The Why Files: Operation Podcast
575: The Underground Grid: Electricity Linking Four Famous Monsters
Sat, 23 Nov 2024
In 2015, geologists discovered something peculiar: identical electrical patterns beneath four locations across the globe. These places shared another connection - they were all home to famous cryptid sightings. From the Jersey Devil to Mokele-mbembe, these creatures seemed random and unrelated. Until scientists found the underground grid. Now research suggests these legendary beasts might be more connected than anyone imagined. What lies beneath these locations, and why are the tunnels expanding toward a central point?
Chapter 1: What unusual discovery did geologists make in 2015?
In 2015, a routine study by the United States Geological Survey, or USGS, discovered strange electrical patterns and vast cave networks beneath New Jersey's Pine Barrens, formations that shouldn't exist in that area.
Chapter 2: Which other locations share similar electrical patterns?
When researchers compared their data with other surveys, they found identical formations and energy signatures in three other places, the hills of West Virginia, the Congo Basin, and eastern Oklahoma. Each site had vast underground cave systems, and each site showed unusual electrical activity, repeating patterns of energy too precise to be natural.
Chapter 3: What cryptids are connected to these underground tunnels?
The more the data was analyzed, the more connections were found. And there was one connection the government did not want to talk about. All four locations were connected to cryptid sightings. In 2018, the USGS quietly issued a final report. Despite being thousands of miles apart, the tunnels are laid out in the same mathematical grid, a grid that's slowly expanding toward a central point.
It looks like that not only are the creatures living in the underground caves, now they're digging and they're digging toward the same destination. So two questions, how are these cryptids connected? And what happens when their tunnels intersect? The earliest mention of the New Jersey Devil is 1735. Deborah Leeds gave birth to her 13th child.
According to the legend, she cursed the child, saying it would be the devil. Then the child transformed into a monstrous creature.
Teenagers, am I right?
One sentence. Can I build drama for more than just one sentence?
Sorry, I know you don't like cryptids, so I'm trying to help you keep it moving.
You don't need to. We're going to talk about four different cryptids today.
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Chapter 4: How is the Jersey Devil described in local folklore?
Fine. I'll write four times as many jokes. No, please don't. You're welcome.
Local folklore says the Jersey Devil has bat wings, a goat's head, and a forked tail. You can sometimes see it flying around the Pine Barrens of New Jersey.
The only thing scarier in New Jersey at a drive is, you ever see them on a dirt bike trying to wrangle a left turn out of a jug handle?
All right, that's enough. The most documented appearance of the New Jersey Devil was January 1909. Hundreds of residents across multiple counties reported seeing it. The wave of sightings transformed the local legend into national news. The creature was described the same way by many witnesses. It had wings like a bat, a head like a horse or a goat, and walked on two legs.
Chapter 5: What evidence exists for the Jersey Devil's sightings?
From the side, its face was like a kangaroo, a long neck and eyes that were described as glowing red orbs. Several people said they smelled sulfur. It was awkward looking, but fast and agile. It could launch itself straight up into the air and take flight. There were even hoof prints in the snow. The prints would suddenly disappear as if it jumped into the air. It was a big deal in the area.
Schools were closed. Factory workers refused to work nights. Police officers, politicians, businessmen, they all filed reports. The Philadelphia Zoo offered a reward to anyone who could catch it. Multiple newspapers, including the New York Times, covered the incidents. Law enforcement records showed consistent physical evidence at multiple locations.
Witness reports flooded in from Burlington, Gloucester, and Salem counties. A Burlington hunter reported being attacked and clawed by the creature. In Woodbury, a group of boys threw rocks at it, which caused it to screech and flap away. Modern analysis gives a clue why this area might be home to the devil.
The New Jersey Pine Barrens sit on top of one of the largest aquifer systems in the country, more than 17 trillion gallons of water. Recent studies revealed extensive cave networks threading through the aquifer system. Geologists say these caves shouldn't exist in this type of sedimentary rock. During the 1909 sightings, there were also electrical anomalies reported.
Telegraph equipment behaved erratically. Messages were garbled with strange sequences of numbers. When modern cryptographers analyzed these sequences in 2018, they found a pattern, one that matched electrical wavelengths now being recorded by the USGS. In 1909, police reports documented footprints in the snow. Cloven hooves that started and stopped impossibly, as if the creature just vanished.
They even took plaster molds of the tracks. The Jersey Devil moved with an unusual gait, unlike any other animal on record. In 2021, the Philadelphia Police Department finally released their complete files from 1909. Among them was a sealed report about the plaster casts. Modern analysis revealed rare minerals in the prints that don't exist in surface soil.
They only exist in deep cave systems, thousands of feet underground. They finally discovered the lair of the New Jersey Devil. On September 12th, 1952, seven people in Flatwoods, West Virginia saw something that changed their lives and the town forever. Witnesses included Kathleen May and Eugene Lemon serving in the National Guard.
Their encounter would become part of Project Blue Book, the Air Force's official UFO investigation program, The entity they described was at least 10 feet tall. It hovered above the ground in a column of mist with glowing orange eyes. Its body appeared both mechanical and organic. A metallic, dark pleated skirt-like structure tapered to a point. Most distinctive was its head.
People said it was shaped like an ace of spades and it had small claws on its sides. It emitted a nauseating metallic odor that made witnesses violently ill. There was physical evidence as well. Seven witnesses suffered nausea and throat irritation lasting several days.
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Chapter 6: What is the legend of Mokele-mbembe?
They were connected, tied to locations that hide vast underground tunnel systems and unusual electric phenomena. But is it true? Well, hard evidence is tricky. There is hard evidence of all four of these, but is it definitely evidence of a cryptid? Well, we don't know. Skeptics say the Adair Beast footprints are a hoax, but that part of Oklahoma is a Bigfoot sighting hotspot.
There's been so many reports that for the past 16 years, Honobia, Oklahoma has hosted an annual Bigfoot festival. Now, I don't know if these people have seen a Bigfoot, but I believe that they've seen something. The Jersey Devil has been seen by thousands of people, over a thousand in January 1909 over the course of just a few days. But the story has a few problems.
First, there's no record of a Deborah Leeds or her 13 children, but I didn't expect there to be. But Daniel Leeds was a local politician in the early 18th century. He was so unpopular that locals called him the devil. In fact, the Jersey devil creature was first known as the Leeds devil. The 13th child legend emerged from around that, but the truth is this was political name calling that stuck.
300 years before Trump did it. Yep. It was so effective that Daniel Leeds left the country. In 1909, thousands of people did see the Jersey Devil, but what they saw was proven to be a hoax. It was a live kangaroo that had wings attached to it with a harness.
And the people fell for this?
Well, people believe what they want to believe. I'll prove it. Look, are alien abductions real?
Of course they are.
See?
But the hooves! The hooves!
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Chapter 7: What sightings have been reported regarding the Adair Beast?
Oh, wow, I should have seen it was a plane.
Probably not. There was no wreckage. The creature was gone. All that was left was the smell and something oily in the grass. Now, later we learned that one of the witnesses drove his truck over the area, which would explain the oil and the tracks. And there are sulfur springs in the area which could explain the smell. But there still isn't a full and reasonable explanation for any of this.
Whatever was in the sky, it was important enough for the Air Force to send investigators. Now, the theory about aquifers and electrical energy is interesting. Aquifers do create energy. We covered this a few times. We go into detail in the episode about the pyramid power plant theory.
Link to Tesla pyramid down in your pickle barrel.
Connecting the four cryptids together is a stretch. The cave systems are there. The aquifers are mostly there. There might be a pattern, though I don't see it. According to believers, the electrical readings at these sites produce numeric sequences that shouldn't be possible in nature, the implication being they're being generated by advanced technology.
Okay, I love the theory, but I don't see the pattern. Another theory is that these beings are extra-dimensional. They slip into our world through cracks in reality created by the electrical anomalies. This would explain their prehistoric origins and how they appear and disappear without a trace. It kind of reminds me of the liminal spaces and the back rooms.
That's still one of my favorite episodes.
Back room link down in your munchpacks.
So that's a thing now, huh?
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Chapter 8: How do these cryptid sightings relate to underground electrical hotspots?
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Those are the plugs, and that's going to do it. Until next time, be safe, be kind, and know that you are appreciated.
I played Polybius in Area 51. A secret code inside the Bible said I was. I love my UFOs and paranormal fun as well as music. So I'm singing like I should. But then another conspiracy theory becomes the truth, my friends. And it never ends. No, it never ends. Fear the crab cat and got stuck inside Mel's home with MKUltra being only too aware.
Did Stanley Kubrick fake the moon landing alone on a film set? Were the shadow people there? The Roswell aliens just fought the smiling man, I'm told. And his name was Code. And I can't believe We'll see you next time. The Mothman sightings and the solar storm still come to have got the secret city underground.
Mysterious number stations, planets are bold to project Stargate and where the dark watchers find.
In a simulation, don't you worry though The black knight said a lot, he told me so I can't believe I'm dancing with the fish Heck of a shot, Thursday nights with AJ too And the white balls of the beat all through the night All I ever wanted was to just hear the truth So the white balls of the beat all through So the world falls on its feet all too fast.
Yeah, Gertie loves to dance on the dance floor because she is a camel. And camels love to dance when the feeling is right on wasting time.
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