Rhamphorhynchoid | Live Pterosaur

April 18, 2018January 16, 2019

Living Pterosaurs in Nonfiction Books

By cryptozoologist Jonathan Whitcomb

UPDATE: The links on this post (on non-fiction books about modern pterosaurs) have been shown to be safe, with “https” in the URL’s.

Let’s take a brief glance at a number of publications, each of which could be considered a paranormal book.

Strange & Unexplained Happenings (Volume three)

At the beginning of the book it says about itself:

. . . It picks up where the studies of the occult and parapsychology leave off, telling the rest of the story of the world’s mysteries—those dealing with strange natural and quasi-natural phenomena, things that seem to be a part of our world but are usually disputed or ignored by conventional science.

In the chapter “Folklore in the Flesh,” the first section gives us the following locations for creatures that some modern cryptozoologists could suspect were living pterosaurs:

Sudsexe (Sussex, England): 774 A.D. (serpents in the sky; fiery dragons)
Devonshire, England: 1762 (“twisting serpent” lit up the sky)
Nebraska, USA: mid-1800’s
Missouri River, USA: 1857-1858 (“flying serpent”)
Bonham, Texas, USA: 1873 (enormous serpent in a cloud)
Kansas, USA: 1873 (huge flying serpent)
Maryland, USA: 1883 (monstrous flying dragon)
Tanzania, early 20th century (flying dragon)
Namibia, early 20th century (large flying snake)
South Carolina, 1888 (huge serpent moving through the air)

Some of the above reports come from old newspaper articles.

Mysteries of the Unexplained

(Readers Digest Association; 1982)

The following potential flying creatures are mentioned on page 165:

Fire-breathing dragons
Thunderbird (American Indian lore)
Jersey Devil
Kongamato
Mothman

Folk Lore And Folk Stories of Wales

(first published in London in 1909, reprint in 1973)

On page 168, we read:

“. . . the winged were described as very beautiful. They were coiled in repose, and ‘looked as thought they were covered with jewels of all sorts. . . .’ it was ‘no old story’ invented to ‘frighten children,’ but . . . a real fact. His father and uncles had killed some of them, for they were ‘as bad as foxes for poultry.'”

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Books on Living Pterosaurs

. . . some of the nonfiction books are entirely about these featherless flying creatures and others include cryptids of other types or even are mostly about paranormal events in general (with non-extinct “pterodactyls” making up only a small part).

Strange & Unexplained Happenings

Volume 3: When Nature Breaks the Rules of Science

The first section of the chapter “Folklore in the Flesh” has a number of references to old sightings, at least some of which could have been encounters with non-extinct pterosaurs.

Living pterosaurs in old newspapers

An 1891 issue of the Los Angeles Herald newspaper had an article from an earlier California news publication, about reports of “dragons” flying over an area south of Fresno, around Selma.

Not Misidentified Frigate Birds

I know of three cases in which a person has seen a frigatebird, or a photo or video of that kind of oceanic bird, and thought it was a living pterosaur (or at least he put forward the idea that it was a non-extinct pterosaur). Take that in context: Over the past thirteen years, I’ve looked at hundreds of eyewitness sighting reports of possible living pterosaurs.

Science and Pterosaur Extinction

In science, Occam’s razor has also been called “the law of succinctness,” but the simplicity of that label can be misleading. It does not really mean “the simplest explanation is most likely correct.” A better definition might include “when competing hypotheses are otherwise equal in explaining something, the simpler hypothesis deserves preference, unless and until the less-simple one is someday found to explain things better.”

North Carolina Pterosaur

I would be delighted if many American newspapers would publish stories like that, for I feel sure that someday, in some town or city in America, some newspaper professional will be struck by the possibility that maybe great blue herons are not playing dress-up. Will that article, whenever and wherever it will be published, fly well enough for a Pulitzer Prize? I’m willing to help that writer make a run for it.

March 22, 2016March 22, 2016

About Umboi Island in Papua New Guinea

James (Jim) Blume interviewed this old native. The glowing ropen was trying to rob a human grave.

To some Americans and other Westerners, Umboi Island is known as the home of the ropen, reported to be a large long-tailed surviving pterosaur (Rhamphorhynchoid type), also called pterodactyl. Yet most Westerners have never heard of Umboi Island, even those who know that Papua New Guinea is an independent nation of islands between Australia and the Philippines. The following should be informative.

I recently got an email from a young man who asked seventeen questions about Umboi Island. At first, I was reluctant to give him any information until I knew his intentions, for it sounded like he wanted to go on an expedition there, to search for ropens. His questions were inadequate to prepare him for such a dangerous adventure, even if all of them were answered adequately.

He then told me that he was a high school student (perhaps with fewer years of life than the number of questions he was asking) and had no intention or ability to go on an expedition on Umboi Island. After he told me he was writing a novel, I felt that it was safe to give him the following answers, which are slightly edited in this post:

Question-1: Do most of them [natives on Umboi Island] speak English or is Tok Pisin more dominant (if at all)?

Answer-1: Tok Pisin is probably used more than English when the natives are communicating with each other. But within a village, the local language is used. A number of these local languages exist on Umboi. When a visitor comes from an English-speaking country like the USA or Australia (which is rare), then some of the natives will try to communicate in English or in a mixture of English, Pisin, and village-language words. Be aware, however, that most natives know very little English, if any, or they do not get enough practice in English to be able to use it if it’s needed.

Question-2: [Is] the estimated population around 15,000?

Answer-2: 15,000 population seems a little high to me, but I only explored a small part of the island in 2004. An average village might have about 150-300 persons living in it, but a few other huts may be found around a typical village.

Question-3: Is the island frequented by tourism and how is the overall opinion of this matter by the locals?

Answer-3: Rarely will a foreign tourist visit Umboi. Maybe a few natives from the mainland will visit Umboi on occasion, or from other smaller islands in the area, but many of those visitors will be natives who originally lived on Umboi and are just returning to visit relatives or friends.

Question-4: How is the infrastructure on the island? I’ve seen on google maps that they have at least one airfield, but how is it with cars, roads, electricity and communication (cell phone and satellite phone)?

Answer-4: The air field is not regularly maintained and is rarely used. If a native wants to communicate with someone on the other side of the island, he or she will walk there. Cars seem to be rare, except that two or three may be operating in or near Lab Lab (I was given a ride in a pickup there). Broken down bridges are not generally repaired, so cars have limited use.

Question-5: How diverse are the different cultures on the island itself?

Answer-5: Natives walk from one village to another [so ideas and attitudes can be shared]. I saw three churches in or near Gomlongon Village: Catholic, Baptist, and another Protestant one. To outsiders, however, many villages may look very similar.

Question-6: On your ropen blog, you mentioned that the inhabitants had strict property and trespassing laws, and that they had “man traps” as well. Would you say that the inhabitants would take violent actions against trespassers? Where you ever told any tales of punished trespassers?

Answer-6: The man traps were meant to keep native thieves from stealing a battery on Mount Bel. The battery was for powering a radio tower. In general, village leaders resent uninvited trespassers on what they consider their property, but my experience is that threats are more common than actual violence when outsiders are accused of trespassing.

Question-7: I’ve seen on google maps, two villages at the coastline (at the only part with high enough resolution to see them), are most villages at the coast or 50/50 coast-inland?

Answer-7: I have not explored all of Umboi, only mostly around Gomlongon and Opai villages and one other village near Mount Tolo (what is called “Mount Tangulop” on maps but that’s a mistake on the maps). Maybe half of the villages are on the coast, but I’m only guessing. I believe that malaria is more common on the coast than in the inland villages that are higher in elevation. Mosquitos are uncommon in Gomlongon. [I was giving my reasons why I thought so many natives live in higher elevations on this island, but I did not get into that reasoning in my answer to this high school student: Gomlongon Village is less hot in the evening than coastal villages and mosquitos appeared, to me, to be far less common up in the interior.]

Question-8: How is their will/opinion on modernization? Or are they more inclined to continue a more traditional life?

Answer-8: In Gomlongon and Opai, they are happy to use whatever technology they can get, if it’s not expensive.

Question-9: On google maps there seem to be vast areas of lighter green (especially one place in the south), is this an indication of open grass fields/low bushlands?

Answer-9: Some of the rain forest has been cut down [or burned off] for cultivation of crops.

Question-10: Is there any significant import and export of wares?

Answer-10: They have limited access to money. Crops are difficult to move because of the broken bridges. They have crops to sell but no easy way to get them out of their areas to where they could sell them.

Question-11: What’s the environment like? Welcoming? Harsh? Wet? I’ve read that it’s a temperate rain forest, is that true?

Answer-11: This is a tropical rain forest. It’s hot and humid on the coast, but up higher in elevation, inland like at Gomlongon and Opai, you can get some relief with a pleasant breeze in the evenings. Whenever you go higher in elevation you get lower temperatures, although the humidity may not change much: It’s still humid.

Question-12: How did you get to Umboi? Specifics would be nice. Example: You went to the San Diego Airport, flew to Lae, then took a boat to the island.

Answer-12: I took a flight from Los Angeles to New Zealand. I later took a flight from NZ to Cairns, Australia. From AU, I flew to the capital of Papua New Guinea, which is Port Moresby. My last flight was to the city of Lae (PNG). I waited a few days in Lae for when a ship would [take me] to Umboi.

Question-13: What are their villages like? Are the houses sturdy? Are the people nice?

Answer-13: Read my book: the fourth edition of Searching for Ropens and Finding God.

Question-14: What food did they commonly eat? What food is considered a delicacy to them?

Answer-14: Locally grown food mostly. Coconuts are so common that they have tired of eating them. [See #13]

Question-15: Do you know the PNGs government interest in the island? Is it just another island to them or is it the crown jewel?

Answer-15: See #13

Question-16: What’s most unique about this island? Besides the fact that there might be a living fossil that lives there.

Answer-16: Umboi appears to be similar to many other islands in PNG. [In fact, ropens may live on many islands of Papua New Guinea, for these large long-tailed pterosaurs are mostly nocturnal and relatively rarely seen by people in daylight.]

Question-17: Have you ever heard or encountered of people that have misinterpreted some kind of bird for being a juvenile ropen? [meaning people may have seen a bird but thought it was a ropen]

Answer-17: The natives know the local wildlife. They do not make a mistake like misidentifying a ropen or a bird or a Flying Fox fruit bat.

Conclusion

I wish the young man success in writing his fiction book. The ropen, however, is real.

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Umboi Island, Papua New Guinea

In the non-fiction book Searching for Ropens, the cryptozoological investigations of this creature are analyzed and compared with standard models that are popularly taught regarding science.

Ropen of Umboi Island

American cryptozoology author Jonathan Whitcomb believes the ropen of Umboi is related to the “Gitmo Pterosaur” of Cuba.

Ropen in Papua New Guinea

After he [Duane Hodgkinson] and his buddy walked into a clearing, they were amazed as a large creature flew up into the air. The men soon realized that it was no bird that started to circle the clearing. It had a tail “at least ten to fifteen feet long” . . .

What is a Ropen?

The tradition [from some natives on Umboi Island] says that [the long tail] is always straight except at the base where the tail connects to the body. This correlates precisely with the biology of the tails of Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs. They could not (or cannot) move except by a few vertebrae closer to the tail base. This is more cryptozoological evidence that “basal” long-tailed Rhamphorhynchoids are extant, not extinct.

Living Pterodactyls

An American World War II veteran says that he saw a live “pterodactyl” in New Guinea in 1944. . . . If this press release referred to an isolated account, we might dismiss the veteran’s report, but natives on the island of Umboi (in Papua New Guinea) have reported the same thing: the long-tailed bat-like “ropen” eats fish. This is just north of Finschhafen, where the American veteran saw a giant pterodactyl that had a tail “at least ten to fifteen feet long.”

June 8, 2015

The Ropen as a Modern Rhamphorhynchoid

Page 206 of "Reports of Living Pterosaurs in the Southwest Pacific"

What is a Rhamphorhynchoid, also called a basal pterosaur? A definition by a non-scientist could be “a long-tailed pterodactyl.” Why believe that the cryptid called ropen is a modern version of that kind of pterosaur? It’s not just the long tail on a reportedly featherless flying creature. Sighting reports of apparent “pterodactyls” often have a description of the end of the tail, and a common word used is “diamond.”

In truth, “science” has never proven that all species of pterosaurs became extinct millions of years ago. Let’s look at a few excerpts from two scientific papers about reports of modern pterosaurs.

Scientific Paper by Jonathan Whitcomb

Standard models of evolution assert that all species of dinosaurs and pterosaurs became extinct long ago and that their fossils are evidence for unlimited common ancestry, the extinction of the vast majority of species opening the way for those more fit to survive. . . . [but] investigations of reports of creatures whose descriptions suggest Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs in remote areas of Papua New Guinea were carried out between 1994 and 2007. . . .

The search for living pterosaurs is cryptozoological. Cryptozoology is the study of “hidden” or “unclassified” zoological species or possible species, especially in the early discovery stages. A number of expeditions in recent years have collected and analyzed eyewitness testimony, primarily in Papua New Guinea . . .

Jonah Jim and Jonathan Ragu, both [natives] of Umboi, made separate sightings in different areas of Umboi. However, both described a glowing, flying creature. When shown many illustrated silhouettes of birds, bats, and pterosaurs, both chose the Sordes Pilosus, a Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur as best fitting what they had seen (Woetzel-Guessman expedition).

From the scientific paper “Reports of Living Pterosaurs in the Southwest Pacific”

Scientific Paper by David Woetzel

Over the years Biblical scholars have speculated about the nature of the creature described in the Authorized Version as “the fiery flying serpent.” . . . recent cryptozoological research provides new insights into the identification and characteristics of this creature. Moreover interviews and personal observations from a 2004 expedition that I led to Papua New Guinea convinced me that a fiery flying serpent still survives on a remote island there. . . .

Described as a nocturnal creature, the Ropen possesses two leathery wings like a bat with “hands” on each wing, a long tail with a diamond-shaped flange on the end, and a prominent beak. The creature is thought to still inhabit the islands of New Britain and Umboi, located in the Bismarck Archipelago.

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Ropen on Dragon Blog

What is a ropen? A modern flying dragon? Could it be a misidentified flying fox fruit bat? True science requires we be specific: Ask a specific question that gets to a critical point.

A Long-Tailed Rhamphorhynchoid

What are the flying creatures called “ropens” on Umboi Island? . . . The following compilations of many eyewitness testimonies are taken in the context of a few of the second-hand accounts, with conclusions by Jonathan David Whitcomb.

Destination Truth Ropen Episode

Josh Gates leads an expedition team into a jungle in Papua New Guinea, as they search for evidence for a modern pterodactyl.

Ropen Bioluminescence in New Guinea

Let’s compare the words of four witnesses: three natives on Umboi Island and one British biologist on the mainland of New Guinea. Each describes flying lights: on two sides of Umboi and on the mainland to the west of Umboi.

Brian Hennessy Sighting of a Ropen

He said that no feathers were discerned by him but he could not be sure: It may have had feathers that he could not distinguish under the conditions of his sighting.

March 3, 2015April 11, 2015

Ropen Seen by Brian Hennessy

Brian Hennessy - He travels between China and Australia

Q & A with Jonathan Whitcomb

Regarding the 1971 sighting on an island in eastern New Guinea

Question #1: Did Brian Hennessy see a living pterosaur on Bougainville Island?

Answer: Yes he did, probably a Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur, as best as we can tell, without actually having the animal captured and in our hands.

Question #2: Was it related to the ropen, the apparent bioluminescent flying creature on Umboi Island?

Answer: Yes, in fact it’s quite likely even the same species.

Question #3: Why has this animal not yet been acknowledged by Western science?

Answer: As of early 2015, no living ropen or any recovered body seems to have come into the possession of any biologist. Part of the challenge is that this flying creature is mostly nocturnal, difficult to observe.

Question #4: Why was Hennessy so fortunate to have seen a ropen?

Answer: It was probably the noise of the truck driving on that road that morning in 1971. The creature may have been sleeping nearby when it was startled by the truck noise, perhaps the shifting of gears, whereupon the ropen flew up into the air.

Question #5: Why could Hennessy not be sure whether or not the thing had feathers?

Answer: He said that no feathers were discerned by him but he could not be sure: It may have had feathers that he could not distinguish under the conditions of his sighting. Some birds, including the oceanic Frigate bird, do not have obvious feathers, especially when seen from some distance. Biologists know that they have feathers, of course, for they are birds. Some eyewitnesses are positive that the ropen they had observed had no feathers, but Mr. Hennessy is just not one of those eyewitnesses. Nevertheless, he observed a number of important details. These included the large size of the head and the long and rather thin tail.

Question #6: If there may have been feathers, why think it was a pterosaur?

Answer: Mr. Hennessy did not give any indication that the creature had feathers. His observation was important, and his report included the following (sent to me in an email in 2006):

The head had no ‘normal’ beak. Rather there seemed to be (and this is difficult to describe) a kind of beak that was indistinguishable from the head, and the head seemed to continue this ‘point’ at the back of the head. There was a clear line running from the ‘beak’ to the back of the head . . . where the ‘line’ continued to protrude . . .

Answer (continued): We do not expect that any one eyewitness sighting report will be close to perfect in itself, for who can expect to have both a perfect observation and a perfect memory? Some eyewitnesses in the southwest Pacific have seen a flying creature that appeared very similar or somewhat similar to Hennessy’s. Gideon Koro, for example, described a gigantic featherless long-tailed “ropen” that had a tail length that he estimated at seven meters (23 feet); he was positive that the creature had no feathers. I believe it was the same species (or a closely related species) as the ropen that was seen by Mr. Hennessy. I believe these flying creatures are Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs, even if no paleontologist has yet found a fossil with very similar characteristics (both a horn-like head crest and a long tail).

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Brian Hennessy

Brian Hennessy is a professional psychologist who enjoys working in China. Why would he play a hoax that could do only harm to his reputation? And why would his description of a flying creature correlate so well with other eyewitness descriptions from the southwest Pacific?

Hodgkinson and Hennessy Sightings Compared

When two eyewitness testimonies agree on several points, the credibility of the most natural or direct interpretation of those points is strengthened. Accumulating evidence strengthens the case.

Scientific Paper on Living Pterosaurs

Most ropen sightings are of a bright but brief glow that moves approximately horizontally at about 330 ft (100 m) above ground level, often against a mountain background. . . . Of the nine American expeditions (1994–2007), six resulted in at least one sighting of the light. . . .

China – Australia Consult

Brian Hennessy is an Australian author, educator, and psychologist who has lived and worked in China for ten years. These days he divides his time between both countries.

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Live Pterosaurs in America – third edition – nonfiction – pure cryptozoology genre

Reader review:

Mr. Whitcomb does a thorough job questioning indoctrination and the close-mindedness of the Western world. Reading so many eye-witness reports of people who have seen living pterosaurs in America was mind-opening, to say the least. Speculation is not an easy thing to address, but Whitcomb does a noteworthy job stringing together testimony and speculation in a scientific, yet personal way. The passion that Whitcomb and the pterosaur witnesses feel about these investigations make this book a great read and keep the pages turning. . . . (R. Montgomery)