Bruno Facchini's encounter at Abbiate Guazzone

Abbiate Guazzone is a frazione of Tradate, in the Province of Varese, Lombardy. Bruno Facchini lived there beside a field, married with a young son. Accounts describe him as a reliable, trustworthy and well-liked mechanic, metalworker or factory worker. Monday, 24 April 1950. About 22:00, after a violent thunderstorm had passed over the Lombardy plain.

Facchini went outside and saw sparks and flashing light in the next field, near a power-line pole. He walked toward them. "It was still a little farther. I decided to go there. Then I saw there a huge dark shape, like a ball, with a flattened top."

It was about 10 m wide and 7 m high. A small ladder led to an opening lit from inside, where he glimpsed rows of connected cylinders, gauges and dials. A constant buzzing filled the air, like a giant beehive.

"Almost immediately, I understood that the light came from some sort of lamp handled by a standing man who seemed to be engaged in welding." There were four figures, about 1.70 m tall, in tight grey suits like heavy diving suits. Masks covered their faces, with a flexible tube hanging from each like a breathing hose. They moved slowly and stiffly.

"I offered to help, but the only answer I received were some guttural sounds that were not understandable." He had the feeling they were inviting him aboard, and ran in alarm. One of the beings pointed a device at him. "I was hit at the back by a light beam, and it had such a force that I felt pushed. I lost my equilibrium and I hit the ground, knocking my head against a stone."

He later told Antonio Giudici how it ended: "the door closed. All the lights went out. And the buzzing sound continued. Suddenly the sound became louder. The craft took off, gained speed and disappeared."

A blackened mark spread across his back and hurt for about a month. Police from Varese saw the traces in the field. Four circular depressions about 1 m across were set in a square with sides of about 6 m, with burnt grass in and around them. Pieces of melted metal went to a metals research institute in Novara. It said only that they were heat-resistant, antifriction metal.

In 1951 Renato Vesco judged the samples essentially bronze. Later retellings give about 74% copper and 19% tin, a common bearing alloy. Vesco himself is regarded as unreliable on other subjects. The story first reached a wide audience in July 1952, in La Domenica del Corriere, and retellings disagree on the number of beings and whether the object landed.

Yet Facchini's own account held. Sergio Conti interviewed him in 1973. Giudici published the case in Flying Saucer Review in 1974. Ezio Bernardini met him in 1981, and nothing in the story had changed. Facchini only regretted speaking: "If I had known how much trouble I would get from this experience, I would not have said one word about it, guaranteed!"

Jacques Vallée listed the case in his Magonia catalogue, and Timothy Good included it in Alien Base. It remains a classic close encounter with occupants, ground traces and effects on the witness. In December 2021 it was the subject of an evening at the Tradate Astronomical Observatory.