TURBALLE (LA) (44) 22.12.2024

At about 23:24, a witness in a garden in La Turballe, Loire-Atlantique, saw a luminous phenomenon described as a flaming band in orange and yellow hues. It appeared to the northeast at an estimated elevation of 35°–45°, resembling a cascade of fire pouring towards the ground. The sighting lasted only a few seconds. The witness reported particularly favourable weather with a completely clear sky. A few minutes later, he telephoned the gendarmerie and used his mobile phone to record his position's GPS coordinates and the azimuth of the phenomenon. On 2 February 2025, he sent GEIPAN a completed technical questionnaire, accompanied by a phone screenshot showing the coordinates and measured azimuth, a photograph locating the observation site and viewing direction, and an illustration of the scene superimposed on a site photograph. GEIPAN assessed the evidential support as good. Although there was only 1 account and no photograph or video of the phenomenon itself, its description and location data were very precise. GEIPAN defines evidential support as the amount of information collected for an account that is considered reliable and objectively established. GEIPAN found that the witness had been looking directly along the receding trajectory of a fireball seen by several dozen people. The International Meteor Organization (IMO) database recorded 73 reports for event 8095-2024. According to the Vigie-Ciel.org account reproduced by GEIPAN, a remarkable fireball crossed northwestern France on Sunday 22 December 2024 at 23:24 local time, labelled 'CEST' in the source, corresponding to 22:24 UT. It was visible for more than 10 seconds and was widely described as spectacular. A witness in Flers, Orne, initially thought it was a shooting star but saw it continue straight, cross a cloud producing green light, travel extremely fast and finally fragment like a firework while turning orange. Several dozen reports were submitted online. Vigie-Ciel reported an apparent magnitude of −8, approximately 30 times Venus's brightness, and detections by 4 FRIPON cameras. FRIPON stands for Fireball Recovery and InterPlanetary Observation Network. Video analysis reconstructed the trajectory and estimated the object's physical and orbital properties. The account identifies the meteoroid as originating in the outer main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, with an estimated diameter of 15–20 cm and a mass of approximately 20 kg. It entered the atmosphere above Mayenne at a relative speed of approximately 13.6 km/s, nearly 49,000 km/h. It began emitting light at an altitude of 75 km, approximately 15 km southwest of Laval, and travelled northeast at an azimuth of approximately 44°, inclined only 18° to the horizontal. Vigie-Ciel attributed the exceptional visibility duration to this shallow path: it travelled more than 140 km through the atmosphere before fragmenting and going dark at approximately 32 km altitude, near the northern boundary of Orne and approximately 15 km west of L'Aigle. The cited sources are Vigie-Ciel.org's 'Fireball of 22 December 2024 at 23:24' and the event report. GEIPAN found the witness's northeast viewing direction and precise 23:24 timing a reliable match to the fireball reported through IMO. Detection at the same time and along the same axis by 4 FRIPON cameras strongly supported the account's credibility and consistency. It attributed the unusual orange-yellow cascade appearance to the rare view along a descending fireball's receding path, enhanced by fragmentation followed by gradual extinction. The concluding analysis again cites Vigie-Ciel's shallow 18° inclination and gives an exceptionally long visibility of 7–10 seconds, described as atypical for such an atmospheric event. This differs from the earlier more-than-10-second account and the individual witness's few-second sighting; all durations are retained. GEIPAN classified the case A: observation of a fireball.