Meral entity encounter — 1954

The earliest recovered regional account, published October 14,1954, identifies Baptiste Potin, forty, cycling toward work at 6 a.m. on Monday October 11 near Méral. He said an orange light ahead seemed to descend near the Saint-Poix road, about 600 metres away. It appeared flattened and domed, extremely bright and translucent, with a motionless, indistinct dark form inside. After eight or ten minutes it reportedly reddened and disappeared northwest. Continuing his journey, Potin passed through a luminous cloud shedding snow-like material. At the farm he found sticky white fluff on his clothes, reportedly resistant to brushing. Later versions change the witness to Duvivier, the date to October 14, the time to evening, and the deposit to material that soon evaporated. Those differences should remain visible. The early description does not identify the dark form as a person or supply anatomical details. Patrick Gross proposes a setting-Moon misidentification based on the light's direction, time and changing appearance; that is his interpretation, not a contemporary determination. No recovered material analysis establishes an unusual residue. The plate therefore preserves the reported light and unresolved dark mark while correcting the witness, dawn setting and chronology, without manufacturing an alien occupant.