The Bermuda Triangle legend is thought to have been started around 1945, when five Navy Avenger airplanes from Fort Lauderdale, Florida disappeared. Soon after, theories and explanations about the triangle-shaped area that lies between Miami, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico.
1. Magnetic Fields Awry
Perhaps the most famous is the myth about compasses in the Bermuda Triangle spinning wildly out of control. Legend has it that the Bermuda Triangle is one of only two places on Earth where a compass points true north, instead of the magnetic north.
Modern day navigators understand that a compass requires calibration to make up for the deviation depending on their location, also known as declination. Even though the Bermuda Triangle was previously a place where a compass pointed true north, the reality is that Earth’s magnetic field is constantly changing, therefore, compass variations.
2. Ridiculous Weather Patterns
The theory of crazy weather is actually crazy in itself.
Bermuda Triangle is located right in the middle of hurricane alley and is scientifically prone to intense, severe storms. Add a swift-moving Gulf Stream and masses of warm and cold air colliding, and you’ve got some very problematic territory for plans as well as ships.
3. Underwater Disappearances
Part of the mystery is the total disappearance of ships and planes that seem to just vanish into thin air. The truth is that the underwater terrain in the Bermuda Triangle is rugged and deep, not to mention the extreme currents combined with that depth – it is a perfect combination for whisking away anything that lands in the area. Notably, it’s home to Puerto Rico trench, the deepest point in the Atlantic Ocean. So, the likelihood of finding wrecked sea vessels or planes? Not so much.
4. The Atlantis Theory
One theory suspects that the Bermuda Triangle is located where the lost city of Atlantis lays. Part of the theory states that the Bimini Road that is just of the coast of the Bahamian island of Bimini, is a dock that once served Atlantis.
In reality, the Bimini Road is one of many odd rock formations composed of uniform, shaped towers of rock. It is a naturally occurring geological force of nature.
5. The Numbers Are In
Thanks to a piqued interest in the Bermuda Triangle legend, sensationalized books, articles, and other print media covered the phenomena extensively. The numbers of disappearances were wrongly reported with little to no research done.
Critic Larry Kusche, who published The Bermuda Triangle Mystery: Solved in 1975, called author out on calling some cases “mysteries” when they weren’t mysteries at all and that some reported cases hadn’t even occurred within the Bermuda Triangle. After extensive research, Kusche found that the number of disappearances that occurred within the Bermuda Triangle no greater than in any other area of the ocean with similar traffic.
6. Methane Hydrates
There are pockets of trapped methane gas deep beneath the surface of the Bermuda Triangle that could be unlocked by seismic activity or underwater landslides. If unleashed, this methane gas could bubble to the surface, reducing the density of the water, thus causing a ship to lose its buoyancy and sink.
Similarly, if enough of this gas were to come to the surface and get way up into the air, it could ignite an airplane’s engine spark in turn blowing up the plane.
The reality: The Bermuda Triangle is not the only place where methane hydrates exist, nor is it even the area with the highest concentration.
Now, would the eruption of these hydrates be powerful to sink a ship or down a plane? You decide.
7. Higher Insurance
Norman Hooke, who conducted marine casualty studies for Lloyd’s Maritime Information Services, says that disappearances in the Bermuda Triangle are most often weather-related, despite claims of monsters, aliens, and the like. So regardless of the theories and legends as to why ships and planes disappear there, insurance premiums are no higher than for any other area of the ocean.