Sighting in Saint-Christol, January 4, 2017

Around 4:35 p.m., a friend phoned the witness to point out a bright phenomenon in the sky. From their garden, the witness saw something like a star, which they first took for Venus. Then they noticed that it was moving across the sky. They had time to photograph and film it. No other witness account was gathered.

GEIPAN's investigation concluded that the phenomenon was most likely a white drone, recreational or professional, flown by sight from a nearby field or meadow. Several points support this: the colour matches some models, the movements are within what drones can do, the calculated distances are plausible, and open spots suitable for flying one by sight exist close by. A structure lying in the line of sight may have been photographed by a professional drone, and a company is known to have produced such images with a white drone at about that time. It is not certain, however, that this was the same aircraft. It could have been another recreational drone, or the same drone used for other purposes over the village, closer to the witness. The strangeness is therefore fairly low; what remains is mainly that the photos do not show the phenomenon's precise shape clearly enough to recognise a drone. The case was classified B: probable confusion with a drone.