Years ago, a local boy was walking by Lake Kurtna Matasjarv. He noticed tracks leading into the lake, but not coming out anywhere. The lake was too small for boating or anything like that and located in the middle of nowhere. He knew that there was no good reason for those tracks being there which heightened his curiosity. For two months, he saw air bubbles emerging from this lake. After some investigation, a team started to probe deeper into the mysterious clues surrounding the lake. What they pulled from Lake Kurtna Matasjarv is nothing short of absolutely amazing.
While walking near Estonia’s Lake Kurtna Matasjarv, a young boy spotted something strange.
The path, which appeared to have been gouged into the ground, led into the water, and there was no vessel or body in sight. But there were bubbles coming from the bottom of the lake in a steady stream.
After notifying authorities, they decided to take a look at the cause of the air bubbles coming up from the lake.
They knew it was big and decided to pull whatever it was out from the mud at the bottom of the lake.
They started pulling this massive thing out at 9:00 am.
And continued pulling for 8 more hours using some very heavy equipment and giant steel cables.
They quickly realized it was a full size military tank, leaving people scratching their heads.
It had very old WW2 markings on it.
The weight of this sunken tank was around 30 tons and required a 68-ton dozer.
A lot of digging, repositioning and pulling was required to pull this tank out of the mud. This is obviously no easy job.
It was a tank from WWII in perfect condition.
The tank appeared to be a Soviet-built T34/76A.
It is now believed that the tank was abandoned in the lake to keep it out of enemy hands.
The tank, which weighed over 27 metric tons, had been at the bottom of the lake for 60+ years.
Watch the footage of the tremendous effort it took to get the old tank out of the mud:
The tank was in surprisingly good condition after they pulled it out. This thing had been sitting beneath the murky water, buried deep beneath the mud for decades. It was later confirmed that this tank was captured by the Soviet Army in 1944 and then used by the Germans. It is suspected that the tank was intentionally driven into the lake to conceal its location. The tank that was pulled from Lake Kurtna Matasjarv has since been restored and is now in full running condition.