Kabagon
By Cole Herrold
The oceans while beautiful are frankly a
terrifying place. Since the dawn of time, there have been rumors of all sorts of
colossal critters and haunting entities that have allegedly made their home in
the dark depths. These entities range in description from the colossal multi-tentacled
ship destroyer the Kraken to the long tadpole-like Hook Island Sea Serpent. Yet
of all the entities reported in the ocean perhaps one of the eeriest is the
ones that bear a strong resemblance to humans or mammals such as the Ningen. On
July 18, 1971, the Mainichi Daily News would report a similar eerie humanoid
or mammalian-type entity that would peer out from the water.
It was on August 28, 1971, that Captain
Miyagi Kimura and 25 other crew members of the 28th Konpira Maru,
a 235-ton tuna long-line fishing boat from Onagawa, in the Miyagi prefecture were
sailing in the Pacific Ocean near the South Island of New Zealand casting their
lines into the ocean. Their exact position based on the ship’s logbook was 44.15
degrees South Latitude and 173.34 East Longitude, 25 miles SE of Lyttelton. The
water they traversed reached a depth of about 40 meters. It was 12 o clock, and
the day was bright, and the conditions were fine as a sweet northern breeze
blew and the water was seemingly placid that was until their attention was
drawn to a strange disturbance in the water near them. The crew watched in awe
and confusion as a brownish-gray figure started to emerge from the deep. The
figure a large mound of folded flesh some 5 ft tall was fitted with a pair of
large eyes each about six inches in diameter and two large nostrils (or as some of the other art depictions show another set of eyes) located
just below it. They noted that this ball of flesh was clearly the semi-submerged
skull of some colossal creature and decided to attempt to capture the creature.
The crew stopped their fishing adventures and began to man the harpoons. Some
of the crew including the captain continued to stare at the creature which to
them seemed very similar to a deformed hippopotamus particularly in the area of
the nose yet they knew that this creature could not be one of those since they
tend to dwell mostly in fresh water and live exclusively in Africa. The captain
proceeded to draw the creature and even decided to coin the beast Kabagon after
the Japanese word for hippo ‘Kaba’. The creature however, later on, would also be
called the Bug-Eyed Monster or BEM They then altered the course of the boat and
as they got within 30 meters of the creature it suddenly possibly sensing the
danger it was in proceeded to disappear into the briny deep. The crew was left
speechless and disappointed at the elusiveness of their quarry and kept the
story to themselves until they returned home to Yaizu Port, Shizuoka prefecture
where the crew proceeded to tell their account. However, before the crew
returned to tell about their encounter a weekly magazine in New Zealand released that
on the Lyttelton Peninsula that a strange series of footprints were found. The Mainichi
Daily News would propose that these footprints were caused by the strange
creature.
As with almost all Fortean cases, one needs
to entertain that there is the chance of hoaxing. Outside of just making up a
story, there’s not much to point in this direction. Yet there is an interesting
parallel that could point to this being the case. Horror, Sci-Fi, and other
Exploitation film fans might be quick to notice that Kabagon bears a strong resemblance
outside of just its name to Japanese Kaiju films. The overall appearance of the
creature is almost identical to Hedorah the giant smog monster that appeared in
Godzilla Vs. Hedorah or as titled here in the US Godzilla Vs. The
Smog Monster. To add to this the film was theatrically released on July 24,
1971. Four days after the sighting was reported however trailers for the film
was certainly released before that day. It is very possible that members of the
crew had seen the trailer and proceeded to create an encounter resolving around
a beast similar in appearance to Hedorah. Yet this is all speculation.
Another possibility is that this creature
could have been misidentified the eyewitness sketch does bear some resemblance
to known animals even though it may seem goofy. The closest animal to the
Kabagon in appearance would be a female walrus and even the original Pursuit
breakdown of the case quickly pointed to this as a possibility. However,
the article also says that this would be highly unlikely as walruses in general
are found in the arctic and subarctic areas of the planet and not in the warm
waters of New Zealand. Another problem is that the creature’s head was 5ft
alone and the crew had no way of measuring the rest of the creature which
clearly would have been at least 3x bigger than that, so an estimate of about
say 20-30 ft, which would be bigger than any currently living walrus or
pinniped. As walruses tend to have a max size of about 12 ½ ft and even then
the females; which Kabagon is more similar in appearance to, are much smaller. Another
thing is if the tracks found on the beach of the peninsula were caused by the
creature and it was indeed a kind of pinniped it would not be so much as
classic tracks as we would associate with a primate or cervine but that there
would also be body drag marks or almost semi-destroyed tracks from the movement
of the creature. It's from this that it would seem unlikely that what was seen
by the crew was a known pinniped or pinniped at all.
A possibility most people like to go with
when discussing this creature is the cryptid possibility. Obviously, there are animals slightly similar in appearance to the creature except that the form
seems to be more pinniped or humanoid-like, yet none are an exact match. In
cryptozoological circles, there are several entities and theories that could
explain what we are seeing or are very similar to what was reported.
Unsurprisingly most of these creatures were reported by Japanese sailors. The most
famous of which would be the Ningen a colossal humanoid type creature that is
human-like in its face and arms, but the rest of its form is like a white
whale. Now a lot of the reports and images of this creature are hoaxes so there
is some debate if this is a real cryptid or if this is some creepypasta-style
creation. The other similar creature is a colossal critter reportedly seen in
Antarctica and dubbed by the ship's captain Matsumoto in 1958 as “Antarctic Godzilla”.
The creature appeared in his book Antarctic Transportation and was described as
again a hippopotamus-type creature but again with other features as it was
described as having a cow-like face, monkey-like head, large ears, large
shoulders, dark brown hair, and a noticeable dorsal fin. The creature was
noticeably colossal in size and originally was mistaken for a large barrel by
some of the crew before they noticed its face. So large mammalian sea cryptids
are not exactly unheard of and could be the same type or similar type of
creatures.
A popular theory and one that I personally
subscribe to in some reports is the Seal Serpent Hypothesis. This is a theory
put out there as a more plausible answer to reports of cryptids that seem to be
living plesiosaurs. In the theory, it is proposed that over time a group of
seals developed a longer neck to basically fill in the niche that was left open
after the plesiosaurs went extinct and therefore through convergent evolution
developed a similar form. It’s from this I propose that Kabagon may have been some
variation of this built for the warmer waters. It would have the hairless build
of say a sea lion or elephant seal and could still have the large eyes and
nostrils one would expect from a marine mammal but would simply be colossal in
build. There are countless photos of seals and sea lions doing similar behavior
as Kabagon and we can extend this as well to members of Sirenia like manatees
and dugongs. Of course, this theory has never been proven and is more of a kind
of thought experiment and therefore speculation.
Something that is not discussed usually
with this case is the idea that this creature bears some resemblance to a
particular Yokai the Umibozu. These entities are described as the spirits or
ghosts of drowned Buddhist monks or manifestations of the ocean itself they
often manifest as giant heads either human-like or monstrous most of the time
bald or with some hair to the side, yet other forms and sizes are reported. Most
of the depictions of them in art are of a giant dark-colored form with large
eyes. This is almost exactly what the crew was witnessing. I am not here to
claim that all Umibozu are actually misidentified Kabagon however I offer the
counterargument. When immigrants from other countries enter a new location we
often see in a short period of time that the faeries and creatures from their
native countries start appearing in the countries where they now reside. The Trolls
of Sorenson’s Woods are a prime example and the same goes for family banshees
now seen in West Virginia or the Tommyknockers of Pennsylvania. Perhaps there’s
something about these entities that will cause them to follow people to other
countries and manifest only to them or there’s something about the people
themselves and their beliefs that can result in these entities appearing
whether any of the crew were Shinto believers is however unconfirmed and again
this is all speculation.
Another possibility for this creature
could be that it is an Undine or some other aquatic fae the image of the Kabagon
is also very similar to a painting of the Nokken an aquatic faerie and aggressive
water spirit from Scandinavia. The world has countless areas known for such
spirit-like beings or paranormal entities that perhaps what the crew was seeing
was not something from their own country or something that followed them but
instead something that was an elemental for that specific area. Whether the
area of New Zealand has folklore of something similar to Kabagon however or
tales of something lurking in the area, however, I currently am unaware of any.
Just what Kabagon is we can only guess as
currently, no one else has reported a sighting similar or in the area since 71’.
Yet that does not mean that this is the last of it. Our ocean’s are colossal
and are filled with tons of places to hide and are full of creatures we know we
haven’t discovered yet. We are certain that there are more undiscovered
creatures in our oceans than what are on land. Most will certainly be small and
strange, yet some will be colossal, and perhaps if Kabagon is real, even
stranger.
Quick Facts:
Species/Potential Species: Mammalian Sea
creature (probably a Pinniped or member of Sirenia)
Location: Pacific Ocean, 44.15 degrees
South Latitude and 173.34 East Longitude, 25 miles SE Lyttelton, South Island,
New Zealand
Sighted: April 28, 1971
Works Cited Page:
Pursuit No. 18 April 1972
“A Bug Eyed Monster Off New Zealand” Malcolm’s
Cryptid Blogspot. malcolmscryptids.blogspot.com/2022/10/a-bug-eyed-monster-off-new-zealand.html.
Accessed 2/12/2023
No comments:
Post a Comment