The 1954 French flap:

YESTERDAY MORNING AT DAWN

A TREMENDOUS EXPLOSION WOKE THE PEOPLE OF DIEPPE

blowing open doors and shattering windows

It is believed to be caused by the fall of a meteor

Dieppe, January 7. -- This morning, between 4:30 and 5:15 a.m., nearly 70 dockworkers from the port of Dieppe saw a blinding light in the sky, followed four minutes later by a tremendous explosion that blew open many doors and shattered several windows in houses throughout the city.

Most of the residents of Dieppe were awakened by the deafening noise. It does not appear

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THE DIEPPE EXPLOSION

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it is unlikely to have been a hallucination, as there are numerous testimonies that agree on almost every point. The only discrepancies among witnesses concern the direction of the light, which some said came from the north, while others claimed it came from the west.

The postal vehicle operating between Dieppe and Rouen was near the first of these two cities at the time the light appeared. However, according to the two occupants of the vehicle, the explosion occurred only eight minutes after the light.

The semaphore station in Dieppe contacted the one in Fécamp and those in all the small ports along the coast. All confirmed that the phenomenon was seen at these various locations. However, the semaphore station in Le Havre reported nothing.

Meanwhile, several witnesses living in La Mailleraye, a town about eighty kilometers southeast of Dieppe, and in Serqueux, a village located 50 kilometers southeast of Dieppe, were categorical: they saw the light coming from the direction of Dieppe.

Finally, it should be noted that about a week ago, a fishing boat arrived in Dieppe riddled with small fragments that could have come from a meteorite.

For the moment, the nature of this strange phenomenon remains the subject of speculation.

IT IS BELIEVED TO BE A METEOR

It is very likely, according to the Paris Astrophysics Institute, that the phenomenon observed this morning in the Dieppe area was a meteor. The very hour at which the sighting occurred—just before sunrise—supports this theory[!]. But, they added, such explosions are not very rare and have been recorded many times around the globe.

It is known that meteors are bodies whose origin and composition are poorly understood, and which move through the sky at extreme speeds, heating up when they encounter Earth's atmosphere due to the resistance it offers. That is when they become incandescent. Sometimes, they pass unnoticed except for a luminous trail. Sometimes, they explode silently, and sometimes with a loud bang. It also happens that they fall to Earth, whole or fragmented: such is the origin of meteorite falls.

The Dieppe flying saucers:

Fireballs,
savants think

THE EMOTION raised by the appearance in the sky of Dieppe during two following nights of "balls of fire" is not yet quiet down. The phenomenon was not only observed by the dockers of Dieppe, but also by S.N.C.F. employees in Serqueux, by postmen in Rouen, by all the semaphore operators of Dieppe to Fécamp, and by the market gardeners of Forges-les-Eaux, Neuchâtel-en-Bray and of La Mailleraye. At about the same hour the ball of fire was also seen by a witness in Arras.

While popular opinion is convinced that these are "flying saucers", observers from the Paris Astrophysical Institute think of a fireball.