The Zanfretta UFO Incident, Torriglia 1978

Winter 1978. Italy was in the middle of a wave of sightings. CISU would later count about 2,300 reports that year. Pier Fortunato Zanfretta was 26, a night watchman for the Istituto di Vigilanza Val Bisagno in Genoa. His rounds took him through the hills around Torriglia, on unlit mountain roads iced by galaverna, a freezing rime fog.

The night of 6 December 1978, about 23:30. At Marzano, a hamlet of Torriglia, Zanfretta saw four small lights moving in the garden of the villa "Casa Nostra." The gate and front door were open. He suspected burglars and went round the back of the house. The engine and headlights of his Fiat 126 had failed.

Then his voice came over the radio. "Mamma mia, quant'è brutto… no, non sono uomini, non sono uomini." My God, how ugly. They're not men. The line went dead.

Later he described "an enormous being, about three metres tall, with undulating skin, as if it were fat or a soft suit, in any case grey." It had glowing yellow triangular eyes, a metallic grille for a mouth and three large spines on each side of the head. It left in a giant triangular light surrounded by lights of different colours. A great hiss. Then, with fantastic acceleration, the craft vanished into the sky.

Colleagues Walter Lauria and Raimondo Mascia found him over an hour later, in shock, confused and feverish, his body unusually warm on a freezing night. Neurologist Giorgio Gianniotti said: "The man is in a state of shock, but he is perfectly sane!" Brigadier Antonio Nucchi of the Carabinieri at Torriglia took 52 statements from people who had seen a light in the sky. None of them saw the beings. The Carabinieri certified a horseshoe-shaped mark at the villa.

On 23 December 1978, Dr. Mauro Moretti hypnotised him, and Zanfretta said four beings took him aboard, stripped him and examined him on a metal table. They called themselves the Dargos, from the planet Titania. More episodes followed, 11 claimed by 1981. Footprints over 50 cm long. A guard, Giovanni Cassiba, emptying his revolver at a light near Fallarosa.

A Carabinieri telex to the Interior Ministry rated Zanfretta's credibility "buono," meaning good. On 11 January 1980 the case was archived for no grounds for a crime, without any ruling on extraterrestrials. Genoa's police commissioner revoked his firearms licence without giving a reason. In December 1982 he left security work for a warehouse job.

Gian Paolo Grassino visited the villa in April 1980. He found that the mark matched where the owners tied a horse, a TV aerial against the fir trees could resemble a tall figure in darkness, and the footprints could be rain puddles. "Dargos" resembles Hydargos, villain of UFO Robot Grendizer, hugely popular in Italy in 1978. Roberto Pinotti and Enrico Baccarini of the CUN called the hypnosis sessions "irrimediabilmente contaminate." A CISU representative called the case a confirmed hoax.

Others weighed it differently. Moretti said the possibility that he lied was negligible. Psychoanalyst Cesare Musatti judged him to be in good faith. And the light seen by 52 people has never been matched to any aircraft, flare, balloon or astronomical event.

Il Secolo XIX broke the story on 8 December 1978 under the headline "Incontri ravvicinati a Torriglia", meaning "Close encounters at Torriglia". Italy now had its own close encounter. Journalist Rino Di Stefano chronicled it in a book that ran to six editions. Zanfretta played himself in the 2004 film InvaXön. In 2025 the Genoa punk band Ratbones released a song bearing his name.