SOBEPS Flash

History

The Societe Belge d'Etude des Phenomenes Spatiaux (Belgian Society for the Study of Space Phenomena) was founded in 1971 by Lucien Clerebaut and Michel Bougard, among others. For nearly four decades, SOBEPS operated as Belgium's premier civilian UFO research organisation, publishing its bulletin, SOBEPS Flash, and maintaining a case file database covering sightings across the Benelux countries and northern France.

SOBEPS distinguished itself from many contemporaneous European groups through its close working relationships with institutional authorities. When the Belgian UFO wave began in November 1989, with hundreds of witnesses reporting large triangular objects over the Wallonia region, SOBEPS became the de facto investigative body. The Belgian Air Force cooperated directly with SOBEPS investigators, sharing radar data and coordinating F-16 intercept information. This level of military-civilian cooperation was unprecedented in UFO research anywhere in the world.

The wave investigation produced two major SOBEPS books, Vague d'OVNI sur la Belgique (1991) and the follow-up volume in 1994, both edited by members of the SOBEPS research team. These remain the most detailed technical analyses of any European UFO wave, incorporating radar tracking data, triangulation from multiple ground observers, and photographic analysis. The organisation's bulletin, SOBEPS Flash, carried ongoing case updates, investigation methodology discussions, and scientific analyses throughout the wave and in the years that followed.

SOBEPS dissolved in 2007 after Clerebaut's death. Its archives, including case files, the SOBEPS Flash bulletin run, and the Belgian wave investigation materials, were partially dispersed. Some materials were transferred to successor organisations; others remain in private hands. The loss of SOBEPS as an institutional home for Belgian UFO research left a gap that has not been filled.