In last week’s episode, The Final Flight, we looked at the tragic story of Australian Training Corp pilot Fred Valentich and his mysterious disappearance one evening in October 1978.
In a famous last communication between Fred and Air Traffic Control it appeared that Fred was being tracked by a large UFO just prior to his disappearance. If, as some believe, Fred had in fact fabricated the event, it has been suggested that the Stephen Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind may have served as a possible source of inspiration.
Yet, only 6 months previously something far more fantastical had occurred that would no doubt have been noted by Fred, a young man with a keen interest in UFOs and the hunt for Alien life...
Find out more at www.unexplainedpodcast.com and @unexplainedpod
Sources
1. Tate, K (2015), SETI: All About the Search for Extra-terrestrial Intelligence, Space.com, http://www.space.com/30043-seti-search-for-extraterrestrial-intelligence-infographic.html
2. Big Ear Memorial Website, http://www.bigear.org/
3. Reneke, D (n/a), Wow - The Big Ear, DavidReneke.com, http://www.davidreneke.com/wow-the-big-ear/
4. Pre-History of Radio Astronomy, National Radio Astronomy Observatory, http://www.nrao.edu/whatisra/hist_prehist.shtml
5. Redpath, M, (2012), Karl Jansky: The Father of Radio Astronomy, ArmaghPlanet.com, http://www.armaghplanet.com/blog/karl-jansky-the-father-of-radio-astronomy.html