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Strange But True S04E01
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00:00Good evening, welcome to a new series of
00:28strange but true. We'll be offering you tales of the mysterious, the extraordinary and
00:34the paranormal and putting them to the test. Nearly all of us seem to have had such experiences
00:39or know someone who has. A sighting of mysterious lights in the sky, an encounter with a ghostly
00:45apparition or perhaps a vivid premonition. The sceptics naturally claim we're still waiting
00:50for definitive proof that any of these phenomena actually exist. But if a paranormal event
00:56was to be caught on camera, would that be enough to provide conclusive evidence? And
01:02in over a hundred years of photography, surely by now there must be such an image.
01:08Just before Christmas 1996, over 800,000 people flocked from all over the world to gather outside
01:14an office block in Clearwater, Florida. What they saw caused many of them to faint, become
01:20hysterical or claim to have had life-changing experiences. They lit candles and left gifts
01:26and donations of over £20,000 outside the building. Their pilgrimage had been inspired by this image
01:33on the glass-fronted structure. To some it was a simple trick of refracted light, but to others
01:38it was a manifestation of the Virgin Mary herself. A case of believing what you see or seeing what
01:45you want to believe. Dr. Roger Green is an expert witness in assessing photos and video images.
01:52I think the explanation is relatively simple. If we drop some oil on some water, we get what's
01:59known as a colour fringing effect. It's due to the way the light falls on the surface and is diffused
02:05and reflected from that surface. It's a classical scientific phenomenon.
02:09The Freemans Guild Dinner at Coventry's 14th Century Guild Hall. A pleasant enough scene,
02:16but on closer examination there appears to be a rather sinister guest saying grace at the top table.
02:23No one recalls seeing the hooded figure on the night.
02:26I don't think it's a hoax. Certain things about the image which are strange, and I think it's a
02:30curious coincidence of events whereby one person standing here is in front of another person in white,
02:35who could be a waitress or it could be the ghost of a knight in armour. It's all a matter of
02:41interpretation and this is, in a sense, the mystery of the picture.
02:45This picture was taken by a vicar. Would a man of the cloth be so mischievous as to invent a ghostly
02:51presence in his own church?
02:53I find it an interesting figure, not least of which there are certain inconsistencies about it as far as
02:58what might be called common sense is concerned. But optically, if we look at the figure here,
03:02we can see if we look very carefully, there are in fact what seem to be specular reflections from a
03:08pair of glasses. And if we use image processing techniques even more, we can actually home in
03:13and see what appears to be an eye behind the piece of cloth. In addition, I find it rather strange that
03:18the monk figure has decided to cover his head with a piece of cloth anyway, so the whole thing is
03:23just generally rather implausible.
03:26Video is not so easy to tamper with. This footage was shot by a birdwatcher in Yorkshire.
03:31It was only when he watched the video at home that he noticed two spectral figures in the background.
03:38I have to say it gave him the creeps because I was quite surprised to see some of what appeared
03:42to be figures within the field of view. Where the figures appear to be is actually quite a
03:48dangerous area. It's an old sewerage bed about 30 feet deep in unmentionable material. And these
03:55figures appear to be standing right on the spot. It's almost an impossible situation physically
03:59because I've been to the site taking photographs and it's not possible to stand in any way where
04:05those figures have appeared.
04:08Any explanation of the picture remains unforthcoming.
04:12More recently, the phenomenon of crop circles has provided a new mystery. Could video evidence be
04:19used to prove that paranormal forces are at work when they are created. Just a few hundred yards from
04:25a crop circle, what appears to be a silver object hovers over some fields. Some claim it's connected.
04:34Well, to me, it doesn't look like any kind of UFO. In fact, it looks more like a bird. It could well be a sea bird
04:40because it's moving erratically and it's got perhaps glossy wings which reflect the light in a manner not
04:45unlike a metallic object. In this video, the moving white objects are seen by some to be UFOs
04:52in the process of creating designs in a cornfield. For 34 years, Peter Southurst was a technical expert
04:59at Kodak where he examined hundreds of so-called paranormal images. That was one of the most bizarre
05:06pieces of film that I've ever seen. It's unusual to actually see a crop circle being actually being
05:12produced. I don't think I've ever seen one or heard of one being produced before. We're seeing some
05:18kind of electrical device hovering around the field and then suddenly the crop circles appeared.
05:26One problem is that the identity of the person who took the video is a mystery. But what if footage
05:32is supplied by a reputable source like NASA from a space shuttle camera pointing at the earth? Nick Pope
05:38was guardian of the real-life X-files on UFOs at the Ministry of Defence. This is a fascinating
05:44piece of footage. What we're looking at here is three objects which are apparently rendezvousing with
05:50each other. This is interesting because the astronauts are zooming in on this. So if this was just
05:56something natural and mundane, why the interest being expressed? The three objects which form a sort of
06:02triangle look to me to be some form of specular reflection and as the camera zooms in effect
06:09on them they change their configuration because of the change of the optical path. So they're most likely
06:16internal in some way to the system. This is a famous photograph taken from an aircraft over Costa Rica
06:24in 1971. Again, it appears to show a disc-shaped craft. It certainly seems to be pretty big but it
06:31was only in the picture for about one frame which means that it was going very very fast.
06:37I was an aerial photographer at one time and one of the things that can happen when you're taking
06:41photographs from the air is that you get things dropping off. So I think we're looking there at
06:46something which has fallen from the aircraft. It's still within a few feet of the aircraft and has been
06:50imaged by the camera as it's gone down. There are thousands of images which are alleged to feature
06:56visitors from outer space. Some could simply be saucepan lids, reflections or even a well-placed
07:02button. Others wouldn't be out of place in an old B movie. Well, I think quite a lot of them are hoaxes.
07:08In the case of this particular one, we have to look very carefully at the lighting in the scene.
07:13If we look at the grass on the ground near to the camera, we can in fact see a shadow from this so-called
07:18UFO, which is appropriate to a small object near the camera and not a large object further away.
07:24In addition, the antenna on the top of the UFO appears to be of the wrong kind for long-distance
07:29radio communication. As an engineer, I find that rather strange for a high-tech machine.
07:3590% of these unidentified images on film can be dismissed as different types of aircraft or natural
07:43phenomena. But is some footage worth more detailed inspection? Since 1991, Mexico has been home to
07:50hundreds of sightings like this one and this one, seen on the same day as the total eclipse of the sun.
07:58I think we were looking at something which was a weather balloon, which comes down, changes shape,
08:06revolves and there's a whole variety of contortions as it comes down to earth.
08:11This doesn't look like a weather balloon to me. Weather balloons fly fairly steadily up through the
08:16atmosphere and then drift on the wind and then come down to earth. This appears to be hovering.
08:22It's no weather balloon. Here we've got a truly remarkable piece of film
08:27footage. It clearly shows a structured craft moving slowly across the screen with apparently
08:34a flashing light on the underside. Now, some of the sceptics might say,
08:39well, this is an airship. But the flight paths of these airships are well known.
08:44As it happens, no airships were confirmed to have been airborne at the time.
08:49Earlier this year, there were reports of the most stunning UFO video ever seen.
08:53It was apparently enough to convince an insurance company to pay out a million pounds to a man
08:59called Joe Carpenter, who claimed he'd been abducted by aliens. But there was something about his story
09:05that seemed just too good to be true. I went to Swindon, Wiltshire with a couple of my friends.
09:11We have a small UFO group called Majestic. We got spare batteries?
09:17We are armed to the teeth with all manner of high-tech gear, camcorders, binoculars,
09:23in order to do a sky search to see if we can find or observe any strange phenomena in the sky.
09:31But for two hours, nothing happened.
09:33Suddenly, the torches flickered.
09:39Oh, great. We can't be the batteries. They're new.
09:45Joe? Joe, where are you going?
09:47I felt this weird force pulling at me.
09:54Joe! Joe! Come back!
10:03I saw this bluey-glow triangular object.
10:11All of a sudden, I was hit with an intense beam of light, and I was lifted off the ground.
10:23I then awoke. I was in an extremely surreal place. The only way I could describe it was a dome-like structure.
10:33I saw a shadowy figure. It looked like dolphin shapes.
10:46My camcorder was still running, and the next thing I remember is that I was once again falling to the ground.
10:57Joe! Joe!
10:59I'm recording it.
11:00We have a claim, and there's an 80% likelihood that we will be paying that claim.
11:07The man in the audience was Simon Burgess, managing director of insurance company Grip, who'd covered
11:13Joe against alien abduction. He claimed the video evidence had convinced him to pay out one million
11:18pounds. As the story hit the headlines, Joe was flown all over Europe to give his account.
11:24Eventually, things got way out of control. I had phone calls from France, Germany, all over Europe,
11:31Canada, Australia, America. The whole world and his brother went to interview Joseph Carpenter. Now,
11:38I couldn't handle this. Friends, family, people from off the street were asking for money.
11:45Eventually, I thought, I have to tell the truth. This is too much for me.
11:50Joe finally admitted the whole story was a hoax. Joe Carpenter is, in fact, Joe Tagliarini,
11:57a family man from Enfield. His real video archives consist of nothing more unusual than sightings of
12:03his son, Luke.
12:04I created the alien abduction insurance certificate basically as a novel thing.
12:12I had a friend in the insurance industry. I did persuade him that it would be in his interests and
12:18mine to participate in the hoax of claiming to have paid out a successful claim of one million pounds.
12:27My main objective was to see if people really did believe. And they did.
12:36Joe still goes on regular sky watches with his friends and he's promised to let us know if he
12:41has a real close encounter. I think next time we'll need a little more than his word on it.
12:50There is a theory that everyone on this earth has a double, a doppelganger. The chances of you
12:56meeting your double are fantastically remote. Unless, of course, you are an identical twin.
13:03They've always held a fascination for the rest of us. The idea of two people yet only one genetic
13:08blueprint is almost as if the same person is in two places at once. Tonight we tell the story of
13:14two sets of identical twins whose extraordinary bonding seems to transcend all the boundaries of
13:19normal relationships. Sherrilyn Ring and Lindsay Brady are identical twins born in 1960. Throughout
13:27their lives they've experienced a series of bizarre and painful coincidences.
13:32We were in a friend's garden playing on those swings like kids do, having a good time.
13:36And we both fell off the swings at exactly the same time. And we both cut our tongues open and mum
13:51rushed us both to the hospital. We're all fascinated to watch twins in action. They seem to kind of mirror
13:57each other's movements. They finish off sentences for each other. They have the same mannerisms and so on.
14:02There is definitely a very special psychological relationship there. Even as the twins grew up
14:08and apart, they shared a common bonding in the experience of pain and discomfort. This took a
14:13further twist when Sherrilyn went into hospital to have her first child. What followed suggested that
14:18one could now transmit her physical condition to the other with surprising but unpleasant results.
14:23After being in labour for about six or seven hours, the midwife decided that it was best to have an
14:31epidural to ease the pain. So in comes the anaesthetist and there's everybody in there. They fix up the
14:38epidural and the labour is progressing. I'm still getting terrible pains. Nurse, I can't stand this anymore.
14:48It was evident that the medication was having no effect on Sherrilyn. However, over 250 miles away
14:54at Lindsay's house, it was a different matter. My legs started to feel very, very strange. A very
15:00strange sensation came over them. The numbness sort of crept down my legs. Johnny, I can't move.
15:09Johnny, come and help me.
15:11It appeared as though Sherrilyn had transmitted the desired effect of the drug to Lindsay. But having
15:18done so, she now exposed herself to the impending pain of childbirth.
15:22You're about to get me some help. Quite disturbing, the fact that she had the pain relief and I'm sat
15:27there having the baby with no pain relief.
15:32This empathy was not diminished even when Lindsay moved to Hong Kong. Now a new dimension was to become
15:38apparent when she was admitted to hospital with symptoms which were diagnosed as needing urgent
15:43and serious surgery. But was Lindsay again just expressing Sherrilyn's condition?
15:49I had the hysterectomy in the October. The following day, the doctor came and he said,
15:55Mrs Brady, we have actually taken out a perfectly healthy womb. If we'd have had more time,
16:01we could have prevented this by hormone treatment or whatever. But because of your condition,
16:09because you were so ill and anaemic, we had to do something quickly. My first thoughts were,
16:16oh my golly, Sherri's got the problem. In the January of the following year, I had
16:22my hysterectomy. Even on the morning when I was having the operation, the specialist said,
16:28we really don't need to go through with this. And I said, yes, I insist. When I came round from the
16:35anaesthetic, he came back and he said, you know, good job we did this. My womb had a severe endometriosis.
16:43At times, I feel that it's pressure on us both, because if one of us is feeling unwell,
16:53then the other one's going to feel it. Over the years, I've definitely felt more pain for Lindsay
16:59than Lindsay's felt pain for me, which is annoying really, because it's enough having to put up with
17:06your own pain without having to feel who it is as well. And I do sometimes worry that if we were to
17:13ever have something seriously wrong with us both together at the same time, what the effects
17:19on both of us would be is it can be a curse, because you sometimes don't know what you're
17:26feeling, whether it's yours, whether it's hers. Can Lindsay and Sherrilyn's ability to experience
17:33each other's feelings be explained by non-verbal skills acquired in their mother's womb, even though
17:38they can be thousands of miles apart? If it is because they spent a large part of their formative years
17:43in close proximity, then how can we explain in our second case the remarkable coincidences that
17:49occurred to twins who were separated at birth and did not meet for 30 years? Barbara and Daphne were
17:56born in Hammersmith Hospital in July 1939. Their mother, Helena Jakobson, was an unmarried Finnish au pair
18:03who'd come to England to give birth to her illegitimate children away from her family and shame.
18:08The twins were given up for immediate adoption, but no family could be found that was willing to take
18:12both girls, so they were adopted by separate families of very different social and economic
18:18backgrounds. Their upbringing could not have been more dissimilar. Barbara was brought up in a
18:22working-class family in the west of London. There was very little income from their father,
18:27a council park gardener. Daphne was raised in comfortable surroundings in Luton. Her adopted father,
18:33a professional man, able to provide every advantage. However, the girls were to share much in common.
18:39I, um, went to school. It was a poor school. The education was very, very poor. I didn't even pass
18:46my 11-plus. I left school at 14 and I went to work for Darien and Tom's. I failed my 11-plus for the
18:56second time and I left school just before I was 15 and in the August I started work. I came down to
19:03Dover because my stepsister was here and we went to a town hall dance. It was Christmas time. I think
19:09it was Christmas Eve when I met him. I met my husband at a town hall dance. They have an annual
19:18Christmas dance and I met my husband there and he walked me home. I got married in October which is
19:24sort of an autumn wedding and I think I was a bit unusual because I had a wedding dress that was blue
19:31but it had white lace over the top and it was a very nice wedding in Dover and we had, um, the scene
19:39was blue and white which I thought was pretty unusual at the time. In the mid-1970s Barbara first saw her
19:46birth certificate and discovered that not only was she adopted but because the time of the birth had been
19:51recorded that she was also a twin. There followed a long and arduous battle with bureaucracy in her search
19:57to find the twin she'd not seen for over 30 years. Eventually, Barbara was allowed to write to her
20:03sister in the hope of making personal contact. She now found herself in the position of coming face
20:12to face with her own living mirror image, Daphne. The question ran through her mind, what would her
20:18sister be like after all these years? A meeting was arranged at King's Cross Station. The meeting
20:39was rather strange. I wasn't necessarily nervous. I was a little bit excited. The train pulled in,
20:48and Daphne was right in front of me. And she opened the carriage door. She said hi.
20:54We didn't kiss. We didn't hug. There was no need. And we wandered off the platform chatting away.
21:00We forgot about our husbands. We'd left them behind. Reunited after 30 years, Daphne and Barbara began
21:07to discover all the similarities in their separate lives. Got married. Then, sort of, a few months after
21:15that I had a miscarriage. Then I went on to have two boys and a girl. I had a miscarriage, unfortunately,
21:23and then I had two sons and a daughter in that order. I'm not interested at all in politics.
21:30Coming to Pink Pots. Yes, a horrible Pink Pots. I don't like politics. I don't vote.
21:38When I was 15, I was working Derry and Tom's store, and I fell down some stairs. Well, I think I first
21:46started falling down stairs when I was about 14, 15. Therefore, if I go down some stairs,
21:53I've got to hold on, at least touch a rail. I am pretty worried about stairs, and I do hold on.
22:00How could Daphne and Barbara have shared so many experiences over the years without ever having
22:05known of each other's existence? Basically, we are quite surprised, I think, at the degree to which
22:12things like preferences do seem to be genetically determined. But the fact that they are means that
22:18even with twins who are separated at birth and reared apart, they will quite often follow quite
22:23similar life courses. Now, Barbara. The sisters travelled to America to assist research into twins.
22:30I'd like you to write a sentence for me. One experiment in particular stood out. Anything you want.
22:37And I sort of panicked. I thought, oh, my God, I've got to write a sentence. So I wrote,
22:42the cat sat on the mat. But unfortunately, it didn't come out like that. It came out as the CAS,
22:47C-A-S, sat on the mat. Then it was Daphne's turn. Right. Now, the first thing I'd like you to do for
22:55me is I'd like you to write a sentence for me. Because you don't really know what sentence to write,
23:00so it has to be short, not meaningful and deep. So I wrote, well, I hoped it was going to be,
23:07the cat sat on the mat. But when it came out, it came out as the CAS sat on the mat.
23:19As a matter of routine, Lindsay and Sherilyn visit the doctor and say,
23:23my sister is feeling unwell. Please, can I have a checkup? An amazing story. But for them,
23:29it's part of everyday life. Good night.
23:41the cat sat on the mat.
23:43To tomorrow.
23:43the cat sat on the mat.
23:48And the cat sat on the mat.
23:53The cat sat on the mat.
23:57The cat sat on the mat.
24:02So let me see you.