Following CFZ Director Jon Downes' appearance on the Coast to Coast radio show with George Noory several night ago, we were innundated with (a) requests from listeners wanting to join the CFZ; (b) offers of help in conducting research; and (c) intriguing witness reports.
We thank you all indeed; every email sent to the CFZ is always read and is greatly appreciated.
One of the most interesting items came from John Weatherley, who was kind enough to allow us to share with you his memories of a close encounter of the giant-eel kind. Thanks, John! It's an account that we are actively researching to try and uncover more data on; and if anything surfaces we will post it to this blog.
For your reading pleasure, here's John's account:
"Greetings Jon,
"I enjoyed your interview on Coast to Coast AM this morning - (3 AM here in Florida). I was particularly interest in your theory regarding giant eels in northern lakes e.g. Loch Ness. Perhaps you could help me identify the creatures that I and many hundreds saw a few years ago?
"I am British and live in Florida. My family and I came to Florida by sea from Australia in 1969. Our ship left Acuapulco and sailed along the west coast towards the Panama canal. It was the first week of July 1969. The sea was calm and we were cruising quite slowly because of congestion in the canal.
"As we cruised along the west coast of Costa Rica and Panama we were about 7 or 8 miles from shore and just a few yards from the flotsam line. It was clearly defined line of sea weed about 30 feet wide with odd bits of wood and the occasional small tree limb,
"We cruised along this path for several hours in bright sunshine between about 10 AM and 2 PM. There were many fish visible and some very large turtles but the significant sighting were huge eels. These creatures were always in pairs and we saw a pair perhaps every 20 minutes or so.
"They averaged about 15 feet long and had a diameter of about 1.5 feet. They were khaki or olive in colour and were identical to the eels for which I used to fish as a boy in my home town of Canterbury Kent, except they were so large. They were lazily swimming very slowly along through the flotsam or just wallowing at the very surface.
"The ship was carrying about 1200 passengers and most were on deck on this idyllic day so the eels were seen by many people. Most were engaged in counting the enormous numbers of sharks which were clearly visible around the ship.
"I wonder if you have any idea what species of eel these were? They could easily have swallowed a child or a small adult. Regards, John Weatherley."
5 comments:
It could have been the slender giant moray eel. I looked it up on Wikipedia and it said that they could grow to lenghts of 13 feet. Try googling the image and see if that was it.
Good luck,
Cayla
Cayla
That was my first thought and I suggested this to the witness. However, there were apparently a number of distinct differences, such as in the face and colors. And he's sure that it wasn't a Moray. We're still looking and hope to post an update to the blog, as we have a couple of people looking into it.
Thanks for writing.
Nick
Hi! I live in New Zeaand. I have seen 2 such giant eels here in our local rivers. One i saw was in Lake Karipiro and it was about 4-5mtrs in lenght and approx. 18" wide. Same colour as described in the story too..
A good freind of mine and 7 of his freinds were out tramping in native forest over here. They all witnessed observing a massive eel swimming on the surface of a flooded stream only a few feet from them. It was a black/brown colour, and its tail was about 2 ft wide. He tells me it was about 14 - 15 ft long, and about as round as a transformer power pole.
Ihave done alot of scuba diving also, and never seen a moray that would come "close" to these eels. Cheers!
Hi Bob
Many thanks for sharing your account - very interesting indeed! A number of reseachers are speculating that the Loch Ness Monsters may be extremely large eels; and there's some evidence for this in England's Lake Windemere too.
I'll probably do a new post in the near future on the "giant eel" angle of lake monster sightings, with new data etc.
Best
Nick
In 1991 while diving on the north easter coast oc Colombia, out of a little town called Taganga I and three friends came across a giant moray eel. We were in 40 feet of cristal clear water with over 150 feet of visibility. At first I thought it to be a huge fish under a bolder but when ith moved further under the rock I saw it's tail was that of an eel. I swam to the top of the boulder which it was under and then crawled to where I could observe it better.
I ahve over 6 years experience as a pipeline diver in the Gulf of Mexico and I know how to tell dimensions from experience. I could not have put my arms around it and know it was more than 24 inches in diameter. I got to within 15 feet of it's head and observered it for more than 15 minutes. Shortage of air, bottom time and boredom caused me to surface.
Truely amazing to see an anmial of it's size. Deffinately a Moray and deffinastely a giant. they do exist.
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