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- NEWS CLIPPING SERVICE
-
- DATE OF ARTICLE: May 29, 1989
- SOURCE OF ARTICLE: Sun
- LOCATION: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
- BYLINE: Brett Stavorback
- ========================================================
- (C) Copyright 1989 ParaNet Information Service
- All Rights Reserved.
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-
- A MID-AIR MYSTERY
-
- UFOS -- now there's a topic to tickle the imagination.
- Galactic tales of flying saucers inhabited by little green
- critters have been the source of both intrigue and ridicule.
- Believers argue it's ludicrous to suggest earthlings are the
- only life form in the universe to have discovered the art of
- space travel.
- But cynics claim UFO sightings seem to be made by
- hillbillies in the middle of nowhere as opposed to university
- professors on the campus of Cambridge.
- Whatever your view, there is the mysterious matter of the
- 1978 disappearance of light aircraft pilot Frederick Valentich
- over Bass Strait.
- His mid-air claims that a UFO had harassed him prompted such
- headlines as "Kidnaped by alien beings".
- More than a decade later, there is no trace of Valentich or
- his plane.
- This puzzling story is recreated in a fascinating
- documentary called Something Shining on SBS tonight at 7:30 p.m.
- What started as a seemingly simple joy flight from Moorabbin
- to King Island turned into a baffling case about which everyone
- is quick to theorize.
- The fact the Transport Department refused to release the
- tape of Valentich's frantic last radio messages adds to the
- drama.
- But it has been revealed he said of the alleged hovering
- UFO: "It seems to me he is playing some sort of game.
- "He is flying over me, two or three times, at speeds I
- couldn't identify.
- "What I'm doing right now is orbiting and the thing is just
- orbiting on top of me...it's just vanished."
- Interviews with air officials and Valentich's family don't
- shed light on what happened on the night of October 21, 1978.
- "I don;t know what he saw, but whatever he said he saw, he
- saw," one said.
- Is Valentich's disappearance a con job or did aliens kidnap
- him?
- ABC newsreader James Dibble sums up the special:
- "I wonder if he had been taken by a UFO and had come back --
- would anyone believe him?"
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- 6/89
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