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This MoD file, titled UFOs - Persistent Correspondence - Dr David Clarke, holds Dr David Clarke's Freedom of Information requests and emails to the Directorate of Air Staff from 2005 to 2008. Clarke asked for the DI55 report on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena in the UK Air Defence Region and for Rendlesham papers. He also sought records about Nick Pope. Other items include an internal review that released redacted passages on plasmas, the MoD's statement that it had no report of the 2008 South Wales police helicopter sighting, and a 2009 disposal form.
“RAF”42 pages
itself classified. If that is the case, I can see no valid reason to conceal the security classification of this document.
7. I noticed that DAS or it's predecessor Sec(AS)2 were not included in the distribution of the DIST letter of 4 December 2000. Presumably, DAS will have been notified of the decision in a separate document? If that is the case, please may I have a copy of that document?
With regards to the requests made under my second FOI request dated 17 June 2005:
8. Firstly, with reference to my request for a copy of the DI55 Policy file, D/DI55/108/15 Pt 4. I do appreciate the time and costs involved in preparing whole files for release, and the costs already incurred in answering the other requests made on 17 June.
You helpfully suggest that DIST staff would assist if I was looking for something specific from this file. Therefore, I would like to modify that request to encompass a search of the file enclosures between the years 1980 to 1996 for documents relating to the Rendlesham forest UFO incident. I would be particularly interested to see any documents dated between 1981 and 1984 relating to the report received from the USAF at Woodbridge. These may contain the description "Unexplained Lights" or "UFO report from RAF Woodbridge" as the case is described in the Sec(AS) file released in 2002.
9. Could DIS confirm a) that the chronological dates of enclosures in the DI 55 file cover the years 1971-1996 (these appear on the description of the file you supplied in a list attached to a letter dated 2004) and b) the file was not among those searched by DAS staff in 2001-2 when MoD assembled the contents of the Rendlesham file now available on the Publication Scheme.
Secondly, with regards to my $ 2^{\mathrm{nd}} $ FOI requests 1a &b, covered by your letter of 21 July 2005. In response to these requests you enclosed copies of two letters copied from the file D/DS8/10/209 Pt F - General briefs & reports, UFO correspondence 1983-84, namely:
- E39 a letter from Jenny Randles dated 1 August 1983 requesting a copy of the MoD file on the Lakenheath-Bentwaters UFO incident of 1956
- E52 a reply from Section 40 of DS8 dated 26 August 1983 in which she writes: "...I have checked to see whether, by chance, the file relating to that period had been retained in spite of the general policy in force at that time..."
10 Presumably, prior to 26 August 1983 Section 40 exchanged memos with Defence Records and received a reply which allowed her to frame her response to Section 40 This would presumably be filed between enclosures E40 and E58. Could you please provide a copy of the relevant papers covering this important internal discussion. Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. The text was read from the page images by an OCR model; expect the odd misread word. 160 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.