On July 9, 1968, Coronel Sergio Bravo Flores sent a circular from Chile’s Meteorological Office to 43 aeronautical installations from Arica to Antarctica. It requested systematic reports of anomalous aerial phenomena. That document is the founding act of Chile’s official UAP investigation programme, now with over 2,200 cases and monthly 2026 publications.
1968–1975: The Condon Connection
Bravo’s Provisional Committee ran for seven years and gathered roughly a dozen investigation reports. Some were sent to the University of Colorado’s Condon Commission — the US government-funded academic review of global UAP evidence. Chile was contributing primary investigation data to international UAP science while the US simultaneously funded a committee to debunk the phenomenon.
1997: CEFAA Founded
A wave of Arica sightings in early 1997 prompted Resolution 01599 on October 3, 1997, creating CEFAA. The programme was driven by reports from commercial, private, and institutional aircraft crews — a civil aviation framing that distinguished Chile’s approach from military-led programmes elsewhere.
2021–Present: SEFAA
On October 18, 2021, CEFAA became SEFAA under the DGAC Communications Sub-department. By April 2026, Case 2229 had been filed. Monthly case reports for all of 2026 are published at sefaa.dgac.gob.cl, alongside institutional lectures at Chilean airfields.
Source: sefaa.dgac.gob.cl/historia/. SEFAA history and monthly case publications.