YEAR: 2015

SEASON: Summer

MONTH: August

DATE: 8

STATE: Washington

COUNTY: Ferry County

LOCATION DETAILS: Middle of one of the last stands of untouched forest. Location to remain private at witness' request.

NEAREST TOWN: near eastern Ferry County

NEAREST ROAD: new logging road

OBSERVED: I was driving an excavator to the job site in the middle of the night on a brand-new logging road we were constructing when I noticed there were three sets of tracks and they were three different sizes huge, medium, and small! I followed them for a little more than a mile they went all the way to the end where we were our job site was and that's where I lost the tracks. It just so happened to be the only night it rained in August and it was the night of my birthday. After work they were obscured by the rain in the fine dust and lost. My boss saw them as well his nephew.

ALSO NOTICED: That was the third or fourth time bigfoot was around, the first for myself.

OTHER WITNESSES: 2 sleeping in truck at job site waiting on my arrival.

OTHER STORIES: My boss had 3 of his guys quit, including his own son cause of rocks being thrown and screams w/ wood knocks.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: Night partly cloudy

ENVIRONMENT: Old growth forest tons of fresh clean water and wildlife as well as berries.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Darrel Verney:

The witness is a heavy equipment operator for logging operations and an experienced outdoors man. The area he described is at an elevation of 4200 feet and has plenty of resources. There are swamps, lakes with fish, and a variety of other wildlife, including “tons of rabbits and small game, moose, bear, deer, cougar, and lynx.”

This night, he followed three sets of unusual tracks for a mile on his way to a new logging job site. In his excavator, he was right over the tracks and had a good view of them. He described three distinctively as different size foot prints.

He compared them in human terms as about a size ten men's, for the small prints, a size thirteen men’s, for the midsize prints, and size eighteen to twenty men’s, for the big prints. The tracks were on a new, packed, dirt road, with about half an inch of powdery dust on top. The steps were farther apart than he could walk without hopping a little. The witness is 6 feet tall.

The tracks were along the edge of the road, overlooking a gully where a stream flowed. The smallest prints were not visible at times. He likened it to going on a walk with his wife and kids. Sometimes his kids would want a piggyback ride so they didn’t get too tired.

He could clearly see toe impressions. The toes were spread apart with 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch gap between them. There was no arch on the bottom of the soul. The toes looked like they were gripping the ground when they pushed off with each step. Although there were some similarities, they were not human tracks.

The witness also noted that the creator of the largest tracks would stop and turn to the side every so often, which he thought was “weird.” His thought was that it was slightly ahead of the others and was stopping to wait. It may have simply turned occasional to check behind, staying alert to their surroundings.

He didn't have his phone with him, so he was not able to get any pictures. By the time his shift was over, it started raining, so the tracks in the powdery dust were hard to see.

The witness also described some strange incidents and issues they had during their logging operation. “The funny thing is that we only had issues when we had to work through streams, installing culverts and constructing our road.”

“I had to cut 3 trees that were blocking the road one day. They were about 12-16 inches across and 30- 40 ft. long. They were all broke off about ten or so feet off the ground and laid across the road in the same direction, with the butts too far away to have simply fallen over. They were about a 1/4 mile apart from each other on the edges of the swamp.”

“One of the last things that happened was a work light on the main boom of our excavator was ripped off the 1/4 inch steel bar it was mounted to. The bar was bent down and slightly twisted, the light housing had three long cracks on the top like where fingers had gripped it and it cracked from the pressure, and was laying face down on the ground with the glass not broken. The height of the light is 14 ft. at its low point with the boom all the way down. There were no sticks or branches that could have done it the area was clean, and there was no bark or evidence that something knocked it off. It was ripped off of its mount, ever tried to break the plastic those lights are housed in? Not easy it takes a lot of force to break one and this thing was ripped from its mount the bolt was still tight on the mount with the light bulb intact lying face down on rocks and was not even scratched, when the plastic case was in about 3 pieces. From 14ft if it fell, it would've shattered.”

About BFRO Investigator Darrel Verney:

Originally from Alaska, Darrel now lives in north central Washington. He studied Wildlife Biology and Wildlands Recreation, and has worked for the National Park Service and National Forest Service in the past. He feels fortunate in having had several sightings and numerous encounters during expeditions and informal outings. Darrel has attended the Redwoods ’06, North Cascades ’08, ’09 & '16, Olympic ’09 & ’11, and Morton ’12 & ’13 expeditions.