Publisher’s Note: Some of you may already know that I am intrigued by stories and sightings of the Loch Ness Monster. It is the reason that I started the website Monster Tracker. In 2005 on a trip to England I was lucky enough to take a train up to Inverness in Scotland and visited the town of Drumnadrochit where there is a local museum devoted to Nessie. I would recommend that you also visit Urquhart Castle where various sightings have taken place and take a sightseeing boat to tour the Loch. On my trip I didn’t see Nessie but apparently this article indicates that there still may be proof of the monster. Dirk
Sonar Image Shows ‘Serpent-Like Creature’ at Bottom of Loch Ness
It is one of the greatest mysteries of the deep, and its legend has outfoxed score of investigators over the generations.
Stories, pictures and rumors about a monster living below the surface of Scotland’s deepest loch go back for decades.
But it is now hoped this grainy image of a long ‘serpent-like creature’ may finally unlock the mystery of the Loch Ness Monster.
The sonar picture, that shows a large unidentified living object deep underwater, was recorded by Loch Ness boat skipper Marcus Atkinson.
The mysterious being was recorded at a depth of 75 ft in the murky water and measured nearly 5ft wide.
Mr Atkinson’s sonar fish-finder device records the width of objects in the depths directly below his tourist boat every quarter of a second.
Image produced when his vessel was in the Loch’s Urquhart Bay showed a long moving object that had followed the boat for more than two minutes.
The consistent marks on Mr Atkinson’s sonar create a horizontal mass, which is not an indicator of length.
But excited Loch Ness monster experts have ruled out the ‘sighting’ being any other fish, seal or wood debris and believe it is proof of an unknown creature in the Loch.
The picture taken on Mr Atkinson’s mobile phone of his sonar screen, has won him first prize in the Best Nessie Sighting of The Year Award run by bookmakers William Hill.
Mr Atkinson, 43, from Fort Augustus in the Scottish Highlands, said: ‘I was dropping customers at Urquhart Castle and then got my boat out of the way of the other tour companies.
‘I moved out into the water and looked at the sonar and saw this image had appeared.
‘The device takes a reading of the depth and what is below the boat every quarter of a second and gradually builds up a picture, so it covered a time of about five minutes.
‘The object got bigger and bigger and I thought “bloody hell” and took a picture with my mobile phone.
‘There is nothing that big in the Loch. I was in shock as it looked like a big serpent, it’s amazing. You can’t fake a sonar image. I have never seen anything returned like this on the fish finder.
‘It is a bizarre shape to me. I have shown it to other experienced skippers and none of us know what it was.
Article continues here: The Daily Mail