The article below was published in the daily newspaper La Nacion, Buenos Aires, Argentina, on April 14, 1998.
SAN CARLOS DE BARILOCHE. -- Many residents claim to have seen strange phenomena in the sky during a series of power outages before nightfall that proved inexplicable to the technicians responsible for the electricity supply.
"They were lights of various colors, at low altitude; there was no noise, and every time a strong white light appeared, the electricity was cut off," America Jara told our newspaper, although surprised by her observation.
The luminous signals split up to the east of the city, at the airport. There, the employees tried to dispel the mystery: "They were planes; during the weekend, different private planes took off at the last minute. In addition, there were night flights, because there was fog in the terminal and therefore it was inoperable," confided Mr. Gomez, from the local meteorological service.
But the arguments did not convince the witnesses. Some remember that, precisely in this place, in August 1995, two pilots of Aerolineas Argentinas who were preparing to land had problems when the airport remained in darkness, but a flash of light guided them to the runway.
The case had a national impact and even led to investigations in the United States.
No explanation
The most puzzling thing was the surprise of the technicians of the Cooperativa Electricidad Bariloche at not finding the reason for the malfunction that left a large part of the city without light. "The search for the origin of the power outage has remained unsuccessful, despite a review of the power supply station by station," we learned in a press release.
The facts began with the power outage that occurred at 7:45 p.m. It was twilight on Easter Sunday when half the city remained in darkness. Technicians checked that there had been no acts of vandalism on the conductors or insulators and, on the other hand, the good weather conditions made it possible to rule out the possibility that a branch or the wind was the cause of the disaster.
Whatever the cause of this affair, everything returned to normal and the service was restored. But this was not the end, but rather the beginning. Around 9:00 p.m., a series of small power outages began and reverberated across different areas of the city, causing sudden voltage drops lasting a few seconds.
