Man Reports 2003 Sighting of Humanoid Flying 'a Scooter with No Wheels' near Springfield, Illinois

*(Emily Wayland / Singular Fortean Society)*

The Singular Fortean Society was contacted at the end of July by a man who said that in September of 2003 he had seen a flying humanoid in a wooded area on the southern edge of Springfield, Illinois. The witness agreed to allow the use of his first name, Mike, when sharing his report.

According to the initial contact from Mike:

I had contact with a flying humanoid in September 2003. It was in Springfield, Illinois in the woods behind the [now defunct] Four Seasons bar. I was walking down the rail road tracks around 10:30 p.m. when someone in a house along the tracks picked up the phone. I got spooked they were calling the cops. So I went into the woods. I waited about 30 minutes and figured that they did not call the cops (walking on tracks is a crime), so I decided to leave the woods and follow the tracks home like I have done many times before.
I got a about 50 feet from where I had spent the last 30 minutes, and I heard footsteps coming towards me in the leaves. I know what human footsteps sound like in the woods. Fearing an encounter with a homeless person, I hid behind a tree that was right there, the steps stopped right on the other side of the tree. I waited a couple minutes and figured they went towards the way out.
I decided to go back where I waited for the 30 minutes. About five minutes later I had the worst feeling, like I was not supposed to be where I was and to get out of these woods right now. I ran fast for about four blocks, [and] when I got to the outskirts of the woods the small trees started acting funny, kind of spinning in circles on the top, for some reason it almost felt like the woods were alive and the trees were going to grab me.
All of a sudden, all the hair stood up on the back of my neck and I felt pure evil behind me. Something told me don't look back your not going to like what you see. So I looked back and saw a creature on what appeared to be a flying scooter of some kind, flying over the tree tops parallel to the way I was going, perfectly silent. I ran like hell and didn't look back. Several months later, I read an article in a magazine about strange creatures, and the picture of the "flying humanoid " looked exactly like what I saw.

Investigator Tobias Wayland interviewed Mike over the phone in mid-August of this year.

"It’s really got me stumped," Mike said. "I remember the details pretty good. I know the trails real good, I grew up in that area. I used to ride my bike on the dirt trails there as a kid. I pretty much knew the trail like the back of my hand; I knew exactly where it happened at. I knew the trail that I heard the thing walking down, and there was some light, it wasn’t pitch black. It was the end of September, so a lot of the leaves were on the ground. There was some light coming through the trees; I could still see."

Especially puzzling to Mike was the missing tree.

"That tree, there was no sign of a tree ever being there that I hid behind. It was on top of a ravine, there were no roots. Right off one side of the trail is [the] ravine. And right where the tree was it almost would have been in the middle of the trail, but when I stepped back behind the tree I was standing flat-footed on the ground." he explained. "It was weird that I remember hiding behind that tree, but there was no actual tree there. It was almost like it had been an implanted memory or something. I wonder if it actually might have been aliens or something like that."

The image seen in a magazine by Mike. The video from which this still image was taken was filmed in June of 2005; over a year and a half after Mike’s sighting. (Horacio Roquet) — The image seen in a magazine by Mike. The video from which this still image was taken was filmed in June of 2005; over a year and a half after Mike’s sighting. *(Horacio Roquet)*

But that wasn’t the only aspect of high strangeness present in the report. The phantom footsteps remain unexplained, as does the intense fear he felt even prior to his sighting—not to mention the appearance of the creature itself.

"I assumed [whoever was making the footsteps I heard] was a homeless guy," Mike said. "I had a stick and I’m behind the tree and I’m waiting. I was by myself, I didn’t have a phone on me. I figured if he tried something I’m going to fight with him. So, I hid behind the tree, and I heard the footsteps, and they stopped right on the other side of the tree, where the trail was. The trail I was on was a little ‘off trail’, one [people] don’t ride their motorcycles on, so it had a lot of leaves on it, but the main trail didn’t have a lot of leaves because there’s a lot of motorcycle riders that go back there. When it got to the trail, I waited a couple of minutes, and I figured that whoever it was went towards the [way out of the woods].

“I went back about 50 feet or so, and I smoked another cigarette, and a couple minutes later, that’s when I had that bad feeling,” he continued. “The feeling just overwhelmed me, it was like ‘What are you doing? You’re not supposed to be here. Matter of fact, get the hell out of here, right now.’ That’s when I ran out of the woods. I ran as fast as I could for three or four blocks.”

"The area behind these woods, I remember when I was a kid, there used to be little structures built, like little wood structures, down in the ravine, and we never saw any homeless people back there," added Mike.

The trail exited into a “circle track” of cleared land where people would sometimes ride motorcycles, and as he left the woods, "the trees seemed like they were spinning in circles around the top, and I felt like the trees were going to grab me, like they were alive, like the whole woods were alive."

And that’s when Mike felt his final pang of terror that night.

"All of a sudden, all of the hair on the back of my neck stood up and something said ‘Whatever you do, don’t look behind you, because you’re not going to like what you see.’ I looked behind me and I saw that thing flying parallel to me," he said.

"It looked like it was wrapped in something, like it maybe had a cape on—it had something wrapped around it. It looked like a person, like a big person, on a scooter; I swear I could almost see the handlebars on the thing. That’s what my recollection was. A scooter, with no wheels, with some big guy, probably six foot, 250 pounds or something like that. It looked like a little Honda scooter, and it looked like it had a little light on one side of it. I remember seeing something shining, like on the front of it—kind of like a headlight," recounted Mike.

Whatever the flying humanoid wanted, Mike wasn’t about to find out, and again he ran; this time to the relative safety of the well-lit suburban streets.

"I went back a few months later, during the daytime of course, I don’t think I’d go back in those woods at night. I don’t know if whatever is there lives there, or if it was just travelling through, but I don’t think I would go back there at night," he said. "I’m glad I got out of those woods."

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