PONTOISE (95) 01.01.2014

Around 01:10 on 1 January 2014, a witness in a Pontoise (95) street saw 5 yellow-orange luminous balls pass successively below cloud. The observation lasted about 20 minutes before they disappeared one after another. No additional accounts were collected. GEIPAN describes the account as precise and extensively documented. The horizontal path was straight, below the cloud layer. Winds were from the southwest at Pontoise-Cormeilles and from the south-southwest in the Infoclimat record for Saint-Ouen-l'Aumône. Looking southeast, the witness saw the balls rise as they moved right to left. He felt they were approaching, either because they really were or because they brightened. Excessively zoomed, out-of-focus videos showed only orange colour and optical and digital artefacts, without object detail. GEIPAN found that the trajectory proposed in the witness's dossier was unsupported. The account had the characteristics of sky lanterns: orange lights following one another along roughly the same straight wind-driven path on a festive night. GEIPAN considered them probably much closer than the witness estimated, likely 1–2 km away. It classified the case B: probable observation of sky lanterns. The witness rejected this explanation.