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Fortean Flinging

Tunn11

Justified & Ancient
Joined
Nov 23, 2005
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Under the highest tree top in Kent
I’m really not sure where to put this Mods please “fling” it where you think best!

I’m wondering about the labelling of some Fortean phenomena particularly with regard to things being flung around.

First, where they are flung. If it is in or around a building it is attributed to a poltergeist, but not always. For instance, stones flung at a semi-detached in Neasden will be attributed to a polt but stones flung at a hut in Washington state will probably be attributed to a bigfoot. Fish flung around a field will be a fish fall and lumps of ice through a house roof probably aircraft. But why should this be unless there is other evidence (Phantom monks, smelly, hairy bipeds or errant fishmongers)?

Why shouldn’t a polt throw a load of sticklebacks across a field in Sussex or lob a rock at some hikers in California?

Second, what’s being flung? Fish falls seem to be fairly small creatures and aquatic whereas polts seem to be able to move people and sometimes cattle into barns etc. Bigfoot can lob some pretty hefty rocks but remarkedly, as with polts, never seems to do anyone serious harm. The overall biomass associated with fish falls might be quite large but not the individual creatures and IIRC they arrive unharmed. Why no small mammals, or are they just not noticed? Why no giant squid dropped on Surbiton?

I suppose that what I’m asking is whether there is a distinct phenomenon “Fortean flinging” which sometimes gets lumped with other phenomena because of where it occurs or what is being flung about and could this give an insight into the cause?
 
To say something was flung implies it was cast / thrown / launched in such a way as to travel airborne and then impact or land at some horizontal distance from the point where it was thrown.

Phrased another way, if something is flung it is presumed to follow a ballistic trajectory impelled by the force by which it was thrown aloft.

This presumption of literal or figurative throwing doesn't apply to "falls" such as fish falls or ice falls.
 
Aren't some objects flung by polts described as having followed a strange trajectory, often landing softly without breaking? Perhaps not "flung" (sorry, I liked the alliteration :)) perhaps better described as guided?

With "falls" how did the fish/frogs etc. get up there? Surely the fall only refers to half of the phenonmenon with them falling from the apex of a trajectory or arriving from somewhere else?
 
Aren't some objects flung by polts described as having followed a strange trajectory, often landing softly without breaking? Perhaps not "flung" (sorry, I liked the alliteration :)) perhaps better described as guided?

Certainly! If one sees an object flying across a room it can just as easily be described as being (e.g.) carried, drawn, attracted, levitated, etc. rather than 'flung' (as in 'thrown').
 
With "falls" how did the fish/frogs etc. get up there? Surely the fall only refers to half of the phenonmenon with them falling from the apex of a trajectory or arriving from somewhere else?

The most common (and generally defensible) explanation for small animal falls is that the animals are sucked / drawn up by vortices (waterspouts; tornados) and kept aloft by the vortices or other winds until such time as the surrounding air's carrying capacity is exceeded and they simply fall down.

There are also documented cases of fish being caught up by firefighting tanker aircraft and dropped onto (e.g.) burning forest lands. This scenario doesn't involve any forceful ballistic projection of the fish from their original location.

These types of fish conveyance aren't the same as (e.g.) shooting the fish into the air with a catapult.
 
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