SEFAA — Chile's office for unidentified aerial phenomena

OVERVIEW

The Sección de Estudios de Fenómenos Aéreos Anómalos (SEFAA), formerly the Comité de Estudios de Fenómenos Aéreos Anómalos (CEFAA), is an official body of Chile's Dirección General de Aeronáutica Civil, part of the Chilean Air Force. Its task is to collect and study reports of anomalous aerial phenomena in Chilean airspace, analyse them scientifically and judge any risk to flight safety and national security.

HISTORY

It continues the Comisión Chilena para Estudios de Fenómenos Espaciales No Identificados, created on 9 July 1968 under the National Meteorological Office after sightings at Arica in March of that year and wound up in 1975; the air traffic controller Gustavo Rodríguez Navarro, who had been collecting cases for years, supplied its idea. The CEFAA was established by DGAC Resolution No. 01599 of 3 October 1997, signed by General Gonzalo Miranda, with its seat at the Escuela Técnica Aeronáutica at Quinta Normal, Santiago; its offices are now in Cerrillos, beside the National Aeronautical and Space Museum. On 18 October 2021 the 1997 resolution was revoked and the office renamed SEFAA.

REPORTED ACTIVITY

The office avoids the word OVNI (UFO), with its suggestion of alien life, and speaks of FANI, unidentified aerial phenomena. It receives reports from the public and from military, commercial, private and sports aircrews, and says it investigates them scientifically and without secrecy or ridicule of witnesses.

VISITING

An office of the DGAC in Cerrillos, beside the National Aeronautical and Space Museum.