Creatures, Myths & Legends

Could the 'Thunderbird' be a real creature ?

By T.K. Randall
February 13, 2015 ·  73 comments

Could the Thunderbird be a relic from a prehistoric age ? Image Credit: CC BY-SA 2.0 Ryan Somma Myths and tales of a massive eagle-like bird in North America have persisted not just in the centuries-old stories of Native American tribes but in far more recent accounts as well.

On July 25th 1977 at around 8:30pm, two boys, Travis Goodwin and Marlon Lowe, had been playing hide-and-seek in their back yard in Lawndale, Illinois when two huge birds suddenly swooped down out of nowhere, narrowly missing them.

When the two creatures swung around and swooped down a second time one of them managed to grab Marlon in its claws, lifting him 3ft in to the air for several seconds before dropping him again.

Four adults including the boy's parents and two other visiting friends witnessed the incident. In 2002, another large bird was seen by several people in Alaska. Its wingspan was estimated to be around 14ft across however this figure would later be called in to question by scientists.

"I'm certainly not aware of anything with a 14-foot wingspan that's been alive for the last 100,000 years," raptor specialist Phil Schemf told the Reuters news agency at the time.

Some critics have argued that these sightings and many others like them could be attributed to encounters with existing birds of prey, especially some of the larger eagle species.

Whether there exists an eagle that can pick up a child however remains a matter of some debate.

Source: The Epoch Times | Comments (73)

Tags: Thunderbird