Something enormous, furry, and headless washed up on a beach, and nobody with a lab coat came to look.
This furry sea monster earned its nickname from the strange body part it had where its head should have been. What was it?
A trunk Beachgoers described an elephant-like trunk attached straight to the torso with no head in sight, so a British monster hunter later dubbed the creature Trunko.
The giant carcass lay on a South African beach for over a week. Which experts never bothered to show up and examine it?
Scientists Because no scientist ever studied the body while it was beached, no reliable description exists, which let the legend grow for decades.
Before it washed ashore, witnesses claimed they saw the creature at sea brawling with two of the ocean's toughest predators. Which ones?
Killer whales Onlookers said the battle raged for hours, with the creature swatting the whales with its tail and heaving itself high out of the water.
A farmer who watched the fight said the thing looked like a supersized version of which snowy land animal?
A polar bear Farmer Hugh Ballance's description of thick white fur inspired the London newspaper headline that first made the creature famous.
When old photos of the monster finally surfaced, a fossil expert said the fluffy white fur was really something much grosser. What was the creature?
A rotting whale Paleontologist Darren Naish explained that the fur was frayed, decaying whale tissue, making Trunko a classic globster rather than a new species.
