The French UFO wave of 5 November 1990 (Gorizont 21 re-entry)

3 November 1990. A Proton-K rocket lifted off from Baikonur carrying the Soviet satellite Gorizont 21. Two days later, on Monday 5 November, at about 19:00 local time, a piece of that launch came home. It broke up above the Bay of Biscay at 94 km altitude. Its path ran northeast, from Royan toward Strasbourg. Over 1,000 km of French sky.

At Gretz-Armainvilliers, Jean-Gabriel Greslé, a retired Air France captain, watched with six others. He saw "a beam with a triangular cross-section, marked with lights and enormous headlights." It came down to less than 300 m. It levelled off. It changed direction twice "in impressive silence." He put its length at about 400 m.

Near Dax, an army helicopter instructor known as Gilles F. was flying an Alouette II at 1,500 ft. He saw "an enormous, dark, triangular shape," larger than a Boeing 747. White lights flickered along its leading edge "like neon tubes." Its wing blocked out the lights of the town. Then it accelerated east.

At the gendarmerie training centre in Tulle, 32 trainees and a sergeant looked up. They described a hexagon, a V "like migrating birds," a delta wing. Thirteen said the object was transparent, with stars visible through it. All agreed on one thing. No noise whatsoever.

In Colmar, teacher Patrick Depin filmed with a shoulder camera. The sky, he said, was "completely ablaze." It felt like "an armada." To his wife he said: "They're finally here." His 23-second clip aired on TF1 three days later, to roughly 10 million viewers.

An Embraer crew over the Massif Central saw 10 to 12 lights with bright trails. Controllers at Orly and Roissy saw it too. Their radars showed nothing. Over the Netherlands and Germany, crews of six RAF Tornados from Laarbruch reported being "overtaken by a giant UFO." The Ministry of Defence logged the report and did not investigate.

That same night, amateur satellite tracker Pierre Neirinck identified Proton debris. NASA confirmed the re-entry on 8 November. SEPRA gave the explanation to the press on 9 November. Years later, GEIPAN rebuilt the event. CNES specialist Pierre Omaly simulated it with DEBRISK software. The debris was 90 to 50 km up, slowing from 7 to 2 km/s. Its brightness created an "illusion of proximity." Across 500 testimonies, the estimates followed a bell curve. The strangest reports sat at its far ends. GEIPAN classifies the case "A." Fully explained.

Not everyone accepted it. Gilles F. remains "absolutely certain" he did not see the debris of a Soviet rocket. The Tornado crews stayed sure it was no Russian satellite. Some ufologists pointed to a dark body joining the lights. Joël Mesnard of Lumières dans la Nuit argued that Depin's frames show a triangle. Robert Alessandri answered that one side is a trail, another a smear of the video signal, and the third "does not exist."

James Oberg and Robert Sheaffer are among those who accept the re-entry. A known object, seen by more than 1,000 people, often described as a solid craft. Documentaries still return to it as "la mystérieuse nuit des OVNI."