A Diver's Encounter with the Monster

A regular on various cryptozoological blogs and forums told me this tale which she had related before to others. It was a friend of the family whose name she cannot remember and the story suggests the event perhaps happened during the Second World War. This is what she told me concerning the tale of a diver friend:

He had a facial disfigurement when his plane was shot down and after convalescence he was visited and offered a desk job, which was not him at all. They noticed diving certificates from when he was younger on his wall and suggested that was the way to go. So he did and one of his jobs was to dive under at Loch Ness. He told me when I was six. He took a job with the Pru when older and told me because I was looking at my kids encyclopaedia at the time and he'd come to collect mum's money on her insurance.

He told me casually about his encounter as I was looking at a dino picture at the time. He said he was told to go down beside a wall and had lights with him. He said while he was working he noticed something was moving above him. Thinking it was the boat he'd dived from he looked up and his goggles were filled with something just above his head, he realised it was a huge animal. He said he froze and waited for it to move again and when it floated on, he started to surface as fast as he could shining a light downwards to see what it was.

He said he saw the Loch Ness Monster, the classic plesiosaur shape was described and how it moved with his hand, which I can remember. He was a quiet religious man who never drew attention to himself, especially because of how he looked he preferred to melt into the background. He was very sincere with what he told, so I have no reason to disbelieve what he told me and for him, I would like to see whatever it is discovered.

So concludes a story we can add to the experiences of Robert Badger, James Honeyman, Duncan MacDonald, Beppo the Clown (see Badger case) and doubtless a few others as well. It is the rarest of Nessie encounters and I would wager the most unsettling when one considers you are in the monster's domain with little avenue for escape (though no casualties have ever been disclosed).

Actually, when I read the story and how the diver had gone "down beside a wall", I wondered if he was part of the diving team that were involved in the search for the body of Mrs. Hambro, who drowned in an accident at Loch Ness in 1932? I thought the wall could be the sheer drop that occurs at the Horseshoe Scree, where the accident happened. However, this event seems to have happened in the 1940s and was perhaps training at the loch for wartime operations. Did he report the event to his superiors or keep it to himself? An FOI request on wartime operations at Loch Ness would be an interesting exercise, though perhaps ultimately unfruitful.

It was also mentioned that her diver friend said the closest picture he had seen to it was a sea monster called a "Tomberino" or something like that. Off the top of my head, I don't know what that may refer to, but if anyone knows, leave a comment here. 

 

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com