BUFORA: The Myths, the Mysteries and the Rumours. Conference 2^nd July 2011

The conference was first thought of by our Investigation Coordinator, Heather Dixon.  She was aware that there were not many UFO groups in the area but BUFORA had made a conscious decision to look at regions or locations that do not always get a local opportunity. We had not presented a conference for a while and were aware that this was something BUFORA was historically well known for producing.

There were difficulties with some local media. An advertisement in the local free paper, the Metro seemed to have hardly any effect on ticket numbers and the local university didn’t even respond, despite many attempts to their radio and email to various departments, including the student union. I wonder how many students missed out of many academic departments, just because they were prevented from gaining knowledge of the conference.

However, a great thank you is in order for a lot of publicity by the BUFORA committee and in particular, a great thanks to John Wickham, back from the U.S. and promoting us in many places.

I have to also give great thanks to Dave Franklin and Amanda at UFO Matrix magazine, who assisted in every way possible to promote the conference after the set back of the poster not going in the magazine as scheduled. He ensured we had a prominent place on the website and got us good electronic exposure via his diverse media group, incorporating not just UFO Matrix but the Paranormal and Mindscape magazines. We also wish to thank Michael at UFO Matrix and Healings of Atlantis group for reporting at the conference and also a thank you to Phil Mantle, who suggested sponsorship by the magazine earlier on in the year.

We had a setback for one of our speakers, Tim Good, who had to put family commitments first and for those who wanted to see him at Newcastle, he will be back for the London 50^th anniversary next year.

We were delighted when the author of Haunted Skies, John Hanson, agreed to replace Tim for this conference. John was accompanied by his partner, Dawn Holloway and many of us we were looking forward to meeting both of them for the first time. Dave Sankey, one of our consultants, continues to provide some striking high quality graphic images for the books and this was a chance for old friends to meet up.

We would like to give a big thanks to the BBC local radio studio, which covered this event superbly and their enthusiasm for this conference. There were interviews and reminders for people to attend and the phone-in parts of some of the shows were very busy. This indicates that Newcastle is just as interested in the phenomenon as any other part of the U.K. and we are extremely grateful to everyone at the BBC Newsroom team for the North East for the interest and promotion of the UFO subject and our conference.

A big thank you is in order for the Sunday Sun, who produced an article with input from two of our speakers, BUFORA Research Coordinator Tony Eccles and Andy Roberts, writer for Fortean Times and author of many books, speaking at Newcastle on the Berwyn Mountain incident. Tony was able to discuss the shaman lecture and he is preparing to take this on to the Weird conference in the Swindon area this year.