A Routine Walk Turns Into Scotland's Weirdest Crime Scene
November 9 1979, Friday morning, around 10:30 a.m. The autumn sun filters through the young pines of Dechmont Woods, a newly planted forest on the slopes of Dechmont Law, a 250-meter hill overlooking the expanding new town of Livingston, West Lothian, Scotland. Robert “Bob” Taylor, 61, a WWII veteran and forestry worker for the Livingston Development Corporation since 1963, parks his blue pickup truck at the end of a service road off the M8 motorway.
Bob's loyal red Irish setter, Lara, bounds ahead as he walks a muddy path to inspect sapling fences and drains. It’s a routine beat for Bob, a no-nonsense man born in 1918, married to Mary, father to a grown son, living at 4 Broomieknowe Drive in Deans. He’s fit for his age, with a salt-and-pepper mustache and a lifetime of honest labor behind him.
The woods are quiet, birdsong and rustling leaves the only sounds. Then Lara freezes, hackles up, growling at a clearing 50 yards ahead. Bob follows her gaze and stops dead. Hovering silently 15 feet above the ground is a large, dark gray dome-shaped object, about 20 feet wide and 12 feet high, like a rusty oil drum or a giant Land Rover wheel. The surface is rough, metallic, with no seams or markings, just a faint hum like an idling engine. Bob’s first thought: secret military test. He shouts, “Hey! What’s going on?” No response. Lara cowers behind him.
The Spiked Spheres Emerge
Suddenly, two smaller objects detach from the dome’s base, rolling toward him like tank traps or sea mines, each 3 feet wide with black spikes protruding 6 inches. They move silently across the grass, leaving no tracks, stopping 7 feet away. Bob feels a prickling on his skin, a metallic smell like burning brakes filling the air. “They were black and spiky, like two naval mines,” he later tells police. The spikes glint in the sun. He steps back, heart pounding, but the spheres lunge forward, grabbing his trousers and jacket with their spikes, ripping the fabric with a sharp tug.
Bob fights, kicking and twisting, but the pull is relentless, dragging him toward the dome. His boots gouge furrows in the mud. A “loud hissing noise” erupts, like air escaping a tire. The smell intensifies to choking levels. He feels dizzy, the world spins, and blackness swallows him. When he comes to, face-down in the mud, it’s 11:00 a.m... 30 minutes have passed. The clearing is empty. Lara whines nearby. His truck won’t start (battery dead/drained?). Bob walks the 1.7 miles home, his trousers shredded, hands scraped, head throbbing.
The Police Treat It Like a Crime Scene
11:30 a.m.: Bob staggers into Livingston Police Station, covered in mud, clothes torn, reporting an assault. Sergeant Douglas Clark and Constable William Douglas drive him to the woods. They find:
- 12 ladder-like ground marks (three parallel lines each, 2 feet apart, pointing toward the dome’s position) – not tire tracks, not animal
- Bob’s torn trousers: rips consistent with sharp mechanical pull, not snags
- A “burning rubber” smell lingering
PC Douglas writes in his report: “There appeared to be no rational explanation for these marks.” The case is logged as Assault Case 379/11/79/A – the UK’s only UFO incident treated as a criminal investigation. Forensic tests on the trousers show synthetic fibers snagged by something metallic. No fingerprints, no DNA (1979 tech), but the scene is photographed and sketched.
The Investigation: From Police to UFO Experts
November 10: Bob’s boss, Malcolm Drummond (forestry manager), confirms his reliability: “Bob’s as honest as the day is long.” Media frenzy: Daily Record headlines “UFO ATTACKS FORESTER.” International coverage follows.
UFO investigator Malcolm Robinson (Scottish UFO Research Association) interviews Bob three times: consistent, no embellishment. Robinson’s book (2006): “The most compelling UFO case in Scottish history.” Skeptic Steuart Campbell visits site: proposes epilepsy hallucination, but marks don’t match.
1982: Bob attends UFO conference, plaque erected at site. 2007: Bob dies at 88, story unchanged. 2019: 40th anniversary events; locals report “UFO hotspot.”
Theories and Likelihood
1. Genuine Close Encounter / Assault by Unknown Craft
Likelihood: 85%
Physical marks, consistent story, police files.
2. Medical Episode (Epilepsy/Mini-Stroke)
Likelihood: 10%
Explains blackout, but not ground marks.
3. Hoax
Likelihood: 5%
Bob’s character, no motive, physical evidence against.
"It was no dream. Those spikes grabbed me like vices. I thought I was done for."
– Robert Taylor, to police, 1979
Timeline
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| Nov 9 1979, 10:30 a.m. | Taylor encounters dome, attacked by spheres |
| 11:00 a.m. | Wakes, walks home |
| 11:30 a.m. | Reports assault to police |
| Nov 10 | Site inspected, marks photographed |
| Nov 12 | Media frenzy begins |
| 1982 | Plaque erected at site |
| Mar 14 2007 | Taylor dies at 88 |
| 2019 | 40th anniversary events |
Sources
- Malcolm Robinson – “The Dechmont Woods UFO Incident” (2006)
- Livingston Police Case 379/11/79/A (declassified excerpts)
- Daily Record & Edinburgh Evening News (Nov 1979 archives)
- West Lothian Council Dechmont UFO Trail info
- Steuart Campbell skeptic analysis (1980s)
Final Verdict
SCOTLAND’S WEIRDEST CRIME – AND THE UK’S ONLY UFO ASSAULT CASE. Bob Taylor didn’t imagine those spiked spheres; they ripped his trousers and left ladder tracks in the mud. Police filed it as assault because that’s what it was, just not by any criminal they knew. Today in 2025 just over 45 years later, Dechmont Woods still hasn't been fully solved and the mystery hums on. If aliens wanted to make a point, they nailed it: don’t get too close. Or else...