The Frederick Valentich UFO Incident
The
Frederick Valentich UFO
incident, sometimes referred to as the
Frederick Valentich
alien abduction/disappearance, took place on
October 21, 1978, and allegedly involved a close encounter between a
Cessna 182L piloted by Valentich and a UFO.
The day started
normal enough, Valentich departing Moorabbin Airport, Melbourne, at
18:19 local time, headed southwest, purportedly reaching Cape Otway on
the Australian coast at 19:00 the first leg of his journey. It was on
the second leg from the cape across Bass Strait to King Island that
things apparently began to go wrong.
At 19:06 Valentich
contacted Steve Robey, a Melbourne Flight Service Officer, for
information on another aircraft flying at his altitude, below 5000 feet
(1524 meters), and was told their was no known aircraft at that level.
Valentich replied that not only was there an aircraft but that it had
passed 1000 feet (300 meters) overhead a number of times, traveling at
a high rate of speed and apparently playing with him.
Robey
asked Valentich to confirm his altitude which the pilot did, Robey then
asked for an estimate of the aircraft’s size, to which Valentich,
seemingly not hearing, replied the aircraft had a shiny metallic sheen,
a green light and was hovering above him. This was followed by a short
pause then “It’s just vanished.” Then another pause before “now
approaching from the southwest.”
At 19:11:52 Valentich reported
that his engine was idling rough and when questioned at as to his
intentions replied he was proceeding to King Island followed by “Ah
Melbourne that strange aircraft is hovering on top of me again. It is
hovering and it’s not an aircraft.” This conversation was apparently
followed by seventeen seconds of strange “metallic, scraping sounds,”
then nothing.
Search and rescue was alerted and when Valentich
failed to arrive at King Island a sea and air search was undertaken
which continued until 25 October with no results. A Department of
Transport investigation though unable to determine a cause (no trace of
Valentich or the Cessna was ever found) presumed that Valentich had
died in the incident.
As for the public, a number of individuals
came forward with stories of “moving green lights in the sky.” At least
one, tying the green lights to Valentich’s plane, described an
encounter with the lights following the Cessna as it dived in avoidance.
A number of possible explanations for the incident have been offered
over the years:
According
to Guido Valentich, the missing pilot’s father, his son possessed an
extensive background in ufology (not necessarily a factor but the "how
to" of a hoax would certainly have been within his capabilities,
especially when one takes into account that the aircraft was never
tracked by radar anywhere near Cape Otway though a light plane was
reported to have landed nearby).
He became disoriented, crashing after flying upside down and seeing his
own lights reflected in the water. [1]
He committed an elaborately staged suicide.
He was struck by lightening.
He encountered and was brought down by drug smugglers.
He encountered an alien craft and was abducted by extraterrestrials.
[1] Possible but not probable, the Cessna 182 has a gravity feed fuel
system making extended inverted flight extremely unlikely.
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