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Many people are not aware of, or they don’t recall a supposed UFO wave that shook Mexico in the year 1965. This “wave” is unanimously considered the most important that has occurred in Mexico and it happened simultaneously with other waves throughout the Americas. During this time – from July 1965 to October of the same year – an important rash of UFO sightings occurred in the Southern Cone, especially in Argentina and Chile. There were some very notorious sightings south of Mexico during this time including flying saucers hovering over military bases in Antarctica, and a humanoid creature that landed on the roof of a building in Peru on July 11, 1965. During this year there were literally tens of thousands of witnesses and experiencers coming forward across most every state in Mexico practically daily. Researchers analyzing the phenomenon have come up with a total of 84 cases. These were well documented at the time in the national press and in the Mexican UFO and paranormal pulp magazines, which were in their infancy at the time. This Mexico Unexplained episode will highlight some of the most important and dramatic alleged sightings during this Gran Oleada, or “Great Wave.”
One of the first incidents of note occurred on July 12, 1965, and was reported in both the Mexican newspaper El Universal and issue number 113 of the pulp UFO magazine Contactos Extraterrestres. The witness, who was identified as Señor J. R. Rico, was traveling with an assistant by car on a highway, towards Villahermosa, Tabasco. At around 10:00 p.m., when turning a curve, some 150 feet away he could see a luminous object that was above the road. The object seemed to be made of transparent plastic illuminated from the inside with an intermittent light of reddish and orange tones. Frightened by the apparition, they decided to stop the car some 10 meters away from the object to avoid a collision. When they stopped, they were able to observe better and realized that the object had a discoidal shape. Scared for his life, Rico’s assistant tried to get out of the car, pistol in hand, but as he did so, the object began to rise slowly and, moments later, it jumped and shot off towards the north, becoming a luminous point that was lost in the sky. The sighting corresponded to 
another incident from the previous day in the city of Chilpancingo, Guerrero, where numerous people reported seeing several luminous bodies moving at high speed in the sky. This happened between 2:30 and 4:40 in the morning. Among the 6 witnesses were a university professor and the correspondent for the newspaper Novedades, Alejandro Cervantes Delgado. The objects were described as two glowing points that remained fixed in the sky and after a few minutes changed places at dizzying speed, coming to a dead stop, and then moving in another direction. The objects moved from left to right and up and down, they had a very strong light in their lower part and as they moved their color became more vivid, becoming yellowish white. Also on July 11, Luis de Guevara, a staff writer for El Sol De Salamanca, reported that in the Federal District, at 1:00 on Sunday, he was able to see a luminous mass like a long strip, yellow at the top and red at the bottom, from which bright red flashes emanated. The reporter was able to clearly observe the object for about 3 or 4 minutes. At first, he thought he was seeing reflections of the lights from nearby television towers, but this suspicion vanished when the object began to move and gain altitude, getting lost in an easterly direction.
According to reports from El Nacional and El Universal on July 15, in Ixtepec, Oaxaca, about 10 people, including the correspondent for El Nacional, Evaristo Cortés, were able to see a flying object north of the city at 9:15 p.m. The object gave off an orange light that in seconds changed to blue. Some people thought that it was an omen of the end of the world and others assumed that it was an experimental rocket being tested by the Mexican military or NASA. The correspondent for El Nacional dismissed these theories and noted that the object emitted no noise.
The newspapers Últimas Noticias in its second edition as well as Novedades the following day reported that on August 7th in Salamanca, Guanajuato, numerous people saw a UFO descend in the vicinity of the town of Cerro Gordo. The news caused many people to go to the place in search of wreckage but absolutely nothing was found. That same day, according to Novedades, in Ébano, San Luis Potosí, Fermín de la Fuente, a farmer, reported that when he was returning home after his workday, he could see a luminous object in the sky, which almost blinded him. It was a cylindrical shape that moved at high speed. Subsequently, the object remained static, at an altitude of about 9,000 feet, for half an hour. The farmer informed the authorities who did not believe him, but later other people confirmed what he said he saw.
On August 19th witnesses claimed to have seen a large glowing flying saucer with a dome that landed in a vacant lot near the Instituto Politécnico Nacional in Mexico City. The landing gear of the craft was made up of a tripod and the saucer left a burnt circle in the field some 60 to 70 feet across. College students Yago and Payo Rodríguez Díaz cordoned off the area and began charging a few pesos admission to visitors who wanted to see the saucer’s landing site. The students later confessed that it was all a hoax and they paid off the supposed witnesses with money charged from admission to the field.
Also on the 19th, but in Aguascalientes, on the border with the state of San Luis Potosí, La Prensa reported that Professor Roberto Carrión, coach of a women’s basketball team along with several players from it, saw a strange object flying in the sky. At first, they thought it was a comet but, upon taking a closer look, they observed that it was actually an oval, silver-colored object that was ascending at breakneck speed until it was lost among the clouds.
La Prensa in its August 25 edition told of an interesting sighting that occurred on August 22, in Tijuana, Baja California Norte, in the vicinity of a place known as Valle de San Quintín. That day, 4 men had gone hunting and set up camp for the night. At around midnight, one of the hunters was preparing to sleep when he observed an object in the sky, at which time he called out to his companions. Half seriously and half-jokingly they began to signal the light with their flashlights. The luminous object then descended and several more appeared. Frightened by this, they fled their campsite, leaving their belongings behind.
The month of September saw 46 reports of UFOs and is considered the peak month of the Gran Oleada. On September 5th, numerous residents of 7 separate neighborhoods in the northern part of the Federal District were able to see, close to 4:15 in the afternoon, several objects cross the sky wrapped in a yellowish light. That same day 4 hours later, dozens of people who were traveling through Coyoacán, also in the Federal District, reported seeing the same thing. These objects moved in different directions, mainly from Southeast to Northwest. The objects seemed to change colors and went from being enveloped in yellow to blue and red light. Some say the objects had the appearance of stars and made strange turns. Some researchers claim that these Federal District reports are probably due to confusion with conventional aircraft.
On September 9 in Acapulco, Guerrero, around 9:30 p.m., hundreds of people reported having seen a glowing object that even illuminated the sea in the surroundings of Pie de la Cuesta. The object remained stationary in the sky and then circled away.
On September 11, in San Luís Potosí, San Luis Potosí, several people witnessed the passing of a cigar-shaped flying object in the heart of the capital city. The sighting reportedly occurred at 3:30 p.m. The object made some movements around the bell towers of the city’s main cathedral and then rose at great speed emitting a brilliant violet-colored light. Later it disappeared from sight towards the East. In this case, the information is contradictory, because while the newspaper Novedades gave the city of San Luis Potosí as its location, the Ovaciones newspaper of September 12 gave the town of Río Paisanos as the location.
On September 16, Mexico’s Independence Day, flying saucer fever seemed to be at its peak in the Federal District. Numerous “contactees” had predicted a fleet of flying saucers would fly along the Paseo de la Reforma in the heart of Mexico City on that day. Obviously, this prediction, as well as many others, was never fulfilled, but just talking about this possibility led the people of the capital to pay attention to what was happening in the sky, which produced several reports. Many of these reports could be explained as confusion with various conventional objects: Satellites, planets, planes, balloons, etc. The need to see flying saucers on that day caused traffic jams in different parts of the capital as people slowed down their cars and looked to the skies hoping to see the long-awaited parade of flying saucers promised for Independence Day. The newspapers received many reports of lights in the sky, as did the National Meteorological Observatory, but the latter dismissed all claims reported to it.
Moving through September, on September 17, the whole state of Morelos seemed to have been terrorized by flying saucers with several witnesses reporting strange atmospheric phenomena.
On the 22nd of September in the city of Puebla, Puebla, at 7:00 a.m., a gray mushroom-shaped UFO was seen hovering in the sky. The newspaper Ultimas Noticias reported that there were several dozen witnesses. The object was about 1,500 feet away and later descended into an uninhabited area. Numerous people went out to look for the strange object’s landing site but before being able to do so, the object rose again, getting lost behind the volcanoes. The rest of the month of September saw numerous sightings of UFOs many of which were isolated incidents with few witnesses.
The month of October continued Mexico’s UFO fever. On October 1st in Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz, a 14-year-old girl witnessed the appearance of a 21-foot-diameter flying saucer that hovered over her emitting a soft whistle, at a height of no more than 30 feet. The girl’s father, a policeman and other people saw this strange craft. Witnesses described the object as being surrounded by a string of bright lights hanging from it. The object reappeared several times during October.
In his 1969 book, Passport to Magonia, French UFO researcher Jacques Vallée cites a report dated October 10 from Mexico City, where it is said that three women saw a group of three-meter-tall beings without nose or mouth. The beings had glowing red eyes and were dressed in gray. Also in the same work, Vallée reports another sighting with almost identical characteristics, except that this last one takes place in the city of Jalapa, Veracruz. The Jalapa sighting was a being described as having “cat’s eyes” and wielding a metal tube. It is very likely that it is the same case confused by the press agencies.
Throughout October UFO sightings in Mexico began to wane and by the end of the month the great UFO wave was over. Researchers consider most of the sightings to be mistakes, wishful thinking or made-up stories with about 10% or so being genuine UFOs. With such a high number of sightings during 1965 even the low percentage of 10% makes for an intriguing mystery. Almost 60 years later these unexplained events still baffle serious researchers and skeptics alike.
REERENCES
Contactos Extreterrestres magazines (in Spanish)
“Little Green Martians” website (in Spanish) https://marcianitosverdes.haaan.com/2011/10/la-oleada-de-1965-final/
