Location: Lightning Ridge, New South Wales
Event: Yowie Sighting
Date: 2001
Time: 9pm
[Male Witness – Interview with Paul Cropper]
Paul:
Walk me through what you were doing, what happened, what you saw… just take me through the whole experience.
Brett:
One day, my close mate Greg said: “ come out to Lightning Ridge, start opal mining with me and rebuild your life”.
I went out to the Ridge and from that point forth is where everything started.
[He was out mining alone for some weeks]
I started to feel a presence…having been a bouncer in nightclubs. I've always had this situational awareness. I had [felt] this presence from about two weeks in and it was non-stop. It was every time I come up out of the (mining) hole. I'd be sitting on my log near my fire…behind me was fairly thick forest.
[One evening he encountered a creature]
I'd finished mining for the day and I was lying down (in my caravan) and I hear these footsteps. I'd left the fire going. I was watching the stars because you’d have this incredible (view) of the Milky Way. I hear these footsteps… I'm like what the hell's outside? It was coming from the north side of the caravan.
These footsteps were huge. I knew the sound of my own footsteps on the dead leaves on the ground. You get a gauge of the timing between each footstep and this thing was huge. It was taking footsteps that were easy four or five foot between each step. It was crunch, crunch, crunch, crunch.
I've got all sorts of stuff racing through my head, because I'm in a caravan. I'm naked on my bloody bed, I'm reading a book and I'm thinking, my god what the hell is standing outside my van. It then moves around the northwest of the van towards my fire. It comes around then walks to my fire and stops and starts to take a leak. It sounded like someone had started a fire-hose and at that point I'm like, bugger this.
I get up I open the door and there he was, not six feet from me. Looking at me with this grin on its face. I'm butt-naked, he's standing there doing what he's doing and we're looking at each other in disbelief. I've got no words. What the hell do I say to this other than, I was thinking.. I'm so sorry, I should have put that fire out. At which point he turns and walks.
Paul:
What did this thing look like?
Brett:
Hairy, face covered in hair, body covered in hair, arms covered in hair. Incredible structure, mostly muscle. Would rip you in half in a heartbeat. Huge feet, huge arms, huge hands. He was monstrous, this thing was monstrous, standing there. He was looking at me with half a grin and it was more telepathic.. I swear we were talking to each other. My first thought was, my god, so sorry, this is careless, I should have put that fire out and he's turned and walked off. No threat, no intimidation, nothing.
Paul:
Did you get a sense of its face like a human face or a non-human face or an or a monkey face what sort of face were you looking at?
Brett:
It was it hard to say - that's a great question - human facial features but covered in hair
Paul:
The hair on it was it short hair or long hair?
Brett:
Relatively long yeah…probably safe to say around the four to six inch mark
Paul:
Was there a colour?
Brett:
Brown, a really deep brown.
Paul:
Was the hair the same all over?
Brett:
The density was consistent all over it.
Paul:
Was this a lean thing or was it like a rugby player?
Brett:
Legs like tree trunks a chest and arms on him like a bodybuilders. He was immensely powerful… to the point where I'm a big man, like, if you know, I put the wind up an awful lot of people, I'm nearly six three, I'm a hundred and thirty kilo, fit, built like a brick shit house. I'm an immensely powerful human being and he put the wind up me. He could have just played with me like a kid plays with a Barbie doll.
Paul:
Did you get a sense of how many kilos that thing would have weighed?
Brett:
He'd be probably closer to 250 to 300 and probably even bigger than that in all honesty
Paul:
When you said you communicated with it and you sort of were saying sorry for leaving the fire on because it was pissing on it… did you get anything back from this thing or was it just you had that reaction it was telling you that that you shouldn't have done that?
Brett:
Exactly how you describe it because you know what's insane about this is not an hour later the wind blew up like you would not believe and it's absolutely pouring down rain and lightning everywhere that wind would have caught that fire because I'd left it going.
Paul:
So this thing walks off you're still butt-naked well what did you do?
Brett:
I just stood there in disbelief how do you comprehend something like that. I (eventually) left the Ridge then moved to Queensland and I've been up here since.
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