Case description
At about 4:30 p.m. on August 30, 1978, woodcutter Miguel Freitas was taking a break from work near Gobernador Dupuy in Argentina's San Luis province. The newspaper account later translated by Jane Thomas identified him as twenty-three. Freitas said an unfamiliar vehicle approached to within roughly two metres. A humanoid emerged in bluish light and advanced with its hands extended, palms toward him. He could make out neither its face nor its lower limbs. When he tried to escape, it pressed a button on its chest, and he found himself unable to move.
Freitas then recalled being inside the craft with its occupants. His account described questioning and a physical examination, although the questions themselves were not preserved. The figures pricked his arms with needle-like instruments and spread a grayish substance around his mouth. Before releasing him, they gave him several objects, including a box from which he said their voices could be heard.
By dusk, Freitas found himself in difficult country approximately thirty-five to forty kilometres from his workplace. He wiped the substance from his mouth with a handkerchief. He left the talking box where he had been released but carried away the other objects. In the fuller retelling, a neighbour accompanied him when he reported what had happened to the local police. The remaining objects were reportedly handed to the San Luis police.
Investigators subsequently arranged medical and psychological examinations. The handkerchief was also submitted for toxicological analysis. Reports described a dye resembling a bactericidal substance; the later account compares it with gentian violet, without identifying it conclusively. The medical checks, including reported X-rays and an electroencephalogram, were described as showing no abnormalities. Freitas was brought to Mendoza by the head of a UFO research group, and his account appeared in the Buenos Aires press in September 1978 before being summarized in the MUFON UFO Journal.
