Original subtitles

For over 25 years,

a creature has been terrorizing a small town

nestled in the Allegheny Mountains.

It scared me.

With a wingspan of over 18 feet...

And it goes like this...

...12-inch talons capable of lifting children...

Grabbers picked me up.

...and a razor-sharp beak that can pierce a human skull...

Oh, my God.

...the Thunderbird has been reported across North America

for over seven centuries.

Now, encounters have started to rise.

But the menacing creature remains unconfirmed.

What the hell is that?

In the mid-20th century,

scientist Ivan Sanderson

set out to separate fact from fiction.

He investigated hundreds of frightening encounters

with unexplained creatures around the world.

My next guest tonight

is one of the world's leading naturalists,

accumulating material for some 30 years.

As the founder of cryptozoology,

he built the most extensive archive

of unclassified creatures on Earth.

There seem to be a lot of these creatures

on our continent, in South America and Africa,

and all of Asia.

But following his death in the 1970s,

that archive disappeared...

until now.

Armed with modern tech and Sanderson's lost research...

We need to take this and compare it to what's in the archives.

...a team of experts will reinvestigate

his unexplained cases,

using up-to-the-minute research

and predator expertise.

I've never seen wildlife do this.

There's nothing like that that should be doing that here.

Holy.

Can Sanderson's files lead to an incredible new insight...

...and take another creature from myth...

Did you see that?

...to reality.

One of the cases that Ivan Sanderson was obsessed with

was the Thunderbird.

These stories span decades, if not hundreds of years.

These large birds coming down

and attacking children or small people.

Thunderbirds are linked to large bird-like sightings

all over the world.

The Thunderbird was first recorded

in 2,000-year-old cave paintings

by indigenous tribes

as an enormous winged creature

that creates thunder by flapping its wings

and lightning by flashing its eyes.

Endless reports of huge winged things,

light brownish birds

looking like buzzards or turkey vultures.

In one account,

the wingspan was four feet greater than a two-lane road,

stretching 25 feet wide.

In correlation with the sightings,

people of all ages went missing.

There's tons of Thunderbird material in here.

He was definitely obsessed with this creature.

And don't forget,

one of the largest stories ever told

was by Marlon Lowe.

Right. And that story came out in 1977,

which was four years after Sanderson had passed away.

Marlon was attacked.

He and his mother claimed the huge bird swooped in,

picked Marlon up,

and then tried to fly off with him.

Had Ivan been alive when that occurred,

he would have had a lot of interest in talking to Marlon.

- Yeah. - I think there's a real opportunity

to get his firsthand account.

I really think that this would be a really interesting case

to figure out what's going on.

Because the sightings in Pennsylvania,

they've been ongoing, especially at Chestnut Ridge.

Like, I had actually heard from a guy

that has had multiple accounts on his property.

He's saying that it's been visiting his farm

and he's seen him multiple times.

And it's interesting to note that Ivan Sanderson

actually looked into the Chestnut Ridge.

Around Chestnut Ridge in western Pennsylvania,

Ivan Sanderson documented over two dozen frightening encounters.

I could actually kind of cross reference

where the farm sits

to the ridge that Ivan

was already mapping out in Pennsylvania.

So we've got the map and a location.

- Yep. - We have Marlon's firsthand account,

and we have a farm

where the Thunderbird keeps showing up.

I think we have enough to start

making our way to Pennsylvania.

Chestnut Ridge was the main area of interest in Ivan's research,

and we are going to carry that investigation forward.

Brittany, Justin and Troy will head to Chestnut Ridge

and investigate the recent sightings that are occurring there.

Tracy and I will interview Marlon Lowe.

We'll measure the gathered evidence

against his classification index.

That will help us determine

if this creature is a known animal species,

a Lazarus species,

something formerly thought to be extinct,

or an entirely new species altogether.

Sanderson believed that he was close

to tracking the Thunderbird at Chestnut Ridge.

And this is a great opportunity to build on his work.

Our goal is to figure out what the Thunderbird is

and document proof that this creature exists.

A creature the size of the Thunderbird

speaks to the Andean condor.

Yet this massive new-world vulture

is an ancestor of the teratornis,

the ancient winged animal whose size dwarfed

that of the condor's we are familiar with today.

Now, some scientists claim it became extinct

at the very end of the Pleistocene,

some 10,000 years ago.

However, I'd like to propose that...

perhaps the mysterious Thunderbird

is truly a living breathing teratornis.

This is one of the eyewitnesses

that sees these large birds

that would be considered the Thunderbird.

- Okay. - So I wanted to come out here

and take a look at everything

because the sightings are starting to really accumulate

out in the area and around this area.

I guess we might as well go up and check this out.

You ready?

Chestnut Ridge is a 90-mile long ridge

in the Allegheny Mountains of Pennsylvania.

For decades, this area has had attacks from Thunderbirds.

The most recently reported sightings

are all located in the same vicinity

that Sanderson had circled on his map,

a Thunderbird hotspot along the ridgeline.

How's it going, good sir? - Aaron.

Good to see you, sir. - Justin.

- Hi, Justin. - Troy. Nice to meet you. How are you?

Troy, how you doing?

The team meets with an eyewitness

who recently encountered the creature on his farm,

which sits directly below the Chestnut ridgeline.

Interviewing an eyewitness is extremely important

because it's allowing us to identify

what we could be dealing with.

We know a lot of the species in the area,

but based off of what the sightings are,

this is something much larger.

You seem to have some sightings on your property.

Do you mind kind of...

- No, I don't mind at all. - ...just kind of giving us some background.

I've seen them three times.

- Okay. - The first time I seen 'em,

I was out here cutting the field.

And we're looking out there at the field

and there's a tree stump.

and I'm thinking, "Why is there a tree stump in my field?

I just cut it."

And the tree stump picked its head up.

And it goes like this...

So then it takes one kind of like a lean forward into the breeze,

kind of gets up and goes...

It was thick in the neck and big.

So feathered all the way from the front to the back?

Yeah.

We've seen a lot of birds flying around here.

There's pelicans, there's storks,

there's buzzards,

there's eagles.

This was none of those.

This was much, much more massive.

I want to get an idea of size.

Justin, if you stand over here for a minute.

Justin's about 6'5". I'm 6'1".

So, if we...

if we had a wingspan like this, right? - That's it.

- Add this. - Stretch out.

Yeah, right here.

So about like this, Brittany.

Sweet Jesus.

So we're looking at a 15, almost.

That's how big we are, right here. - Yeah.

Based on Aaron's testimony,

I don't think we're talking about the cryptid,

but I have no idea what the culprit would be.

So hopefully we can do some more experiments

and really try to nail something in.

Something maybe a little bit less ordinary.

I just want to get to the facts, okay?

Sanderson theorized that the Thunderbird

could be related to a prehistoric species.

So, like we're talking neo dinosaurs.

Neo dinosaurs are a Lazarus species of cryptid,

which are animals believed to be extinct,

but some believe could have survived extinction.

We have the Argentavis.

They had a wingspan of 20 to 25 feet

and weighed in at about 180 pounds.

The teratorn had a wingspan of about 13 feet,

and weighed between 30 to 40 pounds.

And he did mention both.

He seemed to lean a little bit more towards the Argentavis.

Let's just understand what we're doing here.

We're talking about a Thunderbird we know nothing about.

As far as I'm concerned, it's mythological.

When you see a bird that's five feet tall

and flies over it, it looks massive to you.

So sometimes perception is wrong.

Now, could there be a gigantic bird,

something that just grew a little bigger

that's already a large species?

You've got those herons.

What else you got? You're talking hawks,

red-shoulders, golden eagle.

The bald eagle,

they're gonna have white patches and stuff

that may be harder to see from up high.

The reason why I think it's gonna be a golden eagle

is, number one, it's a large-sized bird,

one of the largest raptors we have in the area

with a wingspan of almost eight feet.

Number two, the color, the shape of the beak.

The one thing that does throw me off,

the cross over of the wings,

the head down, and then looking up.

That's more of like what we would see

with a bat hanging upside down.

What if we're dealing with something that isn't documented?

It's just completely undocumented and flying under the radar.

That's a possibility.

Aaron mentioned to us that when he mowed,

this thing would swoop in.

It's possible this bird has habituated.

It triggers the sound to food.

When Aaron mows, mice scurry around,

and it becomes a feeding frenzy.

If we can replicate those conditions,

we might bring the Thunderbird to us.

45 miles away, Charlie

and former CIA intelligence agent Tracy Walder

head to Farmington, Pennsylvania,

to meet with a potential witness.

We're on our way to meet Marlon Lowe.

He was attacked in 1977 by a large bird.

So we want to get his direct account.

In 1977,

the story of 10-year-old Marlon Lowe's abduction

by an enormous bird made national headlines.

The claim made by Marlon and his mother

is still met with skepticism today.

An important part of this investigation

is attempting to authenticate the accounts we're being given

and detecting signs of deception.

They used to call me the human lie detector at the CIA.

And I think the reason I'm able to do that

is because I keep people talking.

I'm Tracy. It's nice to meet you. - How are you doing?

And I keep people talking

to look at consistencies in their stories, body language,

and their voice inflection.

Would you be willing to sort of like walk me through

what you experienced?

- Yes, I would. - All right, cool.

My name is Marlon Lowe,

and I had a life-changing experience when I was young.

I got picked up by a Thunderbird

when I was 10 years old.

I just want to get an idea...

of what you experienced.

And I was running down behind my house.

And while I was running,

those wings had pushed right like that.

And when it pushed me,

something just grabbed me right by my tank top

and my shoulders and picked me up.

And when it picked me up, I was just running on my feet, you know.

And when I run...

the-- it dropped me, and I just kept running.

Typically, when someone's being untruthful,

they tend to tense up and become highly anxious.

But that's actually not what I got with Marlon.

His answers were very consistent.

And he actually relaxed.

It had like a 15 to 25-foot wingspan,

black with a ring around his neck

and a curved beak on it.

It looked just like a condor.

But it was ten times the size of the condors you see now.

Where did it grab onto you?

Well, it grabbed me just around my shoulders.

- Okay. - I got a little scar.

Oh, wow.

Oh, wow.

I think "little" is an understatement...

- That's-- - ...respectfully, sir.

- That's quite a large scar. - That's-- I can't--

That must have really hurt.

Oh, it did.

Would it be all right, for my journal,

if I measured your scar with a measuring tape?

- Yeah. Yes. - Just to get an idea.

Okay.

With the curve, uh, somewhere around six inches.

Yeah, it probably got a little bit bigger

because of my...

You got older and grew. - As you get older,

it probably stretched a little bit.

Marlin's firsthand account is terrifying.

His scar is interesting,

but I think I really need to get up with Troy and Justin

because they know a lot more about birds than I do.

I want to figure out what could have done this.

Back at Chestnut Ridge,

Brittany is prepping an experiment

to try and lure in the Thunderbird.

Right now, I'm having Aaron do what he normally does,

which is just clear the land.

When he does this, it seems to bring this bird in.

You know, birds like to look for things that are moving,

uh, and they also go by sense of smell.

So what I'm trying to do is I'm going to set up something

that will not only have their food moving,

but it's gonna smell really bad.

These are the carcasses that, uh,

Aaron is allowing us to use.

They died naturally,

which is the only way I would use them as bait.

Some large raptors, like eagles,

can see prey as small as a rabbit two miles away,

while others, like turkey vultures,

use scent to smell their food from eight miles away.

Brittany is attempting to appeal to the strengths

of all the Thunderbird's predation tactics.

She hopes, by using collected carcasses from around the farm,

she can lure out the Thunderbird

to see where they are nesting.

So these guys are really important

because they're actually motion activated.

They get triggered. And what they do is these are video.

I need one in the skies

to see where birds are coming from and going to.

And then I have this one pointed down

at my rotating table of delights.

All right. I've got all the equipment going,

I've got the turntable going,

and I'm just waiting and hoping to find a Thunderbird.

I've spent 40 years doing what I call search,

searching for answers by conducting

rigorous empirical studies

by way of careful analysis and observation.

We're gonna keep this out for a while,

so the experiment's going to be ongoing

and we'll see what happens.

While Brittany attempts to draw out

the monster bird of prey from its nesting site,

20 miles away, Charlie, Troy, and Justin

meet at a local bird sanctuary.

How you doing, big boy?

How we doing, man?

Their goal is to determine all of the bird species

in Chestnut Ridge large enough

to be identified as a Thunderbird.

- Hey. Good to see ya. - Hello.

- Hello. - How are you?

I'm Katie Fallon,

and I'm the executive director

of the Avian Conservation Center of Appalachia.

I'm kind of obsessed with birds and bird-watching,

and we heard that there may be some Thunderbirds

or other unidentified large flying birds in our region.

And I would like to think that there are things out there

deep in the heart of Appalachia,

that might be unusual or undiscovered.

We have an account where someone says a large bird

with a 25-foot wingspan

essentially grabbed them and left a big scar.

Are there any bird species you know of in here

that could be big enough to do something like that?

Let's be very clear on one bullet point that we talked about.

Condors, which is what's described in that account,

does not grab like that.

Yeah, they have chicken feet. - Yeah.

I would bet that it's a species of raptor.

Carnivorous birds can be classified into two groups,

hunters and scavengers.

This bird, this is a peregrine falcon.

These particular species

can get very territorial around their nests.

Birds that hunt their prey like hawks, falcons and eagles

have bodies and talons designed to attack

and kill their prey.

That's the red-tailed hawk in there.

Look at that display, dude.

You can see the wingspan that hawks like this,

they have a big body.

Scavenger birds like vultures and condors,

which are descendants of the teratorn and Argentavis,

are larger in size but have feet like chickens

and pick carcasses with powerful beaks.

This is Neo, the broad-winged hawk.

And Neo is a female broad-wing,

a lot bigger than broad-wings you would see in the wild.

I think these birds are a bit too small.

Is there anything here of larger stature?

I would say your huge amazing eagle.

Beautiful baby.

With several species in Pennsylvania,

eagles are the largest birds of prey in the United States.

With wingspans topping seven feet,

they are fierce hunters with strong territorial instincts.

The largest of them all, the golden eagle,

can drop down on prey,

including full-sized cattle and deer

at speeds of over 200 mph.

But notice the talons. Look at the grip on the foot.

When it goes down, watch the grip.

Watch it, watch it.

And look at the length of the legs.

So it could 100% be what this guy is saying.

It's a massive bird.

They can definitely think that the bird

is a lot larger than it is.

Yup, I 100% agree.

Accounts of the Thunderbird describe a creature

with characteristics that just don't make sense.

It would be bigger than a condor,

but attacks with talons.

And nothing here comes even close to that description.

So we have to take into account, Charlie,

that this may be something

that may not be exactly native to here.

It looks like we've eliminated everything, but maybe an eagle.

So rogue migration is not out of the question.

Big weather events can change migration patterns.

So there's a possibility that we may have a bird,

a species of bird,

that could be here that's unrecognizable to the locals.

What birds are migrating through here

that's not supposed to lately? - Right.

So there are certain species that may be showing up

further north than they used to be.

Steller's sea eagle is an example.

There was a Steller's sea eagle

about a year ago that was sighted

in a lot of different places in the eastern US.

And that's a species that's in Siberia.

I don't know that we really know

how that Steller's sea eagle

ended up, um, in eastern North America.

This actually makes the mystery deeper.

We've ruled out so much

that this sort of takes the legend further.

Based on what I've seen today,

I'm a little more intrigued with the possibility

this could be a giant eagle species,

possibly even a golden eagle.

But the idea that we could be looking at something migratory

is something worth looking deeper into.

There are a ton of fireflies right now.

They're just circling on the tops of the grass.

It is so quiet out here.

It's starting to get dark.

This experiment was a complete bust.

Raptors normally hunt during the day,

so maybe I'll get lucky after sunrise.

Oh, God, it stinks over here.

That is animal carcasses.

Where the hell is that sound coming from?

Do you hear that?

I can't either.

I don't know. I saw some movement over here.

I don't know if it's any kind of animal.

I see something.

What's that?

Do you see that?

What is that?

Is that a wing?

I don't know. I saw some movement over here.

I don't know if it's any kind of animal.

It's hard to tell what it is on the thermal.

It could be a wing.

Let me listen again. Hang on.

I want to go closer to it.

I don't know. It could have flown away.

I think whatever was here is gone,

but I think we encroached on it.

God dang it.

Personally, I feel like this was a failure.

I really believed that I had something in the tree,

but unfortunately I do think

that I may have scared it away from this area.

40 miles away, Charlie and Tracy

are meeting with a local journalist

who has traced the Thunderbird's migration.

Hey! Come on in, guys. - Thanks for having us.

Come on in, guys. No, no, it's my pleasure.

So Marlon's account obviously isn't the only Thunderbird story.

There are hundreds from right here in Chestnut Ridge.

And we've already spoken to bird experts.

So Tracy and I are gonna meet up with a Thunderbird expert.

You may have a seat, stand, or whatever you may like.

My name is Ron Murphy,

and I'm a local author and researcher

who have lived in the shadows of the Chestnut Ridge

for my entire life.

And I've been researching the Thunderbird

and writing about such things for about 35 years.

You know, this used to be marginalized

into the field of cryptozoology,

but in actuality, there's been a lot of people

writing about these Thunderbird legends

for quite some time.

I think the Thunderbird is actually

an uncatalogued avian species,

and I get people reporting sightings

at least once a month.

So, Ron, it appears that the bird is highly migratory.

You've studied the stories.

How do you think we can track it?

Well as a researcher,

the first thing I take into account

is whatever kind of mythology and legends exist

from its origin, right.

Because that is when we get closer to the truth.

The Thunderbird has been recorded

by over 20 different Native American tribes.

Cave paintings uncovered in Wisconsin

reveal a history of the large intimidating bird

dating back almost 2,000 years.

I think that when you look at these Native American legends,

whenever they talk about it coming in on the storms,

it looked as if they were bringing the storms with it.

But in actuality,

it was just a way to soar over the, uh...

over the plains.

It just makes perfect sense to me.

Right. I mean, just the mechanics of the wings.

- Absolutely. - Like, the bone structure.

I really liked that Ron connected

modern science to folklore,

and these birds would arrive with the storm.

They would bring the storm with them.

We know through our understanding of flight now

that the reality is birds of a certain size

have to ride weather systems.

According to indigenous accounts,

including the Wekakawahu,

whose totem features a Thunderbird.

The creature brought with it spring and summer storms.

Sanderson and other cryptid researchers

suggest that because of these legends,

the Thunderbird uses storm fronts to ride up drafts,

heat and other seasonal wind patterns for migration,

allowing it to soar through the sky

and remain undetected in the dark sky at high altitudes.

Something is migratory, okay?

People see it, they report it, investigators go to the scene.

By the time they get there,

this creature could already be hundreds of miles away.

If something is riding weather systems in a migratory pattern,

that means they'd be flying 21,000 feet in the air.

Migrating birds can actually be tracked

using different types of radar.

Have you done any research into that?

Absolutely.

I visited our local airport,

which is a very small, little airport,

and I got access to the room that has the radar

of the commercial planes and the private planes.

They all come up with an ID number.

And it was curious because

there were other things coming up on the computer,

uh, that were not labeled.

When was this?

About three years ago.

The gentleman who was manning it

told me that the ones that were not marked were military.

Right? But this is the same range

where people are witnessing the Thunderbird,

which would also appear on radar as well.

- So-- - How do you differentiate?

How do you differentiate it?

Observing anomalous objects on a radar

means a lot of different things.

But the thing that I took away from that

is that critics will say,

"Why don't we see Thunderbirds on radars?"

My response to that would be

maybe we are, and they're just unidentified.

According to Ron,

a Thunderbird would be large enough to be spotted on radar.

I want to give Brittany a call

and get this information to her stat.

Hey, Charlie. What's up?

I just got to meet with Ron, the Thunderbird expert.

He shared some details

that I just hadn't even considered before.

So one of the questions that comes up all the time

is why aren't these things showing up on radar?

- Ron thinks they are. - Really?

Yeah. So he got in with the local airport

and the only thing that the air traffic controllers

really care about when they're looking at these radars

are the commercial airlines.

There are things on there that aren't tracked,

like government planes,

other anomalous flying objects.

And within the last couple of years,

flight traffic control now tracks a way broader spectrum

of height and size of objects.

And there's all kinds of stuff showing up

that wasn't showing up before.

For most of history,

US radar filters have been set to track

high-speed objects over a certain size.

In 2023, these filters were adjusted

resulting in detection of more anomalous objects

at slower speeds, lower altitudes,

and smaller sizes.

So the air traffic controllers are required

to keep records for six months.

- Okay. - So here, check this out.

You see where the planes are represented here by little icons

and they have an ID number on there?

Yeah, I see them.

And then there's some anomalous objects

in here that don't have IDs.

That could be our animal.

Over here is Chestnut Ridge.

So focusing in on that area,

you can see that over the course

of the six months of records,

there's a notable increase, a peak, and then a decrease

in unidentified things in the sky there.

So if, let's just say,

that could be the bird of interest,

that would match up with what our eyewitness is saying.

Because basically there's only certain times of the year

that he is seeing these large unknown birds.

So the radar gives us

a specific point on Chestnut Ridge.

It could be the Thunderbird's nesting spot.

But it also shows us a dwindling migration pattern.

We need to get there.

Could you send me that pinpoint of interest?

I'd like to be able to send it to Troy and Justin,

meet up with them, and get up to the ridge.

We may only have a small window,

and we'd really need to get up there before that window closes.

Absolutely.

I have faith only in reality.

And I have no hesitation in stating

that I am an out-and-out materialist.

By this, I mean that I do not believe

there is anything unmaterial, or non-material,

any more than there is anything material.

You collect the evidence necessary to make it material.

So in order to collect the evidence,

one must have faith in the unrealized and undiscovered.

And that is what I as a scientist do.

In the westernmost escarpment of the Alleghenies

lies Chestnut Ridge,

a rugged expanse stretching some 90 miles,

a formidable range of sharp cliffs.

This is a land of low mountains and forests.

And it is from here that the most startling reports

of the presence and passage of modern Thunderbirds comes.

This ridge was really important

to Ivan Sanderson's work.

When he was here doing research,

he had the whole Chestnut ridgeline circled.

But according to the radar that Charlie showed me,

they're flying over this specific path on Chestnut Ridge,

but the activity seems to be dwindling.

If they're migrating, that period is pending.

Using the flight-path coordinates

from Charlie's radar data,

the unidentified objects on the radar

circled near the ridgeline above the Schachte farm.

Charlie's found a possible nesting location for these birds.

We have a long range to cover.

We've got a lot of steep rocky cliffs.

Guys, I've got this big, bad boy right here.

I'm gonna be able to get wherever we want to get with that.

And then I can click it from regular imaging to thermals.

As long as we get to the high point, I can send this bad boy out,

and then we can look for the nesting that we need.

Troy, you got that knife?

Well, just in case there's a rattlesnake or something.

Now birds of prey do demonstrate nest aggression.

Kinda spear.

To explain what nest aggression is,

is if you're sitting in your own house and you have your children,

and someone decides to kick into your territory,

what would you do?

Out in the middle of the woods, you can look behind me.

It is dense forest from here to Timbuktu.

You can keep looking up, too.

I mean, obviously, the birds are gonna take a good spot to nest, so...

Some of the bigger ones will be on the cliff sides,

but we could have some other birds of prey

nesting up in the trees.

The location in which we're standing in right now

is a perfect location for any cryptid.

They like to remain out of sight,

and completely hidden.

They look for forest ranges, high-cliff altitudes,

a lot like this, especially when we're talking about the cryptid,

the Thunderbird.

The Thunderbird could have been migrating

to this area for years

and stayed completely out of sight.

Here we are, right through here.

Probably runs all the way this way,

and all the way out there.

If you wanna put your bags up, I'm gonna go down.

We'll go look for some nooks and see if there's anything nesting.

We're gonna be looking for all kinds of evidence.

Bird activity, what's in the area,

and then also just the remnants of birds,

whether it's old nesting or the regurgitated pellets.

We'll go through it and see what, you know,

the birds around here are eating.

Or see if we can find anything strange

located on the ridge.

I mean, rodents poop a lot.

So this is from Alvin, Simon and Theodore,

chipmunks out here, hanging around.

So it gives us a good sign that we've got

plenty of, uh, food around.

Even though I don't see any signs of birds nesting here,

this general location might be a good spot to search.

So the landscape that we have

is ideal for... for larger predatory birds,

or larger birds, in general,

to kind of feel safe, against the rock,

where nothing's gonna come from above or below,

and they have eyes on everything.

So we'll launch the drone, get a better look,

and then we'll use the thermal to see if we can get any heat signatures.

Are you guys ready?

Yep.

The temperature inside a bird's nest

is typically between 96 and 105-degrees Fahrenheit.

This optimal range for bird egg development

is usually 20 degrees above the ambient temperature,

meaning it should stand out along the cliffs.

You see how it's all lit up? - Mmm-hmm.

- And we've got a lot of hot. - We've got a lot of hot.

Now you see the smaller hot spots?

- Yeah. - That's what we want.

Aim the camera back towards the cliff for me.

What's that right there?

- I don't just-- - I don't know. What is that? I don't know. There's...

I don't know what that is there.

- That looks huge. - Wow.

That means there's probably nesting there? - I would assume.

Well, let's go look.

Using a thermal drone,

we found a cluster of hot spots on the cliff

just to the west of us.

That is the spot that I need to investigate next with the team,

and hopefully, find the nesting site.

- Ugh. - Oh, my gosh.

Let me see if I can, uh...

Ooh!

Hey, be careful.

Oh, it goes down pretty far. Careful, J.

Oh, dude, it's like a whole ass cave system.

You have any signs of nesting down in there?

Mmm... not that I can see. - That's just too deep

- to be bird-- - Definitely bats.

But, hoo! We got a fall down here.

- Thats' bad. - Yeah, that drop down there, look at that, huh?

That's a drop.

All right, I'll come back up to you guys, then.

Look at this.

It's a pellet.

Carnivorous birds eat their prey whole,

but their digestive systems

are not capable of breaking down the bones

and tougher pieces of their kill,

so they must regurgitate the remains into a solid form

known as a pellet.

- All right... - Yeah.

So we'll dissect this.

- All right, so... - So, it ate a snake.

That's an eye socket right there.

You know, a little raised brow. - Mmm-hmm.

And this would be the rest of the skull right here.

So the eye's on this side.

That's really cool.

And I can't say for sure because it's just the pellet,

but if I had to bet my bottom dollar,

I would, a 100 percent, go for a vulture.

This is a small pellet.

That's not the bird we're exactly looking for.

But we could probably look along the side

and we can... might be able to find some more.

Now they only do it once or twice a day.

And that might have been his one.

Look at this.

What is it?

Oh, my God.

Look at that. Dirty.

Wait, let me see.

Look, it's pecked.

Or chewed.

That's not teeth marks,

so, like, you have the chewing.

Okay, well, we also have rodents under that chew that for calcium.

It just looks like drags, not teeth drags.

This bird is eating a large prey.

Yo! I got a nest.

That's a lot of bird

That is... Please be careful.

Well, there's a piece of a bone down there. - Oh, yeah.

I see it.

That's a big nest.

I got a nest.

Please be careful.

This makes me very nervous.

So what do you got, J?

That's a big nest.

Yeah, some sort of, uh, hoofstock.

There's some fresh green stuff in there, though.

It's built on some grass.

- Is that built... - Yeah, it's...

- ...on top of? Oh. - That grass is connected. Yeah.

This was definitely a nest for a larger bird.

But everything here

looks like it's been vacated for quite some time.

What the hell is that?

- Jesus! - What does he have? I can't see it.

He's got a pellet.

A pellet?

That's not a pellet.

- What is it? - A submarine.

So we found the large pellet,

which is gonna lead us to believe that we're in a very large species of bird,

and it's kind of in between the base of rock.

So it looks like it's nesting on these rocks,

which is very common for a large species of bird.

Let me lay down here, bud,

and I'll take that from you, so you can climb up. You ready?

- This rock is-- - I see the bones.

Yeah.

We know it's from a large bird

because we own large birds.

I have a Eurasian eagle-owl.

That's one of the largest owls in the world.

So that spits out a very large pellet.

So, for that pellet to be bigger than what I have at home,

it's gonna be a very large bird.

This isn't like a...

vulture-type of deal either.

Wait, Can you smell it? -

- God, bless-- - Don't open it up anymore.

Can you feel a little bit of that there?

- Can you tell-- - Jesus, bud, don't...

- I don't need the waft... - Sorry. I'm trying to look away

- from you. I won't-- - ...in my direction.

That's a feather.

- Okay. - So, there's bird in it.

Then there's some smaller bones

- and fur. - Stop! Stop.

Okay, so we know

the bird's in this area,

but what...

known bird would do it this size in this area?

Let's just say a really big eagle like a harpy.

They're not supposed to be here.

The only other theory that I would have is gigantism.

There's a very big possibility there's golden eagles here.

There's bald eagles here.

Maybe they're just seeing a giant bird

that has just had an overproduction of growth hormone

and got really, really big.

Or it's not even gigantism.

What if it's just an unknown

anomaly of a bird

like the teratorns or the Argentavis,

that lives in a certain region,

and maybe got off its... got off course?

This is enough evidence for me to believe

that there is some type of raptor

that is off its migration and shouldn't be here.

So let's put together all the evidence.

Extremely large, abnormal-sized pellets,

on top of that, we found skull remains.

Based off of everything here today,

I feel that we can walk away

with two possible culprits

in this investigation.

One being a large raptor

that is not local to this area,

off migration,

and possibly dealing with gigantism.

Also, I'm thinking Teratornis.

Again, yes, it went extinct,

but there could have been descendants

from that line of bird.

And we don't know for sure.

All we can do now is bring back the evidence

and samples we have collected

and see if DNA testing reveals anything.

But for me, those two culprits

are what we're dealing with out here.

So in the case of the thunderbird,

we have contributed a lot to the file.

Yeah, I definitely think so.

I mean, the field exploration

really brought us a lot of good evidence.

The report from the pellet came back,

that Justin found in that nest,

that we discovered up on the ridge.

The DNA was identified as an eagle.

However, it does mention down here in the comments,

multiple species,

and a possible, uh, potential cross-contamination.

So it wasn't actually able to conclusively indicate

one specific bird species.

So we could be looking at an eagle...

Could be looking at an eagle. - Or we could be looking

at something that ate an eagle.

- That's right. - Okay.

So the DNA testing is inconclusive.

But the evidence that we've collected between the large pellet

and interviews with witnesses,

the radar detection reports,

they all point to a large flying predator in Chestnut Ridge.

We have two theories of what that could be.

One is an eagle with gigantism.

That would fall under the known species.

Or number two,

it could be a modern-day teratorn.

That would fall under the Lazarus species.

We just don't have enough evidence to make a definitive call.

That's at least one area that Ivan looked into,

but we have other areas with different sightings,

and we can go back to those later.

Like Ivan Sanderson,

I still believe the thunderbird exists.

We're still discovering different species all the time.

So our research will continue.

The Thunderbird is out there somewhere,

and hopefully, one day we'll find it.

There are very few experts in the unexplained

because how can you be an expert

in something people know very little about.

But it is through their disciplined inquiry,

that we are able to glimpse

even a fraction of the, uh,

profound mysteries that surround us.