2005 Christmas card from Dr. Sanchez

From: Dr. Virgilio Sanchez-Ocejo ufomiami@bellsouth.net
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 2005 11:48:05 -0400

Bigfoot, Chupacabras and others Strange Creatures
An Essay by ©Virgilio Sanchez-Ocejo

INTRODUCTION

For more than a century, there has been a legend in the ever-enigmatic mountains of the American Northwest. The legend is based on tales about enormous hairy creatures that walk upwards in the same way that apes do. These creatures have received different names, such as "Sasquatch", "Yeti", "Momo", "Touke Monster", "Yowies", "Dawn Man", "The Abominable Snowman", "Big Spirit", etc. But perhaps the most common name is "Bigfoot". Other creatures, of different characteristics, have also received different names, like "the Moor Monster", "Jersey Devil", "Mothman", "Dove Demon", "Loveland Frog", and lately, the "Chupacabras".

Here in Florida, the creature known as Bigfoot has been called the "Florida Skunk Ape". The name Skunk has been attributed to it for its apparent bad smell, which has been described as a combination of skunk, rotten eggs, and soiled manure. For the most part, the creature has been described as standing nearly 7 feet high and weighting about 300 pounds. The area located between Homestead, Lake Okeechobee and Fort Myers, Florida, is where most sightings have occurred. The creature can very easily hide in this part of the Everglades; the vegetation is so dense that within a few steps, it can hide in the brush, without anyone seeing it, not even a low-flying helicopter. Furthermore, footprints are almost impossible to last long enough to be found in the swamp. The popular legend of the Skunk Ape has been part of the Everglades for decades.

One of the first stories mentions that the military captured one of these beings and maintained it captive in the Everglades National Park, until the creature knocked down a fence and escaped. Dozens of reports of sightings during the seventies also mention the presence of an awful smell, allegedly emitted by that creature. Nevertheless, contrary to other Bigfoot-like beings, the Skunk Ape is described as a friendly creature.

On the other hand, there was strange activity during the month of March of 1996 in the area of Miami that points out to an unknown predator. These reports are very similar to events that happened before in other parts of the country and abroad. This predator has been nicknamed the "Chupacabras" among many folk stories, which have generated considerable popularity. Moreover, it is interesting to compare its behavior and characteristics with those of other similar creatures that have been described in other parts of the country and the world.

By the middle of August of 2001, neighbors of a community in Esmeralda de Tocopilla, in Chile, at around five in the morning, reported seeing a strange creature on top of the roof of a house. They described it as dark colored, with very bright eyes and making enormous leaps while leaving the place where several domestic animals were found dead. The animals had a small hole in the neck and no blood left in their bodies. Due to those particular characteristics and descriptions, one eyewitness said that it was the Chupacabras.

Aside from the endless amounts of sightings of this creature, we will present a brief summary of some of the cases that we have looked into. Although they describe different physical characteristics, they do show similar sequences of events.

FIRST CASE:

Miami, Florida. Date: August of 1977.
Robert Morgan is considered a Bigfoot expert and has been at the front line of different expeditions trying to capture a live specimen. In the summer of 1977, we interviewed him after his conference in the University of Miami. Among other things, he told us that he was investigating a very interesting case that happened in Islamorada.

"From Islamorada to the south of Miami, we were following a Bigfoot case, when neighbors of the island, reported hearing strange noises, such as garbage cans hitting the floor and some broken windows. The police closed all traffic to the island hoping to capture the animal. After hours of searching for it, they found nothing. Some eyewitnesses claimed to have seen a Bigfoot-like creature in the island. Others were sure they saw it walking into the sea", said Morgan.

"At this time, I am investigating several Bigfoot sightings in the Everglades. The area between Homestead, lake Okeechobee and Fort Myers is where they have been seen it", he added. His interview was published in a Spanish magazine called "Revista Replica".

SECOND CASE:

Miami Beach, Government Cut. Duration: 4-5 minutes. The exact date is unknown. It was in the summer of 1967, at approximately 3:00 AM.
Anthony Martin was fishing at a location near the Port of Miami. Suddenly, he saw a whirl in the water. He first thought it was a scuba diver, but to his astonishment, he saw an enormous animal coming out of the water. It stood about 8 feet tall and its weight must have been about 400 pounds.

"Its head, face, eyes and ears looked like the ones of an ape. The body was covered with a very black thick hair, its arms were long; they extended below the knees. Its hands and feet were very big. A bright lamp from a small house lit the entire place. When it finally came out of the water, it walked towards me.

The creature was limping on its left foot. There was a small fence nearby; it was only about 3 feet high, so it wasn't difficult for the creature to jump over it; in fact, the being was so big that it stepped right over it. It walked a full circle around me. The animal stopped at about 10 feet from me and emitted a guttural sound. By that time, I saw the lights of an approaching police car. The headlights were pointing at us. The creature continued to walk around for a few more moments until it finally went back in the water and disappeared. Two police officers with their guns came out of the patrol car; they told me that they already knew about the creature. I finally left and went home. That marked the end of my favorite sport: fishing", he said. At the present time, Mr. Martin is retired and he lives in Las Vegas, Nevada. This interview was recorded on video, in 1991.

THIRD CASE:

Highway I-75 (Alligator Alley). Duration: less than one minute. Date: July 1977. Time: 11:00 PM.
Mr. Hector Abascal, 26 years old, and Mr. Jorge Porte, of 25 years of age, were traveling on highway I-75, also known as the Everglades Parkway. They were going to visit some friends in the city of Tampa. Afterwards, they were planning to continue traveling to Orlando, where they would later visit Disney World.

"We noticed that the car had a flat tire when we were near Naples, it was well over 11 at night. I opened the trunk, grabbed the lug wrench, and began loosening the nuts on the rim", said Hector. "The first thing we noticed was a bad smell shortly followed by some fairly audible footsteps. I looked to the other side of the highway and I saw an enormous creature, illuminated by the rear lights of our car, crossing the highway and heading right towards us. I turned around to see if I could find Jorge, but he was already at a good distance from me; he was so scared that he had already started running away from the site. I stood up holding the lug wrench in my hands like a weapon. Within an instant, the animal was already standing in front of me. I felt paralyzed. The animal looked at me, then it just turned around and walked away. It continued heading north, until it finally disappeared in the bushes. Jorge came back and we got in the car without saying a word. We left the place immediately, without even changing the tire", said Abascal.

According to their description, the Bigfoot creature was about 7 or 8 feet tall. It also emitted a strong scent similar to rotten eggs. It breathed heavily. It had the body shape of a human, but with the face of an ape. Furthermore, its body was covered with black hair. The interview was recorded on audiocassette.

FOURTH CASE:

Tocopilla, Chile. Date: June 18 of 2000. 12:00 AM.
A group of young people was at the beach enjoying the warmth of a bonfire. Suddenly, a large creature came out of the water. They were all astonished as they saw the strange being getting closer. The creature approached one of them making several guttural sounds, as if it was trying to communicate with the young man. Moments later, it placed its right hand on the young man's left shoulder, leaving a green stain on his sweater, which they described as the same color as marine algae. The Bigfoot-like creature soon left, as it got back in the water and disappeared in the dark. The eyewitnesses, whom they preferred to remain anonymous, described the creature as 8-feet tall, with long dark furry hair, long arms with hands below the knees, big round eyes, with a long nose and mouth shaped like an animal muzzle. This interview was recorded on video.

DISCUSSION

For the first time, this latest case alerted us about the possibilities that the Bigfoot might have some kind of connection with Chupacabras phenomenon, given that northern Chile, for the most part, is well known for its Chupacabras sightings. This was something that never would have occurred to us before.

A strange coincidence is that so many elements in both the Islamorada and the Tocopilla cases are almost identical; both creatures were seen leaving and entering the sea. This makes us think that they might hide under the sea, lakes or swamps. Both creatures left footprints the size of a football and other similar traces behind. Nevertheless, they have never been photographed, and in spite of countless efforts, they have never been captured. Furthermore, no one has ever found any remains of these creatures.

There are many reports of ufos entering and leaving the sea, both in Florida and in Chile. During an interview for Teletrece, a national Chilean television network, dated October 21 of 2001, Jorge Martinez, a retired Admiral and former Chilean Chief of Naval Operations, admitted that he personally had witnessed two ufo sightings at sea. During one of them, a nearby ufo caused interference with the navigation systems and the ship's radar. It is widely known that many other naval officers have seen similar objects, which they call "UUOs", (Unidentified Underwater Objects). According to the former Chilean Navy Chief, this phenomenon is real.

A taxi driver, who we call Carlos, and happens to be a friend of Jaime Ferrer, our associate in Calama, Chile, has told us that during a trip to Tocopilla, he and some customers saw several low-flying ufos coming from the sea towards the nearby Atacama Desert, where later, tracks made by some kind of landing gear, as well as Chupacabras tracks were found. The tracks appeared to be coming from the exact spot where the ufo landed.

Coincidently, just like the Chupacabras and ufo tracks in Chile, there have been reports of ufos in the same areas where Bigfoot creatures have been seen. Although we have not been able to establish a possible Bigfoot-UFO connection in the United States, we can look at the cases reported near Mount Rainier, in the State of Washington, where Kenneth Arnold observed nine ufos in 1947 giving popularity to the "flying saucer phenomena". Yet, in the same area, there have been countless Bigfoot or Sasquatch sightings dating back to the XIX century.

On the other hand, in light of the evidence found in Chile, we can now affirm that the Chupacabras is part of the ufo phenomenon. We have not found evidence that it is part of some kind of terrestrial genetic experiment, nor do we believe that it is an ordinary animal. The evidence points out to a ufo related origin; I don't have slightest doubt about it.

All this is creating a new chapter in the investigation of the ufo phenomenon that undoubtedly, many will find difficult to accept. But this is very typical. For example, the abduction phenomenon took more than 20 years before ufologists accepted it as part of the ufo investigative field. Even today, many still doubt that alien abductions take place.

It is not my intention to try to convince anyone that the Bigfoot and the Chupacabras phenomena are the same; instead, like many other strange creatures, these may have a possible relation with ufos. It is not a coincidence that we receive reports mentioning a Bigfoot creature in Tocopilla, Chile, followed by numerous Chupacabras and ufo sightings, in what we could call the Chilean 2000-2001 wave.

\We are facing a presence of intelligent or programmed creatures that have appeared sporadically and have been associated with other phenomena for more than a century, to whom erroneously, we have given them different names. To finally understand what is really behind all of these creatures, we have to study their characteristics, their behavior, and most importantly, the other associated phenomena that are often reported when these cases take place. We should know and learn about these phenomena, not only for their physical aspect of these creatures, but for their intentions, and most importantly, for their actions and their reactions.

We are buried in some kind of game where our intelligence faces another intelligence, which happens to be strange or, to say the least, different than ours, where the apparently incompatible logic doesn't seem to work, let alone our intuition. Accumulating data from field investigations is all we can do at this point in time. But, will we finally ever know the essence of these phenomena?
We still don't hold the truth in our hands, but we are looking for it.

Translation by Mario Andrade