The road is an old Roman road, and a bit neglected in parts, also there is little or no road illumination to aid night drivers. It is, however, like most old Roman roads, extremely straight, running roughly from north to south, with a connection at its northern end with the main A5 Watling Street road, before crossing over it to become a minor country lane, eventually meeting with the B4114, close to the villages of Sapcote and Croft.

It is not an exceptionally busy road, and is used by many as a handy route for places like the village of nearby Brinklow, and continues for many miles in an approximate SSW direction. Perfect, one would think, for making a no-nonsense journey, and, for those who would rather avoid the more busier roads. From the events of recent years however, it seems that the Fosse may be being used by others, perhaps as a navigational aid for after dark manoeuvres by non-earthly aerial objects who momentarily, have to stop to fix their position. Or perhaps, on the other hand, simply, just like earthly folk, they are looking for a straight course to follow in order to reach their destination.

This particular sighting came to the attention of LUFOIN in 1994, via the editor of a local (Hinckley) music magazine, and involves the observation of a brightly lit cross-shaped object seen hovering above the Old Fosse (B4455), N. Warwickshire at map ref. SP450 826 in April 1989 at approximately 7.30 p.m. The names of the two witnesses involved have also been changed by request, and we will refer to them as Mr. and Mrs. ‘M’.

“It was around five years ago in April 1989, My husband and I were coming back from a day out in the Cotswolds to Hinckley at about 7.30 p.m. It was a clear, bright, still evening. We were out of Brinklow and coming along the Old Fosse, when we came to the Crossroads where you turn left to go down to the Axe and Compass public house in Wolvey. (B4112). Suddenly, we saw something overhead out of the front windscreen. We stopped the car engine by the white cottage there and looked up in amazement for about three minutes. (At least a couple of minutes elapsed to when we came across the UFO to when it moved off). I got out of the car and stood with the door open upon the sill. We were absolutely gob smacked at what we were looking at.

We were looking up from almost directly underneath it. I should say, after consideration, the object was very low, only about eighty feet up. It was slightly offset from the road, above some trees, about fifty feet from a white cottage.

Its difficult to describe the object because you couldn’t actually see it. What you could see was a formation of bright white lights rather than a solid mass. These lights were arranged in patterns, formations of two, and shone out brightly despite it being a clear, calm spring evening. They didn’t flash on or off and they were the same consistency all the way through. There were no coloured lights at all.

The shape of the object’s ‘undercarriage’ was a cross. It’s north-south strut being slightly longer than the east-west strut. As we observed it, we counted pairs of lights along these struts. Across the east-west strut were eight evenly placed pairs of lights. Across the north-south strut there were ten pairs, again, evenly placed. Its difficult to be accurate but I should say it was about thirty feet along its north-south strut about, and about 25 feet along its east-west strut. When the object moved off, it went in the direction of its longest strut. There was something behind the lights, a mass of something, but we couldn’t make it out.

The whole evening was very calm. There was no movement of trees. The thing above us was absolutely silent, and this is what struck us the most about the object. It was absolutely motionless, still and silent. It wasn’t hovering because the lights would have been twitching. It was completely stationary with no movement at all. Neither my husband or myself heard a sound, nothing at all.

After about two to three minutes, (it couldn’t have been any less), the object moved off and we watched it until we couldn’t see it anymore. It didn’t go extremely fast, but it went fast. It didn’t rise any higher as it moved but stayed at the same height. Once again, it was totally silent as it moved, and when it took off there was no back-kick at all, you know, how you would imagine an engine to thrust back. There was none of that before it went. As it took off and was speeding away, we watched it disappear. There is a dense wooded area in the far distance, as you are looking back south towards Brinklow way. (All Oaks Wood) ? We had started up the vehicle to follow it, and were watching where it was heading, but it just disappeared.”