Sighting in Mirecourt, November 22, 1989

Between 2:00 and 2:15 a.m., a woman looking out of her window saw a bright red phenomenon cross the sky quickly on a slightly descending path. She woke her husband, who also saw it. She described its shape as two stacked cylinders separated by a black band, the lower one being longer, and a drawing is included in the report. Showers of sparks and flames surrounded the object, which trailed a tail of sparks in a kind of mist. Three tall fir trees near the house then hid it from her view. No sound was heard during the brief sighting. The witness later contacted the gendarmerie and the press.

The case had first been classified D and was later reviewed. According to GEIPAN, the description leaves no doubt that it was an atmospheric re-entry. An artificial re-entry is the preferred explanation, since the path and time of passage of the Soviet satellite Cosmos 2047 match the sighting very well. Its re-entry is dated 21 November 1989, but with an error margin of a few hours, so a passage on 22 November around 1:00 a.m. (UT) is entirely possible. There was no other witness, so the real duration of the phenomenon could not be established. The 20 seconds observed is short for a large artificial object and would point more toward a natural bolide, but the witnesses saw only part of the event: they first noticed it from their bed, and trees hid it at the end. The case is classified A, an almost certain misidentification of the atmospheric re-entry of Cosmos 2047.