Sighting in Tintry, March 16, 1994

On the evening of 16 March 1994, at around 8:10 or 8:30 p.m., a witness was walking home when a milky-looking cloud appeared in front of them. Three times, for a few seconds each time, a large, bright orange crescent showed itself within the cloud. No one else came forward: the gendarmerie investigation turned up no other testimony.

The case therefore rests on a single witness, but the description of the phenomenon was fairly precise, and the witness's sincerity and credibility were never questioned. The file had first been classed "C" by SEPRA under a different name, then was reexamined.

GEIPAN noted many features in common between the witness's account (duration, shape, size, colour) and a crescent Moon seen through a layer of cloud. The Moon was also present in the part of the sky concerned. The witness's visual perception was not at fault; rather, it was their interpretation of what they saw, shaped by how they felt (tiredness, only part of the Moon visible through a cloud). The case, of low strangeness, is classed "A": a misidentification of the Moon.