by Victor Amela

Q: Is there indeed intelligent life out there, Mr. Ribera?

AR: Yes. There are beings with an intelligence greater and lesser than our own, which is about average.

Q: How do you know this?

AR: It's my hypothesis. There are no exceptions in the universe. Life and intelligent life are universal phenomena coexisting on various levels of evolution.

Q: And do UFOs constitute the proof of this?

AR: UFOs are super-machines, possibly powered by electromagnetism and having an interplanetary origin.

Q: You must admit that it's hard to believe...

AR: It's my conviction, and I said as much in 1979 before the British House of Lords, at Lord Clancarty's invitation.

Q: And how did the Lords react to that?

AR: One of them stood up and asked me: "And why don't these ships burn up upon entering the Earth's atmosphere, Mr. Ribera?" I replied: "Because they're not made by NASA, milord."

Q: Couldn't they be Pentagon prototypes?

AR: Not a chance. It's a technology far superior to our own. Governments conceal the fact.

Q: While science rejects it...

AR: Many scientists behave today much as Laplace did in the 18th century, when he told his son: "Do not pursue astronomy, since everything in that field is already known."

Q: Is it necessary to study ufology?

AR: The UFO phenomenon is the greatest enigma--the greatest challenge to our science.

Q: And you have been in this field since when?

AR: In 1930, at the age of ten, I saw a film that impressed me greatly, The Woman in the Moon by Fritz Lang. I then became fascinated by anything unusual and curious.

Q: It wasn't a youthful obsession, I see...

AR: More than an obsession, it is a malady that has lasted my whole life.

Q: Could you teach a thing or two to Fox Mulder of TV's X-Files?

AR: It's a proper series. It's evident that Chris Carter has good information and good advisors.

Q: How many UFOs have you seen?

AR: I've seen them on eight occasions.

Q: Maybe they were airplanes...

AR:...or meteorites, satellites, thermal inversions, flocks of birds, weather balloons. Say no more. Ninety-five per cent of all sightings are in fact that, but the remaining five per cent is utterly inexplicable, like what I saw.

Q: Since when have they been visiting us?

AR: UFOs are depicted in the caves of Altamira, La Pasiega and Puente Viesgo.

Q: If that's the case, then why haven't they chosen to contact us?

AR: They do, but they don't turn up with a bunch of roses for the president's wife.

Q: Then how do they do it?

AR: Through abductions. An abduction is the transient kidnapping of a human by alleged aliens. Abductees subsequently recall nothing at all.

Q: Maybe I've been abducted?

AR: If you have any amnesic lapses in your life, a few hours of missing time, it could be due to an abduction episode. Regressive hypnosis could determine if this is indeed the case.

Q: Have you been abducted?

AR: I would have liked to have been. But I'm too old and sick now, and they want healthy young people. Shame. I'm an action man. A strange combination indeed--a man of letters and of action at the same time.

Q: Give us an example.

AR: Together with Eduardo Admetlla, we were the first to dive in Spain using the regulators Cousteau had invented, in the early 1950's. In the winter, we went diving in woolen jerseys! I wrote the world's first underwater travel guide in 1956: Guía submarina de la Costa Brava with a foreword by Josep Pla.

Q: So, from the depths of the sea to the depths of space, right?

AR: Yes. In 1958, I founded the Centro de Estudios Interplanetarios along with Márius Lleget, Antoni Pelegri and Eduardo Buelta. We were interested in the UFO enigma.

Q: When did you publish your first UFO book?

AR: In 1961. It was entitled Objetos desconocidos en el cielo. The publisher, Ignacio Agustí (of "La saga de los Rius" fame) kept in a drawer for over a year. He was afraid to print it for fear of ridicule! In the end he took a chance and it was a big hit.

Q: A subject that draws the attention of millions of people, if only casually.

AR: That has been the case since 1947, with the first massive "flying saucer" wave--which is how aviator Kenneth Arnold described them--in the United States. It's funny. Pliny the Elder described them in much the same way two thousand years earlier.

Q: How's that?

AR: As clipei ardentes. In the second book of his Natural History he compares unknown flying objects to clipei, the small round shields used by Roman soldiers. You see? They were and are among us.

Q: Agreed. Well, advise me on what I should do if I run into a UFO...

AR: Don't lose your calm. Continue your path without making any attempts, and see what happens.

Q: What if I get abducted?

AR: You won't recall. Maybe they'll stick a chip in you. You'll only be left with an unconscious trauma similar to that of rape...