1979 Spanish UFO Incident (Super Caravelle Case)
The 1979 Spanish UFO Incident — also known as the Manises UFO Incident or the Super Caravelle Case — took place on the night of November 11, 1979, when TAE flight JK 297, a Super Caravelle carrying 109 passengers, made an emergency landing at Manises Airport in Valencia after its crew observed anomalous lights that actively responded to the aircraft's evasive maneuvers. A subsequent military intercept by a Mirage F1 fighter produced additional close-range observations and avionics jamming. The case is considered Spain's most significant UAP incident and represents the first documented instance in aviation history of a commercial flight being diverted and grounded due to a UFO encounter.
| Date | 1979-11-11 |
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The Commercial Flight Encounter
On November 11, 1979, TAE flight JK 297 departed from Mallorca on a route from Salzburg, Austria to Las Palmas, Canary Islands. At approximately 23:05 hours while cruising over the Mediterranean Sea at 23,000 feet, flight mechanic Francisco Javier Rodriguez alerted the crew to two powerful red lights visible ahead and to port.
Captain Javier Leo de Taha radioed Barcelona Air Traffic Control, which confirmed no other aircraft were operating near the flight path. The lights began drawing closer. When the captain changed altitude to avoid a potential collision, the two lights mirrored the aircraft's altitude change and maintained a distance of between half a mile and five miles — behavior incompatible with any fixed light source or conventional aircraft.
Unable to identify the objects or execute effective evasive maneuvers, Captain Javier made the decision to abort the flight and performed an emergency landing at Manises Airport, Valencia. Just prior to landing, the crew detected three additional UFO radar returns — each estimated at approximately 200 meters in diameter — which were simultaneously witnessed by personnel at Manises Airport and Marines stationed at the nearby air force base. Emergency runway lighting was activated when one radar return passed close to the runway, as ground crews could not rule out that it was an aircraft in distress.
The Mirage F1 Military Intercept
At 04:00 hours, Spanish Air Force Captain Fernando Kamaro was scrambled from Los Llanos Airbase in a Mirage F1 to intercept the unidentified objects. The pursuit lasted approximately 90 minutes and reached speeds of Mach 1.4 (approximately 1,074 mph) — the speed required merely to achieve visual contact with one of the objects.
Kamaro visually identified an object with a truncated cone shape displaying bright, rapidly changing colors. On each attempt to approach, the object rapidly accelerated away. When Kamaro came close to one object, his Mirage F1's avionics were actively jammed — all electronic flight systems failed simultaneously, and the aircraft's onboard alert system warned him he was being targeted by continuous wave missile radar. When he attempted to lock onto the object with an infrared missile, his targeting systems were also jammed. After the engagement, the UFO rapidly accelerated toward the coast of mainland Africa. Kamaro was forced to return to base with critically low fuel.
Parallels to Other Military UAP Encounters
The avionics jamming and active radar lock behavior Kamaro experienced are consistent with instrumentation disruption documented in other military UAP cases. Commander David Fravor reported active radar jamming during the 2004 Nimitz UAP Encounter (Tic Tac) off San Diego. Major Parvis Jafari experienced total instrument and communications failure when approaching a UFO in an F-4 Phantom 2 during the 1976 Tehran UFO Incident, during which a secondary sphere separated from the main object and approached his aircraft. The recurrence of avionics jamming and countermeasure behavior across independent military encounters spanning different decades and countries is treated by UAP researchers as evidence of a genuine non-random phenomenon.
Official Response and Debunking
The Spanish Parliament addressed the Manises incident in September 1980, officially attributing the sightings to "a series of freak optical illusions." Specific mundane explanations offered included:
- Refinery lights: The red lights seen by the flight crew were attributed to the combustion towers of the Escombreras Refinery near Cartagena. This fails to account for the lights mirroring the aircraft's altitude changes and executing vector pursuit behavior — behaviors impossible for a stationary ground installation.
- Stars and planets: Moving lights witnessed by multiple Manises Airport personnel and nearby Marines were attributed to misidentification of Venus or Jupiter. Trained military observers and airport personnel independently confirmed anomalous motion.
- US 6th Fleet electronic interference: Kamaro's avionics jamming was attributed to electronic signatures from two LPH Iwo Jima-class helicopter carriers of the US 6th Fleet operating in the Mediterranean during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Kamaro explicitly rejected this explanation, stating he was too distant from the fleet for its systems to affect his navigation, radio, or emergency controls — and noting it could not account for the truncated cone-shaped object he visually confirmed.