Are UFOs real? France opens archive of sightings and investigations

[PIT2]

France became the first country to open its files on UFOs Thursday when the national space agency unveiled a website documenting more than 1,600 sightings spanning five decades.

The online archives, which will be updated as new cases are reported, catalogues in minute detail cases ranging from the easily dismissed to a handful that continue to perplex even hard-nosed scientists.

"It is a world first," said Jacques Patenet, the aeronautical engineer who heads the office for the study of "non-identified aerospatial phenomena."

Known as OVNIs in French, UFOs have always generated intense interest along with countless conspiracy theories about secretive government cover-ups of findings deemed too sensitive or alarming for public consumption.

"Cases such as the lady who reported seeing an object that looked like a flying roll of toilet paper" are clearly not worth investigating, said Patenet.

But many others involving multiple sightings -- in at least one case involving thousands of people across France -- and evidence such as burn marks and radar trackings showing flight patterns or accelerations that defy the laws of physics are taken very seriously.

http://www.physorg.com/news93780011.html

This is the website where the files are on (its not accessible right now):

The website itself -- which crashed host servers hours after it was unveiled due to heavy traffic -- is extremely well organised and complete, even including scanned copies of police reports.
http://www.cnes-geipan.fr/

 

[PIT2]

BBC story:

So many people have already tried to look at the files that it has become impossible to access the site.

Now, thanks to a small team of space agency researchers who call themselves the Office for the Study of Unidentified Aerospace Phenomena, the French will be able to access some 10,000 documents about UFOs, including photographs, police reports and videos sent in by witnesses.

But only about 9% of France's UFO cases have ever been fully explained, the group says. And of the 1,600 cases registered since 1954, nearly a quarter are known as Category D - meaning that in spite of good data and witnesses, the mysterious sightings remain inexplicable.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6486287.stm

Another one:

In one of the cases considered most credible, a 13-year-old boy and his 9-year-old sister were tending their family's cows near the village of Cussac on Aug. 29, 1967, when the boy spotted "four small black beings" about 47 inches tall, according to the documents.

As they watched, the four beings became agitated and rose into the air, entering the top of what appeared to be a round spaceship, about 15 feet in diameter, which hovered over the field. Just as the sphere rose, one of the passengers emerged from the top, returned to the ground to grab something, then flew back. The sphere rose silently in a spiral pattern, then "became increasingly brilliant" before disappearing with a loud whistling sound. It left "a strong sulfur odor after departure," the report said.

The children raced home in tears and their father summoned police who "noted the sulfur odor and the dried grass at the reported place where the sphere took off," the report continued.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/world/4654758.html

 

[Ivan Seeking]

They have been swamped from day one. I still haven't been able to access the site.

 

[arildno]

A timely disclosure, whichever point of perspective you have.

At the very least, these are valuable documents that register under-currents of modern perceptions, however we interpret these.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

They could be most valuable to those who have no definite bias.

 

[arildno]

They could be most valuable to those who have no definite bias.

Since about a quarter is in category D, wholly unexplained, I'm sure many will enjoy to just to read about a lot of weird incidents.

 

[PIT2]

The site is accesible now but its all french. There are research documents (like cometa)The sightings themselves are all police reports. Some have photos but i haven't seen any good ones yet. This is an example of one of the reports in D category, 3 witnesses saw and drew this thing: http://img239.imageshack.us/img239/9035/centreloiretchecysq3.jpg

 

[David Burke]

Look, we don't know a lot about the universe and I think it's pretty safe to say that alliens are up their with the question of does God exist etc. Until they come say hello in a very forward manner we will always be considering the question so there's not much point dwelling on it. We simply don't have the tech to go looking for them properly and until we do I don't think much will come of discussing it. Sorry to sound so uninterested but I have a friend that thinks it's interesting to talk about allien sightings but I just can't get anything out of a conversation with no solid answers other than someone elses opinion.