Witness Reports Sighting of "Owl Man" in Rolling Meadows, Illinois

An image created by the witness using AI to visualize the creature.

Lon Strickler of Phantoms & Monsters recently received the report below following the airing of ‘The Mothman Revisited’ on Unsolved Mysteries.

Hello. It has been a few years (June 2022) since that strange evening. I thought I would share our (my husband and my) experience now that it has been brought up again recently while watching an episode of "Unsolved Mysteries" on Mothman. Finding out that there have been a large number of sightings in the Chicagoland area has made me feel less alone.
My husband and I were driving down Kirchoff Road in Rolling Meadows, Illinois, heading home towards Plum Grove Road. It was a little after midnight when we left my in-laws' house to head home. It's a short trip of only about a mile, which we've taken thousands of times. This night was different.
As we got close to home, a very large, winged creature landed on the road on the opposite side. It was dark, but we could see the massive wings that were larger than an SUV. The wings were spread out, and we slowed down and stopped the car. I turned on my brights and shifted the car more toward its direction to see what the hell it was. We didn't see any face, but we saw legs that looked almost human-like, and the biggest wings we'd ever seen. This was no bird. It was huge, and when I shined my lights on it, it shot up so fast into the tall trees and disappeared. It was strange how quickly it happened and how it flew back up into the trees.
We went to look further and turned the car around to see where this creature, or as we like to describe it, an "owl man" that was four to five feet tall with wings taller than its body. It was gone. Something that big should have been visible in a tree or around us, but it wasn't. We were shocked and unsure of what we saw. We talked about it that night, and I tried to convince myself it was some crazy-sized owl or bird, but my husband knew it was something different, something more.
After all this time, I never did any research as I felt in denial about what we saw, but our experience seemed similar to others. Reading that there was a similar sighting so close to us in Hoffman Estates a few years back, I now believe that what we saw is real and out there. I feel we saw the back side of this creature and could identify its legs, which were the size of a man's, not a bird's or even an owl's, but the wings were reminiscent of an owl's, just way too big to compare. I wanted to share our experience as others might have had this experience as well.
Feel free to reach out and let me know if u have any questions.
I had AI create a photo similar to what we saw as I attached to the email.

Strickler added that the witness had said she would call him soon, although their communication via email has provided him with enough to make a full report of the incident.

A second image created by the witness using AI to visualize the creature.

Less than 10 miles away from Rolling Meadows is Hoffman Estates, where, as mentioned by this witness, in October 2019 a woman and her husband reported an “unknown flying human owl” perched in a tree near their apartment.

Other notable owl-like winged humanoid reports in the area include: a summer 2003 report of an “owl man” in the Chicago suburb of Alsip; an April 2018 report of an "owl man" in the Woodlawn neighborhood of Chicago; an October 2018 report of a winged humanoid resembling a “large owl” also in Alsip; a June 2020 report of a “huge owl” with "glowing red eyes that looked like [they] belonged to the devil himself" near a parking lot at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport; an April 2021 report of a large, humanoid owl at O’Hare; and a March 2022 report of an “owl-like” creature with “bright red eyes” and a “big black body” at a construction site outside of the airport.

Because of its proximity to other sighting locations, the creature described in the above report could be related to the larger Lake Michigan Mothman phenomenon. Those sightings are commonly reported within a few-hundred-mile radius surrounding Lake Michigan, including every state bordering the great lake.

The sightings ostensibly began in the spring of 2017, but more historical accounts are being reported as more people become aware of the phenomenon. They generally take place in the evening or at night, often in or near a park or natural area, and around water. Witnesses consistently describe a large gray, brown, or black, bat or bird-like creature, sometimes with glowing or reflective red, yellow, or orange eyes, and humanoid features such as an upright, bipedal posture are often reported. Some witnesses have reported feeling intense fear and an aura of evil emanating from the creature they encountered. Many of the sightings are also of something seen only briefly or are described only as a flying creature with few details, which leaves open the possibility that a misidentified large bird—such as an owl, heron, or crane—or some type of anomalous avian species could explain some, although certainly not all, of the encounters. A number of associated high strangeness incidents have also occurred alongside the creature sightings. These include reports of UFOs, other anomalous flying creatures and mysterious humanoids, parapsychological phenomena, and bizarre events experienced by those investigating the sightings.

You can view a timeline of the sightings so far here.

A map of the sightings, compiled by Lon Strickler, is available here.