Lake Baikal has perfect conditions for mirages formation: streams of warm air above cool water in summer, transparent atmosphere and strong frosts with still air masses in winter. The number of days with mirages at Baikal normally varies from 2 to 16; while seeing them is a great luck for tourists, the local fishermen often tell about ancient castles, old ships and trains, and even UFO witnessed above Baikal.

Mirages are regularly registered near the north-eastern part of Olkhon Island, the Sunny cape and Bolshoi Ushkanij Island. The Baikal fishermen call this phenomenon “golomenitsa” – when remote objects appear closer and become distinctly visible, although in normal conditions they are almost impossible to see. The most common type of mirages here is remote capes floating above the lake waters. They mainly occur when the wind direction is changing.

Dwellers of the local villages Bolshie Koty and Bolshoe Goloustnoe have also witnessed unusual mirages when they could distinctly see a village located on the opposite coast and could even count the houses, although the distance between the coasts exceeds 40 kilometres and in normal conditions the village is not available for being seen by the human eye even with the help of a binocular.

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In the water area of Baikal it is also possible to see turned upside-down mirror silhouettes of ships that are perceived as some big mysterious and unexplained objects floating above water. Sometimes one can see a reflection of the remote Baikal capes and islands lifted high above water. The local newspapers regularly publish notes about mirages. Thus, once one of the Irkutsk newspapers has reported about witnessing a mirage in the village Bolshie Koty when a fairy village consisting of small orange houses hanged above water. The witnesses claimed they could distinctly see the lights in the houses windows. That mirage was similar to those famous ones in Greenland and England when people could see big unknown cities with castles and temples hanging in the sky for up to 3 hours.

In 1957 one of the Baikal researchers V.V. Lamakin described a rare night mirage that he witnessed not far from the village Bolshoe Goloustnoe. “The day before strong south-western wind was blowing but when we were on our way back, the weather was quite still. The night happened to be very dark. When I came out to the deck I could see a stunning sight. In front of me, somewhere one kilometre away, a passenger train was flowing in the sky. In reality the train was on the opposite coast of Baikal 50 kilometres away. The ghost train was moving soundlessly; it was not possible to hear any train sounds from such a distance. In fact the carriages were not distinctly seen but we could see its lit windows and silhouettes of the passengers. The train stopped for a few minutes and then went on moving…”

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Source:
    babr.ru

Translated by Lavrentyeva Natalya