These Bizarre Sea Creatures Stunned Scientists ｜ The Proof Is Out There

Centuries ago, mysterious sea serpents and mermaids were believed to be hidden in the world's vast oceans. They've captured the human imagination for ages. But in Japan, scientists now think one of the alleged creatures may have been caught and preserved for generations. And they're taking x-rays to prove it. February 2nd, 2022. Scientists in Japan open a box said to contain a mythical creature captured by a fisherman in the Pacific Ocean in the 1700s. According to legend, the mummified body in this box was passed down from generation to generation until now. Inside the box is a bizarre mummy that measures 12 inches long and leaves scientists baffled. Using a CT scan, paleontologists are now looking into the 300-year-old mummy's origins. Researchers are also using DNA samples to identify which known species, if any, the creature is made of. Take another look at this oddity. It has hollowed out eye sockets, pointy fang-like teeth, hands, and a fish-like tail complete with scales and a small flipper. What is this thing? Field researcher Ken Gerhart says Japan has a long tradition of merfolk, even though their folklore might be a bit different than what we're used to. In Japanese culture, we have some very distinct types of mermaids. One in particular is known as the ningyo. Unlike the beautiful, glamorous Western mermaid, the ningyo is described as being hideous and, frankly, the stuff of otherworldly nightmares. It is usually depicted as being fish-like but with varying degrees of humanoid features. The ningyo is often described as having a monkey-like mouth full of razor-sharp teeth, like we're seeing here. The ningyo first appeared in ancient Japanese text 2,600 years ago and it's said that if one were to eat a ningyo, you'd add centuries to your life. There's one account of a woman who once ate a ningyo and lived for 800 years. Still others conjecture that this creature could in fact be another type of Japanese mermaid known as the amabie. Now the amabie is said to have long flowing hair and it's covered in scales. It is said that the amabie first appeared in relation to a pandemic that happened centuries ago and that this light or glow that was emitted from the amabie was sort of taken to be a warning that this pandemic was coming. In the early part of 2020, when the worldwide pandemic hit, people in Japan began to sketch visions of the amabie and post them online because looking at a picture of an amabie is said to ward off disease. In other cultures, mermaids are said to possess four main powers. Immortality, telepathy, hypnosis, and clairvoyance. For more clairvoyance on this mystery, we turn to our experts. First, professor of anatomy and anthropology Dr. Jeff Meldrum dives into the ningyo theory. A ningyo is described as being the size of a seal and has a face like a monkey. So in those respects, this relic would seem to align with this identification. On the other hand, if you consume its flesh, you will be endowed with everlasting life. That then begs the question why someone would preserve the remains of such a as a relic as opposed to serving it up for dinner and reaping the benefits of that immortality. Of course, maybe the person who found it didn't want to live for 800 years or was saving it for someone who did. Remember, it was preserved in a box by priests like a kind of heirloom. Next, marine biologist Shay Conger considers whether this could be the amabie. The amabie is said to have some sort of transformative powers. And one of these is that it's able to form legs to walk on the shore. And it's said to have three appendages. This creature doesn't seem to have anything like that. It actually seems to just have a tail or a fin. Conger also points out that a mermaid with this body type would be unlikely to survive in the ocean. Something like this would have a really difficult time thermal regulating. The fact that a mermaid has long limbs and arms, and usually a head situated on its neck, wouldn't be very advantageous. And that's because living in an aquatic environment sucks a lot of body heat away from you. Marine animals are actually fusiform in body shape, meaning that they are oval shaped. They don't have a defined neck. Seals and sea lions and whales have a lot of blubber around their shoulders and neck because it keeps their head and their central nervous system warm. So a creature that had a human head like this actually would be very cold. So could this all be a hoax worthy of P.T. Barnum? Some objects, like for example the Fiji mermaid, were determined to be a salmon taxidermied with some kind of a primate. And in some cases they were orangutans. No evidence of sutures has been found, though a hidden stitch is commonly used in taxidermy for facial repair and in very short haired areas, like the one we see here between the belly and the fin. The fact that we don't necessarily know if this is a real animal or if it ever lived doesn't diminish the cultural importance of what we're looking at because they directly reflect some really important nature-based religious aspects of Japanese culture. Our verdict? Unexplained object. The paleontologists will soon release their results and while Conger believes this is a hoax, until those DNA tests come back we're going to say we just don't know. 2017, the Mediterranean Sea. A team working a debris sweep along ocean pipelines comes across what at first looks like just another deep sea carcass to be cleared away. But closer inspection reveals this is truly something unusual. What appears to be a 90-foot long dusty spine sits undisturbed on the bottom of the ocean. A remote-controlled crane reaches out to investigate the skeleton, turning over one of the vertebrae, which disintegrates. British podcaster and investigator Debbie Hatswell was one of the first people to see this intriguing film after a member of the pipeline maintenance team reached out to her. He said they've seen a lot of carcasses on the sea floor and they've seen wild carcasses and fish and all that and it just doesn't fit. It doesn't fit with what they are. He's saying this is an anomaly and he's felt that it was a very, very old animal of some kind. So I reached out to a number of marine biologists and nobody really got back to me with it as to what it was. Field researcher Ken Gerhart explores the idea that perhaps these are the remains of a long extinct ocean predator, the dreaded megalodon. In 2022, the Atlantic Shark Institute out of Rhode Island was deploying sonar when they encountered what they believed to be a shark of unbelievable proportions, perhaps 50 to 60 feet in length. Now, if so, this would be the best account of a modern megalodon. The megalodon, a nautical nightmare that experts believe could weigh as much as 50 tons, has been thought extinct for nearly 3 million years. Have these Rhode Island researchers uncovered a modern-day version of this historical monster? And if so, could we be looking at the remnants of one in this video? This would certainly fit within the paradigm of what we know about megalodon. Gerhart also sees a connection between this discovery and the classic mythology of the region. In Greek mythology, different sea monsters like Cetus, Charybdis, the Linnean Hydra were said to live throughout the Mediterranean Sea. And while there are many suspects, there's one sea dragon sighting in particular that Gerhart thinks could be connected. In October 1907, fishermen on the island of Corsica claimed that they were terrorized by a horrible 200-foot sea dragon that actually ripped apart their nets. And the fishermen were so scared to go back out and fish that they actually called on the government to bring in a torpedo boat in order to kill the monster. And that just happens to be the location where we've got this footage of a 90-foot spinal cord. Sea dragons can be found in all sorts of ancient texts and tales dating back thousands of years, from Norse mythology's Midgard Serpent to the ancient Babylonian saltwater dragon Tiamat, who many say was rebranded as the Leviathan in the Old Testament. Is there a connection here? Let's see if our experts can help slay this oceanic mystery. Marine biologist Dr. Shea Steingass strongly doubts these are the remains of a sea dragon of ancient myth. It's been hypothesized that this might be a sea dragon. That's probably not the case because we really don't have any scientific evidence of these creatures existing. Steingass also points to the fact that we can see what appears to be a pelvis, something not found in the numerous depictions of these serpent-like creatures. What we're actually seeing here is a very old skeleton of some kind of modern animal. But the only documented modern marine animal that could possibly grow to this length would be a whale. Could that be what this is? I would say the chances that this is a really large whale skeleton are really slim because we would likely see other types of large bones like a skull if we were to see a spinal column. These remains aren't like anything I've really seen before. With Dr. Steingass at a loss, we checked with wildlife biologist Stephanie Manka to see if this could be a modern megalodon like the one thought to be discovered near Rhode Island. If it were a megalodon, I wouldn't expect to see the bone as intact as this. Megalodons, like other sharks, instead of bone skeletons, they have cartilage skeletons which don't fossilize well. Bone contains minerals whereas cartilage doesn't. Bones are much harder and if you think about your ear, this part where it bends is the cartilage and that's what shark skeletons are made of. When cartilage breaks down, it turns into a jelly-like substance that dissolves into the water, which is why the only proof we have for megalodons are their teeth. And as for that alleged megalodon spotted by the Atlantic Shark Institute of Rhode Island, further research indicates this sonar image is more likely a large school of Atlantic mackerel. So with all of our theories ruled out, what is Manka's best guess? I believe that this is a whale. What is probably going on here is the whale skeleton has been on the ocean floor for so long that organisms have eaten away at the bone and there are fin whales in the Mediterranean, which are the second largest whale species. They usually don't get up to 30 meters, so there is a little size discrepancy, but everything else seems to allude that it is a whale. Our verdict? Unknown sea beast. Stephanie Manka thinks it could be an abnormally large whale, but our marine biologist Dr. Stein Gass says no way. Until there is further investigation of the skeleton itself beyond this video evidence, these bones will remain a mystery. August 10th, 2019 in Tymoth, United Kingdom, a small seaside town in northeast England. A local man enjoys a morning coffee on a pier overlooking the water when he spots this. We see a creature in the water, dark, skinny, and wiry of indeterminate length. It lurks just beneath the surface in the shallows, hovering in place and almost submerged. But then it breaks the surface and reveals a long, smooth body. Its shape is reminiscent of a snake, and then it goes back under and disappears. Field researcher Ken Gerhart helps make sense of what we just saw. What's exciting is that I can't readily identify what type of animal this is. One intriguing possibility is that there could be a form of quote-unquote underwater alien, and this is born by an ex-ocean ex-researcher who does underwater exploration, who claims to have encountered alien-like creatures in the ocean that he described as hyper-advanced. But physiologically speaking, he said that they somewhat resembled stingrays or manta rays with wing-like appendages. Next, Gerhart wonders if this might be a saltwater cousin of a local freshwater legend. Still others have hypothesized that this could be Bownessie, which is England's most famous aquatic denizen. Bownessie has been reported from Lake Windermere, the largest lake in England. It's described like a serpentine animal, but very large. Reports of Bownessie only date back to about 2010 or so, when it was first observed by a reporter. And since that time, there have only been about 10 sightings or accounts of Bownessie. But still, we have to recognize that there is a long history of lake monsters throughout the British Isles. Bownessie, like its legendary cousin the Loch Ness Monster, is thought by many to be a plesiosaurus, which were believed to live exclusively in the oceans. Until July 28, 2022, when an international team of researchers discovered plesiosaur fossils in ancient freshwater riverbeds in Morocco. So is it possible that a plesiosaur could be making its way from Lake Windermere to the ocean? In addition to aliens that resemble stingrays, underwater photographer Luis Lamar has described giant underwater spiders and poisoned deepwater sea snakes with bright yellow heads. Such figures are referred to as USOs, or Unidentified Submerged Objects. Could this be one of the alien creatures from Lamar's accounts? Let's ask our experts. Wildlife biologist Stephanie Shuttler weighs the possibility that we're looking at one of Britain's famed water monsters. People think that this is Bownessie or some type of lake monster by the way that it's moving. It seems to be going in and out of the water and these things fit what a lake monster would look like. But Shuttler's more skeptical. I wouldn't say it's really characteristic of an animal. Usually animals move faster, especially at the end. They don't bob up and down like that. When the end parts of it come up and down they look like 90 degree edges and I can't think of any animal that fits that description. Next, marine biologist Shea Conger discusses the possibility that this is a creature from another planet. It's been conjectured based on some witnesses that this might be an extraterrestrial but this to me looks like a really normal object. It's in pretty shallow water so it doesn't seem like there's anything particularly mysterious about it. It does seem like it's moving pretty dynamically in the water and that could either point to the fact that this is something that's alive or it's just something that's really flexible and catching the incoming tide and currents as they come in. Based on the fact that this object is not really making any advanced or directed movements, I can pretty much rule out that this is some kind of alien or extraterrestrial creature. But even though she doesn't believe this figure is an alien, Conger still thinks the evidence points towards something strange and unexpected. It's not navigating its environment, it's just waving a lot. Hydrologically if this were an animal you would see something like a wake or disturbance at the surface. So because of that I don't think this is a living self-propelled item. I believe this is probably some sort of plastic or other type of debris that's being moved around in the water. Conger points out that more than 10 million tons of plastic waste enter the oceans each year and between the angular shape of the object, the lack of a wake, and its dark reflective nature, all signs point to this being a large piece of plastic floating in the current. The verdict? This is just some floating debris. We didn't spot Bo Nessie this time, but rest assured we will keep a keen eye out for more sightings in time. February 2022, it is a warm winter night off the coast of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, and a fisherman is cruising home after a long day on the water, but he soon notices he has some unexpected company. The boat speeds along, its motor creating a wake behind, when out from the water emerges a glowing yellow-eyed creature. The creature appears to be following the boat. Again and again it jumps from the waters, revealing its piercing eyes before diving into the craft's wake. The pursuit is ominous. The fisherman even captures the video with a phrase that translates as it wanted to attack me. Take another look. This thing's glowing eyes are striking. The sea of five, six, seven, eight foot long thing coming out of the water with glowing eyes. I wouldn't want to be on that boat. Field researcher Cliff Barrickman says the creature could be a particular figure from Brazilian folklore, the Minhocau. The Minhocau is reported to resemble a giant worm covered in black scales and two tentacles attached to its head. It's said to drag cows and horses into the water and drown them before it devours them. Barrickman then wonders if it could be a documented yet equally peculiar species. Another possible candidate is the Boto Cordeirosa or the Amazonian River Dolphin. Since these mammals are unique to this region, they've become fodder for local myth. One of the stories is that they can change into a man and they find the unattended females. They seduce them and so when kids don't know their father, they say they're children of a river dolphin. But if we set aside the supernatural angle, is it possible this is one of these rare dolphins? And if so, why is it seemingly hungry for humans? Brazil is one of the most biodiverse countries in the world, estimated to have about 4 million plant and animal species, about 20 times more than the United States. So it's easy to see why there are so many possible explanations for this creature. Let's see if our experts have any ideas. Biologist Floyd Hayes torpedoes the Minhocau theory because of speed. The Minhocau allegedly has a worm-like or eel-like body, but this cannot be a Minhocau because eel-like creatures don't swim very fast. Hayes estimates this creature could be swimming at 15 miles per hour, but eels max out at a measly 2.4 miles an hour. Electric eels can jump out of the water, but not in this undulating way. They only emerge from the waters to defend themselves against predators. They do not use this behavior as a means of hunting prey. Marine biologist Dr. Shay Conger considers the river dolphin theory. Amazonian river dolphins are actually very light in color. They've been described as bubble gum pink. This animal is very dark and also doesn't have a beak like a dolphin, and I don't see anything like a dorsal fin. So this is not some kind of a dolphin. Conger hits on another more feasible possibility. One possible species is a leopard seal. Leopard seals are known to be very aggressive. They're top tier predators that can swim at least 20 miles per hour, so it would easily be able to keep up with this little boat. You think of seals as lovable, but leopard seals are apex predators. They eat penguins, even sharks. Keep in mind, they weigh more than many bears and have teeth designed to shred blubber and crush bones. In 2003, one even tragically killed a marine biologist. So is this a leopard seal on the hunt for humans? And what about those glowing eyes? Leopard seals have the tapetum lucidum, like a deer, the reflective membrane in their eye. It maximizes the visible light because it reflects it into the front of the eye, so it's almost like a self-designed flashlight. Because seals spend time at depth and the ocean hunting prey, the better you can see in that type of environment, the more you can survive. So because of all of that, I think this is a leopard seal. Dr. Conger had us convinced, but we couldn't resist sending the footage to our video forensic analyst, Michael Primo, and he had a surprise. It's clear that this area of the image was different than the rest of the image, which is an indication that it was overlaid. There's also a difference in this shadow area. The eyes are essentially moving away from that region at some points. Like here is where we see the difference in the eyes. And if it was actually moving too fast for the camera to be able to interpret, I would expect to see some motion blur, but this is a doubling effect where those frames are essentially being produced twice, which is not an accurate depiction from that original camera. If this was genuine and was recorded in real life, the macro block motion vectors would indicate that. And thus the verdict is that this is fake. Our verdict, this was a hoax. It's possible the video overlaid footage of a real leopard seal, so Dr. Conger's analysis might be spot on, but there's definitely some video shenanigans involved here. April, 2022, a couple in their fifties holiday in the Scottish Highlands. After waking up early on a Monday morning and heading out with their camera, the couple is taking in the eerie sight of the still waters of Loch Ness when they record this. Take a closer look as we zoom in and sharpen the image. It looks like a creature moving through the water. So admittedly, this video was hard to make out, but I want to draw your attention to a couple of features that really intrigue us. First of all, it is this wake that leads us to believe that this is actually a creature moving through the water. And then this hump right here is so consistent with other sightings of the Loch Ness monster. Some researchers have called this the most significant footage to come off Loch Ness in the last 20 years. It doesn't seem to have an artificial or staged quality. It seems like whatever they're filming is actually there in Loch Ness. Field researcher Ken Gerhardt says the elusive legendary creature affectionately known as Nessie has actually had its fair share of caught on camera moments. The first compelling image of the Loch Ness monster dates from November of 1933. And then in April of 1934, something known as the surgeon's photo surfaced. It appeared to show a small head, a long neck, and a hump protruding out of Loch Ness and quickly achieved worldwide fame. Unfortunately, in the 1990s, researchers proved that the surgeon's photo was in fact a hoax. But the sightings continue to this day. Nessie is often described as an aquatic creature having two humps, which has led to the theory that there is a surviving plesiosaur swimming beneath the surface of the Plesiosaurs were an archaic marine reptile that lived alongside the dinosaurs up until the end of the Cretaceous period, about 65 million years ago. They were about 20 or 30 feet long. They had a very big body with a long neck and a small head, four flippers and a very powerful tail. And in some respects, this does fit some of the eyewitness accounts of Nessie. But Gerhardt says there's a reason why many Nessie sightings remain unexplained to this day. Loch Ness is incredibly deep, up to 754 feet. And what's really problematic in terms of research is that the water is very dark. Despite those challenges, researchers have managed to collect compelling evidence that something is lurking in the loch. Dating back to 1954, there have been literally dozens of sonar contacts with large animate objects swimming in Loch Ness, 20 to 30 feet long, usually serpentine in shape. And as recently as this year, there was a sonar contact at a depth of about 500 feet of a large serpentine unidentified object about 20 to 30 feet long, further adding to the body of evidence that the Loch Ness monster exists. Loch Ness holds an estimated 263 billion cubic feet of water, which is more than all the water and all the lakes, rivers and reservoirs in the whole of England and Wales combined. So could this video be the latest proof that Nessie is somewhere in there? We turned to our experts to find out. Forensic video expert Michael Primo determines if this video is yet another hoax. In terms of authenticity, nothing appears to be CGI. The video appears to be consistent and plays consistently. No editing or splicing was detected through the media interrogation, digital information analysis through medics. We were able to confirm the authenticity of this video, and it is genuine. So if a video is real, what are we looking at? We turned to marine biologist Dr. Shea Conger to break it down. You can actually see based on the other objects around it that not only is this animal moving through the water, it's actually navigating. You can see it turn towards the shoreline. To me, that means it's not something being towed or something stuck in the water. This is actually a really large animal, I think, moving across the surface of Loch Ness. So could a dinosaur thought to be extinct for 65 million years really survive in the frigid, murky waters of Loch Ness? Plesiosaurs did actually inhabit this area, but plesiosaurs were known to be very large, voracious predators. So there would have to be a lot of food to support a remnant dinosaur. It would be very difficult for an animal like a plesiosaur to obtain enough food. So I can rule out that this is some sort of living dinosaur. Furthermore, Conger says that in one of the biggest DNA studies of its kind, scientists from New Zealand's Otago University were able to identify the presence of around 3,000 species in the deep, dark waters of Loch Ness. This 2019 study actually ruled out the idea of some plesiosaur living in Loch Ness because there was no genetic material associated with that that was found. DNA from whales and dolphins was also identified in Loch Ness by the researchers. Conger rules those out, though, because you can't see a dorsal fin in the video. But she does have one guess. The eDNA study actually showed a lot of eel DNA in Loch Ness, and this brings the possibility that maybe the Loch Ness monster is actually just a large eel being sighted at the surface. If it is an eel, it's huge, which is fascinating in itself. There's still a mystery that's going on, and we're not really sure what we're seeing in Loch Ness. Our verdict? We're going to say this is possibly a gigantic eel, though we can't say for certain what species. Perhaps one that hasn't been discovered yet. But the mystery is far from solved, so we'll keep our eyes peeled for more evidence. It's March 2020, a hot and humid day in the Brazilian Amazon. Local fishermen are crossing the Xingu River when they encounter an extraordinary sight. At first, it almost looks like waves or ripples, but let's have a closer look. It's some kind of gigantic snake. This thing is nightmarish, and by one estimate, it's 50 feet long. Field researcher Ken Gerhart says it immediately reminds him of the legendary river serpent known as Boryuna, a gigantic mythical deity of South America. It's described as being an enormous black snake or serpent, and it's considered to be a guardian of sorts, that it actually stands guard at certain sacred places. But huge snakes aren't just part of folklore, they're actually part of the Amazonian fossil record. This is the prehistoric predator Titanoboa, which measured more than 40 feet long, its midsection as wide as a man's waist. It weighed over a ton and could stay underwater for as long as 45 minutes. This thing did in fact exist, and in this kind of habitat. Who's to say that they're all gone? The fossil record shows that Titanoboa went extinct millions of years ago, but field researcher Cliff Barrickman notes that sometimes, allegedly extinct species turn up alive and well. Example, the famous coelacanth fish. The coelacanth fish was thought to be extinct for millions of years, like 20 million years, until it was discovered in the 1930s swimming around in the oceans off of Indonesia. So we should expect to be discovering animals that were either thought to be extinct or are related to extinct animals. Wow. Is the creature in the video some kind of relic species, some extremely large cousin of the Titanoboa that somehow survived? And when the Amazonian tribespeople described Boyuna, the Serpent River God, could they really have been talking about something real? We turn to our experts. I mean, this is extraordinary. Wildlife biologist Lucy Eckersley finds the video remarkable. It could be that this snake is a living relic of Titanoboa, something that could trace its lineage back to that enormous animal. But she thinks the serpent might be too big to be believed. I think that this is an incredible sighting of an enormous snake. I think that this video has been stretched and manipulated to make it look even more enormous than it really was. So we head back to forensic video analyst Michael Primo to authenticate the footage. This video has left me baffled. We have a rippling effect that's consistent with the movements of the snake, which is a level of consistency that would be incredibly difficult to manufacture. If it has been changed, it's been changed to a minimal degree. So could it be a relative of Titanoboa? Marine biologist Dr. Shea Conger says that even if the video is totally legit, the creature's distended midsection is key evidence. It appears to have consumed a very large prey, possibly a capybara or some type of ungulate. From what we know about the Titanoboa, they primarily consumed fish. Based on that dietary profile, Conger concludes this is a giant anaconda. But interestingly, she is not prepared to dismiss the notion that it could still be the god Boyuna. The people that inhabit this area have spent centuries living around these animals. The division between the deity and the biological creature are not two different things. So to deny the fact that this animal may embody a regional deity or religious icon is outside the scope of what science should do. So with that guidance in mind, our verdict, this is a giant anaconda. And whether you want to call it a predator, a deity or some combination of both depends on how close you live to it. October 2016, Craig McKay of Alaska's Bureau of Land Management is overlooking the Chena River in Fairbanks when he notices something extremely peculiar in the water. It looks to be around 20 to 25 feet long. And when we zoom in, it appears to be swimming against the current. I looked down and saw this really bizarre object. It was much larger than anything I'd seen in the river and undulating or swinging back and forth in the current. It was really spooky. Given the location of this discovery, field researcher Ken Gerhardt says we should consider the local folklore. In Alaska, we do have a number of legends of water creatures. The Inuit culture talks about something called the tizharuk, which is a long serpentine animal with a long head, a prominent tail fin. There are many tales of the tizharuk actually snatching people off of bridges or out of canoes and devouring them voraciously. Gerhardt says descriptions of the tizharuk vary, but the most terrifying form is said to be a giant eel-like creature with transparent skin, which not only allows observers to see still digesting victims, but also makes the creature less visible when stalking its prey. In addition, we have the Lake Iliamna monster, which is also known as the Jig-Ignak. This particular monster has been reported several times. It's described as being 10 to 30 feet in length with a torpedo-shaped body and kind of a dull aluminum color. So, you know, we have to ask the question, could this be related to those stories? Early stories of the Jig-Ignak described fish-like monsters traveling in groups and attacking canoes. So is that or one of its descendants what we're looking at here? Let's let the experts decide. Marine biologist Dr. Shea Conger says if this thing were a snake, it's unlikely to have accumulated snow on his back. And as for serpents... There's no water snakes in Alaska. This is because reptiles and amphibians are exotherms. They're reliant on the environment to maintain their body heat, and there really isn't enough heat to allow these species to persist in this area. So Dr. Conger turns for clues to the hydrology of the scene, the motion of the water. It seems to kind of be moving back and forth through the water, as you would expect an animal with a tail to be swimming against the current. But hold on, look again. When the video zooms out a little bit, you can actually see that this object doesn't seem to be moving forward at all. Rather, it's just fixed in place and being hit by the moving current downriver. Therefore, I conclude this isn't a biological object. Rather, it's some type of debris like a piece of rope or fishing line encased in ice. So there you have it. Our verdict? Based on Dr. Conger's hydrology analysis, this is a frozen rope. But sightings of Alaskan lake and river monsters continue to this day. Are they all misidentifications? Or is there really something down there? We'll keep looking for more video until we have an answer.