Although it is not officially recognized by any official body, the Bermuda Triangle is a place that has been the site of numerous mysterious disappearances.
From ships sinking under strange circumstances to planes abruptly crashing, the Bermuda Triangle is shrouded in legend and mystery. Throughout its known history, the triangle has taken a number of victims and continues to be one of the most mysterious places on earth.
One of the first recorded incidents that took place in the Bermuda Triangle was in the late 19th century. The crew of a British ship called the Ellen Austin found an old, worn out ship. They decided to place a small crew on the ship and attempt to sail across the Bermuda Triangle to New York.
There are various stories surrounding what happened after this, but they all end with the mysterious disappearance of the crew and ship. Regardless of what happened, it certainly creates an air of eeriness around the mysterious triangle.
In 1918, the Bermuda Triangle claimed yet another victim. The USS Cyclops, along with a crew of 309 men and a large load of manganese ore, departed from the Barbados Islands on March 4, and was never heard from again. This marked the largest loss of life in the history of the US Navy not related combat.
Shortly after the disappearance of the USS Cyclops her two sister ships, known as Proteus and Nereus, also disappeared in the same area. While there are a few scientific theories as to what caused their disappearance, no one knows for sure why they were never seen again.
At the end of January in 1921, yet another ship appeared to have become a victim of the Bermuda Triangle. The Carroll A. Deering was found abandoned on the coast of North Carolina. Its crew was never heard from again.
It is suspected that this particular ship was a victim of piracy, attributing it to the illegal alcohol trading going on during this time due to the Prohibition. Oddly the ship and crew of the SS Hewitt also disappeared around this same time taking with it the crew thought responsible for the disappearance of the Deering crew.
Ships are not the only victims that Bermuda Triangle. There have also been a number of aircraft that have mysteriously disappeared when trying to fly through or near the Bermuda Triangle. Flight 19 is just one of these flights.
Flight 19 was composed of a group of five Avenger bombers on a navigation training mission. They went missing on December 5, 1945. When they never returned to base, a search and rescue aircraft was sent to look for them and it also disappeared.
At the time that the search and rescue flight disappeared it was recorded that a tanker cruising off the coast of Florida had reported a large explosion. This was believed to have been the rescue aircraft.
In 1948 and 1949, almost exactly a year apart, the Star Ariel and the Star Tiger, both flights that were either leaving or going to Bermuda, disappeared. Neither plane was ever found nor were their crews or passengers heard from again.
Both of these planes were operated by the British South American Airlines. The explanation behind the disappearance of these two planes is that both were operating at the limits of their functionality.
Yet another victim claimed by the Bermuda Triangle was a leisure yacht Connemara IV whose crew disappeared in 1955. The yacht, without its crew, was found on the coast of Bermuda in 1955. The legend says that the ship had survived being on the waters in the middle of three different hurricanes, only to later appear off the coast, after having already lost all of its crew members.
Two of the most recent victims of the Triangle were two US KC-135 Stratotankers that crashed into the Atlantic Ocean in 1963. Some people claim that the aircraft collided, and that is what caused the crash.
Others point out that there are two distinct crash sites that are over 160 miles away from each other, meaning that a collision of the two airplanes could not have been the reason for their crash.
While scientists have attempted to explain away many of the stories and legends surrounding the Bermuda Triangle, still many believe there is something strange about this place. The preceding is just a small sampling of the many planes and ships that have disappeared to the hundreds of lives that have been lost in and around the Triangle.
Many have mundane explanations, but others defy explanation despite extensive research. Regardless of what skeptics claim, the Bermuda Triangle continues to be undeniably one of the most intriguing places on earth.
