Lake Norman Monster?

Is it possible a monster lurks in a man made lake?

Lake Norman was created by Duke Power as part of the construction of the Cowans Ford Dam. It has 520 miles of shoreline and a surface area of more than 32,500 acres. Lake Norman is North Carolina’s largest man-made lake and was created between 1959 and 1964. The monster, if it does exist, could hide in 130 feet of water in the lake’s deepest part (the south end at the Cowans Ford Dam). The average depth of Lake Norman is only around 30 feet.

Descriptions of Normie, as it is known, range from a crocodilian like creature to the more classic three humped serpent, most seem to agree that the beast is more fish like, with a slender body, thick whisker like appendages, flippers and a ragged looking dorsal fin.

One of the better known sightings was reported by a teenager, S. Campbell of Maiden, North Carolina. His testimony : About ten years ago in high school some friends and I were jumping from the Duke Power trestle. We had been there for about 2 hours and making a lot of noise. I went to dive in and decided to make a huge splash. When I arose to the surface everyone was like get out of the water! Yelling and screaming that something was after me. I shrugged it off and then after realizing that the water 20 feet behind me was rippling I decided to swim like crazy! I reached the surface and climbed up the rocks to see a giant shadow under the water. It was at least 14 feet long!! It surfaced a little more before finally going down, it had to be an alligator gar, but I couldn't imagine a fish getting that big! It looked like 2 people holding on to each other swimming. So who knows what it was? Needless to say I haven't been back to jump from the trestle anymore!

One of the more recent sighting of Normie , according to the Lake Norman Monster’s official website was reported by a man named Tyler from Fox River Grove, IL on January 22, 2007 :

So I was on vacation with my dad and we were on the lake. I was tubing and I had just fallen off from a quick turn. I floated in the water waiting for the boat and as I did I saw a large neck emerge from the water about 5 feet in the air. I was terrified because it was only about 40 meters from me and I don't know if this thing is mean or not. I quickly turned and started swimming towards the boat as my dad sped towards me because he saw it too. When I got on the boat he said it disappeared right after I turned around. We have had a good story to tell ever since.

Another North Carolina resident claims to have seen the Lake Norman Monster. She said she had only visited her friend’s lake house but she saw something so terrible that made her swear never to come back to that place again. She claimed she saw the creature come out of the water. Its head, she described as looking like that of a prehistoric dinosaur. It had a brown-coloured neck was about ten feet long and its eyes are horrifyingly bright and large.
There has been a reported 50 sightings in the last 40 years.

There have been various theories put forward from cat fish to crocodile and there is a rumour about a biological experiment that possibly went wrong. Some years ago, Arkansas Blue Catfish and Wyoming Buffalo Carp were reportedly cross-bred in hopes of producing a fish that would grow to 1,000 pounds and provide excellent table fare. Rumours were that these fish were stocked in Lake Norman.

For more information see here:

http://www.lakenormanmonster.com/home.shtml