Mothman Rides a Bus

In his study of Appalachian UFO encounters, author Kyle Lovern records a Mothman encounter from the mid 1960's. An account that in fact, predates the famous Point Pleasant West Virginia sightings by several months.

The incident occurred on Buffalo Mountain in the summer of 1966. The location was between the towns of Williamson and Delbarton where US Route 52 winds through the hills.

When she was a young girl, the witness, Gail, had been on a walk with her mother to visit a relative. It was in the evening and the pair had come off a hill and onto the hardtop road.  Gail's mother caught her attention saying:

"Honey, there's the big bus coming, so step aside till it passes."

Gail recalls that the roadside was very narrow at that spot and they stepped aside to get out of the way:

"We stepped aside and watched the bus pass. As the vehicle passed us the Mothman creature flew off the side of a nearby cliff and jumped onto the back of the bus. He covered the back end of that bus and his wingspan and wingtips wrapped around the sides of the vehicle. I was scared to death.

Frightened, I gripped Mom's hand and whispered and asked her if it would hurt us. She answered, 'Just stand still, honey, and let's see if it goes on across the mountaintop. If it was going to hurt us, I'm sure it would have done it already.'

Due to the bright lights on top of the bus, we could clearly see that large creature as it gripped tightly onto the back of the bus."

Gail reports that she and her mother watched as the bus crossed the mountain and drove out of sight. She says that she had many nightmares after the event and still vividly remembers the creature. Gail's mother had told her to keep quite about the event and it took her years before she shared the encounter with anyone:

"My mom told me not to tell anyone about it because people would think we were absolutely crazy. She told me not to even think about it anymore. I thought at the time that if mom wasn't scared then I'd be okay too. We never discussed it after that."

She states that the creature was hairy and that she did not see the eyes. "The hair was a deep reddish brown--a pretty dark auburn--and resembled the feathers down the stem of a peacock feather."

She also reports that someone else in the area had witnessed the Mothman on the bus that night but gives no further details.

As noted, Gail's sighting predates the first recorded Point Pleasant encounter which occurred in November 1966.