Monsters and Myths

It was reported in the media last month that the lost civilisation of Atlantis had been discovered in the Atlantic Ocean, a few hundred miles off the coast of Morocco, just where Plato said it should be, beyond “the Pillars of Hercules”.

The image was discovered on Google Ocean by Bernie Banford, of Chester, and it showed a rectangular area roughly the size of Wales that appears to have roadways, man-made area divisions and a city-like grid design.

It was quickly discounted in some quarters, but whether the discovery is valid or not – other much-vaunted locations for Atlantis over the years have included Cyprus, the Azores, and even Antarctica – it has been postulated that Atlantis was the “mother culture” of the Egyptian, Native American, Mayan and other ancient civilisations around the world.

I think it’s more valid to treat Atlantis as a metaphor for an early advanced race which spread its knowledge around the world, and which was largely destroyed in some global catastrophe, rather than as one particular place.

Of course, the “A” word is not mentioned in academic circles without a smirk and a raised eyebrow. But the concept, that legend recounts as being destroyed by a great flood, has grasped the imaginations of generations of researchers and historians.

One author who has spent 20 years travelling, researching and scuba-diving to find evidence of this lost civilisation is Graham Hancock, of Bath, who has written three books on the subject – the runaway best-seller Fingerprint of the Gods, most notably, Heavens Mirror and Underworld.

Although Graham never discovered the actual location of Atlantis, and rarely mentioned the “A” word, his research has helped to shift the view that advanced societies could not possibly go back in to prehistory. He believes we are a species with amnesia, which has completely forgotten its remarkable past but, fortunately, our ancestors left clues in great stone monuments all around the planet that seem to be triggering a cultural memory recall.

Graham will be discussing his latest research into lost civilisations – and will talk about how our current civilisation, with climate change and rising sea levels, could become the next Atlantis – at the annual Megalithomania conference at Glastonbury on May 23 and 24 where he will be the keynote speaker on the Saturday evening, a role he has fulfilled previously at the conference, to great acclaim.

Almost every week a major archaeological discovery is made that pushes back the date of advanced cultures. Edmund Marriage, of Milborne Port, Dorset, who has been researching the Biblical area of the Garden of Eden, in the area once known as Sumeria and the Lebanon, points to the discovery, again with the help of Google Maps, of great canal systems and megalithic construction.

Edmund, who runs a research organisation called the Golden Age Project, will be outlining these new discoveries in the context of other megalithic sites in the area at the conference on the Sunday.

Megalithomania resides in a persuasive and growing minority that seriously challenges the current, outdated view of history, specifically from the Neolithic era going back to 10,000BC, the era of the legendary Atlantis.
thisisbristol.co.uk/wdp/mysteriouswest/Atlantis-key-lost-golden-age/article-768622-detail/article.html

BOSTON — The headmaster of one of the city’s most prestigious exam schools is dealing with an unusual rumor sweeping student classrooms.

There are no vampires at Boston Latin School, says headmaster Lynne Moone Teta.

Seriously.

Students at the school, which was founded in 1635, began e-mailing news organizations Wednesday night with the strange story of vampires roaming the halls.

“Supposedly 3 students believe that they are vampires and today when a student was bitten the police were informed,” wrote one student in a message to TheBostonChannel.com. “I heard that one girl was arrested another suspended.”

Police, however, denied reports that anyone at the school was bitten.

The rumors were strong enough to cause anxiety among the student body and disrupt classes on Thursday. “I seek your cooperation in redirecting your energy toward the learning objectives of the day. Please do not sensationalize or discuss these rumors,”

Teta wrote in a notice obtained by the Boston Globe and sent to faculty, students and parents. Teta said she was concerned that some students’ safety might be jeopardized because of the rumors. “At no time was anyone’s safety in jeopardy,” she wrote. In its long, rich history the school’s students have included revolutionary firebrands Ben Franklin, Sam Adams, John Hancock, but likely never vampires.

Boston police acknowledged visiting the school Wednesday after learning about the rumors. “We did go over there and speak to some of the students and quelled the rumors that were going and kind of told them the effect those rumors could have on the rest of the student population,” spokesman Eddy Chrispin said.

Interest in vampires among young people has been rekindled in the past year with the release of the hit movie “Twilight”. It tells the story of a teenage girl who falls in love with a vampire.

The movie, which stars teen heart throb Robert Pattinson, was released on DVD last weekend. The DVD sold 13 million copies on its first day of sales, according to Entertainment Weekly.

thebostonchannel.com/cnn-news/19020075/detail.html

What is lurking in the waters of Japan’s Lake Kussharo?

An unknown creature, known affectionately as “Kusshi” in an attempt to emulate Loch Ness’ “Nessie,” has long been sighted in Lake Kussharo, in the nothern island of Hokkaido, Japan.

Lake Kussharo is located within Akan National Park in eastern Hokkaido and derives its name from the Ainu word “Kuccharo,” which means “The place where a lake becomes a river and the river flows out.”

It is a caldera lake, formed in the crater of a volcano long ago, and is notable for being the largest lake of this kind in Japan as well as the 6th largest lake in the country overall.

It also boasts the largest island in a freshwater lake in Japan, the islet Nakanoshima, which is in fact a composite volcano. Lake Kussharo is massive for a caldera lake, being approximately 57 km in circumference and reaching depths of 117.5 meters.

Kusshi is reported as being between 10 and 20 meters in length (30 to 60 ft), and the most commonly cited coloration is a dark brown. The neck is of a moderate length, and humps are sometimes mentioned. The head of the creature is said to look somewhat like that of a horse, only larger, with silver eyes, and is sometimes described as having two protrusions like giraffe horns on top. A few reports mention the creature making strange grunting or clicking noises. Interestingly, many witnesses report having felt distinctly uneasy, disturbed, or “icky,” upon seeing the creature.

One very interesting characteristic of Kusshi is the high speeds at which it reportedly can move. In 1974 footage was taken of a mysterious creature moving across the lake at breakneck speed. In Sept, 1974, a group of 15 witnesses reported being surprised by a large, somewhat triangular shaped animal with shiny skin like glistening scales, moving under the surface of the water with the speed of a motorboat. In 1988, a Mr. Takashi Murata was riding in a motorboat and reported being paced by a large animal at a distance of 15 meters away, which he described as having a dark back that looked like that of a dolphin. The animal followed him for a time, keeping up with the fast boat, before disappearing beneath the water.

Lake Kussharo’s alleged lake monster first came to widespread publicity during the 1970s due to a number of high profile sightings. In 1972, a man reported seeing an object that looked like a “boat turned upside down,” swimming quickly through the water. In August of 1973, a group of 40 middle school students on a field trip, as well as their teachers, spotted the creature not far from shore. In July, 1974, another famous case was reported by a Mr. Wada, a farmer who sighted a large, dark animal with several humps at intervals of 4 meters apart. The farmer watched the creature for some time before it submerged with a huge swell of water and a splash.

These sightings and many others like them brought attention to the lake, which culminated in an active search for the animal. For one month in Sept 1974, TV crews, boats equipped with fish finder sonar, and teams of divers explored the lake. These efforts produced some interesting results. Some of the sonar equipped boats reported finding large images at depths of 15 to 20 meters and a TV crew from the Hokkaido Broadcasting Company actually managed to catch footage of the alleged creature. Over the years, Kusshi has been photographed and filmed on several occasions, including as recently as 1990.

Kusshi continued to be sighted throughout the 70s and beyond, sometimes by large groups of people. In May, 1976, Kusshi was sighted by a group of 22 tour bus passengers and their driver. As recently as 1997, a group of firefighters spotted a strange animal swimming 100 meters offshore, which they estimated as being 20 meters long, with a dorsal fin and banded markings. Another sightings was made by tourists in 2002, and reports occasionally pop up to this day.

Although media attention made Kusshi famous in the 1970s, it would be a mistake to think that this was the first indication of something strange or unknown in the lake. The Ainu people who inhabit the area have long told of giant snakes that inhabit the lake. Pioneers coming to the area during the Meiji era also told of seeing these creatures, which were said to attack and eat deer whole. These stories have a long tradition among locals in the area. During the 40s and 50s, there were quite a few sightings of Kusshi as well, although these never did gain the attention that the 1970s sightings did.

So what could Kusshi be?

Lake Kussharo is itself not particularly a good habitat for aquatic life. The area is well known for its hot springs and volcanic activity, and volcanic gases bubbling up beneath the surface render the water of the lake highly acidic. In addition, a 1938 eruption in the area created a large amount of sulphur which found its way into the water. The conditions are not ideal for fish. Those that do thrive in the lake are species that are resistant to acidic water conditions, such as the introduced rainbow trout, and most fish in the lake congregate near inflowing streams which dilute the water. This limits the potential food supply and makes conditions difficult for a large animal.

One hypothesis is that swimming deer or other animals are behind the sightings. A swimming deer could perhaps fit in with some aspects of Kusshi reports, especially the general shape and presence of horns sometimes mentioned.

Another idea is that swimming horses could be the culprit. Kusshi’s head is often described as being horse like, and the creature has even been mistaken for a horse on at least one occasion. In July, 1975, a forestry worker saw what he at first thought was a horse swimming in the lake until he noticed that it was much larger than a horse as it came closer. The creature then dove below the surface not to be seen again. Could a horse or deer be behind these reports? It is an interesting idea, but the sizes reported for Kusshi are much larger than these animals and we are still faced with the reports that describe these creatures moving at high speeds.

Some point to the culprit as possibly being misidentified schools of fish such as rainbow trout, sockeye salmon, or Sakhalin taimen (Hutcho perryi), which is found in Hokkaido and is one of the oldest and largest species of salmon. It is something to consider, but would do nothing to explain the head and neck seen in many reports. Still another, more unconventional explanation, is that Kusshi could be some sort of giant slug. Kusshi has been attributed to misidentifications of motorboats as well.

There are those that have even used the surviving plesiosaur theory, and there is even a model of Kusshi found at the lake that most certainly resembles the mainstream “Nessie” image of one. However most reports do not really describe the animal in that way, and this speculation seems to be an attempt to liken Kusshi to the popular image of Nessie more than anything else. This sort of thing has led some people to make the accusation that the lake monster has been played up in order to promote tourism to the area.

Whatever it is, Kusshi’s identity remains an interesting mystery.

cryptomundo.com/cryptozoo-news/kusshi

The first recorded sighting of a “monster” in Loch Ness was nearly 1,500 years ago. Apparently, a huge, ferocious beast leaped out of a lake near Iverness, Scotland, and ate a local farmer. Since then, the lore of Nessie has grown and grown.

A photograph, taken in 1934 by a London doctor, seemed to show a dinosaur-looking creature with a long neck emerging from the water, and it fueled the Nessie obsession.

Then a home movie shot in 1960 showed a family picnicking near the water, but the movie also shows a strange figure swimming nearby.

British intelligence analyzed the film and concluded it was probably “something animate.”

Millions of people have peered into this forbidding water, in search of the truth. One-thousand visitors have reported unusual sightings.

One woman named Val who claims to have spotted Nessie said the creature she saw was “very dark gray. Shiny, obviously, because it was wet.”

MIT professor Robert Rines was at a Scottish tea party in 1972 when he and the others spotted what they thought was the Loch Ness monster.

“It was a big tremendous thing. Like the back of an elephant,” Rines said. “It came back, right in front of us and … thuuup. Submerged!”

Rines, now 85, has returned to Loch Ness almost every summer since that first sighting, hoping to prove that he did see a monster.

Using sonar technology, he plumbed the vast, vast blackness of Loch Ness — which is 750 feet deep, 23 miles long, 380 million years old — and claimed he detected large, moving masses.

In 1975, he captured underwater photos of what appeared to be the body, flipper, neck and head of a large animal.

“This is probably a progenitor of something that should have been dead 65 million years ago,” he said.

Since the 1980s, Rines’ underwater sonar and photos have not picked up any trace of a creature. Rines’ latest theory is that Nessie might now be dead, and he wants to comb the Loch’s bottom for bones.

A recent video showed suspicious movement in the Loch. But that was actually me swimming in the inhospitable waters, demonstrating that it’s easy to fake a sighting.

The water was just a few degrees above freezing the day I went in, and it was murky and dark. There aren’t even many fish brave enough to live in here. So what sort of monster would choose to call Loch Ness home?

Some have speculated that Nessie might be a plesiosaur, a type of dinosaur that resembles other lake monsters spotted around the world, and looks a lot like Nessie.

Adrian Shine, head of the Loch Ness Project, has spent 30 years trying to prove Nessie doesn’t exist.

“I don’t happen to believe that Loch Ness is Jurassic Park. I think it’s about the last place on earth a warm water marine reptile of the Jurassic era would actually want to live,” Shine said.

Shine said certain natural phenomenon like boat wakes or unusual currents created when warm surface water meets the cold water below.

These kinds of currents can make a floating log look like it’s swimming upwind, and create visual illusions, Shine said. For science, eyewitnesses are not proof enough. But for me, they’re enough to keep my imagination running wild.

abcnews.go.com/GMA/AroundTheWorld/Story?id=7185124&page=1

The expedition that went looking for bigfoots in a cave in the mountains of Siberia has so far been fruitless, but its organizers blame the weather for failure and say they will return in summer.

Earlier this week an expedition headed by “yeti specialist” Igor Burtsev set off to explore the several kilometer long cave in the Kemerovo Region, where local hunters reported to have seen the creatures. The expedition returned to Moscow without any success.

“Our expedition visited the Azasskaya Cave. Unfortunately, we did not find any direct evidence of a bigfoot’s presence there,” Burtsev was quoted by RIA Novosti as telling a press conference directly after his return.

But he was not discouraged by this failure, blaming it on bad weather and the curiousity of local people.

“People are simply pouring in there now. If there had been any footprints there originally, they were destroyed,” he said.

Besides, the cave is very deep, Burtsev said, and to explore its full length, a team of speleologists would have to join the mission. Since the exploration was made almost impossible by heavy snow drifts, the expedition should return in summer, he added.

In February the administration of Kemerovo Region in Russia’s Siberia started receiving reports from local hunters who claimed to have seen human-like creatures near Azasskaya Cave, 500 kilometers off the city of Kemerovo. The creatures reportedly were 1.5-2 meters tall and covered in fur. One of the hunters also made a photograph of what he said was the creature’s footprint in the snow.

Burtsev, a PhD in History and a passionate believer in bigfoots, says he sees nothing strange about bigfoots possibly showing up in the Kemerovo region. Its mountains are part of the Altai range, thought to be the favorite yetis reproduction spot. In late 19^th and early 20^th century, he says, female creatures with young ones were frequently spotted there.

The Russian Academy of Sciences, however, is skeptical of Burtsev’s enthusiasm. To preserve a stable population, there would have to be many yetis, but only single creatures have so far been spotted, an anthropologist of the Academy, Sergei Vasilyev, told RIA Novosti. Besides, no body of a bigfoot has ever been found and studied, no matter how many sightings have been reported.

mosnews.com/weird/2009/03/25/bigfootupd/

Three new large marine mammals, so-called sea-serpents, are extremely likely to be discovered according to researchers.

In a paper published today, a team of scientists conclude that three new unusual species might await discovery, all of which may belong to the group of marine mammals known as pinnipeds. The best known pinnipeds are seals, sea lions and walruses.

The team used a combination of statistical analysis and eyewitness reports to evaluate the existence of unknown large sea animals.

Led by doctoral student Mr Michael Woodley of Royal Holloway, University of London, who worked with Dr Darren Naish of the University of Portsmouth, and Dr Hugh Shanahan, also of Royal Holloway, the team used two different statistical models to estimate the number of unknown pinnipeds. The paper was published in the academic journal Historical Biology.

“While the low number of three possible new pinniped species matched our statistical expectations, there is a need for scepticism as all known pinnipeds are noisy animals with close ties to land”, said Mr Woodley.

“These pinnipeds would have to possess some exceptional characteristics, if they exist.”

One of the team’s two models suggested that 15 such species might remain to be discovered, however that was regarded as a significant overestimation, Mr Woodley said.

According to the researchers the discovery of several large marine animals during the last 30 years demonstrates that there are sea mammals in existence which have so far remained undiscovered.

Examples of these animals include the Lesser or Peruvian beaked whale, a strikingly marked whale from the eastern Pacific, which was discovered in 1975; the Megamouth, a giant, filter-feeding shark known from tropical seas worldwide, discovered in 1976; and the Indonesian coelacanth, a deep-sea fish with a striking metallic sheen, was discovered in 1998. Omura’s whale, a close relative of the gigantic Blue whale, was only discovered in the late 1970s.

The study of animals that have yet to be verified by science – sea-serpents and similar enigmatic creatures – is known as cryptozoology. According to Mr Woodley, cryptozoological literature includes hundreds of accounts of mysterious large marine animals, many going back hundreds of years.

“Many sightings have been made by trained observers, including military personnel and experienced naturalists,” he said.

“Over the years, cryptozoologists have suggested that several sea-serpents might be unusual types of pinniped.”

Among the best known of these is a creature sometimes called the merhorse. Supposedly a gigantic, long-bodied, deep-water animal 4 to 30 meters long, it is not only known from sightings, but also from a carcass found in the stomach of a whale in 1937.

A second relevant mystery animal is the long-necked sea-serpent, supposedly a plesiosaur-like sea lion with a 2-3 meter long neck. A third creature is the Tizheruk, a semi-mythological seal-like water monster of the Pacific Arctic is described as long-bodied, and with a snake-like head.

“We consider that if such creatures as the merhorse and long-necked sea-serpent exist, they must be extremely rare. They must also dwell in remote and seldom visited regions of the oceans,” said Mr Woodley.

A Bigfoot research group reported finding a handprint that “looked like a huge gorilla paw” during a recent expedition on Sand Mountain.

“It would’ve made two of my hands,” said Hawk Spearman, a founder of the Alabama chapter of the Elusive Primates of North America, or EPNA.

Spearman said the find was the first handprint he has discovered in more than a decade of research, although he has found footprints in the past.

“We were pleased with what we did find,” he said.

From Feb. 20-22, Spearman said the group explored a heavily wooded area about 15 miles from U.S. 431 and the Albertville and Boaz area. Spearman declined to release the exact location because he said the property owners did not want media attention.

Spearman said the group heard a number of vocalizations during the expedition.

“One guy said it was like sleeping in a zoo,” added Spearman. “There has been activity out there for quite a while.”

One of the vocalizations was particularly interesting.

“We heard something that sounded like a really mad cow vocal and then what sounded like a bear vocal,” Spearman said.

When the bear vocal drew closer, Spearman said, “All of a sudden we heard this vocal, like six deep, long, guttural growls. We know we upset what was there. We didn’t physically see anything.

“We did get vocalizations from that area in January as well, but we were unable to identify them. Lo and behold, we were watching Animal Planet and heard a similar vocal. An expert from Texas A&M University said it was an unknown primate with human texture vocalization.”

Spearman said a former game warden from Pennsylvania accompanied the group and noted signs of a bear or a big cat in the area.

EPNA’s next meeting is Saturday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Oneonta Public Library, where the Alabama chapter has been meeting for the past year.

Spearman said a group called the American Primate Research Organization, or APRO, from Cullman is expected to attend. He said EPNA plans to merge with APRO in the next few weeks.

sandmountainreporter.com/story.lasso?ewcd=dcb39996f2dafae0

Suspicious images that emerged last month showing what some believed to be a legendary giant snake in Borneo have been proven to be fakes.

The Daily Mail reported that the image above had sparked local villagers’ fears that the mythical Nabau, a 100-foot-long serpent, had returned. But online investigators tracked down the real photo, identical to the image that created a frenzy but without the serpent figure.

Scientific American talked to a Kansas librarian who was one of many to reveal the hoax. Nathan Chadwick explained that by using the reverse search engine TinEye, which crawls the Web for pixels that match an uploaded image, he was able to locate the original photo. According to many Web sites, the original image shows the Congo River in Africa, not the Baleh River in Borneo.

A second photo that the Daily Mail included in its story was actually found to be an image that was entered in a 2002 hoax contest.

When AOL posted an earlier story about the photos and questions over their authenticity, 55 percent of those answering a poll said they believed the images did in fact show a 100-foot-long snake.

It would appear the Borneo monster is just a myth.

news.aol.com/article/borneo-snake-hoax/382584

A 150-year-old mystery has reared its head after a woman woke to find ‘Satan’s hoofprints’ dotted across freshly fallen snow in her back garden.

The single track of cloven-like prints - which appear to have been made by a two-legged creature - precisely resemble footprints recorded in the area in 1855.

The phenomenon, which has never been explained, became known as the ‘Devil’s foot prints’ in a local legend.

The new tracks appeared in fresh snow in Jill Wade’s back garden on March 5th.

Grandmother Jill, 76, of Woolsery, Devon, said: ‘I looked in the garden and it really intrigued me.

‘I couldn’t believe it - the footprints were in the shape of a cloven hoof. There were no other marks at all in the snow.

‘I was quite surprised by it and I hadn’t got a clue what it was, but I thought I would love to know.’

Scientists from the Centre for Fortean Zoology inspected the prints which measure 5ins (13cm) long with a stride of between 11 and 17ins (28 and 43cm).

Jonathan Downes, who runs the centre, is investigating whether the footprints could have been left by a hare or rabbits hopping on their hind legs.

He said: ‘Thousands of people across the world believe in the paranormal, but so far every single thing we have looked into has turned out to have a natural explanation. I’m sure these will as well.

‘Do I believe that the Devil comes from the pits of Hell to wander around the gardens of North Devon? Of course not.

‘But if you’re asking if there are things that can’t be explained by modern science, then yes. But human knowledge is expanding all the time.

‘I believe that things that are currently put down to the paranormal will one day be explained by science.’

The original ‘Devil’s footprints’ appeared after a light snowfall on February 8th, 1855, and travelled from Exmouth to Topsham in Devon - even crossing the estuary of the River Exe.

The tracks reportedly continued unbroken for 100 miles - appearing on both sides of 14-foot walls and locked gates.

Some villagers blamed the church, who had recently changed the standard prayer book, for letting the devil into their communities.

Others blamed animals, pranksters, and even a weather balloon - but the phenomenon, described as the ‘great Devon mystery’, was never explained.

dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1161765/Ancient-mystery-returns-Satans-hoofprints-spotted-Devon-garden.html