Human Foot Found On Jetty Island: Police

EVERETT, WA - People hanging out on Jetty Island outside Everett on Wednesday made a grisly discovery when they came across a water-logged boot with a human foot still inside. The dismembered foot was reportedly given to the Snohomish County Medical Examiner who will try to determine its original owner.

It's not actually uncommon for feet to wash ashore in the Pacific Northwest, apparently, though it's certainly not an everyday kind of thing. Typically, when feet are found, it's closer to Vancouver, British Columbia, rather than so far into the sound as Jetty Island.

The 14th human foot to wash ashore in Vancouver over the past decade was recorded this past May. At the time, authorities said they'd identified the owners of nine of the 14 feet that had been found.

The Jetty Island foot was located on the south end of the island just after 2 p.m. Jan. 2, Everett police said, noting the condition of the boot indicated the foot may have been in the water "for some time."

In December 2017, after the 13th foot was found near Sooke, Canada, various news media outlets shared explanations for how and why this keeps happening.

With more than 5 million residents in the Seattle and Vancouver areas alone, it's not too far fetched to think hundreds of dead bodies could be in the water at any given time, according to a report from NPR. Preserved by the cold water of the northern Pacific, the bodies reportedly don't decompose as quickly — though they do eventually break apart.

"And then, if a foot happens to be in a type of shoe that floats, it can end up getting carried ashore," NPR reporter Mark Memmott wrote. "That's a rather unexciting explanation for something that's gotten people speculating that there's a killer on the loose. But sometimes facts do get in the way of good stories."

So while it's definitely macabre, randomly finding disembodied feet along the beaches of western Canada and Washington isn't really unusual.

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