Sighting in Luttenbach-près-Munster, June 26, 2016

Around midnight, a witness looking out of a west-facing window noticed a red-orange point of light crossing the sky. It moved silently and slowly toward the northwest, then disappeared behind trees. The sighting lasted one to two minutes. The witness described the light as moving slowly before shifting to the right. Only one witness came forward in the commune.

The gendarmerie investigation found that about thirty points of light had been seen the same evening, at roughly the same time, in the Marne département, very far from the place of the sighting. This confirms that lantern releases were taking place in several parts of France at that time of the summer.

GEIPAN concluded that the color, shape and trajectory matched a Thai lantern. The slow drift toward the north fits the wind recorded at Hohrod, which came from the north at about 3 km/h. The sighting took place on a weekend night, a time favorable to festivities, and single-lantern releases by private individuals are common and often go unreported to the authorities. The case was therefore classified B: probably the passage of a Thai lantern.