In Search Of UFOs (I)

It was just another normal day in the north central Chilean town of Paihuano, when locals say the bright, shiny object crashed into the mountain just outside the urban area.

Lorenzo Torres, the Paihuano mayor, told me he was working in his office when some people came in and said something was on top of the hill. He grabbed his binoculars and darted out to investigate, but to this day, can't exactly say what caused the excitement that October day back in 1998.

The day after, whatever it was, mysteriously disappeared. But speculation was already rampant that a flying saucer had crash landed and that senior officials, following orders from military chiefs in Santiago, had tip-toed off with the evidence during the night.

"Townsfolk have no idea what it was, but it's theorized it must have been some craft from another planet, extra-terrestrials, an unidentified flying object," said Torres.

Roswell, New Mexico, it ain't. But the incident caused a stir among locals, not to mention the press and Chile's squadron of self-styled ufologists. To this day, many claim something out of the ordinary occurred and that the whole truth still isn't known.

I can't say I was convinced, looking up at the barren, snow-dusted mountain where the thing was spotted. But taken together with the stream of other UFO reports I had regularly digested off the nation's nightly news programs, the incident had been enough to get me on a bus northward out of the Chilean capital, where I live and work as a freelance journalist.

From the broiling desert of northern Chile to the forests of the south, the nation is a long hotspot for UFO activity, the nation's ufologists say, rivaling UFO havens Brazil and the United States.