Sighting in Rebigue, February 26, 2023

At around 8 p.m., the witness was travelling by car with three other family members when they noticed two white points of light in the sky, very close together and moving very slowly. The sighting lasted five minutes in all, including a three-minute break during which the surroundings hid the lights from view. The witness described successive positions in the east and north, then the south, east-south-east and finally the north-east. The lights kept moving even while the car was stopped. No noise was reported. Only the witness wrote an account for the GEIPAN, and no photos or videos were provided. The GEIPAN rated the case as having medium consistency.

The investigation looked at two hypotheses. A conjunction of Venus and Jupiter, low on the western horizon, was ruled out: the two lights were arranged horizontally while the conjunction was tilted at about 65°, their movement was continuous, which does not fit a celestial body, and the reported directions did not match the conjunction's fixed position in the west.

The A400M hypothesis was retained. Data from flight-tracking platforms (ADSB-Exchange and ADS-B.NL) show such an aircraft in the area at low altitude during a large military exercise. Its transponder was switched off and its lighting reduced to a few position lights, which explains its unusual look. Directions and elevations match closely for the start of the sighting and for the period when the witnesses were stopped. The end is harder to confirm, because there were no radar data and another aircraft was approaching Toulouse-Blagnac at the same time, which may have caused confusion. The lack of noise is explained by the distance, a northerly wind that did not carry sound toward the witnesses, and the low-visibility flight mode. The GEIPAN classified the case as A.