The index page for the 1954 French flap section of this website is here.
Reference for this case: 12-Oct-54-Marseille.
Please cite this reference in any correspondence with me regarding this case.
The regional newspaper Le Provençal for October 13, 1954, wondered about a "cigar" that had been seen at the Gineste pass:
"It was certainly neither a jet, nor a helicopter", thus spoke yesterday evening in our offices Mr. A.D..., who lives 11, street Lafayette, in Marseille. And Mr. A.D..., whose attention had been drawn by a ten of cars stopped at the top of Gineste, continued: "the drivers and occupants of these cars will be able to tell you, the machine which had a shape [illegible] the late hour (it was 06:15 p.m. and the sun was hidden since a quarter of an hour). It left behind itself a white trail and moved while zigzagging vertically. It disappeared, after one minute of maneuvers."
Some brief summaries of this case appeared later in the French ufological literature.
[Ref. lpl1:] NEWSPAPER "LE PROVENCAL":
|
Nîmes (C.P.).
Whereas he was in his garden, district of the Mas de Boudan, a policeman of Nimes, Mr. C..., saw Monday, around 6 p.m., in the direction of Montpellier, a craft with metallic reflections and having an extremely odd form.
"You would have said, he stated to us, a pile of cigars - four or five - of different size, the smallest being above." Suddenly, the quadrilateral machine from where escaped red gleams on a side, orange gleams on the other side, disappeared suddenly, to the great relief of Mr. C..., who admitted to us the emotion felt at the sight of this appearance.
It was certainly neither a jet, nor a helicopter", thus spoke yesterday evening in our offices Mr. A.D..., who lives 11, street Lafayette, in Marseille. And Mr. A.D..., whose attention had been drawn by a ten of cars stopped at the top of Gineste, continued: "the drivers and occupants of these cars will be able to tell you, the machine which had a shape [illegible] the late hour (it was 06:15 p.m. and the sun was hidden since a quarter of an hour). It left behind itself a white trail and moved while zigzagging vertically. It disappeared, after one minute of maneuvers."
Sunday October 10, between 06:30 and 7 hours, a dozen people of Neyrac, Barutel, Crouzet saw a large ball of fire which, coming out of the valley of the Lignon, crossed the sky in direction S.-E. - N.-E. with a speed higher than that of a fast plane to disappear between the hill and the "Serre de Sainte-Marguerite". The "unidentified flying object" carried out a rectilinear trajectory but was like agitated of sudden starts. The moon, at this time, lighted the sky, which made a little girl, G. Blachère (aged 4), say in awe: "Oh! mummy, there are two moons in the sky!"
It is the second appearance of the phenomenon in Neyrac, the first being in 1951.
[Ref. fru1:] MICHEL FIGUET AND JEAN-LOUIS RUCHON:
The two authors indicate that in Marseille in the Bouches du Rhone, on October 12, 1954 at 06:15 p.m., there was a sighting of a very shining cigar on the level of Mount Gineste.
They indicate as source an article in the regional newspaper "Le Provençal" for October 13, 1954.
[Ref. lcn1:] LUC CHASTAN:
Luc Chastan indicates that in the Bouches du Rhone in Marseille on October 12, 1954 at 18:15 hours there was an "Observation of a very shining cigar on the level of the Gineste mount."
The source is indicated as "Ovni, Premier dossier complet... by Figuet M./ Ruchon J.L. ** Alain Lefeuvre pub. 1979".
[Ref. rbt1:] RENAUD BENOIST:
The author indicates that on October 10, 1954, one read in the newspaper "Le Provençal" an adventure of a dozen motorists stopped at the top of the Gineste. Drivers and passengers were stunned to face at about 3:15 p.m. a machine of very strange form leaving behind a long white trail zigzagging in the sky at low altitude.
[Ref. ubk1:] "UFO-DATENBANK":
| Case Nr. | New case Nr. | Investigator | Date of observation | Zip | Place of observation | Country of observation | Hour of observation | Classification | Comments | Identification |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19541014 | 14.10.1954 | Marseille | France | 18.00 | NL |
|
La Gineste is a pass on the Southern side of the city of Marseilles:
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I cannot decide what this was; I would have suggested a jet plane, but one of the witnesses had thought about it and rejected that explanation. Was he wrong?
So I leave the case as:
Unidentified, insufficient information.
(These keywords are only to help queries and are not implying anything.)
Marseille, Bouches-du-Rhône, cigar, shiny, mount Gineste, night, trail, zigzag, white, vertical, duration, anonymous
[----] indicates sources that are not yet available to me.
| Version: | Created/Changed by: | Date: | Change Description: |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0.1 | Patrick Gross | October 24, 2004 | First published. |
| 1.0 | Patrick Gross | March 11, 2009 | Conversion from HTML to XHTML Strict. First formal version. Additions [lcn1]. |
| 1.1 | Patrick Gross | January 26, 2017 | Additions [rbt1], [ubk1]. |
| 1.2 | Patrick Gross | March 30, 2022 | Addition of the Summary, Explanations changed, were "Not looked for yet." |
