Haunted Wirral: The UFO that levitated a car

ON the night of Friday, June 17, 1983, a V formation of lights passed over Ellesmere Port, coming from the direction of Chester and heading north, where they were seen by many witnesses crossing the skies of Eastham, Bromborough and Bebington.

The delta formation of orange-red discs then performed a right-angled turn and flew across the Mersey to Liverpool, where more people saw them.

At some point that evening the chevron formation of glowing objects all went out simultaneously somewhere over Lancashire.

The local newspapers reported on the UFOs and one self-proclaimed expert (who I shall not name) stated on a BBC TV programme that the arrowhead grouping of lights were in fact a gaggle (or is it a flight?) of Canada Geese that took off somewhere near Boughton, Chester.

The expert said he had seen the lights himself through the windows of the Trooper Inn pub. No one else saw geese; most saw orange-red ovoid-shaped craft with windows, lights and an aura around them.

On the night after the flying wedge pattern of lights was seen, a classic "Flying Saucer" type of craft was seen by many flying over the Fox & Hounds in Barnston and swooping down onto cars travelling along Barnston Road.

That Saturday night, Paul and Stephen Carrow, two brothers in their twenties from Heswall, pulled up outside of the Fox & Hounds ready to meet up with their parents, as it was the birthday of the boys’ mother and in addition to cards and gifts they had brought her an old family photo album which she thought she had lost until Paul had found it among his belongings.

However, when Paul asked his brother Stephen where the photo album was, he was told: 'You had it last in the Devon Doorway when you were showing that woman the pictures.'

'I distinctly remember telling you to put it back in the car,' Paul told his younger brother, and realised with horror that he would have to turn the car around and go back to the pub to get the album.

He said to Stephen: 'Go in and tell them what’s happened and I’ll go back to the Devon Doorway – I just hope it’s still there.'

'No, I’ll go with you,' Stephen told him, 'the ‘arl lady will only blame me – she’ll say I’ve lost it; I always get the blame for everything.'

And so Paul turned the Chrysler Sunbeam around and stepped on the gas. The Devon Doorway was just under a mile away – a 10 minute journey, Paul estimated. That night something very strange and terrifying took place.

As the car was speeding south along Barnston Road, Stephen turned the vehicle’s radio on and strange echoing laughter broke in on the channel, swamping out the pop music.

Stephen tried to tune the car radio to another station but the weird reverberating laughter continued to come through the speakers.

The radio was switched off and Paul said: 'Must be a pirate station in the area,’ but then the car shuddered as if it had gone over a deep pothole, and the road ahead was bathed in a pinkish light.

Paul looked at something bright that was reflecting in his offside mirror – it was a circle of coloured lights that were turning almost hypnotically.

He told his brother about the weird spectacle and Stephen turned in his seat and looking through the rear window of the car he gasped, 'Oh my God! What is that?'

It reminded Stephen of the illuminated carousel rides and merry-go-rounds of a fairground at night, only this circular structure had to be a few hundred feet in diameter.

It was tilted at 45 degrees but levelled out into the horizontal as it flew over the car, and as it passed overhead the chassis of the Chrysler shook. Paul swore and asked Stephen, 'What is that thing?'

'A UFO, that’s what that thing is!’ Stephen replied, adding, ‘They’ve been seen all over Wirral.'

The gigantic craft accelerated at a phenomenal speed and then it tipped upwards and flew into the night sky.

'No one is going to believe what we saw tonight,' said Stephen, and Paul gazed in his rear view mirror and said: 'I don’t believe it; it’s back again.'

This time the craft travelled slower over the Chrysler and Paul noticed there was something wrong with the steering – he could turn the wheel as the bend in the road came up but the car carried on straight ahead – and then Paul realised that the car’s tyres were not touching the road’s surface.

He experienced a fluttering feeling in his stomach as if the car had gone off a cliff.

'What’s wrong?’ asked Stephen, watching his brother turning the wheel left and right as he tried to get the steering column to engage.

‘It’s left the road!’ Paul told him, and Stephen said, ‘What are you talking about?’

The vehicle lifted about six feet into the air and Stephen grabbed at the door handle, contemplating jumping out of the airborne vehicle but he knew he would almost certainly sustain horrific injuries leaping onto the ground as it flashed by at 60 mph.

And then the car was lowered down until Paul and Stephen heard the tyres hit the tarmac and the car almost went out of control and narrowly missed hitting a chevron sign.

Paul pulled over and he and his brother watched as the gigantic UFO flew on.

It was so low its undercarriage almost hit the top of the lamp standards. The brothers sat there in awe watching the craft slowly disappear into the distance.

After a few minutes the car continued on its way to the Devon Doorway pub and the first person the brothers saw in the place was a friend of Stephen named Brian who said to the lads, 'You should have seen the UFO that passed over here before. It was huge.'

Paul told the Brian the craft had almost picked up his car but Brian thought he was joking and said: 'I’m serious – it was huge. I was coming up Well Lane – '

'I'm serious as well!' roared Paul and Brian jumped, startled by the bizarre outburst. Paul took a deep breath before apologising for raising his voice and he explained what had happened, and most of the drinkers listening in smirked when they heard the seemingly far-fetched account of the UFO levitating the car.

Paul met the woman he’d chatted to earlier as he had shown her the old photo album and she handed it to him, saying he’d left it on the bar counter. When the brothers drove back to the Fox & Hounds they kept a constant lookout for the UFO and dreaded it swooping down on their car again.

I mentioned the case on a local radio station many years later and received some curious calls from people who remembered the UFO but the most intriguing call came from a listener in Caldy named Gordon, who claimed that the craft was a top secret military prototype that was propelled by an engine that used superconducting materials that were decades ahead of their time.

These “meta materials” as Gordon called them, could allegedly interfere with gravity, and Gordon claimed that the craft malfunctioned a few years later and vanished along with its crew, never to be seen again.

How Gordon knew all this, he did not explain but seemed to know all of the dates and places pertaining to the UFO sightings of that summer in 1983.