The real mystery of the Bermuda Triangle – Part I

There are any number of stories about mysterious disappearances of ships, planes and people in the roughly triangular area of the Atlantic Ocean with points at the island of Bermuda in the North, the Florida coast in the West and the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico in the East that covers some of the most heavily used shipping lanes in the World, and is also home to some of the most violent storms in the Atlantic including hurricane tracks. Stories in the popular media began in the 1950's with reports of disappearances going back to the case of the Ellen Austin in 1881. Probably the most infamous cases are the loss of Flight 19, a training flight of TBM Avenger torpedo bombers out of Fort Lauderdale in 1945, and the USS Cyclops a metal ore carrier that disappeared in 1918 with 309 hands, but cases are numerous. Similarly numerous are the theories surrounding the area, from the scientific to the paranormal, covering everything from magnetic anomalies, freak waves, methane gas pockets and violent storms to time portals and UFO's but there are a couple of interesting aspects that are seldom covered in reports and stories.

The first is that when the figures are actually analysed, as they were in 1992 by Lloyds of London, the maritime insurance specialists there is no significantly higher loss rate in the area than in other high traffic areas. This does not mean that there are no disappearances, just that there are not any more than might be expected. What the figures don't show though is the number of missing ships and planes that are either never found, or that when found show no obvious signs of a cause for the disappearance. When these cases are factored in the figures become highly significant. In other areas of the oceans it is relatively rare for ships to simply disappear without some identifiable cause, although it does happen. It happens more often proportionately in the triangle area than anywhere else on Earth. It is interesting to note that large parts of this region are relatively shallow so it would be expected that wrecked ships would be easier to find rather than more difficult. Indeed, the triangle is renowned for its wreck and reef diving opportunities, yet still ships and planes simply vanish.

The second interesting aspect is that the ships and planes that do disappear have something in common. They have all been lost having deviated for a number of reasons from their planned or scheduled routes. It appears that vessels that stick to their planned courses tend to navigate their routes safely, but deviation causes problems. Possible reasons suggested for this are that the charted shipping lanes are free from some of the dangers naturally found in the area such as rogue waves, or that the lanes have been positioned to avoid known volcanic rock outcrops, which can cause magnetic instrument anomalies, but there is another possibility which might also help to explain the mysterious nature of the disappearances. Since the second World War and the challenges faced by the US Navy operating in the Atlantic Ocean in tracking and dealing with the threat of German U-Boats, there has been a need for America to develop undersea technology. This need became ever more pressing through the Cold War to combat Russian nuclear submarines tracking down to Cuba. In order to develop these technologies which have included high intensity sonar “nets” and remote monitoring buoys amongst other, more advanced systems, test areas were needed, and the area around the Florida Keys was found to be ideal.

It has been known for some time that US Navy experiments with long range sonar monitoring had a dramatic effect on migrating whale populations, and it is suspected that live testing of more aggressive defensive systems may have been at least in part responsible for some of the disappearances. It is not beyond the realms of possibility that in carrying out research in this area the Navy made some rather interesting discoveries that triggered some of these unexplained events as consequences. This leads on to the discoveries made around the Island of Bimini in the Bahamas, and these will be discussed in part II of this series.

The North Atlantic Exclusion Zone conspiracy

Space flight has always been beset by tremendous risks, with the use of highly volatile fuels, complex multi-stage vehicles, challenging atmospheric conditions and the like, and there are numerous cases of disaster and near disaster. As part of the contingency plans for manned space flight NASA developed a proposal that allowed for late flight aborts that would allow for the rapid recovery of astronauts in the event of a mission terminating problem. The key issue was that escape for the astronauts would typically be in the command module section of the vehicle, a section designed for water landings. Consequently this led to the selection of a flight plan that ensured that after take off from Cape Canaveral the path would as quickly as possible carry the crew over the North Atlantic. Officially there was an additional requirement added to flight plan requirements. It stated that in the event of a late stage in flight abort, the landing site must be within 150 nautical miles of either St Johns in Newfoundland or Shannon in Ireland. The area between these points was designated the North Atlantic Exclusion Zone (NAEZ), but was renamed the Down Range Abort Exclusion Zone (DAEZ).

Officially the reason for this requirement was two-fold. Firstly prevailing sea conditions inside the exclusion zone are extremely cold and prone to storm conditions, and secondly that rescue missions would most likely be provisioned from land bases and therefore ensuring a maximum rescue mission range of 150 miles gave the best chance of successful rescue. These are perfectly valid reasons, but there are a couple of additional pieces of information that may cast doubt on this being the full story. In 1968 the fishing vessel Atlantic Adventurer sailing out of Seattle and crabbing on the Grand Banks was caught in a large storm. When the storm abated the crew found that they had been blown significantly away from their normal grounds deep into the North Atlantic. Their attempts to locate their exact position were hampered by strange anomalies in their instruments. Their magnetic compasses were showing apparently random directions. Usually completely reliable radios became erratic and the boats electrical systems began to play up. Within two hours of the storm abating the crew were shocked to see bright lights in the water around the boat, moving at high speed and appearing to move up and down in the water column. These lights stayed around the boat for an hour, disappearing just minutes before a US Navy submarine surfaced 100 yards from the vessel. Navy personnel from the submarine crossed to the fishing boat in inflatable craft and gave the captain an electronic compass that appeared to be working and forced the crew to sign documents stating that they would not reveal anything that they had seen. The crew kept their secret for over 25 years before finally revealing what they had seen.

This is not an isolated case. For many years the North Atlantic has been a no go areas for shipping, ostensibly because of the dangers of icebergs, as highlighted far earlier by the sinking of the Titanic. It is interesting to note that meteorological studies of iceberg formation are classified before being released after approval by the US Navy. Between you and I, there are far fewer icebergs than are reported and they pose far less danger to shipping than suggested, but that is not to say that the NAEZ is safe for shipping. Far from it, but not for any natural reason. The real reason is far more interesting. The exclusion zone exists to protect a vast sub-sea base jointly created by US and Russian Naval forces and an alien civilisation that is aiding both superpowers, along with Chinese and European Union assets. The base is located on the ocean floor at a depth of 3000 fathoms plus and extends to an area in excess of 100 square miles. It is the source of many of the coastal UFO sightings along the Atlantic seaboard of North America and Europe and is by far the largest secret base on the planet. This is a story that is only just coming to light, and further details are expected over the next two months as preparations are made for significant announcements before the end of the year.