An open record of things people cannot explain

Vienne, France · 2016-01-15 · from the GEIPAN archive

An account in Vienne, France

On Friday, January 15, 2016 at around 6:30 PM, a witness standing in front of his garage was scanning the sky and noticed a white-orange object blinking among the stars. He ruled out the possibility of an Iridium flare because of the blinking, as well as an ISS pass. The object was quickly hidden by the house. Only one testimony was collected. The garage entrance is located at the southeast corner of the house, opening to the east. At the end of the observation, the UAP disappeared behind the house, blocked by the building ("the object passed over the house and I could no longer see it"), which confirms the direction of the UAP's disappearance, that is, toward the northwest. Of low strangeness and medium consistency (single witness, no photo or video), this case turns out to be a probable misidentification of a rapidly rotating satellite, possibly in distress (see the investigation report). The observation indeed presents the characteristics of such a misidentification (see the investigation report). This type of object, rather unknown to the general public, can be a significant source of non-identification. It should be noted that several satellites out of service or rocket stages, potentially rotating rapidly, passed through the sky, on the trajectory described by the witness, at the time of the observation. However, the lack of precision in the testimony as well as doubt about the time of the observation prevent the formal identification of this satellite. This case is classified B: probable misidentification with a satellite.

 

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This is an official case file of GEIPAN, the French space agency's unidentified aerospace phenomena office, machine translated from French. The original text and the full investigation file are at geipan.fr. We reproduce it with thanks and remove anything on request.