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Loch Ness Monster hunters get help from Google

Now anyone can go looking for "Nessie," the mythical monster of Scotland's Loch Ness lake from the comfort of their home.
/ Source: TODAY

Now anyone can go looking for “Nessie,” the mythical monster of Scotland’s Loch Ness lake from the comfort of their home, or any place else with an Internet connection.

Google loch ness celebration
Google loch ness celebration

In honor of an iconic, grainy photo taken 81 years ago of what appears to be the curved head of a creature making its way through rippling lake waters, Google dedicated its homepage Doodle to Nessie with a drawing of an alien-filled submarine.

Google Maps also unveiled a new feature: a 360-degree Street View image of the legendary Loch Ness lake. It also captured a series of photographs taken deep beneath the surface of the murky, peak-filled waters.

Although the 1934 picture that became known as “Surgeon's Photograph” was revealed to be a hoax, the image has stuck with many who have hunted down the creature over the following decades.

“Like the world’s best legends, the Loch Ness Monster transcends the everyday and exists at the edges of possibility,” Google says in a blog post. “It lives in the telling of stories. Whether or not you believe, most people hold a romanticized vision of the creature that, legend has it, plumbs the depths of the Loch.”

Loch Ness
A view of Loch Ness from Fort Augustus in Scotland.Jeff J Mitchell / Getty Images

For the project, Google partnered with Adrian Shine, the head of Loch Ness & Morar Project who has logged more than 1,000 Nessie sightings, according to Google.

The search engine company also pieced together a series of underwater photographs taken beneath the Loch Ness surface by Catlin Seaview Survey.