Sighting in La Bouëxière, October 8, 2018

At about 5:30 in the morning, the witness was smoking a cigarette on their doorstep when they noticed a moving white point of light in the night sky. They watched it for several minutes and filmed it with their mobile phone, which they had to hand. The light looked bigger and brighter than a star, and its glow was steady. It appeared in the northwest, crossed the sky in a straight, descending line at what seemed a constant speed, and disappeared at the southeast horizon after about 5 minutes. The witness contacted the GEIPAN the same day and sent in a questionnaire and a video two days later. No other witness account was collected.

The light's appearance, its straight path, its disappearance at the horizon and the length of the sighting all suggest an artificial satellite, and the angular speed estimated from the witness's description is consistent with that. Calsky data show that the ISS was not visible at that moment, but several geostationary satellites were crossing the witness's sky, two of them on a path close to the one described. These satellites are usually invisible to the naked eye, but around the equinoxes the sun can light them up enough to be seen. The sighting, about 3 hours before sunrise, fell within such a period. The video, shot on a phone held at arm's length, was too poor in quality to be used.

The GEIPAN rated the case as having low strangeness and medium consistency (single witness, fairly precise description, unusable video). It was classified A: a very probable misidentification of a geostationary satellite.