Lake Khayr (Lake Pestsovoye) is a body of water in the north of Yakutia beyond the Arctic Circle, where, according to the testimony of some eyewitnesses, a huge animal of an unknown species, similar or coinciding in descriptions with the “devil” from other Yakut lakes Labynkyr and Vorota, should have lived.
In 1939-1940, the famous Russian pilot Valentin Akkuratov often had to fly over these places. And once from a height of 700-800 meters, he noticed two long dark spots on the lake.
Having descended to a height of 50 meters, the navigator clearly saw the large bodies of unknown animals, which, frightened by the noise of the engine, disappeared into the depths. It turned out that there are at least two large animals in Lake Khayyr. But real interest in the lake appeared only after a quarter of a century.
In 1964, the deputy head of the North-Eastern expedition of Moscow State University G. N. Rukosuev said that a mysterious animal with a long snake head lives in Khayyr. Member of the biological expeditionary team of the Yakutsk branch of the USSR Academy of Sciences N. F. Gladkikh left the following written observation:
“At 7 am I took the buckets and went to the lake for water. Earlier I heard about the existence of a "devil" in the lake, but I do not believe in evil spirits, so I walked to the lake without being careful, looking at my feet so as not to stumble. Not reaching 15-20 meters, I heard something like a splash, saw that an unknown animal had crawled out of the water. His body was 4-4.5 meters long, 1.5-2 meters high, his neck was long - perhaps one and a half meters, and a flat small head, like a snake.
Its color is dark blue with a shimmer, the skin is smooth. It seemed to me that it was eating grass. I … buckets involuntarily fell out, the "monster" turned its snake head in my direction. I hardly remember what happened next, because I was very agitated … I shouted loudly, ran headlong to our camp, but, unfortunately, the detachment staff were not in the camp at that time. When I looked at the lake, I saw that waves were spreading over it, although there was no wind, the weather was calm …"
Creature from Lake Khayyr (drawing by eyewitness N. Gladkikh)
In the next year, 1965, a group of submariners and tourists went in search of the "devil", but in the lake (despite careful research of it) they did not find anything, but limited themselves to collecting legends and questioning local residents from the nearby village of Khayyr.
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According to their conclusions, the stories of the Yakuts about the lake monsters are associated only with the "bull-pike", i.e. just a big pike, possibly living here. The expedition also concluded that Nikolai Gladkikh could not observe the monster in this lake.
Later, Gladkikh himself made a statement that he had invented the whole story. By the way, nothing is known about Rukosuev's reaction to his confession.
It would seem that the sensation has been debunked and there is no monster in the lake. But not everything turned out to be so simple.
Three decades later, they started talking about Khayyr again. This time - after the appearance on the lake of the researchers of the biological team of the Yakutsk branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The detachment explored the Quaternary deposits of the Kular ridge, the scientists set up their camp on the shore of the lake.
Once, not far from the camp, from the depths of the lake, first a head appeared on the surface, then a fin on its back. The lizard beat the water with its long tail.
Inhabitants of a small Yakut village, located nearby, managed to learn that deaf sounds and strange bursts are still heard from time to time on the lake.