Radio Keto and Radio Gran Colombia

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Radio Keto prepared beforehand and contacted some other radios in Keto to be part of the radio drama. They would pretend to make exchanges like news exchanges from Radio Keto to Radio Gran Colombia for example. And they would exchange different information about the invasion between the two radios. So there was more reason to believe that this was actually happening than there was to think that this was some sort of hoax.

On a Saturday night, in February 1949, the music programming on one of the most popular radio stations in Quito, Ecuador, was interrupted with an urgent news bulletin: strange objects in the sky that looked like large disks with bright lights were using a powerful ray to destroy a nearby city. And they were heading right for Quito.

Thanks to Lisette Arévalo for sharing her tape and her reporting. In 2020, she reported this story for the Spanish-language podcast Radio Ambulante – it’s called “The Extraterrestrials.” You can listen at https://radioambulante.org/en/audio-en/the-extraterrestrials.

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