October 1978, 20 year old Valentich went missing on a 125 mile training flight in a Cessna 21st 182L aircraft over the Bass Straight in Australia. He reported to Melbourne air traffic control that he was being accompanied by an aircraft about 1,000 foot long, he was described as a flying saucer enthusiast. He stated on the last part of his contact that it was not an aircraft.
After he went missing it seems that reports were made, but this seems more to do with an aftermath and interest in the story than actually being UFO spotting. In fact quite a few were skeptical with some reporting that maybe he was disorientated and saw his own lights reflected in the water, or maybe that they were from a nearby island.
He had not been new to flying; he had around 150 hours flying time but had sadly been rejected by the Royal Australian Air Force, due to his inadequate educational qualifications. He was determined one way, or another, to have a career in aviation. He had kept failing for his commercial licenses but seems determined to keep going.
The crash was presumed fatal, and five years after he went missing a part of the plane, the cowl flap, washed up on Flounder Island. It is said that the part was from a Cessna 182 and matched his serial number. It seems that it may well have been nothing more than a simple air tragedy for a semi-experienced but slightly dippy pilot!
It seems that all was not clear either, he had been involved in a few incidents and one included straying into a controlled zone in Sydney. He received a warning for that, he also had two incidents of deliberately flying into clouds, and prosecution was being considered. His father, Guido, said that he was an ardent UFO believer and worried about attacks from them too. There were no known aircraft in the area at the time, and he said he could see something moving at speed illuminated by four bright landing lights. His transmission was then interrupted by the sounds of metallic, scraping sounds. A search and rescue was undertaken by plane and ships, it covered over a 1,000 square miles and ceased on 25th.
It is suggested that he might have staged his disappearance, and given that no plane seems to have shown up on the Cape Otway area where he was maybe he was not even there. Melbourne Police had reports of a light aircraft making its way to a mystery landing not far from there around the same time. It is just as possible however that he was disorientated and ended up loosing his way and crashing into the water.
UFOlogists speculated that it might have been abduction, that people in the area had seen “an erratically moving green light in the sky” and that maybe this was significant, he had mentioned them in his radio transmissions at the time. Amongst the evidence they sight photo’s taken by plumber Roy Manifold, it shows a fast moving object exiting the water near the Cape Otway lighthouse. They are not that clear (oh what a shock I hear you say!) but UFOlogists state that it does seem to qualify as unknown.
I remain firmly skeptical regards UFO’s in that if they are here they are man-made. I don’t believe that physics has quite given us the best answer about the travel, the life-length for those going and why they’d be interesting in abducting cows and half-qualified pilots. Let me know your thoughts.
Investigations into the unknown and weird 