Case · C-056

The Petit-Rechain photo (1990): the Belgian “triangle” was a model

Petit-Rechain (Verviers), Liège Province · Belgium · Apr 4, 1990

In flight Civilian witnesses Photos

What happened

The slide of a dark triangular object with a light at each corner, taken at Petit-Rechain in April 1990 and circulated without the author's name, became the emblematic image of the Belgian wave and was considered authentic for about twenty years by the SOBEPS association. Several analyses, including one at the Belgian Royal Military Academy according to accounts, had found no clear evidence of faking. In 2011 the author admitted the hoax and explained how he had built the model.

Proposed explanation

In July 2011 the author, Patrick Maréchal, told Belgian television RTL that he had photographed a polystyrene model painted black, with a light at each corner and hung from a string, to play a joke on his colleagues.

Sources

1. VRT News, “Belgian UFO picture was really a forgery” (July 27, 2011) (press)
2. Le Figaro, “La photo d'un ovni belge célèbre était un trucage” (July 28, 2011) (press)
3. Caelestia (Wim Van Utrecht), “Triangles over Belgium (addendum)”: the confession and the story of the photo (analysis, skeptical)
4. Wikipedia (en) – Belgian UFO wave (section on the Petit-Rechain photo) (other)

Open in the interactive archive The whole section: Map of UAP and USO cases

UAPgrade's entries are compiled with artificial intelligence (three verifiers with opposing roles) and checked against the sources listed above: how we work. Have a document that changes this entry? Bring it to the Investigations Unit.