[D2] de SAINT-ANDEOL-LE-CHATEAU (69) vers GIVORS (69) 07.12.2017

On 7 December 2017 at 15:12, a witness in a taxi examined and photographed clouds with a smartphone. A small fluorescent-green circular patch in the landscape seemed stationary or kept pace with the taxi. He took several photographs and later a video. Only one account was collected. He was looking for “elementals” or “beings of life” and believed he had found one following him among the landscape and roadside bushes. GEIPAN identifies sunlight reflected within the smartphone camera. At 15:16:29 the Sun lies off-centre; a faint green patch with a halo is its classic optical ghost, reflected across the image centre. At 15:16:42 the same effect falls on an already bright cloud and is not visible. At 15:16:18 it falls on foreground bushes. The video shows the same phenomenon. GEIPAN states it no longer accepts anomalies seen only on a camera screen without direct observation. The witness claimed a check: “I moved my screen aside to look at the curious green patch in the bushes, and it really was there.” GEIPAN does not accept this verification after analyzing the whole account. He makes no distinction between a supposed naked-eye UAP and the real screen image created by the optics. It also judges his eagerness to find unusual things to undermine critical scrutiny: he may unwittingly have believed he briefly saw the glow in the bushes without checking carefully. GEIPAN considers the photographs unequivocal evidence of an artifact. Classification A: photographic artifact caused by the Sun.