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YEAR: 2005
SEASON: Winter
MONTH: December
DATE: 12-03-05
STATE: West Virginia
COUNTY: Wyoming County
LOCATION DETAILS: Heading to the deep mine Poca #2, the airshaft would be on your right hand side. Look a little past the bridge where the stream flows south. All this is private property.
NEAREST TOWN: AMGIO (Left Fork Mines)
NEAREST ROAD: Mine haul road
OBSERVED: I don't know if what I saw was two bigfoots or something else, but one thing I know is they were things I've never seen before. I also know they weren't bears. I worked in the coal mines near a small town called Amigo. What I used to do (my job description) was coal sampler. I would drive around all day collecting coal for chemical analysis, from the high walls to the deep mine. The deep mine is more remote since they just put the belt head in. It is so far from the plant to the deep mines it would take me about 30 to 35 minutes driving in the mountains.
Last week I was driving back from picking up a sample and noticed something running back up in the woods. It was two does. Then I noticed something was laying on the ground. I beeped my horn thinking it was a bob cat and up jumped this light tan (just a little bit darker than the deers skin) thing.
I froze. It was definitely wasn't a man or bear. All I know is it was walking upright. It did something that looked like it clapped its hands. Then I watched it kneel down and crawl into an airshaft for an abandonned mine. To my surprise, another one appeared out of nowhere and ran past it.
I could tell this one was only a couple inches taller than me (6-7).
I do know it was something I’ve never seen before. The second one kneeled down and crawled into the same airshaft.
ALSO NOTICED: Only when the first one did this clapping motion. Prior to doing this the second one appeared out of nowhere.
One other miner, an older man that had seen something while gutting a deer. This guy was telling his story on the CB but stopped when the other workers started teasing him about it.
OTHER WITNESSES: NO
OTHER STORIES: NO
TIME AND CONDITIONS: The time was exactly 2:40 PM. The weather conditions were cold and it had rained the night before. It had just started snow flurries. Light conditions were average for a winter day at 2:00 PM plus.
ENVIRONMENT: There was a little stream and a lot of trees kind of like a side of a mountain top. The first one blended in with leaves and the two does and the second one that ran across in front of the truck was the very dark colored.
Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Stephen Willis:
Saturday afternoon December 31, 2005, a fellow BFRO investigator Brian B. and I met with a young man who submitted a report to the BFRO. His sighting was on an active mine site in southern WV. We met in Beckley and drove south to the location. Brian questioned the witness during the 45-minute drive.
We gained admission to the mine and drove along the haul road. He led us to the site and pointed to the area where the creatures appeared. Jim did not want to get out of the truck, and he did not want to stay alone when Brian and I walked away to investigate the terrain.
I proceeded to the hole in the hillside Jim said the things disappeared into. Beaver heavily populates the local area and they are intent upon downing every tree within eyesight of their pond. Their track ways ran everywhere. Trees littered the ground. Some were suspended in the air from being wedged between opposing stream banks.
The "hole" was a man made chamber approximately 30 -40 yards from a seldom traveled mine road (2 lane black mud/dirt road).
The structure had obviously been there several years and had not seen mining use recently. It had an opening that was about the size and shape of a regular door. Inside this entry way the chamber widened to about 10 feet all the way to the back. It was about 16 feet deep. The ceiling angled from 7 feet or so at the door, down to the floor at the rear.
If does not appear to see regular use by anything, human or otherwise. It had a small rock window with a sliding metal door on the right side after you entered the opening door. There was a pool of clear water rougly 8 by 10 ft long and approximately 18" to 24" deep at the bottom of the slanting floor of dirt and debris. The pool extended all the way to the rear wall of the wedge-shaped chamber. They could have only gone in just enough to get out of plain sight. There was no other exit. No visible tracks, though there were some indentations. No odor other than a vaguely limestone type aroma. No visible scat, no hair, no bones.
There is a small outlet of a larger beaver pond about 15 yards in front of the entrance. There were several well-used game trails in the immediate vicinity including some drag marks, which I took to be from the beaver. Other than deer tracks in the mud by the side of the road I saw very few tracks of any sort in the soil.
The road is located about 30 to 40 yards in front of the chamber and has 4 to 5 foot berms on the other side and a fast flowing creek interchangeably flowing along its sides. There are large growths of both rhododendron and mountain laurel in abundance on the sides of the hills bordering both the creek and road throughout the area. There are also a couple of areas in the vicinity that are boggy/swampy. The sighting occurred about three miles from a small coal camp.
From his demeanor, Jim definitely saw two strange things and was ready to depart the area without delay. He jumped nervously at any unusual noise or movement, even while inside a moving vehicle.
He made drawings of the animals. They looke like sasquatches. One was about 6 feet tall and the other about 7 feet.
Like most other people, he thought the bigfoot subject was "all a big hoax" until this incident occurred. He is now very interested in the subject and wants to attend the West Virginia expedition schedule for October 2006.
About BFRO Investigator Stephen Willis:
Grew up in central West Virginia. Retired from the US Army in 2003. Small manufacturing business owner. Lived for almost 7 years in Germany and 1.5 years in the Mideast.