Perhaps there were far better things to do in 1970 than look at the sky. After all, Man had already been to the Moon twice – to the elation of billions – but the near-loss of Apollo 13 tempered the excitement with a reminder that space was the ultimate hostile environment. There were more pressing situations to be addressed on Earth, and particularly at the street level, as student uprisings in the Western nations alternated with free festivals, singing songs with a decidedly political descant to them.
Mexico entered the new decade reeling from the brutal suppression of activism at Tlatelolco in 1968 – weeks before the Olympic Games slated for that year – and a government in transition. The same upheaval in music, politics and consciousness was to be found there, and in such a state of affairs, no one was surprised that “los marcianos” – the Martians, everyday parlance for the concept of “space aliens” – had taken an interest in terrestrial matters, whether to lend a hand or laugh at foolish humanity.
The intense UFO activity of the mid-to-late Sixties carried into this new decade as well, with the generalized belief that human space activity had attracted the notice of space-faring civilizations, perhaps unmindful of the fact that the same had been said about nuclear activity in the ‘50s. Were these putative aliens worried that the noisy neighbors with their atomic firecrackers now threatened to bring disturbance to their worlds?
Scott Corrales and his excellent Inexplicata-The Journal of Hispanic Ufology, is the best source for Latin American related UFO information out there, IMO. To read more, click here.