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New details have emerged shedding light on a spate of mysterious UFO and alien sightings which gripped a West Wales community almost 40 years ago.

Dubbed the 1977 Broad Haven Triangle mystery, conspiracy theories went into overdrive when reports emerged that 14 pupils from Broad Haven primary school had seen a UFO landing in Pembrokeshire.

The head teacher at the time backed up their claims, saying they had all drawn similar pictures of the craft.

Many others reported being petrified by a strange silver alien.

Now a new novel claims to have revealed details of a declassified MoD document which suggests top-ranking officials carried out a covert inquiry into the mysterious activities.

'Archive evidence'

The Watchers by Neil Spring is said to be based on “true events” and promises to reveal the truth about what really happened at Broad Haven.

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According to the Express, Mr Spring researched the case through documents sent to the National Archives 30 years after the bizarre happenings and after a new witness came forward.

“I visited Broad Haven a sceptic, and came away convinced that some of the locals knew far more about the mysterious occurrences of 1977 than they are willing to reveal,” he said.

'Faceless humanoid'

According to documents held at the National Archive in Kew, the story began one night in April 1977 at 2.30am when Rosa Granville, who ran the Haven Fort Hotel in Little Haven, was awoken by strange noise and lights.

Looking out of her window, she described seeing an object which looked like an “upside-down saucer” in the field next to the hotel and two “faceless humanoid” creatures with pointed heads.

The incident, she said in a subsequent letter she wrote to her MP Nicholas Edwards, left her “agitated and disturbed and not the least bit desirous of another encounter”.

'Inundated with sightings'

On receiving Mrs Granville’s letter back in 1977, Mr Edwards contacted the Ministry of Defence and Flight Lieutenant Cowan, an officer from RAF Brawdy, then visited the hotel.

The MP said at the time: “I am being inundated at the present time with representations about UFOs said to have been seen in Pembrokeshire.”

Other incidents reported in the Broad Haven area at the time included a class of schoolchildren who claimed to have seen a spacecraft near their playground.

Then a family said they saw several UFOs in the space of a week, as well as several sightings of silver-suited creatures.

MoD officials expressed no interest, saying there was no threat to national security.

'Discreet inquiry'

However, among the documents was a letter from the head of the MoD’s S4 wing to the Provost Security Service, the RAF’s internal police force.

The S4 chief wrote: ”I have not even told the Minister I am consulting you” and called for a “discreet enquiry” after expressing bewilderment at the number of apparently “level-headed” witnesses to the strange activity.

Mr Spring said: “(The new witnesses’) testimony rocked the very foundations of the British Government.”

'Bombshell document'

Nick Pope, who worked as UFO investigator for the MOD, said: “This bombshell document shows how the MoD’s UFO project asked the RAF Police to conduct a secret investigation into these mysterious events, while Parliament, the media and the public were being told the subject was of no defence significance.

“Defence ministers were cut out of the loop.”

The disclosures have prompted Tory peer Lord Black of Brentwood to call for a full explanation from the MoD of what it uncovered.

'More answers needed'

Lord Black said: “A number of recently released MoD files leave little doubt that a small number of sightings of aerial phenomena - particularly by military personnel, pilots and air traffic controllers - remain unexplained and unidentified.

“There needs to be further examination of these issues in the hope of learning something new.”

The sightings in Broad Haven took place near a military base, leading some observers to suggest the crafts had actually been Harrier jump jets and the aliens were just men wearing fireproof flying outfits.

Two years ago a former US Navy sailor came forward to say that the cause of the silver-suited being was in fact a US military personal wearing their standard fireproof uniform and the UFOs were new Harrier jets being flown.

The MoD has not commented.