The above images were analyzed by the missile defense physicist Cliff Paiva, of BSM Research Associates. Paiva seems to have no doubt that these two glowing objects are closely related, even if they are large bioluminescent flying creatures not yet classified in Western science. One video was recorded in Florida; the other,  in Mexico. And these are only two sightings.

Yakima Lights

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.

Sightings of large glowing flying creatures—those have also been reported, in modern times, in widely diverse areas: Papua New Guinea, Los Angeles County, California; the Caribbean Sea; and in England.

Cheesman Lights and Marfa Lights

On the surface, it might seem better to tie the Cheesman lights to the ropen light of Umboi Island, Papua New Guinea, for all those lights, as individual lights, seem to last for only about five or six seconds or so, and individual CE-III Marfa Lights may last much longer. But the indava lights (seen just a couple of mountain ranges or so south of where Cheesman was) sometimes do glow longer than a few seconds.

I have noticed many Youtube videos that require attention: various flying lights, mostly without the vidoegrapher or uploader being aware of the possibility of bioluminescent flying creatures.

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Cryptozoology Book

Regain your faith in the human potential for courage by reading of eyewitnesses who bravely tell their experiences and cryptozoologists who explore sighting areas and interview those who have seen live pterosaurs. How did this escape the notice of American scientists? If you walk away from this book, how will you know?

Winged Dragons and Modern Pterodactyls

What do old dragons and old pterosaurs have in common? Celtic dragons had arrows at the end of their tails; they may relate to pterosaur tails. What about those Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur tails? Are not dragon tails also long? Perhaps most noteworthy are the wings: both pterosaurs and common artistic portrayals of big flying dragons have featherless wings.

This web page “Winged Dragons and Modern Pterodactyls” brings up a point about fictional stories that have non-fictional elements. Both grandmothers and wolves are actual living beings of this world, even though the story “Little Red Riding Hood” is a fictional story. In a similar way, old legends need not be 100% fictional. Dragon legends about giant fire-breathing monsters that could destroy villages with fiery breath—those fictional legends include monsters, humans, fire, and villages, but three of those elements are non-fictional in their general existence: humans, fire, and villages. Need we assume that any reference to a dragon must involve a creature completely unreal? Perhaps some of those old stories could be fictional in their exaggerations and embellishments but non-fictional in mentioning a large flying creature.

Flying Dragons in Australia

. . . sightings of pterosaurs flying, or something like that, have been reported by Australians, and those sightings have been in diverse areas, mostly coastal, especially in the west, south, and east. You would think they would be mostly on the north coast, being closer to Papua New Guinea and the ropen habitat, but there it is.

Live Dragons

Before the ship arrived on Umboi (Siassi), Luke and I met an old sailor who knew something about what we were seeking. “You want to catch Wawanar?” he asked. I assured him that we only wanted to get a “photo” of the flying animal. The old man told us that the dragon Wawanar is said to own the land and the sea; nobody can catch Wawanar.

Fiery Flying Serpent and Flying Dragons

I sometimes come across the word “dragon” in a communication with an eyewitness of what I suspect or believe was a live pterosaur, for example, the glowing dragon observed in England in 1987 or 1988 (I received an email from the eyewitness). In 2004, during my expedition trip to Papua New Guinea, I heard about the dragon called “Wawanar” by an old sailor. But most eyewitness use another word, like “dinosaur bird.”

“An investigation of what she may have seen should come first”

It seems that Hill thinks that I should have evaluated non-pterosaur explanations before publishing this brief report on a blog post. I suspect that Hill may not be familiar with this blog and its purposes, or was simply trying to discredit this account. Most critics I have encountered during the past eight years have actually tried to discredit the general idea that modern pterosaurs still fly, that they are not extinct; I will not get into that here, for Hill does not explicitly state that. This appears a good time for explaining some of the purposes of this blog.

Some eyewitnesses of apparent living pterosaurs may never send me an email or give me a phone call. I can understand that. But some of them may be comforted in reading about other eyewitness accounts, for it eases their minds: They are not crazy for seeing something that Western indoctrination proclaims cannot exist. I feel that is a worthy purpose. But there is more.

Eyewitnesses who have sent me an email or given me a phone call usually had read something online, often something I had written about reports of apparent live pterosaurs; in other words, publishing reports of living pterosaurs results in more eyewitnesses coming forward. I suspect that some of the eyewitnesses might never report their sightings to any cryptozoologist if they had not learned of someone (me) who specializes in listening and taking such reports seriously. Part of the purpose of this Live Pterosaur blog is to encourage more eyewitnesses to come forward.

What if another eyewitness in Pennsylvania has had a close encounter with a ropen-like flying creature: a glowing pterosaur? How could that person find the courage to report such a weird experience? The December 15, 2011, post “Strange Flying Creature” (mentioned above) gives few details, mostly because the eyewitness has not yet given me much more than that. But what an impact it could make on another eyewitness! This short report, imperfect as it is, might result in a much more detailed sighting account, a report that will be much more useful, for it could give another eyewitness the courage to come forward.

“To assume that it is a ropen or pterosaur is ridiculous”

The glowing pterosaur or bioluminescent ropen is not necessarily the only explanation for the Pennsylvania sighting, of course. But Hill needs to understand that the eyewitness gave her sighting report to me because she thinks it could have been a ropen. Nothing in that blog post suggests that it must have been a bioluminescent pterosaur; in fact, I mentioned, “it is sufficient to consider that it was a possible American ropen.”

We need to keep in mind that the eyewitness said, “I have found that a pterosaur is identical to what we saw.” That deserves some consideration, at least, unless and until a better explanation is found for her experience.

We also need to keep in mind the subtitle of this blog: “Investigating Reports of Living Pterosaurs.” The point is the continuing nature of the investigation of each sighting report. Although some reports have many sighting-details given, and may have been analyzed in detail, I do not wait for all that before writing a post about a sighting. The key is “investigating,” not “investigated.”

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Press Room for News Releases on Live Pterosaurs

Pterodactyl Reported in Papua New Guinea

Glowing Creatures Videotaped in Papua New Guinea

Reports of Living Pterosaurs in the U.S.A. not Hoaxes

Unmasking a Flying Predator in Texas

etc

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“How are sightings in the United States related to those in the southwest Pacific? How do some apparent nocturnal pterosaurs pertain to bats, and how are bats irrelevant? How could modern living pterosaurs have escaped scientific notice? These mysteries have slept in the dark, beyond the knowledge of almost all Americans, even beyond our wildest dreams (although the reality of some pterosaurs is a living nightmare to some bats). These mysteries have slept . . . until now.”

Purchase your own copy of this amazing nonfiction cryptozoology book, on Amazon or from select book-sellers. Don’t forget: the third edition of Live Pterosaurs in America.

A few weeks ago, I received an email from a lady who was a passenger in a car one night; both driver and passenger saw a glowing creature as the strange thing flew by. Afterwards she did some research and told me, “I have found that a pterosaur is identical to what we saw.” She has not yet told me any details about her research nor what image she may have seen that looked like what was encountered; but it is sufficient to consider that it was a possible American ropen. The sighting was in Pennsylvania, and I believe it involved bioluminescence.

She also mentioned that the flying creature ”was not too terribly high off the ground” and that it was ”quite large and seemed to be lit or glowing. . . . It was one of the strangest things I have ever seen.” She is one of the few eyewitnesses who have reported both a form of an apparent living pterosaur and a glow coming from the creature: strange indeed.

Demon Flyer

That brings up the idea that “ropen” comes from two native words. A brief reflection makes that appear unlikely, for how could such a short word come from two words that mean “demon” and “flyer?” No, it is much more likely that the original meaning of the word was something like ”flyer.”

Strange Flying Creatures and Bulverism

“Bulverism” C. S. Lewis labeled the slick ploy of avoiding reasoning on a subject by pointing out the reason ones opponent is so silly. Do some criticisms of living-pterosaur investigations qualify as bulverism? I believe so.

Let us not make the mistake of some critics. When eyewitnesses report something strange, and the reports have similarities, we need not reject all the reports simply because they appear strange. In this wonderful world in which we live, some creatures appear strange, including some creatures that fly.

Combining “Strange” and “Like a Pterosaur”

If at least some modern pterosaurs have bioluminescence, why do we have so few sighting reports of glowing pterosaurs? Simply combine the two: uncommon modern pterosaurs and brief bioluminescent flashes. When two things are uncommon, the probability of observing both of them together is more rare. But there is more going on hear than just multiplying two improbabilities together. In our Western society, what would happen if somebody reported seeing a glowing pterodactyl? It would sound much too weird, like a fire breathing dragon or like a . . . well . . . a glowing pterodactyl. In Western countries like the United States, we would not expect many eyewitnesses to report a luminous pterosaur to a newspaper, and few newpapers would print that kind of thing; but if a nonfiction author wrote books about that kind of thing, then a few eyewitnesses would send him their reports. That is what has happened to me, since I started writing my books. And I pay attention.

Newspaper Articles – Live Pterosaur Media Center

The Houston Chronicle, by circulation the ninth largest newspaper in the United States, pulled away the welcome mat to “flying dinosaurs” that might want to fly over southwest Texas; it emphasized Whitcomb’s lack of credentials and experience. But “What’s going on in Marfa?” (December 19, 2010 issue) was elicited by the press release “Unmasking a Flying Predator in Texas,” which was written by Whitcomb after he had received, over several years, eyewitness reports of apparent living pterosaurs in Texas, from citizens of Texas. The Houston Chronicle writer failed to mention that.

This Houston Chronicle article deserves attention, although I had previously written about it briefly on this blog (Dinosaur Bird post). Before getting into details, I emphasize that I am grateful that “What’s going on in Marfa” was published by that newspaper, for it may have given at least a few readers the opportunity to consider the possibility of modern living pterosaurs, or at least to know that some people take it seriously.

Unfortunately, the staff writer for the Houston Chronicle, Claudia Feldman, did not take my cryptozoological hypothesis seriously. She asked me about my education and about my ideas about Marfa Lights, but appeared to set aside the sightings that make up the foundation of my investigations. Considering the politics of major news media, this should not be surprising. Any idea contrary to the beliefs of the great majority of newspaper readers—that is rarely taken seriously unless ample or obvious evidence appears in other news reports. What media writer would want to take a serious risk of censure? The idea that glowing pterosaurs live in Texas—that can too easily appear too paranormal to most news writers. That said, I feel that Feldman made a serious error in neglecting the many eyewitness accounts, reports from citizens of Texas who have encountered apparent pterosaurs; I have interviewed some of them myself, and have found them to be credible.

Front Page News – Live Pterosaur

The Antwerp Bee-Argus was more kind to the possibility of live pterosaurs. The August 5, 2009, issue of this weekly newspaper in Ohio gave the subject the front page, unfortunately misspelling “pterosaur” in the title, but giving an open-minded approach to a strange sighting by a local man.

Few major newspapers have published eyewitnesses accounts of apparent living-pterosaurs, at least in recent years. As reported in the Antwerp Bee-Argus, they “have been thought by many scientists to have gone extinct many millions of years ago,” that is, the pterosaurs, not yet major newspapers.

The Australian Steven Cottingham was the government’s Officer-In-Charge (Kiap) of Umboi and surrounding islands, and he lived on Umboi Island for one and a half years (natives call this island “Siassi,” although that word is also used for the group of islands that include “Big Siassi”).

His first email included:

My sighting occurred at night near Lab Lab on the southern tip of Umboi. The light lasted for four to five seconds, and until reading your reports now, have never been able to explain the sighting. The natives I was with simply said it was a spirit light!

I asked him a few questions:

Thank you, Steven

Thank you for telling me about your sighting. May I ask some questions?

1) Do you recall the time of night?

2) What direction was the light traveling (or was it stationary)?

3) Was there any color to the light or was it just white?

He answered:

1) Approximately 7 pm. I had been out fishing off the reef.

2) Horizontal, across the top of the Coconut palms. It was moving slowly and in a wavelike motion. It was too high and covered too much distance to be a person walking with a lantern, but I checked at daybreak to see if there was a walking track on a hill behind the coconut palms. There was nothing at that height. The coconuts were on flat ground.

3) Yes, dull orange. Not as round as the moon, but bigger than what a Coleman lantern would be.

I suspected that the “wavelike motion” related to wing flapping, but I asked him an open question: “Was the wavelike motion from side-to-side or up-and-down?” He answered, “Rhythmic, gentle UP-AND-DOWN as the light flowed in the direction of left to right.” This confirmed the possibility that he had observed a flying creature.

Cottingham in Context

A sighting by the biologist Evelyn Cheesman, a few decades before Cottingham’s sighting, is described in one of her books:

In her book, The Two Roads of Papua, she said that the flash lasted “about four or five seconds, but that flash had been a little distance away from the first. Flashes continued at intervals. . . . a most intriguing mystery; because by no possibility could there be human beings out there using flash-lamps at intervals . . .”

Cheesman’s sighting was on the mainland of what is now Papua New Guinea, west of Umboi Island.

Notice that the government official said, “The light lasted for four to five seconds,” and the biologist said that the flashes lasted “about four or five seconds.” That is very close to what natives on Umboi Island have said about how long the ropen light lasts.

On a different note of the same composition:

Are Live Pterodactyls Only Misidentified?

“Some skeptics have suggested that this flying creature is just a misidentified bird. One or two skeptics have even suggested it is just a Manta Ray or Singray, for those fishes, at times, can jump out of the water and might appear to fly.

“There are major problems with a gliding-fish interpretation, however. One skeptic said a little about two sightings in New Guinea: the Hodgkinson sighting of 1944 and the Hennessy sighting of 1971. Details were entirely absent in this critic’s writing, however. Neither sighting could have been from any fish.”

BBC Wildlife Article by Richard Mabey (December, 2009, issue)

[The will-o'-the-wisp] was once frequently seen in marshy areas, and I’ve found records for the Waveney Valley where I live. None [of the records] are later than the 1830′s . . . the floating and bouncing, the eerie motion against the wind. One Norfolk fenman remarked that it “flew like an owl.”

But this spring an Australian reader of BBC Wildlife, Fred Silcock, sent me a copy of his self-published book about will-o’-the-wisps Down Under, where they’re called Min Min Lights. It’s based on more than 600 first-hand accounts, and ends with an extraordinary theory about their origins.

Mabey mentioned how Silcock obtained physical evidence for Barn Owl bioluminescence: “He commissioned histological examinations of a number of road-kill barn owls . . . [examinations] revealed dermal structures bearing similarities to known organs of luminescence found in some fish species.”

The Min Min Light (nonfiction book by Silcock, revised edition)

From page 49:

Eddie Sutton of Logan, Victoria, told me of a walk around the farm he took with his grandfather one day . . . when Eddie was a boy. They came upon a dead bird, which Eddie said he later believed was a Barn Owl. ‘That looks like the bird that lights itself up,’ said grandfather.

Eddie’s grandfather, long ago, once went to sleep on a haystack. He was awakened by a bright light next to him. The light rose quickly and flew away, revealing itself as a bird.

From page 50:

“The wife was with me [Mantung, South Australia] and we went into a paddock . . . we saw a bright orange light shoot up from the ground and hover over the trees . . . about 150 metres away. As we got closer the light came down and settled into the canopy of one tree. After a minute or so the light shut off and sitting where it had been was a white owl . . . The Barn Owl is white, isn’t it?” (words of Dennis Stasinowsky)

Marfa Lights of Texas (differs from Min Min and will-o’-the-wisp)

Residents around this part of the state, human residents, see some evidence of intelligence in these lights; that’s why they are called “dancing devils.” Along with that, Mr. Bunnell, one of the world’s leading authorities on the “ML’s” (mystery lights) has been amazed by their complexity. It seems that the scientists, including Bunnell, have no good explanation for that complexity. Non-living entities are deficient, entirely deficient, in any reasonable way, when it comes to reasons for dancing lights, and the dancing are far too complex.

Weird Bat-Like Creatures

The eyewitness called the strange flying creatures “monkey birds,” although he also mentioned a lack of feathers. He called it that, because of the strange call that he heard them make. The original report (or near-original) is found at Lights in the Texas Sky.

We have seen and heard a strange nocturnal, bat-like creature . . . huge, light grey, skin with no fur, feathers or scales. It silently swoops down at you with giant bat wings. . . . We keep our chickens and goats, small dogs and cats safely housed at night, however two of our cats who sneaked out one night onto the roof disappeared without a trace of fur, blood or any evidence of what exactly happened. They wouldn’t run away, and our outdoor watch dogs don’t allow any coyotes or ground traveling predators anywhere near us.

Pterosaurs in the Western United States

Peter Beach, a professor of biology, at night witnessed what he suspects was a bioluminescent flying predator over the Yakima River in the state of Washington. Much of his account is in the nonfiction cryptozoology book Live Pterosaurs in America.

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.

Obviously meteors do not fly horizontally under cloud cover; in addition, Professor Beach mentions that one of the flying lights flew in a curve. He also noted one particular pair of light blasts that caused the local Night Hawk birds to scream in response. It suggests that the bioluminescent flying creatures (pterosaurs or not) were hunting Night Hawks.

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Fiery Flying Serpent and Marfa Lights

What about the Fiery Flying Serpent? For Moses, when the Israelites needed to be healed from venom, what would have been the worst possible choice of an animal image to use as a symbol, to strengthen the faith of the people of God? How obvious! Use anything except the image of a snake, for that animal relates to Satan in the Garden of Eden.

I’ve written much about my investigations over the past eight years, much of it concerning the testimonies of eyewitnesses whom I have interviewed (more recently concerning conjectures about Marfa Lights). From various countries, various languages, various cultures, and various religions, these common persons simply tell me about their encounters with flying creatures that have various names. Most of the flying creatures are described with long tails, and most eyewitnesses have various degrees of certainty about the absence of feathers. Those two factors alone suggest living pterosaurs.

New View on the Fiery Flying Serpent

In our modern technical world, we are struck by an ancient Hebrew phrase. “Fiery flying serpent,” directly interpreted, appears unconnected with any living thing, or at least unclassified by modern standard biology as living at the time of Moses. Some Bible scholars have assumed that a story of anything like a flying fire-breathing dragon could not have come from any real animal. Thus, to avoid a strange direct interpretation, we’ve been fed indirect meanings for “fiery” and “flying.”

I sometimes come across the word “dragon” in a communication with an eyewitness of what I suspect or believe was a live pterosaur, for example, the glowing dragon observed in England in 1987 or 1988 (I received an email from the eyewitness). In 2004, during my expedition trip to Papua New Guinea, I heard about the dragon called “Wawanar” by an old sailor. But most eyewitness use another word, like “dinosaur bird.” Of course, eyewitnesses usually mean neither a dinosaur nor a bird, but that’s a phrase that may come to mind.

Today I sat in front of my computer, delighted at the detailed sighting report in an email from a lady who, as a child, had observed a “pterodactyl,” around 1965, at the Guantanamo Bay military station in Cuba. Her email indirectly confirmed the 1971 sighting, at Guantanamo, by Eskin Kuhn, directly corroborating the concept that live pterosaurs can be found in the Caribbean, even at a particular shoreline of Cuba, at least in the mid-twentieth century.

Pterosaur in Cuba in 1965

In the words of the eyewitness

I was around six years old. . . . We were walking down near the boat yards, headed home. . . . where it was sandy underfoot, sparse scrub vegetation around four feet tall . . . suddenly it sat up, as if it had been eating something or resting. . . . It was at about 2 o’clock [probably meaning to the right of where they were heading] right in front of us about thirty feet away. All of us froze for about five seconds, then it leaned to its left and took off with a fwap fwap fwap sound . . .  and flew to its left and disappeared behind trees and terrain.

It did have a tail and it had a diamond shaped tip . . . The skin was a leathery, brownish reddish color. It had little teeth, a LOT of them . . . It was as tall as a man when it stood up on it haunches.

This lady has seen the sketch by Eskin Kuhn and she told me it is very close to the appearance of what she had seen; she told me that she would not make any major change to that sketch other than shortening the tail slightly and lengthening the wings slightly and making the head slightly curved.

One of two pterosaurs that the U. S. Marine Eskin Kuhn saw in Cuba in 1971

“I did interview him [Eskin Kuhn, eyewitness who had drawn this sketched] by phone just a few weeks ago, and I found his response to my surprise phone call truly enlightening: He was highly credible in his manner of speaking and his answers to my unexpected questions. This mature man has not been playing a hoax for four decades, for everything points to an honest reporting of a real experience. In light of many other sightings, by many other eyewitnesses, Mr. Kuhn’s sketch now deserves serious attention.”

 

Eskin Kuhn at Guantanamo Bay, 1971

Gitmo Pterosaur Seen by Kuhn

“I was not stationed to the barracks; but to 2nd Battallion, 8th Regiment (reinforced), H&S Co., 106mm recoiless rifle platoon. . . . It was a beautiful, clear summer day . . . most of the platoon was in the new barracks “hanging out”. I was looking in the direction of the ocean when I saw an incredible sight. It mesmerized me! . . .  I saw two Pterosaurs . . . flying together at low altitude, perhaps 100 feet, very close in range from where I was standing, so that I had a perfectly clear view . . .

“. . .  the texture of the wings appeared to be very similar to that of bats . . . they had a long tail trailing behind with a tuft of hair at the end.”

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Marfa Lights as Flying Predators

Recently, two glowing pterosaurs were observed flying together in the Caribbean, between Cuba and Haiti. The lady who reported those two flying creatures was not alone in being an eyewitness on that night on her cruise ship; her daughter can corroborate that sighting. At other times, and in other areas of North America, other eyewitnesses have seen large flying creatures that glow at night. At least some of these may relate to the Marfa Light of southwest Texas, for many sightings of apparent pterosaurs come from various parts of Texas.

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Live Pterosaurs in America, third edition, nonfiction

Read the amazing stories that newspaper editors rarely tell the public: eyewitness accounts of living pterosaurs in the United States of America. Learn for yourself the astonishing secret: These flying creature, many of them huge and featherless and with long tails, are not extinct but still living in North America. How amazing! Live Pterosaurs in America.

This nonfiction cryptozoology book will enlighten you about these living “pterodactyls” that sometimes are seen to fly at night. One chapter is devoted to the Marfa Lights of Texas, but many of the 48 contiguous states of the U.S.A. are included: California, New Mexico, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, Wisconsin, Kansas, etc. Find out for yourself about the sighting by Eskin Kuhn, the U.S. Marine who witnessed those two pterosaurs in Cuba, in 1971.