Sighting in Marseille, December 14, 2022

At 7:36 on a winter morning, a witness stepped out onto their balcony to smoke a cigarette. To their left, they noticed "luminous balls" that appeared and vanished, moving erratically. They stayed in the same part of the sky for several minutes. The witness took photos and shot a video. Their spouse also saw the phenomenon but did not file a report.

The account was detailed and time-stamped, backed up by the images. The witness's address and the direction in which the pictures were taken confirmed where they had been looking, so the case was judged consistent even though only one witness reported it. In the video, the "balls" show a movement consistent with wing beats. They lay in the direction of the Vélodrome stadium, whose brightly lit roof appears in the images. The video's sound picks up birds of this kind, which are common in the neighbourhood.

The investigation concluded that the objects were a flock of about thirty gulls, known locally in Marseille as gabians. Their pale chests reflected the city lighting, which made them look luminous. They were too far away to be recognised with the naked eye or on the phone screen. After watching the video again on a larger tablet screen, the witness reached the same conclusion. The lack of other reports is explained by the ordinary, natural look of the phenomenon. The case was classified A.