All was dark; Reynoso's father never got back from work before ten o'clock and his mother was out visiting neighbors. The only light came from a single bulb in the kitchen, casting enough light to show the kitchen table, which was located next to a window covered by a curtain.

Making his way to the kitchen to grab a bite to eat, the future ufologist noticed movement behind the curtain, but thought it was the normal action of the wind blowing through the open window. Then suddenly, a figure stepped out from behind the curtain: it was a humanoid figure, covered in glossy black hair and standing some thirty centimeters tall with outstretched bat wings. The curtain partly covered its face, so Reynoso was unable to make out any features. Fearlessly, he thought to use the curtain as a means to ensnare the strange apparition and pin it down, but the cloth drapes were suddenly sucked toward the open window, toppling objects on the table surface, and the bizarre creature vanished. Running out to the courtyard, he tried to see if he could find the intruder to no avail.

That's when fear crept in: "I was completely certain that it was no optical illusion," says Reynoso, "nor any known animal. The contrast between the kitchen and its contents, which were all white, and the blackness of the creature, left no mistake as to what I had seen. That event changed my life completely, since it highlighted the interest for the unknown I'd had since age 8." The experience prompted him to join his first UFO research group, in whose files he found another case similar to his own, witnessed by a woman from another Monterrey neighborhood.

South American Oddities

But these events cannot be safely relegated to the 1960s: in the early years of the present decade, the South American republic of Chile found itself besieged for a number of months by a situation similar to what had been experienced in Puerto Rico in 1995 - sightings of winged humanoids, followed by the predatory "Chupacabras".

On April 29 2000, farm worker Jorge Pino reported seeing a strange creature at 8pm under full moonlight. He described as standing 1.50 meters and resembling "a big monkey with , clawed arms, enormous fangs, and wings." The farmhand sent his mastiff is sent to attack the terrifying presence, and the animal returned to its master with a bloody neck to show for its troubles. Within weeks, farmers from Tucapel and Huepil were engaged in earnest discussions about something they called el pájaro (The Bird) whose manifestations were accompanied by unusual luminous phenomena and animal mutilations. In early May of that year, as livestock deaths continued to mount, an officer of the Chilean state police reported seeing something like "a giant bat" engaging in depredations near the city of Angol. Possibly the closest encounter with one of these entities occurred on May 5, 2000, when Prof. Liliana Romero heard a noise in the courtyard of her building shortly after midnight. Peering through a window to ascertain the cause of the disturbance, she was startled to see "an immense man, standing two meters tall, his shoulder blades split as though by a pair of wings."

The most intriguing case of the Chilean wave of events occurred in the Summer of 2003, when researcher Jaime Ferrer of the Calama UFO Center made known the story of a young student known only as "Diego", a resident of Calama who made frequent trips to the desert community of San Pedro de Atacama to visit his grandfather. In these visits he was usually accompanied by this two closest friends, known only as Jonathan and Carlos.

Around 21:00 hours on July 23, as the young men were ready to sit down to frugal dinner, they were startled by the howing of the local dogs, who ran to and fro in a frantic effort to get away from something. The visitors to the small rural house were further alarmed by violent blows rained against the door less than a quarter of an hour later: something very large and strong was clawing at the door, trying to get to them. "Terror seized them," wrote Ferrer in his report, " and the youngsters feared for their lives."

Huddling under blankets and praying fervently that the rickety wooden door would somehow withstand the pounding, Diego heard his grandfather's voice saying that it was safe to come out, and that "it" had gone away. Or had it?

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