HAS LEGENDARY NAZI GHOST TRAIN BEEN FOUND?

Could two treasure hunters have found a legendary Nazi train packed with gold that vanished 70 years ago?

It's a question authorities in Poland's mountainous southwestern Walbrzych district are taking seriously.

It seems on its face unlikely. But not impossible.

The train reputedly went missing in 1945, at the end of World War II, when the Soviet Red Army was closing in on the forces of Nazi Germany.

As local lore has it, the train left Wroclaw, then part of Germany and known as Breslau, for Walbrzych, but never reached its destination.

Now two people, a German and a Pole, say they have found a 490-foot (150-meter) train they claim contains Nazi treasure that could be worth "well over a million dollars," said Marika Tokarska, an official at the Walbrzych district council.

Through a local law firm, they contacted the Walbrzych district council a week ago with news of their find.

But they won't reveal the train's location without a guarantee that they will be awarded 10% of the value of the treasure, she told CNN.

As a military train, it could contain weapons, possibly including unexploded bombs. And local authorities say it could be carrying early Nazi research into nuclear technology, Tokarska said.

To add to the danger, if the train is sealed in an underground tunnel, methane could have built up, creating the risk of an explosion if it is disturbed by excavators, she said.

Once authorities know the location, they will secure it and make sure investigations are carried out as safely as possible, said Tokarska.

If the treasure hunters' claim proves true, it will lay to rest rumors stretching back decades, according to Polish media.

And if they get the 10% share they have demanded, they stand to profit handsomely.

Local media outlets are reporting that the train could hold up to 300 tons of gold, Tokarska said.

To read the complete article, see:
Have treasure hunters found missing Nazi train stuffed with gold? (www.cnn.com/2015/08/20/europe/poland-nazi-train-mystery/)

Mr Marciniak, like many others, is quick to stress everybody has heard stories about the train and its gold before, and how people have tried and failed in the past to gain their fame and fortune by finding it. What sets this time apart from the others, he pointed out, is that the two claimants have taken a legal step by filing a claim with the local authorities in Walbrzych in the hope of attaining a finder’s fee of 10 per-cent of the value of the find.

This is a measure nobody before has taken, and has fuelled speculation that this time somebody may have actually found something.

But just where the train might have been found remains unknown. The two who have claimed to have found it have kept the location under wraps, saying, through their lawyer, that they may reveal their secret to the president of Walbrzych next week. But until then the location stays secret.

The local press have claimed one place the train could lie is the village of Walim. Stretched along a valley some 12 miles west of Walbrzych and overlooked by the forested Owl Mountains, Walim has emerged as a contender for the location because its hills are home to some of the Project Riese tunnels.

One of the biggest construction projects in the history of the Third Reich, Project Riese involved digging miles of tunnels in a series of complexes across the Walbrzych region, which was until 1945 part of Germany. Thousands of slave labourers died hewing the rock for reasons that still remain unclear. Some say the tunnels were for a secret command centre, others claim they were for underground factories for Hitler’s secret weapons, or even hid research on an atomic bomb.

To this day not all the tunnels have been explored so believers in the gold train legend say the locomotive and its cargo may still lie hidden in a secret siding.

Further up the valley at the entrance to Walim’s Reise tunnels, now a tourist attraction, Marcin Pasek, shakes his head at talk of finding the gold train. A tunnel guide for five years he has heard the legend many times and it still fails to ring true for him.

“I have my reservations about this,” he said with a slight laugh. “There has been talk but no evidence. Maybe there was some treasure but why leave it on a train? In the past Nazi loot has always been found in boxes: never on a train. Or maybe somebody has found a train, but perhaps it’s just an old abandoned train with no treasure.”

To read the complete article, see:
On the hunt for the Nazi gold train: Inside the Polish tunnels that may hold the bullion (www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/11818136/On-the-hunt-for-the-Nazi-gold-train-Inside-the-Polish-tunnels-that-may-hold-the-bullion.html)

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