Why Argentina Doesn’t Hide Its UFO Encounters

Argentina holds a unique position in global UFO history as home to one of the most comprehensively documented UFO waves ever recorded — one that prompted the world’s first official military UFO investigation protocol. Unlike other nations that kept such encounters classified for decades, Argentina’s approach was remarkably transparent, creating a paper trail of evidence that continues to intrigue researchers today.

The 1962 Military Wave

The pivotal year was 1962, when Argentina experienced massive UFO activity that couldn’t be ignored by military authorities. According to naval records, the game-changing event occurred on May 22nd at 7:20 PM, when a fighter squadron near Bahía Blanca’s Comandante Espora Naval Base engaged unknown objects during a 35-minute interception. The primary witnesses were Lieutenant Rodolfo César Galdós and student pilot Roberto Wilkinson, with Wilkinson reporting that a luminous object trailing his plane lit up his cockpit while his radio transmission failed as the UFO passed below his aircraft.

Newspaper clippings of UFO stories in Argentina

The military response was unprecedented. Captain Luis Sánchez Moreno revealed that the Navy had maintained constant UFO concern since 1952’s global wave, and his 1965 report documented that Argentina’s Navy alone recorded 22 UFO sightings between 1950–1965. The Navy developed the world’s first standardized UFO reporting system based on U.S. Air Force questionnaires, distributing 2,000 standardized questionnaires to bases nationwide. The “Permanent Commission for the Study of the UFO Phenomenon” (COPEFO) included captains Constantino Núñez and Omar Roque Pagani, along with journalists Eduardo Azcuy and Guillermo Gaínza Paz.

The Crash Recovery Operation

The most explosive claims emerged decades later when a senior military commander came forward with testimony that, if true, would represent one of history’s most significant UFO recovery operations. According to this account, on May 22, 1962 — the same day as the Espora Air Base encounters — a UFO crashed near the Belgrano naval base. The commander claimed he was called to the Military Hospital by Navy doctor Constantino Núñez, the same Captain Núñez who served on the official UFO investigation committee.

At the hospital, he reportedly found two dead alien beings described as very short with unusually large heads. More shocking still, he claimed that both the crashed UFO and alien bodies were transferred to the United States, requiring the rapid construction of an airstrip whose coordinates can still be found today. What lends credibility to these accounts is the involvement of documented military personnel — Captain Constantino Núñez was real, later becoming a Frigate Captain and officially part of Argentina’s UFO investigation commission.

The Dionisio Llanca Abduction

On October 27, 1973, truck driver Dionisio Llanca experienced what became one of South America’s most documented alien abduction cases. According to Llanca’s testimony, while changing a tire on an isolated road at 1:15 AM, he was paralyzed by an intense light that changed from yellow to bluish like an electric arc welder. “Then I saw a great thing in the form of a plate suspended in the air at some seven meters altitude, and three persons at my shoulders looking at me,” Llanca recounted.

Artist Rendition of Beings

The beings — two men and one woman with blonde hair, high foreheads, and elongated eyes — performed what appeared to be a medical procedure, using a razor-like device with a small tube to extract blood from his finger. Llanca awakened 9 kilometers away with complete amnesia. The case was investigated by renowned UFO researcher Fabio Zerpa, who documented more than 3,000 UFO cases during his career and published Llanca’s account in his book “El Reino Subterráneo.” Physical evidence supported the account — investigators confirmed with the local electricity company that there was an unexplained increase in power consumption between 2:00 and 3:00 AM on October 28, 1973, exactly when Llanca claimed to be aboard the craft.

The Trancas Family Encounter

The October 21, 1963 Trancas case represents one of the most detailed civilian UFO encounters in South American history. Sisters Argentina and Jolie, investigating strange lights reported by their domestic worker Dora Guzman, encountered disc-shaped objects that created a green light “tunnel” effect. According to their testimony, a larger craft appeared overhead, extending a beam of “solid light” to the ground that appeared laser-like but allowed objects to pass through while producing warmth. The encounter climaxed when fire erupted from the object’s bottom, causing the women to flee. Physical evidence was recovered — specialists found a peculiar “dusty white residue” containing calcium and potassium carbonate impurities foreign to the local soil, found only at the precise sighting location.

Ongoing Research

Argentina’s UFO activity continues today through the work of Fernando Hildebrandt and the Latin American Aeronautical Security organization (ALAS). According to Hildebrandt’s research, ALAS has documented numerous contemporary cases, including encounters near uranium facilities where objects perform precise circular patterns while remaining unresponsive to radio contact attempts. References to additional historical cases include the January 1965 San Miguel incident, where a cigar-shaped capsule crashed and witnesses reported seeing small individuals in phosphorescent diver-like suits working around the craft, as documented in the Library of Congress UFO bibliography.

Argentina’s transparent approach to UFO investigation, from the 1960s standardized reporting protocols to contemporary research organizations like ALAS, provides a unique window into the UFO phenomenon. The quality of documentation, involvement of credible witnesses, and presence of physical evidence in many cases makes Argentina’s UFO files among the most compelling in global UFO research.

UFO Sightings in Argentina

Sources

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Defense Technical Information Center. (1969). Technical report: AD0688332. Defense Technical Information Center. https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/AD0688332.pdf

Inexplicata. (n.d.). Inexplicata-The Journal of Hispanic Ufology: Argentina: The 1963 Trancas case revisited. https://inexplicata.blogspot.com/2011/06/argentina-1963-trancas-case-revisited.html

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