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The Witheren Yowie, Nov 2018
3 February, 2019. Additional material added on 4 Feb, 2019.
Yowie Lore
The Witheren Yowie, November 2018
The delivery driver, identified only as Gary, says he was driving in the bushy Gold Coast hinterland on a November morning last year when he rounded a sharp right bend at Witheren and had the experience of his life…
Nov ??, 2018
Nov 15, 2018
Report posted on public internet data base featuring a partial transcript of a phone interview with Witness who describes
himself as a truck driver who had an unusual encounter on Beechmont Road, Witheren (Gold Coast hinterland, Qld) on some day in early
November, 2018.
It was just after 10am in the morning and I was coming down the hill. I started coming around a sharp right hand corner and I thought I saw a boulder fall off the embankment onto the road. I've hit the brakes to stop so I didn't hit this rock, and it stood up. It wasn't a rock at all.
I managed to stop just before it and this thing just stood up in the right hand gutter and had already started stepping out on the road as I was skidding. It ended up standing right in the middle of the bonnet in front of me.
"Gary" went onto describe getting a good close view of a huge hairy man-like creature. Despite sitting high off the ground in the truck, he still had to duck down to see the top of the creature's head through the windshield, later estimating its height to be some 10ft (3m). It had a face a "bit like a chimpanzee" while it's head seemed "too small for its body." The creature then grunted before extending its arm and giving the truck a "don't argue" - a fend/push with the open palm which the witness felt as a shudder through the 9 ton vehicle, cracking the bonnet of the truck.
The massive creature then turned and took 2 steps before disappearing in the dense bushland to the witness' left.
Not wanting to be labeled as a "wacko", the witness did not tell anyone about this experience until a week ago finally revealing it to his wife who was supportive.
Dec 22, 2018
The investigator posted the link to the Witheren Yowie report under the title,
Best Encounter of 2018. Some respondents requested
further information on the cracked bonnet but no new information was provided.
Jan 16, 2019
Yowie Sighting (Audio Report #129) at Witheren near Canungra, Queensland was uploaded to YouTube providing a more complete audio of
the original phone interview between the Witness and investigator. The audio plays over some film footage subsequently taken on location
at Beechmont Road but it is unclear if the actual location of the incident was inspected. Further information was provided about the
damage to the truck:
There's a fine crack up in the top left-hand corner but that's not from his hand at all. That's from when he's pushed it (the bonnet) it's hit the body there's a fine crack in the fibreglass but nothing where he actually impacted it.
The video, however, contains no footage containing the actual truck nor the alleged damage.
The witness describes having subsequent
nightmares and being emotionally impacted by the experience. He goes on to describe the creature as more animal than human although
it seemed to display three clear emotions during the encounter - shock, embarrassment, and anger - before departing.
Prior to the
interview, the witness had spent time on the internet seeking to find representations of Bigfoot similar to his own experience. It
is unknown if the witness drew his illustrations before or after his online Bigfoot image search but the face of his Yowie is very
similar to one drawn by Rex Gilroy, the enigmatic self-styled cryptozoologist and mystery-monger, published in his Giants from the
dreamtime : the Yowie in myth and reality(2001) to describe his own Yowie encounter in 1970:
Confirmation or imitation? More on that later...
Jan 23, 2019
Rex Gilroy is an Australian who has written articles and self-published books on cryptids and unexplained or speculative phenomena. His work has focused on yowie reports, 'out of place' animals, UFOs, and propositions regarding a 'lost' Australian civilization.
The Gold Coast Bulletin present a preview of its Yowie article. Most comments were incredulous.
Jan 24, 2019
The Yowie is front page news of the Gold Coast Bulletin. It should be noted that a picture of a very Bigfoot-like footprint cast is
not connected to the current case but is one supposedly found years earlier. More on that later...
Inside, an article entitled,
‘I almost hit Hinterland Yowie’: truckie claims contains some excerpts from the audio interview with the witness followed by some
insights from a long-time Yowie-researcher and some counter-insights from local camp manager, Gary Nutley.
The Yowie researcher points
out that there was a similar Yowie sighting on the same road in 2015 and that sightings in the Gold Coast hinterlands went back
to the 1970s. His search, which includes the use of night-vision cameras and other detection devices, is now very much focused
on the Canungra and Beechmont areas and he suggested that the spate of recent animal mutilations were Yowie related. Furthermore,
conversations with unnamed military personnel have confirmed his conviction that Yowies are dangerous and are actually responsible
for many missing people. He even claims to have been previously attacked by a Yowie, twice.
Sound far-fetched? He cares
not for your opinion, "We (...) believe based on the facts we are presented with. People should be vigilant and aware these things
do exist."
"What are they smoking? There is wild dogs, that is about it," Gary Nutley countered. "I have not ever seen or heard
of anything like that. It isn’t likely unless he has been through the army area. I guess anything could be there."
Interestingly, this article gives the date of the Yowie encounter as being November 13 which doesn't tally up with the witness' original
audio statement that after the incident he didn't tell anyone about it and that "I didn't even tell my wife until a week ago." The
Yowie researcher's original report was posted on the public Internet database on November 15 and, in the absence of reliable
documentation, lets assume it was uploaded on the same day as the interview. If the witness only got around to telling his own wife
about it a week prior that puts the date of November 8 as the latest date it could be. Since it is unclear how long it was before he
told his wife, there is no earliest date - the alleged incident could have happened days, weeks, or even months earlier.
Until
clarification appears, we'll stick with "early November, 2018" as the approximate date of the encounter.
'I almost hit Hinterland Yowie': truckie claims
___
This story went viral over the next 48 hours, being reported
across the country and
around the globe. No further
developments were forthcoming but the investigator was quick to promote his cause on various
podcasts and
radio interviews where
he made further unsubstantiated claims about the history of Yowie sightings. Did you know that the Aboriginals warned the early
colonists about the "hairy man" and soon enough white settlers began encountering the strange creature? Did you know that such
sightings became so prominent in the 1800s that legislation recognizing the "indigenous primate" was debated in parliament?
These
claims have not been substantiated. There are a great number of written documents, articles, and correspondences from the earliest
days of the Australian settlement - there are none that have been shown to contain any mention of such a creature nor any warnings
from the natives. The investigator's own online database of Yowie sightings (accessed 3 Feb, 2019) contains 0 accounts from the 1700s
and only 4 accounts from the 1800s compared to, say, 119 accounts since 2010.
Plotting a graph (on the right) from the
investigator's own data-base we can see that the "hairy man" was inconsequential through the 1800s while the Yowie is a modern
phenomenon.
___
In 2018 Gary Opit, wildlife expert and cryptozoologist, in correspondence with another amateur researcher suggested
that DNA evidence is the way forward. If the Yowie really exists then it is leaving its DNA behind in the form of hairs,
skin cells, mucus, and other bodily discharged just like every other animal. Sticky tape specifically designed for the collection
of minute biological particles could have been used on the part of the truck manhandled by the Yowie yet there is nothing to even
suggest that the truck was inspected by investigators. Maybe the Yowie researcher was simply unaware of such recent
developments in biological testing but that seems unlikely since Opit's advice was posted directly to the
investigator's
own online forum.
This story is sensational but did it really happen as claimed? If so, the subsequent "investigation" missed
a golden opportunity to acquire tangible evidence for objective testing. If not, they also failed to investigate the circumstances
from independent sources to demonstrate it. Such failings are not simple oversights but, rather, are part-and-parcel of how "Yowie
research" has been conducted since the days of Rex Gilroy in the 1970s. Collecting and promoting sensational stories is not enough.
Fellow
"Yowie researchers", for future reference:
"I tried to push it (to) the back of my head, and think ‘that was freaky, it just can’t be real’. I just couldn’t get it out of my
mind. I was having trouble sleeping at night."
In an unfortunate coincidence, the dashcam on Gary’s truck was being serviced
on the day of the sighting, and he didn’t manage to reach for a camera in time.
"The whole thing lasted for five seconds, and
you are staring this monster in the face watching it to make sure it isn’t going to step around at you. You are scared for your life,
not grabbing for a camera."
"I tried to push it (to) the back of my head, and think ‘that was freaky, it just can’t be real’. I just couldn’t get it out of my
mind. I was having trouble sleeping at night."
In an unfortunate coincidence, the dashcam on Gary’s truck was being serviced
on the day of the sighting, and he didn’t manage to reach for a camera in time.
"The whole thing lasted for five seconds, and
you are staring this monster in the face watching it to make sure it isn’t going to step around at you. You are scared for your life,
not grabbing for a camera."
Alleged Yowie sightings from AYR database
Edited 18/02/2022