Trans-en-Provence: GEPAN's physical-trace investigation, 1981 (1981)
A single witness reported a disc-shaped object landing in garden ground at dusk and leaving a circular trace. France's official UFO unit analysed soil and plant samples and concluded that an unusual phenomenon had occurred whose origin it could not determine.
- Case number
- TU-1981-900001
- Date
- 8 January 1981
- Location
- Trans-en-Provence, Var department, Provence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur, France
- Coordinates
- 43.504° N, 6.486° E
- Shape
- disc
- Colour
- Unknown
- Witnesses
- 1
- Status
- unresolved
Case summary
On 8 January 1981 at about 5 p.m., a 55-year-old farmer was working on the upper terrace of his property at Trans-en-Provence, in the Var, when he heard a whistling and saw a grey, disc-shaped device descend and land a few dozen metres below him. It was described as about 2.5 metres across and 1.7 metres high. It rested on the ground for 30 to 40 seconds, then rose vertically and departed at speed, leaving a roughly two-metre circular trace with drag marks.
The gendarmerie interviewed him next day, photographed the trace and took soil and alfalfa samples; GEPAN, the CNES UFO study group, attended on 17 February and collected more. GEPAN reported that four laboratories found soil compaction, iron and zinc deposits, possible combustion residue, and heating below 600 C, and that INRA biochemists found plant damage varying with distance from the trace, including chlorophyll some 30-50 per cent below control levels; no cause was determined, though an intense electric field was proposed.
GEPAN's Technical Note 16, published in March 1983, concluded that an important and unusual phenomenon occurred that day and that the investigation could not establish its origin. GEIPAN still files it as class D - unexplained - noting the account rests on a single witness it judged credible. French sceptics, in a 2007 survey of CNES's work, argued the sampling and analysis were flawed, and pointed to a police report describing marks on an in-use road that resembled tyre tracks.
Nearby strategic sites
- Île Longue Submarine Base — 1003 km away