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The article below was published in the daily newspaper La Bourgogne Républicaine, Dijon, France, page 1 and 8, on February 4, 1954.
See the case file.
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by Jimmy Guieu
If we are to believe the authorities at Marignane airport (1), the night of Monday January 4, 1954, would have been a night like all the others, a little colder however, because of the icy wind which swept the strip. However, that evening, at 9 p.m., it was no longer a customs officer, but a fireman - Mr. Chesneau - who witnessed a stunning display.
While he was leaning against the Boussiron hangar (far west of the grounds), firefighter Chesneau saw a weird discoidal craft come down from the sky, radiating a white light. The lenticular apparatus, at low speed, descended on the runway, touched the ground, bounced three or four times like a conventional airplane, then came to a stop, illuminating this portion of the runway with a strange light.
Worried by the unexpected arrival of this "evening visitor", Chesneau rushed into a neighboring building to make a phone call. But, as he called the control tower, then a duty officer, the lenticular craft silently disappeared. Of course, just like the customs officer Gachignard, the firefighter Chesneau was put in the category of the hallucinated and the visionaries... However, the next morning, an investigator found metal rods flanked by a small ball at one end, as well as by other metal debris, exactly where the flying disc landed!
(1) See the journal for January 9.
Indeed, scattered on the track, a hundred metallic "debris" which should not have been there had just been discovered. The largest of them were stems about an inch long. Curved into a small circle, incompletely closed at one end, they carried, at the other end, a kind of ball about a centimeter in diameter.
What happened to those fragments left on the ground? No one - in principle - knows...
Before this astounding news was released to the public by the press, I learned that one "Mr. X." got this information from a certain "Mr. Z.", technician at the airport. I immediately called "Mr. Z." The latter, not without hesitation, admitted to me that indeed, this "tip" was correct.
- But, he added, you would do well to contact "Mr. Y.", who will give you better information than I...
Continued on page 8, under the title
SAUCERS
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(I specify that "Mr. Z." was fully aware of the "incident" he had reported to my informant).
So I called "Mr. Y." The latter, hesitating, whispers a few words to one of his colleagues, remains silent for a moment, then agrees to answer me:
- I'm not quite sure what you mean. Instead, consult "that" service. There, "one" will inform you.
Annoyed by this series of evasions, I contacted the indicated service... to hear myself say:
- I'll pass "Mr. N." He, will inform you.
Probably voiceless, "Mr. N." listened to me... and simply hung up!
In less than an hour, I was making eleven phone calls that each brought me to a wall of silence. A "voice" even insinuated that there was no firefighter named Chesneau in Marignane... Whereas my colleague and friend, journalist Constant Vautravers, spoke with him for a moment the next morning! This interview, too brief, did not allow Vautravers to gather many details. So he made an appointment with firefighter Chesneau for the afternoon.
At the appointment time, the journalist and his photographer heard the "eyewitness". Not seeing him arrive, they questioned a firefighter on duty. The latter explained to them that Chesneau was currently in that building.
Vautravers and his photographer therefore walked towards the said building. Looking back mechanically, the photographer remained stunned: the interrogated firefighter was heading towards an office at the airport!
The motive for this very discreet rush was very clear. When our friends arrived (the last) at the indicated building, firefighter Chesneau was no longer there.
We do not believe that this evasion was an initiative of the witness or his colleague. This apparently followed an order. All the people, all the services Vautravers turned to then sent him... elsewhere. Everywhere he noticed the same reluctance, the same hesitations and the same instructions that I had encountered. No one could tell him what had happened to the metal fragments left on the ground by the flying disc.
Another journalist friend of mine also experienced the same unsuccessful tribulations.
All airport staff seemed to have been instructed to remain silent.
When questioned, the airport police issued a statement: the phenomenon of January 4 was caused by a "classic rocket." (Statement broadcast by Radio-Marseille during the broadcast of January 8, 1954).
A classic rocket? Does that mean a friendly firecracker... Or a V-2 type remote-controlled vehicle?
In both cases, the "rocket" would not have exploded... silently, and would not have left on the track a hundred curled rods. As for the V2 version it is inadmissible. A formidable detonation would have signaled it and the crater, at its point of impact, could not have gone unnoticed.
Some went so far as to want to prove that the metal fragments discovered were nothing more than the clappers of bells, the claps of bells rattling around the necks of goats! Obviously, this suggests that hundreds of goats and sheep graze peacefully on the runways!
Starting off, we can expect to see the herds moving to the Marignane aerodrome one day...
The reality is quite different. After much cross-checking we can advance the following facts:
a) Technicians meticulously searched the place where the craft landed.
b) They took samples from the ground and found traces of the craft.
c) The metallic elements discovered would be studied in a laboratory.
And if, in the end, it was all just a story put together from start to finish, to what end was the wall of silence erected? Why did one take such precautions while taking these conspirators faces?
Contrary to appearances, would the Air Ministry be "discreetly" interested in "unidentified aerial objects"?
We believe, at the International Commission of Investigations, that the flying saucers are neither hallucinations, nor weather balloons, nor optical illusions, nor secret weapons, nor American or Russian projectiles or prototypes or others, neither meteors, nor ball lightning and other implausible explanations that astronomers and supporters of sacrosanct scientific dogmas want at all costs to make us admit... sacrosaints but not eternal.
The world will live, in the not very distant future, the most fantastic adventure that humanity has ever experienced.
Whatever one says or writes about flying saucers, we would like to affirm that people who witness such "phenomena" do not dream. These craft really exist.
They have nothing in common with what has already been seen in the field of "aerial" vehicles... in the very broad sense of the term.
If you ever see a lenticular apparatus in the sky or on the ground one day - or one night, don't panic. Immediately call the nearest aerodrome or notify the police or the gendarmerie and immediately send a detailed report of your observation to the International Commission of Investigation, 27, rue Etienne-Dolet, Bondy (Seine) which will respect your anonymity if you stipulate it.
The United States Air Force has 75 observation bases around the world, specially designed for the study of flying saucers. The US government is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars investigating these lenticular craft. They maintain fighter squadrons ready to take off 24/24 and even uses intelligence agents in its investigations.
England, Denmark and Canada have formed commissions of investigation to elucidate the mystery of the flying discs. The French Air Ministry probably did not lag behind...
Do you believe that such means of action, such precautions would be taken, everywhere and in almost all countries, to chase away... sounding balloons and meteors?
To answer in the affirmative would be to show an inconceivable naivety, a blindness, above all, perfectly unjustified.
JIMMY GUIEU
Director of the Investigation Service
of the International Commission.
Copyright by Jimmy Guieu.
Tomorrow GHOST SAUCERS
First article: every day, the French weather forecast launches more than 150 "jokes and tricks of all kinds" into the sky, by Ch. GARREAU.
