UFO Case Report:

Mexico City 1997 UFO Video

Date: August 6, 1997
Location: Mexico City, Mexico

In September 1997, [Mexican TV host and UFO researcher] Jaime Maussan received a very special package. Someone had sent him a video tape, in itself nothing remarkable. But when he played the tape on his video recorder, it took his breath away. For the anonymously sent recording showed nothing but points of light and sky - except for a large, metallic, structured, rotating disk, which maneuvered in broad daylight over Mexico City, with a dateline of 6 August 1997.

Video Clip The Mexico City UFO video taken on August 6, 1997.

Classification & Features

Type of Case/Report: StandardCase
Hynek Classification: 
Shape of Object(s): Disc
# of Witnesses: Multiple
Special Features/Characteristics: Photo

More Articles on this Case

Full Report / Article

Source: Michael Hesemann (2000)

On Sept. 26, 1997, Jaime Maussan received a very special package. Someone had sent him a video tape, in itself nothing remarkable. But when he played the tape on his video recorder, it took his breath away. For the anonymously sent recording showed nothing but points of light and sky - except for a large, metallic, structured, rotating disk, which maneuvered in broad daylight over Mexico City, with a dateline of 6 August 1997 - and disappeared behind a high-rise building and reappeared, which speaks clearly for it being a large object. Enclosed with it was only a note, which read, "We know what happens to witnesses, if they go public with something like this." Maussan's first reaction was, "This is a fake; it can't be real!" Yet, on the advice of his colleague he viewed it carefully, again and again, and started wondering. Who had taken this segment of video tape? And where was it taken? Maussan knew that there was only one way to find out: He broadcast the video segment over the air and asked viewers to help him with the investigation of the case. "Are the houses, the buildings, real? Whoever knows, please call us!", he asked in his broadcast of Sept. 27th, which was repeated on the 28th. A woman called in, saying, "I know the place, I lived there. It is the section of the city called "Bosque de las Lomas."

A day later Maussan and his colleague were at the spot. He found two witnesses to the identical event. He asked one man, who sold tacos on the street in a little stand, whether he had seen a UFO at that place. He answered in the affirmative, "My daughter saw a UFO here a couple months ago." The daughter, named Cassandra, was twelve years old. She described that sometime between 4 and 6 pm this grey disk flew over the houses. Everyone in her family thought she was crazy, even her father, who went to take a look only after the object had disappeared. She explained that she had never seen the video, yet despite this her description was consistent with what was to be seen on it. "This little girl has convinced me more than anyone else that there is something to it," he said later.

Then Maussan identified the building from which the video segment had been taken. Yet when he inquired there, no one would speak to him. Everyone that he asked - the renter, the doorkeeper, the security person - seemed to want to defend the person who shot the film. Only one person admitted that he had seen the five-minute video film after it was taken. That witness swore he was being truthful, and insisted he was aware of the film. [But] he came from one of the Central American states and would be detained as illegal in Mexico. His wife and two daughters thought he was still in their own country.

Finally, Maussan and his team found further witnesses. Annie Lash, a young photographer, had just prepared for a photo session, though the camera had not been cocked, when she saw the UFO for a second. Her model confirmed the event. [Hesemann adds that this took place at a pool area in front of one of the skyscrapers.] The photographer [Annie] was wearing a short-sleeved smock and on the next day had a sunburn on the arms and face, which lasted a month. She saw the object from below, close-up, from the location of the high-rise complex. She described the round underside of the UFO and pale yellow lights that surrounded it in rapid rotation. At first she saw a very heavy, very dark cloud, which did not surprise her because it was a cloudy day. But then the underside of the object appeared in the middle of the cloud. She heard a noise as of escaping gas, a hissing, and felt "something like a force, which pushed on my body." She quickly ran to fetch her camera, but by the time she got hold of it, the UFO had disappeared.

Computer analyses of the materials by well known experts such as Jim Dilettoso of Village Lab in Tempe, AZ, the optical physicist Dr. Bruce Maccabee (US Navy) and Prof. Victor Quesada of the "Grupo Sol of the University of Mexico," uncovered no hint of any hoax. The experts estimated the diameter of the filmed object as 15-20 meters (see report in Magazin2000 Nr. 123 [issued around Jan. 1998]).

Since first hearing of the astounding video of 6 Aug. 1997, taken in the section of populous Mexico City called Bosques de las Lomas, I have followed the matter with great interest. Already, a few weeks after its first appearance on Mexican television on 26 Sept. 1997, a clean copy of the video segment lay before us. Jaime Maussan, with whom I have stayed in close, friendly contact for years, kept me abreast on the affair. And so Magazin2000 could already, in the last issue of a series, offer exclusive information on the case.

Nevertheless I was skeptical. The video segment of a rotating disk, which disappeared behind a group of high-rise buildings and reappeared, was too good to be true. Was it indeed THE UFO evidence we all have been waiting for? I doubted it. The wobbling movements of the disk disturbed me. Since I understood the situation in Mexico very well, I knew that popular television moderator Maussan had many enemies and envious detractors. Could someone have attempted to deceive him, in order to make him into a fool before the public? On the one hand, Maussan had carefully researched the place, finding and interviewing a series of witnesses. Eyewitnesses make a hoax unlikely. On the other hand, we know that each true or faked UFO case can inspire "bandwagon jumpers," sensationalist individuals, whose goal is to have 30 seconds in the limelight of the media, and it takes a good lie to do it. To be sure, Jaime assure me that with these witnesses this was not the case; they are trustworthy. To me it was clear that as always the truth lies "out there." I must go to Mexico in order to personally gain an on-the-spot picture of the situation.

Trip to Mexico

The opportunity soon presented itself. I was invited to the 2nd World UFO Congress in Acapulco, Mexico, in early December, 1998, and since I had to change planes in the capital city anyhow, I remained there for two days. I had arranged to meet with a colleague, Alejandra Dehesa, who had earlier worked for Tele Azteca, the rival of Maussan's Televisa. Alejandra, mother of an enchanting little daughter, had interviewed me repeatedly in Mexico and the USA for her program, and I knew her as a caring and capable journalist. However, I had an ulterior motive: her former boss, an arch-skeptic, had already once boasted that he knew the excellent Carlos Diaz film, "With Ease," to be fake. And since his TV program stood in direct opposition to Jaime's newer show, "Tercer Milenio" (Third Millennium), he was, to say the least, under suspicion.

From Alejandra I hoped to receive inside information. In addition, she spoke fluent English and could therefore translate (to be sure, I understand Spanish and can enunciate it, but my speech is not good enough) and serve also as a neutral observer of my investigation. I deliberately wanted to investigate independently of Jaime and surprise him with my findings, whatever they might be. I wanted to remain as objective as possible. Friendship is one thing, a well researched case is another.

In the previous week Alejandra had already made all available information on the case available to me. We therefore already knew in which part of the metropolis - Mexico City is, with almost 30 million inhabitants, along with Tokyo and Sao Paulo, one of the three most populated cities of the world - the event had occurred. Namely, in the section "Bosques de las Lomas," which one reaches via one of the swankier streets of the capital city, "The Reforma." Bosques de las Lomas, which means "Forests of the Hills," is a mixture of undeveloped hilly fields and houses, not so closely packed as in other districts of the Mexico City. One encounters some office buildings, plain private homes and workshops, a modern shopping center and a group of exclusive apartment houses, which are seen on the video.

Case ID: 864 edit: 864

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