OVNI. España

Spain: A Dimensional Doorway in the Vicinity of Aznalcóllar?

By José Manuel Garcia Bautista

In the early morning hours of 25 April 1998, near the locality of Aznalcollar in Seville, one of the greatest ecological disasters to ever affect our country took place. The toxic waste containment pond owned by the Swedish-Canadian firm Boliden-Apirsa, overwhelmed by its hazardous contents, cracked and sent froth a “toxic wave” that covered the region, halting at the border of the Doñana Natural Park. The damage caused to this wildlife sanctuary was minimal, although all local residents are aware of the lethal effects of the toxic leaching into irrigation wells and riverine water supply into Doñana.

The contents of the containment were, in theory, heavy industrial wastes consisting of mercury, lead, iron and derivatives of iron pyrite washing, although the possibility that it also contained toxic chemical wastes from the Huelva Chemical Industrial Park was also considered. In short, a highly dangerous content.

Around that time, in the area known as the “Magnetic Triangle” and whose vertexes are formed by the localities of Gerena, Aznalcollar and El Garrobo, there had been intense UFO activity (CE-1) in the area. On the very same night that the containment broke, a witness driving along N-433 toward a farm in Aracena was able to see an unidentified flying object flying over the property occupied by the containment well in Aznalcollar. Later that night, the containment broke. On the 30th of the same month (April 1998) four witnesses driving along N-433 toward Higuera de la Sierra were nocturnal witnesses to the mysterious flight of a formation of aircraft of unknown origin toward El Garrobo. The sighting was so precise and detailed that they were even able to make out the “holes” in the portholes….

All of these sightings, of course, were ratified by ufologists of the stature of Ignacio Darnaude and Joaquin Mateos Nogales, who have devoted their lives and available free time to researching the UFO phenomenon.

Consultations were made with the Weather Bureau, the Seville Airport Tower, INTA, etc. in an effort to find a logical and rational explanation to the sightings. These turned up negative. It was concluded at the time that what was seen that night by the witnesses was truly “something” that did not obey traditional, rational explanations. They were simply inexplicable from a scientific perspective and the only other possibility was to explain it as an unidentified flying object or objects.

Over a year has elapsed since the event and the facilities at Boliden-Apirsa have renewed their activities. The uncertainty experienced the workers in these facilities has been allayed and their work lives have resumed, but the renewal of all this mining activity appears to have “triggered” UFO activity in the area once again. Since April of this year (1999) the localities of Gerena, Aznalcollar and El Castillo de las Guardas have been at the receiving end of the customary, frantic activity of unidentified objects.

At sundown on April 18, 1999 (a Sunday), flight attendants Maria Angeles Rubio and Esther Marín were driving toward Seville along the N-431 from the community of Palma del Condado. Upon reaching the town of Sanlucar la Mayor, they were surprised to see the mysterious flight of a vehicle with three powerful lights on each of its corners, its fuselage constituting a triangular structure. The sighting took place over a seemingly long 20 second span and the witnesses were astonished. Parallel to this sighting, ufologist Ignacio Darnaude confirmed another sighting on the same date and with the same characteristics. The protagonists of the event are related to the renowned sensitive Malena Martínez. Joaquin Mateos Nogales, a resident of Gerena, confirmed that sightings had indeed occurred in the vicinity and were ongoing.

On the night of 22 April 1999 (a Thursday), Antonio Garrido, an agent for a well-known brand of soft drinks, was returning to Seville from Huelva along N-433. He was able to see a light following his automobile over the “Magnetic Triangle”. The light became smaller and broke into three new lights that alternated their colors from red to green. The three lights “seemed to want to tell me something” and after switching their colors to bright blue, “that thing, UFO or whatever it was, vanished in the dark in a sort of “Z’ configuration. It was startling.” The witness was so overwhelmed that he had to pull over on the shoulder and take in some fresh air after the sighting.

On 24 April, several people were able to see a mysterious luminous formation heading slowly from the locality of Chipiona toward Sanlucar de Barrameda (practically at the mouth of the Guadalquivir River). The García family happened to be at that location with the purpose of closing a rental deal on a home for the summer months. They remarked: “that cloud had a very odd shape and glowed in a very strange way. I don’t think there was anything natural about it. its shape was just too weird!” This curious sighting took place at 19:30 hours and it lasted so long that the witnesses stopped paying it attention, occasionally checking on it to see if “it was still there.”

On 10 May at 2:30 in the morning, truck drivers and a watchman made a new sighting the Aznalcollar mines. The sighting lasted approximately 30 minutes and its shape was similar to that of a “circular electric heater,” according to Joaquin Mateos Nogales. The object was blue in color and with an approximate diameter of 50 meters.

On 15 May of this year (1999)  a new UFO sighting took place near the “Magnetic Triangle”. Maria del Pilar Vargas, driving from Nerva to Seville on N-421 at 21:15 hours, saw a strange light in the sky that approached its vehicle gradually until it came “within 500 to 600 meters distant, flying parallel to my car and at the same speed while it changed colors from white to orange. It followed me and made me feel very nervous. Just when I was about to pull over and entrust myself to fate, “that thing” turned blue and vanished like when a light is turned off.” Furthermore, her vehicle did not operate normally during the event, displaying reduced performance and increasing the stress to the pursued witness. Unquestionably, a strange persecution and experience.

On 20 May, a businessman heading to Seville at 19:00 hours after having gone to El Ronquillo witnessed a quick and mysterious flash in the sky, resembling “the streak left by a lightning bolt in the sky. It was like a ball of light maneuvering wildly.”

On 22 May at 22:35 hours, and from the locality of Gerena (specifically from the location known as Torre Mocha), an unidentified flying object was reported. At first it was believed to be an airliner due to it its straight-line flight path (NW to W) and whitish-red coloring. But the device slowed its speed until it became completely still, “hanging” in the sky before spinning toward the southwest. So strange was the maneuver that it led some to believe it might be a mothership. The sighting lasted some 20 minutes and was witnessed by Joaquín Mateos Nogales, José Mateos Nogales, Antonio Vidal and José Ramírez Mora. Ignacio Darnaude reported a UFO sighting over the Seville Airport (Aeropuerto de San Pablo).

Of course, the fact that we see something in the skies that does not match our mental framework does not mean that the object was a UFO. On many occasions, the phenomena observed can be explained from a physical, astronomical, meteorological or psychological standpoint. Field researchers must concern themselves with covering all of the possible explanations to a sighting before cataloguing it as “unidentified”. This is a hard and complicated task that involves driving many kilometers, interviewing many people, getting in touch with various agencies with a view toward discarding possible logical options (the National Weather Institute, Air Traffic Control, the National Aerospace Technology Institute, the State Police, Observatories, etc.) and taking the witness factor into account. Many times, after all this is done, the work yields little more than two lines in a report, but doing this reflects a commitment to rigor.

The Garcia family’s sighting in Chipiona can be explained from a meteorological perspective. On that day, the Weather Bureau confirmed that large cloud formations were reported throughout the Atlantic littoral of Andalusia due to the aftermath of a storm system over the Straits of Gibraltar. This family’s sighting could have easily been a “noctilucent cloud” (high-altitude cumulus clouds often mistaken for UFOS). The winds make it impossible to determine the direction of the cloud, although in the upper layers of the atmosphere it seems to have an East-West heading, from Chipiona to Sanlucar de Barrameda. Furthermore, solar refraction on the layers that make up these cloud formations endows them with a particular beauty and luminosity.

But what about the other sightings? The Aznalcollar area, according to Seville flight control, has been overflown by units belonging to various television networks. However, on the days of the sightings – 18 April, 22 April, 10 May, 15 May and 22 May – no air traffic was recorded during the respective time periods. The Weather Bureau confirmed good weather and excellent conditions of visibility and temperature (the fact is that the weather was positively summery) at the time, without cloudy formations or any other atmospheric phenomenon worthy of note. The possibility of weather balloons was not recorded at the time. We are awaiting a reply from INTA regarding tests, but these possibilities are remote. Therefore, these sightings that cannot be explained from such a perspective. From the astronomical perspective, it should be noted that the planet Venus is particularly visible to witnesses at these latitudes, but what they saw bore no relation to the planet. Those lights were chasing our witnesses and the planet Venus, of course, lacks such mobility. Aside from this, chases by strange and mysterious lights have become notorious in the region, such as the one that occurred near Aznalcollar when a mysterious luminous sphere chased Mr. Adrian Sanchez for 30 kilometers, all the way to Castillo de las Guardas. A Guardia Civil officer made a report of this after lending assistance to Adrian, who was about to have a heart attack.

What did our witnesses see near the “Magnetic Triangle” on those dates? What were those strange spherical and triangular lights in the skies over Seville? Why were they pursuing our witnesses? What are they trying to tell us?

There is no question that a UFO flap is taking place over Aznalcollar…a year after the breakage of the containment pond at Boliden-Apirsa. One year ago, “THEY” were trying to warn us over the potential danger of the dumping in the area and in the proximity of the beautiful natural landmark that is Doñana. Today they may be warning us about the even more dangerous leakage and the deficiencies of the containment pond, which persist in the waters of the Guadiamar and the Guadalquivir. Today, according to the Environmental Board of Andalusia, Doñana is highly contaminated with arsenic and zinc. The removal of toxic mud has not been useful and dredging the riverbed at its most affected area would be necessary. The area, currently polluted with arsenic, is one of the most hazardous surfaces in Europe due to that type of poison (concentrations of over 40 mg/kg, which is enormous when we consider that the tolerable maximum is only 5%). There is no way to control wild bird movements and it is possible that many of them have been affected by toxic wastes due to the contamination of their food source. Over a year has elapsed since the disaster at Aznalcollar, and “THEY”, from their dimensional doorway in the “Magnetic Triangle”, keep trying to tell us that things still haven’t been put to rights.

  [Translation (c) 2013 Scott Corrales, INEXPLICATA, with thanks to José Manuel Bautista García]