The Varginha UFO incident

Three young women in Varginha, Minas Gerais, Brazil, said that on 20 January 1996 they saw a strange creature in the street. The case became known as the ET de Varginha.

According to Wikipedia, three women aged 14 to 22 reported seeing, on 20 January 1996, an unidentified creature close to a housing subdivision on Rua Dr. Benevenuto Braz Vieira in Varginha. Media reports quoted them describing a biped with a large head, three bumps on its head, vein-like spots on its skin and eyes like two red balls. The being seemed unsteady on its feet, and the women took it to be hurt or sick.

Later in 1996 the ufologists Vitório Pacaccini and Maxs Portes published a book, Incidente em Varginha, naming soldiers as responsible for capturing and moving an extraterrestrial being, the archive of the Superior Tribunal Militar records. In 1997 the army opened a military police inquiry (IPM) into the part soldiers and army vehicles had played in the events the ufologists described, Migalhas reports.

The inquiry's file runs to more than 600 pages. CNN Brasil reported in 2026 that it concluded the ET de Varginha case was a large misunderstanding. The case is often called Brazil's Roswell, Discovery UK notes, for its accounts of crashed objects, alien encounters and a possible military cover-up.