First off, I would like to keep my name confidential; just for the fact that this happened on an Air Force base and I don't know who reads this stuff. This happened sometime in September of 99. I forget the exact date. It was early in the month though. It was between 2 and 3 a.m.

 

I was a Security Forces Airman, working 3rd shift, on base patrol. Now mind you, this is an Air National Guard base that I worked at, full-time. It's on the North side of Duluth MN, next to the International Airport. North to northeast is nothing but large wooded areas. Forest areas. 3rd shift on the base was pretty boring (10 p.m. to 6 a.m.) and us full-timers worked a skeleton crew (usually only 5 - 6 of us, on 3rd shift). I was in the patrol truck, doing my usual rounds; checking doors and fence lines. Late at night, on the north side of the base was usually creepy enough when patrolling by yourself. Anyways; I was on this road, driving towards our baseball field, when my headlights caught a pair of eyes reflecting back at me. They were almost eye level with me, and I was sitting in an F-150. Around this time, a few of the guys had been seeing this huge buck around the property (like a 16 pointer or something around that size). I was about 80 yards or so, when I saw these eyes reflecting back at me. So, I'm thinking it was a big deer. "I gotta see this thing." So, I hit the gas and started speeding towards the field. This is where it all happened so fast. It's almost hard to explain. There was a little slope, behind the baseball field. It sloped down, probably about 12 - 15 feet, into a brush line. The brush went about 30 feet, then turned into a thick tree line. The brush was probably armpit high to me and pretty tough to traverse through; being so thick. As I turned into the baseball field and turned the truck towards the thing, I just caught the rear end of the thing leaping down the slope, below the line of sight of my headlights. The thing was no more than about 20 feet ahead of me when it leaped. All I got a look at was the back end of the thing, and it was big! The best I can do to describe it is to say that it was wolf/dog like in nature. It had a long tail (longer than 2 feet). The hind legs looked exactly like that of a dog's; same with the back paws, but the paws were huge. They were bigger than my hands, for sure. The hair/fur was wavy, yet matted and thick. The color was blondish or very light brown. I didn't notice any gray in it, but this all happened within about 2 - 3 seconds. I sat in my patrol truck for a couple of seconds, confused and thinking, "I know what I saw, but it couldn't have been what I saw." So, I hopped out, with my flashlight, and M-16 rifle, and walked to the edge of the slope. All I heard was the thing running through the woods in front of me, heading in a northwest direction. And this thing sounded like a moose charging through the trees! It made a lot of noise! That's when I started to get really scared; thinking, "If this is some sort of wolf or whatever it could be, my M-16 isn't going to do a thing to this animal." So, I jumped back into my patrol truck as fast as I could and headed back to the S.F. headquarters.

 

I never told any of the other members about this, for fear of ridicule or being called crazy. There is no way I misidentified this thing! I'm a trained observer, an avid hunter and have worked with animal rehabilitation, with the MN DNR, in the past. I know my animals and the North Woods extremely well. I saw exactly what I saw. And that was the back end of a large wolf/dog thing, that basically had its eyes level with mine, while I was in a patrol truck. The back end was definitely much larger than any of the largest deer or black bears I've seen. The points I remember the clearest were the tail and back paws, as well as the texture and color of the hair/fur. This is my story. I have never told it to anyone, in fear of ridicule. I swear it to be the truth!

 

Anonymous​

Date:  Early September, of 1999

Time:  2:30 AM