Martinique, France · 2017-11-12 · from the GEIPAN archive
On November 12, 2017 at 5:15 pm (local time), a witness at his home observes at the zenith a very bright, opaque and white object, ovoid in shape. The witness observes the UAP with binoculars in a clear sky: he thinks of a weather balloon but remains surprised because the object is almost motionless. No particular noise is heard. The witness and the gendarmerie unit patrol will observe this phenomenon until 6:15 pm before it moves toward the East. The witness took a photograph (original not transmitted to GEIPAN). Only one testimony is collected. This observation evokes for the witness as for the gendarmes the passage of a "meteorological sounding balloon". This hypothesis was the subject of checks with the air transport brigade of Lamentin (972). After consultation of the "Flight Radar" site, it is a balloon deployed over Puerto Rico that high-altitude winds pushed toward Martinique. These balloons come from the Loon project set up to provide Internet access to disaster-stricken and/or hard-to-reach areas using high-altitude balloons. It was following the passage of Hurricane Maria in September 2017 over Puerto Rico that it was decided to use a fleet of balloons that allows Puerto Ricans deprived of cellular connection, following the destruction of the antennas, to be able to use the basic functions of their phone. GEIPAN classifies this case as "A" as the observation of a stratospheric balloon coming from Puerto Rico pushed by high-altitude winds toward Martinique.
What stood out: photographed
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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.
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