The 1954 French flap:

- I came into contact
with a "saucer"

said a scholar from Grenoble

AFTER the cosmic energy sensor of an officer of our Air Force, Lieutenant Plantier, of whom "Radar" has already spoken, here is the flying saucer detector of an engineer from Grenoble, Mr. Baccard. But Mr. Baccard's device has the advantage over Lieutenant Plantier's "construction" of having gone beyond the hypothesis stage: it has taken its place among the objects of this world that one can see and touch.

An electronics engineer and astronomer, Mr. Baccard, who has not yet reached his forties, has been a researcher since 1938 to whom nothing that happens in the sky is foreign. His passion for the stars led him to take over the management, for the Dauphiné, of the scientific research center which works in conjunction with the Société Astronomique de France and the observatories of America. In addition, the center has a study station in M'Balmayo, Cameroon. It is to this last Center that we owe the observation of the recent and first appearances of mysterious craft in this part of the African sky.

Surrounded by blueprints and devices, Mr. Baccard begins the interview by stating that he should not be confused with the crackpots and the ignorant who have only one idea: to deceive others or to deceive themselves.

- Since 1947 we have been studying the phenomena that today inspire public opinion. The first cause to rule out is that which could be due to the play of refraction of light. By refraction, a luminous disc hovering at high altitude can be caused by a simple car headlight. An airplane, a weather balloon receiving solar rays can also lead to confusion. Recently, in the Haute-Savoie, we were alerted by an individual who claimed to have seen a saucer. I arrive at the place of observation and the "witness" describes to me the craft which he had just surprised when it left the ground. "A three-sphere device," he says. Indeed, on the grass of the meadow, I noticed three scorched marks. The analysis of the grass proved to me that it had been burned with a blowtorch! A few days ago, a commercial agent from the Drôme claimed to have been flown over at a height of 30 meters by a saucer. He added that the paint on his car had been stained and blistered. But when I wanted to see the car, the agent vanished!

Mr. Baccard, although he is "for" admits the objections of those who are "against".

- I accept all hypotheses and even establish some myself. It is not impossible that the appearances of saucers are caused by the explosions of atomic bombs which have been taking place for several years on an experimental basis. The discs observed would be due to the released positrons. Positive elements, these positrons would be repelled at high altitude by the Earth, an equally positive element.

Did you know that part of Saturn's ring has been destroyed? Anyway, American and French astronomers have observed that new bodies are circulating, one at 650 km. of the earth; the other at 950 km. These two bodies, personally, I saw them silhouetted in black in front of the moon. Is it planetary debris? Are these two artificial satellites launched by observers from another world to study the Earth more closely? As for the famous lunar circuses, wouldn't they have been set up as a starting spot for apparatuses circulating around the Earth?

After much research, the engineer was one day struck by this observation: none of the reported craft left a material trace of its passage. Mr. Baccard then undertook the construction of a detector which would be to magnetic radiation what the Geiger counter is to atomic radiation. We know that after a bomb explosion, the atmosphere is charged with radiation fatal to humans that the Geiger counter does not fail to detect.

- My work has resulted in the development of a device to which I have not yet given a precise name. It is a recorder of magnetic variations. This apparatus, I adapt it to a binocular telescope, the intermediary element being a photo-electric cell. Equipped with an amplifier, my device shows extreme sensitivity. My research was based on the study of Zeemann's phenomena, a study establishing that an atom placed in a magnetic field undergoes a frequency change in its radiation.

Taking advantage of the first passage of a weather balloon, then of passages of motor and jet planes, Mr. Baccard experimented with his device. No needle oscillation was observed. It was then, chance sometimes doing things well for researchers, that in the sky burst what the people of Grenoble still call "the affair of October 7."

- That day, the sky was very clear. I was working at home when I was called on the telephone by the director of Radiodiffusion de Lyon: "A sounding-balloon followed by a craft is flying over Grenoble." I loaded my observation equipment on board my car, I fecthed Mr. Rougemond, the Center's inspector, from his home, and I quickly reached our platform at Seyssinet, which overlooks Grenoble and its surroundings. For two hours, between 4 and 6, I had every opportunity to observe the sounding balloon, moreover reported as coming from Italy, balloon followed by a craft having the appearance of a luminous cigar. Two or three times flames comparable to those of a rocket shot out. I estimated the height of these two devices at about 15,000 meters. For 7 minutes the craft was immobilized and while it did not move, the luminous trail which followed it disappeared. Suddenly the craft descended at high speed vertically. Then it completes a horizontal trip at a low speed faster than that of a jet plane. At this moment, orange fluorescences around the apparatus were clearly perceived. While I was making his observations, at Côte-Saint-André, our laboratory car recorded the same phenomena. Unexpected opportunity for me to finally experiment with my detector. Connected to the binocular telescope, as I expected, I recorded the oscillations of needles which testify to indisputable variations of the magnetic field. A compass also put in contact with my device "lost the north". When the craft rushed at high speed, the oscillations reached the maximum. This experience no longer allows me to doubt the existence of a magnetic field around the observed craft. Is it the magnetic field on which Lieutenant Plantier bases his hypothesis? I'm not far from believing it.

Let us point out, in passing, that in 1947, above Minneapolis, sounding balloons having been launched at high altitude, these balloons were for a long time followed by apparatuses that observers did not hesitate to identify as saucers.

On October 7, did the residents of Grenoble, numbering several hundred, witness an identical phenomenon?

Strengthened by his first success, Mr. Baccard has decided to devote his days and nights more than ever to the study of what can be called the great enigma of the half-century. So he installed on the roof of his building a device of his invention allowing him to be alerted as soon as a machine appears in the sky day or night.

As a good Grenoble resident and eager to respect local traditions, Mr. Baccard intends to do to any saucer that presents itself what is called a "Grenoble conduct."

[Photo captions:]

On the Seyssinet platform, Mr. Baccard indicates to Mr. Rougemond the region of the sky where the craft was moving.

Director of the Center for Scientific Research, Mr. Baccard observes the magnetic radiation detector he invented.