Sighting in Sainte-Maure-de-Touraine, August 8, 2022

In the night of 7 to 8 August 2022, at 12:14 a.m., a witness who could not sleep looked at the starry sky from a window that stayed closed. They first saw a single light that seemed to take on several colors in turn, and filmed it with their phone. Later, two distinct lights appeared at either end of what looked like one phenomenon. The witness recorded four videos, pausing for 5 to 10 minutes between them to review the footage. In the fourth video, the lights formed an oblique line. Tired and a little worried, the witness gave up watching after several minutes. In the morning, they thought they saw the phenomenon again, heading north at high speed.

The case is well documented thanks to the videos, and the witness's availability and answers to follow-up questions point to good consistency. The strangeness came mainly from the fourth video.

After several hypotheses were ruled out, the investigation found the explanation. A forest fire had broken out on the afternoon of 7 August at the place called Le Plessis and had burned half a hectare. Fire vehicles stayed on site to monitor the area until early morning. The colored lights, the duration of the observations and the line of lights around 12:17 a.m. matched the lights of those vehicles leaving the scene. Analysis of the footage showed the lights were close to the ground, not in the sky. The gendarmerie confirmed a fire in a direction very close to the one the witness gave. The case was classified A: lights on the ground reflecting human activity following a forest fire.