Sighting in Saint-Gatien-des-Bois, November 27, 2011

On a Sunday evening, at around 6:50 p.m., a driver and their children noticed a motionless bright phenomenon above the village church. A fifth witness, independent of the others, gave an account later on. The witnesses described broadly the same thing: a circular, white, very bright phenomenon, with no noise at all. They could no longer say exactly how many lights there were. One of the witnesses looked away at once and ran off.

The case was first classified D, because the idea of skytracer laser projectors had been ruled out on the grounds that weather data showed no clouds. A reexamination, based on a more thorough weather study, showed that banks of stratocumulus were very probably present. A nearby golf course to the north held outdoor festive events, and a contractor working for it offered entertainment using a skytracer model whose characteristics match those of the phenomenon. Its actual use at the time could not be formally proven, but function tests may have been carried out ahead of future events. A beam fired at a cloud layer about 1,000 m up would produce the appearance described. The two groups of witnesses probably saw different firing directions, at different moments. The very clear air would explain why the beams themselves were not visible.

GEIPAN concluded with a B classification: probable observation of impact spots from a skytracer in the sky. The witnesses did not supply angular data themselves, which the investigation regrets, but nothing formally contradicts the hypothesis.