Pterosaurs
Still Living

Interview methods: Guessman & Woetzel

        Eyewitness Interviews on Umboi Island
 
Garth Guessman (below) and David Woetzel (2004 expedition) prepared a questionnaire booklet before they arrived in Papua New Guinea. This ensured that important points would be covered in interviewing eyewitnesses of the ropen. Their interviews were well organized and, because of careful planning, many villagers who had not previously been interviewed by anyone gave many details that benefited the investigation.
The images from Umboi Island are copyright 2004, Garth Guessman
Other images and text are copyright 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, Jonathan Whitcomb
 
See also the "Contents" page of Cliff Paiva's report: "Analysis of a video of two indava lights"
        Special thanks to Garth Guessman for the use of these eight images
 
  Guessman reviews the interview form on Umboi
 
Woetzel and Guessman used a detailed set of questions (two pages) to determine time-of-day (or night); sighting location; date; weather conditions; visibility; shape-of-creature: head, neck, wings, feet, mouth, eyes; flight pattern; and name of the eyewitness. Many natives on Umboi Island were interviewed, although not all interviews involved the detailed questionnaire.
Some pages of the interview book had pictures of birds to show natives. (Could a bird be mistaken for a ropen?) This pain-
staking attention to detail helped verify the authenticity of the unique characteristics of the ropen sightings. The local people saw these pictures of birds but no bird picture
was chosen for a ropen sighting. The two Interviewers determined that the ropen looks quite different; it is no bird.
More images shown to Umboi natives
Included images of bird flight
Natives were shown a variety of bird species: to compare with the ropen
    Bird-bat-pterosaur comparison page of the interview book
 
Part of the interview book is devoted to comparing images of many birds, bats, and pterosaurs. This allowed the explorers to find out if there were misidentifications or misunderstandings involving sightings. Umboi Islanders were allowed to choose for themselves which sketch most resembled what they saw.
 
According to Whitcomb's book, Searching for Ropens, only two eyewitnesses had a clear view of the wing-shape: Jonah Jim and Jonathan Ragu; both of them (from thirty-four silhouette-images of birds, bats, and pterosaurs) chose Sordes Pilosus, a long-tailed Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaur.
Interview book
of Guessman
and Woetzel
 
 
Caves and Bats
 
 
Creationist
Perspective on
Living Pterosaurs
 
 
Ropens eat bats?
 
 
Science, origins,
and philosophy
 
 
Three philosophies
regarding origins
 
 
Evolutionary Boundary
 
 
About Whitcomb
 
 
Wooden carvings
(ropen-like animals)
 
 
Evolution, creation, and pterosaurs
 
 
Length of head appendage
 
 
Bingham Lights
of South Carolina
 
 
Pterosaur sighting
by Scott Norman
 
 
Sighting by Wooten
in South Carolina
 
 
Criticisms of YEC
cryptid hunts
Eagles of Umboi Island: very unlike descriptions of ropen
 
The eagles of Umboi Island are well known to the local islanders. Guessman and Woetzel videotaped these large birds. They're nothing like the ropen descriptions given by native eyewitnesses; the nocturnal ropen flashes a brief, bright light. On the rare occasions when it flies in daylight, eyewitnesses describe the ropen as gigantic ("too big" according to Wesley Koro). Gideon Koro, from the Akure Village area of Umboi, answered an American explorers question about the tail length: "sefen meetah" (seven meters) long. It's also said to have no feathers.
Still images from video: birds flying over Umboi Island (at least one eagle)
 
 
In the book Searching for Ropens, the 2004 Guessman-Woetzel expedition is explained in detail;  Whitcomb’s earlier expedition is also covered in detail. Why has the Western world been completely ignorant of this giant living pterosaur? The book delves into why standard models of science are not as objective as portrayed.
 
In the second edition of the book (two chapters have been added) the break-through expedition of November, 2006, is explained: Two indava lights were videotaped deep in the mainland interior of Papua New Guinea; later, in the United States, a missile defense physicist analyzed the video footage: the two lights were not made by lanterns, car headlights, airplanes, or meteors.
 
Other local names for apparent living pterosaurs in Papua New Guinea include duwas, wawanar, kundua, seklo-bali, and indava. On Umboi Island, the name is “ropen.”
Second edition of Searching for Ropens,
living pterosaurs in Papua New Guinea
(by Jonathan D. Whitcomb)