In 1972, newspapers around the world reported that the dead body of the Loch Ness Monster had been found. A team of scientists from a Yorkshire zoo had been on a research expedition when they came across the tragic find. However, it turned out to be an elaborate prank pulled by one of their colleagues, which gained a lot more attention than he had initially planned.
A large bull elephant seal had died at the zoo some weeks earlier. The zookeeper had seen the opportunity for a prank, shaving the seal’s whiskers and padding its mouth to make it look more “Nessie-like.”
The animal was then frozen and smuggled up to Loch Ness, to be thrown into the loch for his colleagues to find. The prank gained more attention than the joker intended when police chased down the English team’s truck so that they could retrieve Nessie’s body.
