Rivera Area France, October 1952October 1952

On October 7, 1952, at 7:28 p.m. local time, two Air France commercial airline pilots over the Riviera area of France reported a luminous, egg-shaped object. The Air Force learned of this from the October 8, 1952 edition of a French newspaper. The pilots said the object was a white, non-blinding light, like moonlight, and elongated like an egg.

The pilots said the object flew an absolutely straight and level course at a continuous, regular speed. They followed it for about 30 seconds without taking their eyes off it. It left a trail behind it that appeared 20 to 25 times its own length, with a bluish, pointed tail. They estimated its speed at two or three times that of a jet aircraft at full speed, perhaps two or three thousand kilometers per hour. They judged it was about three kilometers above them and seemed larger than a normal transport aircraft, on a course from northeast to southwest toward Toulon.

The pilots said comets and meteors follow curved paths, change in brightness, and slow down at the end, but this object did not behave that way, giving them the impression of a driven machine. A follow-up newspaper article said many witnesses along the coast, including an American tourist near Nice, reported similar sightings. The report notes it came from a newspaper and is graded a poor report. The record card lists the conclusion as possibly aircraft.