The Red Glow at the Forest Edge

It was ten at night on 19 September 1979 and two men were out jogging at Lyons-la-Forêt. In the sky they noticed a red glow in the shape of a ball, twinkling like a star. Without warning it moved at a "vitesse vertigineuse" (a dizzying speed) and came towards them. They heard no sound and felt no rush of air and no heat. The glow swept round in a curve and stopped for three or four seconds, some 200 metres away above the edge of the forest. A dark mass appeared inside the light. Then the whole thing vanished at once.

What is on the record

The source is GEIPAN's own file. It is short: a description and two testimony sheets, with no documents attached. The sheets give two men aged 40 and 50, on a clear night among woodland. One calls the object ovoid and the orange of fire, a little bigger than a star. The other calls it a white and red ball that looked like a star and grew as it came closer. GEIPAN notes that no other testimony or evidence was ever gathered.

The file names no explanation that was tested or rejected. It says only that the phenomenon "reste inexpliqué" (remains unexplained). GEIPAN classes the case D, which means it looked into it and could not explain it, and rates it strange to very strange with medium to strong consistency. With nothing else in the file, the event rests on what the two men said.

Why it sits where it does

L0 · SINGLE ACCOUNT. GEIPAN withholds the identities of its witnesses, so the released record carries no identified witness, even though two people saw the light. The tier measures sourcing, not the quality of the investigation. What stopped above the forest edge is not resolved here.