Sometimes, reality out-creeps even the most macabre fictions.
PLAYING FOOTSIE
On the shores of the Salish Sea around Vancouver, more than a dozen human feet—inside shoes, but otherwise unattached—have washed up since 2007. The series of gruesome discoveries, the most recent of which occurred in a Vancouver dog park in January 2012, has inspired amateur sleuthing and conspiracy theorizing, at least a couple of hoaxes, a Norwegian novel, and an episode of the U.S. television series Bones.
The first discovery occurred in August 2007 on the relatively remote Jedediah Island; particularly perplexing was the fact that the shoe, made by Adidas, was sold mostly in India. (Was the owner a victim of the 2004 tsunami?) Six more feet washed up over the next 15 months, including two matching pairs. (Were they bridge-jumping suicides? Victims of grisly murders?) As more feet came ashore, investigators struggled for explanations even as they identified some of the remains, including a local fisherman missing since 1987.
Their efforts weren’t aided by the inevitable hoaxes through the years: shoes that were planted on the shoreline with animal feet or raw meat inside.
JUST DO IT
That uncertainty has fed a rumor mill that became more active through the years, with more occasional discoveries—14 in all, as of mid-2013.
• Did the feet detach from the bodies because of the natural impact of water flows?
• Because sea creatures weren’t hungry for Nikes?
• Because the shoes’ buoyancy (most of them have been sneakers) kept the feet afloat as the bodies sank?
• Or was something more nefarious afoot (sorry)?
No single explanation, for either the deaths or the detachments, has yet proved definitive… so it’s likely we’ll more headlines like this one from 2008: “Fourth Foot Fuels Flotsam Frenzy.”
Garfish, common in the Eastern Atlantic, have green bones.