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 There's
all kinds of weird news to be found all year long. Urban Legends,
hauntings, mythical monsters, the news abounds with them! We'll try and
keep you up to date with some of the latest spottings and stories of
weirdness that we can find. |
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Giant Trap Set for Monster in Lake
August 2 2000 -OSLO (Reuters) - An international team
of monster hunters unveiled a giant trap Wednesday for catching a fabled serpent, reputed
to be a cousin of Scotland's Loch Ness monster, in a lake in south Norway.
``This is the first serpent trap of its kind in the
world,'' Jan Sundberg, a Swede leading a team of 12 experts, told Reuters. The team
comprises seven Swedes, three Norwegians, a Canadian and a Belgian. The 18-foot-long
tube-shaped trap, comprising a metal frame with nylon netting, will be lowered into
Seljord lake in south Norway. It will contain live whitefish for bait to catch an elusive
beast known to locals as ``Selma.''
``The trap is adapted from a fish trap for eels. If anything
up to about six meters long swims in one end, the opening closes and it won't be able to
get out,'' said Sundberg, a veteran of several inconclusive high-tech scans of the murky
lake.
Over the next two weeks, the team will dangle the cage in the
lake, about 110 miles (170 km) southwest of Oslo, at depths of between 30 and 100 meters
near where sightings of the monster have been reported. Two biologists at the University
of Oslo were on standby to fly down by helicopter and take tests if the trap worked.
''We'll take a DNA sample, document the serpent and then release it into the lake,'' he
said. ``We will be very careful not to hurt it.''
Experts on land would also try to track any unexplained
movements underwater with hydraphones and sonars to help experts on a floating platform
move the trap quickly to a promising spot.
Sundberg said the team recorded mysterious whale-like noises
during a visit in 1999. ``We'd be disappointed if we don't get some kind of result this
time...the only evidence scientists would accept is a dead or a live serpent,'' he said.
The beast was first spotted around 1750, and most accounts
agree it looks like a serpent with the head of an elk or a horse. Seljord is a town of
about 1,500 people at the head of the picturesque lake, about 15 km (nine miles) long.
In recent years, Seljord has tried to imitate Loch Ness in
attracting tourists. In 1986, the local council changed Seljord's coat of arms to portray
a sea serpent.
By Alister Doyle -
Reuters
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Every
year, Halloween enthusiasts anxiously await the retail
industry to begin their Halloween season and see who's
first to stock products for the spooky season. Many
stores begin stocking Halloween products as early as
July! |
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