→ Type of Encounter:
Visual Sighting
→ Reported by:
Confidential / Translation by: Stephane of Bigfoot Quebec
→ Location of Encounter:
Encounter #1 – Petawawa, Ontario
Encounter #2 – Wainwright, Alberta
→ Date & Time of Encounter:
1983-02 & 1983-05
→ Details of the Event:
Testimony from a Canadian Armed Forces veteran.
Phone conversation was in French (November, 2020)
Translated and transcripted by Bigfoot Quebec.
(I’m not a professional translator, so please bear with me.)
Both events happened in 1983:
The first one in February, in Petawawa (Ontario), and the second
one: in May, in Wainwright (Alberta).
—————————————-
“I was with the Canadian Armed Forces
for 15 years… I joined in 1980… ”
“I was based in Petawawa, with the Special Operation Forces –
what is known today as the JTF.” *
* Joint Task Force 2. JTF2.
“We were doing special missions… One day, we were
out for a winter survival course… we were about
2-3 km from Algonquin Park… on top of a mountain…
… out in the open… we were going to stay there
for a week. We had training exercices… a lot of
things to do… patrols… I won’t bore you with the
all the details.”
“During the evening, we had to do our guard tour…
while everyone else was sleeping in their tents…
There was always one of us who would stay up
to do the night patrol around our camp…
We were maybe 15 people in total…”
“One night, it was my turn to do the patrol: the guy
who had just finished his shift woke me up…
I put my coat on and went outside… It was maybe
-30 C outside and the wind was blowing like crazy…”
“It was defintely not a good place to be… you had to be
crazy to stay out there… Anyway, I started
doing my guard tour. We had 3 tents where people were
sleeping… and one extra tent where we put all our
gear: stoves… survival stuff. I was garding the tents…
in case of a fire…or …”
“… Petawawa is bear country… bears hibernate this
time of year, but they sometime wake up and get out of
their dens… once in while. And there’s plenty
more animals in these parts: fishers, wolf, coyote…
the whole deal.”
“So I’m doing my tour… and all of a sudden, I hear
some talking down the mountain. The mountain we
were stationned on was about the size of Mt St-Bruno
or Mt Royal” (+-200 m)
“… and about a third of that mountain top was
a huge rocky cape… no trees growing on it, just
… clean.”
“So I hear talking coming from inside the tree line…
as if someone is speaking and then somebody else
responds from 150-200 m away. Like a discussion
going on between two… people. The voices sounded
japanese, like in the samurai movies… pretty much
the same…”
“I was trying to figure out what was going on… but it
was so damn dark outside. We had a lantern shining in
the middle of the four tents, but that was it. So I took
my flashlight… but these were the old ones, not LEDs,
and they didn’t shine much past 3 feet.
So I was trying to take a look at what was making
these sounds… but I couldn’t see anything.”
“…but I still tried to make contact with these voices. I
told them they were on a military base and asked them
to ID themselves. I had my riffle, but on these training
exercices, we had no bullets in them.
So I’m trying to engage, to make contact with these
voices. But I never got a reponse. This went on for half
an hour, chit-chatting like that… the voices were
moving around.”
“After a while, I got fed up with it. I thought: if these
are clowns messing with me, and climbing their way up
here, I’ll make sure they meet their match. So I put a
bayonet on my riffle and started to yell a them to ID
themselves. Again, no response. I couldn’t see who
was chatting down there.
Eventually, the voices stopped.”
“When I came back to camp to find my replacement
-we did this every hour- I didn’t tell him a thing.
Otherwise, he would have thought I was crazy and
that something was wrong with me.
So I kept it to myself.”
“So this is basically my first event. Was it a bigfoot?
Was it something else? It was certainly not normal.
Unlike any animal sound I heard before. I’ve been
hunting since I was young. I’m at home in the woods
and know pretty much all the critters living in the
forest. But I’d never heard that before.”
“So I kept it to myself and left it as it is. And that
was the end of it.”
“That was in February. In May, we went to Wainwright,
Alberta, to do a training exercise. The whole brigade m
oved over there. We set up everything, did our tasks.
I was an electronic technician by trade and part of
the mobile repair team that fixed telecom equipment
when we had breakdowns. One day, my partner and I
were dispatched for a repair job.”
“Anyway, we jumped in our pickup and left. All we had
were coordinates and a topographic map to find this
equipment. So we were driving and looking. Our truck
was camoed -they did a very good job: we had a
hard time finding the truck. Anyway, I was driving
and asked my partner to look on the map for a road
or trail that could lead us to the location.”
“He unfolds the map, all the way, while I’m
sitting in the truck, by the side this gravel road. While
he’s focusing on his map, I’m looking around for a
landmark. I see a firebreak, on the other side of the
road, at about 11 o’clock. No trees there, only low
brush. And I can see this deer grazing in the firebreak.”
“I’m watching this deer. It spots my truck. The deer is
maybe 30-40 meters from us. It’s grazing, moving its
head up and down, looking at us, not sure what to make
of us… it’s on the alert.”
“So, as I was going to tell my partner to take a look at
this deer, I saw something coming out of the woods
-the deer was about 15 meters from the tree line.
Anyway, I’m watching this thing coming out of the
treeline, and it’s running at a hundred miles an hour.
I’m not kidding.”
“From my point of view, and using the deer for scale,
I’d say that this beast was, at minimum, 7 1/2 to
8 feet high. Damn, this thing was 4 feet wide.
Huge. Built like a football player. Made no sense.
I could see the hair flow in the air and bounce around
as it was running.”
“He came from behind the deer, and when he got close,
he put his hand on its head. At the same time,
he put his other hand on the deer’s neck and rotated
on himself. So what happened is that the deer’s body
was held still while the head was twisted 180 degrees.
He broke its neck on the spot.”
(note: What I can gather from the original French
is that the creature had gotten somehow in front
of the deer and was now facing it when it broke its neck. (?)
It also seems that the creature used its whole
body to snap th neck, thus “rotating on himself”.
But it’s not clear -to me, at least- if this rotation
was done on a horizontal or vertical plane.
I’m sorry I didn’t ask the witness for more details.)
“And, in one fell swoop, he made a U-turn
and kept running towards the woods… while, at the
same, grabbing the deer and swinging it over
his shoulder … and goodye, we’re gone.
This was done in a split second.”
(The exact sequence of events here is unclear.)
“As I was watching these events unfold before my
eyes, I let out: “Hey, did you see this deer?”. But by
the time my partner had put the map down, it was
already over.
He asked me: “Where’s the deer?”
I told him : “Forget about it, critters move
fast around here.”
“I had maybe 10 seconds, max, to see what went down.
In my career, I travelled all around the world, and went
once on a photo safari in Africa. I saw a cheetah run
after a gazelle. Well, this thing, I can tell
you, was running faster than a cheetah. Totally insane.
This creature is big and tall, and runs like hell.”
“It’s also impossibly strong.”
“I hunt deer with a bow. A deer weighs about 100 lbs,
sometimes pushing 200.
I’m telling you: you’d have to be strong as hell
to be able to grab a 100-lb weight by one arm and
sling it over your shoulder.”
Me: “I wonder if you remember the colour of the
creature?”
“It happened so fast… to me, it looked like
brown… bown with some red. I’d say that the
undercoat was brown while the tips were somewhat
reddish.”
“His head was set low between the shoulders…
… as he was running…
Oh, yeah: when I saw him coming out of the woods,
he wasn’t actually running: he was leaping…
It was more leaping than running.”
“The first 2-3 leaps he made… it looked like he was on
all fours. It was funny the way he moved… I saw him
coming out of the woods… he was coming at a 45-degree
angle toward the deer…”
“He came out of the woods and leaped: he must have
jumped a good 3-4 meters… and then…his hands…
-because he had hands, not paws-
his hands touched the ground first when he landed.”
“… and then… his 2 back legs came forward and landed
between his 2 hands… if you know what I mean.
And at the same time, he started to leap again… and
landed again in the same fashion, on his hands…
and then brought forward his feet and jumped again.”
“And when he got closer to the deer, he stood
up and started to run on his “back legs” -because he
needed his hands to catch the deer.”
“When he got to the deer, he put one hand on
its head and the other one on its throat, turned around,
and twisted its head.
As soon as he did that, the 2 (front) legs of the deer
buckled… and then he swung the deer over his shoulder
… all in one fell swoop…”
“… he never paused or stopped…”
(all done in one single, fluid motion).
“It was almost like he had an anchor point somewhere
and he was helping himself with a rope… and once
he reached the end of it, he grabbed the deer.”
“He hadn’t even finished taking the deer and he was
already gone and in full run.”
“I never saw him slow down for a second… it was…
bing, bang: gone.”
“I could still manage to see his body working… ”
“… like in the stories… when they say they are built
like bodybuilders… well, what I saw was V-shaped…
unreal… when it’s running, you can see the muscles
working, as he’s moving along… fascinating…”
“You can’t fake that. I’m telling you…
you might want to try to replicate it,
but you wouldn’t be able to do so.”
“And I know it wasn’t a bear… the only bears in
Wainwright are small, black bears. We had bisons there
too… but a buffalo doesn’t have hands.”
“… okay.. while we’re talking about bisons…
have you ever seen the colour of their fur?
The dark brown undercoat … and the surface hue…
a bit reddish. Well, it was exactly like that.”
Me: “So this happened at about 30-40 meters from the
vehicule? This was a pickup truck, right?”
“Yes, a large pickup truck, with a big box.
Yes… at about 30-40 m.”
Me: “Did you notice any difference in lenght of hair,
like on the head or the arms?”
“It all happened so fast… but what I did notice,
though… -I was trying to soak up as much as possible,
trying to understand what was happening-
so, anyway, what I can tell you is that the hair on his
head… it was like he had a pointed head… but the hair
was longer in the middle part of the head and shorter on
the side.”
“This gave me the impression that, while he was running,
the top of his head was making like …waves… in the
wind. So I wouldn’t say sasquatch has a pointed head.
I tend to think that it’s the hair in the middle of the head
that is longer and makes it look like that.”
“When I was looking at him running, I could see the hair
moving… it wasn’t like a solid cone shape.”
Me: “Did you notice any colour difference in the face?”
“It looked pretty much the same colour as the rest of the
body.”
Me: “I wonder if the creature was aware of your presence
and knew it was observed …while it was doing all of that.
The truck’s engine was stopped, right?”
-“Yes.”
Me: “So you were quiet, then.”
“Yes, and our trucks were painted in camo: dark green,
pale green and black. So against a backdrop of forest,
it’s not easy to be spotted.”
Me: “How long had it been since you got there and
stopped the truck?”
“We had just arrived. Not even 5 minutes… maybe
2 minutes.”
“I still had time to look around the area from my
vehicule. And when my gaze turned to the firelane,
that’s when I saw the deer. It was pretty much the
same colour as the brush surrounding it.”
“It raised its head to look at us…if it hadn’t
done that, I wouldn’t have never seen it.
“I’ve gone deer hunting many times and know when a
deer is on full alert.
Me: Ears and tail.
“Yes, it was shaking its tail and moving its ears…
lowering and raising its head…its ears were oriented
toward me.”
“That’s why it didn’t see him coming: because it was
focused on me.” ( ? )
“The deer never heard a thing, because of its uni-
directionnal hearing. Both ears were pointing at me.” (?)
(I guess meaning like a parabolic mic)
“Anyway, it was looking at me, sniffing the air… ”
“I can’t tell you which way the wind was blowing at the
time – but the creature was probably upwind, otherwise,
the deer would have smelled him right away.”
“To me, this shows a certain level of intelligence… to
be able to set position, calculate approach and then
collect, if you will. Then to turn on a dime and
leave the other way. And doing all of that without any
break.” (uninterrupted, fuid motion)
“It wasn’t his first time doing that. It was a predator
move.”
Me: “Maybe he wanted to leave the scene as fast as
possible, because he was aware of your presence -but
he still wanted the deer.”
“And, perhaps, he even took advantage of the
distraction caused by your presence….” (to catch the
deer) “… and then bolted out of there because he was
aware of a human presence.”
– “Yes, yes, that makes a lot of sense…”
Me: “He probably heard your vehicle coming while he
was already hunting… Obviously, I’m speculating, here.”
Me: “Did you hear any sound or noise while these
events unfolded?
“My side window was up. I didn’t hear anything, not
even the deer bell.”
Me: “Once the creature emerged from the tree line and was
out in the open, the deer probably had some time to react a
bit…eventhough this happened so fast.”
“It … ” (trying to explain what the deer did)
“When you hunt deer with a bow, you always have
to aim a bit lower. Because as soon as it hears the
sound… ” (of the arrow) “…its four legs will bend.”
“So if you aim at normal height, the arrow will go
too high. Always aim, say, 8-10 inches lower, to
hit the vital organs.”
Me: “It actually hears the arrow being realeased?”
“Yes, and sound travels at around 600-650 mph* while
an arrow does between 75 to 150 feet/sec.”
(* sound travels at 667 knots, or 767 mph.)
“Yeah.. so the sound arrives before the arrow, so it
has time to react. They have such good reflexes…”
“These are all details a hunter notice and that I
can use to describe my experience.”
“When you see that happening …To me, this was an
animal that was effective at doing its job….
it’s a predator, a hunter… what it was doing was all
planned and calculated… and was practiced
and repeated several times, over many years.”
Me: “Creatures of this size, the number of calories they
need… it’s an argument the skeptics often bring up…
but in many areas, there’s so many deers: it’s becoming
a nuisance.”
“I never spoke to anyone about my experiences…
it wouldn’t have been a good move, at the time, to talk
about it…for my carreer, which had only started.
I decided to keep it quiet.”
Me: “At that time, what did you know about Sasquatch?
What was your knowledge of this phenomenon?”
“What I knew about it was the Patterson-Gimlin film…
I saw it when I was a teen, at the Montreal Expo.”
(The site of the Expo, Notre-Dame island)
(edited for briefness)
“… in this documentary, you could see a stop
sign with a sasquatch hand impressed on it.
The sasquatch had slapped the stop sign with his hand.
The sign was embossed.
Have you ever tried to bend a road sign? You need
something strong as hell to do that.
Anyway, that left an impression on me.” (no pun)
“At the time, it wasn’t something I was interested in,
or that I was following. I saw the movie (PGF) but
that was maybe 10 years before.” (before 1983)
“It wasn’t on my mind. When these things happen,
you don’t necessarily connect the dots right away.”
Me: “Okay, but how long did it take after that
for you to connect the dots and finally realize that this
could be it?” (sasquatch)
“It took me.. … … it hasn’t been a long time since
I’ve realized, not a long time.
“I have PTSD from what I’ve experienced in the
Armed Forces.
I’ve been treated for 10 years, followed by specialists.
While talking with my psychologist… that’s when
these things were brought back to the surface.
They were like… hidden memories.”
Me: “So this was swept under the rug and you’ve never
talked about it, until then.
“No, no, I kept everything to myself…
If I try to tell,someone, they will…
I kept it to myself.”
“It resurfaced in the course of the last 10 years.
And, one day, when it was back on my mind,
I went on the internet and started to do some
research.”
“By that time, I had a pretty good idea what it was
… but I had no certainty.”
We talked another 40 minutes or so, touching
on different topics, from PTSD to cougar sightings
in Quebec. I asked him for gouvernment documents
proving his identity but he told me these were not available.
I also sent him follow-up questions but he texted
me he was too busy these days to answer them. I admit that
I hit pretty hard with my questions (almost an interrogation).
Anyway, he seemed genuine to me, but I’ll people decide
for themselves. He used some descriptives
commonly found in podcasts, like the V-shape, etc.,
but he told me he has listened to them, so he’s been exposed
to the sasquatch ìcultureî and it’s normal that he’s using
some of the expressions. When he imitated the samurai talk,
that raised some flags, because it was very similar
to the Sierra Sounds.
On the other hand, at one point he recalled some new
details as he was speaking (when he remembered the leaping),
and that seemed very spontaneous and natural to me,
not like someone reciting a constructed narrative.
That lends more credance to his account.
Thank you,
Stephane, Bigfoot Quebec