Loch Ness Survey Finds Deeper Lake and Mystery Object

LONDON — The most expensive, sophisticated survey of Scotland’s Loch Ness unraveled some of the lake’s secrets but shed no further light on the legend of the monster, scientists said Wednesday.

Investigators using high-technology sonar equipment found the lake was even deeper than originally thought and came across a large mystery object during their exhaustive search, but they are unable to explain what it might have been.

“If you are talking fish, it would be shoals of fish, but there are no shoals of fish here,” Bob Manson, who was working the sonar, told a news conference.

Organizers of the expedition, named Project Urquhart, declined to speculate on whether the mysterious sonar contact, which lasted two minutes, could have been the monster, affectionately known as “Nessie.”

One thing the scientists did establish was that the lake was even deeper than had first been thought. The new figure of 846 feet exceeds by 92 feet the previous greatest known depth, recorded in 1903.