In October 1978, Frederick Valentich, a civilian pilot, took off from
Melbourne. He had been in the air for about forty-five minutes when he
radioed the Melbourne Flight Service Unit to report that he was being
'buzzed' by an aircraft he couldn't identify. Melbourne had no knowledge of
another aircraft in the Bass Strait area and asked Valentich to describe it.
He said it was large, bright and metallic and carried a green light. It
passed about 1000ft above him, then circled and vanished, only to reappear
overhead, hovering dangerously close to his plane. Whatever the craft was,
it was clearly playing some sort of game with him. His last radio message
to controller Steve Robey said:
Robey was alarmed by the rising panic in Valentich's voice, but all
attempts to raise him again failed. The radio channel was clear: Valentich
simply didn't or couldn't respond.
An air, sea and land search was instigated by Search and Rescue as soon
as it was apparent that Valentich had not reached King Island. For five days
the search teams combed the area, but no trace of plane or pilot has ever
been found. Frederick Valentich had become another victim of a UFO.
