The Bermuda Triangle or The Devil's Triangle

The Bermuda Triangle, also known as the Devil's Triangle, is a region in the western part of the North Atlantic Ocean where a number of aircraft and surface vessels allegedly disappeared mysteriously. The Bermuda Triangle, also called the Devil's Triangle, is an imaginary area that can be roughly outlined on a map by connecting Miami, Florida; San Juan, Puerto Rico; and the Bahamas, an island chain off the coast of the United States. Within that triangular area of the Atlantic Ocean have occurred a number of unexplained disappearances of boats and planes.

The Bermuda Triangle, a sinister sea as beautiful as it is deadly. Boats never make it home. Planes vanish from the sky. There's rarely a mayday, never a trace- just baffling tragedies that seem to defy any explanation. Over the years, swarms of theories have been proposed, examined, and, for the most part, thrown back.

The area known as the Bermuda Triangle is one of the two places on Earth where a magnetic compass does point towards true north, a phenomenon called compass variation. Navigators must compensate the amount of variation or the craft they are on will go off course. A region commonly called the "Devil's Sea" in the Pacific Ocean is the other area of compass variation.

In March 1918, during World War I, the USS Cyclops vanished in the Bermuda Triangle. That ship may have been a casualty of war, but the December 1945 disappearance of Flight 19, a training squadron of five U.S. Navy torpedo bombers, became the most notorious of disappearances associated with the Bermuda Triangle. The squadron left Fort Lauderdale, Florida, with 14 crewmen and disappeared after radioing in several distress messages. A seaplane sent in search of the squadron also vanished. Those two airplane disappearances were frequently cited as the Bermuda Triangle legend grew during the 1960s and 1970s.

Other aircraft that have disappeared in the area include a DC-3 carrying 27 passengers in 1948 and a C-124 Globemaster with 53 passengers in 1951. There are many other documented disappearances that occurred within the triangle. They include a four-engine Tudor IV air-plane lost in 1948, with 31 aboard; an American freighter, the SS Sandra (1952), which sunk without a trace; a British York transport plane, disappeared in 1952, with 33 aboard; a U.S. Navy Lockheed Constellation airplane, vanished in 1954 with 42 aboard; a U.S. Navy seaplane, 1956, with a crew of 10; a French freighter in 1970; and a German freighter, Anita, lost in 1972 with a crew of 32.

The first documented encounter in the Bermuda Triangle was by Christopher Columbus (1451 – 1506) who encountered mysterious lights and compass malfunctions on his first voyage through the area. Much of the Bermuda Triangle mystery was put to rest by a book titled Bermuda Triangle: Mystery Solved by Larry Kusche, a researcher at the University of Arizona. Kusche found many of the supposed mysteries of the Triangle either occurred in other parts of the ocean or in adverse weather conditions.

The Gulf Stream, which runs the length of the Bermuda Triangle, can quickly move debris from a boat or plane accident away from scene, eradicating any trace of the incident. The Bermuda Triangle regularly experiences weather conditions such as thunderstorms, waterspouts, and hurricanes that can be potentially lethal to any craft caught in their path. Recent satellite research has proven the rogue waves, single waves reaching 80 ft or higher, occur with relative frequency in open ocean areas such as the Bermuda Triangle. These waves can damage or destroy even the largest ships.

One of the most popular recent theories to explain the Bermuda Triangle involves an electromagnetically induced fog that wreaks havoc on passing ships and planes. Self-styled physicist John Hutchison claims to have accidentally created the electronic fog that supposedly plagues the Triangle in his apartment as part of a phenomenon he has dubbed “The Hutchison Effect.”