Yeti Scholar On Downed Helicopter

A helicopter full of the intelligentsia of Nepal’s Himalayan conservation and forest management has been apparently found. Radio contact with the craft was lost on Saturday, September 23, 2006, while it was in a remote mountain area of Nepal, 190 miles (305km) east of the capital, according to Reuters.

I note that several of the people on the copter may have had dealings with the search for the Yeti or Abominable Snowmen in the region. One individual, specifically, had been an outspoken advocate of the Yeti in recent years. Nepali environmentalist Mingma Norbu Sherpa (above and below), who did the foreword to a photoautobiography of Edmund Hillary, had studied the natural history of the Yeti and placed his opinion on the record, especially regarding the misinformation circulating that the Yeti was just a bear.

Mingma Norbu Sherpa (above) felt the "Yeti is definitely not a brown bear because it cannot go beyond the altitude higher above 3500 meters approximately. During monsoon season brown bear used to come to the higher altitude forest and eat animals and plants. Based on this assumption he concluded, ‘I think people have come to conclusion due to this reason’," wrote a reporter for the Italian National Research Council in 2005.

The Shree Air helicopter was carrying delegates who had gone to attend the Kangchenjunga Conservation Area handover at Taplpejung, Nepal. They are all still missing and presumed dead, although weather is hampering teams who are trying to reach the downed helicopter.

The following is the list of persons aboard Shree Air 9NAHJ, as published by the World Wildlife Fund:

1. Mr. Gopal Rai, Minister of State of Forests and Soil Conservation (Nepali)
2. Mrs. Gopal Rai (Nepali)
3. Dr. Damodar Parajuli, Acting Secretary – Ministry of State of Forests and Soil Conservation (Nepali)
4. Mr. Narayan Poudel, Director General of Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation (Nepali)
5. Mr. Sharad Rai, Director General of Department of Forests (Nepali)
6. Mr. Pauli Mustonnen, Charge d’Affaires, Embassy of Finland (Finnish)
7. Ms. Margaret Alexander, Dy. Director, USAID (Amercian)
8. Dr. Bijnan Acharya, Program Dev. Specialist, USAID (Nepali)
9. Dr. Jill Bowling, Conservation Director, WWF UK (Joint Swiss-Australian nationality)
10. Ms. Jennifer Headley, Coordinator, WWF UK (Canadian)
11. Mr. Mingma Norbu Sherpa, Managing Director, EHEC, WWF US (Nepali)
12. Mr. Matthew Preece, Program Officer, WWF US (Amercian)
13. Dr. Chandra Gurung, Country Representative, WWF Nepal (Nepali)
14. Dr. Harka Gurung, Advisor, WWF Nepal (Nepali)
15. Dr. Tirtha Man Maskey, Co-Chair, AsRSG (Nepali)
16. Mrs. Yeshi Lama, WWF Nepal (Nepali)
17. Mr. Vijaya Shrestha, Central Committee Member, FNCCI (Nepali)
18. Mr. Hem Raj Bhandari, Nepal Television (Nepali)
19. Mr. Sunil Singh, Nepal Television (Nepali)
20. Mr. Dawa Tshering, Chairperson, KCAMC (Nepali)

21. Crew 1 (Russian)
22. Crew 2 (Russian)
23. Mr. Mingma Sherpa, Captain (Nepali)
24. Mr. Tandu Shrestha (Crew) (Nepali)

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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