LEGE-CAP-FERRET (33) 26.11.2020

On 26 November 2020 in Lège-Cap-Ferret (33), a witness returned from walking a dog at 20:14. While the witness wiped its paws, the dog barked repeatedly in an unusual way. Looking up, the witness saw a yellow-orange luminous sphere, not particularly dazzling, cross the night sky silently in a straight line apparently parallel to the ground. A nearby house quickly hid it. The sighting lasted only 1–3 seconds within a narrow field of view. Only 1 account was collected. The spherical shape and yellow-orange color suggest a windborne light, such as a sky lantern or LED balloon (see the investigation report). Its east-to-west movement matches weather data from Lège-Cap-Ferret and La Teste-de-Buch, supporting this explanation. The evidence is moderate: a single witness, with no photographs or video. The apparent proximity, light, silence and dog's reaction that made the event strange to the witness are all explicable under the retained hypothesis. GEIPAN concludes that a sky lantern or LED balloon was observed. The remote investigation could neither locate its source nor distinguish between these alternatives, so the case is classified B.