Conspiracies & the Unknown: The Mothman

Summary

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Crime House 24/7: “Conspiracies & the Unknown: The Mothman”

Host: Vanessa Richardson
Date: August 5, 2026

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Overview

In this special “Conspiracies & the Unknown” Wednesday episode, host Vanessa Richardson investigates the chilling legend of the Mothman—an enigmatic, winged creature that haunted Point Pleasant, West Virginia, between 1966 and 1967. Blending true crime with unexplained phenomena, Richardson reconstructs local events from eerie first sightings and UFO encounters to the infamous collapse of the Silver Bridge, offering historical context, eyewitness accounts, and lingering questions about the Mothman’s origin and intent.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Legend Begins: Strange Sightings in West Virginia

• Initial Encounter (03:01):

  • On November 2, 1966, Woodrow Derenberger, a traveling salesman, experienced a bizarre roadside encounter near Mineral Wells. A hovering object resembling a “30-foot-long kerosene lamp chimney” blocked his path.
  • The occupant, identifying himself as Indrid Cold, claims telepathically to hail from the peaceful planet Lanulos. He assures Derenberger of their similar biology:

    “I sleep, breathe and bleed even as you do.” (Indrid Cold, paraphrased at 03:53)

  • Cold encourages Derenberger to share his story publicly and promises subsequent contact (which never came).

• The Men in Black (06:01):

  • Derenberger is later visited and threatened by two imposing men in black suits:

    “We think you know who we are, Mr. Derenberger. We’d advise you to forget all about what you’ve seen.” (Unknown Men, 06:11)

  • Derenberger receives mysterious phone calls emitting only electronic beeping.

2. The Mothman’s Early Victims

• Farmer Newell Partridge (07:12):

  • A TV malfunction and a dog’s howling lead Partridge outside, where he confronts two massive, glowing red eyes in his barn. His dog, Bandit, is lost after charging at the mysterious entity.
  • Partridge describes an “all-encompassing, almost hypnotic terror.” The next morning, Bandit's tracks vanish in a circle, and the dog is never found.

• Teens’ Encounter in TNT Area (09:40)

  • Four local teens exploring an abandoned munitions factory are chased by a tall, winged, red-eyed creature capable of keeping pace with a car speeding at 100 mph.

    Mary Mallet: “It made a squeaking sound like a big mouse.” (Approx. 10:12)

  • A dead dog seen by the teens disappears on a return trip—a connection drawn to Partridge’s missing Bandit.

3. Mass Panic and the Mothman Mania

• Naming the Mothman

  • Following press coverage, the creature is dubbed the “Mothman,” inspired by the Batman TV show.

• Ongoing Sightings (15:27+)

  • Marcella Bennett drops her infant in fear as she comes face-to-face with the Mothman and is later immobilized by terror until rescued by a friend (17:00).
  • Multiple daily sightings occur, including firemen describing a giant red-eyed bird and a shoe salesman chased miles by the creature.
  • First daylight sighting:

    Connie Carpenter, after seeing the Mothman on a golf course, suffers temporary blindness, suspected to be from the creature’s “hypnotic stare.” (19:40)

4. UFOs and Intensifying Encounters

• UFO Activity Increases (22:04)

  • Sightings of metal spheres, glowing crafts, and direct interaction with vehicles (e.g., a bloodmobile targeted by a glowing object with pincers) escalate the sense of siege in Point Pleasant.

• Menacing Visitors: Men in Black

  • Journalist Mary H. (Hire) reports being visited multiple times by odd individuals—one fixates on her ballpoint pen before fleeing, another snaps a flash-blinded photograph of her.
  • Other witnesses, including the original four teens and Marcella Bennett, are subjected to intimidation, strange phone calls, or outright attempts at abduction (25:40–29:40).

5. Premonitions and the Silver Bridge Collapse

• Collective Dread and Premonitions (32:06)

  • Local reporter Mary Hire and resident Virginia Thomas experience recurring nightmares of bodies and Christmas gifts floating in the Ohio River.
  • Renowned investigator John Keel receives a telepathic warning from Indrid Cold, predicting disaster on December 15, 1967.

• Silver Bridge Disaster (34:20)

  • At 5:04pm, December 15, 1967, the Silver Bridge collapses under a traffic jam, plunging cars and victims into the freezing river and killing 46 people—a real-life tragedy later attributed to infrastructure failure but forever linked to the Mothman legend.
  • After the disaster, residents witness 12 glowing UFOs departing the TNT area.
  • The cluster of paranormal events abruptly ceases following the tragedy.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Mothman’s Eyes:
  • “The red eyes were just situated at the top of its body, near its shoulders.” (Marcella Bennett’s encounter, 17:30)
• On Menacing Visitors:
  • “We think you know who we are, Mr. Derenberger. We’d advise you to forget all about what you’ve seen.” (Men in Black, 06:11)
• On Community Fear:
  • “By December, there had been so many reported Mothman encounters that the entire town of Point Pleasant was in a state of panic…” (20:40)
• On the Aftermath:
  • “Rescue workers spent days pulling bodies out of the river... hundreds of brightly wrapped Christmas gifts floating alongside the victims. Mary H’s dark nightmares had come true.” (Bridge collapse coverage, 36:15)

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Theories and Lingering Mysteries

• Alien Visitors or Warning?

  • Multiple theories are posed:
    • Mothman and UFOs as harbingers or guardians, warning about the impending disaster.
    • Government psychological experiment.
    • Inter-species conflict between different alien factions.

• Men in Black:

  • Were these intimidating men aliens in disguise? Why did some (like Indrid Cold) encourage open reporting while others harassed witnesses into silence?

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Cultural Impact and Legacy

• The Enduring Legacy (40:48)
  • Point Pleasant's annual Mothman festival draws 15,000 visitors.
  • The town houses a Mothman Museum and a 12-foot-tall statue.
  • The Mothman Prophecies book and movie, documentaries, and appearances in video games and pop culture keep the legend alive.
  • Vanessa: “We still don’t know why the Mothman came... But in a lot of ways, it’s never left.” (Last lines, 43:59)

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Timeline of Major Events & Timestamps

| Time | Segment/Event | |-----------|-----------------------------------------------------------------| | 03:01 | Woodrow Derenberger meets Indrid Cold | | 06:01 | Threatened by Men in Black | | 07:12 | Newell Partridge’s encounter (loses dog, Bandit) | | 09:40 | Teens chased by Mothman in TNT area | | 15:27 | Early mass Mothman sightings recap | | 17:00 | Marcella Bennett’s paralyzing encounter | | 19:40 | Connie Carpenter’s daylight sighting and aftereffects | | 22:04 | UFO sightings increase around Point Pleasant | | 25:40 | Mary Hire’s Men in Black/visitors encounters begin | | 29:40 | Attempted kidnappings and harassment of witnesses | | 32:06 | The return of dread: nightmares and premonitions | | 34:20 | Silver Bridge disaster and aftermath | | 36:15 | UFOs seen after bridge collapse, activity abruptly ends | | 40:48 | Point Pleasant’s Mothman legacy; festivals, museum, statue |

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Conclusion

Vanessa Richardson masterfully reconstructs the spiral of strange incidents that beset Point Pleasant, deftly balancing skepticism with storytelling and leaving listeners with thought-provoking questions:

• Was the Mothman an interstellar monster, a harbinger of doom, or a misunderstood guardian?
• Are there still secrets hidden in Point Pleasant’s history?

Listeners are invited to share their own theories, keeping the legend alive. The Mothman, whether monster or myth, is now a central character in the town’s identity and America’s supernatural folklore.

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Transcript

[Vanessa Richardson]

Hi, listeners, it's Vanessa. Before today's episode, I want to tell you about another show I think you'll love. Crime House and A E are teaming up on the podcast version of the famous true crime series, the First 48. Each week, Carter Roy takes you inside a landmark homicide case. The interrogations, the dead ends, and the breakthroughs in the critical first 48 hours. Listen to and follow the first 48 every Thursday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts. This is crime house. In the winter of 1966, people in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, started seeing something in the dark. Seven feet tall, with wings and glowing red eyes. Thirteen months later, the town's bridge collapsed and killed 46 people. Welcome to Crime House 24 7. I'm Vanessa Richardson. Twice a day, every day, we bring you the best, most timely and gripping cases from across the entire Crime House network, all in one place right here. And every Wednesday is Conspiracies and the Unknown, where we dig into the conspiracies, cover ups and unexplained mysteries that defy easy answers. Today we're opening the file on the Mothman man, the first of two mysteries we've got for you today. And nearly 60 years on, Point Pleasant still won't let it go. Tens of thousands pour into town for the festival every fall. New sightings still trickle in, and people still ask whether the Mothman was a warning no one heeded before the bridge came down. Our community exists because of listeners like you want even more. Join Crime House plus for every episode of Crime House 24. 7 at AD free. Not only that, but you'll get complete access to an exclusive limited series every month and early ad free access to all Crime House shows and bonus episodes go to crimehouseplus.com or on Apple Podcasts. Tap try free at the top of the crime house 24. 7 page. Now I head to Point Pleasant to dig into the legend of the Mothman.

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[Vanessa Richardson]

The strange events in West Virginia actually started 13 days before those teenagers saw the Mothman. On the night of November 2, 1966, 50 year old appliance salesman Woodrow Darenberger was driving back to his home in Mineral Wells, West Virginia, about an hour away from Point Pleasant. It was a rainy night and Derenberger was in a hurry to get off the road. As he crested the top of a hill on an isolated stretch of Interstate 77, a dark colored car came speeding up behind him. The vehicle passed him on the right, then swerved in front and came to a stop blocking the road. Derenberger jammed on the brakes to avoid a collision, but once he came to a complete stop, he realized the object in front of him was wasn't a car at all. Later, he said the vehicle looked like a 30 foot long kerosene lamp chimney. An oblong pipe flared at both ends with a large bulge in the center. It was charcoal gray and hovering a few feet off the ground. As Derenberger stared in disbelief, a door on the side of the craft opened and a man got out. He was about 5ft 10in. Tall with heavily tanned skin, wearing a metallic silver jumpsuit under a dark colored over overcoat. He had his arms crossed over his chest with both hands tucked into his armpits. And as he approached Derenberger's driver's side window, he had a big grin on his face. The man told Derenberger not to be afraid, that he meant him no harm. Derenberger later realized that the man didn't speak these words to him. The words just appeared in his mind as though they'd been communicated telepathically. Their conversation continued this same way. Darren Berger spoke out loud while his visitor beamed thoughts straight into his brain. The man said that his name was Indrid Cold. He claimed to come from a planet called Lanulos, which was similar to Earth with a few key differences. Cold said his planet didn't have any war, poverty, hunger or suffering, but he assured Derenberger that they weren't that different biologically. He said, quote, I sleep, breathe and bleed even as you do. Despite all that, there was still a lot Cold didn't know about humanity. He asked Darren Berger about life on Earth, and as the conversation continued, Cold's chimney shaped vehicle drifted 50ft up into the sky, clearing the road so several other cars could pass them. After chatting for a few minutes, Cold told Derenberger that he had to go, but that they would meet again soon. He encouraged Darren Berger to tell the authorities about his experience and promised to reveal himself and confirm his story at a later date. Then Cold's vehicle drifted back down to ground level. Cold hopped in, closed the door, and flew off into the night sky. After the encounter, Derenberger rushed home to his wife. He was understandably upset, so together they called the police to report what he'd seen. He was questioned at length by both local and state police, and the story of his encounter was published in the local papers the following day. Derenberger's roadside visit sounded unbelievable, but after it became a local news story, multiple other people came forward to back up his claims. Drivers who'd been on Interstate 77 that night reported seeing Derenberger's truck at the side of the road and him chatting with a man in a gray overcoat. Minutes after Indrid Cold got back in his vehicle and flew away, two other drivers reported seeing the mysterious craft flying over the highway. One motorist even claimed that the vehicle shone a bright, blinding light into his car. As for Woody Derenberger, he never got another visit from Cold. But not long after his story hit the papers, he had a run in with some other strange visitors. And this get together wasn't as friendly as his roadside chat. One day, Darren Berger was working at his appliance shop when two stocky, sunburned men in black suits came into the store. They spoke flatly and said, quote, we think you know who we are, Mr. Derenberger. We'd advise you to forget all about what you've seen. End quote. Without waiting for a response, they turned and left the store, got into a black Cadillac waiting outside, and drove away. Derenberger later reported receiving strange phone calls where the only thing he could hear on the other end of the line was electronic beeping sounds. Although he moved several times over the next few years, the calls continued at every address. No one knew it at the time, but Derenberger's unsettling experiences were just a preview of the chaos that was about to descend on this quiet corner of West Virginia. Twelve days after Darren Berger's roadside chat with Indrid Cold, on The night of November 14, 1966, farmer Newell Partridge had a horrifying encounter on his property. It was just after 10:30pm and Partridge was watching TV in his farmhouse outside of Salem, West Virginia. Suddenly, the picture on his TV blacked out and the speakers began to make a loud, piercing whining sound. And at the same time, Partridge's dog, a German shepherd named Bandit, started barking and howling from outside. Partridge grabbed a flashlight and shotgun and stepped onto his porch. He watched as Bandit charged towards the barn, which stood about 150 yards away from the house. Partridge shone his flashlight at the dark barn and found two bright red eyes staring back at him. Even though the barn was more than a football field's length away, the eyes seemed massive. Partridge was an avid hunter who often went out at night, and he'd never seen eyes as massive as these. Bandit was still barking as he approached the glowing eyes, but as soon as he reached them, the barking suddenly stopped. Then there was only heavy, eerie silence. Partridge loved his dog and wanted to go after him. But as he explained in later interviews, the second he saw the eyes, he was filled with an all encompassing, almost hypnotic terror. He found himself unable to leave the porch. Instead, Partridge went back inside, locked his doors and slept with a loaded gun by the bed. The next morning, Partridge went out to the barn to look for Bandit. He followed the dog's paw prints into the barn where. Which led to the exact spot where he'd seen the red eyes. There, the paw prints formed a circle as though Bandit had started chasing his tail. Then the tracks disappeared. Partridge searched the rest of his property, but he didn't find any other human or animal tracks. He also didn't find a body. Newell Partridge never saw Bandit again. Partridge reported his dog missing on the morning of November 15th. That night in Point Pleasant, 18 year old Roger Scarberry, his wife Linda, and their friends Steve and Mary Mallet were looking for some excitement. Point Pleasant, population 6,000, didn't have many good options. The town was home to many chemical factories, small businesses and more than 20 churches. But there wasn't much to do after the sun went down. So the teens took their cars for a joyride around an abandoned munitions factory in the woods outside town, which locals called the TNT area Turkish. At 11:30pm the teens rounded a corner and came face to face with a tall, winged creature with big, piercing red eyes, just like the ones Partridge saw in his barn the night before. Terrified, the Scarberries and the Mallets turned their car around and sped back to town. The creature was right on their heels. Even though they were speeding down the country roads at 100 miles per hour, the monster had no trouble keeping up with them. Mary Mallet later reported that as it chased them, the creature made a squeaking sound like, quote, a big mouse. As they approached the city limits, Roger spotted something lying on the side of the road. The body of a large dead dog. He didn't give it much thought since he was busy trying to escape the monstrous creature following him. And thankfully, the creature seemed to give up. Once the teens crossed back into Point Pleasant, the two couples immediately rushed to the police station to report what they'd seen. Roger volunteered to lead officers back to the TNT area. But on the way there, Roger realized that the dead dog he'd seen at the side of the road wasn't there anymore. And when he arrived at the TNT area with the police, there were no signs of the strange creature either. Despite the lack of evidence, the police knew something was definitely going on. The officers had known these teens for most of their lives, and they weren't the type to make something like this up. They'd also heard about Newell Partridge's encounter and his missing dog. Clearly, something was out in the woods. But what was didn't take long for newspapers in Salem and Point Pleasant to connect the dots and begin reporting about the monstrous red eyed flying creature that had been sighted in bed. Both towns, inspired by the popular Batman TV series that had recently aired, reporters started calling the creature the Mothman for its large wings. Fear gripped communities all over the state as locals worried that the Mothman might visit their town next. But the Mothman must have liked something about Point Pleasant because it stayed there for the next 13 months and the town has never been the same since. If you've spent years trying every diet out there, only to end up feeling totally stuck, listen up. This summer can actually be different. You deserve to feel amazing in your own skin and Weight Loss by Hers is here to help you finally shake things up. 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[Vanessa Richardson]

In November of 1966, something strange was happening in West Virginia. A traveling salesman reported being stopped by a humanoid alien driving a ufo. A farmer was terrified by a beast with glowing red eyes, which later killed his dog. And one day after that farm four teens visiting an abandoned munitions plant called the TNT Area were chased down a country road by the same creature. Reporters started calling the winged monster the Mothman, but they didn't realize that the Mothman had decided to make Point Pleasant its new home, and its haunting spree was about to ramp up. Less than 24 hours after the young couple's encounter with the Mothman at the TNT area, the creature struck again at around 9pm on November 16. Marcella Bennett, her infant daughter Tina, and her friend Raymond Wamsley were finishing up dinner with their friends, the Thomas family. The Thomases lived in a bungalow outside of Point Pleasant, not far from the TNT area, and they were about to have an encounter with their newest neighbor. As Marcella, her baby, and Raymond left the Thomases house and walked towards their car, something stirred in the darkness. Suddenly, the Mothman rose up from behind their parked car. The creature towered over them, its glowing red eyes burning in the night. The witnesses later reported that the Mothman seemed to have no head. The red eyes were just situated at the top of its body, near its shoulders. Like others who'd encountered the Mothman, Marcela was paralyzed by fear at the sight of its eyes. She was so hypnotized by them that she dropped her baby on the ground and was unable to move. Even as Raymond and The Thomases called for her to come back to the house. Finally, Raymond grabbed Marcela's daughter off the ground, took Marcela by the arm and dragged her back into the Thomas bungalow. They locked the door, called the police and huddled inside as they waited for help to arrive. But the Mothman wasn't done. The group reported that while they waited for police, they heard footsteps on the porch and saw the creature appear outside one of the windows, peering in at them with its blazing red eyes. By the time police arrived, everyone in the Thomas's house was hysterical and the Mothman had vanished. But it wasn't gone long, and soon it seemed like everybody in town had an encounter to report. In the early morning hours of November 17, a music teacher who lived across the Ohio river from the TNT area woke up to the sound of her dog barking. When she looked out her kitchen window, she spotted a glowing circular object outside, hovering over the TNT area. It was massive, roughly the size of a house and brightly lit, divided up into different sections of red and green lights. As she watched, the UFO began to zigzag through the sky gradually, then disappeared. That same afternoon, a 17 year old boy was driving near the TNT area when a giant bird like creature dove at his car and chased him down the road for several miles. The next day, November 18, two firemen from Point Pleasant were in the TNT area when they saw a giant bird with red eyes. The fireman later told interviewers, quote, it was definitely a bird, but stated they'd never seen anything like it before. Two days after that, five teenagers driving near a rock quarry outside town spotted the Mothman standing by the side of the road. As soon as their headlights hit the towering figure, it turned and scurried into the trees. Five days later, on the night of November 25, the mothman chased a shoe salesman for several miles down Route 62. The creature only left him alone once he made it to Point Pleasant and drove to the local police station. All these sightings happened after dark, but the Mothman's next appearance would be in broad daylight. On the morning of November 27, 1966, 18 year old Connie Carpenter was driving home from church when she spotted the Mothman and standing in the middle of an empty golf course, she was so transfixed by the creature's red eyes that she could barely keep her car on the road. As she watched, the Mothman extended its wings and rose off the ground, then swooped towards her car, its eyes locked in on her face. When the Mothman passed over Connie, the hypnosis seemed to Break, and Connie slammed the accelerator and drove away to safety. But she didn't get out of the encounter totally unscathed. Shortly after her run in with the Mothman, Connie's eyes became severely irritated and inflamed. Eventually, they swelled up so much that she lost her vision for nearly two weeks. She and others suspected this was some kind of side effect of the Mothman's hypnotic stare, and they were getting really worried. By December, there had been so many reported Mothman encounters that the entire town of Point Pleasant was in a state of panic, and all the chaos was starting to draw outside attention. Throughout November, a local reporter named Mary H. Had been following the Mothman story. She wrote the first article about the Mothman's attack on the scarberries and the mallets, which she later submitted to the Associated Press wire service. This made the article available for newspapers all over place the the country to print, and many did. The story of a small town being haunted by a red eyed flying monster was too good to pass up. Sure enough, By December of 1966, the Mothman had become a national story, and Point Pleasant had become a destination for curious tourists looking for their own close encounter. Every night, hundreds of people arrived in the town, some driving from several states away. After sundown, long lines of cars slowly drove through the TNT area, searching for any sign of the Mothman. Other visitors staked out Woody Derenberger's house, the appliance salesman who had the conversation with an alien named Indrid Cold at the beginning of November. Many of these visitors say they were hoping to spot a UFO or have a conversation with Cold themselves. But most of these visitors never saw what they were hoping for. Still, that didn't mean the strange activities had stopped, because by then, they had just moved into the skies. UFO activity picked up around Point Pleasant during the early months of 1967. In January, a driver on a nearby highway spotted a strange metal sphere hovering above the road. In March, a bright glowing UFO briefly hovered over the city before zooming off and crashing into a nearby hill. The crash site was near the radio transmitter for the local police department. When police and firefighters arrived at the scene, they found the entire hillside engulfed in flames. And when they put out the fire, they didn't find any wreckage. But the transmitter was broken for days, limiting their ability to communicate and respond to emergency calls. That same month, on the night of March 5, a Red Cross blood mobile was driving along the highway outside Point Pleasant on its way back to Charleston after a blood drive. The van was loaded with human blood, which may have made it attractive to whatever strange forces were targeting the area. As the blood mobile made its way down a deserted stretch of road, there was a bridge bright flash of light from the woods. Then a glowing white object swooped over the tree line and began to follow the van. Looking out the window, the nurse in the passenger seat saw that the UFO was hovering over them and lowering a pair of pincers to try and grab the vehicle. But before the UFO could complete its mission, Several cars came around the corner, driving the opposite way. Frightened off by the headlights, the UFO 2 took off and disappeared into the sky. The papers were full of stories like this throughout the first half of 1967, many of them written by local reporter Mary H. But before long, her coverage started to draw some unwanted attention. In the midst of her UFO reporting, Mary hire was working late one night at the newspaper's offices when a very small man man walked into her office. He was about 4ft 6 inches tall with a bowl cut hairdo, and even though it was 20 degrees outside, he was only wearing a short sleeved shirt, a pair of blue pants, and some oddly thick sold shoes. The man asked her for directions to Welsh, West Virginia, A town on the other end of the state. He explained that he was hitchhiking since his car had broken down outside Detroit. Mary wanted to help him, but she knew that was a pretty long trip. Detroit was over 300 miles away and the more she observed the man, the more suspicious he seemed. He spoke in a low, halting monotone voice, and as he talked, he stared straight at Mary almost hypnotically. As he continued his story, he kept inching closer and closer to Mary. It was super weird and considered concerning. So Mary jumped up and went to get one of her co workers who was working in a back room. As Mary and her colleague tried to give the strange man directions, he got distracted by a ballpoint pen on Mary's desk. The visitor picked up the pen and studied it with amazement like he'd never seen anything like it before. When Mary told him he could keep the pen if he wanted it, the man let out a strange cackle and ran out of the building into the night. Mary didn't see the man again until May 5, four months after their first encounter. That day she was working on an assignment in downtown Point Pleasant when she spotted the strange little man walking down the street. He was wearing a khaki colored uniform this time, but still had the same thick sold shoes. The man didn't notice her at first, but when Mary started following him, he spotted her and flew. Freaked out, the man took off running down the street, then dove into the back of a waiting black car, which Mary said was being driven by a very large man. As soon as the little man was inside the car, the driver hit the gas. The vehicle disappeared into traffic before Mary could get the license plate number. But Mary's bizarre encounters weren't over yet. Three days later, on the night of May 8, Mary was walking up to her front door after a long day of work when another black car came to a screeching halt on the street beside her. Before she could react, a man in black jumped out of the car, lifted a camera and snapped a picture of her. The flashbulb on the camera was incredibly bright. So bright that she was momentarily blinded. By the time she could see again, the man had driven away. But Mary Hyer wasn't alone. The two couples who first encountered the Mothman at the TNT area had multiple strange experiences in the months afterwards. Steve and Mary Mallett also had a visit from a pair of mysterious photographers. A man and a woman who knocked on their door wanting to take their picture. The mallet said no and watched the would be photographers get into a black Volkswagen and drive away. Steve wrote down the license plate number on the car, but when he had the police check it, they found that no car with that number existed. The other couple from the TNT area, Roger and Linda Scarberry, were tormented by strange beeping and screeching sounds around their home at night. And a photographer came looking for them too. In September of 1967, a tall, seemingly sunburned man dressed in all black showed up at their house asking to take pictures of the couple. After Linda sent him away, she woke up the following morning with one of her eyes mysteriously swollen shut. This mirrored what happened to Connie Carpenter after her Sunday morning encounter with the Mothman in November of 1966. And Connie also had more strange experiences in store. Not only did she hear beeping noises at night, but but a few months after seeing the Mothman, she was leaving her house when a man in a large black car pulled up on her street. He was young and looked sunburnt and he wasn't wearing a jacket even though it was a cold day. The man asked her for directions, but when she approached the car, he grabbed her and tried to pull her inside. Connie managed to break away and run back to her house. The police were never able to find find her would be kidnapper. And days later she found a note on her doorstep reading be careful girl, I can get you yet. But Connie wasn't the only Mothman survivor to experience an attempted kidnapping. Marcella Bennett, who saw the Mothman while carrying her baby to her car, later reported being followed by a strange man in a red wig while driving on an empty road at night. The man started chasing her in his car and nearly nearly forced her off the road before she managed to escape. This pattern of Mothman adjacent encounters, UFO sightings and unusual targeted harassment continued into the summer of 1967. But then, as summer turned to fall, the strangeness finally seemed to die down. People stopped calling in UFO reports. The Mothman quit chasing cars along country roads, the hordes of cryptid hunters lost interest and quit visiting the city. As 1967 drew to a close, it seemed like the madness was finally at an end. But the people of Point Pleasant weren't in the clear just yet. In fact, they were on the verge of one of the greatest tragedies in the small town's history. 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Starting in November 1966, the town of Point Pleasant, West Virginia was under siege by paranormal visitors. UFOs lit up the evening sky every few nights. Hundreds of residents reported seeing a red eyed winged figure known as the Mothman. And witnesses were later harassed by strange visitors with cameras. But in the fall of 1967, the strange sightings and extraterrestrial encounters finally began to slow down. By late October, almost exactly one year after the events first began, life in Point Pleasant had finally returned to normal. Reporter Mary Heyer, who'd been covering the phenomenon for the local paper, told a friend that the Mothman seemed to be lying low. But she'd spoken too soon. The Mothman wasn't done with Point Pleasant just yet. On November 2, 1967, exactly one year after Woody Derenberger's encounter with the alien named Indrid Cold, a woman named Virginia Thompson Thomas was in her house near the TNT area when she heard a piercing squeal from outside. When she stepped onto her porch to investigate, she saw what was now a familiar sight to many residents. The Mothman was half running, half gliding through a clearing near her home, moving at incredible speeds. As Mothman sightings go, this one was pretty tame. The Mothman didn't chase Virginia and her her eyes didn't swell shut like some of the other witnesses. Instead, she suffered from a different set of disturbing after effects. For weeks after her sighting, Virginia was plagued by horrible nightmares. Whenever she went to sleep, she saw disturbing visions of dead bodies floating in the Ohio river, which ran directly through Point Pleasant. She couldn't figure out what the dreams meant, but it turned out she was in the only one having them. Around the same time, Mary H. Also began having nightmares about the Ohio River. In her dreams, she also saw visions of people thrashing around in the river, slowly drowning. But she also saw Christmas presents bobbing in the dark water among the dead and dying people. Throughout the month of November, Mary felt a constant sense of dread. And she wasn't alone. Everybody she talked to in Point Pleasant described a lingering feeling that something horrible was about to happen. A paranormal investigator named John Keel had the same premonition. Keel had visited Point Pleasant multiple times over the past year, occasionally partnering with Mary hire to investigate UFO sightings and mothman encounters. In November 1967, Keel returned to his home in New York City. But he later wrote to Mary that he'd started receiving telepathic messages from Indrid Cold, the alien who'd stopped Woody Darenberger for a roadside chat last November. According to Keel, Cold had warned him that a terrible disaster would occur in Point Pleasant on December 15. In his letter to Mary, Keel speculated that a factory or military facility along the Ohio river might catch fire or explore, explode. He was wrong about the disaster, but right about the date. December 15, 1967 was a busy day in Point Pleasant. It was a Friday, and as 5pm approached, residents left their downtown office buildings and flooded the local department stores for some last minute Christmas shopping. To make things even more chaotic, the streets were choked with traffic. The Silver Bridge was the center of the gridlock. This 2,235 foot long suspension bridge connected Point Pleasant to Gallipolis, Ohio, on the opposite side of the Ohio River. It was one of the most heavily trafficked routes in town. But that day, a broken traffic light on the Ohio side of the river had led to a massive traffic jam. Now dozens of cars and tractor trailers were inching along the bridge as maintenance workers tried to fix the light and clear the jam. Then at 5:04pm the boredom and frustration on the bridge turned into terror. The first thing bystanders heard was a deep rumbling roar, like the sound of a jet plane taking off. Then the Silver Bridge started to tremble. The roadway began to twist. And then a 740 foot span of the bridge violently broke off from the Ohio side of the riverbank. Suddenly unsupported, the bridge began collapsing. At the other end, suspension cables snapped and severed. Power lines shot showers of sparks. More than 50 cars and trucks spilled off the bridge and into the icy waters of the Ohio river below. Survivors of the bridge collapse talked about how quiet, quickly it happened. One minute they were sitting in traffic and the next they were fighting for their lives as freezing water rushed into their cars. Some victims were crushed under falling debris. From the collapsing bridge. Many others were trapped in their cars and drowned as they sank to the bottom of the river. 46 people died in the Silver Bridge collapse. Later, investigators would determine that the 39 year old bridge was structurally unsound. The bridge had been built in the 1920s, when cars were lighter and there was much less traffic in the area. And after nearly 40 years of wear and tear, the weight of the traffic jam that day was too much for it to bear. Rescue workers spent days pulling bodies out of the river. Because many of the drivers were returning from Christmas shopping trips. Rescuers found hundreds of brightly wrapped Christmas gifts Floating alongside the victims. Mary H's dark nightmares had come true. Just 15 minutes after the bridge collapsed, Point Pleasant resident Jackie Lilly and her two sons were watching coverage of the disaster on tv. As they tried to process the tragedy, one of her sons spotted lights in the sky outside. The family ran onto their porch and stared into the dark skies above. They spotted 12 glowing UFOs rising up from the woods above the TNT area, Then flying towards the town. The Lily family spent the next hour watching the lights as they zigzagged back and forth between the TNT area and downtown Point Pleasant, until finally the lights lifted up into the sky and disappeared. And with that, the paranormal activity that had plagued Point Pleasant for the past 13 months came to an end. From then on, Point Pleasant went back to being an ordinary small town. One that now had to deal with the aftermath of a horrible tragedy. To this day, nobody can explain the strange events that happened in point Pleasant between 1966 and 1960. Many people believe the Mothman and the UFOs all came from the same distant planet, Possibly Lanulos, Where Indrid Cold said he lived. And some theories suggest that there wasn't just a single Mothman. These folks think the UFOs were piloted by many of these winged, red eyed creatures. And the Mothman sightings were reported whenever these pilots were seen outside their spacecraft. But that explanation still leaves a lot of questions. Who were the strange sunburnt people who showed up to harass witnesses who'd reported UFO and Mothman sightings? Because of the strange way they spoke and acted, Many suspect that they were aliens in disguise. But if the aliens were trying to intimidate witnesses into staying silent, why did Indrid Cold encourage Woody Derenberger to report his encounter to the police? Were there multiple factions among the alien visitors with different motives? And that leads to an even bigger question than who these visitors were. What were they doing in Point Pleasant? Why did these creatures from Another world decide to concentrate on one small West Virginia town for over a year. There's no easy answer to this question either. Some say the lights in the sky and the monstrous encounters in the woods were were a distraction meant to draw attention away from abductions and human experimentation in other areas. Another theory is that the entire incident was a long running government hoax. A CIA operation to test run psychological warfare tactics on an unsuspecting town. While some believe that the UFOs sabotaged the silver Bridge as an act of war, a more popular theory suggests that that the opposite is true. Many people in and out of West Virginia believe that the Mothman was trying to warn people about the coming disaster. It used its powers to send residents dreams about bodies and gifts in the water in an attempt to tell them something bad was about to happen. After locals didn't heed its warnings, the Mothman and its alien friends admitted defeat and left the town. So what do you believe? Was the Mothman a monster from outer space? Or a would be guardian angel trying to protect the town? Or was it something else entirely? Everybody's got a theory and I want to hear yours. Even though there hasn't been a confirmed Mothman sighting since 19 1967, it's left a lasting mark on this small rural community. And thanks to the major publicity surrounding the events, the Mothman has gained a worldwide following. Paranormal investigator John Keel's book the Mothman Prophecies was a minor success, which was later Adapted into a 2002 movie starring Richard Gere. The Mothman has been the subject of countless documentaries and low budget horror horror films. It's even appeared in popular video games like Fortnite and Fallout 76. But Point Pleasant has been the biggest beneficiary of the Mothman's fame. Since 2002, the city has hosted an annual Mothman festival which draws an estimated 15,000 visitors for tours, talks, exhibits and even a pancake eating contest. The town is also home to the Mothman Museum and Research center, where experts try to solve the many mysteries of the Mothman's visit to point pleasant. In 2003, a local sculptor created a 12 foot tall statue of the Mothman and donated it to the city of Point Pleasant. The statue of a silver humanoid red eyed figure with massive wings now stands in a park at the center of the town, not far from the site of the original Silver Bridge. We still don't know where why the Mothman came to Point Pleasant all those years ago, but in a lot of ways, it's never left. Thanks for listening to this episode of Crime House 24. 7. Be sure to check out our second episode on the Somerton Man Dropping later today and to enhance your listening experience, join Crime House plus and get every episode of Grand Crime House 24.7 completely ad free along with early ad free access to all Crime House shows plus monthly bonus episodes. To join go to crimehouseplus.com or if you listen on Apple Podcasts tap try free at the top of the crime house 24. Seven page. Hi listeners, it's Vanessa. Before today's episode I want to tell you about another show I think you'll love. Crime House and A E are teaming up on the podcast podcast version of the famous true crime series the First 48. Each week, Carter Roy takes you inside a landmark homicide case, the interrogations, the dead ends, and the breakthroughs in the critical first 48 hours. Listen to and follow the first 48 every Thursday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music or wherever you listen to podcasts.