Sighting in Le Taillan-Médoc, December 15, 2013

On a Sunday evening at around 6:30 pm, a witness noticed an orange point of light in a clear sky. It looked bigger than an aircraft, made no sound and stayed motionless. After a few minutes it moved away and quickly disappeared along an upward path.

GEIPAN looked at several explanations for this orange light near the horizon that barely moved. The first was an aircraft seen head-on, at low altitude or on approach to Bordeaux-Mérignac airport, whose flashing lights the witness would have seen coming closer. Military air traffic control radar traces show heavy air activity in the area at that time, with several civil aircraft at various altitudes and headings. However, the printout is very hard to read and does not allow a clear match with the sighting. The second was a Thai lantern: colour, appearance, duration and rise fit, but the light easterly wind should have pushed it to the observer's left, which the witness did not mention, unless the local wind differed from the one recorded at Mérignac. Given the twilight hour, a reflection of the sun on a weather balloon launched from Mérignac was also possible. Two other bright phenomena occurred that evening at close times: the International Space Station passed between 6:07 and 6:16 pm, in a direction that matches the witness's account poorly, and an Iridium satellite flashed for a few seconds at 6:25 pm, due south and slightly above the horizon.

Several hypotheses could explain this fairly unremarkable observation, but none fits the testimony perfectly. GEIPAN classified the case C because of insufficient information and cross-checking.