burning rubber. If a dog could poop out such a smell, it would need to be seen by a vet with extreme urgency. The only dog that's pooping that out is Cerberus. That is not a... Or Clifford. The big red dog. He eats trucks. He eats battery acid.

After taking just a few more steps, he saw something unusual. A large object. It was big and grey. He could see it was made of metal, but it was dull rather than shiny. From a distance, it appeared to have the texture of sandpaper, but there were parts that looked transparent. The top was shaped like a dome, and it had a rim all the way around like a hat. There were several sets of small blades positioned along the edge like tiny little propellers. Yikes. Though they weren't spinning, and they looked far too small to be able to generate any real lift.

The strangest part is that the object, which was around the size of a car, was hovering several feet off the ground. Okay, now it's weird. Look, I'm a city boy. I don't know a lot about agricultural technology. There's probably some tractors out there. Is that a corn machine? Is that how we get the corn? Yeah, I mean, have you seen some of the shit they have in fields to do things like cut shit or harvest stuff? Sure. It looks insane. I would think that would be some sort of alien technology, but it's not. It's what we use as humans.

But at the point where it's hovering 15 feet in the air. And it doesn't say John Deere on the side. I don't know what that thing is supposed to be doing. Also, worryingly, we're nowhere near a farm. Yeah, we're just in the middle of the woods. Suddenly, there was movement from within the machine. Two round structures covered in spikes emerged from the base and dropped to the ground. Lara started going apeshit. They looked like sea mines and were at least three feet wide apiece. Robert was very afraid, but before he could react, they started rolling towards him.

The sea mines? Each time one of the spines hit the ground, they made a plopping sound. There was nobody around to push them, and it wasn't gravity. He stood in a flat clearing, and they were moving at speed. Right, well that's not the part you should have problems with. It was as if they had a life of their own or were being controlled remotely. The big spiky balls arrived at his feet and before he could react in any way the balls fused with his legs. He couldn't understand what was happening. There's no way that this is the beginning of the story. I think you've missed a few pages.

We literally just started and sea mines have fused to his body. How do you think he feels? How do you think Bob feels? He's like, couldn't you wait until I was done with my walk? He's like, can I still retire with mines for feet? I want to cash out, please. He couldn't understand what was happening. They were climbing up his legs somehow.

He could feel them pulling on his trousers, dragging him down to the ground. They dug into the fabric right beneath his pockets. His trousers were being torn to shreds, exposing his skin and presumably his bare ass. The burning smell from before was stronger than ever and a layer of misty smoke began to descend around him. It was getting so thick

he started coughing uncontrollably. At that point, you're kind of like, I do hope I get abducted because I don't want aliens to just come down to Earth, eat my jeans, and take off into the distance.

Now I'm just bare assed in the middle of the woods, confused and smoky, and I have to go back and tell people what happened. My wife isn't buying that story. No, nobody is. It suddenly became clear that these two balls were dragging him closer towards the dome-shaped craft.

He continued to fight with all his might, but was overcome by the gas in the air. He lost consciousness and fell forward flat on his face. When he finally awoke, he checked his watch. He must have been out for 15 or 20 minutes. He had a raging thirst, a banging headache, and his legs were in abject pain. His throat was sore and there was a deeply unpleasant bitter taste in his mouth. I'm not trying to belittle this incredibly scary situation, but that is exactly how I feel after a heavy night on the tiles.

Splitting headache. No idea what time it is. Foul taste of blue WKD in my mouth. Trousers torn to smithereens. If trousers at all. He tried to get to his feet, but was having trouble just keeping his head off the ground. He struggled in the dirt, trying to regain his strength.

Lara was sniffing at his side, seemingly trying to help him up. He tried to reassure her, but was alarmed to discover he wasn't even capable of speaking. He managed to get both feet on the ground, but tumbled over several times on his way back to the van. He was relieved to get inside and close the door. He sat in the driver's seat, still breathing as heavily as if he'd just finished participating in the Highland Games.

All right, researcher Amy, that's gone a bit too stereotypical. He took a swig of iron brew to calm his nerves and dried his mouth with his kilt. Okay, no, this is offensive to our Scottish listeners. He tried to radio for help, but still couldn't talk. Despite his weakness and the dizziness of his mind, he was determined to get the hell out of there.

He set off, but almost immediately crashed into a muddy verge. Bro, just take a few minutes. You clearly weren't ready to walk. You're clearly not ready to drive. Like, I know you want to get out of here because you just got teabagged by an by an extraterrestrial well we don't know that he got attacked by balls and woke up with a nasty taste in his mouth all right i think we all know what happened just give yourself 30 minutes to recover put the radio on take a nap in the thing don't try and

drive your pickup truck back to civilization. And this is exactly why me and Rory are launching this year a This Paranormal Life pet training program, because in many instances such as this, a victim of a paranormal attack is left trouserless and defenseless, teabagged within an inch of his life, and yet the dog is here and the dog is safe and healthy. Fine, yeah. That dog, trained correctly,

could run to the nearest payphone, bark out just enough intelligible English to call for help. It sounds a bit f***ed up. It sounds a bit like Scooby-Doo, but whenever they do it, it is kind of like a... Master, you hurt! You know, it's a bit scary. It's a bit Master, he hurt!

You know, it's a bit scary, it's a bit strange, but it is possible, and we have proven that time and again through our dog training program, and he could have not crashed his car. Maybe the dog could have communicated that the master was in trouble, had an ambulance arrive on the site, he would have been totally fine.

Of course, a lot of the time, some people are so confused and scared by the the dog call that when the owner does then try and call an ambulance and it's like please i need it it's like you're that dog again aren't you we're not coming it's up because they're ignorant we have to train the dogs to have even more dialogue which takes months it's months per word that they have to learn so for them to say i don't worry yes Yes, I'm a dog, but don't be scared. Don't be scared. Yeah.

And this is the one out of every 20 dogs that doesn't just immediately go insane and attack us. Yeah. So it's, you know, it's in beta. It's in testing. For the low price of 2000 ponds per dog that you want to train, we can make this dream a reality. And are we doing it just so that we can replace us as hosts with dogs on the podcast? Sure, that was the original idea. Rish!

Rit is! I'd like to think if I had to be replaced by a dog on this show, maybe a big golden retriever. Sure. I think that would match my energy. Maybe. Yeah. What would you say i would be

like a little okay like a little piece of shit okay what a piece of shit has that's a descriptor that has nothing to do with the dog why not just say the breed like annoying uh-huh small okay but not in like a physical size like in like a petty way or something or maybe like a cute um shih tzu dog but just like insecure as well okay a weird thing to call a dog i don't know if dogs are sure so maybe still a chihuahua like a cute dog maybe like a fun little dog uh whatever is just like the most i don't i don't care about the breed of the dog but whatever dog is like has like as little going for it as possible right you mean like a human sense because like dogs don't have like jobs or like families or anything so what is that what does that look like i'm just looking for a visual image of like what i would look like as a dog

yeah like and i know that like the smart thing to do would be say the breed of a dog but honestly i'm just trying to think yeah i'm just looking for like doberman i'm looking at you and i'm thinking of any breed and all i can hear in my head is just like worm worm it's just so it's so i guess like maybe if i was a golden a mighty golden retriever it's not really a dog though so if you were like a beetle or something that might work what about a beagle i don't know they're pretty like happy and yeah cute yeah and fun and i don't know i think you can't think of one dog out of the entire species of dogs you could be like a woodpecker just on the side of my head just drilling constantly like like just a pesky little or like a bee that just won't get, go away! So you don't want to pick anything but a dog.

It's like, but you are, to be clear, a mighty golden retriever. You could be like a husky warthog. Like a real husky warthog. I think we're done here. Is there like a breed of dog that, you know, when you're playing fetch with, you don't want it to come back? Because that's kind of closest I could think of that's uh pretty f***ed up man it's just they say like dog is like man's best friend and like so what's like man's work colleague or like acquaintance yeah you know what i get what

is that there's any dog that like a caterpillar are you like a caterpillar because by definition like why would you choose to get a dog you don't like? So I guess it is hard. I guess if you, like, grew up together with that dog and went to the same school together. Can I be a golden retriever? Absolutely not. All right. That's an insult to us goldies. Is there a type of dog that you want to throw the stick off a cliff? Like I say, Bob almost immediately crashed his car into a muddy verge,

leaving him with no choice but to finish his journey on foot. Eventually, he arrived at his own doorstep after what felt like hours of half walking, half crawling. When he got home his wife Mary was extremely disturbed by his appearance. He was supposed to be at work for a good few more hours and ideally fully clothed. Amazingly, we actually have a video interview with Mary giving her reaction seeing her husband. Oh my god! It looked terrible when he came in the door. And he just stood at the door and I said, have you had an accident with your lorry? And he said, no, I've been attacked. And

I said, what with? And he said, a spaceship. And I said, oh goodness me, there's no such a thing as a spaceship. I'm going to phone the doctor. You must have fell and hurt your head. He looked quite shocked and he was drained. He was ripe white and his face was dirty and he had a red scar here. And his clothes were all dirty and his trousers. And then he told me his trousers had been torn. Wow. Pretty interesting, right? To get not only the testimony of a person, but of their spouse,

who kind of on paper is almost more interesting to hear from because it's like, hey, I don't want to believe this either. I don't have a horse in this race, except my husband. Yeah, why would they be? You know, I was the first person to say there's no such thing as UFOs. What are you talking about? Totally. Yeah. Yeah, why would they be? You know, I was the first person to say, there's no such thing as UFOs. What are you talking about? Totally, yeah. Yeah, that is really interesting.

Man, what a crazy story. Kind of matches up with what he claims as well, that his clothes were tattered, his trousers were ripped, he was dirty, he was beaten up. She gestured to say that he had a big cut or mark on his face as well. It's pretty bad stuff.

Now, Mary wanted to phone the police, but Bob wasn't having any of it. They'll say I'm a drunkard or mad. Don't call the Rosers, please. She saw the fear in his eyes and took pity on her poor husband. She wasn't at all convinced he'd seen a UFO, but something was clearly very wrong. She tried to soothe him as she helped him cover his bare ass in an intact pair of trousers. If it isn't a UFO, what's the truth here? He was still probably attacked by something. So it already seems like it's not something he wants to talk about in any form, paranormal or not.

Yeah, I mean, if that's your spouse and they've been attacked, Jesus, you're going to want to help them. Yeah. She said, Okay, dear, maybe Dr. Adams could come around and look in on you instead, eh? Bob agreed and suggested that she also phone his boss to let him know he'd be absent from work for the rest of the day at least, if not longer. Hi, is that Mr. Drummond? Malcolm, yes. I'm afraid my Bob's had a wee to do in the woods this morning. He's home now, but he's definitely not right. He says he was attacked by an alien spacecraft.

All right, well, he told you not to mention that to anyone. Can you believe that? Mary, no, no, no, Mary, less of the alien teabagging story and more of just your husband's hurt, I think. The door knocked. Oh, I better go. That'll be the doctor now. It wasn't long until Dr. Gordon Adams arrived. He'd been the family physician for decades and knew the Taylors well.

He checked Bob over for a head injury, but he didn't seem to have any kind of damage. He had lots of cuts and scrapes, but no concussion. His blood pressure was normal. His ass, sure, somewhat scratched and scraped on account of crawling through the woods home with no trousers, but no permanent damage. The only thing he could definitively say was that Bob Taylor was in a state of severe shock. Dr. Adams suggested he head to hospital for further checks

and helped Mary load him into the car. As they drove, all Bob could wonder was what on earth he'd seen that morning. He hoped with all his might he would get a satisfactory answer. But little did Bob know, his boss Malcolm Drummond was already on the case. He had dropped everything the moment Mary had called him. He mobilized a handful of his forestry staff immediately and headed into the woods to check the scene out for himself. Whoa, that's a pretty intense response.

That's the response of someone who has also had their trousers ripped to shreds. You know, because otherwise you'd be like, hmm, that's just bizarre. He's sitting in the office that day wearing jorts. It's like, my knees are freezing, Mary, thanks to this beast. Yeah, that's intense.

I agree. This is a good boss. But granted, this should be something everyone should be interested in. I mean, Christ, if one boss, but granted, this should be something everyone should be interested in. I mean, Christ, if one of your employees is sent home sick because he says there's a spacecraft, I guess on the nice end of things, maybe he's trying to make sure his forest is safe for his staff. Yeah. On the mean end of things, he's maybe like, that lying bitch, I am going to prove he's a whinging little bastard. So his staff marched through the forest.

What is it we're looking for, Mr. Drummond? I don't know exactly, but if something rattled old Bob out here, then it can't have been nothing. I've heard his war stories. He might be the bravest man I know. Aha! What's this? Malcolm crouched low to the ground and saw an array of divots in the forest floor. They were round and measured about four inches in depth and circumference. He tiptoed along the ground carefully, counting the holes and making sure not to disturb them. There are 40 of them, all identical. Isn't that peculiar?

The scene struck him as so bizarre he felt it his duty to inform the police. They arrived within minutes of the call and quickly set about cordoning off the whole layby and an enormous swathe of woodland. The chief briefed his officers before they headed away from the roadside. Can you call police for something like this? Holes in the floor? A man got attacked. Yeah, but he's going on record for saying it was a UFO. But for all they know, a man jumped out and ripped the cord on a giant Beyblade and it tore his trousers to shreds. It could be an assault by another man. Yeah, wearing cleats. Hovering, sure. Like I say, the chief briefed his officers. Listen up, lads. I know some of you are skeptical, but we've got a

man in hospital right now. A dangerous assault is taking place here today, albeit a mysterious one, and I expect each and every one of you to take this seriously. Of course we will, sir. What happened exactly? An old bastard's nags were blown off by Optimus Prime. He passed out immediately and his dog humped his legs for 15 minutes while he was unconscious. Any questions? immediately and his dog humped his legs for 15 minutes while he was unconscious. Any questions? The police took photos of the indents in the ground and marked each of their positions. It was the strangest thing. There had clearly been something heavy here, but there were no tracks leading to or away from the scene. The boys in blue even entertained the idea that something had flown in from the sky and left the same way, but couldn't see how it could

have made it through the trees without causing major damage. It was the middle of the day and they appealed for witnesses driving along the M8 to come forward, but nobody ever did. One of the officers interviewed Malcolm and his men and came away with the following statement. There is no doubt in my mind that these marks were made by a perfectly solid, heavier than air object. They had been made by some machine which had come vertically downward. I don't believe in anything from outer space. The only conclusion that

I can come to is that it must have been a man-made object. Some sort of secret machine belonging to one of the government departments. Because once again, I don't believe in anything from space. Just to reiterate. Just letting everyone know this is off script.

I just feel like fleshing out his character a little bit because I feel like we don't really know his motivations or why. He doesn't need any. He just needs to find out that his staff are safe, that the forest, whether it has aliens in it or not. Ever since I was a lad. Okay. And I had spent my summers down at the British Museum for Science and Exploration.

Why would he say it like that? What does that mean? I was introduced to an astronaut who was there welcoming the kids. And this is why he doesn't believe in space? And after... I'm trying to flesh out the character, man. Like, they need a bit of a backstory. They need to have a reasoning why he wouldn't believe in space.

It's literally just like a statement for the police. It's just like a factual... Why do we need to know his childhood? I just was gonna, I was gonna do a whole thing where the astronaut that was hired to teach the kids turned out actually he wasn't a real astronaut and the kid found him smoking in the car park afterwards. And then he realized that, hey, maybe space and everything out there isn't actually that real after all. And the world's real problems and issues are down here on earth so given that you just made that up why would that be helpful to our listeners given what i'm telling you is a factual story just so they know why he doesn't believe but it's not why but it's not why because

you just made that up i could see your eyes glaze over as you tried to think of the story on the fly fine he doesn't believe in things from space because when he was 11 years old, his mom hired a f***ing Buzz Lightyear impersonator for his birthday party and he kissed his sister. Okay. How about that? Does that make more sense? It doesn't make sense. Buzz Lightyear didn't exist back then. Not least when he was 11, which is probably the 30s. Buzz Lightyear kissed his sister. And after that, to infinity and beyond meant something entirely new.

It meant, hey, I want to kiss your sister. It meant to second base and beyond. And he was sick in his mouth a little ever after that. To second base and beyond. So disturbing. I want you boys to fan out. Look for anything suspicious. Two second base. And beyond! So disturbing. I want you boys to fan out. Look for anything suspicious.

And if any of you f***ers lays a hand on my sister... Sir, sir, sorry. Sorry, I lost my temper there. Troll's memories coming back to me. See, we're fleshing him out. He's got a whole f***ing family now. Why is he so protective of his sister? It's weird. That's weird. It's to a whole family now. Why is he so protective of his sister? It's weird. That's weird. It's to a weird degree.

His sister is allowed to love Buzz Lightyear if she wants. See, this is why you've distracted from the story, because what I wanted to ask was, that was actually some pretty level-headed analysis by Malcolm, don't you think? It was, yeah. I mean, kind of what you would expect, right? As a police force,

they are probably the ones who need to look at this thing logically, or at least from within the confines of our understanding of how the world works. You can't call a police to a crime scene where you're like, hey, some person mugged me. It's like, well, we don't know it was a person. Let's hold off on that accusation. It's like, no, no, I really need you to just, like, not think so big. I need you to think quite small, really, in this case.

So for these guys, yeah, they need to keep their feet on the ground, quite literally. Now, meanwhile, back at the site, Detective Sergeant Ian Wark was still pacing around the scene of the crime. He thought the idea of a flying object, like Malcolm was vividly describing, was utter BS. But the holes in the ground spoke for themselves. Something had been there, and it was his job to find out what. Now, Rory, here is a police diagram of the patterns observed at the crash site.

Here we go. Whoa! First off, just want to say, love the quality and the frequency of the evidence being provided in today's case. 10 out of 10. Pretty cool to have police documents of a supposed UFO site. Oh, yeah. I mean, this is really cool, guys. What we're looking at here is basically what looks like an aerial view, a bird's eye view of the location of the markings on the ground.

And it has some brief text at the bottom that says, plan of sight markings from police measurements. It's hard to kind of like figure out, presuming the dots are the areas that the balls were, you can kind of like basically see the path of the balls and the way they moved based on the line of the dots. That's right, yeah. So it kind of looks like they went down together,

parallel to each other, and then split off the bottom, forming almost like a W, and then going back up top. Yeah, hard to know for sure where they started or ended, but there is definitely some movement and there's a certain amount of symmetry to it. Yeah. Now, interestingly, in the caption of this diagram in the police document, it says plan of sight markings,

six meter diameter circle is assumed position of UFO as shown in figure two. So they've actually gone a step further and drawn a circle for what they think is the outline of the UFO. Yeah. I didn't realize they had gone this far in entertaining the fact it was a UFO. Yeah. They're literally writing a police report

calling it a UFO instead of just like, this is the crime scene, you know? Back at the station, D.S. Wark started piecing together the arrangement of the indentations they'd painstakingly pinpointed. The results were curious indeed.

They weren't quite symmetrical and didn't match up with any known equipment used by the Forestry Commission. He widened the search area to see if a mobile crane could have dropped something and then whisked it away while Bob was busy crashing his car. He even checked helicopter traffic that day and the week leading up to it,

but none of these lines of investigation went anywhere. And why would someone go through the effort of hiring a helicopter just to take it into the forest and steal a man's Levi's? It doesn't really make sense. Bob's shredded trousers were also taken into evidence. Police scientist Lester Nibb was in charge of the fiber analysis. After a detailed examination, he was confident the tears and markings were not made by forest debris,

sticks, stones, or barbed wire. He decided the damage must have been caused by, quote, a strong mechanical pull upwards. Are rips that unique? I had no idea. There was no way he had just caught these on a nail. A machine had done this. I thought rips were rips. Dude, I don't know.

I mean, I could see how there's a difference between, as researcher Amy points out, catching them on a nail and being shredded by a... Being pulled off of you, literally, yeah. By a f***ing giant mechanized pasta machine. Yeah, maybe it's like the way the fabric reacts around the tear. You know, if it's been pulled off, it's more separated, where if it's been ripped or sliced, it's more of a clean cut.

Yeah, I mean, if you blasted a pair of Levi's with a shotgun, they're going to look different to catching them on plants in the forest. True. The plot was certainly thickening. Rory, I think it's about time I showed you an artist's impression of what Bob claimed to have seen in the forest that day. More evidence. I love this. Holy shit.

Okay. Weirdly, this is exactly what I was imagining. Guys, what we have here is, let's start off with the craft itself. You're very generic UFO type craft. We've got the dome shape, the kind of pointy outward middle bit, a circular bottom. The only thing that's weird is those little bits that you mentioned around it. Those sharp little fin bits.

Yeah, which are almost like little helicopter blades all positioned around it. And then, of course, below the craft is the spiky mines. The balls. Which, you're right,

they just look like sea mines. Terrifying. Really creepy. Dude, if those were coming towards you... So the idea being, as you pointed out in the indentations, that these rolled around, I guess, on those kind of tentacle things sticking out of them. Yeah. And created the marks on the ground. That's terrifying. I mean, as you can see, this doesn't match any known aircraft in the 70s. Now, I've been through

the final police report and found that their conclusion said, the marks indicated an object of several tons had stood there, but no information has been gained to explain them. DS Work added an intriguing comment. In my opinion, Mr. Taylor genuinely reported what he saw

or believed that he had seen. Yeah, right? Because like, look, we've talked about it before. What is he getting out of this? What is it doing aside from just ruining his life, reporting this to his work and his wife and telling his friends and family about it? And the intriguing thing is the existence of these strange markings. And as they say, it would have taken tons of weight or whatever to create these markings it leaves so few possibilities as they say okay a helicopter could have done something like this

but there was no helicopter and it would have destroyed the plants around it and also he would have known what a helicopter was so he would have really had to impromptu decide to do a ufo hoax on the spot yeah yeah yeah and shred his own trousers somehow what a bizarre little piece of this puzzle is the shredded trousers i don't know why i don't know if it's like a big deal as we're making it out to be but i don't just don't think we've ever had that before we've had people who like you know it's way more serious they walk away from these these experiences and they have like borderline radiation poisoning uh they feel ill they're vomiting they've been like away for several days even though it felt like five minutes and it's like

what about this guy it's like his bear ass was exposed to every woodland creature within 100 miles and we're really not making it into a thing like it came up in his wife's testimony the police investigated the trousers yeah it's clearly an important part of the case if i went to another planet and they were wearing something i'd never seen before you know if they had like a i can't even think what it would be because it wouldn't even be something normal like a cool hat or just a fun shirt.

It would have to be weirder than that. It would have to be like a freaking nuclear nipple piercing or something that was glowing like dark matter. Maybe I would say, gimme dat. Maybe, sure, I would come down

in my helicopter and take your dark matter. They set the sea mines on him. Maybe they were scared of him. Maybe, yeah. They were just like, oh, look at those fucking genes. We don't have anything like that on our planet. I really want those genes.

And they were like, gimme the fucking genes. And they shredded off his body and then they were just like go just go we will make we'll recreate them from what we've got go and they just left the rest of them on them there's just an entire race of eight foot tall green humanoids out there in the andromeda galaxy wearing pristinely faded levi's 501s this is like a cool foreign uniform to them. You know, if you're an alien from another world.

Now to hone in on Bob, seeing as he's the center of this entire story, it's worth mentioning he was trusted by many and known to have good character. He never changed his story or tried to make a single penny

from this encounter right up until he died in 2007 at the age of 89. It's a shame that he's not still around to keep the investigation underway, as today we can truly only speculate as to what really happened to him in the forest clearing that day. But of course, thankfully the internet is full of people with their own ideas about this case. So Rory, we know what the paranormal theory is here. He saw a UFO. Yeah.

A spacecraft. And that's what he said, is here. He saw a UFO. Yeah. A spacecraft. And that's what he said, after all. A UFO traveled from another world and attacked him in the forest. But I'm going to tell you some of the more popular scientific theories for what could have happened, and we'll decide if any of those are more believable. Theory number one. Did Bob see ball lightning? Being exposed to such high voltages of electricity could have triggered a fit that caused him to hallucinate. What's ball lightning? Being exposed to such high voltages of electricity

could have triggered a fit that caused him to hallucinate. What's ball lightning? We talked about it a long time ago in this Barnum of Life. It's like there's been stories of lightning that for some bizarre natural weather circumstances turns into a ball instead of a big spear from thor or whatever um there's been stories of like ball lightning appearing inside a plane that people are on what and flying down the aisle of the plane and then disappearing again presumably it didn't shred their genes though

right and like it didn't look like a sea mine you know there's a lot of parts of this story that don't quite line up with that explanation it was writer Stuart Campbell that brought this idea to the table he claimed that the planet Venus that night caused an optical illusion to make Bob think there was a spaceship in front of him never heard of that happening before I don't think that's a real thing. Stuart is a MIB. That's a theory that makes no sense. It's like, nothing to see here, people. It was simply Venus in the night sky.

That's the nonsense sentence for an explanation. That's like me just saying, sometimes the moon makes me steal. Sorry. Needless to say, that doesn't explain the marks on the ground or what chewed up the trousers. Sure. Theory number two. The CIA were testing a prototype UAV.

There are rumors that the US was testing secret Hughes aircrafts in the UK in the 60s and 70s. I've had a bit of a Google and I didn't see any kind of craft that matched Bob's description. But could he have been witness to a project that was never unveiled to the public? Right, right. This is that sweet spot where it's borderline paranormal, but something created by humans on our world. It's just top secret. Our third and final theory, theory number three.

Bob accidentally ate deadly nightshade. This poisonous plant is known to cause extreme thirst, disorientation, blurred vision, and wacky hallucinations. Some have pointed out that a similar spaceship to the drawing you saw featured on an episode of Doctor Who the night before. And some think that Bob's nightshade-addled brain started seeing what he had recently seen on TV, and when he woke up thought he'd seen it for real. However Bob's daughter has commented on this theory saying look he's an experienced gardener and a forestry worker he ain't accidentally eating deadly nightshade he'd be very careful around such things. Is nightshade native to that area in Scotland? I don't know I think it there

probably is some there. It sounds like something from Game of Thrones that you'd have to go give to someone when they get stabbed by a special blade. I think Deadly Nightshade, to be honest, is like a whole family of plants too. I don't think it's just one. Oh, really?

Yeah. Like I want to say like aubergines and stuff are, to our American listeners, eggplants. I think they are in the same family. What? But there's probably one that is much more poisonous and acute. That's nuts. First, folks, don't eat an aubergine or you will have crazy hallucinogenic experiences.

If you like your trousers, don't even look at a slice. But Rory, clearly none of these theories even remotely begin to explain the indentations on the ground that match what bob said leaving one theory remaining that bob saw a genuine ufo the sighting doesn't fit the normal pattern we've seen time and time again and he didn't report any little green men or flying saucers he stuck to his story to his dying day and the police couldn't explain what he saw. So perhaps we can. Rory, do you think this case is truly paranormal or just a bunch of deadly nightshade? What a great story. Wow. A lot more convincing paranormal evidence than I thought there would be on today's story. I guess the only shame is that it was just, again, just this one guy who had's story. I guess the only shame is that it was just,

again, just this one guy who had the experience. I was kind of hoping that during their investigation, they would be like, we did get some reports that day of some people saying that they saw a mysterious craft in the sky. Oh, that would just be the little cherry on top, you know, to get us over the edge. But isn't that what the indentations are they're the physical proof of something being there right he could have eaten a whole f***ing weed a whole ganja i don't know what is there a term for the tree a bush of of smoke of hot smoke what what was it called i'm not cool enough to know this. I don't know, man. He could have eaten a whole kush,

and he still wouldn't have explained the fact that there's all these mysterious holes and patterns in the ground. Exactly. I don't know. I don't know. It's a pretty convincing case today. For me, out of all those theories,

the only possible one we can entertain out of the scientific ones is the classic military testing vehicle. Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's essentially like a f***ing philosophical conundrum. It's like, no matter how strange a story gets, it's always slightly more scientifically possible that this was a secret government test. But I guess like that would explain, the markings the craft i think at one point you said the sea mines fused with his legs right the problem is it doesn't match anything that's come since like they didn't deploy those in the vietnam war it doesn't make such little sense unless he was speaking about that like poetically like he felt like they were fused to his legs.

He was being pulled. Judging by his bare ass, I don't think it was poetic. It sounds like those goo balls that they hit Mr. Incredible with when they're holding him prisoner. This is a crazy story. I don't know. Where's your head at with this one? I don't know. Where's your head at with this one? Rory, I think looking back at the story of Bob in the forest that day, I think we have an intriguing, devilish mix of testimony,

accomplices, at least to our key witness in the form of Mary and the police, and the members of the community who said he wouldn't do something like this, the character references, the physical indentations, the fact that this was written up by the police who couldn't come to any proof other than saying that some kind of machinery of multiple tons of weight must have been here. Rory, today on This Paranormal Life,

at the end of the episode, I'm going to come down on a yes. Whoa. Oh my goodness. You know, I can't say that I expected that to be the result when we started this case. You little worm. Because it is a wild one. Sure.

But I mean, in terms of there's a reason why there's so much evidence in today's stories, because there's a lot of it that's really convincing. And sure. today's stories because there's a lot of it that's really convincing and sure as i said if i was visiting an alien planet and i saw them with a pair of shorts or trousers i'd never seen before that i like the look of i feel like you are honing too much on the jeans though i think that was a give me that i would say is that how you go through your life do you go into like tesco's and you go up to the bakery and you point at a tiger loaf and you go give me that can you imagine if if some some dude glurbo is just strolling down the street one day with a fresh pair of dringles which is their

word for jeans and uh all of a sudden i come down in an apache helicopter run out rip them off his naked alien body and he's like my dringles i hopped back into the craft just do a little shushing face and take off into the sky it's the same thing he'd be telling people he'd be like dude someone ganked my dringles right off my naked ass. Which is insane because how would they know what size you are? Or how would you know what size they are? You just have to guess sometimes. So, like, I get this. I understand.

I can understand the motivation behind it. Listen, I've sometimes gone as far as Stratford to buy a new pair of jeans. If I had a spacecraft, maybe I would go to another galaxy. Just to see what they got, just to shop around a little bit. I think for me this week, it's going to also be yes. That's right, brother.

It's a double yes. I want the Dringles. I want a fresh cut pair of Dringles. Skinny fit, stretch, boot cut, all forms. Boot cut. Dringles if you're listening please come through

with the sponsorship uh I'll go with a 30x30 maybe a 30x32 as well for just for we can get into the details

over the email uh very exciting news guys in the case of the West Lothian wow UFO we have a double yes I know it's a cliche on this podcast that we say yes to all of the UFO ones, but can you blame us? I mean, they are the cases

that have some of the most concrete evidence from some of the most reputable sources. It's hard to say no. Couldn't agree more, Rory. Listen, we'll take the yeses where we can get them. We'll take the W's. wonder I wonder do our listeners agree what do they think you know you can always let us know at this paranormal life podcast at gmail.com thank you to Amy Crisdale of course for researching this case you absolutely love to see it a yes a W in our belts uh for this paranormal life 2.0 in the new era of this paranormal life if you really did enjoy this episode

and you just can't get enough, head on over to patreon.com forward slash thisparanormallife. We are just off the back of a huge relaunch

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like a Ouija board or a cursed voodoo doll or the aura glasses. Yeah. From that investigation. This is great, buddy, but let's stop with all this other like bullshit trashy rewards that people don't really care about let's get to the one let's get to the one that really matters guys how would you like a get out of jail free card huh it's called the this paranormal life night of the Commune Coin. Oh, yeah. That is our reward exclusive to Patreon.com. And look, we're not saying that you can pretty much have diplomatic immunity once you get one of these coins. Yeah, because I don't know if anyone's saying that.

But all I'm saying is you never know who is a fellow fan of This Paranormal Life. Right, so it's like the Stonemasons or the Illuminati. Yeah. You flash the coin and they know you're in the brotherhood. Who knows what kind of doors it's going to open? Who knows what kind of doors it's going to close? Okay. It's really a 50-50.

A lot of people, once they see the coin, will ask you to leave. But that's because they're the enemy. All right? And you need to bear that in mind. You're going to want to see this coin, folks. A lot of love and passion and work went into it. We worked with an incredible custom coin maker. The design was actually done by Adelaide from our community.

It's really cool. It is very nice, but it actually isn't the highest tier on our Patreon. Oh, it all pales into comparison to our final tier with the small price of $50,000 a month. Sure. Chump change. I know what you're thinking. How could it be worth it? Now, obviously, this is a tier so exclusive that we really can't disclose what the rewards are.

Public, it's quite dangerous. Sure. We don't want the MIBs and the CIA getting involved. But for $50,000 a month, reoccurring, of course, you will get a free and we will fly you to to see a

and this is all available on our tier. It's all over on patreon.com forward slash this paranormal life. Check it out. There's something truly for everyone. And I will be dropping the ball massively if i forgot to say that shout outs are back on our 20 and 50 dollar tiers you can get a one-time custom shout out here on this paranormal life just like we used to do in the old days of the show and that's what we're going to do right now to see us home rory let's shout out some of our patrons. So a very special thank you to Amy Gray.

Amy Gray, of course most commonly known as the Power Ranger that didn't quite make the cut. You know, they had the Red Ranger, Blue Ranger, Yellow, Pink. And she was like, Gray! And they're like, ah. Together we make like a whole big f***ing robot. Like where would you even fit, Amy?

What is gray to us? A hat? It was kind of a sad casualty of, like, the invention of the color TV. Before that, all the Power Rangers were gray. Yeah. It really sucks. Amy Gray. Peter Gray. I don't remember the other names, but they all got sacked.

It's true. Whenever they brought in color TVs. So I'm sorry, Amy. You really got burned there. Thank you also to Taylor Talbert and the Texas Fire Station ESD1. Oh, hell yeah. That is amazing.

Look, I know that our podcast attracts quite a cool, elusive society of members across the world. You didn't tell me there was a whole freaking firehouse filled with six foot five jacked up beefy firemen there really is can i have like a bring your son to work day with you where you're their son where i'm your son i just want to like i'd like to ride around in the truck

i'd like to be a fireman for a day and if i have to start a fire to make that happen do not tell them might do it. Do not tell them that. Do not tell them that. Keep that to yourself. Thank you guys and girls for listening. Thank you also to Stephanie King.

Stephanie King, glad to have you on board with the Paranormal Commune. Of course, we will unfortunately have to strip you of your last name upon entry

just because we don't want any. We're a republic. We are a completely flat monarchy-less society. We cannot have titles such as that in the commune. Hope you respect that. And as the kings and presidents of that totally equal world,

we have to enforce those rules with an iron fist. Two iron fists and sometimes a boot. So, Stephanie. Sometimes an iron boot. Stephanie, i hope you don't mind your new title stephanie peasant thank you also to kitty patrick kitty we will be stripping you of your first name because there is only one kitty in the commune and that is me uh i don't necessarily use kitty all the time because i'm not always feeling that kind of cute and playful.

I normally stick with Kit, but, you know, I reserve that right. He does, as a president, leader, and king. So really glad to have you in the commune. Of course, really happy you're here, but I hope you can move on with your current name as Dirt Peasant Patrick. Sure. And thank you today, lastly, to Sam Butler. Sam Butler, that is a name we do not have to change. You're going to fit into the paranormal comm you just find, my friend.

If you could show... We are in short supply of you, my friend. We're going to... Look, we're not saying that you are our butler but of course if you could just wear a tux upon arrival yeah and bring me grapes when i clap twice that would be much appreciated uh if you do come to any of our live shows uh and you do hear the audience applauding at any point, though. Please do not think you must serve them all grapes.

No. It is merely Kit and myself. And actually, if we see you serving a single grape to anyone that's not us, you get the iron boot. That wraps up Shoutouts just for today. We'll be back with more next week, along with a brand new paranormal case to unfold. And if you check us out on Patreon, we'll be back with more next week, along with a brand new paranormal case to unfold. And if you check us out on Patreon, we'll be back with the weekly after party on Friday.

See you next week, folks. Bye-bye.