We aren’t talking curse yet, but there have been four Mokele-related deaths, not three as earlier noted, for 2005.

The Mokele-mbembe-involved individuals, who have died in 2005, are:

Pastor Phil Anderton, 48, who was a missionary for 15 years in the Cameroons among the Baku pygmies, died in Kansas City, of a brain tumor, on August 24, 2005. Anderton assisted several of the Bill Gibbons-John Kirk-Scott Norman expeditions in the Cameroons. Anderton tribute.

J. Richard Greenwell, 63, cofounder of the defunct International Society of Cryptozoology (ISC), died November 1, 2005, of cancer, in Tucson, Arizona. Greenwell accompanied Roy Mackal on his second Mokele-mbembe expedition to Lake Tele in the Congo.Greenwell tribute. More on Greenwell.

Dr. Herman Regusters , 72, an aerospace engineer who worked on many NASA and JPL projects, died December 19, 2005, at Huntington Beach, California. Regusters conducted two expeditions to Lake Tele, in 1981 and 1992. Regusters tribute.

Pastor Eugene P. Thomas, 78, a missionary for several years among the Congo pygmies, died on December 21, 2005, in Canton, Ohio. It was Reverend Eugene Thomas who first told James Powell and Dr. Roy Mackal that pygmies in 1959 said they had killed a Mokele-mbembe. Thomas tribute.

Rev. Eugene Thomas and Sandy Thomas in 1986. Photograph courtesy of William Gibbons.

I am happy to report that despite a heart attack a couple years ago, Roy Mackal is strong and healthy, as are John Kirk, Scott Norman, Bill Gibbons, and several individuals now on expedition in the Cameroons.

Mokele-mbembe art courtesy of Bill Rebsamen. Click on image for a larger view.

Thanks to Bill Gibbons and John Kirk for reminding me that Richard Greenwell should be counted as "number four," as he had been on a Mokele-mbembe expedition.