YEAR: 2024

SEASON: Fall

MONTH: November

DATE: 5

STATE: New Jersey

COUNTY: Ocean County

LOCATION DETAILS: [Investigator (MM) Notes:

GPS Coordinates for location of incident:

39.867336, -74.3198239 ]

NEAREST TOWN: Lacy township

NEAREST ROAD: Lacy road

OBSERVED: I was in lacy township behind Clayton sand pit. Hiking with my dog. We walked up an area of slight elevation on a small trail that was not traveled frequently by others. My dog ran up to something in the brush about 40 yards ahead of me. I figured it was a deer but I wanted to see it anyway. When I ran up to it it was running away from me into the deep brush. All I saw was a dark shadow in the brush, and for a split second saw the back of a dark head of an animal. It was gone so fast. I stayed for a few minutes and listened but there was oddly no sound or footsteps. About 3 min later I heard some footsteps going down the hill away from me.


Today I revisited the area and on my walk there I heard 2 animals in the brush about 35 yards in. I heard low breathing. When I got near it the footsteps and breathing stopped. Then when a gust of wind would blow there would be a few footsteps. Then nothing. I waited for over 5 minutes and nothing but silence so I left. The brush was too thick to see into any further.

OTHER WITNESSES: 1

OTHER STORIES: Class A aggressive sighting a few miles away in wells mills Nj. Just learned today after the encounter.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: 12pm

ENVIRONMENT: Pine forest. Area was slightly elevated compared to surrounding area (50 feet elevation approx). Tight trails. Extremely thick brush.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Jacob Korbel:

I contacted the witness over the phone, and spoke with him for about 30 minutes . This witness was different , as he didnt initially make a report , but instead recited it to a podcast host, which in turn the podcast host reached out to me with the witness' contact information, as they knew I was a researcher in the area. He relayed his story to me and I encouraged him to submit a sighting report to the BFRO.


The witness described the subject as jet black, saw a head with no neck or ears, and back moving up a hill that was covered in thick undergrowth from about 35-40 yards away. It then stopped moving for a few minutes and then continued to move away down hill from the witness.

I invited fellow researcher Eric Spinner to assist me with the follow up investigation. We met the witness at the entrance of a dirt road and followed him in almost all the way to the location. A large puddle blocked access for my vehicle to go any further, but his vehicle was more than up to the task to go through. So we hopped in and headed all the way to the sighting location.

Upon arrival we were greeted with gun fire from someone target shooting nearby, but we headed up the trail anyway. This section of the pine barrens was very hilly, unlike it's usual flat landscape. So it offered much more topographical formations like hills, ridges and bowls that could be quite appealing to a large mammal.

We arrived at where the witness saw the creature move off the trail from right to left, and very quickly found a game trail that was in the vicinity of where the subject was spotted. Eric suggested for me to recreate what the witness saw so, we could get a solid size comparison. Initially, the subject wouldn't have been visible from where the witness first spotted it. But as he ran up to see what was moving into the brush, he caught glimpse of a dark figure that was moving uphill. Pushing aside brush in a swimming motion, hunched over or on all fours, the back of a conical shaped head with no neck or ears, wide back and large glutes were visible.

He said that the figure was smaller than me , it's head coming to my upper back for my 6'2" frame. After thoroughly searching the area for impressions or tracks, we came up empty and decided to take photos of the sighting location and the general area. We said our goodbyes and headed back to the main road and left the area.

I believe the report as credible, in a 10 mile radius of this location there's dozens of reported and unreported activity, so the chances of having some sort of encounter are higher here than other areas perhaps. While they are not 100% sure they saw a bigfoot, the description of the figure rules out alot of other native animals.

About BFRO Investigator Jacob Korbel:

I’m a lifelong resident of southern NJ and If I’m
Not working, I’m exploring the vast 1.1 million acres of Pine Barrens that I live near.
I was pretty skeptical on the subject, until I had my own encounter in 2018 while doing field work in the pines. To fulfill my curiosity on the subject i went to my first expedition in 2021, where i had another class B sighting and various vocalizations that could only be attributed to sasquatch. Ever since then i do field work as much as i can out in the pine barrens and northern NJ, i remain as skeptical as possible with everything and will eliminate every possibility before calling anything bigfoot related.
I have attended some of the following expeditions
South Jersey Fall 2021
North Jersey Spring 2022
North Jersey Fall 2022
North Jersey Spring 2023
North Jersey Fall 2023
North Jersey Spring 2024