‘I won the lottery’ with recent sighting

A longtime Loch Ness Monster sleuth says he “won the lottery” by recording new video of the mythical creature — possibly its eighth sighting this year — but some Nessie enthusiasts pooh-poohed the footage.

“This picture belongs in any exhibition to do with the Loch Ness Monster,” said Eoin O’Faodhagain, who recorded the moment, to the Telegraph. “I won the lottery with this video clip.”

The footage was taken Aug. 27 by O’Faodhagain, an Irishman who watches for the mythical monster over a webcam. It was the eighth time Nessie was reportedly spotted this year.

O’Faodhagain’s grainy footage shows a black mass breaking the water’s surface about 11 a.m. before quickly dunking back underwater as a boat approaches.

“I immediately knew when it first emerged and began to move that this is no large fish — fish do not have wakes,” O’Faodhagain said.

“The emergence of this creature from the water and its movement is uncharacteristic of a seal or an otter. So what could be bigger than those two creatures in Loch Ness? Only the Loch Ness Monster is the obvious choice,” he said.

O’Faodhagain said he noticed a “definite black shape of a hump,” adding that the creature he spotted was rather large. “Fifteen or 20 feet would not be an over-exaggeration.”

Nessie has reportedly been seen six times by someone at the famed lake this year, with a seventh alleged spotting recorded from a Visit Inverness Loch Ness webcam at Shoreland Lodges near Fort Augustus on the southern shore.

But while O’Faodhagain is firm in his belief that he saw the mythical Scottish creature, other Nessie enthusiasts are much more skeptical.

Steve Feltham, a full-time Nessie hunter who has lived in a van at Loch Ness for more than 30 years, told the outlet he suspected O’Faodhagain’s sighting may have been incorrect.

O’Faodhagain has been “blacklisted by anyone seriously interested in this mystery,” Feltham told the outlet. “Everyone knows his stuff is rubbish — it has been ducks and sticks for years.”

According to Feltham, nine out of 10 Nessie sightings are false alarms — including O’Faodhagain’s.

An increase in reputed false webcam sightings in recent years has led to officials tightening the criteria for what can be considered an official Nessie sighting.

O’Faodhagain’s claim will not be logged as a potential sighting, even though he insists, “The quality of the sighting could not really be any better unless you were actually standing there with a high-powered camera.”

A new visitor center in the Drumnadrochit Hotel building — where Nessie was first reportedly spotted in 1933 — opened this summer, bringing newer technology to the hunt to try and track down the mythical creature.

Webcams set up to try and view the Loch Ness Monster can be accessed online at visitinvernesslochness.com