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mysteries |
The Bermuda Triangle |
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What really lies behind the mysterious disappearances of aircraft and ships in the deadly waters around Bermuda? At just after 2pm, on 5th December 1945, Flight 19 - made up of five US Navy Avenger torpedo bombers - flew off into the crisp, clear blue skies over Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station in Florida, US. The patrol leader was a new face on the base, Lieutenant Charles C. Taylor, and this was the first step on a routine patrol over the Atlantic Ocean. Shortly before 4pm, Taylor radioed home with unfortunate news that his compass had failed and the patrol was lost out of sight of land. The control tower told him to fly due west - into the sun - until he reached land. Being new to the area, Taylor failed to realize that he was actually almost exactly on course. Instead, he called the control tower again to tell them that he thought he was over the Florida Keys. Believing that Taylor had found his bearings, the controller told him to turn again and take his patrol north. And with that, the fate of the five pilots was sealed. Even as they were turning, several of the airmen were convinced that all they had to do to reach home was follow their original instructions and head west, but their military training meant that they all stayed together and followed their commander. Heading for Disaster. A radio fix was made on the patrol at around 6pm, putting its position way out over the open waters of the Atlantic Ocean. Taylor, however, had become convinced that he was in the Gulf of Mexico, and turned east in the hope of reaching land. Flight 19, by now running rapidly out of fuel, was heading further out to sea. Although the patrol had flown out of radio broadcast range, some of the radio conversation between the pilots was overheard. The control tower staff listened in hopeless despair as Lieutenant Taylor changed course yet again. By now the planes had barely enough fuel to stay in the air. A rescue plane was dispatched from the Air Sea Rescue Station at Banana River, calling in its departure report just before 7.30pm. It was due to call in again at 8.30pm. Nothing was heard. The captain of a ship patrolling the area reported seeing an airborne explosion at 7.50pm. He said that the plane appeared to catch fire in the air, hit the water and explode. The following day, the US Navy carried out an extensive search of the area, but no debris, either from the patrol or the rescue plane, was ever found. This story is often presented as a classic Bermuda Triangle 'mystery'. It is always emphasized that the weather was fine and the visibility unlimited when the planes disappeared. It was - over Fort Lauderdale. But over the Bahamas, the weather that night was bad, and the seas were rough. There's no such thing as a good night to crash an aeroplane into the ocean, but this was most definitely a bad night, a night when the sea would have torn any ditched aircraft to pieces before swallowing the remains. Despite this, the story of the 'mysterious' disappearance of Flight 19 remained afloat because one officer made a chance remark to the board of inquiry. He said that the planes had 'vanished as completely as if they had flown to Mars'. In reality, the only mystery surrounding this tragic incident was why a relatively inexperienced officer was allowed to lead his men to their deaths. Growing Mythology. Over the next five years there were many such 'mysterious' disappearances in the Atlantic region around Bermuda - all contributing to the growing mythology surrounding the area. In each case there was, in fact, a perfectly rational explanation for what had occurred. In September 1950, however, Associated Press put out an article linking the disappearance of a freighter - the USS Sandra - with the loss of Lieutenant Taylor's patrol. The article mistakenly said that the Sandra had gone missing in June. Fate magazine picked up on the story and pointed out that the weather in the area had been calm throughout the month. In fact, the Sandra had actually gone missing in April, during a hurricane. Nevertheless, the modern myth of mysterious disappearances in the area around Bermuda had been born. Local newspaper reporters began ascribing crashes and disappearances to a mysterious 'Bermuda Triangle'. The southern corners of the triangle were supposed to be the tip of Florida and the island of Puerto Rico; the northernmost corner was Bermuda itself - or, in some versions, the Azores. Tales poured in of ships disappearing in boiling seas and aeroplanes being sucked out of the sky as their instruments failed, or simply exploding in mid-air for no apparent reason; stories which seem to defy rational explanation. The region achieved world-wide infamy and numerous books were written, each of them offering a different explanation for the string of strange events. Recently, however, a new theory has emerged concerning the mysterious Bermuda Triangle, one which even explains the reports of boiling seas and instrument failures. And this time it comes not from fast-buck journalists. but from the scientific community. Compressed Gas. Methane hydrate, a form of methane in which huge quantities of the gas are trapped under enormous pressures and in extreme cold, was first stumbled upon by the Soviets, who found it clogging up their natural gas supply pipes in the 1920's. The icy temperatures of Kazakhstan combined with the immense pressures in the gas pipes to produce this strange and deeply compressed form of methane. The gas was so compressed, in fact, that just one litre of the hydrate produced over 160 litres of methane gas when returned to normal temperature and pressure. Given the right conditions, methane hydrate can also form naturally. One obvious place for this to occur is in the sedimentary layers of the deep-sea floor. The cold, murky depths of the Atlantic Ocean, especially those around the Bermuda Triangle, provide just such conditions. In the early 1970's, oceanographers were lying awake at night puzzling over strange sonar readings which seemed to indicate that there was a second Atlantic 'sea bed', several hundred metres below the first. Test drilling in the area revealed evidence of an abundance of methane hydrate just waiting to burst free of its watery confines. But what would happen if there was a sudden breach in the sea bed, causing such a burst to occur? Any ship passing over it would be in deep and desperate trouble. A great plume of gas would burst up from under the ship without any warning. The surrounding waters would appear to boil violently and the sea would be infused with millions of cubic metres of gas. In seconds, the density of the water would drop dramatically and become incapable of supporting the mass of the ship. Before the passengers and crew had time to catch a breath, their vessel would plummet hundreds of metres down to the sea bed, where it would be swallowed up and covered over with sediment disturbed by the explosive burst of gas. There would be no time to launch the lifeboats, call for help of even say goodbye. Within minutes, the waters would look as they had done before this natural monster from the deep was unleashed. There would be no trace of the ill-fated ship. Nor would aircraft be safe from this gaseous monster. After sinking the ship, the methane gas would continue its rise into the atmosphere, heading for its final resting place far above the flight path of any aircraft. By now it would be entirely invisible. Any pilot flying into this deadly cloud might, if he were lucky, suffer immediate and complete engine failure. If, however, the gas was not sufficiently concentrated for this to occur, then the consequences would be all the more deadly. Methane gas, when mixed with air, will explode on contact with hot engine exhausts. The resulting explosion would occur without warning, giving the pilot no time to call for help. It would scatter debris - and what little remained of the crew - into the sea, leaving no trace from which investigators might discover the truth behind the disappearance. Powerful Magnetism. But what of the well-documented stories of instrument failure that are so often a feature of Bermuda-Triangle tales? A geochemist from the US, Dr Richard McIver, believes that these occur not because of mysterious forces, but because of the negative ions generated when sea water is agitated by an explosive burst of methane gas. The bubbling water at the surface of the sea releases an enormous rush of negative ions. This creates an immensely powerful magnetic field, causing compasses to spin uncontrollably and rendering useless and delicate electrical equipment caught in its sphere of influence. To this day, craft continue to go missing in the general area of the Bermuda Triangle, but this is inevitable when human error is given the opportunity to combine with equipment failure, appalling weather, murderous currents, some of the deepest waters on the planet and one of nature's most deadliest tricks. The idea that the area is home to some 'dark force' which swallows up aircraft and ships alike provides a great story, but it appears the facts are far less sinister. |
Sources: The X Factor By: Nigel Cawthorne Links: |