$2000 reward for UFO sign

HEARTBROKEN organisers of the annual Cardwell UFO Festival believe they were the victims of an orchestrated, earth-based sabotage campaign that included the brazen theft of $6500 worth of promotional signage.

And rather than blame any alien interlopers, festival founder Thea Ormonde believes the culprit is more likely a humanoid form of low-life, with supporters offering a $2000 reward for information leading to their identity.

Mrs Ormonde said the Cassowary Coast festival’s “massive eight-metre by fourmetre signage” as well as 13 informational corflutes lining the jetty had been stolen late on Friday, August 7, or in the early hours of Saturday, the first day of the festival.

“We believe it was sort of sabotage of the festival because there were certain things that had happened, people were being told the festival was cancelled, all this stuff was happening in the lead-up, there was just some nastiness going on,” Mrs Ormonde said.

She said the replacement value of the main sign was $6000.

“When we discovered it was all stolen, I was just so upset, I was like ‘why would anyone do that?’,” she asked, adding the incident was a “kick in the teeth” to the hardworking volunteer committee.

“The stolen signage was purchased through community funds so really the thieves have stolen from the community,” she said.

Mrs Ormonde said she could understand that some people could think the two-day festival was not everyone’s cup of tea.

“At the end of the day it brings business into the town and that’s why we hold it,” she said.

The festival has been growing in popularity in recent years but was badly impacted by COVID-19, with this year’s event failing to attract anywhere near last year’s crowd.”

Mrs Ormonde said she had lodged a complaint with police.

She urged anyone with information to come forward, but she now believed that whoever had taken the signage had destroyed it.

“So we’re just going to have to focus on replacing it,” she said.

In addition to the $2000 reward, the local community is rallying behind organisers, including the Cardwell and District Community Historical Society that is selling homemade preserves to raise money.