[AERO TVF] de AMMAN (JO.AM) vers ORLY (94) 31.01.2023

An airline pilot, T1, reported seeing several points of light during a TVF flight from Amman, Jordan, to Paris-Orly on 31 January 2023. Each travelled across the sky for 5–10 seconds, changing greatly in brightness before disappearing. The lights repeatedly followed 2 directions of travel. His colleague, T2, also saw them but did not submit an account. The observation began at 20:10 UTC while the aircraft was south of Milan, Italy, and ended over Lake Geneva about 30 minutes later. T1 recorded a video. GEIPAN assessed the case as low in strangeness and well supported by evidence, with several witnesses and a video of the UAP, and identified flares from Starlink satellites; see the investigation report. The description and appearance closely match this phenomenon: a prolonged sighting in one limited area of sky, with several moving points of light brightening and fading before disappearing. After identifying the stars visible in the video, a Stellarium check confirmed that the UAP lay 45° vertically above the Sun's apparent position while the Sun was about 38° below the horizon. GEIPAN explains that these conditions match those producing sunlight reflections from structural components of Starlink satellites, also called “cluster flares”. Checks of satellite passes confirmed that numerous Starlink satellites passed near Markab along 2 main directions matching those seen in the video. GEIPAN classified the case A: flares from Starlink satellites in operational orbit. It notes very close similarities to other investigated cases published on its website: [AERO AFR] Abidjan (CI.AB) to Paris (95), 8 April 2023; [AERO TVF] Yerevan (AM.ER) to Orly (94), 13 December 2023; and [AERO AFR] Kinshasa (CD.KN) to Paris (75), 10 April 2023. These 4 cases support a technical investigation note and a news article.