Days after the Indian Army claimed to have discovered the footprints of the mythical Yeti, Nepal officials have reportedly refuted it saying the imprints belong to a ‘wild bear’.
“A team of Indian Army had noticed the footprints and our liaison team was together with them... We tried to ascertain the fact, but locals and porters claimed that it is the footprints of wild bear that frequently appear in that area,” a Hindustan Times report quoted Nepal Army spokesperson, Brigadier General Bigyan Dev Pandey, as saying.
The report says that the ‘local porters who accompanied the Indian Army’ have also denied the claim, saying that such footprints ‘frequently appear’ in the area.
Apart from the Hindustan Times report, an article by The New York Times also corroborates the ‘bear footprint’ viewpoint.
The article quotes Daniel C Taylor, author of the book Yeti: The Ecology of a Mystery, as saying that the footprints “were created by a bear and its cub”.
“The front foot of the mama bear goes down and the back foot goes down so you have an overprint,” Taylor said, adding that the footprint becomes 32 inches long “when a baby cub hops behind the mother”.
“In every case you will find that all yeti footprints were made by the Himalayan black bear, Ursus thibetanus,” he also said.
(With inputs from Hindustan Times and The New York Times)
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