Pterosaurs sightings have been reported in Washington state, Oregon, California, Arizona, Utah, and in other states. Some are recent reportings of encounters years ago, others are recent observations, all are within the past 30 years. We’ll see what is revealed in the third edition of Live Pterosaurs in America, but let’s first look at what is documented in the new nonfiction book Searching for Ropens and Finding God. These two books have only limited overlapping in sightings, by design of the author.
State of Washington
I got an email from another eyewitness in October of 2012: “. . . It flew over me, and my home on the Kitsap Peninsula in Washington State, just yesterday. Seriously, it flew low, made no noise, and cast a shadow as if it were a small aircraft. It freaked me out . . .” He got the impression it may have been featherless but he’s not sure. He also said, “At first I thought pelican, but I know pelicans and this was much larger with less head weight, much larger wings, somewhat short considering the wing span, greyish in color . . . freaky.” [from page 232 of the book Searching for Ropens and Finding God (third edition)]
State of Oregon
In May of 2010, a man and his wife were driving, at mid-day, on the I-84, by the Columbia Gorge in Oregon, when something flew across the highway. The man reported, “It was pretty good size and the thing that really stood out was that it had a long tail and unusually shaped wings, different from a bird because they seemed to be more curved.” [also from page 232]
State of Arizona
A lady was collecting rocks with her son, near Tucson, Arizona, in about late 2011, when they found something most unexpected. . . . Whatever it was, it acted like a baby, notwithstanding the wingspan appeared to be six to eight feet “at least.” The poor thing was in panic, hardly able to stand upright while flapping its wings at the two humans who were only about fifteen feet away. The lady told me, “It was almost toppling over onto its face.”
. . . the top of its head had a “knot protruding” . . . the arms “grew into the wings.” The beak was narrow, with no teeth. But they had no time to wait for teeth to grow. . . . [They] left the area when they thought of the mother of the eight-foot-wingspan baby. . . .
Now let’s turn to the book Live Pterosaurs in America (3rd edition).
Desert Sighting in California
“I have been haunted for close to twenty years by what I saw in the desert. . . .
- Q: What desert was this?
- The [Anza-Borrego] State Park.
- Q: What time of year was it?
- To the best of my recollection it was in the spring
- Q: How well did you see the form or shape of the creature?
- Well enough to remember some details and to never forget what I saw. We were sitting in the late afternoon shade of a ridge, on lawn chairs, enjoying the solitude and peace and quiet of the desert when it passed over. I caught the sight of it with the corner of my eye and looked up. It was soaring along the side of a plateau not far from us. We knew what it looked like. In fact, I remember saying ‘. . . that looks just like a Taradactyl!’ . . . What I saw was large and very much alive. . . . Its skin, I say skin because there were no feathers, . . . looked like dull leather sort of dusty looking. It seemed to soar like a large raptor. The back of the head was pointed.
San Fernando Valley, California
. . . my girlfriend and I saw a creature last night (9/21/2009) . . . [It] baffled us. It was a very large, winged creature that was gliding maybe 100 yards above us. We stared at the creature in disbelief because it was so strange . . . it didn’t look like a bird really. . . . my girlfriend has 20-20 vision and she told a few minutes later that it had lights on it. That didn’t strike me as right so I asked her if she was sure and she said they weren’t lights exactly, but that the wings had a glow or reflection. . . . I begin my search for “flying creature” on Google. One link led to another and eventually I discovered something known as a Ropen. That was it! The description matched exactly what we saw, down to the glow. [Live Pterosaurs in America, third edition, by Jonathan Whitcomb]
Not all sightings of apparent pterosaurs in the United States are reported in the two books, although over two hundred of the pages document American “pterodactyl” sightings. Consider the following Utah sighting.
South of the Great Salt Lake—there’s where we find Grantsville
When I was 14 years old, I lived in Grantsville . . . There was a small play ground . . . One night, my brother Dallin [and] step brother Jonathon and I were sitting on top of a small exercising trampoline . . . We had a blanket wrapped around us as we starred up at the night sky pondering many things that 13 and 14 year old kids ponder. There was a small farm next to our apartment complex . . .
. . . Dallin suddenly noticed something and started yelling . . . a giant bird . . . At [about that] time, the animals in the farm next to us started going berserk. . . . Jonathon . . . started staring up at the sky and yelling similar [things]. . . . I was slightly reluctant [thinking it could be a joke] as I began sliding down the slide to see what all of this was about.
. . . Suddenly as I looked up at the night sky, the farm animals started up again and then I saw it. . . . A beautiful phoenix soaring above me in the night sky and soon after disappearing as if into thin air. I was awestruck. I began to wonder what type of animal this was. But within minutes higher up in the sky I saw it again and appeared soaring above us and then vanished again. I had a very scientific mind for my age at the time and soon developed a theory that this creature was a bioluminescent and nocturnal bird that would “disappear” using the same effect that happens to our eyes when we are in a bright room and suddenly the lights go out. There is a space of time where we can see nothing. I decided it used this to help it hunt. I did not even hear about ropens until nearly a decade after.
Searching for Ropens and Finding God – spiritual true-life adventure
Excerpts from Title Page:
This flies high above a common true-life adventure, revealing the early stages of what may become the most unsettling scientific discovery since Copernicus and Galileo. It soars above disputes about religion, revealing why an official discovery of an extraordinary animal was delayed for so long. . . . Three American Christians—one middle-aged LDS-Mormon high priest and two younger Protestant Young Earth Creationists—explored parts of Umboi Island in two separate expeditions in 2004, interviewing native eyewitnesses of the elusive ropen. They returned home even more convinced that long-tailed pterosaurs live, even thrive, in Papua New Guinea.
Excerpts from Introduction
Expect answers in this book: why my associates and I traveled to a remote tropical island to search for living pterosaurs and why so few professors have given us any hope that they still live. . . . After reading this book, if one person finds a reason to live and abandons thoughts of suicide, what a reward for all of us involved! This is not a textbook for preventing suicide, yet I suggest each of us can find ways to bring meaning into the lives of persons around us, motivating all of us to keep living and learning.