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NARRATOR: On this episode of
Destination Truth
So, you saw three Bigfoot?
NARRATOR: Josh responds to
reports of Bigfoot sightings
in the jungles
of Malaysia.
JOSH: That looks like
a Bigfoot print.
NARRATOR: Will he discover
the missing link?
Or will he become
missing in action?
JOSH: (WHISPERING)
Move, move!
NARRATOR: Then Josh makes a run
for way, way south of the border
to track down Argentina's answer
to the Loch Ness Monster.
JOSH: Well, there is something
really big out there.
Something's splashing
around out here.
I'm Josh Gates.
My travels have taken me to the most
exotic and mysterious places on Earth.
I've seen some unexplainable things which
have raised some strange questions.
Now, I've pulled together
a crack team
armed with the latest
technology to search for answers.
(BAT SQUEAKING)
I'm not sure what's out
there waiting for me,
but I know
what I'm looking for.
The truth.
While everybody's heard
of the Bigfoot legend,
in Malaysia,
he's been headline news
ever since some fishermen spotted
a family of the creatures.
Now people from all
over the country
are coming forward to share
their own Bigfoot encounters.
Of all the guys in Bigfoot suits,
this may be the worst right here.
This is just rock bottom.
Okay, so where exactly
is Bigfoot there?
Well, the Bigfoot thing is
huge in Malaysia right now.
There've been sightings all
over the Malaysian peninsula.
Most of them have been here.
Endau-Rompin National Park.
There's just been
a lot of sightings there.
We've got eyewitnesses who've seen Bigfoot
all over the Malaysian peninsula.
So, Blake, how many infrared
cameras do we have?
We have four.
Four right now.
Each one has its own area on the screen.
And these thing can operate
in zero light conditions?
BLAKE: Absolutely.
And we have 50 foot of cable per camera.
Per camera.
And we got stands for the
cameras as well? Yeah.
Where's the laser thermometer?
It's right here.
And that's all powered
and ready to go?
Yeah.
This is the
MARC: Night shot deal's up here.
Uh-huh?
Works on the same principles,
like Blake's cameras,
and his cameras are actually
meant for infrared light.
So, you should be able to pick
that up with your camera.
Should be able to
shoot at will.
JOSH: We packed up
our surveillance equipment
and made our way
to the airport.
Eyewitnesses have spotted
the creature crossing roads
in Malaysia's
Endau-Rompin National Park
and at the riverbanks
of the jungle.
Some even claim
to have found footprints.
And if there was anywhere that
Bigfoot might be hiding out,
it would be in one of the oldest and
least explored tropical rainforests
in the world, with sections
cataloged to be 248 million years old.
But with no direct flight to
the middle of the rainforest,
we first needed to stop
in Johor Bahru, Malaysia.
After being stuck
20 hours on a plane
where the only in-flight movie
was Battlefield Earth,
I was ready for anything
Malaysia might throw my way.
What I didn't expect was for
them to be throwing a party.
I decided I should do some additional
cultural research at once.
All right,
it's not really research,
but the Bigfoot eyewitnesses would
still be available tomorrow
and the parade
with beautiful Thai women
and dragon fly-bys
was one night only.
Since Bigfoot wasn't
coming to my room
to change my sheets
and bring me fresh towels,
I hit the road
to find Vincent Chow.
Mr.
Chow?
Yes, how do you do?
Hi, I'm Josh Gates.
Very nice to meet you.
Good to meet you.
JOSH: A member of
the Malaysian Nature Society,
Mr.
Chow is the country's foremost
expert on cryptozoology,
the study of
unexplained animals.
We've heard there's been a lot
of sightings and activity
up in Endau-Rompin
National Park.
Okay.
And could you give us
directions to this area?
JOSH: With only 10% of Malaysia's
jungles having been explored,
Dr.
Chow made
a persuasive argument
for the possibility of a
large creature like Bigfoot
staying hidden
in Endau-Rompin.
Plus, he'd personally spoken
to dozens of eyewitnesses.
Before this sighting, did you believe in this?
Did you believe in Bigfoot?
You studied zoology.
Right.
Very hairy.
JOSH: With a background in zoology,
Eva seemed like the last person
to mistake an ordinary ape
for Bigfoot.
Plus, she arranged
for us to meet a driver
who claimed to have seen a whole family of
Sasquatch on the road to Endau-Rompin.
So, you saw three Bigfoot?
And they walked right across
the road here?
Were they moving slowly
or were they moving fast?
And were there other cars around?
Did anybody else see this?
Just you.
What do you think?
What do I think it was?
Yeah, what do you think it was?
A Gorilla?
Orangutan?
No, but there's
But the weird thing is,
there's no orangutans on
this part of the peninsula.
So, there's I mean, There's no
gorillas on this part of the peninsula.
JOSH: These sightings were interesting,
but I wanted to head inside Endau-Rompin
so we could set up camp, break
out our tracking equipment,
and try to find Bigfoot
or whatever animal
was roaming
the rainforest here.
You've been outside
for four minutes.
You're like a lobster,
look at you.
NEIL: That thing is Oh!
Where is it right now?
NEIL: It's in that corner.
Oh, my God!
NEIL: Show him the pictures.
Look at it!
It's bigger than my hand.
Look Hold on, look at the
fangs on the front of it.
I don't even want to
get near the picture.
JOSH: We finally arrived
at the park
where we met up
with a guide named Adan.
(STAMMERING) One of your
friends saw Bigfoot's nest?
Uh, yes.
Is it possible
to walk out to that area?
Or to hike into that
section in the interior?
JOSH: He couldn't
take us into the park.
But he agreed to take us
to another witness.
When they came face to
face, what happened?
(SPEAKING IN BAHASA MALAYSIA)
You mean the *** organs?
It has human
So they went at night so they wouldn't
startle Bigfoot or embarrass him.
Yes.
Okay.
JOSH: We can communicate with him?
Yeah.
And what did he say?
JOSH: Presented with this
description of a naked, bashful,
English-speaking Bigfoot,
I did what any good
investigator would do.
Okay, let's go.
After our quick detour
to crazy town,
our next stop was
the nearby jungle river,
which was the only way to get
into the heart of the park
where the Bigfoot sightings
were reported.
But before hitting the bush,
we needed some supplies.
JOSH: It's a what curry?
Yeah, curry's always
a good food to have
right before you go
into the jungle.
Going back country with a big bag
full of curry strapped to me.
Perfect.
Just perfect.
Protein bar?
No, no, no.
Boiling hot curry?
Please.
Yes.
I'd like to bring that
with me into the jungle.
JOSH: Wow.
Monkeys.
There's like six
monkeys sitting on the hood of our car.
Is that okay?
Can we just leave them there?
Okay, there's
Marc?
This guy's got 20 gallons
of open fuel,
his foot's on the fuel line,
cover's off the engine
and he's smoking a cigarette
six inches away from it.
I don't mind the jungle, I just don't
want this guy to Hindenburg this engine.
Hey, guys?
How's the engine?
No? Bad? You fix?
(INDISTINCT CHATTERING)
What does that mean? Chinya?
Chinya? Totally busted?
In Malaysian,
is that what Chinya means?
JOSH: After a few repairs
and answered prayers,
we hit the river and headed for
the Bigfoot sighting hotspots.
The first stop was a riverbank
where a fisherman said he had
seen a pack of the creatures.
How big was the footprint?
How big was it?
(SPEAKING IN BAHASA MALAYSIA)
Was it bigger than my foot?
Any other evidence at all?
(SPEAKING IN BAHASA MALAYSIA)
Did you see the footprint
that he drew on the ground?
It was like
Armstrong's moon boot.
No toes, big prescription
pill, right in the ground.
And then I was like,
"Did it have any toes?"
And the guy was like,
"Oh, yes, yes, yes.
"
And he started
drawing toes on it.
Taking one small step for man and one
giant leap away from fantasy land,
we headed deeper into Endau-Rompin
to investigate the grounds
of the most recent
Bigfoot sighting.
JOSH: It's really, really
dense in here.
(MEN SPEAKING NATIVE LANGUAGE)
There's definitely a lot of depressions
in the ground around here.
The leaves are all matted down.
It's hard to see specific
kind of toe prints anywhere,
but definitely a lot
of depressions in here.
Definitely starting to see
what seems like a trail here.
All headed
in the same direction.
Another big impression here and
another one right on top of it,
leading up onto this
large stone area.
All sorts of busted branches all
throughout here, things just look snapped.
A lot of these trees
have fallen over.
JOSH: I needed a little more evidence
than broken trees to convince me that
the missing link had pushed its
way through the jungle here.
Although there are
no giant apes in Malaysia,
there are rhinos that could
have made the clearing,
and that's when I found
something that surprised even me.
Dude, look at that!
JOSH: What's that on camera one?
Move! Move!
Okay, let's double back down and look as
we go down and see if we can see any more,
because a lot of this has just
been washed out by the rain.
This has a footprint-ish
look to it.
Dude, look at that!
Definitely looks like a large
foot impression with digits.
And the heel would be right here.
You can see these toes.
One, two, three,
four, five.
Right there.
What do you think
about that, Marc?
Do you have that
casting material with you?
MARC: Yeah.
This is footprint casting powder.
State crime lab!
"Do not breathe or ingest dust.
" Somebody else do this.
It didn't look like the type of
print that a rhino would make,
but I needed to be sure.
All right, so we've got
a bit of a wait.
Is there like a Denny's
around here or something?
(ALL LAUGHING)
JOSH: So, the print's gonna
be destroyed by doing this,
because we're not
We had to clear all the soil out.
(WOMAN SPEAKING
NATIVE LANGUAGE)
(DISTANT GUNSHOT)
JOSH: What was that?
It wasn't the tone, it was the
shotgun I was concerned about.
Basically, I'm just trying to dig out
the surrounding area from the cast.
It's not very thick,
so I'm trying to do it without
snapping off any pieces of it.
All right, here goes nothing.
(GASPING) Wow!
Was it a print?
I wasn't sure, but it was definitely
worth more investigation.
I decided we should stay and find
whatever made this impression.
Our boat guides, however,
had another idea.
They agreed to pick us up in the morning
if we wanted to stay out here,
but they were headed home, because
once the sun goes down,
the animals come out to feed.
This is gonna be in my tent tonight,
is what I'm really excited about.
MARC: Well, this is what you get when
you come into the jungle, right?
JOSH: There are snakes all around.
That snake is on the ground,
and that's totally
gonna be on me later tonight.
Having already had one close
encounter with a nocturnal creature,
it was time to bust out our
motion detectors, heat sensors
and infrared cameras to try to
find any conclusive evidence
of Bigfoot's existence.
The four motion sensor
cameras, we kind of want to
sweep out in this direction,
so let's put one
in this tree right here,
and then if we can get one that
just sweeps straight up this way.
We set up base camp and placed
our cameras in prime locations,
so if anything was moving around the
jungle, we'd catch it on camera.
And with our sensitive audio equipment,
we'd hear anything abnormal as well.
JOSH: (SOFTLY) Keep an eye
on the monitors.
I'm gonna make
a sweep of the perimeter
and see what I can find.
So right now I'm using the laser thermometer
to read the temperature of the jungle,
which is about 75 degrees.
But if the laser hits me, it
jumps up to about 85 degrees.
So I'm gonna continue to sweep
the area with the laser,
watch for any jumps in temperature
that could be Bigfoot
or any other large animals
in this area.
All right, it looks like
this section is clear,
so let's sweep
the rest of the perimeter.
What's that on camera one?
Yeah, right there.
Right there.
We got a bat
coming through camera one.
BLAKE: But, hey, we got a bat, right?
JOSH: We got a bat.
BLAKE: We know it works.
BLAKE: The camera just moved.
JOSH: Which screen?
BLAKE: Camera two.
JOSH: There it goes again!
BLAKE: Maybe it's
just the wind.
(GROWLING)
JOSH: What the hell was that?
JOSH: Did you hear that?
Move! Move!
JOSH: Anything
pop up yet, Blake?
BLAKE: The camera just moved.
JOSH: Which screen?
BLAKE: Camera two.
JOSH: There it goes again.
BLAKE: Maybe it's
just the wind.
BLAKE: Two's down.
JOSH: Move! Move!
Oh, hold on, hold on, hold on!
(JOSH SHUSHING)
It's picking up something.
(DISTANT GROWLING)
Did you hear that?
It sounds like a growl.
Everyone keep their ears open.
Let's follow that sound.
Guys, you okay?
BLAKE: Yeah.
JOSH: Let's watch the water through here.
The waterfall's right there.
It drops right off.
Go ahead.
(BLEEPING)
JOSH: What's the matter?
BLAKE: Go!
BLAKE: The thorns
ripped up my arm.
MARC: (STAMMERING) We went
through a huge thorn bush.
JOSH: Are you okay?
I think whatever was
out here is gone now.
By dawn, we had found a river
and plenty of thorn bushes,
but no Bigfoot.
With the strange growl captured on
tape and our footprint cast in hand,
we headed back
to civilization.
JOSH: Hey, do you think
the car's still there?
I don't know.
I'd say I'd give
even money either the monkeys
Did you see what the guy said
to us when we parked the car?
He asked me to park it
really close to the tree
because it makes it harder
for the locals to steal it.
And then as we got
into the boat,
there was a thousand
monkeys on the hood.
Dude, the monkeys did
a number on the car.
All the other cars are fine.
Our car? Monkey poo town.
BLAKE: Isn't this the spot
they told us to park in?
Yeah, it is.
Exactly, the guy was like,
"Leave the car right here.
"
MARC: Close to the tree.
This is where monkeys love to
just sit, crap and play with it.
We left the jungle and headed
for the first car wash
we could find
with some intriguing evidence.
But when word of
our discovery got out,
we learned that we wouldn't be allowed
to take the only cast of the footprint
out of the country,
so we needed to make a copy
in order to undertake additional
scientific analysis back in the States.
And before you could
say "paparazzi,"
we found ourselves in
the middle of a media storm.
I never would have thought that a
piece of plaster shaped like a foot
would cause a media frenzy,
but in Malaysia,
we were headline news.
As to how conclusive this is, I
think it's something unexplained.
The most important thing is just that
it helps to raise more questions,
propels us to investigate the
unknown and find the truth.
I'd gathered enough evidence to
believe that there was something big
roaming the jungles of
Endau-Rompin National Park.
And I was off to take our
evidence back to the States
to get some scientific insight into the
strange noise we captured on tape,
and to see if the print
we found in Endau-Rompin
could actually be attributed to
something the likes of Bigfoot.
Our first meeting was with Michael Dee,
curator of the Los Angeles Zoo,
to go over our audio evidence
and see if he could
identify the sounds
we captured as coming
from a familiar creature.
There are cricket noises,
but there's noise throughout.
There's a kind of
a droning noise.
What do you think?
It's obviously something, but that
certainly doesn't sound like any mammal
that I'm familiar with.
Yeah, that noise isn't something
that you can readily identify?
No.
Unable to get anything
definitive from our audio evidence,
we hoped that the cast we made
would provide some answers.
So we flew to
Idaho State University
where we met with
Dr.
Jeffrey Meldrum,
one of the country's
foremost primatologists
and also
the resident Bigfoot expert,
to see what he made
of our footprint.
My research involves primate and
human evolutionary biology,
so that's what brings my interest
particularly to footprints
both ape and human
and pre-human.
So this is right up my alley.
I'm very anxious to take a look at this
and see if what you have really
suggests an unknown bipedal primate.
JOSH: Let's take a look at the actual
cast and you can tell us what you think.
Well, there are a number of things
that are puzzling about this.
Primate foot has a tendency for
a natural kind of curvature.
The point being that
the divergent toe
is typically on the inside
of that curvature,
whereas here we've
got the opposite situation,
where what you might think would
be a rudimentary first digit,
it's on the opposite side
one might expect.
It's sticking off to what would
otherwise be interpreted
as the outside edge of the foot.
Sure.
So, that is really odd and
unusual and in this situation,
you're always at the mercy
of your own interpretation,
of what you see as a series
of impressions.
Sure.
Considering all the particulars,
I think it boils down
to essentially three
possibilities.
One is
it's just a series of potholes that
have a strong resemblance to the eye,
resembling a foot.
The other possibility would be
that it is the superimposition
of the track of a commonly known
animal, say, a rhinoceros.
The third possibility would be
that, in fact, this may represent
a plantigrade pentadactal foot.
A flat five-toed foot,
which has some resemblances to the
reports of Bigfoot in footprint evidence
from North America.
JOSH: While the indentation in the
ground might have been just a pothole
as suggested by Dr.
Meldrum,
the pronounced digits and the track-like
pattern discovered in the area
was certainly unusual, and were
consistent with the eyewitness reports
which had sent us
to that very location.
We did capture a strange
growling sound
that Michael Dee couldn't
attribute to any known mammal.
And something
knocked over our camera.
Based on our evidence, I feel it's
possible that a large, unknown creature
could have made a home
in Endau-Rompin.
And it's clearly only a matter
of time before I end up
back in the jungle
looking for Bigfoot,
perhaps next time
with a bigger net.
In the meantime, however, I read
reports of a giant lake monster
terrorizing a resort town
in Southern Argentina.
The creature is called
the Nahuelito.
The Nahuelito is the Latin version
of the Loch Ness Monster,
and is reported to share similar
features to its Scottish counterpart.
It is described as having
a large hump, a long neck,
and a head that looks
kind of like that thing
that explodes out of
John Hurt's chest in Alien.
Witnesses have suggested that the
Nahuelito travels in and out of its home
in Nahuel Huapi Lake
by slithering through
a 300-mile underwater tunnel system
leading to the Pacific Ocean,
meaning that, one, it's not
an easy creature to track,
and, two, it apparently has a lung
capacity rivaling Lance Armstrong.
So, we packed up and hopped a plane
to Buenos Aires, Argentina,
to meet with Fabian, a local reporter who
claims to have caught the creature on camera.
Hola!
So we have to take another cab
because his car just broke down.
There's taxi.
Don't worry.
Sure.
Okay.
Does this happen often?
Car breaking down?
Not in the
Too hot today.
Too hot today.
Too hot.
Too hot today to drive?
Too hot today for the car.
All right.
Okay, so we
Sorry!
It's okay!
Hey, what are you gonna do?
We need another cab.
And here's the tow truck,
right on time.
It's amazing.
It takes
two minutes to get a tow truck.
It doesn't make any sense.
With our taxi
out of commission,
I took a bus to the
Natural History Museum,
where we met with Fabian.
Do you believe, as a journalist, that
there is enough evidence to support
the idea that a creature of this
size could be living in this lake?
(SPEAKING SPANISH)
He says, "Yes.
Absolutely.
There's definitely something there.
"
JOSH: While working as a reporter
for a local news station,
Fabian claimed to have caught
the monster on film.
Who actually shot the footage?
(SPEAKING IN SPANISH)
One of their cinematographers.
He came down the mountain.
And he saw it in the lake.
And that's when
he turned on the camera.
Actual footage of a creature seemingly
born out of nightmares and folk tales
right here on video.
I couldn't wait to see it
with my own eyes.
You see, dobló.
(GASPING) Oh, my God!
JOSH: So, here we were
in Buenos Aires,
watching professionally captured
news footage of the Nahuelito.
It seemed as if South America's
answer to the Loch Ness Monster
was ready for its close-up.
Yes.
Oh, yeah.
You see, dobló.
(GASPING) Oh, my God!
Oh, there is something
really big out there.
All right, maybe "close-up" was
too strong a word for it.
This was more like nosebleed
seats at the Super Bowl.
But what I could make out suggested
that it wasn't a seagull
or a local water-skier making
waves in Nahuel Huapi Lake.
Thank you very much
for showing us this footage,
(SPEAKING SPANISH) I actually find
this footage very, very, interesting.
I certainly wanted to get to
the bottom of the sightings,
and one thing was for sure, I wasn't
gonna find a giant lake monster
in downtown Buenos Aires.
Gracias.
Buen día.
Gracias.
Hasta luego.
My team and I caught
the next plane to Bariloche,
a town nestled high in the Andes and
on the edge of the Nahuel Huapi Lake,
the spot where the creature
reportedly calls home.
The Nahuelito is, after all,
named after it.
Covering a surface area
of about 2,927 square miles,
and with a depth
of over 2,000 feet,
similar to that
of Loch Ness,
this was the perfect spot for a giant
prehistoric serpent to call home.
Upon arrival in Bariloche, I
interviewed another eyewitness, Coli,
a local journalist who had his own
experience with this monster
in the same section where Fabian's
footage was originally shot.
We hopped a chairlift
to high atop the mountain
where Coli was able to
point out the exact spot
where he claimed to have
seen the Nahuelito.
You saw two fins
coming out of the water?
Yeah.
Like a double arch.
Like a double arch?
And they were moving?
(STAMMERS) And they
Yes, they were moving, I mean, walking speed.
Okay.
Maybe six, seven kilometers
an hour, right? Okay.
So you were able to follow
the fins for how long?
A minute or two.
So quite a long time.
Quite
Quite a long time.
And all these people were on the shore,
walking along, following this?
Everyone was.
Yeah.
All of those people that were
there that day, they all believe?
They all believe.
That's a common experience where they believe
they saw something big in the water?
Yes.
And so, what do you think
we're talking about here?
You think it's a dinosaur?
Do you think we're talking about just a fish
that's not supposed to
live in these waters?
I don't know.
You don't know.
I don't know.
Coli couldn't tell me exactly
what the creature he'd seen was,
or where it came from,
but suggested that I speak to a
local named Antonio Las Herras,
who, besides having impeccably
groomed facial hair
and a house decorated entirely
with portraits of himself,
had been studying
the Nahuelito for decades,
and had a theory as to the
origins of the lake monster.
Muy bien, muy bien.
Good.
(SPEAKING IN SPANISH)
TRANSLATOR: There was a German
investigator named Ronald Richter
who investigated an island in
the middle of Nahuel Huapi.
(SPEAKING IN SPANISH)
What Las Herras was saying
was that in the 1940s
nuclear experiments
were being conducted
on an island in the middle
of Nahuel Huapi Lake.
It was these nuclear experiments
and their resulting disposal
of toxic waste into the lake that Las
Herras used to support his theory.
(SPEAKING IN SPANISH)
It's very possible that
after that, for example,
people's throwing out trash in
Nahuel Huapi might have affected
the consistency of the water.
And genetically altered
things living in the water?
Absolutely.
A monster born from the bowels of
a nuclear experiment gone wrong?
Did I just step into the pages
of a Stan Lee comic, or what?
Either way, Antonio Las Herras'
theory was interesting,
so I grabbed a boat and headed
for the place he told me about,
a hidden,
long-since-abandoned area
known as the Island
of Dr.
Moreau.
No.
My mistake.
Wemmel Island.
So this is now the lake, it's
an enormous body of water.
It's a glacial lake
connecting a series of
other finger lakes around it.
This is Wemmel Island,
where, in the late '40s,
Perón commissioned a scientist, Ronald
Richter, to devise an atomic device.
It was never successful,
but he did experiment here
and tried to build a primitive
atomic facility on the island.
According to some legends, that atomic
material may have gotten in the lake
and created some sort of
super-creature.
With dilapidated structures
at every turn,
the island looked like
a science fiction movie
where mad scientists from the '40s had
used the island as a testing ground
to perform nuclear experiments and
then just abandoned the place
when everything
had gone wrong.
I kept telling myself
that this wasn't a movie
and the reality was that
mad scientists from the '40s
had used this island as a testing
ground to perform nuclear experiments
and then just abandoned the place
when everything had gone wrong.
But as strange
as the place was,
could the Wemmel project have created
a giant, sea-dwelling monster
that still lives here today?
Hello?
My team and I scoured the island for any
evidence of an abnormal inhabitant.
And while some of the
buildings certainly weren't
up to code, there were signs
of nuclear testing everywhere.
But that's all we found.
This is one of Richter's labs
where they claimed they had succeeded
in doing thermonuclear experiments.
Most people say that he never
achieved the sort of heat
that would be required
to actually pull that off,
but this is one of his labs
here on the island.
Kooky Nazi scientist.
As desperately as I wanted the crazy
scientist becomes obsessed with power,
tries to develop nuclear fission and
ends up creating a giant monster
theory to be true,
it just didn't pan out.
That being said,
I still felt that the most
compelling eyewitness I met was
a local fisherman, Carlos, who was so
sure that he had seen the creature
that he never returned
to the lake again.
This was surprising
considering
that this was a man who lived
with a terrifying beast of his own.
Lovely.
He's very,
very friendly.
Man's best friend.
It was evident that it would take
something seriously scary to spook him.
You are, or were, a fisherman
here in Bariloche.
(SPEAKING SPANISH)
Sí, sí.
Do you still fish now?
(TRANSLATOR SPEAKING SPANISH)
No.
And why did you stop fishing?
(SPEAKING IN SPANISH)
He'd heard about this,
but he never believed.
He never believed in Nahuelito.
Until one time he saw it.
When the creature itself
came to the surface,
you did not see the head and you could
not see any characteristic features.
TRANSLATOR:
This is all he saw.
You saw a mass come to the surface?
CARLOS: Yes.
And then it would just disappear.
Sí.
And so water was
just pluming up?
(SPEAKING SPANISH)
It was very clear
what it was.
Yeah.
Was it this event,
this sighting of this creature that
caused him to stop fishing entirely?
Yeah.
And you were known in the town as a
fisherman, and you fished all the time,
and you just gave it up after this event
because you're scared to go in the lake?
Is that right?
Sí, sí, sí.
This guy's life was fishing
and mine is truth seeking.
If something was in the lake,
I'd need to
investigate further.
So it was time for a swim.
Strange splashes in the water.
Can't see anything though, it's just so dark.
Okay, that's freaky.
We headed to the spot
of the giant lake
where the sightings of the Nahuelito
lake monster had been most frequent.
Marc and I hit the water
armed with dive cameras,
sonar and underwater headsets.
If there was anything of size in this
lake, our gear was going to pick it up.
But the locals didn't find
any of this cool stuff
to be nearly
as interesting as I did.
What?
While Eric and Lindsay stood
by for contact on the shore,
Marc and I, covered head to toe
in Neoprene, took the plunge.
We had our sonar to detect any large
objects that might be moving
at the bottom of the lake.
But what we weren't counting on
was the utter lack of visibility.
With so much silt
and debris in the lake,
the sonar and our cameras were
rendered relatively useless.
Unable to collect
any evidence from below,
we knew our only option was to do
a night search from the surface.
The fisherman had claimed to have
seen the Nahuelito at sundown,
when no other boats
were on the lake.
Underwater predators tend to feed
on the surface during dusk,
so it was time to lay bait
for our monster,
a process known to fishermen
as chumming.
Eric and Lindsay were monitoring our
four night vision cameras from land
while Marc and I scanned the lake
with our night vision camera
and thermal imager for any
disturbances on the surface of the water.
If we had any chance of catching the
Nahuelito, this was our best shot.
They get to stay on land
and set up cameras
and we get to go out
in the middle of a rough lake
in complete darkness and
look for a giant monster.
Camera one, black.
Camera two, black.
Three, it's more of
a dark gray,
and four, beautiful, beautiful
moonshine, actually.
Very nice.
Almost all the eyewitnesses have
seen it when it's been very quiet,
when there hasn't been
a lot of activity.
And they have a ban here in Bariloche for
boats coming out here after nightfall.
So we're really the only boat
on the entire lake right now,
which is kind of amazing, if you
consider how large this lake is.
We're the only boat out here,
we're completely alone.
The swells kind of group
together, and for a minute,
it's like an optical illusion.
For a minute it looks like something
is traveling through the water,
but then it all breaks apart.
It's picking up
all sorts of strange stuff,
but it all just looks
like waves and white caps,
but a lot of activity out here.
There's a lot of water moving around.
Eric, come in.
Are you guys there?
ERIC: Yeah.
It's really dark out here.
We've just switched over to night vision.
We're pretty far from
shore at this point.
It's just pitch black out here.
We're imaging the surface of the
water with the night vision
and with the thermal camera, but it's really
difficult to make anything out out here.
It's a pretty dark night.
JOSH: We're gonna try to cruise out to
more towards the center of the lake.
It's a bit choppy out there though,
but we really want to get out there
and survey that area.
Josh, keep an eye on your gas.
You only had about a quarter tank when you left.
I don't want you
swimming back.
Let's go.
(MOTOR STARTS)
Let me know if you find
anything on the cameras, okay?
We don't have a visual of you guys, you guys
are really on your own, so be very careful.
Everything looks really
promising for a second.
And then it kind of
reveals itself
and just falls apart and you just
notice it's a bunch of waves.
It's getting rough as hell
out here, though.
It's so dark out here that our visibility
is limited to just about 30 yards.
Eric, we're gonna start
chumming the water.
ERIC: Okay.
A squid.
That is
a big mass of shrimp.
Everyone's favorite.
Big, dead fish heads.
Nothing yet.
What was that?
Something splashing around out here.
Damn it.
Eric, we got a problem
with the motor out here.
Please tell me
you didn't just say that.
All right.
Come on!
JOSH: What was that?
Something's splashing around out here.
MARC: Do you see anything?
Just a lot of creepy water.
There's all these
swells out here.
Some of them get kind of
white caps on them,
but just some loud, strange
splashes in the water.
MARC: Hey, Josh.
You picking anything
up on your infrared binoculars?
JOSH: Right there.
Right there.
You see that?
It looks like something comes close
to the surface of the water.
It looks like a shadow
passing below the surface.
Okay, that's freaky.
It's just so hard to see
because of the lack of
Right there! Right there!
There's a shadow.
Right there!
Part of those splashes seem to be
coming from over in that direction.
Hold on,
we're going over there now.
(MOTOR SPUTTERING)
Come on.
Come on!
Let's go!
Damn it!
Eric, come in, Eric.
ERIC: Yeah.
Eric, we got a problem
with the motor out here.
Please tell me you
didn't just say that.
ERIC: I don't even know if I can
ask anybody to come get you.
You guys aren't supposed to be
out on the lake at this time.
Yeah, that's a good point.
(GROANS)
Give me a couple of minutes.
We'll get it
We'll get it started up.
I hope they don't
get stuck out there.
Come on, Josh.
Eric, do you have a visual
on us on any of your cameras?
Josh, you're way too far out and you probably
only have fumes left in your gas tank.
ERIC: I'm not gonna say
I told you so.
Okay, well don't say,
"I told you so.
"
Come on, come on, come on,
come on, come on!
Come on! There we go!
(MOTOR STARTS)
Eric, I got the motor up.
We're coming in now.
Thank God.
You think whatever you
heard out there's still there?
No, whatever it was,
it's long gone now.
Carter, we're headed in.
JOSH: Like our eyewitness,
I was confident
I'd seen something
on the lake that night.
However, with a faulty
boat engine, no sonar,
and a good chance of getting
arrested for violating the boat curfew,
I felt that it was about time
that we left the lake.
In the morning, I spoke
with Dr.
Roger Whewell,
who is not only a highly regarded
scientist in the world of seismology
but also, as he claimed,
a Nahuelito witness.
The good doctor gave us a technical
explanation for what he believes
causes the disturbances
on the surface of the lake
viewed by himself
and many others.
I saw a
What looks like the wake of a boat.
Okay.
From where I was, you get quite
a wide view of the lake.
The lake at the time
was absolutely dead calm.
And this thing went across, and so
on the Monday I called Valdivia.
You know, the Chileans have a
seismic center in Valdivia.
Uh-huh.
And just about that
time there had been
a measurable seismic movement.
His theory was this.
There's a known
aggressively violent fault line
passing under the lake,
the earthquakes from which have
killed 40,000 people over the years.
His theory claims that the Nahuelito
sightings were little more than waves
caused by the floor of the lake
vibrating under the seismic pressure,
and then sending turbulence
and debris to the surface.
If you imagine what
I saw on flat water
with a normal wind
coming this way,
and the weight going that way,
it will create
rises in the water.
You know, this is
the first sort of
Um
Logical explanation
that I've heard.
Dr.
Whewell's tiny earthquake
theory made a lot of sense,
but I wanted to have our video
forensics experts back in the States
analyze the footage that
Fabian's news crew had shot.
So we met
with Gregg Stutchman
of the Stutchman
Audio/Video Laboratory.
A leader in forensic
video investigation,
Gregg was confident that if there was any
way to identify what this image was,
he would find it.
So, you have this
Nahuelito footage.
Yes, this we do.
Now, were you able to do
anything with this at all?
Very little.
Very little.
JOSH: Yeah.
Why were you able to do
so little with it?
Well, mostly because there were
so many copies of it made.
If it was a first-generation copy, then
we might be able to do something with it.
Every time it's copied, you lose
approximately 10% of the quality,
so you got down to, say,
maybe five, six copies,
you've lost
half the resolution.
And if you didn't have great footage
to begin with, it's a waste.
Right.
We went
to this lake.
I can see kind of the area
that it's taking place in.
We went up this chair lift and it's
leaving a large area of wake behind.
So, at least in that sense, it does look
like something that had some mass to it.
You can see some different
coloration pattern in the water.
There's definitely something there.
But who knows what?
All right, well, thanks
for trying on this one.
It was a challenging piece of footage.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But we appreciate
you guys looking at it.
You're welcome.
Thanks a lot.
But I wasn't finished yet.
I met with fisheries
biologist Tim Hovey,
who gave us his thoughts
on the strange shadow
moving below the surface
of Nahuel Huapi.
Does that look characteristic
to you of anything or no?
Uh
Yeah, that looks
I mean, the water surface is really rough.
And it looks like you're getting light
depth maybe a foot or two down,
but it doesn't look like
anything alive.
If it was something large
moving through the water
right below the surface, it would display
eddies on the surface of the water.
And I don't see anything
like that there.
All right, well, thank you
very much for your help.
Sure.
No problem.
I really appreciate it.
My time searching
the Nahuel Huapi
for this Argentine lake creature
was certainly educational.
While the eyewitness accounts
of a large animal surfacing
in the Nahuel Huapi
were compelling,
Fabian's video evidence was too
poor-quality to hold up to
the analysis of
the forensics experts.
According to Dr.
Hovey, the shape
we saw moving below the water
was probably nothing more
than a trick of the light,
and the loud splashes we heard
may have just been fish
feeding on
our Nahuelito bait.
I feel that Roger's theory
of earthquakes below the lake
causing disturbances
on its surface
could explain many of
the eyewitness accounts.
Without definitive proof, I have a hard
time believing that a giant monster
lives under the Nahuel Huapi.
Perhaps in time,
more evidence will be found,
but until then, I have other
sightings to investigate
and many more secrets
to uncover.