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October 3, 1954, Rouen, Seine-Maritime:

Reference for this case: 3-Oct-54-Rouen.
Please cite this reference in any correspondence with me regarding this case.

Summary:

The newspaper Paris-Normandie, of Rouen, for October 5, 1954, wondered whether the "meteors seen on Sunday" were flying saucers.

The article reported that "Sunday", thus on October 3, 1954, around 9 p.m., in Rouen, on the heights near the Saint Hilaire church, walkers had seen "three meteors located one above the other", "like the steps of a staircase". They seemed to be hovering above the Seine, facing the Sainte Catherine hill.

Suddenly, one of them headed at breakneck speed in the direction of the spectators; it seemed to gain height and grew disproportionately.

Its shape was described as "that of a gigantic neon tube", the light it emitted "became an intense yellow. It bowed as if to turn, set off again towards the Seine and disappeared..."

The other two "meteors" had vanished. Everything occurred without the slightest noise. One of the witnesses, an electrician from the general hospice of Rouen living in the Saint Hilaire district, was returning home with his wife and son when his attention was drawn by neighbors to this phenomenon which he described to the newspaper.

Reports:

[Ref. pne1:] NEWSPAPER "PARIS-NORMANDIE":

[Ref. ppe1:] NEWSPAPER "PARIS-PRESSE":

[Ref. ads1:] NEWSPAPER "L'ARDENNAIS":

[Ref. lae1:] NEWSPAPER "L'ALSACE":

The newspaper reports on October 6, 1954, with no other information, that there was a sighting in Rouen. The date is not given but the sighting is mentioned among others that took place on October 2 and 3, 1954.

See the article here.

[Ref. jve5:] JACQUES VALLEE:

[Ref. ubk1:] "UFO-DATENBANK":

Explanations:

The witnesses are close to the Saint-Hilaire church, the phenomenon appears above the Sainte-Catherine hill, a high spot which overlooks Rouen, and the Seine; if the direction is exact this would be 208°:

At this time and place, Mars was at 200°, elevation 13°. The Moon was at 223°, height 3° 15.

It may seem absurd that I check this, since the report really has little chance of explaining itself in this way. But it turns out that on October 3, 1954, in the Nord department, there had been dozens of misinterpretations caused by a low crescent moon barred by a cloud, often described as "two craft" or a "a craft splitting in two".

But here I rather exclude such an explanation for several reasons.

First of all, in the sector of the Saint-Hilaire church, the few viewpoints (example below) in the direction of the Sainte-Catherine hill have the horizon barred by the Sainte-Catherine hill; that is to say, a Moon at 3° 15 above the horizon would not really be visible, hidden by the hill.

Then, the cloud barring the Moon in the Nord would have had little chance of being present in the same way in such a distant region.

Finally, we are talking about "three", and not two, "meteors" (completely erroneous journalistic designation here).

Mars cannot count as the "third", it is not above the Moon.

Finally, the Moon and Mars were setting, which is difficult to reconcile with "Suddenly, one of them headed at dizzying speed in the direction of the spectators; it seemed to gain height and grow disproportionately."

I don't know what was seen in this case. An extraterrestrial craft? I can't rule it out. But other explanations could be considered, such as projectors on a cloud ceiling. There was no investigation (the witnesses were not named), and the information is quite poor in quantitative terms (durations, angular sizes etc.), which in my opinion does not allow to pronounce any final explanation.

I therefore leave the case as "unidentified."

Keywords:

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

Rouen, Seine-Maritime, tube, neon, three, multiple, stopped, maneuver, fast, yellow, silent

Sources:

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

• [pne1] Article in the newspaper Paris-Normandie, Rouen, Seine-Maritime, France, October 5, 1954.
• [ppe1] Article in the national newspaper Paris-Presse, Paris, France, page 5, October 6, 1954.
• [ads1] Article in the regional newspaper L'Ardennais, France, October 6, 1954.
• [lae1] Article in the regional newspaper L'Alsace, Mulhouse, France, October 6, 1954.
• [jve5] "Catalogue préliminaire de 500 observations", listing in "Les Phénomènes Insolites de l'Espace", book by Jacques and Jannine Vallée, Table Ronde publisher, France, 1966.
• [jve5] "Catalogue préliminaire de 500 observations", listing in "Les Phénomènes Insolites de l'Espace", book by Jacques and Jannine Vallée, Robert Laffont publisher, France, page 250, 1978.
• [ubk1] Online database UFO-Datenbank, Germany, found in 2016, at ufodatenbank.de

Document history:

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This page was last updated on June 30, 2021.