14 Strange Things Found Lying At The Bottom Of Lakes

Some lakes are full of the weirdest trash.... and for some that means treasure

Stephanie

• Published in Interesting
• October 5, 2020

We all know that the ocean is a place filled with mysteries and secrets. It's infinitely deep, dark, and it's crazy BIG, so there's no way anyone can ever cover every part of it.

Interestingly, even with all the technology we possess today, some lakes seem to be as mysterious as the grand ocean is. In fact, if you search the bottom of any lake, there is almost guaranteed to be some random and crazy items down there.

Every now and then, someone will do just that and find the weirdest and most wonderful items. Luckily for us, these 14 people decided to document what they found!

#1 A Statue Of Jesus At The Bottom Of Lake Michigan

Apparently, there's an 11-foot white marble cross with a life-sized statue of a crucified Jesus Christ laying at the bottom of Lake Michigan. The statue was crafted in Italy in 1956 after being requested by a family who lost their 15-year-old son to a tragic accident.

Sadly, the crucifix was damaged on its way from Italy to the US and the family refused to take it. Instead, it was sold to a diving team and lowered into the lake as a memorial to divers who passed away.

#2 The Mystery Of Foss Lake

In September 2013, two rusting vintage cars were discovered at the bottom of Foss Lake, Oklahoma. Later it turned out that these cars contained six dead bodies. One of the cars contained bodies of three teenagers—Jimmy Allen Williams, 16, Leah Gail Johnson, 18, and Thomas Michael Rios, 18—who disappeared after going out for a drive back in 1970. The other bodies belonged to three passengers—John Alva Porter, 69, Cleburn Hammack, 42, and Nora Marie Duncan, 58—who went missing in 1969.

Apparently, medical examiners have stated that all six people died from drowning and the deaths were ruled as accidental.

#3 The Underwater Stonehenge Found Underneath Lake Michigan

In 2007, Mark Holley, professor of underwater archaeology at Northwestern Michigan College, discovered a series of stones arranged in a circle 40 feet below the surface of Lake Michigan. The set of stones is aligned in a mile-long line, forming a close-to-perfect circle. The formation is believed to be over 10,000 years old.

There are some unique things about this arrangement. First of all, they all measure almost the same distance across. In addition, one stone appears to have a carving of a mastodon, an animal that sort of resembles an elephant that went extinct over 10,000 years ago.

#4 200 Skeletons Near A Himalayan Lake

About 200 human skeletons were discovered near Roopkund, a remote lake high in the Himalayan Mountains, by a British forest guard in 1942. At first, it was believed that these skeletons belonged to Japanese soldiers who had died during World War II. However, in 2004, scientists were able to date the skeletons back to around 850 AD! Apparently, the remains belonged to Indian tribesmen who died due to a hail storm.

#5 A Missing Leg

In 2006, two men from Germantown stumbled upon a leg sticking out of a beaver dam while canoeing. At first, they thought that it was a dead body that someone had dumped into the lake. But after taking a closer look, they realized that it was actually a prosthetic leg.

While browsing online, the men found that someone had posted on Craigslist 20 days earlier looking for a lost prosthetic leg. Turns out, it was a 49-year-old man named Mark Warner who lost his prosthetic leg on a fishing trip. Friends returned the leg to Warner and got a $50 reward for it.

#6 Fake Skeletons In The Colorado River

In 2015, a man snorkeling in the Colorado River near the Arizona and California border made a quite terrifying discovery. Apparently, the man came across two human skeletons sitting in lawn chairs about 40 feet underwater. After that, the man reported the incident to the La Paz County Sheriff’s Office. The police sent their own diver to the location and his investigation revealed that the skeletons were, in fact, plastic. These skeletons were even wearing sunglasses.

- Ocean X Team

#7 The Baltic Sea Anomaly, Wrapped In Hundreds Of Conspiracy Theories

The Baltic Sea anomaly is a mysterious, oddly shaped object that was discovered in June 2011 on the floor of the northern Baltic Sea at the center of the Gulf of Bothnia. This strange object is 210 feet long (70 meters) and it showed up on sonar laying 300 feet (100 meters) beneath the waves. The team that discovered this object and took a picture of it claimed that the image captures a circular object with features resembling ramps, stairways, and other structures not produced by nature.

There are hundreds of different speculations and conspiracy theories surrounding this mysterious object with some even claiming that it's a sunken UFO, though according to Volker Brüchert, an associate professor of geology at Stockholm University, this object is simply a glacial deposit. "My hypothesis is that this object, this structure was formed during the Ice Age many thousands of years ago," he said. "Because the whole northern Baltic region is so heavily influenced by glacial thawing processes, both the feature and the rock samples are likely to have formed in connection with glacial and postglacial processes."

Despite the findings, the team that discovered this object maintains that it's not a natural structure.

#8 Mysterious Plane

In 2013, sonar equipment revealed that there was a submerged plane at the bottom of Lake Norman in North Carolina. Many were confused about the situation, since there were no reports of a crash. Besides, divers did not discover any bodies.

Later it turned out that the plane belonged to a woman named Barbara Anderson. According to her, flight instructors who were using the plane had forgotten to put up the locking gear, so the plane simply sunk. The woman had been looking for the plane for quite a while, as no one had been able to locate it.

#9 Norwegian Lake And Nazi Nuclear Artifacts

In 1944, allied forces sank the Norwegian ferry Hydro along with its purported cargo of heavy water destined for the Nazis’ secret atomic bomb project. In case you didn't know, heavy water is a form of water with a unique atomic structure and properties coveted for the production of nuclear power and weapons.

Apparently, this mission was declared as successful, though no one established whether heavy water was actually on board. In 2005, the analysis of the contents of one of the drums showed that the cargo was indeed heavy water.

#10 Mysterious Cone-Shaped Monument Found Beneath The Sea Of Galilee

In 2013, while conducting a geophysical survey on the southern Sea of Galilee, located in the North of Israel, a group of researchers from Tel Aviv University stumbled upon an interesting cone-shaped monument at the bottom of the sea. It was revealed to be 230 feet at its base, with a height of 39 feet and an estimated weight of 60,000 tons.

Apparently, findings indicate that the structure was built on dry land approximately 6,000 years ago! In addition, according to researchers, the structure resembles early burial sites in Europe and was likely built in the early Bronze Age.

#11 The Strange Death Of Tom Sublett

On December 11th, 2012, a dead body was found floating at a marina on the Frederica River in Georgia. Later, it turned out that the body belonged to the 52-year-old county commissioner Tom Sublett. Apparently, his wife had reported him as missing the previous night when he didn't return home after a usual poker game with his friends. Sublett's car was found 150 yards from his body, parked on the shore.

One of the most bizarre things about this whole case was that the man's hands were bound in front of him, and he had suffered a gunshot wound to the head. Despite that, according to the autopsy, the man died by drowning.

Another interesting thing is that police found an empty holster in his car and ammunition, but the gun never turned up. Some, including the Glynn County medical examiner, believe that his death was a suicide.

#12 Remains Of The Ancient "Devil" Discovered In Russian Lake

In 2013, the first divers to ever reach Lake Labynkyr's floor claimed that they found unknown remains of a large creature lying there. Apparently, it was a jaw and skeletal remains that might have belonged to the notorious "devil" that was first reported by locals in the 19th century... However, the evidence was scant, so we can't be sure.

And even if didn't actually happen, Lake Labynkyr is still pretty interesting on its own. The lake is seen as one of the most mysterious in the world because even in temperatures of -76°F, its waters do not completely freeze.

#13 Live World War II Bomb

In June 1988, Navy divers discovered a live 100-pound World War II bomb in Lake Washington. To this day, no one really knows how it got there. One of the theories suggests that a warplane flying in or out of an airfield that once stood in the area may have dumped the bomb in the lake.

#14 The Underwater Ghost Town

After Texas finished its driest 12 months ever in late 2011, the vanishing water of Lake Buchanan made the remains of Bluffton, a small town in Texas, come to the surface. Drought conditions exposed relics from old Bluffton, such as tombstones from the late 1800s and the concrete foundations of several local establishments, including a hotel. Apparently, the old Bluffton was built in the mid to late 1800s. Lake Buchanan was completed and filled in 1936, which left the town of Bluffton 25 feet underwater.

- Albert Ramon

Stephanie