Sighting in Courmes, April 28, 2016

Two people were bivouacking at the summit of a puy, lying in their sleeping bags in the hollow of a doline. Between 9:06 pm and 9:30 pm, and again around midnight, they noticed a bright point of light about the size of a large star. The way it moved around in the sky intrigued them. One witness provided two photographs, taken hand-held, which were of little use because of heavy camera shake.

GEIPAN considered the case highly strange and fairly consistent (two witnesses, photos), although the testimony lacked detail. It concluded that this was a very probable misidentification of the planet Jupiter, combined with an earlier sighting of a satellite in a twilight sky; the witnesses had merged the two observations into a single object. Several points supported this: the description matched Jupiter, the light shifted across the sky during the night, it stayed apparently motionless for nearly 30 minutes, and its position was the same as the planet's. The witness believed its disappearance had revealed Jupiter, previously hidden behind it. However, the sky was completely clear and the air more transparent at altitude, so Jupiter was perfectly visible from the start, contrary to what the witness thought. They had used as a reference its appearance the following day, from the plain and in poorer weather. The first phase suggests the passage of a bright satellite, impossible to identify precisely, but several satellites passed near Jupiter at that time. The jerky movements are typical of an optical illusion caused by involuntary eye movements (nystagmus). The case was classified B.