Real Crime Stories/Paranormal Hauntings/Conspiracy Theories Book II

The Bermuda Triangle

The Bermuda Triangle, also knownas the Devil's Triangle, is a loosely defined region in thewestern part of the North Atlantic Ocean where a number of aircraftand ships are said to have disappeared under mysteriouscircumstances. Most reputable sources dismiss the idea that there isany mystery.

The vicinity of the Bermuda Triangle isamongst the most heavily traveled shipping lanes in the world, withships frequently crossing through it for ports in the Americas,Europe and the Caribbean islands. Cruise ships and pleasure craftregularly sail through the region, and commercial and privateaircraft routinely fly over it.

Popular culture has attributed variousdisappearances to the paranormal or activity by extraterrestrialbeings. Documented evidence indicates that a significant percentageof the incidents were spurious, inaccurately reported, or embellishedby later authors.

Origins

The earliest suggestion of unusualdisappearances in the Bermuda area appeared in a September 17, 1950,article published in The Miami Herald (Associated Press) by EdwardVan Winkle Jones. Two years later, Fate magazine published "SeaMystery at Our Back Door", a short article by George Sandcovering the loss of several planes and ships, including the loss ofFlight 19, a group of five US Navy Grumman TBM Avenger torpedobombers on a training mission. Sand's article was the first to layout the now-familiar triangular area where the losses took place, aswell as the first to suggest a supernatural element to the Flight 19incident. Flight 19 alone would be covered again in the April 1962issue of American Legion magazine. In it, author Allan W. Eckertwrote that the flight leader had been heard saying, "We areentering white water, nothing seems right. We don't know where weare, the water is green, no white." He also wrote thatofficials at the Navy board of inquiry stated that the planes "flewoff to Mars."

In February 1964, Vincent Gaddis wrotean article called "The Deadly Bermuda Triangle" inthe pulp magazine Argosy saying Flight 19 and other disappearanceswere part of a pattern of strange events in the region. The nextyear, Gaddis expanded this article into a book, Invisible Horizons.

Other writers elaborated on Gaddis'ideas: John Wallace Spencer (Limbo of the Lost, 1969, repr. 1973); Charles Berlitz (The Bermuda Triangle, 1974); Richard Winer (TheDevil's Triangle, 1974), and many others, all keeping to some of thesame supernatural elements outlined by Eckert.

Triangle area

The Gaddis Argosy article delineatedthe boundaries of the triangle, giving its vertices as Miami; SanJuan, Puerto Rico; and Bermuda. Subsequent writers did notnecessarily follow this definition. Some writers gave differentboundaries and vertices to the triangle, with the total area varyingfrom 1,300,000 to 3,900,000 km2 (500,000 to 1,510,000 sq mi). "Indeed, some writers even stretch it as far as the Irishcoast." Consequently, the determination of which accidentsoccurred inside the triangle depends on which writer reported them.

Criticism of the concept

Larry Kusche

Larry Kusche, author of The BermudaTriangle Mystery: Solved (1975) argued that many claims of Gaddis andsubsequent writers were exaggerated, dubious or unverifiable.Kusche's research revealed a number of inaccuracies andinconsistencies between Berlitz's accounts and statements fromeyewitnesses, participants, and others involved in the initialincidents. Kusche noted cases where pertinent information wentunreported, such as the disappearance of round-the-world yachtsmanDonald Crowhurst, which Berlitz had presented as a mystery, despiteclear evidence to the contrary. Another example was the ore-carrierrecounted by Berlitz as lost without trace three days out of anAtlantic port when it had been lost three days out of a port with thesame name in the Pacific Ocean. Kusche also argued that a largepercentage of the incidents that sparked allegations of theTriangle's mysterious influence actually occurred well outside it.Often his research was simple: he would review period newspapers ofthe dates of reported incidents and find reports on possibly relevantevents like unusual weather, that were never mentioned in thedisappearance stories.