Jim Penniston

James W. \"Jim\" Penniston (born 1960) is a retired U.S. Air Force Staff Sergeant who served as a senior security officer at RAF Woodbridge in Suffolk, England.

On the night of December 26, 1980, Penniston was dispatched to investigate reports of a downed aircraft in the adjacent Rendlesham Forest, widely considered Britain's most significant military UFO encounter.

• Reported encountering a craft of unknown origin—a triangular, metallic object approximately three meters wide
• Observed the craft resting on the forest floor on tripod-like landing gear
• Physically approached and touched the craft's surface, which he described as smooth and warm
• Sketched the object and its symbols in his notebook
• Witnessed the craft lift off silently and depart at extraordinary speed

Penniston has become a prominent figure in UFO research through his continued testimony and publications.

• Revealed years later that he received a \"download\" of binary code while touching the craft
• Transcribed the binary sequence into his notebook over sixteen pages
• The decoded binary produced coordinates of global locations and the phrase \"exploration of humanity\"
• Co-authored \"Encounter in Rendlesham Forest\" (2014) with John Burroughs
• Has testified about the incident in multiple public forums

In Leslie Kean's book, Penniston provides his most detailed firsthand narrative. At age 25, he was the senior security officer at Woodbridge base with Top Secret and NATO security clearance. When briefed about lights in the forest by Staff Sergeant Steffens, he ordered A1C Edward Cabansag and A1C John Burroughs to respond with him. He describes the craft as a silhouetted triangular object about 9 feet long by 6.5 feet high, fully intact in a small clearing. The air was electrically charged - they could feel it on their skin, hair, and clothes. After ten minutes observing no hostile behavior, he conducted a thorough physical examination, discovering symbols that were pictorial in design with a triangle as the central motif. The surface was smooth like glass but warm with a metallic quality, and he felt a constant low voltage running through his hand. After 45 minutes, the craft lifted off without noise or air disturbance at what he logged as Speed Impossible. His two rolls of 35mm film were reportedly overexposed/fogged. The next day, he and Burroughs found three indentations, scorch marks, and broken branches at the landing site. He made plaster casts of the indentations. The investigation was classified Top Secret, and he was debriefed by AFOSI. He states: I realized that it was 100 percent certain that we are part of a larger community beyond the confines of our planet.