While prospecting for gold veins along the remote King Salmon River (north of Dillingham), Ivan and his younger brother set up a small spike camp on the riverbank. On their third night, their quiet evening was shattered by a scream from across the river that sounded like a woman being murdered. Grabbing their rifles, the brothers crossed the river in their 18-foot skiff to investigate. Finding nothing in the small stands of black spruce, they heard splashing back across the river—and turned to see a dark figure running into the brush exactly where they had just left their camp.
Realizing they had been lured away, the brothers rushed back across the river and frantically began breaking down their camp. As they packed, a massive scream erupted from the nearby black spruce. Almost immediately, an even louder, answering scream echoed back from the hills miles away on the opposite side of the river. Terrified, they threw everything into the skiff and began pushing off. Unable to start their outboard motor due to the thick river grass, they were forced to slowly push-pole their way downriver in the fading daylight.
As they struggled toward deeper water, Ivan’s brother stood on the bow and spotted two entities paralleling them along the left bank, and then another stalking them along the right bank. They were completely surrounded. Once they finally reached deep water, the outboard motor stubbornly refused to start. Just as the engine finally sputtered to life, massive rocks began crashing into the water just behind the boat. Speeding onto the main channel of the Nushagak River, they spotted one of the entities standing on the bank, squatting and rocking back and forth before unleashing a final, deafening scream that violently vibrated their clothes and the hull of the skiff.
