Cowling also confirmed to me by telephone in 1998 August that Nick Pope had not re-checked the facts with him. This was over a year after Professor Close’s TV demonstration that there was nothing significant about the radiation levels at Rendlesham – an opinion with which Cowling, Pope’s own source, now agrees. Judging from Pope’s subsequent utterances, it seems that he has never updated himself on this vital point.

In 2003, as part of a TV documentary about the Rendlesham case, the Sci Fi Channel made their own check on radiation levels at the site in the hope that, had the area genuinely been contaminated with unusually high levels of radiation, some traces might remain. The readings were taken for them by Patrick Davison, an environmental scientist from Mayer Environmental Ltd of Brentford, west London. The Sci Fi Channel’s programme itself was non-commital about the results, but Davison confirmed to me by telephone in 2006 March that he found nothing above background at the site.

If Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire or anyone else is going to continue to use the radiation readings as “tangible proof that something extraordinary happened there” then they are on very shaky ground indeed.