There have been reported sightings my whole life ever since I can remember, and I was born here in Australia in the 1980s.<p>While I don't think it's impossible, I'm not sure what's new here except the fact that almost everyone now carries a camera yet we're still to get clear images ;)
I remember driving through the mountains of Tasmania about 20 years ago - some backwater road towards Zeehan if memory serves me correctly. I recall looking in my rear view mirror during one stretch and seeing a yellow/tan coloured dog like creature crossing the road a few hundred metres behind the car.<p>I couldn't see any stripes clearly in the 2 seconds in was in the mirror. I dismissed it as a dog because (a) it was daylight and Thylacine's are purported to be nocturnal (b) it was near reasonably trafficked road and they are known to be shy and (c) I don't think the population of the Tassie Tiger was very strong in the North Western part of the island where I was.<p>But what if?? <thinking face emoji>
"One report last February said that two people, visiting Tasmania from Australia,"<p>...from "mainland" Australia perhaps.<p>"newly released Australian government documents"<p>...aren't from the federal government, but from the Tasmanian state government.<p>These "detailed" sightings are almost universally worthless.
> One report last February said that two people, visiting Tasmania from Australia,<p>Haha, Tasmania is a state of Australia and they are a little sensitive about slips of the tongue implying Australia is a separate place to them.
People also report sightings of bigfoot, aliens, ghosts. I'd love for them to not be extinct but reported sightings aren't even close to enough to go off of.
I'm surprised that they don't try to set up few dozens photo-traps in the area, in Europe it works quite well for proving re-emergence of wolves in areas where they were not seen for hundred years.
There have long been reported sightings of the Tasmanian tiger, and they're mostly not very credible.<p>The New Yorker had an outstanding article about the small group of people who think it might have survived: <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/07/02/the-obsessive-search-for-the-tasmanian-tiger" rel="nofollow">https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/07/02/the-obsessive-...</a><p>They're sort of like big foot hunters, except the animal they're looking for used to exist.
People have been reporting sightings for decades - almost since the last known one died.<p>Similar for Moas in NZ.<p>Or Bigfoot, Loch Ness monster.<p>Hearsay of sightings should not be news. Quality video evidence is the only thing that should get to a news site.
Not interesting until the frequency of 'spotting dog looking like a Tasmanian tiger' is estimated, and compared with the frequency of current 'tiger' sightings. Otherwise, what's being talked about?
This is very exciting news. The Coelacanth was also extinct - for several hundred million years - until it wasn't.<p>Maybe Tasmanian tiger this year and Mokele-mbembe next year? Not impossible. Though unlikely.