Posted On: April 13, 2022

The year is 1979, the place is a clearing on Dechmont Law in Livingston, West Lothian, Scotland. Bob Taylor, a forestry worker, had an encounter with a UFO. The UFO dragged him along the ground. This is considered to be one of the most significant close encounters in Scotland.

On November 9th, 1978, at 10:30 hours, Bob Taylor advised that, he had been working alone checking fences and gates at Dechmont Woods at 10:30 when he came across the spaceship in a clearing. After the spiked objects rushed out and tried to grab hold of him, all he could remember was a strong smell of burning. When he came to, the clearing was empty, apart from a pattern of deep regular marks on the ground. He went to his van but was so shaken he drove it into a ditch and had to stagger home in "a dazed condition".

When he got to his house he told his wife Mary he had been attacked by a "spaceship thing". Because Mr Taylor was in such a state, the police were called and officers found themselves inquiring into an assault on a forester by alien beings.

Detective Constable Ian Wark, the scene of crime investigator, arrived at the clearing to find a large gathering of police officers were already there. There were about 32 holes, which were about 3.5 inches in diameter, as well as marks similar to those made by the type of caterpillar tracks often fitted on bulldozers.

"After examining every piece of machinery they had up there, we did not find anything to match," he said. The police officer said that the unusual marks on the ground were only to be found in the clearing where Mr Taylor had experienced his reported close encounter.

"These marks just arrived," Det Constable Wark said. "They did not come from anywhere or go anywhere. They just arrived as though a helicopter or something had landed from the sky."

The police report from the time said the marks on the ground indicated an "object of several tons had stood there but there was nothing to show that it had been driven or towed away".

PC William Douglas wrote: "There appeared to be no rational explanation for these marks."

As part of the police investigation, Mr Taylor's ripped trousers were sent for forensic examination but this was many years before modern DNA techniques so analysis concentrated on how the damage had been done.

Police forensics said the trousers seemed to have been damaged by something hooking them and moving up.

In his testimony to the police, the 61-year-old described how he saw a 30ft-high "dome-shaped" object in a clearing in the forest near the West Lothian.

He told how two-spiked spheres then rolled out towards him and, as he passed out, he was aware of being grabbed on either side of his legs. Mr Taylor woke up in a disheveled state 20 minutes later.

Mr Taylor, who died in 2007, was a respected war hero and teetotal churchgoer. No-one doubted that he was sincere in what he believed he had seen and throughout the rest of his life he never deviated from his story.

In his statement, Mr Taylor said that after the UFO incident he was examined by the local doctor who called at his house. The doctor suggested he should go to nearby Bangour Hospital for a check-up and x-ray.

After waiting for two hours at the hospital he got fed up and left without being examined.

Mr Taylor’s trousers are now in the possession of Malcolm Robinson, a Ufologist who has been investigating such cases since the Dechmont incident.

He said they were police-issue blue serge trousers and the type of rips in them did not happen by getting snagged as Mr Taylor crawled away on the ground.

Mr Robinson, who has given lectures on the incident across the UK, Holland, France and the USA and written a book on the subject, said it was one of the most incredible cases in the world.

He said it was one of very few hardcore cases that defied any explanation.

Last year a UFO trail opened which takes people to the spot where a new town forestry foreman claims he saw an alien spaceship.

My Take: Bob Taylor kept to his story until his death in 2007. The marks on the ground have not been explained by anyone. My question is, why did the UFO attack him? When he was unconscious, what did they do to him? What do you think?

Resources: Steven Brocklehurst at bbc.com November 9th, 2019.

Posted On: April 13, 2022

The year is 1979, the place is a clearing on Dechmont Law in Livingston, West Lothian, Scotland. Bob Taylor, a forestry worker, had an encounter with a UFO. The UFO dragged him along the ground. This is considered to be one of the most significant close encounters in Scotland.

On November 9th, 1978, at 10:30 hours, Bob Taylor advised that, he had been working alone checking fences and gates at Dechmont Woods at 10:30 when he came across the spaceship in a clearing. After the spiked objects rushed out and tried to grab hold of him, all he could remember was a strong smell of burning. When he came to, the clearing was empty, apart from a pattern of deep regular marks on the ground. He went to his van but was so shaken he drove it into a ditch and had to stagger home in "a dazed condition".

When he got to his house he told his wife Mary he had been attacked by a "spaceship thing". Because Mr Taylor was in such a state, the police were called and officers found themselves inquiring into an assault on a forester by alien beings.

Detective Constable Ian Wark, the scene of crime investigator, arrived at the clearing to find a large gathering of police officers were already there. There were about 32 holes, which were about 3.5 inches in diameter, as well as marks similar to those made by the type of caterpillar tracks often fitted on bulldozers.

"After examining every piece of machinery they had up there, we did not find anything to match," he said. The police officer said that the unusual marks on the ground were only to be found in the clearing where Mr Taylor had experienced his reported close encounter.

"These marks just arrived," Det Constable Wark said. "They did not come from anywhere or go anywhere. They just arrived as though a helicopter or something had landed from the sky."

The police report from the time said the marks on the ground indicated an "object of several tons had stood there but there was nothing to show that it had been driven or towed away".

PC William Douglas wrote: "There appeared to be no rational explanation for these marks."

As part of the police investigation, Mr Taylor's ripped trousers were sent for forensic examination but this was many years before modern DNA techniques so analysis concentrated on how the damage had been done.

Police forensics said the trousers seemed to have been damaged by something hooking them and moving up.

In his testimony to the police, the 61-year-old described how he saw a 30ft-high "dome-shaped" object in a clearing in the forest near the West Lothian.

He told how two-spiked spheres then rolled out towards him and, as he passed out, he was aware of being grabbed on either side of his legs. Mr Taylor woke up in a disheveled state 20 minutes later.

Mr Taylor, who died in 2007, was a respected war hero and teetotal churchgoer. No-one doubted that he was sincere in what he believed he had seen and throughout the rest of his life he never deviated from his story.

In his statement, Mr Taylor said that after the UFO incident he was examined by the local doctor who called at his house. The doctor suggested he should go to nearby Bangour Hospital for a check-up and x-ray.

After waiting for two hours at the hospital he got fed up and left without being examined.

Mr Taylor’s trousers are now in the possession of Malcolm Robinson, a Ufologist who has been investigating such cases since the Dechmont incident.

He said they were police-issue blue serge trousers and the type of rips in them did not happen by getting snagged as Mr Taylor crawled away on the ground.

Mr Robinson, who has given lectures on the incident across the UK, Holland, France and the USA and written a book on the subject, said it was one of the most incredible cases in the world.

He said it was one of very few hardcore cases that defied any explanation.

Last year a UFO trail opened which takes people to the spot where a new town forestry foreman claims he saw an alien spaceship.

My Take: Bob Taylor kept to his story until his death in 2007. The marks on the ground have not been explained by anyone. My question is, why did the UFO attack him? When he was unconscious, what did they do to him? What do you think?

Resources: Steven Brocklehurst at bbc.com November 9th, 2019.