The 1954 French flap:

The Courier of the Somme

The truce of the saucers has ended

Mysterious craft
crisscross again
the Picardy sky

A clear lull had succeeded the veritable saucer carousel which, for long weeks, had taken our region for theater. No more saucers. Was it possible?

Despite the surprise of some, the disappointment of others - and it must be said - the cold indifference of many, it was necessary to face the facts. The mysterious craft had completely deserted our cities and our countries. They continued to criss-cross the sky, and if they seemed to abandon us, they appeared in other regions of France, in Spain, in Italy, in Hungary, in Egypt.

In the most curious shapes. The whole range, indeed, passed there. Cigars, "bedroom pots", crescents, stove pipes, pots. One even saw flying plates on the island of Java. Was it, in this particular case, the brutal conclusion of a domestic fight? We do not know. Enough kidding.

That of the saucers in the Picardy sky has lived.

Indeed, they resumed contact. And we are going to devote a column to them again. To the delight of those who despaired...

A HAYSTACK-SHAPED CRAFT IN LONG

Sunday evening, Mr. Petit, a long-time farmer, went to his fields with a tractor, to tow a cart of beets.

Near a pasture belonging to Mr. Carpentier, he noticed about twenty meters away, a red ball which suddenly landed on the pasture.

Mr. Petit had the impression that his "eyelids were sticking together", the object, he said, was in the shape of a haystack. Asked about the dimensions, Mr. Petit said: "Twice a kitchen table."

The farmer returned to his home, but the "saucer" which would have been there for almost ten minutes, then flew towards Abbeville and was seen by witnesses, while it was flying at quite a high altitude.

A "GRAY CROWN" IN THE SUN BETWEEN VILLERS-BRETONNEUX AND AMIENS

Mr. Paul Granier, former officeware shop director, rue Miraumont, in Amiens, writes to us that driving in the car, on All Saints' Day, on the road leading from Villers-Bretonneux to Amiens, he saw around 4:15 p.m., "for a few minutes, in the sun a gray crown rotating concentrically and projecting around it gleams of different colors."

Two young motorcyclists, according to Mr. Granier, stopped to "contemplate" the phenomenon.

A "grey crown"
saucer
spotted
in the region of Amiens

The saucers or at least the mysterious craft reappear in the Picardy region, after an eclipse of a few weeks. This is how yesterday we indicated that a saucer had been seen at Long.

Today is between Villers-Bretonneux and Amiens, in the afternoon, around 4 p.m., a mysterious contraption has been spotted. Mr. Paul Grandsir, former stationery manager in Amiens, driving his car when he saw a "gray crown" turning, projecting different colors around it.

Motorcyclists also saw this crown moving at high altitude.