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Case of Wittelsheim, on April 24, 1970:

Case number:

ALSACAT-1970-04-24-WITTELSHEIM-1

Summary:

An article in "Phénomène Spatiaux", the magazine of the French ufology group GEPA, in June 1970, reported UFO sightings in Alsace including that of April 24, 1970, by a man who had seen a flying object resembling a large disc, belted of a crown of light crown, and circling above a region between Mulhouse and the Grand Ballon.

He had watched for 20 minutes, then the object had stopped flashing and had vanished into the night.

GEPA called sent one of their Alsatian correspondents to investigate, and published the result:

The witness, Mr. Hiryczuk, 22, a worker at the Peugeot factories at the Ile Napoleon, living in the district of the railway station in Wittelsheim, was left home his fiancée at 22:30. moped and went in to the home of his parents.

His gaze was suddenly drawn to a red glow, moving and silent, coming from the direction of the Vosges mountains and heading for Wittelsheim. At one moment, the light was just above him, so he stopped his motorbike and looked at it.

The glow seemed to him to be a big round object with a red light of large size flashing at its underside. The craft lit the cloud layer lying just above it of a red glow.

He got scared and wanted to flee, but he could not put his moped to start. He had to push it for long before it started normally, although the moped was in perfect condition.

Upon reaching home, he found that the glow was still in the sky, and that it was heading towards the Vosges mountains, where it suddenly went off, like "a light bulb whose power was cut."

The observation had already been mentioned in the newspaper L'Alsace for April 26, 1970, saying that Mr. Hiryczuk, living rue Ricquet à La Houpe, Cité-Gare, told them he saw "Friday evening", around 10:30 p.m., a large flying object, resembling a disk surrounded by a crown of light, circling in a quite large circle above a region between the Grand Ballon and Mulhouse. He said he had observed the flying saucer maneuvers for almost 20 minutes, after which the object had stopped flashing and had fainted in the night.

Data:

Temporal data:

Geographical data:

Witnesses data:

Ufology data:

Classifications:

Sources:

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

[Ref. gpa1:] "PHENOMENE SPATIAUX" MAGAZINE - GEPA:

[Ref. lcn1:] LUC CHASTAN - "BASE OVNI FRANCE":

[Ref. cvn2:] CHRISTIAN VALENTIN:

Christian Valentin indicates that the newspaper L'Alsace for Sunday, April 26, 1970, published in their Mulhouse issue:

[Ref. uda1:] "UFODNA" WEBSITE:

The sources are indicated as: "Poher, Claude, Etudes Statistiques Portant sur 1000 Temoignag [sic], Author, undated; GEPA, Phenomenes Spatiaux."

[Ref. ubk1:] "UFODATENBANK":

[Ref. ubk1:] "UFODATENBANK":

Discussion:

What GEPA called an excellent investigation report may be called so according to the use of the times; but it is obvious that significant deficiencies should have been addressed.

Among others steps, a precise map of the route followed by the witness on his moped during the observation should have been sketched. A verbatim spontaneous statement should have been recorded, then questions should have been asked. An investigation of the witness credibility should have been conducted. Efforts should have been made to collect angular sizes, angular velocities, and all possible quantitative indications such as comparison of the brightness of the UFO with that of known objects at certain distance.

It is possible that more details were in the possession of the investigator and that GEPA published a digest by space saving necessities.

Places are unfortunately poorly specified, only the end of observation place is pretty much clear, the Wittenheim sector called "cities of the railway station." We are not told where the witness' bride lived, this being the place of beginning of the observation.

But since the sighting lasted about twenty minutes including motorbike ride, the witness possibly moved from place to place on several kilometers.

The distance from Wittelsheim to Mulhouse in straight is nearly 9 km; the distance from Wittelsheim to the Grand Ballon in straight line is nearly 16 km.

This suggests that the UFO was not located in absolute manner at these places, and probably Mulhouse and the Grand Ballon should be taken as directions landmarks.

UFO reports where the vehicle engine does not function are not uncommon. But there are different kinds of malfunction types. For example, in some cases, the vehicle's engine stops and the witness is aware of the presence of the UFO some short time later. In other cases, the witness is aware of the presence of the UFO, gets scared, and is unable to start the vehicle. This case belongs to the second category, so it is possible to assume that it is his fear at that moment, mentioned in the report, that made him too clumsy to restart of the motorcycle. So it would not be an "effect" caused ba the UFO directly.

(So, to note as "Physical effects: engine stall" like [lcn1] did is doubly doubtful: first, the engine of the motorcycle did not stall, it was stopped by the witness and it was the restart that was problematic; second, the possibility that the restart was unsuccessful due to the "uncontrolled fear," duly noted by [lcn1] as an "Effect on the witness" makes the "physical effect" unproven and it could be classified potentially as a consequence of a psychological effect on the witness instead of a physical effect on the moped.)

As for the UFO itself, to be sure, I first checked the possibility that it is the moon. I gave little credence to this possibility anyway: the moon simply does not flash, while the UFO light flashed, and did it when it was above the witness.

That night, the moon rose after midnight only, at 00:38 a.m., at azimuth 135 °. So neither the time nor the direction to the Grand Ballon from Wittenheim coincided.

The reported silence and duration of approximately 20 minutes eliminate many other trivial explanations: plane, helicopter, meteor...

This UFO remains unidentified to me, and I can not rule out it could have been an extraterrestrial craft.

Finally, I want to add that although I deal with this sighting report as if it was a single sighting report, it was not as other sightings reportedly occurred in the same area and date and hours than several others, all to be documented in this catalogue.

Evaluation:

Unidentified, possible extraterrestrial craft.

Sources references:

* = Source is available to me.
? = Source I am told about but could not get so far. Help needed.

• [lae1] * Article in the regional newspaper L'Alsace, Mulhouse issue, France, April 26, 1970.
• [gpa1] * "Observations en Alsace", article in Phénomènes Spatiaux, ufology magazine of the ufology group GEPA, France, #24, pp 30-31, June 1970.
• [cpr1] ? "Etudes Statistiques Portant sur 1000 Témoignages", by Claude Poher, France, the 1970's.
• [cpr2] ? Listed on Claude Poher's website, France, circa 2005, was at http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/universons
• [lcn1] * "Mulhouse (68) on 24 avril 1970", case record by Luc Chastan, on his ufology website Base OVNI France, France, circa 2004, at http://baseovnifrance.free.fr/listgen.php?typlist=1&page=0&numobs=305
• [uda1] * "24 Apr 1970 - Mulhouse, Alsace, France", web page by the UFOdna website, circa 2013, at http://thecid.com/ufo/uf07/uf5/075748.htm
• [cvn2] * "Mythes et Réalités des Phénomènes Aériens Non Identifiés - Histoire des soucoupes volantes en Alsace jusqu'en 1980", book by Christian Valentin, Grimoires d'Alsace publisher, France, pp 102-103, 2012.
• [ubk1] * Case record on the website / database UFO-Datenbank, Germany, circa 2017, at http://ufodatenbank.de

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Authoring:

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