Another Moose Falls From The Sky

It has happened again. Not Fortean fish raining from the heavens. But a shower of one moose.

You may recall that I have reported of Alaskan moose “falling from the sky” previously here.

A moose fell to its death on February 2, 2008, at Mile 113, on the Seward Highway, a couple miles north of McHugh Creek, Alaska. In 1995, a moose calf fell 100 feet to its death in nearly the same spot. Photo courtesy Alaska State Troopers

The Maine moose that “fell from the sky,” in an observer’s words, landed on its head and quickly died.

The yearling bull nearly took a man with him after it fell from the Interstate 95 overpass onto Hinckley Road, near Clinton, Maine.

Shirley Bailey, Clinton assistant town clerk, got the frantic call shortly after 8 a.m. on Tuesday, May 12, 2009.

Bailey recalled his comments: “I was driving under the bridge on Hinckley Road and a moose fell from the sky.”

The man was “a little shook up,” Bailey said. “It was quite frightening, I guess.”

Minutes later, the Waldo County Sheriff’s Department took a call of a young bull moose on I-95, not far away in Burnham, Maine.

Waldo County, Maine, is well-known for its sightings of mysterious black panthers, but this may be the first falling moose report from there.

Mark Latti, a spokesman for the state Department of Transportation, tells motorists to be wary of the big animals. They wander along and sometimes into roads as the roadsides turn green, he said.

Latti said that Maine averages more than 600 moose-and-vehicle crashes a year, and there have been 22 fatalities in the past 10 years.

“Data shows that each spring, the frequency of moose-vehicle collisions increases in April and continues to climb until it peaks in mid-June,” Latti said.

Duane Brunell, of the DOT’s safety office, said, “Due to a moose’s large size, every moose-vehicle accident has the potential for serious injury.”

The moose that fell in Clinton probably was spooked by something, Runnels said. Runnels said he got there quickly.

Runnels, who was on the scene by 8:17, said the distance from the I-95 overpass to Hinckley Road is about 18 feet.

The chief said he didn’t have to keep the lane of Hinckley Road that leads into town closed for long. Just as he got there, a man driving a wrecker stopped, and asked if he could have the moose. Runnels granted the request, and the man drove away with it.

“When I was with the Greenville police, a moose jumped over a bridge onto the banks of the Piscataquis River,” he said.

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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