Category: Lights, strange

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Ropen Expedition Ten Years Ago

Glowing Pterosaurs in Papua New Guinea

I took the flight from Los Angeles International Airport ten years ago tomorrow, to eventually arrive in Papua New Guinea, to search for ropens. How did the living-pterosaur expeditions in those remote tropical rain forests promote awareness that similar flying creatures live in the Americas? That deserves attention.

That expedition in Papua New Guinea required many months of preparation, but when I returned to the United States, early in October of 2004, I was ill prepared for the next few years, when I would get many sighting reports of apparent American ropens. Few persons should have been less shocked than me, to learn that similar flying creatures live in the USA, yet it took some getting use to, for I was still a child of Western culture and our part of this wonderful world, the American part, appears so scientific, so undragonish.

How could it be possible for a real dragon, on any night it chooses, to fly over the Smithsonian castle in Washington D.C.? The most popular science fiction movies show pterodactyls (none of them glowing with any bioluminescence) flying over the most remote tropical rain forests of the planet. Nonetheless, which is more believable:

  1. Dinosaurs and pterosaurs from eggs laid in nests in wilderness areas?
  2. Dinosaurs and pterosaurs extracted from ancient blood in mosquitos?

I choose well-hidden eggs, for no miraculous DNA magic-manipulation is needed for those little darlings to hatch and grow. At least for some species of pterosaurs, it’s much easier to believe in natural nocturnal flying creatures, glowing in the sky and causing ancient people to write about fire-breathing dragons.

Kept in a Corner of Earth or Flying Around the World?

So how exactly do you prevent a large flying creature from spreading out across the globe over a period of thousands of years? You don’t. Some butterflies get blown across a sea or even an ocean on occasion, and some birds navigate across much of the earth, in extraordinary migrations. A large dragon can certainly do the same, and flying dragons have swept across worldwide human cultures, through countless stories, for countless centuries. Don’t even think about trying to hold one of them down on the ground in Papua New Guinea or in any other island or continent in the southwest Pacific.

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Jonathan David Whitcomb in 2004, near Gomlongon Village, Umboi IslandJonathan Whitcomb on Umboi Island

 Sling shots on a table in a hotel in Papua New GuineaSling shots, gifts for villager leaders

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A Glowing Ropen in New Mexico

The moon had already gone behind the trees, by the middle of that night a week ago Monday, so Mr. Slack and his buddy searched the sky for the Andromeda Nebula. This required using a low-magnification eyepiece, fortunately, to locate that galaxy, allowing the amateur astronomer to see the flying creature sweep through the field of view.

Ropen Only Extinct on Wikipedia

Regarding the definition of “ropen,” that encyclopedia-dictionary quotation is outdated. In my nonfiction Searching for Ropens and Finding God, it is defined thus: “A modern pterosaur with Rhamphorhynchoid characteristics.”

Destination Truth Ropen Episode

These great winged beasts — which possess leathery wings, a flanged tail, teeth-lined beaks and razor-sharp claws — are reputedly nocturnal . . .

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Ropen or Pterosaur in New Mexico

An amateur astronomer, standing outside his New Mexico home, about 140 miles west of Lubbock, Texas, saw an apparent bioluminescent nocturnal pterosaur on September 1, 2014. It was gliding across the telescope’s field of view, which was at low magnification for finding the Andromeda Nebula. Michael Slack, of Roswell, New Mexico watched the flying creature both through the eyepiece and by direct observation.

Possible Ropen Bioluminescence

The eyewitness said, “As to there being any ‘lights’ or luminescence…the grayish colored areas of my sketches was a dull grayish brown (Brackish) color that could easily be seen with the naked eye against the night sky. The yellow colored pencil I used in my sketches represents the “Dull” yellowish spotting I saw. On the drawing of the winged creature if you will notice there is some yellow color added…this also represents the area of the creature that looked to me like the most illuminated aspects/parts of the thing combined with the afore mentioned grayish/brown coloring.”

Other Night Sightings of Possible Pterosaurs in Western USA

From the book Searching for Ropens and Finding God (third edition) we read about sightings of strange nocturnal flying creatures:

That report prepared me for an email I received years later, early in 2012, about two men who had seen two huge flying creatures about twenty-five miles to the south, over San Diego [California]. One of the men told me, “It was about 8 pm. . . . it was a really clear night cuzz it had rained the day before. We were standing in the street . . . from the west came this dark object in the sky. It was right over us [90-120 feet high] . . . it looked like a huge bird, it was gliding in the air . . . it turned around and it stood still in the air, it was flapping its wings while it was there. Then . . . came another one . . . as it got close to the other one they both went east.”

From a California Newspaper Article in 1891

[Introduction to Los Angeles Herald article] The Fresno sportsman now goes gunning for pterodactyls. These are dragons who lived in the carboniferous age, but who forgot to get petrified . . .

FRESNO, July 31. The report that two strange dragons with wings have recently appeared in the swamps east of Selma was at first regarded by many as a sen- sational story without foundation in fact, but after different persons at different places had claimed to have seen the strange creatures it began to be thought worth investigating. . . .

The men who live along the swales and sand hollows east and southeast of Selma on the evening of July 13th heard strange sounds in the air just after dark, like the rushing of wings when some large bird passes swiftly through the air overhead. At the same time a cry was heard, resembling that of a swan, though enough different to make it plain it was not a swan . . .

[On another night two men] were surprised to hear a strange, strangling noise in the deep swale under the bridge. In a moment there was a heavy flapping of wings and the two monsters rose slowly from the water and flew so near the men that the wind from their wings was plainly felt.

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Glowing Ropen in New Mexico

The moon had already gone behind the trees, by the middle of that night a week ago Monday, so Mr. Slack and his buddy searched the sky for the Andromeda Nebula. This required using a low-magnification eyepiece, fortunately, to locate that galaxy, allowing the amateur astronomer to see the flying creature sweep through the field of view.

Ropen of Papua New Guinea

Jonathan David Whitcomb, a forensic videographer, interviewed Hodgkinson, in 2004, and found his testimony credible [the sighting itself was in New Guinea in 1944]. In 2005, Garth Guessman, another ropen investigator, in Montana video-taped his own interview with Hodgkinson and the session was analyzed by Whitcomb, who became even more convinced the World War II veteran was telling the truth: The man had seen a ropen.

“Pterodactyl” in Southern States

“I live in central [New Mexico]. Fourteen years ago, in [Socorro], N.M., me and a close friend, who now has a masters in biology, were hiking during the midday sun at [a] box canyon and something blocked the sun for a moment. We both looked up to see what did that and saw a large flying animal.”

Live Pterosaurs in Texas

Getting back to the lady’s encounter northwest of Austin, she told her husband, “It looked like a pterodactyl.” Note that she first was thinking or hoping for a commonplace explanation: a big turkey vulture, only this thing had a long neck and a pointed beak and head. The wingspan was the length of the water trough, six feet, and it was “at least four foot tall.”

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Marfa Lights and Bioluminescence

I recommend the nonfiction book Hunting Marfa Lights, by James Bunnell. It is the best resource I know of for data on the more mysterious of the lights. This book should be a major reference for any researcher of this phenomenon, at least until we have a major breakthrough in discovering the nature of the CE-II and CE-III mystery lights (ML) of Marfa, Texas.

Photo by imelda of a photograph of a CE-III flying Marfa Light

The above is a photograph of a CE-III Marfa Light, flying horizontally

What do I mean by “major breakthrough?” I believe that a future discovery involving Marfa Lights may involve capturing an animal, but that requires an explanation. Let’s begin with strange lights outside of Texas.

Ropen Lights of Papua New Guinea

I led the first of the two ropen expeditions of 2004 on Umboi Island, Papua New Guinea. After interviewing three important eyewitnesses just south of Lake Pung, I began to return to Gomlongon with my natives guides and my interpreter. We met a man, Jonah Jim, who also had seen the huge flying creature. Of course with his limited English, he did not know the word “bioluminescence,” although he surely knew of glowing things in the sea.

I was tired and anxious to get back to Gomlongon and prepare to leave the island, for my funds were running low; I took no notes of my brief communication with Jonah Jim. Fortunately, a few weeks later, Garth Guessman and David Woetzel, on the second ropen expedition of that year, found this eyewitness and interviewed him with a detailed questionnaire. After my associates returned to the USA, I was thrilled at what they had learned from Jonah Jim.

By the way, I had little or no knowledge of Marfa Lights in 2004.

Here is part of what Jonah Jim revealed to us, quoting from the second edition of my cryptozoology book Searching for Ropens:

Page 95:

. . . this young man saw the ropen not as a vague, distant light but as a creature—close. In addition to the glow, he saw the long tail.

Page 113:

All six members of his family were together when the ropen, without wing flapping, flew “directly overhead.” . . . Only the tail was glowing and it was blue, “a shade darker than sky blue.” The “wingspan” [he estimated to be] six to seven meters; tail length, two-and-a-half to three meters . . .

Jonah Jim is hardly visible high up in this coconut tree, south of Lake Pung, on Umboi Island in Papua New Guinea

Can you see Jonah Jim in the coconut tree? (Photo by Whitcomb)

In other words, we have no need to rely on native traditions to tie together the flying lights to the giant flying creatures. And Jonah Jim was not alone. Guessman and Woetzel also interviewed Jonathan Ragu, who also saw a ropen at night: the general form, the shape of the wings, and the glow emanating from the flying creature.

So for Americans who have heard about the strangest kinds of Marfa Lights in Texas, it’s not so strange to consider bioluminescent flying creatures in Texas; we have the glowing ropen that may be related.

Why Should CE-II and CE-III be Bioluminescent Creatures?

Take the CE-III’s first. They sometimes fly long distances well above the desert vegetation, though not as high as airplanes normally fly at night: Sometimes the CE-III’s fly just a few feet off the ground. Those uncommon glowing balls commonly turn off and on. Ropen lights also have a limit to how long they can stay on; they have a shorter duration than Marfa Lights of CE-II and CE-III types.

Bunnell calls the truly unexplained glowing objects around Marfa “mystery lights” or ML. CE-III mystery lights are absent from the Marfa area for weeks at a time. They may be seen in the same area two nights in a row (in warmer weather), but they then commonly disappear for weeks. As far as I can tell from analyzing Bunnell’s data, this CE-III type of light never returns to this area of Texas after 4-10 days or so. When these lights leave, they are gone for weeks. The explanation is simple.

Unless the hunting is especially successful, the bioluminescent flying predators (BFP) will move on to another area of Texas or Mexico, on a night following an appearance near Marfa. And when would hunting be most likely to be especially successful? In warmer weather, when prey is more active and easier to find. Can you guess what Bunnell’s data shows for weather when the CE-III’s are seen two nights in a row? It’s on warmer nights.

What about CE-II mystery lights? They are similar to CE-III’s except that they do not fly; they are stationary. How does that relate to my theory? Flying creatures do not always fly.

Many other details in Bunnell’s data fit perfectly well with the Bioluminescent Flying Predator theory, notwithstanding his reluctance to consider such an unorthodox interpretation. I don’t blame him. After all, the glowing ropen of Papua New Guinea is considered by those who search for it to be a modern living pterosaur, and “not everybody embraces a live pterodactyl.”

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Explanation for Marfa Lights

The author of Hunting Marfa Lights, James Bunnell, said nothing about the following theory in his book. I informed him of part of my theory early in 2010, after the publication of his [book].

Marfa Lights in Texas

. . . a press release about Marfa Lights, suggesting they might be related to  the ropen lights of Papua New Guinea . . .

Marfa Lights – Flying Predators?

James Bunnell has observed and videotaped those strange flying lights that appear near Marfa only a few times each year . . .

Marfa Lights on Consecutive Nights

In the book Hunting Marfa Lights, James Bunnell reveals, “On rare occasions I have observed MLs [mystery lights in the Marfa area of Texas] repeat their location but only on consecutive nights.”

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Attracting a Pterosaur

The following was sent to me by a blog reader who suggests a possibility for attracting a nocturnal bioluminescent pterosaur:

“Has anyone tried the obvious strategy of luring a pterosaur with a glowing decoy? If there are still living pterosaurs, they would be quite rare, and anxious to find a mate (assuming they use their glow like fireflies do.)” [From Joe]

Well, Joe, I believe that some persons have unintentionally done just that, through simply driving a car at night. I have never encountered a nocturnal pterosaur myself (not yet), but I have encountered eyewitnesses who have been surprised and even terrorized, at night, by a glowing pterosaur who appeared to enjoy car chasing.

One case involved a young man who was traumatized by an apparent glowing pterosaur that chased his car for some distance at night. The young man later went through many sessions with a psychologist. How tragic if that psychologist assumed that there was no such flying creature!

Driving While Under the Influence of a Pterosaur

. . . Americans (at least a few Americans) observed Drive Safely Work Week . . . I doubt we will ever have Drive Safely While Witnessing a Live Pterodactyl Week. But in the United States, driving may be the most common activity when someone sees an apparent living pterosaur . . . Within a period of about three years, I received reports of at least ten sightings involving driving, in seven states . . .

American Ghost Lights (bioluminescent pterosaurs)

My associates and I have a unique perspective, having studied the ropen light of Papua New Guinea. We know, from many eyewitness testimonies, that those nocturnal lights correlate with sightings of glowing flying creatures described like giant Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs.

Live Pterosaurs in America -third edition of the nonfiction book - covers

From the Acknowledgements page of the third edition of Live Pterosaurs in America:

Ignoring previous ridicule from those who would not listen, Hodgkinson told us of his experience, helping prepare the way for many expeditions in the southwest Pacific. Alongside countless other American veterans of World War II, who risked their lives to preserve our freedom, he faced the threat of death in a faraway land. But his bravery in reporting a giant living “pterodactyl” gave us another freedom, even the freedom to believe in a life thought to have been long extinct—featherless flying creatures unlike any bat, some of them gigantic, both faraway and here in America: live pterosaurs.

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Marfa Lights on Consecutive Nights

In the book Hunting Marfa Lights, James Bunnell reveals, “On rare occasions I have observed MLs [mystery lights in the Marfa area of Texas] repeat their location but only on consecutive nights.” (See the middle of page 165). One instance of that phenomenon was recorded late in 2008 and found to be from a night-mirage effect on a ranch light, but what about other recordings?

Temperature inversions, which can cause night mirages, may be common in this desert area of southwest Texas. But night mirages only occur within a limited viewing angle, clearly eliminating this explanation in some cases.

For example, the November, 2000, Marfa Lights were observed by eyewitnesses who were five miles apart: about 80 degrees. In addition, the May 8, 2003, were observed by eyewitnesses seven miles apart, and those lights were photographed by one of Bunnell’s cameras from a third location. Obviously, mirage conjectures fail to explain those ML sightings. Bioluminescent flying predators, however, remain in contention.

The May 8, 2003, ML sighting was the second consecutive activity night, with first appearances at 1:19 and 1:38 (hours/minutes) after sunset respectively. This fits quite well with the hypothesis of highly-intelligent nocturnal bioluminescent flying predators that hunt in the same general area on a night following a very successful hunt.

Modern Pterosaur

“Analyzing Data for a Marfa Lights Interpretation”

Over a period of months, some of the nocturnal hunting excursions may be especially successful, even if the prey is a species of small animal like a bat . . . What can we predict after an especially successful hunt? The next night may see those predators hunting in the same area or a nearby area. If the successful hunt were early in the evening, soon after sunset, the second night may also be early in the evening.

We now examine some of Bunnell’s data for camera recordings of significant mystery light appearances from late 2000 through late 2008.

What is most important is this: 75% of those one-night successions involved starting times less than twenty minutes apart, for example one hour and nineteen minutes after sunset on May 8, 2003 and one hour and thirty-eight minutes after sunset on May 9, 2003. On July 15-16, 2006, mystery lights first appeared only about one minute apart: thirty-eight and thirty-seven minutes after sunset, respectively.

That appears to be dramatic circumstantial evidence for a group of nocturnal flying predators that hunt as a group in southwest Texas.

(Marfa Lights are sometimes called “ghost lights.”

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Intelligent Marfa Lights

To begin, the nonfiction book by James Bunnell, Hunting Marfa Lights (HML), gives no hint of any pterosaur involvement with the more mysterious flying Marfa Lights. Still, although he admits having no clear explanation, his book firmly proves that some of the mysterious lights seen flying near this part of Texas are not from any car headlights, and that leads us closer to the truth. My own book, the second edition of Live Pterosaurs in America, has one chapter on the Marfa Lights; it explains that some of them are quite likely from a group of bioluminescent flying predators, possibly even pterosaurs similar to the ropen of Papua New Guinea: intelligent flying predators.

But why believe that Marfa Lights are directed by intelligence? For the moment, let’s set aside pterosaurs, and concentrate on sighting reports that Bunnell classifies “CE-III.”

Let’s begin with a “legend” reported on page 15 of the book HML:

Hiking in this part of Texas, a college professor got lost late one afternoon. Being lightly dressed, he realized the danger of being stranded in the cold high desert at night. Soon after sunset, he saw a light, and assuming it was a ranch light, followed it for awhile, until he found that it had led him back to his truck. Then the light went out.

I realize that without careful interviewing of this professor, some aspects of his encounter may have become distorted through retelling. Nevertheless, if his experience is anything close to this summary, it seems very unlikely that following a non-living light, one without any intelligent direction, would lead a lost person back to their vehicle at night. Bunnell offers no explanation. Of course, all this assumes that this professor was a real person, not just a legend.

Marfa Lights that Chase Cars

Four sighting stories in HML may be related. Each involves a light witnessed by the driver of a car that seems to be chased by the light. These are obviously real persons, with names, including “Bunnell.” He offers “Fata Morgana” as a possible explanation but admits his own sighting (one of those four) does not fit that type of mirage phenomenon very well. But another of those four sightings seems to defy the Fata Morgana explanation.

Linda Armstrong, at about 8:45 p.m., on October 8, 2008, was driving from Alpine to Marfa when she noticed a bright white light approaching from behind. Thinking something was about to collide with the back of her car, she accelerated, but the light simply passed her, following the curvature of the road ahead of her. That alone may discredit the Fata Morgana explanation, but there’s more: “It then left the road and flew through Mitchell Flat south of the View Park.” That was a real Marfa Light.

Forgive me if I state the overly-obvious: An intelligent fast-flying creature never collides with the trunk of a fast car.

How do car-chasing lights in Texas relate to living pterosaurs? Consider the restaurant waitress who saw a “mutated pterodactyl” flying alongside her car, as she drove on I-75, outside Atlanta, Georgia. Also consider that many eyewitnesses have seen glowing pterosaur-like flying creatures in various parts of the world.

Adding More:

Return of the Marfa Lights

. . . reports of living pterosaurs here in North America keep coming to my attention, and those strange flying Marfa Lights keep returning. Strange as it may seem to most people in this country, there seem to be a number of scientifically unknown animals in North America, and the ropen, even a long-tailed pterosaur, may be one of them.

Marfa Lights Unmasked

Many other eyewitnesses, in Texas and other states, describe a long tail on a featherless flying creature.  How does that relate to strange flying lights in the  southwestern area of Texas? In Papua New Guinea  and other countries, strange flying lights have been  seen to be large or giant pterosaurs with long tails,  when the eyewitnesses have been close enough to  observe detailed features of the flying creatures.

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News: Pterosaurs Seen in the United States

Reports of modern living pterosaurs keep coming in, and most of them appear to be unrelated to any hoax or misidentification.

A Real Pterosaur in Pennsylvania

I noticed a large black bird in the sky . . . I called my students attention to it and they were both instantly mesmerized. The wingspan appeared to be at least six feet . . . you could clearly make out a long “horn” or “cone” type protrusion coming out of the back of its skull . . . It flew over top us and landed in the water . . . Carrie ran around the building . . . There are always ducks in that water as well as rats and other things. [She returned] . . . she said it had taken off, Carrie said it was in the water splashing and eating or grabbing something in its mouth.

 All About Marfa Lights and Pterosaurs

This has recent news about ideas on the Marfa Lights, how they resemble other lights that have been connected with sightings of living pterosaurs. (Texas)

What an extraordinary idea! Marfa Lights come from glowing pterodactyls? How could such a wild idea have any merit? Consider what critics have written about that idea; you may be surprised. When the sarcasm is brushed aside, as we eventually must do to all sarcasm, the arguments against the bioluminescent-pterosaur idea appear weak.

Another Pterodactyl in California

It’s not new news, coming from a 2007 article in The Signal of the Santa Clarita Valley; but the original report is much older, a Los Angeles Times article about sightings in the 1880′s.

The creature . . . was “as big as a horse, had wings like an oversize bat, big bulgy eyes the size of mushmelons . . . and a long, woolly tail.”

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Umboi Island Expeditions

On a blog about reports of living pterosaurs in the United States, why talk about strange flying creatures in Papua New Guinea? Recent cryptozoological investigations in the United States came from successful expeditions in the southwest Pacific. Without those years of work in distant tropical islands, revealing the credibility of eyewitnesses there, who would have taken seriously the possibility of pterosaurs flying overhead in the United States? Even for me (I am probably the most active researcher and writer on this subject), the idea of a living pterosaur flying over Los Angeles County at night, in recent years, was difficult to accept, before my expedition on Umboi Island in 2004.

We learned from the natives of Opai, Gomlongon, and other villages, many details about the ropen. Who are we? My associate living-pterosaur investigator David Woetzel is one of the American cryptozoologists who explored Umboi Island. Late in 2004 (soon after my own expedition there) he and Garth Guessman interviewed many islanders in central Umboi. Many of the natives have seen the flying light; but a few have seen it up close, revealing the nocturnal creature to be large and long-tailed.

What makes the ropen a pterosaur? The absence of feathers and presence of a long tail, on this large winged creature, strongly suggests “Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur.” The description of the tail movement and “diamond” at the end of the tail—those speak more loudly for that surprising conclusion. But the clear credibility of the eyewitnesses made a huge impression on me as it did on the American explorers who went before me and who followed me, interviewing eyewitnesses in Papua New Guinea.

Gideon Koro was not alone, when I interviewed him in his village, in 2004, only a few kilometers south of Lake Pung (at that crater lake, about ten years earlier, he had been terrorized by a giant ropen that flew, in daylight, over the surface of the water, revealing a tail about seven meters long and a mouth “like a crocodile”). Two of Gideon’s friends I also interviewed in that village, and they confirmed what Gideon told me. Mesa and Wesley were with Gideon when the giant featherless creature flew over that lake; Mesa was still nervous talking about the experience.

What ties a strange flying light on Umboi Island to a giant featherless flying creature on Umboi Island? Ask Jonah Jim and Jonathan Ragu. Those two natives each observed, at different locations on Umboi, a very large flying creature . . . glowing. It’s not just a native tradition.

Why believe natives who say they have seen giant long-tailed flying creatures that have no feathers? Ask the Australian Brian Hennessy and the American Duane Hodgkinson. Those two Westerners observed giant featherless flying creatures in New Guinea (now the nation of Papua New Guinea) . . . creatures with long tails.

Much has been written since those expeditions in Papua New Guinea, in the last few years of the twentieth century and the first few years of the twenty-first. Those giant nocturnal flyers that glow brightly—they have few if any borders or boundaries to prevent them from establishing themselves in other parts of the world. How could giant nocturnal pterosaurs live for thousands of years in the southwest Pacific, yet remain absent from other parts of the world? And what wonderful opportunities in North America!

Yet even today few Americans are prepared for the living-pterosaur interpretation of Marfa Lights in southwest Texas. Glowing pterodactyls? Here in America? What next? Non-flying mammals (without wings) that built machines (with non-moving wings) in which those mammals fly around the world? I think it far easier for humans to believe in modern bioluminescent pterosaurs flying over the hills near Marfa, Texas, than for those pterosaurs to believe in non-winged humans flying around the world. Try explaining airplanes to a pterodactyl.