The Riddle of Teleportation
By Scott Corrales - © 2017 Inexplicata
An interesting news item passed unnoticed among the never-ending news about terrorism, celebrity outrage or virtue-signaling. A Chinese satellite, the Micius, broke the 100 kilometer quantum teleportation record set two years ago.
Micius - launched in 2016 as part of the QUESS program - was designed as an initial step at establishing a "global quantum communication network", sending photons at a distance of 1200 kilometers. A small step for a satellite, a giant leap for a new era in communications.
But the concept of "teleportation" evokes unfortunate memories, such as the haunting 1950's film The Fly and the hideous commingling of scientist and insect. Even Star Trek's transporter room - one of the crown jewels of that beloved franchise - wasn't free of awful moments, such as the transporter accident in
Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) early on in the feature. Fantasy has taught us that moving objects through space, and sometimes through time, is fraught with peril. Random teleportation is even more frightening: who would want to take a casual step forward on a city street, a country field, or in the safety of a school or office building, only to find themselves transported to a remote jungle, desert or the middle of the ocean? Suddenly appearing in medieval times wouldn't be a picnic, either. In an earlier article on the subject of bizarre relocations in space, we mentioned Isaac Asimov's "Pebble in the Sky", whose protagonist, Joseph Schwartz, suddenly finds himself on a future planet Earth where people are condemned to die at the age of sixty. The retired tailor avoids "stepping over a Raggedy Ann" doll to find himself in an empty field, looking nowhere like his native Chicago.
In more recent times, the U.S. Air Force has commissioned the
Teleportation Research Study (AFRL-PR-ED-TR-2003-0034) that includes a very interesting paragraph. "Very early investigations of, and experiments on, p-Teleportation occurred during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Many cases that were studied, and the experiments that were performed, were undoubtedly due to fraud, and few experiments have occurred under controlled conditions during that period [...] Psychics Uri Geller (1975) and Ray Stanford (1974) claimed to have been teleported on several occasions. Most claimed instances of human teleportation of the body from one place to another have been unwitnessed. There are also a small number of credible reports of individuals who reported being teleported to/from UFOs during a UFO close encounter, which were scientifically investigated (Vallée, 1988, 1990, 1997). But a larger number of such reports are anecdotal, whereby the witness data tends to be unreliable." It is nonetheless fascinating to look back at some of these early accounts of teleportation.
The Encyclopedia of Occultism and Parapsychology gives us the intriguing case of Ofelia Corrales (no relation) and her siblings, who were seen to suddenly vanish from the living room of their early 20th century home in San Jose, Costa Rica only to reappear in the back yard. To their delight, without a scrap of fear, they were returned to the living room in the same manner. The bizarre claims were investigated by law professor Alberto Brenes, who wrote that children had been placed the greenhouse as part of a test. A loud report was heard, and when the living room doors were unlocked, they found the youngsters, whose ages ranged from seven to ten - standing single-file inside, laughing and discussing the experience. When Brenes asked them the manner in which they had been spirited away, the children described feeling a kind of "pressure under their arms" and then finding themselves in the place to which they had been taken. "Spirits" were deemed to be responsible for this activity, and researchers interacted with them.
These were the years of spiritualism and the investigation of forces unseen to humans, conducted earnestly by persons of unimpeachable reputation. Frauds were unmasked, as could be expected, but other cases presented a challenge, such as the 1901 case involving Italy's Pansini family, where the teleportation phenomenon appeared to center around their son Alfredo. The youngster was possessed by "angelic forces" who instilled with mediumistic abilities and the less desirable attribute of being able to vanish suddenly from his home in Ruvo di Puglia, reappearing elsewhere in the town or in adjacent communities - in one instance, the boy found himself aboard a fishing vessel at sea. The case was the subject of research by Dr. Joseph Lapponi, a physician with ties to the Vatican, who included it in his book
L'Hypnotisme et le spiritisme, étude médico-critique (Perrin, 1907). Teleportation bedeviled not only poor Alfredo, but his sibling as well. "Very often in a few minutes and in various ways, writes Lapponi, "the boys have found themselves successively at Biscelglie, Giovinazzo, Mariotta, and Terlizzi, from whence they returned to Ruvo either by the help of friends of the family or the public Authorities. One day the two boys were in the Piazza di Ruvo at 1:35 in the afternoon and at 1:45 were at Trani, before the door of the house of one of their uncles, Signor Girolamo Maggiore." The author adds: "It was concluded to useless to fight against the supernatural forces" and the boys were allowed to remain paranormal shuttlecocks, at the mercy of the unknown "angels." (The reader will allow a brief note at this point - the Alfredo Pansini of this disturbing paranormal case is not the Alfredo Panzini who went on to write the screenplay for the 1926 version of
The Last Days of Pompeii, and who was a distinguished lexicographer as well).
Spanish researcher Marcelino Requejo looked into a high-strangeness event that took place in Galicia, Spain’s northwestern corner. On May 7, 2007, Juan M.L. and Bernardo D.G. became the protagonists of a bizarre incident in the vicinity of Lugo. The events took place around 15:00 hours as they traveled in their car toward a saw mill located near the city. Apparently they were barely one kilometer from their destination at a location known as Piugos da Pena, and had just left behind a well-known automotive dealership, when the witnesses noticed a dense fog that appeared to emerge from their vehicle.
They pulled over on the shoulder to see what was going on. The smoke vanished. Only seconds after continuing their journey, they realized that they were in a completely different location from the one they had been before.
"We had no idea where we were," said Juan. "We were only meters away from the sawmill and we suddenly found ourselves next to a road sign that read: "Santa Eulalia de Bóveda". So, completely astonished, we decided to continue driving to Santa Eulalia to see if we could get to the saw mill from there."
In the wink of an eye, they had traversed the 6 kilometers that separate the environs of the saw mill and the detour to Santa Eulalia de Bóveda. While they looked for the way back, both men witnessed an odd phenomenon: the Sun appeared to be right in the middle of a gigantic, smoky triangle.
Aside from the notorious “Vidal Case” and its fictional trappings, one of the most interesting teleportation experiences on record is that of Carlos Acevedo and Miguel Angel Moya which occurred in Argentina in 1978. Both men were participating in the first stage of the Rally de America del Sur, an event involving a number of drivers and sponsored by major organizations. Much like the better known Paris-Dakar competition, the rally sought to test the limits of both man and machine by asking drivers to go from the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, to Buenos Aires.
By the time Acevedo’s vehicle – a Citroen GS – reached the Andean resort city of Bariloche, he had lost his co-pilot, Hugo Prambs, and replaced him with Miguel Angel Moya. During the last leg of the rally, the drivers stopped for fuel in Viedma, Province of Rio Negro, and much needed coffee. At 2 o’clock in the morning on September 23rd, the race car was on the road again, heading toward Bahía Blanca (notorious in UFO and teleportation chronicles). At around 3 in the morning, Acevedo and Moya had reached the salt flats located to the north of Carmen de Patagones with Acevedo at the wheel.
They were about to enter the pages of the history of the unknown.
An overwhelmingly bright light became visible in the car’s rear view mirror. It was subsequently described as a “dense yellow light” which appeared at first as small dot, yet increased in size at it approached.
The Citroen’s crew was not in the least bit alarmed, thinking the light represented the headlights of one of the other vehicles involved in the rally. Acevedo slowed down and moved over to the shoulder to allow the competitor to “pass”. The light had other intentions.
According to the driver, the passenger compartment was bathed in light, blinding the occupants. Acevedo felt he had lost control of the Citroen, which was now six feet above the ground. In a split second of confusion, the driver thought the vehicle must have hit a bump on the road and become airborne, waiting for the inevitable crash as the car hit the paved road again. But the car kept rising into the air.
In subsequent interviews, the racer would say that it took him a number of seconds to realize he was caught in an abnormal situation, unable to see his dashboard or even the car’s hood on account of the dense yellow light with a “slightly violet cast” to it. Turning to his co-pilot, he was stunned to see that Moya was “no longer there” or had become invisible.
Moya, on his part, would later say that Acevedo looked rigid, with outstretched arms clutching the steering wheel, staring straight ahead. The driver appeared to be screaming, but nothing was coming out. The overpowering yellow fog had them in its clutches, causing enough fear in the co-pilot that Moya thought to bail, reaching for the car door handle. The door appeared to be welded shut as the temperature inside the passenger compartment increased. “Suddenly,” he told interviewers, “the light enveloped everything and I could see nothing whatsoever. I don’t think I could even see my own hands.”
There was a shudder and Acevedo realized the car was on the road surface once more. The light dimmed and normal visibility was restored as the “object” – a cone of yellowish light – departed in a westward direction. Driver and co-pilot exchanged stunned looks, remaining silent. What unknown force had overtaken their car, and what was it after?
Realizing that his first duty was to the car, Acevedo stepped outside to inspect the vehicle before getting back in and resuming the drive. Upon reaching a filling station in the town of Pedro Luro, north of Carmen de Patagones, they had a shocking realization: the distance between these communities was seventy-eight miles (127 km) and the odometer showed they had only covered thirty-two miles (52 km). However, the clock showed that it had taken them a little under two and half hours to cover a journey that should have taken an hour and fifteen minutes. Worse yet: the Citroen’s fuel tank – filled to capacity during their stop in Viedma – was now completely empty.
An article appeared at
www.Hoy.com in 2010 featuring corroborating testimony by two other drivers:
“Race car drivers Edmundo Carvajal and German-born Lothar Ranft were the only Ecuadoran team to participate in the Rally Sudamericano held in September 1978.
“Carvajal and Ranft finished the race, which was an accomplishment in itself for an unserviced vehicle. But aside from participating in the race, both shared an experience involving an alleged UFO witnessed by a pair of Chilean drivers. The unusual situation took place in the penultimate lap of the Rally, organized by the Automovil Club de Argentina.
“We were leaving the Comodoro Rivadavia to Bahía Blanca leg,” explains the former tricolor driver, stating that the incident occurred during a normal stage of the competition. “A Citroen vehicle belonging to a Chilean businessman by the surname of Acevedo passed us before a curve, and this was followed by a very long straight segment, typical of the Pampas, some 80 to 100 kilometers long. I never saw him again after the curve. This drew our attention, because the vehicle wasn’t going that fast, to point that we couldn’t even see its lights.”
“In the early morning hours, Carvajal and Ranft reached a filling station. They found Carlos Acevedo standing outside his car; co-pilot Miguel Angel Moya sitting inside, and many people surrounding them.
“When we got there, we asked them what had happened, because we noticed they were extremely nervous. He told us that after the long straight segment, they saw a very bright light come up behind them; they thought it was one of the Mercedes Benz units that were winning the rally. They were about to pull aside to allow them to pass, but the light became more intense and didn’t pass them by – it placed itself above them.”
“The light lifted our car,” Acevedo allegedly told Carvajal.
“The light carried the car through the air for a few seconds, and at the end, they were deposited without a drop of gasoline in their tank near a filling station. Acevedo recovered from the fright, but his co-pilot was pale and in shock.
“Skeptically, Carvajal noted that “it could have been a well-contrived ruse” but three things impressed him: “[Acevedo and Moya] arrived at the filling station nearly an hour and fifteen minutes before we did. This means an average speed of 4000 kilometers per hour. This was confirmed, because they took time to report the case to the local police. Their odometer showed that the vehicle had covered less than 70 kilometers. Add to that the co-pilot’s state of shock. One can make up stories, but it must be very hard to get into such a state on purpose.”
“Once they reached Buenos Aires, the drivers of the Rally Sudamericano received their awards from Juan Manuel Fangio, the five-time World Formula One champion. There was a celebration later that evening. “We were in a group of friends talking to Acevedo. A lady approached and jokingly asked why they had made up the story about the UFO. They became annoyed with this person and decided to leave the party. Acevedo said that he was a serious businessman in his country and that discussing his experience could be harmful. But what they had experienced was indeed true.” (
INEXPLICATA, March 10, 2010).
Interest in abrupt teleportation was rekindled in 2017 as a result of news stories concerning the “Hermandarias Event” – an incident during which a teenager vanished within his own home, only to reappear miles away at a taxi stand, having contacted his worried relatives from that location.
The incident occurred on Monday, 22 May, around 22:30 hours in the small and pleasant town of Hernandarias, Province of Entre Rios, Argentina. The situation: a family gathered together for dinner. A 13-year-old had been sent to another part of the property to fetch certain items. An adult gave him a hand in opening a door that presented certain difficulties and was in fact stuck, causing the boy to be delayed. The man struggled with the stuck door for two or three minutes, and upon turning around to look, he noticed that the teen was no longer there. Supposing he'd returned to the rest of the family, the man did the same. Confusion reigned: no one had seen the boy.
Concerned, they took to the street as a group to find him, something that took the family less than ten minutes to accomplish when a cellphone rang. It was the teenager, saying he had no idea how he suddenly found himself at a "taxi stand". He described the location. Meanwhile, the police - which had already been alerted - identified the location and went to collect him. The youth did not understand what had happened. All he knows is that he was standing behind he was "blinded by a powerful light" and heard "a snapping noise", finding himself next at the place where he was ultimately found.
Researcher Gustavo Fernández – whose investigative team has been granted exclusive access to the family – describes the main experiencer, identified only as “R.”, as a quiet, introverted fellow who interacts with a limited number of relatives and acquaintances, never leaving his home unless escorted by a family member, hardly the type of fellow who would pull a prank. Fernandez also dismissed suggestions that the experiencer “had run at top speed” from his home to the taxi stand in order to stage the deception.
“No satisfactory theory exists to explain the mechanism of such events,” wrote Stuart Gordon in his compilation The Paranormal-An Illustrated Encyclopedia (London: Headline, 1992). “If indeed it is possible to take apart the billions of constituent atoms in any one body, then somehow transport them, or the information as to their organisation, to a distant point, there to reassemble them exactly in their former arrangement, this is a science unknown…or forgotten.”
