Much has been written in recent years about the burgeoning number of animal mutilations across the world, many of which seem to be integrally involved with UFO phenomena. At the Centre for Fortean Zoology we have been collating reports of such things for many years, but it has only been relatively recently that we have been receiving what are perhaps the most disturbing and perplexing reports of all. These are accounts of what seem to be genuine UFO related mutilations of marine mammals, especially whales and dolphins.

We have personally investigated several such incidents. In view of the publicity that they have engendered in certain quarters we feel that it is useful to describe these cases here.

CASE HISTORY ONE. A JUVENILE PILOT WHALE (Globicepalum melaenae)

On October 1st 1997, Nigel Wright made the following report to the Exeter Strange Phenomena Research Group:

"Approximately three weeks ago two young men were swimming in Otter Cove. As darkness drew in they decided to make for the shore and change to go home. As they got changed, one of them looked out to sea. He saw what he described as a `greenish` light, under the surface. He called to the other young man and they both watched as this light `rose` to the surface of the water. The next thing they knew there was a very bright light shining into their faces. They turned and fled the scene".

The next day a dead pilot whale was washed up on the beach nearby. There were no signs of injury to the beast except for a circular hole, apparently incising its genitals and anus. As many UFOlogists know such injuries have been reported on domestic and wild animals, often in conjunction with flaps of UFO activity. It is important to note that the zoologist from `English Nature` who examined the creature was at a loss to explain such peculiar injuries. The fact that a marine mammal exhibiting such injuries is found in conjunction with USO activity, is, we believe, at least partly significant!

CASE HISTORY TWO:
ADULT FEMALE CUVIER`S BEAKED WHALE (Ziphius cavirostris)

What compounds the strangeness of the above episode is that ten years before, almost to the day, another whale was stranded in the area. This time at Otter Cove itself. The Exmouth Herald for September 25th 1987 reported:

"Please could we have our whale teeth back

Callous looters hacked off the lower jaw of a rare whale washed up near Exmouth to steal its two front teeth. After the 20-ft long Cuvier`s beaked whale was found dead at Otter Cove on monday, Exeter's Royal Albert Museum and the British Museum in London sent experts to retrieve it for research. But during Tuesday night, the whale floated back out into Lyme Bay because nobody had secured it. In the meantime, Customs officers who had arrived to take charge of the carcase on Tuesday morning found that the teeth which are Government property were missing.

Here, we would like to note that the newspaper`s conclusion that the lower jaw was hacked off by souvenir hunters is probably correct, is remarkably reminiscent of another scenario commonly reported in UFO related animal mutilations. The coincidence between the locations and the timing (as we shall see there were UFO reports in 1987 as well) is worth remarking upon. Otter Cove is a particularly isolated spot that can only be reached by driving through the grounds of a local holiday camp.

If the mutilation was carried out at night (which it would have to have been in order to escape the prying eyes of gleeful holiday makers) it would seem almost impossible (having visited the location) that:

a. The operation (which would have needed a chainsaw to complete) could have been carried out without attracting attention.

b. That the perpetrators (whoever they were) could have taken the immense jaw up the treacherous cliff path without having incurred an unreasonable degree of danger.

or

c. Anyone would have bothered.

D.J.Coffey (1977) notes that although:

"...the male has a pair of teeth at the point of the lower jaw. In the female these do not erupt"

As every report on this particular stranding has stated the animal was a female. This satisfactorily refutes any allegations that it would have been mutilated by souvenir hunters even if they had had the time, the opportunity or the motive, which is very questionable. It should be noted that as shown in "The Rising of the Moon - The Devonshire UFO Triangle" by me and Nigel Wright (Domra Publications 1999) both these Otter Cove whale strandings took place at a time of heavy UFO activity.

CASE HISTORY THREE:
A JUVENILE BOTTLE NOSED DOLPHIN (Tursiops truncatus)

In March 1999 there were a number of UFO reports across south Devon. As we have always been staunch believers in the John Keel viewpoint of UFO reality which expects a string of apparently disparate anomalous phenomena to occur at the same time as spates of UFO activity we were not at all surprised to receive reports of a strange lion-like animal seen in the area and to hear of a series of mutilated dolphins being washed up along the shoreline.

Thanks to a helpful representative of Brixham Seawatch, a local cetacean conservation group we were able to examine the corpse of one of these creatures in situ, and for the first time we were able to perform a detailed autopsy. What we found was conclusive but it unfortunately seems to have nothing to do with either UFO phenomena or any other mystery.

Our findings were as follows:

1. Despite reports in certain areas, the head of the animal had not been removed with a single clear cut (reminiscent of a laser according to one source). The head had obviously been `sawn` off by two or more strokes of a serrated, cleaver type instrument. There were saw marks on the blubber and on the cervical vertebrae and the patterns of the cuts through the blood vessels to the head all confirmed this.

2. We removed the lungs. If the animal had either drowned there would have been sea water in the lungs. If the animal had been asphyxiated, for example, by staying under water with its blowhole closed, the capillaries in the lung itself would have burst and there would have been excess blood in the interior of the lungs. Despite the fact that the lungs were completely intact and undamaged there was no excess fluid inside.

3. There was, however, an excess of blood in the body cavity itself, which is consistent with the animal having been concussed.

4. On the tail of the animal, just below the tail flukes were marks of what appears to be nylon rope, probably from a net.

Our conclusions are that the unfortunate animal had swum into drift nets, probably placed illegally by Cornish Crab fishermen, and became entangled. Whilst still alive, the fishermen, unwilling to damage their nets, bashed the dolphin over the head with an oar to stun it, and sawed its head and some of its fins off, before throwing it back into the water.

CASE HISTORY FOUR:

JUVENILE PILOT WHALE (Globicephalum melaenae)

One of the most famous incidents in contemporary forteana turns out upon investigation to have equally mundane an explanation. As I show in my book The Owlman and Others (Domra Pubs, 1997) the "strange and unidentified carcasse" washed upon a beach in southern Cornwall during the middle of the infamous 1975/6 UFO flap was not (as has been suggested many times) a dead sea monster but was actually the decomposed carcasse of a pilot whale the skull of which is now in my collection.

CONCLUSION.

Although Case History Three proved to have a prosaic if unpleasant explanation, and Case History Four is too vague to provide any meaningful data it does seem as though there is a mystery to answer with the first two incidents described. In the absence of any further data the case must remain open.