Flying Creature of the Night
“Remember your worst nightmare? Were you glad to wake up? Be grateful. In the early morning hours of February 23, 2010, a few miles or so southwest of Marfa, Texas, the victims were terrified by what awakened them. I am not the eyewitness, but a few days after this event, I interviewed my friend James, who had been driving through Southern Texas; he had stopped at the Marfa Lights viewing platform to see whatever he could.”
Flying Creature in San Fernando Valley
A report of a large flying creature in Sherman Oaks, California, suggests similarities to the [glowing] ropen of Papua New Guinea. A man reported the creature after he and his girlfriend observed it while taking a walk at about 10:30 p.m., on September 21, 2009. He reported, “It was a very large, winged creature that was gliding maybe 100 yards above us. . . . it beat its wings, once, before going out of view.” . . . The man estimated the wingspan: ten to fifteen feet; the girlfriend estimated twenty feet. The wings appeared more like those of bats than birds . . .
Entomologist Observed Strange Lights in New Guinea
. . . a British entomologist . . . in the 1930′s, was puzzled by strange lights . . . [on the] mainland of New Guinea. She later wrote a book . . . in which she described the flash . . . It would be decades later that a few American cryptozoologists would explore several areas of Papua New Guinea, searching for bioluminescent Rhamphorhynchoid (long-tailed) pterosaurs. . . .
From cryptozoology.com, a sighting of footprints and scat suggest a Bigfoot (reported May 18, 2010):
This was about three or four years ago . . . a stream called Big Pipe Creek, which was adjacent from a soybean field in rural Carroll County, MD, close to the Carroll/Adams county border. This was around mid October. . . . descending toward the stream I found tracks going towards the stream, one in particular was in mud were there was no grass around. This track was about 14 inches long and about four inches wide and was sunk in about 2 to 3 inches in the ground. I weighed about 225 lbs at the time and did not sink in at all. Fallowing these footsteps I happened upon a huge pile of scat. Not sure how to describe it except it was black in color with a yellowish tint in large clumps making a large pile. It looked to be composed mainly of vegetable matter. . . . I contacted the bfro [Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization] and they explained there have been quite a few sightings in that area. I have also notice strange things (mainly vocalizations) in the area throughout the years.
From the blog Modern Pterosaur
” . . . The eyewitness was only eight years old when he had this close encounter, which would make this sighting around 1995 (northeast Texas). . . .”
I saw a featherless flying animal with a wingspan of about 4 1/2 to 5 feet and a long tail with a diamond-type shape at the tip of it. No hair or feathers anywhere, just leathery reptile-type skin. I have a well established knowledge of animals, especially reptiles, so I can easily tell what animal something is and what it isn’t. The animal had bumps down its back, feet with longish toes, and long black claws, like an Oprey has for grasping fish. It had a long mouth/beak full of long sharp teeth that somewhat protruded from the mouth like a crocodile’s do when closed. . . .
See also “Northeast Texas Pterosaur” on the blog Live Pterosaurs in America
“Barn owl” hardly seems mysterious or paranormal, but what about the strange lights of Chapel Hill, Tennessee? The legend involves a headless ghost that uses a lantern to search for its head. According to one version of the story, long ago a signal man was walking on the railroad tracks one stormy night. He slipped in the rain and hit his head on the rail before a train came and . . . well, you know. Another version has the poor man falling off a boxcar; that seems more likely. But the general drift of the story resembles other ghost light stories in the United States, for example, the Gurdon Light of Arkansas. The explanation for the Chapel Hill Light and the Gurdon Light is the same: bioluminescent barn owls.
Many ghost lights in the eastern and southern states resemble the “Silcock Min Min lights” of Australia. Fred Silcock wrote a book about the slow-flying mystery lights: The Min Min Light, The Visitor Who Never Arrives. Of course it does not explain all strange lights of the world; but when a slow-flying light, just above the ground, weaves back and forth like a hunting barn owl, then that is probably what it is. The surprising characteristic of the glow is not yet classified in biology textbooks; nevertheless, eyewitnesses verify that some barn owls sometimes glow. And that explains the white underside feathers: to allow light to easily pass through those feathers.
Not all ghost lights in the United States behave light hunting barn owls, however. Marfa, Texas, is famous for the dancing lights that have defied scientific explanation for a long time, but that’s another story.
See the Marfa Lights, “Living Nightmare” (not any barn owls)
In my nonfiction book Live Pterosaurs in America, I mentioned the sighting by Professor Peter Beach, in the summer of 2007, near the Yakima River in the state of Washington. Consider part of what he wrote about it:
. . . we saw many . . . flashing lights. I would have assumed that [they] were fireflies but we [don’t] have them in Washington. One of the flashes took off from a big tree overhanging the river and made a kind of flashing coma turn. Many flashes were parallel to the river. . . . there were many fish . . . Prime hunting grounds for fish-eating birds. Only these things fish at night with bioluminescence. At first I thought I was just seeing shooting stars, but they were all parallel to the river and close to the horizon. Next I noticed that when the cloud cover came in, I could still see the flashes. They were under the cloud cover. Whatever they are, I suggest that they are at least unknown to science, night flying, bioluminescent, flying creatures . . .
About a year later (perhaps in the same area) the professor led another expedition, observing the flight of the bioluminescent flying creatures for three hours:
. . . there were two light [flashes] . . . about 50-100 ft., above the river. . . . followed by screeches from about a dozen or so agitated nighthawks in the general area. I think the Rhamphorhynchoids, if that is what they were, were feeding on the nighthawks as the nighthawks were feeding on the flying insects. Bats were also common, but they were fast, made sharp turns, and were relatively small . . .
I know of others who encountered strange flying lights over rivers in the United States, flights that were only just above the water. Even where fireflies live, these flying things are much larger and faster.
See “Pterosaurs Alive in America”
See also “Cryptozoology, science, and pterosaurs”
On August 9, 2004 at 7:30 a.m., the houseboat on Lake Okanagan started to rock back and forth. John Casorso and his family got up and looked out to see what happened. They were shocked at what they saw swimming away from them; it had just swam under the boat, apparently colliding with it. “We could really feel the power and size [of] what it was,” said Casorso.
He quickly got out his video camera and recorded about 15 minutes of footage. In the video is a long dark hump rising above the water. Casorso estimated the length of the creature at 15 meters but acknowledged that there may have been more than one creature.
The creature named “Ogopogo” is believed by some to be a kind of aquatic dinosaur, living in Okanagan Lake, British Columbia, Canada. It has been compared with “Nessie” of Loch Ness, Scotland, another ”lake monster,” although there has been much controversy about interpretations. Perhaps it would be best to simply call them “cryptids.”
