Sighting in Lourdes, December 25, 2015

At about 6:40 p.m., under a clear sky, a witness standing still outdoors saw a single small red-orange light pass by, circular or star-shaped. A second person was present, but only one account was collected. The light followed an irregular path, first from east to west, with no noise and no trail, then vanished toward the north after one to two minutes. The witness filmed it on a mobile phone in a tight shot, so the surroundings do not appear in the video. Puzzled, they could not liken it to a fireball, a star, an aircraft or a helicopter. The sighting took place on a Friday evening, Christmas night, in a built-up but sparsely developed neighbourhood on the south-east edge of the town.

At the nearby airport, about ten kilometres to the north, the wind was light, around 6 km/h, from the south, with no precipitation; cloud cover is unknown. GEIPAN favoured the hypothesis of a Thai lantern: the bright appearance, the colour and the disappearance fit a lantern going out, and a festive evening suits such a release. The hilly terrain at the foot of the Pyrenees can alter the wind locally and account for the observed path. The testimony was of average consistency and the video of little use, but the hypothesis was judged highly probable. The case was classed B.