FINDING BIGFOOT: Ripped from the Headlines

Animal Planet - Original Air Date: 11/11/12

The team heads to Pocatello, Idaho, to check out a video shot by teenagers last winter (2011) that seems to show a bigfoot-like-creature atop a snowy, forested ridge.  The footage has been nicely stabilized by local news, but the footprint they show looks like a fake to me (and Cliff) -- too regular in its features.  Ranae thinks the whole thing is too good to be true, noting that teens are "the perfect candidates to pull off a prank or hoax."  And it only takes her 15 minutes to hike up to the place the teens said it took them an hour to get to.  She suggests the video shows another hiker in heavy winter gear, though Matt believes it's a bigfoot.  They then do a night hunt, and after that a town-hall meeting and witness interviews.

Ranae is this week's solo camper, and she does that while the rest talk to witnesses.  As usual, the stories are compelling (I had a friend tell me of her encounter 2 weeks ago), but where's the physical proof?  They then go to the lab of Dr. Jeff Meldrum (famous bigfoot researcher) and show him the video.  He compares it favorably to the Patterson Gimlin film (which you probably know I believe to be a hoax - see Is it Real review).  When the group reunites, Ranae shows them pictures of footprints she found in the dust, which don't seem to have been from a bear.  But is it bigfoot?  They decide to throw a Rave in the woods to see if the sights and sounds will attract the animal.  They get a thermal hit in a tree down the valley, which the guys think was a small bigfoot, but Ranae (sensibly) thinks was a racoon or small bear.  Again, nothing concrete, and I wish they could spend more time in one area concentrating on a search, rather than flitting around from week to week.