Sighting in Groix, April 14, 1982

In the night of 13 to 14 April 1982, at about 2:45 a.m. (the date the gendarmerie considered most likely), three people travelling by vehicle to various places on the island noticed a luminous phenomenon in the sky. They felt that it followed them and stopped whenever they did. One of them went home and woke a fourth witness, who confirmed at around 3 a.m. the presence of a very bright, stationary object they did not recognise. For some of the witnesses, the observation continued at different spots on the island until 5 a.m., roughly three hours in all. The fourth witness saw an object of identical shape the following night.

The gendarmerie, informed by chance on 20 April 1982, investigated on site a few days later. It found no other witnesses, no EDF power disturbance, no observation reported by the Lann-Bihoué naval air base, and no ground traces in the areas the witnesses indicated. The witnesses' credibility was not in question, but their accounts contained contradictions and imprecisions, particularly about the date and about the speed and direction of the phenomenon.

GEIPAN noted that the description (duration, shape, size, colour, slow movement mostly from west to east) matched the Moon, which was then at last quarter and was prominent in the east/south-east part of the sky where the witnesses placed the object, about 20° above the ocean at the end of the observation. With a clear sky, the witnesses could not have missed the Moon beside the object, so they did not recognise it. This kind of mistake is common in GEIPAN's archives. The impression of being followed is the "following ball" illusion, caused by the witnesses' own movement, and the emotion it provokes can reduce the accuracy of perception and memory. The case was classified A: observation of the Moon.