GEIPAN
Encyclopedia
GEIPAN formerly known as GEPAN (1977-1988) and SEPRA (1988-2004), is a unit of the French Space Agency CNES
CNES
The is the French government space agency . Established under President Charles de Gaulle in 1961, its headquarters are located in central Paris and it is under the supervision of the French Ministries of Defence and Research...

 whose brief is to investigate unidentified aerospace phenomena (UAP) and make its findings available to the public.

The French Gendarmerie
Gendarmerie
A gendarmerie or gendarmery is a military force charged with police duties among civilian populations. Members of such a force are typically called "gendarmes". The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary describes a gendarme as "a soldier who is employed on police duties" and a "gendarmery, -erie" as...

 was instructed to channel data from reports of UFO
Unidentified flying object
A term originally coined by the military, an unidentified flying object is an unusual apparent anomaly in the sky that is not readily identifiable to the observer as any known object...

 sightings to SEPRA, which therefore was in a position to draw on a large database of such events. In cases where physical traces appeared to be present, SEPRA could call on the technical resources of CNES
CNES
The is the French government space agency . Established under President Charles de Gaulle in 1961, its headquarters are located in central Paris and it is under the supervision of the French Ministries of Defence and Research...

 to perform a thorough scientific investigation. A famous example of such an investigation was in the Trans-en-Provence Case
Trans-en-Provence Case
The Trans-en-Provence Case is one of the rare cases where a UFO is said to have left physical evidence, in the form of burnt residue from a field. The event took place on January 8, 1981, outside the town of Trans-en-Provence in the French département of Var...

.

In March 2007, GEIPAN started to make its archives available online to everyone.

Skeptical critics

French skeptics have criticized the quality of the work of the GEPAN (active from 1977 to 1988).
  • Rossoni, D., Maillot, E., & Déguillaume, E. (2007). Les ovnis du CNES – 30 ans d’études officielles. www.book-e-book.com. (extracts from the book in French). Critical skeptical investigations of GEPAN's work.

External links

GEIPAN official site
  • Goals and history of GEIPAN on the CNES
    CNES
    The is the French government space agency . Established under President Charles de Gaulle in 1961, its headquarters are located in central Paris and it is under the supervision of the French Ministries of Defence and Research...

    website.
  • From GEPAN to SEPRA: Official UFO studies in France (International UFO Review, winter 2000-2001), the earlier years of GEIPAN related by Gildas Bourdais.
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