One day there will be genuine footage of a Sasquatch on You Tube and most people will ignore it. Look at the crunch up side of the costume head and that cheap "hang on" chimp. I really -really- wish this had been genuine.
Photo credit:
Matt Wang, Flickr: anosmicovni. European Space Agency. Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko Relative to Downtown Los Angeles
Our sense of scale tends to adjust to circumstances. So when we
think about comets it is easy to compare them with other astronomical
objects. In which case, comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko –just
three kilometers wide –sounds tiny.
However, as you can see in the image above, things look rather
different when you compare the comet to something we are really familiar
with - such as tall buildings.
While Churyumov-Gerasimenko is small enough that one could walk from
one end to the other in less than an hour, it’s easy to forget the three
dimensional nature of something like this – three kilometers across is
no big deal, but two kilometers helps make sense of what happened to the dinosaurs.
The image is by Matt Wang, who combined a photograph of Los Angeles with an image from the Rosetta spacecraft rendezvousing with Churyumov-Gerasimenko, prior to going into orbit and eventually landing.
While Rosetta will be doing its best to touch down very gently on the
comet’s surface, we can’t count on Churyumov-Gerasimenko doing the same
if it ever paid LA a visit. You can get some idea of what would happen
in such a collision here, although the scale of the damage depends greatly on the impact speed you choose to enter.
Since Churyumov-Gerasimenko never crosses the Earth's orbit there is
no danger of a collision, at least until a close encounter with some
other planet shifts its orbit. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for
other, even larger, asteroids and comets.
Note: An update to the image credit has been made. Credit: Matt Wang, Flickr: anosmicovni. European Space Agency.
Don't get me wrong: I am not shouting out "hoax!" and I believe, from watching the video that the photographer, Reg Jones, is sincere. That said. I have sent emails off to various people/organisations in Australia but have received no responses
It is, therefore, only possible to analyse based on what we have.
Here is a still from the video on You Tube. You can quite clearly see the supposed humanoid form sitting in the background.
Cropped and showing "scale" between alleged Yowie and the men to the foreground.
Now here is an enlargement of the frame showing just the "Yowie". Huge, bulky with a withered left arm. At least it is what you think you see. Look around this "Yowie" and you'll see matrixing or Pareidolia and there is a good article about this on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareidolia
You do not really need to look that hard for other things to emerge -is the "Yowie's" left arm resting on a giant baboon head? There are other things matrixing produces in this image.
I have to write that based on this image nothing more than matrixing is involved. Think about it: the photographer took his photo but did not see -some 10ft/3m?- a huge humanoid creature sitting there? If the distance between the men and the "Yowie" is around 10ft then it must stand a good 8-10ft tall -sitting about 5 feet (1.5m)?
How on Earth could you not see that??
If you have read any of my books -particularly my last one: Pursuing The Strange & Weird:A Naturalists Viewpointthen you will know that I would love for this to have been a genuine large hominid photograph -1936 and before all the modern age Yowie craze!
Sadly, no good image to look at and have checked by a photographic company I have to make do with what is available.
Every photograph or piece of video footage that gets posted or published needs looking into because if we do not -I have a sad life and I do check it all- then we may certainly miss the genuine article!
So, I do not agree with Paul McCleod, who posted the video item, that this is a genuine Yowie photograph but I do commend him for posting it.
I think that this video demonstrates exactly what I was writing about last week in my post about Sasquatch, UFOs and ghost hunters. Society in general and in the main people who really do have rice pudding for brains and will seriously -seriously- accept these really bad computer-effect aliens because they have been fed movies, TV shows, documentaries sci fi books and comics for so many decades that they cannot accept no one has recorded a real live alien in a street somewhere.
Seriously, if they believe all they read -I take it they DO read?- then Budd Hopkins, John Mack and David M Jacobs and even C. D. B. Bryan have actuallt explained WHY people are not catching aliens on video or phonecams.
And, yes, I DO still watch all this stuff and study new photographs because one day there just might be a genuine piece of footage or photo. Budd and David both told me that if that ever happened it could be explosive -if people didn't dismiss it as another You Tube fake!
pack -possibly from the film crew ensuring that the animals filmed DO
flock across the more "picturesque" river than in the direction the
others are going.
I'm sorry but is this a joke? 6 minutes in we get a closer look at the "blob" and we see it is a man with a back-pack.
This is
nothing new -guy dressed to meld into the background (in black clothing
and head covering so he is not immediately standing out like a sore thumb
in the "natural scenery".
It
is quite common and all that had to be done was ask the company filming
-IF they admitted it because if they did suddenly you do NOT have a
"natural scene". Man pure and simple right down to body size.
ThinkerThunker explains why he thinks this is a genuine Sasquatch. I don't. I got pretty sea-sick with his back-forth frames but I did notice the left arm is hanging a lot. This seriously does look like a bad Sasquatch costume.
That said, I've not been face-to-face with a number of sasquatch for comparison. I say hoax.
Photo credit:
Lexicon via wikimedia commons. The most distant of these outer
solar system objects share a trait that hints at an unknown planet.
This article by Stephen Luntz over at IFL Science http://www.iflscience.com/space/signs-planet-x-and-maybe-y is interesting -it must be 38 years ago that I first wrote about "Planet X", "Vulcan" and the belief in other planets further out in our solar system.
I'm still unsure on the maths involved here but the concept is still interesting (hmmm....maybe those "Greys" do come from closer to home?).
The possibility of a planet lurking in the outer reaches of the
solar system has gained new ground, based on the orbits of recently
discovered objects. There is a new twist to the latest evidence,
however, with suggestions of not one but two large planets at
mind-bending distances from the Sun.
The quest for a "Planet X" beyond Neptune has been going on for more than a century. Recently, two dwarf planets Senda and 2102 VP113 have been identified with orbits extending to distances hundreds of times further from the Sun than our own.
Distant as these orbits are, they are too close to be part of the Oort Cloud, a collection of comets that mostly orbit at distances beyond 5000 AU.*
Instead it is thought that these objects formed closer to the sun.
The gravitational influence of a large planet is one explanation of how
their orbits changed. The theory has its own problems – if we can’t
explain how objects like these came to be orbiting at such distances,
then it’s equally unclear how a theoretical planet came to be there.
Scott Sheppard, of the Carnegie Institution for Science, and the
Gemini Observatory's Chad Trujillo noted a clustering in the orbits of
the solar system’s most distant known entities, many of which they had discovered. Ten Kuiper Belt Objects, and minor planets Sedna and 2012 VP113, all have orbits that cross the plane of the solar system at angles that range from shallow to steep.
Yet all of these distant objects reach their closest point to the sun
just when they are near the plane the planets circle in. The scientists
considered this unlikely to be a coincidence, and speculate it might be
a sign of a planet influencing all of their orbits.
E. Otwell. The two most distant minor planets have very different orbits, but converge when closest to the sun.
In Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Letters
brothers Carlos and Raul de la Fuente Marcos of Complutense University
of Madrid have taken this a step further. “The analysis of several
possible scenarios strongly suggest that at least two trans-Plutonian
planets must exist,” they conclude.
Even more recently, Lorenzo Iorio of the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research has argued in the same journal
that if planet X exists, it must be much further out than Trujillo and
Sheppard proposed. How far it would need to be depends on its mass, but
an unknown object twice as heavy as the Earth could not be less than 500
AU from the Sun, Iorio maintains.
Other astronomers are more cautious. David Jewitt of the University of California, Los Angeles told Science News,
"The outer solar system can be full of all sorts of unseen and
interesting things,” Jewitt says, “but the argument ... for a massive
perturber is a bit puzzling.” Jewitt notes that if the Kuiper Belt
Objects in the Trujillo/Sheppard study have a planet keeping them in
line, it may well be Neptune. Sedna and 2012 VP113 are too far out for
this to be true for them as well, but it is far easier to explain two
orbits as coincidences than twelve.
While the question may only be finally settled by the discovery of a
large planet lurking in space, a number of teams have redoubled their
efforts to find modest sized objects whose orbits might help us lend
credence to, or reject, the theories proposed so far.
Below a CalTech.Edu imagehttp://web.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/sedna/
Artist's conception of the cold distant Sedna. The sun is a tiny
point of light 8 billion miles away from the red planetoid. A
hypothesized
tiny moon appears nearby.
BBC News and other agencies are reporting on this. From the photo and tracks it does look like a juvenile tiger and spoor has been found. Where did it come from?
In Europe, as in the USA, any exotic trader legal or illegal and the 'tranquiliser guns' I've just seen on UK news are high powered snipers rifles.
Hmm...tranquilise or shoot?
BBC News:
Police and fire officials are searching for a tiger on the loose in a town outside Paris, local authorities say.
A woman alerted officials after spotting the big cat in a
supermarket car park in Montevrain, east of the French capital, local
media reported.
The Montevrain council said on its Facebook page that an area of woodland had been roped off.
Residents have been advised to stay indoors, and children are being kept in schools.
It was unclear where the animal came from, though there is a big cat park near Montevrain.
The owner of the lntermarche supermarket in Montevrain said his wife had spotted the animal at about 08:30 (07:30 GMT).
"She didn't get out of the car and called me to say 'I think I
saw a lynx'," he was quoted as saying. The woman took a photograph that
appears to show a large cat.
Le Parisien newspaper said several local residents had sighted the animal.
Specialists said the animal's track's were those of a young
tiger. An official from the mayor's office said they had been able to
trace the animal to the woodland by following its prints, and that a
helicopter was assisting police and fire officials in the search.
The Montevrain mayor's office dismissed the idea that the
tiger could have escaped from a circus that was in the town until
Saturday, Le Parisien reported.
EuroDisney, which operates nearby Disneyland Paris, said it kept no tigers.
And, yes, the UK media is doing their "silly story" best....even with the evidence they've seen. Not surprising!
There has always been a problem with any type of non-scientifically backed investigation into phenomena. Today the internet is full of wholly inaccurate details of cases (such as the Barking Beast of Bath -of which I was the only investigator in the field at that time) or just plain downright lies -Bigfoot type creatures seen in the UK, huge fiction on the Beast of Gevaudan and "Girt Dog of Ennerdale" -using contemporary sources and even corresponding with academics has resulted in the actual facts (you really will need to read my books!) -now if Cryptozoologists "of note" have really done their work why didn't they reveal the truth because I knew it and put it on the record over 25-30 years ago? I leave that answer up to you. Book sells and lecture fees help (clue).
I am always astonished that 50 years after cases "experts in the case" (who were not even born at the time so did not investigate "at the time") come up with so many wildly varying descriptions and 'facts' that were never on any record before.
Okay, we know Roswell had no crashed flying saucer but it is a huge cash cow and a small town with an annual event that keeps it thriving...okay. But just how many flying saucers and aliens were found there? Let's not joke about it.
Aurora UFO crash: the biggest faked nonsense by a newspaperman in 1897 to draw attention and people to a small town that had been ravaged by a disease that killed many at the time. See your town turn into a ghost town or keep it going on a little fib? A tiny body in a grave that never existed (the joke grave did though some think it might have contained the body of a child who died at the time). Not one single investigation has so far produced one solid fact or piece of physical evidence proving this case or the Roswell case.
The 1952 Braxton County Flatwoods UFO/'Monster' incident has always fascinated me and Ivan T. Sanderson investigated the report and thought it genuine and gathered all the details he could. Now we are told by "experts on the case" that it was some lizard-like creature floating about in some hover device and it's still being seen -might even be living in caves nearby. this is beyond a joke -and alleged serious cryptozoologists/ufologists (they switch their title for whichever aspect the media is trying to push for sensationalism) go along with this. Ahh, that old bitch master money.
Kelly-Hopkinville is another fascinating case. Even that most investigated of cases (by competent investigators at the time) is having new angles added to it. All "reboots" to bring the events in line with modern media culture.
Yes, they bring in good tourist revenue....see the reality dawning here?
So many faked UFO and alien videos as well as photo-shopped images out there now that, yes, I do check them out "in case" but they are obviously fakes. Some by investigators -or people claiming to be investigators.
I have dealt with Sasquatch in my books as well as various unknown sea creatures. I do not find it at all surprising that very well known faked images are still being touted as genuine and I no longer correct people because the amount of abuse is ridiculous -even when you supply the source of the hoaxers confessions!
Then we have ghosts. Paranormal Witness, Haunted, Ghost Hunters, Ghost Adventures -the media fascination with them -especially in the US- is, obviously, fuelled by pulling in viewers and you pull in viewers you pull in money.
In the UK Most Haunted was the focus of so many hoaxes and tricks by its presenters and crews -caught on camera- that eventually it admitted it was "just an entertainment show not factual" and this is stated in legal documents quoted by various sources so those who still cling to hoaxers being "brave investigators" ...let's not get rude about people. But when audio of presenters declaring things are faked and video clips of the actually faking incidents are revealed and people still think the same.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Most_Haunted
Ghost Hunters I watched from series 1 and began noticing things. Something happened and the main presenters -Jay and Grant- have the most badly acted reactions. I dismissed this thought. Audio of nothing -I know people who have used university equipment to amplify 'voices' said to be heard on the show and heard nothing. Amazing how they see but do not capture anything...wait...surely not? That is, surely, the whole trademark of Destination Truth? Could the TV company be getting them to act out their reactions because they were not filmed initially? Does it say "re-enaction"?
Then I see things. Oh boy. Grant obviously faking things. Was pressure put on him to come up with results by the production company so he did this?
No. Jay and Grant appear to be in with the fakery. Grant leaves the show for various reasons -the credibility of the show slumped. Grant no longer there -no faking. Right. Then for the 200th episode Grant returns and may return permanently.
Listen to this interview again and you'll see why the boys are probably happy for non-disclosure agreements on contracts. It does show why TAPS members leave.
Then you have the utmost ridiculous thing ever that is said to "provide proof of a ghosts presence" -the flashlight trick. This guy explains -and demonstrates- how it works. I tried it before seeing this because it is that obviously...well, watch.
Now, what I did was "adjust" my flashlight.
"If there is here present a purple bogied throgglewort could you please turn the torch on to prove it?"
nothing.....nothing...
"please I just need to prove you are here so--"
Torch goes on!
"Okay, so, please, could you make the torch---"
Torch starts flickering.
"Thank you. That's what I wanted. Could you turn the torch of---"
Torch goes off before I finish. So then I go switch it off -"thanking" the purple bogied throgglewort. In fact, leaving the torch on and you will get really ticked off as it goes on. Flickers. comes on then off until you really do get the point that it's not a purple bogied throgglewort.
Incidentally, Ghost Hunters is noted for the number of female "butt-shots"/"side boob" shots and even a few "crotch-shots" by camera crews -some of the women have spoken about this privately and on camera go to You Tube and search "Kris Williams and the "Crotch Shot"
Most Haunted and Ghost Hunters are faked. Entertainment. They might as well add the horror aspect of special effects and "domoned-up" actors as per Paranormal Witness.
My faith was slightly restored when I saw Ghost Adventures. Initially three guys Zak Bagans, Nick Groff and Aaron Goodwin with three cameras and sound equipment. Opportunity to fake -zero because each is filming the other and -initially- any voices or sounds they played back immediately on camera.
Watch this clip from Ghost Adventures - Brick Thrown, Goldfield Hotel - GAC Documentary but watch the whole documentary because the analysis at the end answers any critics. I still think this is one of the best videos I've seen to date.
During 2009 Halloween special Ghost Adventures Live at the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum a guest,
Robert Bess, inventor of the so-called Parabot Containment Chamber, faked an incident badly and the cameras caught it. The GA crew later denounced this as a "non-paranormal event".
This was the problem. Three guys. Three cameras and camera outside the building so no hoaxers could pull a stunt. But then, guest -series 9 I was shocked to see Nick Groff suckered by the most fake 'psychic' routine and then there was the guy who "just happened" to turn up and say within earshot of the crew that he had "seen something" -so the crew interview him. Set up. Series 10 and the "Zozo demon". Quija board fakery by a guy obviously earning from "the Zozo phenomena" and his wife's act...and it was so obviously AN ACT.
Now I believe that the GA Crew really do believe they are dealing with the devil and demons. Is this created by their own minds or is something using the concept of a devil to fool them? Maybe a bit of both. They seem to have fallen into the whole "fighting evil" thing.
There are EVPs (Electronic Voice Phenomena) the Crew capture and put their own slant on while I sit there shouting "NO -LISTEN AGAIN!" Several times I've sat bolt upright because of what is implied in the EVPs. For instance, in the old mining shack in the documentary they leave a digital recorder and play it back to hear what they think is a voice stating "This is Satan" but listen carefully and it is a voice, clearly questioning: "Is it satan?" and on another show voices recorded include a female stating she can see "someone" at the far end of the corridor -the GA Crew. there are others and I'll look at those in my next book BUT it is quite clear that the 'ghosts' are seeing 'ghosts' in the 1800s!
Now we come to the fact that TAPS -remember the "TAPS family of proven fakery"?- "called out" the GA Crew at Bobby Mackeys club without actually saying "Ghost Adventures". This was either badly edited or the owners change the story slightly but the good thing is that the GA Crew have video recordings of the staff talking about events -so the GA Crew never made that up. I do think things got a bit out of hand but then if Crew members put the slant they do on events it will.
But for a long time there have been rumours that Ghost Hunters feel Ghost Adventures is infringing on "its turf" and there have been some nasty and snide attacks on the GA Crew. I mention this because in August, 2014, Aaron 'spoke' exclusively about the show being faked and how bad the production company was. I heard and read this but what was odd was that Aaron was filming with the other GA Crew members -he supposedly outed Nick Groff over faking...lots more stuff.
His reply on his Twitter page was this:"Aaron Goodwin wrote:Omg that article u all r reading about
me is bull crap. I'm shooting right now in Ireland on #GhostAdventures
don't believe that article. If u follow me on #instigram #twitter or
#Facebook u would now I'm out shooting in Ireland. I read this a while
ago & ignored it but so many people r asking me about it now. There
I'm done talking about it ps u guys rock for caring - Love u all"
What I found when checking with people was that there was a very strong but no physical link to this being a fact that this was instigated by Ghost Hunters. Murky waters, people. Murky waters and cash cows.
To
me, series 9 and the introduction of so many "guests" and additional
crew has made this Ghost Hunters Adventures. Jay Wasley - Audio
technician for the GAC and Billy Tolley Audio-Visual Tech, are essential
in case of tech problems and useful back-up "in case" but there are
just too many people and guests and I am very sorry to have to say -as many fans have already-
that too many opens up the possibility of hoaxing and that the show was
better and produced more credible results when it was just three men
and three cameras.
As to host-hunting equipment I suggest you check out Screamfreak79s You Tube channel!
NOTHING beats the serious investigator and valuable field experience and I just wish TV would show that. It might get boring but that is ghost hunting!
Ahh. The days when I had a full head of hair! 1982. All I can remember is my driver chasing after UFOs -and a near collision with a bus- and climbing onto buildings and towers and walking over all sorts of places looking for UFO trace evidence.
UFO reports....lots of UFO reports.
Being quizzed by a Russian diplomat over UFO sights and aspects thereof.
The Falkland/Malvinas War. A time when several contacts were arrested and I never heard from them again. Their names have not re-appeared in Argentine Ufology since.
Planned expedition to look for a Peruvian hairy hominid that had to be called off because of my "position"....do I look like a spy here? Cute and fuzzy.
Some great UFO incidents in that year from the UK and, of course, a good few reports from UK Armed Forces personnel taking part in the above war.
A busy time.
And what thanks did I get when I 'retired' in 2005? None. I was swept out like the rest of the "no longer required" brigade.
My big mistake? Accepting Lord (Brinsley) Clancarty and Sir Victor Goddards offer and setting up the AOP Bureau.
But that aside -there was a lot of excitement and fun.
People ask me why I feel so insulted when someone decides
to call me a “Fortean” or
“Cryptozoologist”.Let me explain.
Well,Charles Hoy Fort apparently objected most strongly to the creation
of a Fortean Society.Most Forteans,even
when they get one hundred per cent incontrovertible facts,will mix in half
truths or even lies to “fill in the gaps” concerning an event.They say it is “in the spirit of Charles
Fort”.Yes,Fort liked a bit of dry wit
but that was his style.To say that,as a
Fortean,you are challenging science to look at mysteries is pointless if you
cannot give straight facts.That is why
Forteans are seen as a loony fringe.
Cryptozoologists.Well,there are
those who stand out in my mind:Ivan T. Sanderson,Bernard Heuvelman,Loren
Coleman and John Green.These people put
in the work and reported facts,though a small amount of speculation is needed
in this subject –but based on
zoological knowledge.
Then there are “The Others”.These
people like to pretend to be scientific but will appear on TV,radio and in the
newspapers making fools of themselves and in some cases issue the most
sensationalist or downright stupid statements that they later have to retract
because someone checked and pointed out they were talking rot.These people will tell you with an inane
chuckle:”No such thing as bad publicity,old chap!”They will also plagiarise.
Ifthe latter type could be
gotten rid of then I might not be too insulted if someone asked whether I was a
cryptozoologist.
I prefer naturalist-research investigator.
The case of the so called “Barking beast Of Bath” is a prime example and
what these Forteans, Cryptozoologists and others say thirty years on I’ll come to
later. First,the case itself and I need to point out that the incidents took
place in the Limpley Stoke, Monkton Combe and Claverton Woods area not in Bath itself.
At the time of this case I was acting jointly as Director of UFO
International and running a branch of the late Ivan T. Sanderson’s SITU
[Society for the Investigation of The Unexplained].Both slotted in nicely with being Regional
Investigations Co-ordinator [RIC] for the British UFO Research Association
[BUFORA].
It was BUFORA that seemed to want to get me involved and the Press
seemed to be desperate for any UFO group
to get involved!The BUFORA National
Investigations Co-ordinator at the time,Maureen Hall,sent me three newspaper
clippings and urged me to get actively investigating –I was promised that more
revealing information would be forwarded soon.
Suddenly,my phone began to ring non-stop with local and national
reporters from newspapers,radio and TV asking how my investigation was
progressing?I was told several times
that “BUFORAs Press Officer said you were the man to contact”.I got the hint that more was going on than I
was being told.
The Bristol Evening Post of 12th August,1980,reported:
“Beware of the Beast!Anyone stalking the mystery
beast of Brassknocker Hill,Bath,could be in for a
nasty shock,RSPCA Inspector Peter
Meyer warned
today.Renewed hunts are being made for
the creature after a policeman and
a taxi driver
saw a monkey about three feet tall
near the woods
behind the hill at the
weekend.The beast first
appeared last summer,damaging trees
and
frightening wildlife.Efforts to track it down failed.
Today Mr Meyer said:’If it is a
chimp or a
Monkey and it has been living in
the wild for so
Long it could be extremely dangerous…”
The item went on to state that Mr. Meyer’s search on the 11th
had been unsuccessful but that he planned another search that day.Mr. Ron Harper,a retired cabinet maker,who
was then living on the edge of the woods,was convinced that this “beast” was a
monkey.He told reporters:
“It has been here in the wood all
the time but it
comes out in August when it gets
warmer and the
new shoots appear on the
trees.We think that it was
let loose from a car,probably by a
foreigner who
didn’t want to report the loss.”
Mr. Harper repeated the same theory to me.As much as I looked I could find no UFO
angle.The Daily Mirror of 12th
August had a field day and what it was reporting was “interesting”.It reported that a “strange furry creature”
was first seen in the August of 1979 and went on to inform its readers that:
“…shaggy shapes and glaring eyes
made some of
the locals think twice about
venturing out at night.”
When I talked and corresponded with Mr. and Mrs. Harper they made it
very clear that they were in no way afraid of the creature.Mr. Harper was not amused by the Daily Mirror
report.
John Elphinstone,a taxi driver,was driving along when the
beast,according to reporters,”hailed him” from the roadside.A strange shaggy creature flagging down a
taxi?A policeman dispatched to the scene
was just in time to see the creature lope off.Inspector Mike Price of Bath Police said:
“We were sure that this mystery
creature would turn
out to be a monkey of some
sort.After all,men from
Mars aren’t hairy are they?”
I decided that I really needed to track some of these people down and
see what they were really seeing/thinking.According to most of the reporters Bath’s
neighbourhood was being invaded by night-crawling hairies from Pluto!
My first port of call was the Royal Society for the Prevention of
Cruelty to Animals [RSPCA] Bath
office.I tried to telephone and make an
appointment to meet Mr. Meyer.It took
several attempts but I then spoke to someone who asked me to hold on.I waited for minutes and was then told “Mr.
Meyer is not here.Can you leave your
telephone number?”The way it was said I
knew I was getting the brush off.I
pointed out that I would be in Bath
the next day –perhaps if I popped in?Silence.Then several reasons why
Mr. Meyer might not be in the next day.
I left my telephone number and asked if he could contact me urgently it
would be greatly appreciated.I was
using my naturalist hat and never even once mentioned UFOs,shaggy men from Mars
or anything of the kind.By nine o’clock
in the evening it was obvious Mr. Meyer was not going to return my call.
The next day I concluded my business at the Ministry of Defence in Bath and walked around to
the RSPCA office.The person I spoke to
said Mr. Meyer was not in that day but I showed my semi-official [non-UFO]
credentials and the lady went through a door to reappear several minutes later
with another lady.I was told Mr.
Meyer’s was not in and was on leave.Glancing through a window I saw a man whom I recognised from a TV news item as Mr. Meyer
rush into a car and drive off.
I actually laughed out loud.The
two ladies stared.I handed a business
card to them and pointed out that I was not a nut-case but a naturalist and I
was interested in talking to Mr. Meyer –confidentially if need be— about the
concerns of residents regarding the animal in the woods.
I never did hear from Mr. Meyer or find out why he avoided me –though a
few years later I did get offered one explanation and it involved the “beast”.
When I later contacted the Bristol RSPCA to explain my interest and the
situation I was told,without a moment of hesitation:”You ought to try the
Primate Protection League.”So,I
contacted the International Primate Protection League and explained my interest
as a naturalist.No response to my
letters.I tried telephoning but was
asked to leave my number and someone would get back to me.No one ever did and this was the Secretary of
the League.
I then tried to get a response from the League’s local
representative, Mr. tony Pain.No call
back after I left a message.No
responses to letters.I was beginning to
think the shaggy men from Mars were mind-controlling people –and
that’s a joke,just in case someone
thinks I’m being serious!
A reporter –a stringer for The Daily Telegraph—contactedme and asked if I had heard about the strange
lights being seen at night at the same time that the beast was seen stalking
the area?
I was getting fed up and fast.So
I contacted Bath Police and a very helpful officer told me:”Oh,right. You
really need to read the Daily Mirror article!”
The situation was becoming a farce.It seemed half the reporters in the country were out at Brassknocker
Hill.I needed to talk to Maureen Hall
at BUFORA and find out just what the
additional information was that she hinted BUFORA had.I got through to Maureen and after a few
pleasantries got down to brass tacks and asked just what it was BUFORA knew
because as far as I was concerned all that had been reported was an escaped
primate.I was promised “certain
information” was going to be forwarded to me very soon.Whichever way I asked I just could not get
any hint of what this information was.
I’d already visited the area where,apparently,”everyone” was said to be
either searching/hunting/pursuing the beast.I saw no one.Locals responded to
my question:”Have you seen the RSPCA man or journalists around?” with a look of
surprise and,usually,the words:”Are they supposed to be around here?”It seems that,apart from local BBC TV and ITV
news types who went “a bit potty” when the story broke,that was it.
It’s easy to suppose that the article that appeared in The Guardian on
the 23rd August,1979,had much to do with the mystery and confusion.However,when I contacted the reporter,Mr.
Dennis Barker,he could not recall much other than thatthere was “something” to do with UFOs.All his notes were gone anyway –though he did
later find a couple of contact numbers that I had already told him I had.This was very surprising since it turned out
that it was Mr. barker who tried to rope in UFO International in 1979 –a year
before BUFORA had contacted me.
Barker’s article reported that the four feet tall [1.2m] tall beast had
shattered the peace of the little village “using its Draculaesque teeth”.I love reporters.The beast gave the impression of wearing
white [framed] spectacles.Pigeons,magpies
and jackdaws had vanished from the area and bark had been stripped off trees as
far up as twenty feet [6 m].Yes,this is
why it was hailed “the barking beast of Bath”,not
because of any vocalisation but because it tore bark from trees.If it had barked I’m sure that it would have
been reported as stalking the quiet village with “werewolvesque teeth”!
The theory was put forward,though I have no idea by whom,that the beast must be able to hang upside-down and
lean over to do the damage.The beast
always did its work at night it seemed.
Bless him,but Mr. Harper then gave reporters [mainly Mr.Barker] a morsel
that they could use to boost the story even more.Mr. Harper reported that it was some kind of
rodent.And he wrote that a man from the
Bath Parks Committee had paid a visit and stated:
“You know,Mr.Harper,if I was not talking
silly,I
would say that you have a squirrel ten times
bigger than normal.”
I’m glad he wasn’t “talking silly”;though I have mused over that line
many a time.Mr. Harper also wrote that
the teeth marks found were “ten to twenty times the size of a squirrel’s”.
I think we need to interject a few facts into this madness.When I spoke to the head of the Bath Parks
Committee he admitted his man had
made the remarks quoted by Mr. Harper.He wishes that the man had not but he did and was not thinking anyone
would publish them.
There were no Red Squirrels [Sciurus
vulgaris] in the woods around Monkton Combe,Limpley Stoke or any part of Bath.So that would leave the Grey Squirrel [Sciurus carolinensis],of which there was
some evidence but I got the distinct impression that squirrels,like magpies and
pigeons,were “fair game” to humans so the drop in numbers might not be that
unusual.
The total length of a squirrel skull is under 54mm [just over 2 ins],it
has a hind foot measurement of roughly 2.5 x 3 cms [around 1-1.25 ins].The body length is 200-236mm [roughly 9.5
ins];the tail on average is 165-200mm [roughly 6-9 ins].
The body weight 250-400 g..
So,if in proportion with the teeth at 10-20 times the size of
normal,you’ll get a squirrel with a 0.508-1.016m [20-40 ins] long jaw;a
0.254-0.508m [10-20 ins]hind foot not to mention a 2.29-4.88m [7.5-16 ft] long
body and to which we can add a 1.53-3m [5-10 ft] long tail. More worrying,it
would weigh around 2500 – 5000 g [5.5-11+lbs] body weight—and the ability to
hang upside-down while leaning over!
Impressive.No wonder some
foreigner passing by dumped it from his car.
The Harpers noted that their pet goat would not go near to one tree that
the beast had “attacked”.There were
some fifty other trees damaged in a similar fashion in the area.
At the time of the stripped bark being discovered,no one had actually
seen the alleged beast or,at least,had they it was not reported.This all changed when,at around 00:30
hours,Mr. Christopher Morris and a friend were driving through Monkton
Combe.Both saw the beast in the middle
of the road,illuminated by the car headlights.“It” was 3-4 feet [90cms- 1.2m] tall and had what seemed to be bright
white rings around the eyes which was interpreted as looking like spectacles.Interestingly,Mr. Morris thought that the
beast “looked like a baboon”,though his companion was quite adamant that it was
a chimpanzee.
Being young and stupid I decided to check the area out and lived rough
for a week,not telling any locals who might be hoaxing or unintentionally
mention the fact to hoaxers.Each
evening I climbed up into a different tree.Covered in dirt and leaf sap to try to hide my smell.
Just some of the
newsclippings pertaining to The Barking Beast Of Bath and covers the
sensationalist warnings of possible attack by “the beast” to its connection
with UFO sightings.These reflect the
tones taken by local BBC TV and radio as well as Independent TV.More than one reporter refused my invitation
to join me at night in the woods.
In that entire week,while the RSPCA and reporters were supposedly moving
around by the handful I saw no one.No
RSPCA Inspector.No member of the
International Primate Protection League.Not a solitary reporter.Well,I did hear someone one evening;a couple
decided to go to a tree nearby where they got rather,uh,”involved”.I couldn’t very well make a noise to let them
know I was up a tree closeby or else they may have wondered just what I was doing up the tree.I also had to consider the possibility that
the police might be called and then I’d have to explain to them what I was
doing.I closed my eyes and put my
fingers in my ears –one has standards.
I did find one quite old track in dried out mud that looked like a
chimpanzee foot but damp had gotten into my camera and when I later returned
with casting material there were deer tracks obliterating it.But by a shed frequented by the beast there
was a strong smell.One I knew all too
well.While at Greenway Boys School in
the early 1970s,we one day had a visit from the owner of the Westbury-on-Trym Wildlife
Park a nice spot to visit in Bristol back then.The owner had,in those pre Dangerous Wild
Animals Act days,brought along a chimpanzee with a couple more mundane
creatures.As the chimp was held up to
be handed to me it decided to relieve its bladder…a lot.That smell,mentally,has stayed with me for a
long time now,but in 1979/1980 my hair stood on end when I smelt that same
odour again.
I checked but there were no droppings I could associate with a
chimpanzee. Ron Harper had told me that
he had seen a chimpanzee on several occasions and.later,his widow re-iterated
that they had both seen the chimpanzee on a stone wall that stood next to one
of the damaged trees –the tree their pet goat would not go near.
A few years later [1996] when I wanted to see whether anyone else might
have plucked up courage to finally report their own sighting,I received at
least two phone calls from different sources telling me that there could be
between 2-3 chimpanzees loose in the area.I checked but it seemed,as I suspected,to be nothing.
I had,through a contact,seen the statement made by two police officers who had clearly seen a chimpanzee –one had been
to Bristol Zoological Gardens a few days before and spent some time watching
the chimps.Sadly,as is procedural,the
reports were later destroyed along with other files when “dead”.
But 1996 saw a letter arrived from the Isle of Benbecula,in the North Atlantic.The taxi driver mentioned in the press reports,Mr. John Elphinstone,was
now living on the isle but a relative had sent the article mentioning the beast
to him.He wanted me to know that he was
familiar with chimpanzees and their habits and was worried it might be approached
by a child or member of the public with an image of friendly “chimp tea party”
creatures in their heads.It was because
he saw the animal so clearly that he contacted the police and he pointed out
that the policeman had gotten a good long look at it –not the brief glimpse
suggested by the press.
Perhaps one of
the greatest mysteries surrounding The Barking Beast Of Bath involved the Royal
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals [RSPCA].Contact with the Press/Media was always
strictly guided and watched over.Their
Inspector at Bath
tried to take ludicrous measures to avoid me [as did other staff].An RSPCA Inspector’s face all over TV news
items as well as in the Press and same Inspector making statements on radio
would,you might think,be known to the RSPCA hierarchy but when Bath HQ told me
I needed to speak to Bristol I got the above letter.The Media sensation was totally ‘unknown’ to
them.In 1981 a similar statement came
from Bath HQ.
Back in 1980,smelly,cold and really needing a bath,I arrived home and
immediately telephoned Maureen Hall.I
told her that it was clear that one of the odd lights seen in 1979 was a
meteorite as that had been seen by amateur astronomers I knew.The other lights seemed to be aircraft and a
military helicopter.I emphasised that
there was no alien or aliens running around the area.What I was then told helped me decide to
leave BUFORA.
I was told that the new chairman had instigated a big publicity push and
had been contacted by Mr. Barker and a seeming promise of publicity was made
[but never kept].BUFORA had been told
about the meteorite and other information suggested to them that aircraft
lights were the “UFOs” and because there had been a report from the south east
of England
of a UFO and “monkey-like alien in silver” they decided to get me to
investigate:though they never had any
doubt it was an escaped chimpanzee.
Speculation was that Mr. Meyers was a friend of Mr. Pain,the local
Primate Protection League man and one of his colleagues.Mr. Barker,when I spoke to him on the
telephone told me he would send a list of people he’d spoken to and
added:”Check out where the Primate man lives”.Mr. Pain lived in Limpley Stoke.The suggestion,unsubstantiated,was that somehow the wall of silence was
due to a chimpanzee escaping locally.
The stripped bark that I saw looked as though it had been torn off in
places but clearly squirrels had been at work on others.No sign of giant squirrel anywhere.
But the idea that the beast “comes out in August when it gets warmer and
the new shoots appear on the trees” was mind boggling.No chimp could have survived the Winter of
1979-1980 out in the open.On the 12th
December,1979,it remained at 8 degrees Celsius for a 24 hour period with sharp
drops in the temperature throughtout the month.In January,1980 to temperature was fluctuating between 4 degrees Celsius
in the day and 2 degrees at night –and those were town temperatures.
Forraging would not be good for a chimpanzee.My guess was that a chimpanzee kept in the area,had
escaped twice;once in 1979 and again in 1980 and on both occasions was
recaptured after a few days,though chimpanzees once they get the liking for it
become habitual escapees as Longleat Safari Park found out in the early days.
It was as simple as that.
I wrote a report on this for the Flying Saucer Review which rejected the
item because I could not see the cosmic game being played out by paranormal
forces.
A more lengthy item was written
and sent to The Fortean Times who acknowledged it’s receipt and I was told in a
later phone conversation with one of the editors that the article would appear
in the next year [over ten years later and I’m still waiting]
However,UFO groups as well as various Fortean sources got copies of the
report and two even published the articles.The editor of one still wanted to make it a Fortean mystery despite the
facts and still does. I’ve even put the article online sending out links.So,just to “see”,I ran an internet
search.Not one source gives factual accounts
and American Monsters,Man Beast UK, Farshores,Scottish Big Cats,International
Folklore Tales as well as Tinwiki all list the Beast Of Brassknocker Hill as
either some paranormal Bigfoot type,simple myth and even worse.
Rather like the Dead Aquatic Creatures of Canvey Island [related in Some Things Strange And Sinister],very
little detail is given and even the basic data is distorted to keep it a
mystery,yet I have had several articles published in widely read magazines
explaining the events!
And
when HTV set two very young producers the task of making a 25 minute
documentary on the affair in the mid 1990s they were given complete files and I
arranged for them to meet and film those witnesses still alive.On the day of filming I waited but no TV
crew.Apparently they had decided to opt
for a group of sensationalist Cryptozoologists who had never even visited the
area and the whole programme turned into a very amateurish and horrendous to
watch “Blair Witch Project” spoof –the higher ups at TV Centre were not amused
and I don’t think the producers worked for HTV again.
So,please understand why I don’t like being called a Fortean or
Cryptozoologist.
References
1.Mystery Of Bath’s Beast Of Bark,The Guardian,23rd August,1979
2.Taxi! It’s the Beast,Daily Mirror,12th August,1980
3.Beware Of The Beast!,Bristol
Evening Post,12th August,1980
4.Report On The Barking Beast Of Bath:Escaped
Chimpanzee,Society for the
Investigation of The Unexplained
[SITU],October,1980. A copy of this
report
was sent to the RSPCA Bristol and Bath as well as Primate
Protection League.
Note:Other letters,documents,etc.,are
contained in my report The Barking Beast Of Bath:1979-1980 now
unavailable.All original material is
still held on file but contain personal information on witnesses,etc. so cannot
be released yet.
You do not really need to look that hard for other things to emerge -is the "Yowie's" left arm resting on a giant baboon head? There are other things matrixing produces in this image.
