“This is the voice of Vrillon, representative of the Ashton Galactic command speaking to you,” began the voice. It was November 26, 1977 when the Hannington Independent Broadcasting Authority tower suddenly broke through with a peculiar static and the voice of a mysterious being some would later claim was an extraterrestrial with an urgent message. But was this early case of radio pirating truly from an extraterrestrial entity attempting to gain the hearts and minds of Earth’s public? The case remains unsolved to this day.
Speaking as an authority from a higher power and representing what became known as the Ashton Galactic Command, Vrillon then proceeded to warn Earthlings that they would soon be entering a dangerous time as they entered the time of Aquarius and would be expected to lay down their weapons of destruction in favor of a more peaceful way of life so they could ascend into the stars among their brothers in space. It would be a voice of reason and seemingly madness that would later be mimicked several times in both the new age movement and among UFO believers worldwide. And though the message would be quite disturbing to some as it broke through the evening news on the BBC, some were more skeptical of this sudden pirated version of what they considered a recreation of the War of the Worlds broadcast by Orson Welles.
But just as the world was beginning to react to the words of Vrillon, it was retold in different forms. Understandably the words were met with some level of fear – some even reporting that the voice of the mysterious figure known as Vrillon had claimed he would invade Earth if his demands were not met. But Vrillon had actually been intending to do nothing more than warn the people of upcoming dangers by humanity’s own hands. There had been no violence implied by the voice coming from either himself or the aforementioned Ashton Galactic Command.
So what was Vrillon? Interestingly, the transmission was at a point where it could have been overridden at one broadcasting station which had bottlenecked the signal. Even a weak transmission could have in theory moved into the normal broadcast and allowed the voice of a hoaxer to reach the ears of thousands of viewers throughout the region. But why? In 1977 the hoaxer may have simply been wanting to make a splash in the newspapers and gain the peoples’ attention – calling them to action to be more peaceful and less intent on war with foreign nations.
But there is one other theory that has been popularized through Youtube videos giving Vrillon a voice once again. These theorists suggest the technical abilities of the average hoaxer would not have been sufficient to allow them to bleed through the broadcast, and instead the explanation may lie somewhere in space. Vrillon, they suggest, may have been a real entity attempting to communicate with Earth. Though Southern Television categorically declared the incident the work of a hoaxer, it has never been proven one way or another. It remains after all these years, entirely unexplainable.