|
Are Dragons Pterosaurs? |
|
Why connect the dragon of myth with the pterosaur of science? Aren’t dragons fictional and pterosaurs were real? We have fossils to distinguish between fantasy and reality, don’t we?
Are all fictional stories based upon people or animals that never existed? Let’s be careful not to rush to conclusions about dragons, for fantasies, though fictional, are often based upon some truth. The story of Little Red Riding Hood is fictional, but grandmothers and wolves are both real.
What do dragons and pterosaurs have in common? Celtic dragons had arrows at the end of their tails, which may relate to ptero-saur tails. What about Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur tails? Are not dragon tails also long? Perhaps most noteworthy are the wings: both pterosaurs and flying dragons have featherless wings. |
|
According to the book Searching for Ropens, there is a native tradition (around some small islands in Papua New Guinea) about a dragon they call “wawanar.” It is said to own “the land and the sea.”
Northwest of the small islands is the larger island of Umboi. Here there are more than legends about giant flying creatures. Of the three American explorers who visited Umboi Island in 2004, one of them saw a glowing object unlike any meteor he had ever seen. David Woetzel, of New Hampshire, said, “I . . . . saw some meteors while on night watch. They were whitish in color and had a tail. But this thing was different . . . almost golden and shimmering around the edges. . . There was no tail and it was flying horizontally . . .”
What were the three Americans watching for at night? The ropen of Umboi Island is described as a giant featherless flying creature. According to the book, three native young men saw a giant ropen flying over a crater lake around 1994 (the same area where Woetzel saw his ropen light). When asked about the tail, they said that it had a “diamond.” The tail was “long.”
Although the ropen does not destroy villages with its fiery breath, it does glow brightly at night. The investigators call this kind of light “bioluminescence.”
Could Woetzel be mistaken about what he saw? Could the islanders’ accounts of the ropens be just superstitious legends? The problem with that idea is that the American World War II veteran Duane Hodgkinson also saw a giant “pterodactyl” in New Guinea in 1944. What he described is similar to the ropen of Umboi Island. How could everybody be wrong in the same way?
Whatever people want to believe about dragons, the creature called “ropen” seems to be real (but still a cryptid).
NEWS: February, 2007: a physicist confirmed the possibility that the video footage of two lights, recorded on the mainland of Papua New Guinea, in November, 2006, might be large bioluminescent creatures. Investigators maintain that they are glowing pterosaurs (consistent with David Woetzel’s account).
Spring of 2007: the second edition of the book Searching for Ropens was published. In it, the author examines the eyewitness testimony of Brian Hennessy, a psychologist who works at a medical university. He saw, in Papua New Guinea, in 1971, a creature fly overhead. It looked “prehistoric.”
Late 2007: A lady from South Carolina came forward with her report: a giant pterosaur-like thing flew in front of her car on a remote highway in South Carolina. There were definitely no feathers, according to eyewitness Susan Wooten. |
|
See also “Dinosaurs alongside Humans.”
Pterosaur neck length (WW II veteran’s account)
Mesozoic strata and living pterosaurs
Creation and the ropen
Baptist pastor sees living pterosaur-like creature
Evolution and living pterosaurs
“Duah” comes from another name for ropen.
cryptozoology and the ropen
Hoax Explanations for Living Pterosaurs |
|
Glen Kuban has written a web page dis-crediting the idea of living pterosaurs. As of the late Spring of 2007, however, he fails to mention important points about sightings of “pterodactyls” or apparent-pterodactyls in Papua New Guinea: extremely long tails, bright glowing appearance at night, and grave robbery. It seems the best explanation that Mr. Kuban can come up with is the old standby: the Flying Fox fruit bat! (This kind of bat is large but has almost no tail, is not bioluminescent, and never robs graves.) |
|
Composite sketch of the ropen, apparently a giant living Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur |
