At that hour, Mr. Leon F[ - ], a teacher, drove with his wife from Stembert towards their residence in Limbourg.
Little before the crossroads known as of the "Goronnes", they saw an object seemingly motionless above the locality "Halloux", in the North-East of where they were.
They thought that it resembled a big "banana helicopter", these helicopters with two rotors such as the Chinook, the thing being thicker on its two ends than in its middle portion. The object emitted a powerful light.
|
Above: Aspect of the object seen from the side from the location "les Goronnes" according the figure by SOBEPS investigators.
The dotted line and the "?" indicated by SOBEPS are not captioned, it might be an indication of some unsatisfactorily described luminosity above the object.
They ended up arriving just below this object, driving underneath it, estimating that it must have been between 200 and 300 meters above them.
They could distinguish that it had what they described like "assembly structures", without being able to better specify this.
It was of a clearly material aspect, rigid, opaque, its color was dark gray, without metallic reflection.
They saw three "headlights" laid out in triangle which emitted a very sharp white light, that they compared with that of night lightings of football stadium. The headlight located at the point of the object had the aspect of a "sphere" and seemed larger than the two side-lights. It is this headlight which projected towards the ground a white beam, but attenuated by daylight. Concerning the light in the center, it was orange and flickered "softly".
|
Above: Aspect of the object seen from underneath according to the figure by the SOBEPS investigators.
The object which had been motionless then started to move with the point forwards, at a moderate speed, but considered higher than 60 km/h, and silently moved away towards the east, in direction of Goë.
Then it changed direction and left towards the south-west, until arriving above the locality "Louveterie", where it changed direction once again and directed itself full north towards the witnesses.
It marked two or three minutes of stop on the western side of the crest road of "Halloux", where the two witnesses had stopped, and moved away quickly in direction to Jehanster-Spa, that is to say a north-north-east towards south-south-west course.
Leon F. noticed what seemed to be "two dark lines" being detached in relief under the object, laid out in a symmetrical way, these lines evoked to him "deflectors" or a kind of "skis landing gear."
The observation lasted in the whole a quarter of an hour.
SOBEPS presents the case as a daylight observation. It should however be noted that the sun set that day at 16:37. The night has not yet fallen, but the night is falling during the observation. The sky thus presents to have close the color which I used on the diagrams.
From the summary by the SOBEPS, I tried to trace the positions of the objects and the positions of the witnesses.
| Object: | Witnesses: | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Phase: | Position: | Mouvement: | Vers: | Position: | Mouvement: | Vers: |
| 1 | Above "Halloux". | Motionless | N/A | Just before the "Goronnes" crossroad. | Are driving by car. | Are going from Stembert to Limbourg. |
| 2 | Abve the witnesses. | Motionless | N/A | Under the object. | Are driving by car. | Towards Limbourg? |
| 3 | Above the witnesses. | Starts to move at a bit more than 60 km/h. | Towards the East in the direction of Goë. | ? | Are driving by car. | Towards Limbourg? |
| 4 | ? | Changes direction. | Towards the South-West. | ? | ? | ? |
| 5 | Above the location "Louveterie." | N/A | N/A | ? | ? | ? |
| 6 | N/A | N/A | From "Louveterie" straight to the North where the witnesses are. | North of object. | ? | ? |
| 7 | West side of the ridge road of "Halloux". | Motionless 2 or 3 minutes. | N/A | Ridge road of "Halloux". | Stopped. | N/A |
| 8 | N/A | Moving fast. | At the West of the ridge road of "Halloux" going to Jehanster-Spa, i.e. NNE to SSW. | Ridge road of "Halloux". | N/A | Arrêtés. |
As it appears, it is practically impossible to reconstitute a path of the UFO or UFOs observed with any guarantee for accuracy, the summary being too fragmentary and the continuity of the observation not being specified.
At best, I can locate the area of the observation geographically. In blue, the ridge road where the witnesses were driving:
|
It quite tempting to think that the witnesses could have actually seen a dual rotor helicopter or even a traditional helicopter or an airliner from the side initially, and a twin-jet airliner afterwards, the same or another. The diagrams strongly suggest it, and the two "deflectors" or skis under the triangle could simply be the two engine nacelles of a twin-jet aircraft.
Several details seem to go against this type of explanation, such as for example the immobility followed by a move; unfortunately nothing is quantified, in particular, neither timing neither no angular size neither angular elevation nor angular displacement are indicated and thus all sorts of optical illusions about a plane or helicopter can be proposed and the report is practically meaningless as it stands.
However, it remains important to remember that this observation is by no means isolated this evening in this area; it is one among more than one hundred - and this makes it interesting in an approach of the complete event of that night.
