An Italian geologist claims to have busted the myth of the Loch Ness monster. Dr Luigi Piccardi believes the sightings of the ancient monster can be attributed to geological forces. He says the shaking ground and bubbles that have been described in historical sightings of the monster are actually signs of active fault line that runs under the lake, the Great Glen fault system. Read more
Special trip marks 80th anniversary of first Loch Ness monster sighting
On April 14 1933, Mrs Aldie Mackay, manageress of the Drumnadrochit Hotel, spoke of seeing a "whale-like fish" in the loch. Alex Campbell, a water bailiff and part-time journalist, recorded the sighting in the Inverness Courier, under the headline: "Strange Spectacle in Loch Ness". Read more
Hugh Gray photographed the Loch Ness Monster on 12 November 1933
Spoiler
On 12 November 1933, Hugh Gray was walking along Loch Ness after church when he spotted a substantial commotion in the water. A large creature rose up from the lake. Gray took several pictures of it, but only one of them showed up after they were developed. Read more
A scientist has spent four painstaking decades studying the loch best known for the creature affectionately known as "Nessie". Why does this mythical monster hold such fascination for so many people, ask Chloe Hadjimatheou and Vanessa Barford. Read more
The earliest report of a monster associated with the vicinity of Loch Ness appears in the Life of St. Columba by Adomnán, written in the 7th century. According to Adomnán, writing about a century after the events he described, the Irish monk Saint Columba was staying in the land of the Picts with his companions when he came across the locals burying a man by the River Ness. They explained that the man had been swimming the river when he was attacked by a "water beast" that had mauled him and dragged him under. Read more
One of the most iconic images of Nessie is known as the "Surgeon's Photograph". Its importance lies in the fact that it was the first photo and only photographic evidence of a "head and neck" - all the others are humps or disturbances. Supposedly taken by Robert Kenneth Wilson, a London gynaecologist, it was published in the Daily Mail on 21 April 1934. The image was originally revealed as a fake in The Sunday Telegraph dated 7 December 1975 Read more
Scientists have measured the way Loch Ness tilts back and forth as the whole of Scotland bends with the passing of the tides. It is a tiny signal seen in the way the waters at the ends of the 35km-long lake rise and fall. When combined with the direct tug from the gravity of the Moon and Sun, the loch surface goes up and down by just 1.5mm. Read more
Scotland's Loch Ness moves back and forth depending on movement of the land it rests upon, a new study has revealed. When the tide comes in on the North Sea, 13 kilometres to the east of Loch Ness, the increased pressure on the seafloor deforms the Earth, a process called ocean tidal loading. And though the moon controls the tides of the North Sea, and affects the loch too, the wobbly movement of the land from the pressure of the changing tides is what actually determines the loch's levels. Read more