THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE,
SUPERNATURAL…. OR NOT?
Sam Weber
BRIEF INFORMATION
•
“Devil’s Triangle”
•
Located off the Southeastern coast of the United States in the Atlantic Ocean
•
Apexes in the vicinities of Bermuda, Miami, Florida, and San Juan, Puerto Rico
http://abcnews.go.com/images/GMA/gma_ISOT_BermudaTriangleStars_090324_mn.jpg
SUPPORTING REASON #1 – ELECTRIC FOG
•
“On December 4, 1970, Bruce Gernon and his father were flying to Bimini in
clear skies when they saw a strange cloud with almost perfectly round edges
hovering over the Miami shore. As they flew over it, the cloud began spreading
out, matching or exceeding their speed. At 11,500 feet, they thought that they
had escaped the "cloud," only to discover that it had formed a tunnel. It
appeared the only way they could escape the cloud was to go through the
tunnel. Once inside, they saw lines on the walls that spun in a
counterclockwise direction. Gernon's navigational instruments went haywire
and the compass spun counterclockwise. When Gernon contacted Miami Air
Traffic Control to get radar identification, the controller said that there were no
planes on radar between Miami, Bimini and Andros. After several minutes,
Gernon heard the air traffic controller report that a plane had been spotted
directly over Miami. Gernon didn't think he could possibly be over Miami
Beach, because it usually took 75 minutes to get to Miami and only 47 minutes
had passed. At this same time, the cloud tunnel began to peel away in what he
described as ribbons of fog. The instruments began operating normally and
Miami Beach was directly below them. This loss of time, confirmed by their
watches and the plane's clock, made Gernon believe that the electronic fog
had time travel qualities.”
http://adventure.howstuffworks.com/bermuda-triangle6.htm
THE FOG
•
Rob MacGregor and Bruce Gernon wrote a book describing their experiences with the
electronic fog called, “The Fog: A Never Before Published Theory of the Bermuda Triangle
Phenomenon.”
•
Bruce recorded, “[I] realized that something very bizarre had happened. Instead of the
clear blue sky that we expected at the end of the tunnel, everything appeared a dull,
grayish white. Visibility appeared to be about two miles, but there was absolutely nothing
to see - no ocean, no horizon, no sky, only a gray haze."
•
Bruce said he experienced this situation a second time with his wife. Many other pilots
have also admitted to encountering a similar situation like the one Bruce described.
•
He believes that there are powerful electromagnetic storms within the Earth and that they
can break through the surface and enter the atmosphere where they disappear shortly
after, leaving the electric fog.
SUPPORTING REASON #2 – U.S.S. CYCLOPES
•
WW1 542 foot long steel hull collier assigned to the Naval Overseas Transportation
Service
•
Scheduled to sail to Brazil to refuel British ships in the south Atlantic
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Left from Rio de Janeiro on February 16, 1918 and arrived in Barbados March 3
•
Left Barbados March 4. Never seen again.
•
306 crew members and passengers disappeared with the U.S.S. Cyclopes. This is the
largest loss of life in the history of the United States Navy of a U.S. warship where there is
no direct evidence of why it happened.
SUPPORTING REASON #3 – DC-3 FLIGHT NC-16002
•
December 28, 1948 DC-3 commercial flight NC-16002 set out to Miami, Florida from San
Juan, Puerto Rico.
•
Captain Robert Lindquist requested landing instructions from Miami 50 miles out.
Instructions were sent, but the plane never landed.
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Weather conditions: clear with high visibility
•
After losing radio contact, it was recorded that the wind direction had changed and without
the radio contact, Captain Lindquist could not be informed of the weather change. It is
believed that this result could have sent them up to 50 miles of course.
•
“Douglas Dakota or the DC-3 has been probably the most reliable aircraft ever designed
and built.”
http://www.bermuda-attractions.com/bermuda2_i000118.jpg
SUPPORTING REASON #5 – FLIGHT 19
•
December 5th, 1945, Five Avenger torpedo bombers left from Fort Lauderdale,
Florida at the Naval Air Station at 2:10 in the afternoon.
•
Mission: 14 men fly due east 56 miles to Hens and Chicken Shoals to conduct
practice bombing runs, then to fly an additional 67 miles east, 73 miles north , 120
miles southwest straight back to base. Total distance: 316 miles.
•
4:00 pm radio message received from the senior flight instructor stating that they
were lost and that their compasses had malfunctioned. Believed to have departed in
the wrong direction and be somewhere around Florida Keys. Told to fly north if they
were for sure located over the keys.
•
It is estimated that they were never over the Keys and had traveled in the proper
directions, when told to head north, they flew north into the endless ocean
disappearing.
•
One of two PBM patrol planes also disappeared searching for the Five Avengers. It
was believed to have burst into flames.
Estimated paths of
Flight 19
REASON AGAINST #1 – GULF STREAM
• The Gulf Stream is a very powerful and turbulent body of water which is
partially located within the Bermuda Triangle. The strong currents and deep
waters can hide and remove evidence from a disaster in a moments notice.
• It is about 300 times faster than the flow of the Amazon River.
• This refutes the idea of supernatural disappearances and promotes the idea
of a crash landing or another wreckage of a sort. The water is strong enough
to overturn wreckage and make it sink, especially heavy material.
REASON AGAINST #2 – LLOYD’S OF
LONDON STATISTICS
• “A check of Lloyd's of London's accident records by the editor of Fate in 1975
showed that the Triangle was no more dangerous than any other part of the
ocean. U.S. Coast Guard records confirmed this and since that time no good
arguments have ever been made to refute those statistics.”
• This states as it is read that the area within the Bermuda Triangle has no
abnormally large number of accidents on record than those of other areas in
the oceans surrounding our land masses.
REASON AGAINST #3 – METHANE
HYDRATE
•
Methane hydrate is a large stored up capacity of methane within a large crystalized
structure of water similar to ice. These hydrates can be located on the bottom of the
ocean floor.
•
When a methane hydrate breaks and releases the methane, it travels straight up in the
water, decreasing the density of the water.
•
Depending on the current density of the water, weight of the material on a boat or vessel,
and the strength of the released methane, a ruptured methane hydrate underneath a boat
can decrease the density of the water to the point where the water cannot uphold the
vessel, causing it to sink.
•
This can be a direct solution to many disappearances of boats, especially scenarios with
large heavy vessels like the U.S.S. Cyclops.
REASON AGAINST #4 – NATURAL
DISASTERS
• Possible oceanic weather interferences: Hurricanes, water spouts, thunder
storms
• The first radar was not developed until 1935 by Robert Alexander WatsonWatt.
• Until the development of radar and other telegraphic devices, sailors and
pilots could not locate or recognize the action of a storm like a hurricane until
it was visible on the horizon where if could be possibly too late.
• Current devices used by sailors and pilots can still malfunction and can
cause a captain to be unaware of a storm.
CONCLUSION
Supporting
Against
•
Primary sources
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Scientific Sources
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Secondary sources
•
Scientific Explanation
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Stories
•
Logical Explanations
The U.S. Navy does not believe in the Bermuda triangle and there is also no
government issued map with the boundaries of the Bermuda Triangle, but
there is no definite answer for either side of the argument. This leaves the
decision up to you. Is the Bermuda Triangle real, or not?
SOURCES
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http://adventure.howstuffworks.com/bermuda-triangle.htm
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http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq8-1.htm
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http://www.unmuseum.org/triangle.htm
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http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq15-1.htm
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http://www.navyhistory.org/2013/06/unanswered-loss-uss-cyclops-march-1918/
•
http://www.bermuda-attractions.com/bermuda2_00009f.htm
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http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/gulfstreamspeed.html
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_clathrate
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http://energy.gov/fe/science-innovation/oil-gas-research/methane-hydrate
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http://www.decaturelectronics.com/content/history-radar