One of my favourite zooform stories pertains to Mount Pilchuck in Washington State and dates back to 1981. The following story reminds me very much of an ingredient in my favourite television show of all time, Twin Peaks.
Picture the scene: the town of Granite Falls. A quiet restaurant is disturbed by the entrance of several police officers. They are accompanied by two other men, one who is visibly shaken. The officers are attempting to calm the man down and coffee is ordered quickly from the waitress who has had her afternoon peace shattered by the commotion.
A woman sitting behind the officers with her son can hear the conversation, and what she takes note of is an incredible and disturbing series of events. It seems that the military were called in after two car-loads of people travelling on a remote part of the mountain were attacked by a huge winged creature. The vehicles had suffered deep scratch marks and the military took the witnesses away.
The creature was described by the shaken witness as being around eight feet in height, with leathery wings, large feet and reptilian in nature. It seems that the witnesses were on their way to a picnic and were parked up on a slope when they noticed what seemed to be a hang-glider. They couldn’t get a decent view of the object as the bright sun shone in their eyes. The object approached from the sky and it was then that the horror was realised. The observers ran for their cars, turned around and sped down the mountainside. One driver, in his panic, drove into a ditch as the winged entity swooped down, clawing at the car. It was alleged that one of the car occupants had a heart attack after the fright. The other vehicle zoomed off to get help and the military swarmed the area within the hour. A large truck took the damaged vehicles and the witnesses were ushered into a military ambulance.
Nothing else was ever heard of the incident, and it was alleged that two years later the local Police Department containing all the files, mysteriously burned down.
However, this wasn’t the first time that mysterious winged creatures were observed in Washington State. In 1948 it was claimed that a winged humanoid was sighted in Chehalis and Longview.
It is also an interesting fact to bear in mind that two witnesses standing together looking at a Thunderbird in the air can each describe something completely different: one will describe a pterodactyl and the other will describe a more normal Big Bird.
ReplyDeleteMy evaluation of the incident that it was an ordinary Thunderbird sighting and the description is distorted by fear and hysteria.
By the witness' own account, they DIDN'T get a good view of it because of the viewing conditions.
Sort of a pooh-pooh attitude from someone who wasn't there, don't you think? Myself, I was wondering how accurate a report could be gathered by a woman trying to overhear a conversation in which she was not a member. But let's assume she snooped just fine.
ReplyDeleteWhat caught my attention is the tasty irony that you've served up, with that "ordinary" stuck in there to describe a Thunderbird sighting. Do I have this right? You're sneering at people who claim to have seen a pterosaur, because you assume their perceptions were distorted by "fear and hysteria"; yet you think what they really saw was a Thunderbird?!
Oh man, that is rich. Understand, I have no quibble with the reported sighting: it was what it was; whether pterosaur, Thunderbird, or the result of a bit of street theater put on to gig a nosy woman trying to listen in where she had no business.
It's the hypocrisy of your condescension that is surprising. Why should we not all dismiss your suggestion (particularly since you weren't there), inasmuch as you suggest a creature which the vast majority of people would call "outlandish"? And I bet you've complained about the closed minds of those who won't accept the possibility of the existence of the noble Thunderbird, eh?
Get my point?
Someone put a fish in the percolator!
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