Panama Creature
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

The "Panama Creature" (also variously referred to as the "Panama Monster", "Panama ET" "Cerro Azul Monster", "Blue Stream Monster" or "Blue Hill Horror") refers to a carcass photographed near the town of Cerro Azul,
Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Co ...
, in September 2009. After the animal was discovered and reputedly killed by a group of teenagers, photographs of the corpse were given to Telemetro, a Panamanian television station. The story and pictures circulated, and comparisons to the Montauk Monster were made. There was speculation about the identity of the creature, with suggestions including a hairless sloth, an
alien species An introduced species, alien species, exotic species, adventive species, immigrant species, foreign species, non-indigenous species, or non-native species is a species living outside its native distributional range, but which has arrived there ...
and a creature new to science. A
biopsy A biopsy is a medical test commonly performed by a surgeon, interventional radiologist, or an interventional cardiologist. The process involves extraction of sample cells or tissues for examination to determine the presence or extent of a dise ...
performed by the National Environmental Authority of Panama on the remains a few days after the creature's discovery concluded that the corpse was in fact that of a male
brown-throated sloth The brown-throated sloth (''Bradypus variegatus'') is a species of three-toed sloth found in the Neotropical realm of Central and South America. It is the most common of the four species of three-toed sloth, and is found in the forests of South ...
. The odd appearance had been caused by underwater decomposition, which had resulted in hair loss. Once identified, the corpse was buried.


Events

A group of four or five teenagers aged between 14 and 16 claim to have been playing near a cave in Cerro Azul,
Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Co ...
, when the creature emerged. They say that it approached them, and, fearing for their safety, they attacked the creature with sticks and rocks, killing it. They claim that they then threw its corpse into a pool of water before leaving the area. They later returned and took photographs of the creature's corpse, before sending the pictures to Telemetro, a Panamanian television station. According to some sources, subsequent photographs were taken of the creature after it had further decomposed; however, doubts have been expressed about whether the later photos were of the same specimen. A few days after the photographs were taken, one of the teenagers gave a different account in an interview with ''Telemetro Reporta'', saying "I was in the river and I felt something grabbing my legs ... We took it out of the water and started throwing rocks and sticks at it. We had never seen anything like that." The photographs show a pale creature that is mostly hairless, with a rubbery body. It has "revolting features"; a snub-nose and long arms. Writers for the '' Huffington Post'' said that while the head is clearly animal, the torso is "strange", while the limbs are reminiscent of thin human arms. Writers for WBALTV.com compared it to both a "small, portly" version of the alien in '' E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial'' and ''
The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's b ...
'''s
Gollum Gollum is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium. He was introduced in the 1937 fantasy novel '' The Hobbit'', and became important in its sequel, '' The Lord of the Rings''. Gollum was a Stoor Hobbit of the R ...
's "long-lost cousin".


Speculation

The story and the photographs circulated the Internet, including various
cryptozoology Cryptozoology is a pseudoscience and subculture that searches for and studies unknown, legendary, or extinct animals whose present existence is disputed or unsubstantiated, particularly those popular in folklore, such as Bigfoot, the Loch Ness ...
blogs, with a great amount of speculation about possible explanations. A video showing the original photographs, as well as some footage of the further decomposed corpse, became very popular on the web, being one of the most viewed videos over the course of a day. In addition to its prevalence on the Internet, the story was covered on television and radio. Comparisons were drawn to the Montauk Monster found in Montauk, New York, in June 2008. A popular theory was that the Panama Creature was a
sloth Sloths are a group of Neotropical xenarthran mammals constituting the suborder Folivora, including the extant arboreal tree sloths and extinct terrestrial ground sloths. Noted for their slowness of movement, tree sloths spend most of their l ...
(perhaps an
albino Albinism is the congenital absence of melanin in an animal or plant resulting in white hair, feathers, scales and skin and pink or blue eyes. Individuals with the condition are referred to as albino. Varied use and interpretation of the term ...
) that had somehow became hairless; proponents of the hypothesis cited the hooked claw visible in one of the photographs. Science author Darren Naish, writing for
ScienceBlogs ScienceBlogs is an invitation-only blog network and virtual community that operated initially for almost 12 years, from 2006 to 2017. It was created by Seed Media Group to enhance public understanding of science. Each blog had its own theme, spec ...
, supported the sloth hypothesis, but had a "difficult time" explaining the creature's hairlessness. The sloth theory was generally considered most credible; in 1996, similar photographs were taken of a creature found on the coast between Panama and Costa Rica that was later confirmed to be a sloth that had started to decay. Further Internet speculation led to some proposing that it was in fact a
dolphin A dolphin is an aquatic mammal within the infraorder Cetacea. Dolphin species belong to the families Delphinidae (the oceanic dolphins), Platanistidae (the Indian river dolphins), Iniidae (the New World river dolphins), Pontoporiidae (the ...
or a pit bull terrier, an example of a species previously unknown to science, or some sort of genetic mutation. Some Panamanian zoologists said that it appeared to be a
fetus A fetus or foetus (; plural fetuses, feti, foetuses, or foeti) is the unborn offspring that develops from an animal embryo. Following embryonic development the fetal stage of development takes place. In human prenatal development, fetal dev ...
of some kind. In addition to naturalistic explanations, Billy Booth of
About.com Dotdash Meredith (formerly About.com) is an American digital media company based in New York City. The company publishes online articles and videos about various subjects across categories including health, home, food, finance, tech, beauty, ...
reported that "there has been speculation that it is alien, and thereby the connection to UFOs, undersea bases, the whole ball of wax".


Necropsy

The creature's corpse was recovered four days after the encounter, and a
biopsy A biopsy is a medical test commonly performed by a surgeon, interventional radiologist, or an interventional cardiologist. The process involves extraction of sample cells or tissues for examination to determine the presence or extent of a dise ...
was performed by the National Environmental Authority of Panama (ANAM). The biopsy concluded that the corpse was in fact a male
brown-throated sloth The brown-throated sloth (''Bradypus variegatus'') is a species of three-toed sloth found in the Neotropical realm of Central and South America. It is the most common of the four species of three-toed sloth, and is found in the forests of South ...
, a species common in the area. André Sena Maia, a veterinarian who works at Niterói Zoo,
Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a ...
,
Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
, explained that "most people know how a dead animal looks like in a dry environment", and claimed that "the body must have got stuck under the water, and the movement of the currents gave the false impression that it was alive." A
necropsy An autopsy (post-mortem examination, obduction, necropsy, or autopsia cadaverum) is a surgical procedure that consists of a thorough examination of a corpse by dissection to determine the cause, mode, and manner of death or to evaluate any di ...
revealed that severe
trauma Trauma most often refers to: * Major trauma, in physical medicine, severe physical injury caused by an external source * Psychological trauma, a type of damage to the psyche that occurs as a result of a severely distressing event *Traumatic i ...
had been inflicted on the body of the sloth, and Melquiades Ramos, a specialist from the ANAM Department of Protected Areas, estimated that the body had been in the water for "about two days" prior to discovery. The hairlessness was probably caused by the fact it was submerged in water, which can lead to acceleration of fur loss, resulting in smooth skin. A post-mortem bloating further contributed to the unusual appearance of the corpse. After the sloth was identified, its body was buried by ANAM staff.


See also

*
Globster A globster or blob is an unidentified organic mass that washes up on the shoreline of an ocean or other body of water. A globster is distinguished from a normal beached carcass by being hard to identify, at least by initial untrained observers, ...
* Montauk Monster


References

{{Reflist, 30em Sloths 2009 in Panama Alleged UFO-related entities 2009 animal deaths Viral videos Individual animal corpses