Pterosaur Sighting in Orange County, California

Why would a large ropen, or flying creature like a ropen, apparently a giant Rhamphornynchoid pterosaur, fly over the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary, in Orange County, California, in daylight? It was not millions of years ago but in mid-2007. A large long-tailed pterosaur does not fly around the university campus at Irvine every day or we would have photos of the creature. It seems more likely that a solitary nocturnal ropen, perhaps one of the largest, had been hunting at night in those wetlands near the campus, and was awakened from sleep the next day, disturbed by something that caused it to take a rare daylight flight, passing over Campus Drive.

In July of 2008, by phone, I interviewed the eyewitness who was driving north on Campus Drive, on that day in 2007, as the creature flew right in front of his car. The man has no desire for publicity, for his reputation as an honest sane professional is critical. I agreed to protect his identity but now feel it safe to reveal that he is one of the following:

• Doctor
• Fire Fighter
• Lawyer
• Police Officer

From the Cryptozoology Book Live Pterosaurs in America

He described [it] . . . as 30 feet long, with 15-16 feet of that being a tail. He saw the creature fly “at low altitude,” in front of his car, over the road (Campus Drive), into the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary, in daylight. . . . SNW (anonymous) had no view of any feet and no good view of the head. He noticed that during the creature’s flight the tail was straight, as if it was “stretched out to be measured.” A flange, close to the end of the tail, he described as “triangle-shaped.” . . . The wings had “wrinkles” on the underside, showing absence of feathers . . . the creature looked wet, as if it had just come out of the water.

Another Orange County Encounter

“I had an experience about 12-years ago . . . I was living at the time in Rancho Santa Margarita, which is a master planned community near the O’Neill Canyons and the foothills of Saddleback mountain range. . . . One night I was awakened [about 1:00 a.m.] with screeching and screaming . . . like some sort of creature was suffering, or fighting for its life in my backyard. . . . accompanied my some thrashing around in some hedges or bushes in the backyard of my [neighbors house] . . . I went to the front door and went out into the dark. . . . I then moved cautiously towards the driveway on the side of the house . . . I was transfixed with fear . . .”

Jonathan David Whitcomb, cryptozoologist