The Bermuda Triangle is an enduring mystery that has fascinated me for many moons. Back in the 70s and 80s, it was very much the on-trend maritime mystery and there were many news and magazine articles along with books devoted to this eerie triangular space.
I’ve always been attracted to the stories of our deep blue oceans, from the tales from ancient civilisations of the Kraken, Poseidon, and Neptune to the wicked deeds of terrible pirates like Blackbeard and ‘Calico’ Jack Rackham. That’s before we consider ghost ships, huge octopuses and other creatures of the deep, whirlpools and places so remote and unfathomable we haven’t even been down there (the Mariana Trench, for one).
The idea of a triangle of sea being at the centre of the mysterious disappearance of more than 50 boats and 20 planes is thrilling, intriguing and chilling all at once. The area stretches roughly from the Florida coast to Bermuda to the Greater Antilles islands. The actual dimensions are up for discussion, but it is said to range in size from 500,000 and 1,510,000 square miles.
Unexplainable disappearances and strange occurrences were first reported in the region in the mid-19th century, although the first written account of these issues actually dates back to Christopher Columbus in the 15th century. In his journal, he wrote about his compass ‘going berserk’ when the ship touched an unseen boundary between Florida and Puerto Rico.
There are tales of ships being completely abandoned and others disappearing without a trace, with no transmitters or distress signals occurring.
The First Vanishings
In the early days, the disappearances consisted of ships and boats, the first of which was the USS Pickering in 1800. It was the first brig built for the United States Revenue Cutter Service and went on to serve many years with the United States Navy.
On orders to join Commodore Thomas Truxton’s squadron on the Guadeloupe Station in the West Indies, she sailed from New Castle, Delaware, on 20th August. That was the last anyone heard of her; the ship tragically lost with 91 people on board.
It was thought the USS Pickering disappeared in a gale sometime in September, although nothing was ever proven. The disappearance remains a mystery.
In the same storm, the USS Insurgent also vanished without a trace.
It was in 1840 that the first abandoned ship was found, the Rosalie (it may have been the Rossini). There seems to be some confusion over two stories of two different ships. It appears one did disappear and was found abandoned with only a cat, fowl and canaries left behind, sadly half-starved. It was left full of good foods, fine wines and silks and comfortable quarters. Eventually, the travellers on this ship were found in Cuba, having left of their own accord because it ran aground. The other ship vanished somewhere, presumably in the area of the Sargasso Sea in 1840. While a derelict vessel (which could have been either a ship) was towed to Nassau in the Bahamas for breaking, paperwork mix-ups occurred and it is unclear which ship it was.
So, while there may not have been anything particularly unusual about this disappearance, there are many others with unexplained circumstances. Vessels continued to vanish in the triangle, with substantial loss of life when the USS Cyclops sailed from Barbados to Baltimore on 4th March 1918 and all 306 crew and passengers perished.
The Age of Planes Begins
The first reported plane that went missing in the Bermuda Triangle was in 1945 when Thomas Arthur Garner and eleven other crew members, were lost at sea in a US Navy patrol seaplane within the Bermuda Triangle. They left their naval station in Florida to head to Great Exuma in the Bahamas for radar trading. Their last radio position report was sent near Providence Island. After that, they were never heard from again. An extensive ten-day surface and air search, including a carrier sweep, yielded no results.
Another similar disappearance occurred in 1945 when Flight 19, consisting of five torpedo bombers, was lost with 14 airmen. When it was realised they were missing later that day, the PBM Mariner was sent to look for Flight 19. Tragically it also vanished with 13 airmen onboard while searching for the missing airmen.
Most of the other planes lost in the 1940s through to the 1960s were military planes, but as private planes began to take to the skies more regularly, there were reports of domestic planes disappearing.
The Legend Was Born
It was not until a couple of decades after the planes started disappearing in the Bermuda Triangle that somebody began to suspect there was more to these vanishings than it first appeared. Journalist Vincent Gaddis wrote an article in 1964, The Deadly Bermuda Triangle, and so the legend was born.
From here on, a few witnesses came forward reporting they had ‘survived’ travelling through the Bermuda Triangle. Gerard Hawkes wrote to Vincent Gaddis after reading his article which was reprinted as part of a book. He told Vincent of a flight he took from Idlewild Airport (now John F. Kennedy International Airport) to Bermuda. He said the plane had suddenly dropped two hundred feet, as if falling in some sort of lift-shaft in the air. Then the aircraft shot back up again, almost as if it had been lifted by a magic hand. The pilot could not find Bermuda and the operator could not make any radio contact. They continued to fly until they made contact with a radio ship and found Bermuda. As they disembarked the plane, it was a clear, starry night with no wind, very much the opposite of what they had flown through. Gerard said it was as if he was caught ‘in an area where time and space seemed to disappear.’
Another witness recounts travelling 340 miles when his plane could only have covered 200 miles in the time, describing it as being in a time warp.
Time Warps and Lift-Shaft Skies
Theories were put forward by various people to explain how all these ships and planes disappeared, some more fanciful than others. One particularly controversial idea even involved the fabled lost city of Atlantis. Whirlpools were also mentioned! One theory that I feel could be regarded as credible is that some sort of vortexes, causing equipment interference, are formed from electromagnetic earth activity.
The Philadelphia Event
This is really a bit of an urban legend but it has got mixed up over years with some people using it to explain what was going on in the triangle. In 1943, the US Navy was said to have been experimenting and trying to create magnetic vortexes, resulting in a ship, the USS Eldridge, being shrouded in hazy green light before disappearing, turning up in Virginia, 1000 odd miles away from Philadelphia. Several crew members died and others went insane. This experiment was known as the Philadelphia Event and it suggests that these vortexes can exist in space-time warp objects.
Ufologists stuck their oars in, even suggesting these magnetic vortexes were attracting UFOs who were then abducting humans for alien experiments straight from the sea and sky! I can’t say that’s my number one theory.
Magnetic disturbances certainly exist across the planet and they can play havoc with electronic and navigational equipment. I’m not a scientist, but it sounds plausible that it could be a cause for all the strange activity within the Bermuda Triangle.
Mystery Solved!
Here we are in 2025, and scientific knowledge has advanced significantly since the late 20th century. Scientists have revisited the evidence and using the most up to date statistics and knowledge, when comparing the number of disappearing ships and planes, it appears there isn’t that much of a difference in the Bermuda Triangle to other areas.
In 2017, Australian scientist Karl Kruszelnicki claimed to have solved the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle. Quite simply, a few factors explain most of the disappearances despite anecdotal evidence suggesting otherwise.
Firstly, the seas beneath the Bermuda Triangle contain reefs and shallow waters, making ship navigation treacherous. There are over 300 shipwrecks around Bermuda, most of which sunk as a result of run-ins with reefs.
Combine this with highly active tropical weather systems around the Gulf Stream and you have a potential recipe for disaster. Tropical storms and hurricanes can cause intense conditions, especially from June to November. Although we now know far more about how to monitor severe weather, this hasn’t always been the case.
Kruszelnicki explained ‘The Bermuda Triangle is one of the most heavily travelled shipping lanes in the world, with vessels passing through to reach ports in the US, Europe and the Caribbean. It is close to the equator, near a wealthy part of the world, America, therefore you have a lot of traffic.’
There’s also human error to consider. One wrong move and you could hit a reef. Now, with advanced technologies, sonar’s ability to map out safe channels through which ships can travel has made seafaring through the triangle significantly less risky.
Conspiracy theories, a favourite subject of internet forums, still tout the possibility of rogue waves causing the ship disappearances. Scientists in a documentary, The Bermuda Triangle Enigma, claimed that conditions in the zone are just perfect for the creation of ‘massive rogue waves’. These are freak waves which are much larger than the ones around them, often described as walls of water. They are a serious threat to ships and they could well be responsible for some of the losses in the Bermuda Triangle. Of course, this doesn’t apply to the missing planes.
Kruszelnicki finally pointed out that the Bermuda Triangle is no more dangerous on a percentage basis, according to insurance company Lloyds of London, than other shipping areas.
The long and short of it is there probably isn’t anything too mysterious going on in the Bermuda Triangle, and its legend is now much diminished. I must admit, I’m somewhat disappointed that it’s all explainable by science. It was one of my favourite mysteries! But alack, I know it will now have to be filed away in the ‘solved’ folder.
Until next time!
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