Flatwoods Monster: In 1952, several children in West Virginia went up the mountain chasing a fallen star

On the evening of September 12, 1952, in a small town in West Virginia, USA, Flatwoods, several boys were playing on the playground when a streak of light suddenly crossed the sky. Some said it looked like a ball of fire, falling from the other side of the mountain and disappearing on the hillside. Several children thought it was a plane crashing, or a flying saucer, so they ran to find their mothers, called up a young National Guard member, and several companions, bringing flashlights and a dog, and headed up the hillside.

They said that as they neared the top of the mountain, they first smelled a scent, pungent, like burning metal, and their throats felt itchy. Then came a low-lying mist, clinging to the ground, and a large thing emitting a faint red glow, flickering in the mist.

A child raised a flashlight and shone it onto a tree. In the light stood a thing, fully three meters tall, with a round red face, surrounded by something like a black hat brim, two eyes emitting green light, its body like a long dark garment, with no feet visible, a pair of arms stretched out in front, fingertips like claws, floating in the air, drifting slowly toward them, making a hissing sound from its mouth.

The young National Guard member was so frightened on the spot that he couldn't shout; he later said his throat felt as if something had burned it, and he vomited all night after returning home, lying in bed for several days. The others took to their heels, tumbling and scrambling down the mountain.

The next day, people from the local newspaper went to the scene and saw several long tracks like ruts on the hillside, and a faint metallic smell still lingered in the air. The newspaper published the story, with the word "monster" in the headline, and overnight, all of America knew about Flatwoods.

Decades later, some people seriously studied the incident. In 2000, a writer who specialized in investigating strange events, named Joe Nickell, visited the scene. His conclusion was: that night, a very bright meteor indeed streaked across the skies of West Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania, seen by many people. The children ran up the mountain, and in the darkness, what they faced was a tree, with a barn owl perched on it, wings spread, a white heart-shaped face, a hoarse cry; when illuminated by a flashlight, in a patch of mist, it became a three-meter-tall "monster". As for the metallic smell and sore throat, he believed it was caused by tension, running, and soot in the night air.

Flatwoods is now a very small town; there is a monster museum in town, with a model of the monster inside, and every year people come specifically to visit. When locals talk about this, some laugh and say it was the owl that night, while others say they don't know, but that day their fathers saw that ball of light down at the foot of the mountain.

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