A very surprising story was published in May 1992 by the famous American tabloid Weekly World News. The newspaper was incredibly popular due to the fact that on its pages a great many stories were told about supernatural and unexplained phenomena. Due to the fact that journalists sometimes could not prove the reality of such paranormalism, many were skeptical of the publication and scornfully called it the "yellow press".
Nevertheless, this story is in no hurry to dismiss it as an obvious invention and fake. Many well-known cryptozoologists believed that the events described below could well have taken place in reality. This story looks too plausible for an outright fake. Moreover, there is indirect scientific evidence that all this actually happened. The mysterious story has acquired a kind of cult status and has been reprinted many times, as well as added to various collections and encyclopedias about monsters.
The appearance of the monstrous moth
So, the staff of Weekly World News wrote that in January 1992, a colossal moth with a wingspan of at least 10 meters flew up at night to the operating coastal lighthouse and burned up in it. "Like a moth crashing into a street lamp," the only eyewitness to the striking incident drew an analogy. It happened near the Norwegian city of Buda in the Salten region of the Arctic Circle.
Karl Friedensen, who worked in the 90s as the caretaker of this lighthouse, first mistook a huge fantastic monster for an airplane. When the Norwegian realized that this was not an aircraft at all, but a flying living creature of unimaginable size, the man was dumbfounded with exorbitant horror, not knowing what to think.
Of course, it could not be a plane, an agitated witness told reporters. The plane would not flutter its wings and rush from side to side in a searchlight. But my brain simply could not at first admit that it was a moth with a wingspan like an airplane."
Friedensen said that he was at that moment at the foot of the tower. Out of the darkness of the night suddenly appeared a gigantic winged creature, which began to rush frantically in the light of the lighthouse. Finally, the monstrous moth slammed into an electric radiator. The impact was so strong that it seemed to the lighthouse keeper that there was an intense tremor, and now an earthquake will begin. Karl hurried up the spiral staircase.
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What he saw there literally shocked the Norwegian. The cryptid, which broke the powerful glass of the Fresnel lens, ended up on hot electrodes and burned alive, ending in charred dust. The stench was so strong and pungent that our hero almost fainted.
It was like a scene from some horror movie. And the stench was simply unbearable. I held my breath and rushed down into the fresh air like a bullet, Friedensen recalls.
Where did the monster come from?
The lighthouse, of course, was quickly repaired and cleared of the remains of the creature. However, Karl managed to take samples of the burnt monster and sent them to entomologists. The researchers conducted a thorough analysis of the tissues and concluded that they, in fact, belonged to an unknown member of the order Lepidoptera. However, it was not possible to determine which one. After listening to Friedensen's story, the astonished scientists suggested that the moth came here from the virgin forests of South America, which have not yet been fully studied. Perhaps such outlandish creatures live precisely in the impenetrable jungle, where no human has ever set foot.
There are other interesting versions of the origin of the cryptid. Some experts believe that the monstrous moth was a mutant. Others suggest that we are talking about a creature from a parallel world - about the legendary moth man. According to others, it was a representative of an extraterrestrial civilization or even an organic "flying saucer" of aliens. Others are inclined to believe that the secret experiments of the government on living beings are to blame. In a word, there are curious theories with a carriage and a small cart, but it is impossible to say anything with certainty. Maybe someday such a monster will appear in Europe again, and this time it will be possible to catch him alive?