MORLAAS (64) 29.11.2021

On the morning of 29 November 2021, a Morlaàs (64) resident looked through her glazed garden door and discovered circular and semicircular cloud formations. She watched for about 5 minutes as they gradually faded and disappeared. GEIPAN finds very good evidential substance: one witness but several photographs (see investigation report). The spectacular, unfamiliar appearance caused the strangeness. She researched the phenomenon. Fully circular shapes did not fit press explanations of horseshoe clouds. In questionnaire answers E3 and E7 she said she had sincerely expected a weather phenomenon but found the complete, sharply defined circle unlike any horseshoe cloud she had seen or read about. Still seeking understanding, she hoped GEIPAN could provide examples of complete cloud circles that would confirm a meteorological explanation. The horseshoe-cloud hypothesis was rejected because the heavily overcast, stable or very slowly moving atmosphere and horizontal rather than vertical shapes were incompatible with its formation. She also described an “odd sensation” like vibration, tension or electricity in the air. GEIPAN suggests several operating helicopters could explain vibration: Figure 15 shows nearby red, blue and orange tracks with closely spaced position points indicating their low speeds. The investigation identified contrails from a military formation manoeuvring about 30 km north of her. The very uniform cloud ceiling in the photographs indicates extremely slow cloud motion, consistent with contrails persisting for about 45 minutes. Classification A: condensation trails.