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October 26, 1954, Valcourt, Haute-Marne:

Reference for this case: 26-Oct-54-Valcourt.
Please cite this reference in any correspondence with me regarding this case.

Summary:

The newspaper L'Union of Reims of October 29, 1954 reported, among other observations of what they described as an "unidentified object" in the region on October 26, 1954, that Mr. W. B., aged 25, living in Valcourt, who was alone in the street in the center of the village between 07:15 p.m. and 07:45 p.m., was going to fetch his milk from the nearby farm.

He then suddenly saw "a curious object which had, in his eyes, the apparent size of an aspirin tablet," orange in color, moving at very great speed in the direction northwest–southwest, beyond the Bourguignons ridge, at an altitude he could not specify.

This object left behind it a trail of multicolored sparks.

It "disappeared instantly" after crossing half of the celestial vault.

The newspaper noted that the weather was partially cloudy, "which would explain this sudden disappearance."

A few moments later, the witness told what he had just seen to the farmer's wife who served him his milk, without knowing that the same phenomenon had been seen elsewhere.

Reports:

[Ref. unn1:] NEWSPAPER "L'UNION":

Scan.

Three testimonies confirm the passage of an "unidentified flying object" Tuesday evening in our sky

In our issue yesterday, we published the testimony of Mr. M. S., who, on Tuesday around 7:30 p.m., while approaching the intersection of Rue de Vandeuil and Rue de l'Arquebuse, saw an unidentified object in the sky. This fact is now firmly established, as yesterday we collected two more testimonies regarding the same phenomenon.

Mr. W. B., 25 years old, residing in Valcourt, was alone in the street at the center of the village Tuesday evening, between 7:15 and 7:45 p.m. He had gone to fetch his milk from the neighboring farm. Suddenly, he saw a curious object that appeared to him the size of an aspirin tablet, orange in color, moving at very high speed in a northwest-southwest direction, beyond the Côte des Bourguignons, at an altitude the witness could not specify.

The object left behind a trail of multicolored sparks. It disappeared instantly after crossing half of the sky. The weather was partly cloudy, which might explain this sudden disappearance. A few moments later, Mr. W. B. told the farmer's wife, who was serving him his milk, what he had just seen. He could not have suspected that the same phenomenon had been observed elsewhere.

Indeed, a ten-and-a-half-year-old boy also saw the object Tuesday evening. This boy, Jean-Pierre H., who lives with his parents on Rue du Colonel-Raynal, was playing in Rue de l'Arquebuse opposite the construction sites. When he returned to his parents at 7:45 p.m., he boasted of having seen something round, white in color, surrounded by smoke, passing through the sky in the direction Théâtre Municipal-Marne.

At first, the parents thought it was an overactive imagination on the part of their son, but they changed their opinion yesterday morning upon reading l'Union.

Mr. W. B.'s testimony was already significant on its own, and three concordant testimonies, coming from respectable people who do not know each other, carry even more weight in this regard.

Only one point does not match in these testimonies: the color of the observed object. Bright green for one, white for another, orange for the third. In truth, such color variations in "unidentified flying objects" have already been reported; they are, after all, just one aspect of the phenomenon, inexplicable as a whole.

Explanations:

Map.

Obvious description or a meteor.

Keywords:

(These keywords are only to help queries and are not implying anything.)

Valcourt, Haute-Marne, anonymous, object, orange, fast, trail, sparks, multicolored

Sources:

[----] indicates sources that are not yet available to me.

Document history:

Version: Created/Changed by: Date: Change Description:
1.0 Patrick Gross March 15, 2026 First published, [unn1].

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This page was last updated on March 15, 2026.