Key' found at Alton Barnes !.

 
Colin Andrews flew to England last week to undertake an urgent follow up to the 1998
'magnetometer survey'.
 
Last summer a magnetometer survey was carried out in six crop circle formations in
the counties of Hampshire and Wiltshire, England.  Normal readings were found at three sites, while the remaining sites revealed interesting readings but one significantly.
 
The 'Snowflake' in East Field, Alton Barnes showed that the earth's magnetic field took on  a finger print over the formation which mimicked the formation itself across one half of the formation profile.

There were also three magnetic hot spots within the formation which suggested
buried metallic objects.

Because Grasdorf (Germany) and another site in Australia revealed metallic discoveries within the formations,  It was felt very important to follow up on the findings.  The project had the usual co-operation of Tim Carson, the farmer.
 
Specialists using high quality metal detection equipment worked with CPRI and assisted with a sweep across a marked out grid over the area covered by last year's formation.

Our 1998 magnetometer results were found to have been very accurate, with three
large metal objects discovered at the places where 'magnetic hot spots' were measured
during the 1998 survey also carried out by CPRI. Numerous other items were also uncovered.
 
The three 'hot spots' were caused by large pieces of broken farming machinery buried
underground.

You would never believe the quantity of objects and materials we found in that 250 by 250 feet area. Amongst them were the three very large pieces of farming equipment, broken and buried over the years and then 29 other categories of items spanning 2,400 years in time. There were Roman artefacts, including a coin from an early Roman Emperor (possibly gold), two clay pipes around 300 years old, World War One bullets and army uniform buttons and belts etc.... Even Lead Sling Balls thought to be around 1,500 years old.  There were more recent bits as well - just extraordinary for one small area of the ancient English countryside. There was a medium sized meteorite and two smaller pieces.  I guess a wye smile could be had by one find - 'a key', which resembled the formation which appeared at that spot in 1990 (the first complex pictogram). The key was modern and from a company called 'Squire'.

The project was very successful and allowed us to eliminated the 'magnetic hot spots' from the equation.  However we have no idea what caused the micro level modifications to the magnetic field over the formation, creating a magnetic profile which greatly resembles the actual crop design.  This work will continue - further tests will be conducted between June and August this year while Colin is in England carrying out his 1999 research of new crop designs.

Colin Andrews.