When residents of Marfa, Texas, and those in surrounding areas, including those living in ranch houses, have observed the more mysterious flying lights—many observations over the decades—they recognize an intelligence in the “dances.” A light sometimes will split into two lights and the two will slowly separate for quite a distance, eventually turning back as they approach each other, like in a square dance. Variations can appear on that theme, but the basics are commonplace. The point is this: Why do so many outsiders, scientists or not, assume that all those residents must be wrong when those local people ascribe intelligence to some of those lights (the ones Bunnell labels “CE-III”)? How we need common horse sense!

For those who have not read my book, or blog posts on this subject, I’ll summarize. The light splittings probably relate to a specific hunting technique. Bioluminescent flying predators attract insects with their glowing. They separate for a short while, allowing Big Brown Bats to go after those flying insects. The larger predators then reunite to try to catch bats, although they may not both remain glowing all the way back, for that would alert the bats.

How can one flying predator split into two? There were always two (or more), but they were close together when they started their hunting “dance.” From a distance, it appeared to be one light splitting into two.

According to Sherlock Holmes, “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” I don’t have the omnipotent-like assurance of Sherlock Holmes, but I feel about 75% sure that those special flying lights, the ones labeled (by the scientist James Bunnell) “CE-III,” that appear only a few times a year around Marfa, Texas, are modern living pterosaurs, hunting as a group.

Explaining Marfa Lights

He admitted to me that Marfa Lights last much longer than ball lightning and are seen in all kinds of weather (discounting ball lightning), and he told me what he himself had seen, near the MLVP, unwittingly suggesting a bioluminescent creature. Near the MLVP, Hendricks saw a light come down and move about in the nearby bushes, like an animal would . . . I suspect that Hendricks had witnessed a ropen-like nocturnal flying predator that was chasing a Big Brown Bat.”

Biological Marfa Lights

That reminded me of the light from the ropen of Umboi Island, Papua New Guinea, and the flying lights seen by the British biologist Evelyn Cheesman, on the mainland, west of Umboi. Those lights are very limited in how long they remain on, only a few seconds.

Flying Under the Radar in Marfa, Texas

But why is that Houston Chronicle newspaper article indirectly instructive? The writer makes no examination of the possibility or impossibility of a biological interpretation. The opinions of two non-biologists (James Bunnell and Karl Stephan) receive most of the attention . . .

More Light on Marfa Lights

After reading the book Hunting Marfa Lights, it becomes obvious that some lights around Marfa are not at all like common lights. Something strange is happening around Marfa, Texas.

I hope that no pterosaur was responsible for any of the human deaths in British Columbia, Canada, along the 500-mile stretch of highway from Prince George to Prince Rupert, but I also hope that all attacks from irresponsible humans, against innocent human victims, will cease, and that this world will become a paradise in which death itself will cease. Notwithstanding all our hopes for the future, however, we now face a present danger, a warning from Gerald McIsaac, author of Bird From Hell, who believes that “most of the hitchhikers [on this highway at night] who disappear have been killed by this animal. It is also my opinion that many of the people who have disappeared have not been reported.”

Chapter Eight, “Highway of Tears,” in Bird From Hell reveals, “Amnesty International estimates that since 1969, thirty-two women and girls, most of them Aboriginal, have disappeared along that highway.” Nobody denies that some women and girls in this part of Canada are victims of abuse at home and that some of them hitchhike on this highway, making themselves vulnerable at night. But the general human population, at least the Native Americans in one area of northern British Columbia, keep indoors at night to avoid the “devil bird,” and some eyewitnesses of that flying creature have been attacked by an animal with wings, when those persons have stayed outside after sunset.

Of course it is possible that aboriginals are superstitious and that all the missing persons, over the decades, who have walked that long highway at night were attacked by human rapists and murderers; that seems possible on the surface. But animalistic humans do not fit all the reported encounters at night in British Columbia, according to the book Bird From Hell.

What about the dead horse mentioned in that book? Much of its body was found by a tree. Of course ordinary non-human predators could be responsible, or so it seems. But why were parts of its body in the top of that tree, with some of the branches broken?

What about the girl in Kwadacha (northern British Columbia)? She was outside one dark night, when it seemed that “one of the boys” was spying on her. She was big for her age, and decided to teach him a lesson by charging him. At the end of the charge, she came to a stop. It was not one of the boys . . . She was facing a creature that she later called the “devil bird.” It released a “cloud of smoke” and flew away. Whatever the species of that flying creature, pterosaur, whatever, it was not one of the boys or one of the animalistic humans who have attacked girls on the Highway of Tears.

I don’t believe everything that I’ve read in Bird From Hell, but other cryptozoology books mention “pterodactyl attacks,” even when a different name is used for the flying creature. Take one account in the pioneering nonfiction On the Track of Unknown Animals, by Bernard Heuvelmans:

Coming straight at me only a few feet above the water was a black thing the size of an eagle. . . . its lower jaw hung open and bore a semicircle of pointed white teeth set about their own width apart from each other. . . .  And just before it became too dark to see, it came again, hurtling back down the river, its teeth chattering, the air “shss-shssing” as it was cleft by the great, black, dracula-like wings. . . . the brute made straight for George. He ducked.

Those are the words of the well-known biologist-explorer Ivan T. Sanderson (1911-1973). Within minutes, a large flying creature had dived straight at a human twice; I would call that behavior “attacking.”

I have read other reports of early-to-mid twentieth-century attacks, in Africa, from pterosaur-like flying creatures; but in late-2004 I did more than read: I led a small expedition on Umboi Island, Papua New Guinea, where I interviewed an old villager who encountered a strange flying creature. Micheal told me that he had witnessed, in 1949, the glowing ropen one night, when it dug up and carried away a human body that had just been buried in a grave in Gomlongon Village. I would not call that behavior “attacking,” for the man was already dead, but it was extremely rude to the family and friends of the deceased. If I were a resident of Umboi Island, I would not allow my children to wander too far, alone at night. And if I were a resident of northern British Columbia, I would avoid a long walk at night.

Nocturnal Pterosaurs in San Diego

“I was at my friend’s house. . . . We were standing in the street . . . from the west came this dark object in the sky. It was right over us about, I say, 40 yards [high]. As it got closer we both yelled, “What the hell is that?” It looked like a huge bird. It was gliding . . . I was stuck looking at it the entire time. I began yelling at it, then it turned around and it stood still in the air. It was flapping its wings while it was there. Then outta nowhere here came another one. It was waiting for it; as it got close to the other one, they both went east.”

Apparently, the two ropens were flying in the same direction, from the west, but one was following the other. The first one was observed to be gliding but it stopped (with some wing movement or flapping) and waited for the other one to catch up. They then continued together towards the east.

A Joke Earlier in 2011

I am still searching for some strategy for communicating with the news media in the San Diego area, for we have a serious problem with the time of this late-2011 sighting. Just three months earlier, in August, somebody played a practical joke with a model “pterodactyl” being placed onto a statue in the north-coastal area of San Diego County. That “pterodactyl” joke was covered in quite a few news outlets, making any report of a genuine ropen sighting very difficult to market in this part of Southern California.

“Pterodactyl Sighting 2008″

For those unfamiliar with the scene or declared-scene: Flathead Lake, in NW Montana, is the largest freshwater lake in the western United States, in surface area, although Lake Tahoe is almost as large and surely holds more water (at a greater depth than Flathead Lake).

I don’t demand that eveybody must use perfect English (perfect spelling, perfect grammar, perfect punctuation), but when errors multiply with each sentence I suspect it comes from a writer unfamiliar with proper English or from a careless writer, and carelessness is not always confined to language. But let’s set aside this problem and examine the video itself.

When I first saw this video it gave me a feeling like it was a hoax. It’s hard to put my finger on it, but it did not look real to me, not organic, not living. When I reviewed it at a much later time, I got the same feeling. But it seems that at least a few viewers have believed it to be a real living pterosaur, so I decided to look closer.

Although this is technically a video, it actually shows a series of still images, seemingly still photos. The third image (the second image in which a flying thing is shown) shows what look like artifacts commonly found on still images taken from actual video footage, bringing up a question: If this comes from a video, why did the one giving us these images just give us the video? Why are we given only a few still images?

The first image shows us that the camera is just above the surface of a lake, perhaps as high as ten feet or more above the lake but unlikely over a hundred feet. The fourth image seems consistent, as it seems like we are looking at a slight angle up at the flying thing, with a ridge under it. The fifth image also seems like we are looking up at the flying creature. The sixth image seem even more like we are looking up at it, as does the seventh. But the eighth appears somewhat different, like we were almost at the same level as the flying creature. The ninth image gives me the impression that I am looking slightly down at the flying creature; I notice one of the hind legs (kept straight back behind the rear of its body) now is seen above its right wing, and the main part of the head is below the left wing. I have tried to imagine some way that I could be looking up at this flying creature, in this image; my mind rebels against the thought. Of course it could be in a steep dive, but this seems inconsistent with the other images. It looks more like this photo, if it really is a photo, was taken far higher, way up in the air; but how did the camera get so high up in the air?

Other issues appear serious. For one, why did the one submitting this YouTube video not respond to many comments from viewers who mentioned reasons that this is a hoax? I read many objections with words like “fake” and ”hoax” (especially “fake”) but not one comment in response from the author or recorder of this “video.” One or more commenters mentioned artifacts around the “pterodacty” images, suggesting a paste-on hoax; why no response from the one submitting this to us?

Where is the cryptozoological report? I should have heard or read something about this somewhere, in the past three years, for there may be no person on the face of the planet who spends more time on living-pterosaur investigations than I do. If the eyewitness sent his report to Loren Coleman (instead of to me), why do I not see anything about this 2008 Flathead Lake “pterodactyl” on Cryptomundo?

I have read some of the comments on this YouTube video, comments about remote-controlled mechanical “pterodactyls” at Flathead Lake. Why has the video-submitter not replied to the insinuation that his “photos” are of radio-controlled devices?

This “report” of a modern living pterosaur may not be the lowest in credibility of all the reports that I have received or examined over the past eight years, but it is a runner-up contender for most-likely non-pterosaur.

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Objective Ministries Hoax

I conclude that there is no such educational facility as “Fellowship University,” and there is no such creationist “Richard Paley” affiliated with “objective ministries.” All the supposed plans for an expedition “to locate and bring back to the United States living specimens of pterosaurs or their fertile eggs” are fictional.

No Hoaxes with Pterosaur Wingspan Estimates

According to standard ideas in paleontology (and that is mostly what is mentioned in Western media when it is mentioned at all), only a small percentage of Rhamphorhynchoids attained wingspans over eight feet. But the data on wingspan estimates does not show any sharp decline above six feet, more of a gentle downward slope (fewer eyewitness estimates) into sizes much larger than standard ideas about Rhamphorhynchoid fossil wingspans. If a significant number of hoaxers made some of these fifty-seven estimates, and a significant number of those hoaxers were trying to portray Rhamphorhynchoids, there would have been a steeper decline above seven feet.

Ropen: a Demon Flyer?

. . . a brief Google search makes me suspect that the island of ”Rambunzo,” by that spelling, does not exist in Papua New Guinea; perhaps it is a misspelling, for the first few pages of Google searching refer [only] to cryptozoology sites and Wikipedia has nothing by that spelling. But if this is a misspelling of “Rambutyo,” (near Manus Island) we need to consider what at least some of the people of the northern islands of Papua New Guinea call the large nocturnal flying creature : “kor.” My contact person in that part of PNG is clear about that word for what Umboi Islanders (to the south) call “ropen.” “Kor” is their word, which I suspect is used by the people of Rambutyo.

That post gives many more details on this use of the phrase “demon flyer” in referring to the flying creature that is called by a number of names in Papua New Guinea. I’ll add here what was left out there.

On Umboi Island, at least some of the villagers have a different perspective on the concept of spiritual beings, at least different from many Americans. An intelligent being need not be either 100% spirit or 100% physical. The ropen of Umboi, according to Darius (who recited native traditions to the American explorer Paul Nation, in 2002), is like a spirit but also like a man. It flies around at night and sometimes comes down from a mountain to hunt game animals. To many islanders, this being may appear to be both spiritual (flying) and human (hunting animals for food).

In addition, natives may have a more complex concept of spirits than most Westerners have. A spirit, to them, need not be either 100% good or 100% bad. In that sense, at least, “demon flyer” seems a poor translation for a word that probably does not have a purely negative connotation for them.

Addendum

Marfa Lights Explanation

We need to consider the apparent intelligence in the movements of those CE-III Marfa Lights, for sometimes some things are exactly as they appear to be, in this case, intelligent.

The third edition of Live Pterosaurs in America (published in this version in November of 2011) is available on Amazon.com and from some other book sellers.

From the third paragraph of the back cover:

Americans, for years, have reported obvious living pterosaurs, with sightings in Washington state, California, New Mexico, Texas, Ohio, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, Rhode Island, Maine, New York, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Virginia, Kansas, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Missouri.

Please excuse the repetition, but we also need to review some of the names for modern pterosaurs (English-language and otherwise):

Pterodactyl, dragon, flying dinosaur, prehistoric bird, dinosaur bird, ropen, indava, seklo-bali, wawanar, kor

Exploring Papa New Guinea

The following four Americans have explored in Papua New Guinea, within the past eleven years, searching for living pterosaurs in remote tropical rain forests. This is not an all-inclusive list but few other cryptozoologists, if any, have given nearly so much of their time in this kind of search. I list these adventurous explorers in order of when they first interviewed eyewitnesses in Papua New Guinea.

Paul Nation

This expert in ratites (flightless birds like ostriches) first became involved in ropen searches by accompanying Carl Baugh (who no longer searches for living pterosaurs) on an expedition on Umbi Island, PNG. In 2002, Paul took his son Nathanael to Umboi, where they talked with many natives but saw no ropen.

Paul was instrumental in helping organize the two ropen expedition of 2004, both of which were searches on Umboi. He was unable to go along that year but had his own expedition with Jacob Kepas, late in 2006, deep in the mainland of Papua New Guinea. That expedition resulted in one daylight sighting of a giant indava by Kepas and several nighttime indava-light sightings by Nation. The video footage recorded by Nation in 2006, showing two glowing objects near the top of a ridge near Tawa Village, was found to be strange: not any camp fires or airplane lights or flash lights or meteors any other commonplace explanation.

On the sideline, the indava lights are seen just south of the area where the British biologist Evelyn Cheesman saw strange flying lights in the 1930′s. But the duration of the lights Cheesman saw relate more closely to the ropen lights of Umboi than the indava lights, even though Umboi is further away and in a different environment (coastal reefs for ropens to fish rather than deep jungle interiors).

Jonathan Whitcomb

With the advisory help of Paul Nation, Whitcomb was able to embark on his own expedition on Umboi Island, in 2004. Like David Woetzel, he eventually wrote a scientific paper in a peer-reviewed journal of science, on this subject. Whitcomb has written two books (in multiple editions) and about a thousand web pages and blog posts on living pterosaurs. A few of his web pages are non-English including French, German, Hungarian, Spanish, Japanese, and Polish. He receives emails from eyewitness from around the world and may be the world’s leading expert in worldwide sighting reports. He may be the only cryptozoologist who devotes anything close to a full-time effort, six days a week for eight years, to the subject of living pterosaurs. His controversial ideas have been noted in various newspapers, mostly American, including the Houston Chronicle.

Garth Guessman

With David Woetzel and native Jacob Kepas, Garth Guessman explored Umboi Island, Papua New Guinea, searching for ropens. Just a few weeks after the Whitcomb expedition, these three explorers interviewed many islanders, most of whom had not been interviewed by Whitcomb.

According to Creationwiki:

Guessman’s knowledge of Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur fossils allowed him to notice an important clue about the ropen‘s classification [being the same kind of flying creature]. [Guessman and Woetzel] learned that the native traditions describe the ropen‘s tail as being stiff, never moving except near where it connects to the body. Guessman recognized that this relates to the stiffening extension rods of Rhamphorhynchoid vertebrae: all but a few vertebrae are locked into stiffness; the few that are flexible are near where the pterosaur’s tail connects to the body.

Guessman has lectured in church and creation-association meetings and continues to support the concept of modern living pterosaurs and their relevance to the origin of life.

David Woetzel

Cameroon Expedition in Africa

They call it li’kela-bembe, and they revere it for its fierce reign over the Boumba river. They have never told a soul about this muscled beast that feasts on molombo fruit and pummels crocodiles with its serpentine tail – because nobody ever asked.

Nobody, that is, until last November, when Concord businessman David Woetzel went crashing through the virgin forests of Cameroon on the trail of this much-rumored but ever-elusive modern-day dinosaur. Now, thanks in part to Woetzel, this mysterious li’kela-bembe may be roaming into range of a camera lens for the first time.

But David Woetzel has searched jungles other than in Africa and for creatures other than dinosaurs (pterosaurs are scientifically classified as being seperate from dinosaurs). Although he never saw the dinosaur in Africa, he did see the ropen light in Papua New Guinea.

Woetzel Sees the Light on Umboi Island

“My sighting was so quick that it was impossible to get a video—maybe 2 seconds  . . . almost golden and shimmering around the edges. It looked like an old-fashioned street light in the fog. There was no tail and it was flying horizontal from  Mt. Barik toward  Mt. Tolo.” (Woetzel was interviewed by Jonathan Whitcomb soon after this sighting)

Live Pterosaurs in America (third edition of the nonfiction book by Jonathan David Whitcomb)

About eyewitness accounts of living pterosaurs, Jonathan Whitcomb has written more books, more web pages, and more blogs than any other person on earth. . . . After interviewing many natives [on Umboi Island, in 2004], he returned to the United States convinced of the identity of the ropen: a living Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur; but he did not return to his former profession: He became a writer, proclaiming to the world that pterosaurs are still living.

Author Tracks Pterodactyls Among Us

Matt Coker, in a December, 2010, post on a blog for a California newspaper, mentioned my conjecture about the Marfa Lights of southwest Texas (I’m still not nearly 100% certain about bioluminescent pterosaurs causing some of the Marfa Lights; we need more close-sightings).

Jonathan Whitcomb is actually based in Long Beach, where as a cryptozoology author he offers an explanation of the mystery lights of Marfa, Texas, and Papua New Guinea. Human inhabitants in both places have observed in the sky balls of light that seem to split into two, fly away from each other and then turn around and fly back together.

Such sights have produced legends about dancing devils or ghosts and scientific explanations involving lightning or earthlights. Whitcomb has a far different explanation: bioluminescent predators flying together . . .

Of course the subject of flying predators causing CE-III Marfa Lights is a deep subject, too deep for most news articles.

Live Pterosaur Media Center

This online “media room” or “press room” makes it easier for news writers to gather together the information and images they need regarding sightings and investigations of apparent living pterosaurs.

Contrary to what many paleontologists believe, some cryptozoologists, including Jonathan Whitcomb of Long Beach, California, believe that one or more species of pterosaurs are still living, although most, at least, seem to be nocturnal and uncommon. For eight years, Whitcomb has gathered and analyzed eyewitness reports from around the world, including North America. He has concluded that a number of species of pterosaurs still live on the earth.

Cryptozoology book on live pterosaurs

Two things, before leaving the Cuban pterosaurs: Patty Carson’s sketch of the flying creature she saw is soon to be on the cover of the third edition of Live Pterosaurs in America. She feels the beak is not quite right and not connected to the skull quite right, for how she remembers the creature, but the book publication needed to proceed well before Christmas, and it was waiting only for improvements in that sketch. It will have to do.

While talking with Patty on the phone yesterday, she remembered how many large rats were in the coconut trees at Gitmo, when she and her family was there. She now believes that the creature may use its long beak to get into the foliage and snatch rats for snacks. Yummy!

News Media Page on Live Pterosaurs

In a 2009 press release, Whitcomb declared that at least 1400 Americans have seen a living pterosaur between 1980 and 2008. After a number of cryptozoologists objected to the speculative nature of his estimate, Whitcomb maintained that sightings are far more common than the few news reports, in the late twentieth century, would suggest. He emphasized that many of those Americans are reluctant to tell anyone that they have seen a living “pterodactyl.”

News of Live Pterosaurs in New Jersey and Idaho

“In the summer of 2009, I saw something that I didn’t quite understand, in the pinelands of New Jersey. . . . The following year, on the same stretch of highway, I definately saw something clearly and without doubt. . . . I saw a giant bat-like bird, dark brown without feathers, something prehistoric . . . a long thin head, a long tail, [and a] kind of leathery dark brown skin. The body seemed to be the size of a good-sized man; the wind span, maybe 12-15 feet across.”

Orang-Bati of Seram Island

The kor of the northern islands of Papua New Guinea have also been said to attack people, especially in the past. This nocturnal glowing creature is probably closely related to the ropen of Umboi Island, if it isn’t actually the same species. They are thought to be pterosaurs.

Pterosaurs around Singapore

Also west of Papua New Guinea, the “vegetarian pterosaurs” of Singapore fly, or at least are reported to have flown many years ago, according to an eyewitness who contacted me a few months ago.

My sighting occurred probably between the period 1958 – 1960 thereabouts when I was still a little kid. In those days we lived in a small village which was near a densely wooded area. Of course with the general development of Singapore to a metropolitan state it is today, the creatures, if they had propagated, would have [ventured] further south to the wilder regions to avoid civilisation (to ensure their survival).

Live Pterosaurs

Perhaps the first web site, or series of web pages, devoted to being used by the new media, “Live Pterosaurs” makes images and text available for unrestricted use by the media.

In a 2009 press release, the cryptozoologist Jonathan Whitcomb estimated that at least 1400 Americans have seen a living pterosaur between 1980 and 2008. After a number of cryptozoologists objected to the speculative nature of his estimate, Whitcomb maintained that sightings are far more common that the few news reports, in the late twentieth century, would suggest. . . .

Acknowledgements in a recent cryptozoology book includes, “I give special thanks to Duane Hodgkinson, whose unflinching testimony gave birth to modern living-pterosaur investigations. His account of the 1944 sighting on the mainland of Papua New Guinea helped inspire Carl Baugh’s first expedition of 1993. Ignoring previous ridicule from those who would not listen, Hodgkinson told us of his experience, helping prepare the way for many expeditions . . .”

. . . the Salak Mountains of western Java reportedly harbors a winged cryptid known as ahool, in imitation of its distinctive hunting cry. Witnesses describe the ahool as having a 12-ft wingspan, a coat of gray hair on a torso the size of a one-year-old child’s, and a round head resembling that of a monkey with large, dark eyes. It is a nocturnal hunter, armed with long claws on its flattened forearms . . .

With limited eyewitness evidence for this flying cryptid (be it a living pterosaur or otherwise), it may or may not be related to other flying cryptids in this part of the world.

Vegetarian Pterosaurs Near Singapore?

[The two pterosaurs were] circling some tall palm trees (those with small orange coloured fruits) and then helping themselves to the fruits. They were making cries which sounded like squawking in the process. They were large . . .

My sighting occurred probably between the period 1958 – 1960 thereabouts when I was still a little kid. In those days we lived in a small village which was near a densely wooded area. Of course with the general development of Singapore to a metropolitan state it is today, the creatures, if they had propagated, would have [ventured] further south to the wilder regions to avoid civilisation (to ensure their survival).

Flying Fox Fruit Bat

These large bats, common in many areas of the southwest Pacific, have been suggested as explanations for reports of living pterosaurs in Papua New Guinea; but most sighting reports of “pterodactyls” do not relate well to this idea, especially when the large flying creatures are described with very long tails. In addition, when a native sees something whose description strongly suggests a living pterosaurs, a fruit bat misidentification can be highly unlikely, in particular when that native is well aware of fruit bats (as most natives in these islands often are).

A few years ago, at an undisclosed location, several investigators saw many bats flying where flying lights were common. The bats appeared more numerous than the flying lights, and the cryptozoologists were sure of at least two kinds of nocturnal fliers. Since the lights are seen throughout the year, by the local land owner, I pondered why ropen-like creatures would be flashing so regularly. Catching-bats jumped out at me, far ahead of a mating-ritual explanation . . . pterosaurs eating bats. [quote from the cryptozoology book Live Pterosaurs in America]