Location: Lake Brosno, North- West of Andreapol, Tver Oblast Map
Elevation: 243 meters
Length: 10.8 km
Wide: 4 km
Area: 7.2 sq km
Shore length 16.2 km
Maximum depth: 41.5 m
Average Length: 17 m
The Brosno monster is a cryptid like a dragon, according to local
beliefs, supposedly living in Lake Brosno in the Tver region of
Russia. The monster is known from the words of “eyewitnesses” of
local residents, most of them talk about the lizard in words, but
some, supposedly, were even “lucky” to take photographs of it.
According to eyewitness descriptions, this creature is scaly,
like a reptile, measuring at least five meters.
This story began, as usual, with a legend. In ancient Rus', people
believed that a monster living at the bottom was taking revenge on
everyone who came to Russian land with unkind thoughts. The first
who knew the righteous anger of the monster, according to
references, was the leader of the robbers, who planned to transport
the stolen goods across the lake.
As soon as the loaded ship
was on the water, a terrible creature with a huge mouth rose from
the depths and began to destroy the vessel, simultaneously devouring
all the bad people. Since then, Lake Brosno has gained a bad
reputation.
However, in ancient times people could sincerely
believe in something creepy and frightening, because they simply did
not understand what was really happening. Time passed, and now in
modern Russia, talk about a terrible lake began.
According to
another legend, Batu’s troops stopped at the shore of the lake. At
night, the warriors heard a strong splash of water, and then saw a
huge monster climb ashore and attack the people. The army fled in
horror. The Khan considered this a bad sign and ordered the army to
retreat. This version may have a completely logical explanation. The
fact is that in the Middle Ages a large road was built along the
lake. It is quite possible that foreign merchants, having learned
about the Mongol invasion, simply asked for all their goods and ran
away. Among this goodness there could have been exotic overseas
animals, including small crocodiles. In medieval castles throughout
Europe you will find the skulls of dragons killed by St. George. In
fact, these are crocodiles that once lived with rich people.
According to the stories of local residents, during the Great
Patriotic War, the monster swallowed a German pilot who ejected from
a downed plane into the waters of Lake Brosno. Some claim to have
seen the scaly head of the monster above the surface of the lake
even today.
In 1992, a resident of one of the surrounding
villages saw “something” reminiscent of an ancient dinosaur, about 5
meters long, basking on the coastal sand.
In 2001, word
quickly spread that a monster had allegedly killed a little girl,
right in front of her parents. There were rumors that one day a boat
washed ashore, containing the bodies of several young people.
According to the stories, all three faces were distorted with
horror. All these stories created fear among the villagers.
The Brosno monster gained mass popularity after the publication of
an article about it in the weekly magazine “Karavan + Ya”. The
weekly's correspondents repeatedly went on expeditions to the lake,
but they did not receive any documentary evidence of the existence
of the monster.
In June 2002, on the TNT channel, in the
Segodnychko program, the reality show “Behind the Monster” was
broadcast on weekdays. In it, a group of volunteers tried to find
the monster of Lake Brosno by interviewing residents and exploring
the area. However, by the final episode of the show, they were still
unable to obtain solid evidence of the monster's existence. They
found huge beaver dams in the forest, which allowed them to assume
that local residents mistook a large beaver for the monster. It was
also found that hydrogen sulfide hydrates, formed from the remains
of plants in local forests, accumulate under the bottom of Lake
Brosno. They are under pressure from the water column, but as soon
as you “disturb” them with a thrown anchor or something else, they
immediately float to the surface, bubbling and exploding. The
processes in the lake are close in their mechanism to gas volcanism,
as a result of which some people could be knocked over from boats
and they, in fear, mistook what was happening for a monster attack.
On the TNT channel, an investigation into the phenomenon of the
Brosnensky monster was shown in the program “Inexplicable, but true”
(episode “Lake of Madness”).
Cosmopoisk expeditions have
repeatedly visited the lake. Research was carried out using echo
sounders, a helicopter for aerial reconnaissance, with the
involvement of scuba divers, etc. Based on materials from
expeditions of 2002-2007, it was concluded that the so-called Brosno
monster is accumulations of gas emerging from the depths of the lake
to the surface.