In October 1978, Frederick Valentich – a 20-year-old promising Australian pilot – began a 241km training flight on a Cessna 182L light aircraft to King Island – an Australian island. 

After a few hours of flying, the plane mysteriously disappeared over the Bass Strait – a narrow stretch of water located between Australia and Tasmania, in the state of Victoria. Since then, no one has seen Valentich and no one has an explanation for the pilot’s disappearance except for a mysterious radio signal.

Historian Reg Watson has researched the disappearance for many years, saying: “I’ve been looking at this case for over three decades, and it’s really unusual. I know many people will I don’t believe it, but I have to say, in my opinion, he had an encounter with a UFO – note that I’m being extremely serious.”

The mysterious disappearance of Frederick Valentich has sparked many speculations and theories.

Valentich disappeared on the night of October 21, 1978. Mr Watson said Valentich had planned to fly from Moorabbin in Victoria to King Island. He reported that due to some minor problems, the flight time will be longer than expected. He left Moorabbin at 6:19 p.m. and was in radio contact with air traffic control in Melbourne at 7:06 p.m.

“He asked controllers to check to see if there were any other aircraft in the area,” Watson said. Valentich then went on to report that a large, unidentified plane flew over his head, adding: “The person flying it was trying to challenge me.”

Air traffic controllers continued to keep in contact with him to get information to find out what the object was. Valentich described it as being quite long, metallic and having a blue light. Sometimes it disappears and then suddenly reappears.

Everything was silent for a moment and Valentich spoke up: “It’s not a plane.” And those are the last words we have heard from him so far.

Information about the disappearance of Frederick Valentich and the plane was published in the press.

Mr. Watson also added that authorities have been searching for Valentich for four days but have had no other leads on him to this day. There are some theories that Valentich orchestrated his disappearance because his plans went awry that night. “There is a mystery about whether Frederick will actually go to King Island,” Mr. Watson said.

“Valentich booked his flight to Moorabbin but according to information gathered from the checkpoint, he did not report to King Island flight services that he was arriving, so they did not turn on the standby lights at the airport . “This has given rise to two theories for Valentich’s disappearance: one is that he planned his mysterious disappearance; Or two, he committed suicide.”

Mr. Watson said that if it was hypothesis number 2, it would be crazy, because he talked to Valentich’s family and friends and as far as he knew, his attitude that day was still very normal, with no signs of death. signs of sadness or depression, it did not resemble a person about to die at all, he did not think that this young man intended to commit suicide that night.

“Frederick is a very young but very talented guy. No matter what difficult situation he is in, he always calmly handles it. In addition, Valentic also has a girlfriend, and there is no conflict between the two. There are no conflicts, he shows no signs of mental illnesses such as autism or depression, and he also gets along very well with his family.” – Mr. Watson commented.

Immediately after Frederick lost contact with air traffic control, a sea and air search was launched that included a RAAF Lockheed P-3 Orion aircraft, along with eight civilian aircraft. According to documents, the search for the young pilot expanded to more than 2,600 square kilometers. However, search efforts were discontinued on October 25, 1978 without any evidence found.

Frederick Valentich before his disappearance. Photo: News.com.au.

The incident attracted global attention and sparked many conspiracy theories, the most popular of which is that Valentich was abducted by an unidentified flying object (UFO).

Others concluded that Valentich faked his own death to escape or that in fact, the plane he was piloting had flipped upside down and the lights Valentich saw were just plane lights reflecting on the sea surface before the moment of death. it plunged into the water.

Not long after Valentich disappeared, Guido, his father, told reporters that he was sure his son was still alive and confirmed that he was abducted by a UFO. “I’m just worried that it will be released in another area, very far from where it was captured,” he said.

 A UFO (Unidentified flying object) is a sighting that cannot be immediately identified or explained. Upon investigation, most UFOs were determined to be known objects or atmospheric phenomena, while a small number remained unexplained. UFOs have become the inspiration for many different movies and TV shows.