Giant Bat “Hoax” Flies Again

Just in case you didn’t catch it in March 2012, there’s a dramatic photograph that has been making the Internet rounds. And here it is – yes again – this week (in October 2012). The new websites and forums are several, including ones who have posted it cold, as if the “mystery” hasn’t been already solved. But as Red Pill Junkie has shown me, a simple search (here) demonstrates this has spread far and wide since March.

This photo (Muercielago Gigante), again, has been falsely labeled as from Peru of a “giant bat” that might be a Chupacabras (as noted on a Spanish site).

But it is not from Peru. It is not a new South American bat. It is not a Chupacabras.

So, just in case you see this again, here’s what this is and where it was taken: It is an Asian bat, a flying fox, also called a fruit bat, and the photo location origin is the Philippines. Add in forced perspective, and you’ve got another web wonder.

There are other large (supposedly) “flying” mystery animal pictures floating around, so readers/viewers beware. These all too seem to be from Asia, not South America. Not Africa. Above is not a bat, for example, but it is a colugo or flying lemur (Dermoptera); thanks to Karl Shuker for id. (FYI, they glide, and do not fly.)

One mystery with this “Giant Bat” photo does remain. Why did these apparent Filipino soldiers hang a sword over the bat, like the hanging Sword of Damocles? Anyone know if there is a cultural answer why they would hang that apparent sword there? Or was that a clue to the hoax?

Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.

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