April 19 – Eighteen months after its earlier reported sighting, with none the previous year, the legend of Loch Ness monster is back.
Amazing images of a huge creature swimming below the surface of the world famous lake in Scotland have been accessed from a satellite high in the atmosphere, using Apple’s satellite map app.
According to a report in Daily Mail, the photographs were captured by two different amateur Nessie (as the monster is popularly called) hunters scanning different satellites transmitting images of the earth from space.
Due to the lack of sightings last year, bookmakers William Hill who offers a GBP1000 annual prize for the best Nessie sighting is doubling this year incentive because it went unclaimed last year.
Three sightings were reported in 2013 but they were discounted as fakes.
Nessie was first spotted in 565AD and has been seen 1036 times in the last 1500 years. Popular interest and belief in the animal’s existence has varied since it was first brought to the world’s attention in 1933 with its first clear picture which later turned out to be a hoax. Evidence of its existence is anecdotal, with minimal and much-disputed photographic material and sonar readings.
The most common speculation among believers is that the creature represents a line of long-surviving plesiosaurs (large marine reptiles of the Mesozoic era).
However, the scientific community regards the Loch Ness Monster as a modern-day myth, and explains sightings as including misidentifications of more mundane objects, outright hoaxes, and wishful thinking. Despite this, it remains one of the most famous examples of cryptozoology.
-India Today
