Sighting in Honfleur, August 20, 2000

On a Sunday evening, starting at about 11:30 pm, a driver noticed a moving object in the sky. It formed a large circle made up of luminous "windows". The witness followed it for roughly 8 km before it disappeared. Further on, after stopping, the witness saw a red dot darting about in all directions on the car's bonnet. Looking up, they found the same circular phenomenon again, stationary above the vehicle. After a few seconds, both the phenomenon and the red dot vanished. Only one account was collected.

The case, first classified D in 2000, was re-examined. According to GEIPAN, the description matches reflections on a sky screen from a set of advertising searchlights, known as "skytrackers": only the spots they cast were visible, not the beams. The pattern seen is typical of the sweeping and rotating capabilities of equipment then used in nightclubs, and another GEIPAN case led investigators to find such equipment. The weather fits: clouds could have served as a screen, and recent rain could have cleared the air of the droplets that make beams visible. The setting also fit: a summer weekend evening in a holiday area on the Normandy coast.

The red dot resembles the effect of a handheld red laser used by a prankster from nearby houses, which is plausible but cannot be verified. Already faced with the first phenomenon, the witness may have linked the second to it. GEIPAN classified the case A on the basis of the first phenomenon. The testimony is weak in consistency, lacking in particular angular sizes and positions in the sky, but the appearance and weather conditions allow a confident conclusion, even though the original searchlight was not identified: a very probable sighting of a skytracer or lasers.