The Valensole Encounter
The account
A farmer found a craft parked in his lavender field and was paralyzed by small beings.
What investigators found
The case rests on a single witness; there is no independent proof of the object or the beings described.
The story
In the early morning of July 1, 1965, farmer Maurice Masse was in his lavender field near Valensole, in southern France, when he said he saw an object the size of a car standing on legs, with two small creatures beside it. According to him, one of the beings pointed a tube at him and he was paralyzed until the object left at great speed.
Local police recorded his account, and Masse said the plants at the spot struggled to grow afterward. The case became one of the most famous in France and inspired books and films. Skeptics point out that there is only the word of one witness, with no photo and no one else who saw the object. The marks on the ground have been interpreted in different ways, and the episode remains without an accepted explanation.