THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE MYSTERY
—SOLVED

THE BERMUDA

TRIANGLE MYSTERY
Lawrence David Kusche
MEW ENGLISH LIBRARY
TIMES MIRROR
-SOLVED

Grateful acknowledgement is made for permission to reprint excerpts from the following;
The New York Times. Copyright © 1921, 1925, 1926, 1935, 1944, 1951, 1952, 1953,
1954, 1955, 1956, 1958, 1969 by the New York Times Company. Reprinted by per-
mission.
The Miami Herald; The Virginian-Pilot; The Galveston Daily News; The San Juan
Star; The Times-Picayune; The Arizona Republic and The Washington Post Service; The
Times (London); The Yomiuri Shimbun (Tokyo). All reprinted by permission.
The United States Naval Institute. Proceedings, January 1920, April 1920, September
1923, July 1969.
Dictionary of Disasters at Sea During the Age of Steam by Charles Hocking, London:
Lloyd's Register of Shipping, 1969.
Lloyd's Register, Wreck Returns. 1900-1904; 1925-1926. Lloyd's Register of Shipping.
Lloyd's Weekly Casualty Reports December 18, 1925; October to December, 1955;
July 9, 1963. Lloyd's.
Lloyd's List. September 25 1840; October 17, 1840; April 24, 1950; May 2, 1950;
June 3, 1950. Lloyd's.
Designed by Sidney Feinberg
Maps drawn by Lawrence David Kusche
First published in Great Britain by New English Library Ltd., 1975
Copyright © by Lawrence David Kusche, 1975
*
FIRST NEL PAPERBACK EDITION NOVEMBER 1975
This new edition February 1978
Reprinted October 1978
*
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NEL Books are published by
New English Library Limited from Barnard's Inn, Holborn, London, EC1N 2JR
Made and printed in Great Britain by Hunt Barnard Printing Ltd., Aylesbury, Bucks.
45003835 1

To the members of the Interlibrary Loan department at Arizona
State University and their unseen partners in other libraries.

Contents
Preface	9
Acknowledgements	13
1.		The Legend of the Bermuda Triangle as it is
usually told	17
2.		1492: Christopher Columbus, the Sargasso Sea, and
the Bermuda Triangle	30
3.		August 1840: Rosalie	35
4.		April 1854: Bella	38
5.		December 1872: Mary Celeste	41
6.		Winter 1880: Atalanta	45
7.		1881: Ellen Austin and the Derelict	52
8.		1866: Lotta 1868: Viego 1884: Miramon	54
9.		October 1902: Freya	55
10.		November 1909: Joshua Slocum and the Spray	58
11.		March 1918: Cyclops	60
12.		January 1921: Carroll A. Deering	69
13.		April 1925: Raifuku Maru	77
14.		December 1925: Cotopaxi	79
15.		March 1926: Suduffco	81
16.		October 1931: Stavenger	82
17.		April 1932: John and Mary	84
18.		August 1935: La Dahama	86
19.		February 1940; Gloria Colita	90
20.		November, December 1941: Proteus, Nereus	94
21.		October 1944: Rubicon	96
22.		December 1945: Flight 19	98

23.		December 1946: City Belle	120
24.		1947: Superfortress	122
25.		January 1948: Star Tiger	123
26.		March 1948: A1 Snider	135
27.		December 1948: DC-3	136
28.		January 1949: Star Ariel	144
29.		March 1950: Globemaster	149
30.		June 1950: Sandra	152
31.		February 1953: British York Transport	155
32.		October 1954: Navy Super Constellation	157
33.		December 1954: Southern Districts	159
34.		September 1955: Connemara IV	163
35.		November 1956: Navy Patrol Bomber	165
36.		January 1958: Revonoc	168
37.		January 1962: KB-50	170
38.		April 1962: Piper Apache	173
39.		February 1963: Marine Sulphur Queen	174
40.		July 1963: Sno" Boy	184
41.		August 1963: Two KC-135s	187
42.		June 1965: C-119 Flying Boxcar	193
43.		January 1967: Black Week	196
44.		December 1967: Witchcraft	200
45.		May 1968: Scorpion	203
46.		July 1969: Five Abandoned Vessels	207
47.		August 1969: Bill Verity	212
48.		November 1970: Jillie Bean and the Piper Comanche 213
49.		April 1971: Elizabeth	216
50.		October 1971: El Caribe	218
51.		February 1972: V. A. Fogg	221
52.		March 1973: Norse Variant and Anita	226
53.		October 1973: Linda	228
54.		The Devil's Sea	231
55.		Vile Vortices	240
56.		Magnetism, Mystery, and the Bermuda Triangle	244
Epilogue	250

Preface
Strange events seem to be taking place in the Atlantic Ocean off
the coast of the United States. In and around an area formed by
an imaginary line connecting Bermuda, Florida, and Puerto Rico,
a significant number of ships and planes have disappeared under
mysterious circumstances. Known popularly as the Bermuda
Triangle, the Devil's Triangle, and Limbo of the Lost, the area
has also been called the Hoodoo Sea, the Twilight Zone, and the
Port of Missing Ships. Mysterious occurrences continue to be
reported there, and the sequence of events has grown into a
modern-day sea mystery.
The Bermuda Triangle has received much attention in the last
decade. It has been the subject of books, magazine articles, and
radio and television talk shows. A television special was devoted
toit, and it also figures in the UFO and ancient astronaut mysteries.
According to all accounts, there is something very strange going
on out there.
My interest in the Triangle began in 1972 when, as a reference
librarian at Arizona State University, 1 was frequently asked to
help someone find information on the subject. Nothing seemed to
exist. A new reference librarian at ASU, Deborah Blouin, had
previously experienced the same frustration of being unable to
locate anything, so we combined forces and spent several months
advertising in journals and writing letters to various government
agencies, research organizations, and libraries along the east coast
to see if anyone could suggest any sources. Some of those we
contacted sent a citation or two and we eventually compiled a fairly
lengthy bibliography which we made available to anyone who
needed it. The demand was overwhelming. Nobody, it seemed, had
been able to find much on the Bermuda Triangle. The problem was
9

that although several dozen articles and book chapters existed
they were not the type of material that could be found when they
were needed by consulting card catalogs or periodical indexes.
After reading all the chapters and articles I realized that the
Bermuda Triangle mystery was much more than just an account
of the strange disappearance of a large number of vessels. Pro-
clamations of the Navy, the Coast Guard, the Air Force, and
Lloyd's (London) had been repeated, interpreted, and assimilated
into the story. Many writers who had made the earlier attempts to
solve the mystery later found themselves and their theories an
integral part of it. New incidents were continually being incor-
porated into the tale.
These writings, then, taken together, constitute what might
be called the story, or the legend, of the Bermuda Triangle as it is
usually told. The most important of these are listed in Section I
of the bibliography. I decided to investigate the mystery further;
to collect all the information that could be found on each incident,
to see if there might not be an answer here and there. The sources
I discovered are listed by incident in Section II of the bibliography.
I have adopted a somewhat unusual format to present the
results of my research. First I retell the entire legend of the
Bermuda Triangle (in italic typeface), to give the facts and flavor
of the story as it has developed over the years. Then I examine
individual incidents in chronological order. For each I give a
detailed account of the episode as it usually has been told. Next
come pertinent extracts from the various sources that I found
during my research. My own comments, assumptions, opinions,
and deductions either follow or are interspersed with the quoted
material. The purpose of this arrangement is to let the reader know
the origin of the information he is given and thus permit him to
draw his own conclusions about whether a particular incident is
mysterious or whether it appears to have a logical solution. In a
few cases the information is inconclusive and a decision cannot
be made.
The word Legend, capitalized, has been used throughout as an
abbreviated way of saying 'This is how this incident has usually
been told as a part of the story of the Bermuda Triangle.' It was
almost always possible to do this because most versions of any
particular incident were similar. There are a few cases, however,
for which it is not possible to say 'This is how it has usually been
told,' because there is considerable difference between versions.
For these incidents I have told what appeared to be the best-known
account.
10

Because the Legend is a composite of many sources, no
individual is cited for his particular contribution except where a
part indisputably 'belongs' to a given writer. To have attempted to
show who contributed each part of the story would have required
a different kind of book. My concern here is with the incidents
themselves, not with those who have publicized them.
Repetitious and extraneous material has been omitted from
quoted matter to spare the reader tiresome duplication of facts
in news accounts and details in reports such as the thickness of
bulkheads and the serial numbers of planes and servicemen. In a
few official reports the time of day has been converted from the
military twenty-four-hour clock to Eastern Standard Time, and
directions and positions have been simplified or explained.
In many cases the facts given in the quoted material differ from
those in the Legend. It is left to the reader to decide for himself
which version is more likely to be true.
L. D.K.
May 1974
Tempe, Arizona
11

Acknowledgments
The research for this book was done in widely scattered locations
around the world - Tokyo, Oslo, Paris, London, St John's,
Nassau, San Juan, Santo Domingo, Washington, D.C., Norfolk,
New York, Chicago, Miami, New Orleans, and Galveston.
I traveled to all these faraway places by airmail, teletype, or tele-
phone. Thanks to the cooperation of many librarians, news-
papermen, and members of the military I was able to obtain the
many sources of information that J requested.
I especially want to thank Lyn Ashley, Virginia Brown, Joyce
Casagrande, Jewel Hayden, and Lois Schneberger of the Inter-
library Loan Department, Arizona State University, Tempe, for
their efforts in fulfilling my many requests for microfilm, books,
and photocopies of sources held by other libraries.
Many others at ASU were also helpful: Deborah Blouin, my
partner on the Bermuda Triangle Bibliography; Debbie Engel-
mann, whose honest evaluation of my first attempts sent me back
to the writing desk; Shirley Cooper, Doohe Chang, Barbara Cox,
Kay Gilman, George Ilinsky, Donna Larson, Jim Lestikow, Greg
Middleton, and Gene Price, who all lent their special skills. Larry
Young of Sawyer School of Aviation, and Ron Dobbins and Don
Bruce also provided a great deal of help.
I am indebted to the following people for taking the time to
answer my questions and to search for the material I requested:
Commander F. A. Rice, Lt Arthur Whiting, and Lt Richard
Tate of the Casualty Review Branch, U.S. Coast Guard, Wash-
ington, D.C., Lt G. F. Johnson, Public Information Office,
Seventh District, U.S. Coast Guard, Miami.
D. Gail Saunders, Archivist of the Ministry of Education and
Culture, Nassau, Bahamas. T. M. Dinan, Head of Casualty
13

Records and Historical Research, Lloyd's. Shigeru Kimura of the
Asahi Shimbun, Tokyo. 'Action Line' of the Mainichi Daily News,
Tokyo. Yasuchika Ohno, Maritime Safety Agency, Tokyo. Dean
D. Hawes, Norfolk. Barbara Case and Helen Porter, Newfound-
land Arts and Culture Center, St John's. William Felker, Free
Library of Philadelphia. Else Marie Thorstvedt, Librarian,
Norwegian Maritime Museum. H. Vinje, Office of the Director
General of Shipping and Navigation, Oslo.
John A. Shelton, National Climatic Center, Ashville, North
Carolina. James N. Eastman, Jr., Maxwell Air Force Base,
Alabama. Richard F. Gerwig, Norton Air Force Base, California.
Federico A. Mella Villanueva, El Caribe, Santo Domingo,
Dominican Republic. Joel Kirkpatrick, Galveston Daily News.
Lt A. Solano, Sheriff's Department, Galveston. D. A. F.
Ingraham, Department of Civil Aviation, Bahamas. Samuel L.
Morison, Washington, D.C.
Special thanks go to my wife Sally, and the kids, Rebecca and
Andrew; and most of all, to Jeanne Flagg, editor, Harper & Row.
14

'The fact is, we have all been a good deal puzzled
because the affair is so simple, and yet baffles us alto-
gether.'
'Perhaps it is the very simplicity of the thing that puts
you at fault,' said my friend. 'What nonsense you do
talk!' replied the Prefect, laughing heartily.
'Perhaps the mystery is a little too plain,' said Dupin.
'Oh, good heavens! whoever heard of such an idea?'
'A little too self evident.'
'Ha! ha! ha! - ha! ha! ha! - ho! ho! ho!' - roaredour
visitor, profoundly amused, 'oh, Dupin, you will be the
death of me yet!'
- 'The Purloined Letter'
Edgar Allan Poe

wcri. DUUR jnur
CENTRAL STREET
BASSETERRE ST. KITTS
The Legend of the Bermuda Triangle As It
Is Usually Told
The night was ablaze with stars as the DC-3, pushed along by a
friendly tailwind, began a gentle descent toward Miami. A slight
lowering of the nose increased the airspeed a few knots, and the
altimeter slowly began to unwind. In the cabin the passengers, on
their way home after a Christmas vacation in their native Puerto
Rico, sang ' We Three Kings' as the stewardess served cookies and
punch. In the cockpit the captain reached for his microphone.
'Miami Tower, this is Airborne Transport N16002, over.'
'Airborne Transport N16002, this is Miami Tower, go ahead.'
'N16002 is approaching Miami from San Juan, Puerto Rico. Am
now fifty miles south, all's well, have the city in sight. Landing
instructions, please. Over.'
'Zero zero two, continue your approach, advise when you have the
airport in sight.
'Zero zero two, this is Miami Tower. Please acknowledge. Over.
'Zero zero two, do you read? Over.
'Airborne Transport N16002, this is Miami Tower. Do you read?
Do you read?Please acknowledge. Over.'
But N16002 never acknowledged the call from Miami Tower on
that early morning of December 30,1948, nor did it answer repeated
calls from New Orleans and San Juan Overseas Radio, and from the
Coast Guard. A massive search began almost immediately. Hundreds
of ships combed the sea, while planes scanned the area from above.
The weather was ideal, the water clear and calm and so shallow in the
area that large objects on the bottom could easily be seen. But the
sea guards her secrets well; no trace of the DC-3 was ever found. In
the carefully phrased accident report of the Civil Aeronautics
Board, issued six months later, 'sufficient information is lacking in
this case to determine the probable cause.'

But, on the docks, in the airports, on the beaches, and in the
taverns, wherever the old-timers met to discuss the mysteries of the
seas and the skies, the pattern of the disappearances could be seen.
The menace that haunts the Bermuda Triangle had struck again,
claiming yet another victim. Those who knew anything of the sea
knew about the terrifying mid-Atlantic region where ships (andnow
planes) had been vanishing for more than a century, vanishing with-
out reason, in good weather, without sending cries of distress and
without leaving a trace.
Veteran observers of the area knew about the British South
American Airways airliner, the Star Tiger, that had vanished in
January of the same year while approaching Bermuda from the
Azores. Just as the DC-3 seemed destined to do a few months later,
the Star Tiger sent an 'all's well' message when nearing the end of a
long, routine journey, then lapsed into silence. At the conclusion of
the Star Tiger investigation, the Ministry of Civil Aviation stated
that it had never encountered a more baffling problem. Because of the
lack of evidence supporting any other theory, the Ministry suggested
that the mishap had occurred because of''some external cause'.
A few weeks after the loss of the DC-3 the Star Ariel, sister ship
of the Star Tiger, disappeared between Bermuda and Jamaica on a
flight in calm, clear weather. The word spread quickly, lt was time
to break the jinx, to find out what was causing alt the disappearances.
A search such as never before seen, made possible by the fortuitous
presence of a large U.S. Navy task force and a number of British
ships and planes, spared no effort in the recovery attempt. But once
again it was all in vain, for the Star Ariel had also flown into oblivion
in the Bermuda Triangle.
A line drawn on a map from Bermuda to Puerto Rico to Florida
and back to Bermuda outlines the center of this area and gives it its
name. Some of the disappearances have taken place outside the
center triangle, and when they are all plotted on a map the triangle
is expanded and distorted into almost a square or a kite shape. This
is the sinister no-man's-land that is said to be creating such fear in the
hearts of sailors and pilots that they refuse to discuss it with out-
siders. Surrounded by the vacation lands of Bermuda, the Bahamas,
and Florida, patrolled by the U.S. government and heavily traveled
day and night, the region is in no way isolated. Although many
vessels, both civilian and military, cross it daily without mishap, the
number of disappearances is altogether beyond the laws of chance
for such a relatively limited area.
On the afternoon of December 5, 1945, the strangest aviation

drama of all time began as five Navy Avenger torpedo bombers took
off from the Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station on a short routine
patrol that was to end in confusion, tragedy, mystery, and the
apparent deaths of twenty-seven men. Although there was no
evidence of bad weather, the flight leader radioed that all five planes
were lost and unable to tell in which direction they were flying.
A short time later communications faded out, never to be resumed.
A rescue plane immediately headed for the supposed area of the lost
19

patrol, and it, too, vanished. The greatest search in aviation history
lasted for five days, but no trace of the six aircraft was ever found.
The Navy, after a lengthy investigation, admitted that it was more
confused than before the inquest had begun. Authorities could only
scratch their heads and wonder what it was that continued to strike
again and again in the Bermuda Triangle. One Navy officer com-
mented that' They vanished as completely as if they'd flown to Mars.''
Many other incidents occurred in the 1940s. The City Belle was
found abandoned near the Bahamas in 1946, and the Rubicon, a
ghost ship, drifted near the coast of Florida in October 1944, in
excellent condition, but with only a dog aboard. Al Snider, an inter-
nationally famous jockey, vanished in March 1948 while on an
afternoon fishing trip near the southern tip of Florida. In 1940 the
Gloria Colita was found abandoned, but in excellent condition, near
the western coast of Florida, in the GulJ of Mexico.
Going back farther, the La Dahama was sighted in the Bermuda
Triangle in 1935, several days after another ship had reported watch-
ing it sink. In 1931 the Norwegian ship Stavenger disappeared in the
Bahamas with forty-three men aboard, and the Raifuku Maru
vanished on a calm day in 1925 after sending the message ''Come
quick, it's tike a dagger! We cannot escape '
The Carroll A. Deering was discovered hard aground on Diamond
Shoals in January 1921 with all sails set. Two cats were the only
living creatures aboard. The strangest part of the incident is that a
full meal was on the stove, waiting for a crew that would never arrive.
The same year a dozen other ships vanished in the area. They left
their ports on normal, routine voyages and all sailed the same ghostly
path. Although their destinations were officially listed as Bermuda,
Jamaica, Miami, and other such locations, they all arrived instead
at the Port of Missing Ships.
In 1918 the U.S. Navy, one of the favorite targets of the jinx,
suffered a major loss. The Cyclops, a 542-foot collier, sailed from
Barbados for Baltimore with 309 men on board and was never seen
or heard from again, despite a frantic search effort. It was the first
radio-equipped ship ever to vanish, but it sent no SOS. After half a
century the Navy admits that although many theories have been
suggested, none satisfactorily accounts for the loss of the Cyclops.
Compounding the mystery still further, two of her sister ships, the
Proteus and the Nereus, disappeared in 1941 on almost the identical
route.
The victims have not always been nameless and faceless. In 1909
Joshua Slocum, at that time the world's best-known sailor, vanished
while crossing the Triangle. Eleven years before he had gained endur-
20

ing fame by being the first man to sail alone around the world. He and
the Spray sailed south from Massachusetts one day and never
emerged from the Bermuda Triangle. Those who knew him and the
Spray did not consider it likely that the two were victims of any
normal hazard of the sea.
The infamous history of the Bermuda Triangle extends far back
into the last century, into the century before that, and then even
farther, back to the first known traveler in the area, Christopher
Columbus. Columbus sailed through the Sargasso Sea, another
legendary twilight zone, and the Bermuda Triangle on his first voyage
to the New World in 1492. His men were spooked by the strangeness
of the Sargasso and unnerved by events as they crossed the Triangle -
a bolt of fire that fell into the sea, unusual actions of the compass, and
a strange light that appeared in the distance late one night.
Although records are scattered and incomplete, it is documented
that four American naval vessels vanished without explanation
between 1781 and 1812. In 1840 the Rosalie, a large French ship, was
found deserted near Nassau, sails set, a valuable cargo intact, and
everything in order. The Bella, a mystery derelict, was found in 1854.
The Lotta, a Swedish bark, vanished near Haiti in 1866, followed
two years later by the Viego, a Spanish merchantman.
One of the greatest mysteries of the sea is the strange disappear-
ance of the Atalanta in 1880. She left Bermuda in January for
England with a crew of three hundred cadets and officers and was
never seen again. Despite a massive sweep by a large armada of ships
sailing swaths across the ocean within sight of each other, not a scrap,
a spar, or a lifeboat from the Atalanta was ever found.
The chain continued unbroken in 1884 when the Miramon, an
Italian schooner bound for New Orleans, glided silently into limbo.
When the Freya, a German bark, was discovered abandoned in 1902,
there was some speculation that an earthquake might have been the
cause.
The lurking menace of death should have been satisfied after all
the victims it had claimed, especially the three airliners and the
flight of planes in the 1940s, but airplanes and ships have continued to
disappear up to the present day. The story is always the same: good
weather conditions, no mechanical problems, routine radio reports,
and then silence. So rarely is anything found in the vast, intensive
search that follows that it comes as a surprise when any debris is
recovered or a message is received.
One of these exceptions occurred in February 1953, when a
Jamaica-bound British York transport sent an SOS while north of
21

the Triangle. After the message ended abruptly without explanation
a search was launched, but nothing was found. A London court later
reported,'Cause unascertainable.'
In March 1950 an American Globemaster vanished north of the
Triangle and was followed several months later by the freighter
Sandra. It vanished one calm, tropical night with a load of in-
secticide.
Incidents continued unabated: a Navy Super Constellation in
1954; the sulfur-laden Southern Districts in the Straits of Florida in
the same year; the Connemara IV, found derelict in the very center
of the Triangle in 1955. In 1956, as if making up for a slow year, the
jinx claimed a number of victims, including a Marine Sky Raider and
a Navy patrol bomber with a crew often.
An unusually high number of vanishments have occurred near
Christmas, and experts have not yet discovered why the Triangle is
especially ominous at that particular time of year. In December 1957
publisher Harvey Conover, one of America's best-known yachtsmen,
and se veral relatives, left Key West on the 150-mile trip to Miami in
his racing yawl, the Revonoc. Although their intended path would
have always kept them in sight of land, they vanishedforever.
Meanwhile, planes were not being ignored. In 1962 an Air Force
KB-50 rolled down the runway at Langley AFB, Virginia, and
headed for the Azores with a crew of nine. Shortly after takeoffthe
tower received a brief, weak radio message that the tanker was in
some sort of trouble. An extensive search once again produced no
trace of any kind.
The U.S. Navy has lost two nuclear submarines, the Thresher in
1963 and the Scorpion in 1968. Both ended their final voyages near
the Triangle.
1963 was a big year for the jinx. It started with the Marine
Sulphur Queen, a cargo ship specially refitted to carry molten sulfur.
Bound for Virginia from Texas, it vanished off the tip of Florida after
sending a routine radio message. With the exception of several life
jackets, nothing from the vessel was found. The loss was highly
publicized, as was the Coast Guard inquiry into the matter. Although
a number of possible solutions have been suggested, no one alive
knows what really happened.
One of the most baffling aspects of the disappearances has always
been the failure of searchers to find bodies. It would generally be
expected that one or more would be washed ashore after a ship-
wreck, but this has never happened in the Bermuda Triangle. Since
most of the incidents have occurred within sight of land, the absence
of bodies is especially puzzling.
22

In July 1963 the Navy and the Coast Guard searched for ten days
without finding a trace of the Sno' Boy, a 63-foot fishing boat lost on
an 80-mile trip from Jamaica. A month later two KC-135s were
caught in a sky trap with eleven crewmen. At noon they radioed their
position, then were never heard from again. When debris was located
near Bermuda it was assumed that there had been a midair collision.
But the finding of debris 160 miles away created a mystery. If there
had been a midair collision, why were there two areas of debris ? If
the planes had not collided, why did they crash simultaneously?
There is no satisfactory answer, and Air Force officials are still
scratching their heads over the affair.
Puzzling disappearances continued. In 1965 an Air Force C-119
vanished while on a flight in good weather from Homestead AFB to
Grand Turk Island. A strange, garbled message was received by the
Grand Turk tower operator just about the time the plane should have
been touching down. What desperate, last-minute information was
the pilot attempting to relate before he crossed over into oblivion ?
There is speculation that one of the UFOs sighted by Gemini IV may
have played a part in the loss.
In 1967 a number of vessels took one-way trips into the Bermuda
Triangle. The year started when a Chase YC-122 cargo plane
vanished into thin air on the 60-mile'flight from Fort Lauderdale to the
Biminis. The plane was carrying motion picture equipment for a
Lloyd Bridges movie entitled, ironically, The Unkillables. The year
ended with the loss of two Floridamen who had gone on a short boat
ride to view the Christmas lights of Miami Beach from a mile out at
sea. The Coast Guard received a call that the men were unable to run
the engine because of a bent propeller, but that there was no danger
of any kind; they simply would like a tow back to port. Nineteen
minutes later the Coast Guard arrived at the location given by the
men but found nothing of the boat that lived up to its name - the
Witchcraft.
In July 1969 five abandoned vessels were found during calm
weather in the same general area. A Lloyd's spokesman exclaimed
that this was 'most unusualespecially considering the excellent
weather. The next month Bill Verity, an experienced transatlantic
voyager, vanished in the Triangle.
Unexplained incidents are still occurring: the freighters Elizabeth
and Caribe vanished in 1971; and in March 1973 the Anita, the larg-
est cargo ship ever lost without a trace, sailed from Norfolk and was
never heard from again.
Officially, the Navy, Coast Guard, and the Air Force deny the
23

existence of strange forces in the area. Unofficially it is a differen
story. They admit that they are baffled, and that the few clues they do
have only increase the mystery. A spokesman for the Navy said,
'It looks almost like they [the missing vessels] have been covered by
some gigantic electronic camouflage net. We know there's something
strange going on out there, we've always known it, but there doesn't
seem to be any reason for it all. We don't sneer at it a bit around
here.' For those who remain skeptical of the mysterious pattern, the
record of disappearances is available for anyone to check. It takes
only a few minutes.
Pilots avoid discussing the vanished planes with outsiders, and
only reluctantly discuss them with each other. Crashes, although a
touchy subject, are at least something that can be analyzed, some-
thing for which a cause can usually be found. Disappearances are
another matter. It is possible for an airplane or a ship to go down
occasionally without leaving a trace. It's possible but not very likely.
There is almost always something, some debris or oil slick, to mark
the spot. Pilots have no control over the situation, but can only
continue to fly, hoping that their plane will not be the next victim.
Despite their basic skepticism of unknown forces, pilots have en-
countered many strange phenomena. Compasses spinning wildly,
severe turbulence during excellent weather, crooked radio beams,
misbehaving gyroscopes, glowing windshields and instrument panels,
and many, even stranger anomalies have been authenticated.
During the last century and a half more than forty ships and twenty
airplanes have carried almost a thousand beings* into this misty
limbo of the lost. Until the late 1940s each incident was merely a
baffling individual event. But then the pattern became obvious: too
many vessels were vanishing under similar circumstances in such a
small patch of ocean. Investigators were not easily convinced - it was
a long time before they conceded that something might be amiss with
the area itself. Aviation and marine experts now strongly suspect that
some phenomenon of the region, rather than a series of'coincidental'
mishaps as the Navy suggests, may be responsible.
Accident investigators have ruled out the usual hazards such as
sudden tropical storms; they do strongly suspect, however, that
atmospheric aberrations and electromagnetic gravitational dis-
turbances may be responsible. Some such force may have affected
the compasses and silenced the radios of the five Avengers, then
incapacitated the Mariner rescue plane when it entered the same
zone. This incident, particularly the pilots' description of a strange
sea and the inability to see the sun, as told in the Navy report, suggests
* An estimate only, as bodies have never been found.
24

some kind of atmospheric aberration, or'hole in the sky\ an area, as
yet unknown, that planes can enter but cannot leave. Many experi-
enced pilots and sailors feel that the aberration theory is the only one
that could account for events such as these - events that occur only
occasionally, always without warning, often enough to be alarming,
but irregularly, so that they cannot be predicted. Exactly what this
aberration is and why it appears to be restricted to tropical waters
such as in the Bermuda Triangle is not known at this time.
Some think the aberration may be a space warp, and that the miss-
ing vessels may have been entrapped in the fourth dimension. One
prophet has predicted that one day the space warp will free all the
vessels and they will return to their home ports with the skeletons of
the crews. Another speculates that the crews may be alive, the same
age as when they left, and will be able to reveal the secret of what lies
beyond the shadowy edge of the Bermuda Triangle.
Perhaps time runs at a variable rate rather than at a constant rate
as has always been thought. If so, this would account for the many
cases of ships and planes suddenly finding themselves hundreds of
miles from where they were supposed to be for no logical reason. If
the time flow varied enough from the standard rate, a vessel caught in
such a trap might simply cease to exist in this world. Another
possiblity is that time does not always move in a straight line, but
that parts of it occasionally break off and head away from the main
flow, carrying with them whatever might happen to be in the area at
the time. These vessels and their unfortunate occupants would be
transported to the future or the past, or might be trapped in a parallel
universe.
Some scientists feel that seaquakes, sudden shiftings of the ocean
floor capable of causing waves up to 200 feet high, may be the most
logical answer. Such waves could easily swallow a ship and would
account for the absence of SOS's and of debris.
While the Navy and other experts dismiss the possibility that
underwater volcanic activity and seaquakes are the cause of the
losses, a number of scientists think that freak seas might be involved.
Waves of 100 feet and more have been verified, and such a gigantic
wall could easily roll even a medium-sized ship bef ore it could send an
SOS. Although not much is known about what causes such waves, it
is suspected that power/id ocean currents or waterspouts may be
factors. The flaw in this theory is that it takes a storm of some
magnitude to produce a freak sea, and in none of the disappearances
in the Triangle could the weather be called bad. Moreover,freak seas
could not be responsible for the disappearances ofplanes. To account
25

for plane losses, gigantic, invisible atmospheric waves not unlike
those of the ocean have been postulated.
Aircraft occasionally encounter turbulence, not only in and near
cumulonimbus clouds, but also in clear air. Extreme turbulence can
actually disintegrate an aircraft, and may be the cause of some of the
vanishments. Under careful examination, however, this theory also
does not stand up. First, the weather was good when most of the
disappearances occured, and second, an aircraft that disintegrates
leaves debris over a wide area.
Although most theories fail to account for more than a few of the
incidents, there is one that does appear to make sense - that of
magnetic anomalies. Compass variation is a phenomenon known
even to the tyro pilot and sailor. The compass rarely points to true
north, the north pole; it points instead to the magnetic pole, which is
some distance away. In many places the variation is a significant
factor that must be taken into account; if it is not, a vessel may well
end up hundreds of miles from where it is supposed to be.
There are two places on the earth's surface where the compass
does point to true north - the Bermuda Triangle and an area off the
coast of Japan known as the Devil's Sea, which also has a high rate
of disappearances. Between 1950 and 1954 at least nine ships
vanished in the Devil's Sea. These were large freighters with power-
ful engines and radios, not merely small fishing boats. Only one was
able to send an SOS. Extensive searches found a few small pieces of
debris, but no survivors, bodies, or lifeboats. Alarmed, the Japanese
government began a survey of the area, but all that was found was a
new volcano. The eruption sank one of the research ships! The Japan-
ese government then officially proclaimed the area to be a danger
zone.
The U.S. Navy, in a classified operation known as Project Magnet,
has been conducting an extensive geomagnetic survey, bringing up
to date many measurements more than thirty years old. It is believed
that the project may also be performing other functions, including
listening for messages from outer space and investigating the theory
of reduced binding'.
Wilbur B. Smith, an electronics expert who was in charge of a
1950 study of magnetism and gravity made by the Canadian govern-
ment, detected regions in the atmosphere where what he called
'reduced binding' existed. These regions, he reported, were about
1,000 feet in diameter and extended to an unknown altitude; they
either moved or faded away, only to reappear at another location.
Smith found that'reduced binding' fields were often present where
unexplained crashes had occurred. He theorized that while most
26

planes would probably not be affected, others of a specific design and
size might sustain enough of the force to be destroyed. It is possible
that these forces not only affect aircraft and their compasses and
radios, but also interfere with the human senses, causing vertigo and
loss of spatial orientation.
Evidence has been presented that the Bermuda Triangle is merely
a part of a larger problem region. This area, known as the Limbo of
the Lost, includes the continental shelf north to New Jersey, the Gulf
of Mexico, and the Atlantic Ocean east to the Azores.
Other researchers have discovered that the Bermuda Triangle and
the Devil's Sea are only two of a number of anomalic areas spread
across the globe. Mathematicians and engineers have found twelve
such zones, named ' Vile Vortices 'for lack of a better term. These
vortices are alleged to occur at the north and south poles and at five
locations in each hemisphere. They were found to be equidistant from
27

each other, and lines drawn on a globe from each vortex to those
adjacent form a series of equilateral triangles. Scientists have not yet
learned the significance of this pattern.
It was recently realized that the same geographic characteristics
of the small sector of ocean known as the Bermuda Triangle that
make it an ideal path for rocket launchings might also make it an
ideal channel for landing approaches by vehicles from outer space.
Perhaps a power source or signal device left in the area many
centuries ago by a scouting party from another planet continues to
send signals into space, showing the followers of the earlier explorers
the best landing approach to this planet. The device might operate
only occasionally, which would account for the fact that most ships
and planes that traverse the area do so without incident. When the
device did activate, however, the powerful beams might well be
strong enough to affect navigation instruments and the human mind,
and possibly even completely destroy any vessel unlucky enough to
be in the way. Such a force could account for the many incidents that
have occurred because of the apparent directional problems of the
pilots, most notably in the case of the five Avenger bombers.
Increasing evidence that past civilizations have possessed know-
ledge and accomplished feats far beyond what scientists previously
thought possible supports the theory that earth was visited in ancient
times by beings from outer space. It is considered unlikely that many
of these achievements could have occurred without aid from an
extremely advanced mtelligence.
The Coast Guard claims that the many incidents in the Bermuda
Triangle are merely coincidence and that' there is nothing mysterious
about disappearances in this particular section of the ocean. Weather
conditions, equipment failure and human error, not something from
the supernatural, are what have caused these tragedies.'' Most of the
mishaps, according to the Coast Guard, occur because of the large
number of people who brave the ocean in small boats while crossing
to the Bahamas.
This statement does apply to those inexperienced boatmen who
venture out in craft never intended for use in the open sea. But what
about Joshua Slocum, Harvey Conover, and the many other expert
sailors who have vanished? What of the lost airliners, the Air Force
jets, and the five Avengers ? They were piloted by men who knew their
business and how to handle the roughest of conditions, yet they still
vanished. The Coast Guard statement fails to account for the over-
whelming majority of the disappearances.
The Bermuda Triangle continues to baffle officials. New theories
are tried and discarded almost as quickly as vessels disappear. The
28

only link that seems to exist between the missing vessels is that they
were all crowded into the same smalt geographic confines. All
explanations fail to explain why wreckage or bodies are never found
and why the disappearances always occur during good weather. It
may well be that man is not yet advanced to the point to be able to
understand the forces that exist in the Bermuda Triangle.
29

2
1492
Christopher Columbus, the Sargasso Sea,
and the Bermuda Triangle
Christopher Columbus, the first known traveler through the Sargasso
Sea and the area now known as the Bermuda Triangle, gave it an air
of mystery that has grown as the years have passed. In his logs are
descriptions of the weed-filled sea and reports of an erratic compass,
a great flame of'fire, and the appearance of a strange light at sea.
Each incident frightened an already jittery crew and was to them a
warning to turn back. Word of the unusual events spread among
sailors everywhere, and the region soon acquired a reputation for
being strange, a reputation that continues to this day.
When the astronauts began their quarter-million-mile journey
to the moon in 1969 they had much more information about their
intended voyage than Columbus had about his 3,000-mile trip in
1492. The astronauts were backed by thousands of technicians
throughout the world, using the best computers and the best com-
munications devised by man. They knew the exact time the journey
would take and they were aware of and prepared for the many
dangers they might encounter. When Columbus sailed from the
Canary Islands with ninety men in three small ships he had almost
no idea of what to expect. There were no charts to follow, no one to
communicate with, no place to go for help, and no clue as to how
long the trip would be or what dangers might be encountered.
The Sargasso Sea, an area with less wind, rain, and clouds than
the rest of the ocean, is in the central part of the North Atlantic
Ocean, stretching from 30° to 70° west and from 20° to 35° north.*
It is almost as large as the continental United States, more than
2,000 miles long and 1,000 miles wide, and is bounded on all sides
* The North Atlantic Ocean extends south to the equator.
30

by currents which cause it to rotate slowly clockwise. Its name is
derived from the Portuguese word for seaweed, sargat;o.
The first sailors to cross the Sea feared they would soon run
aground, as the presence of great masses of seaweed normally
indicates that land is near. However, the ocean is several miles
deep throughout the area. Many unusual creatures inhabit the
Sargasso, either as recent stowaways on material that has drifted
in, or as descendants of stowaways that have adapted to life on the
weeds.
The horse latitudes, a belt of calm weather between latitudes
30 and 35, add to the strangeness of the area. The air in this region
is often so still that sailors have been known to read all night on
deck by candlelight, and sailing ships have been stranded there for
months at a time.
Though Columbus reported the weed accurately, those who
31

followed spread stories that inspired fear in all seamen. Sailors at
that time were uneasy about traveling far from shore; they were
not accustomed to being out of sight of land for extended periods.
The yellow, brown, and green seaweed crawling with strange
creatures and extending as far as the eye could see was terrifying to
those sailing through it. Stories quickly grew, especially after ships
sat becalmed for long stretches in the horse latitudes. Soon it was
not the lack of wind that stopped them, according to the tales, but
the thick mats of weed that supposedly grew up the sides of the
ship, up the ropes and chains, and held them fast under the hot sun
until all aboard died of thirst or starvation and the ship became a
rotted hull manned only by skeletons and prevented from sinking
by the seaweed tentacles. Borer worms, which thrive in tropical
waters, sometimes did turn the sides of a becalmed ship into a
rotted mass. The little things that crept along the mats of weed
were transformed in the stories into monsters and giant squid that
could haul a ship down to the depths of the ocean. The rumor grew
that crews often died an agonizing death because there was no air
to breathe.
Once debris of any sort has drifted into the relatively calm center
of the Sargasso Sea it usually remains until it sinks, moving in
enormous circles as a captive of the rotating pool. Plants carried by
the surrounding currents drift into the center, where many con-
tinue to grow. It is suspected that much of the weed comes from the
Gulf of Mexico, borne by the Gulf Stream, and from the Carib-
bean. Trees torn from riverbanks by tropical floods in Central
America and the West Indies float in. Refuse from any river could
eventually float to the Sargasso Sea. In 1968 it was reported that
there was more oil and tar in the area than sargassum, coming
from oil spills throughout the world.
Many derelicts have been found in the Sargasso, giving it the
reputation of being a graveyard of ships. Several novelists have
created civilizations in the center of the Sea. Here, according to the
stories, countless wrecks, many of them hundreds of years old and
full of treasure, pile up against each other. The residents of the
floating kingdom, who all drifted in helplessly at one time or other,
disdain the treasure since it is of no use to them. The Sargasso Sea,
both in truth and in fiction, is a strange place.
The horse latitudes received their name when ships with horses
aboard became stranded in the region. After a time of no rain and
no progress, the supply of drinking water often grew dangerously
low. Thirst-crazed horses occasionally broke away and plunged
into the sea, or the weaker ones were thrown overboard to save the
32

water for the better horses. Superstitious sailors believed that
ghosts of the dead horses haunted the area.
On the evening of September 13, Columbus noticed that his
compass needle no longer pointed directly to the north star, but
instead pointed about six degrees to the northwest. That was the first
time that such a variation had ever been noted. He watched the
variation increase for the next few days, knowing that the crew
would be alarmed should they learn of the new development. The
other pilots also noticed it and their concern quickly spread to the
crew, who became terrified. To them it seemed that they were
entering a region where even the laws of nature were different. The
sailors felt that some unknown force was causing the compass to
betray them, and they feared that other mysteries might lie in wait
as they sailed on into the strange area.
At this point those who write about this incident in relation to
the Bermuda Triangle normally move on to some other subject,
leaving the impression that there is indeed some strange force at
work in the area. But the story does not really end here. Columbus
reasoned that the needle did not point to the north star, as had
always been thought, but to something else. The pilots and the
crew, having respect for their leader's scientific skills, believed
him, and their alarm subsided. More than three centuries later,
Washington Irving, in his biography of Columbus, wrote,'... the
explanation of Columbus, therefore, was highly plausible, and
it shows the vivacity of his mind, ever ready to meet the emergency
of the moment. The theory may at first have been advanced merely
to satisfy the minds of others, but Columbus appears subsequently
to have remained satisfied with it himself.' Although Irving
doubted that Columbus's theory was correct, Columbus did have
the correct answer to the puzzle.
The compass needle points not to the north pole or to the north
star, but to the north magnetic pole, which is presently near Prince
of Wales Island, halfway between Hudson Bay and the north pole.
There are, in fact, very few places on the surface of the earth where
a compass points to true north, almost everywhere there is some
variation, ranging from a few degrees up to as much as 180
degrees. Pilots, sailors, and hikers must be familiar with this now
commonly known property of the compass, and it is a routine
matter to add or subtract the required number of degrees to com-
pensate for the variation in the area.
The 'great flame of fire' that Columbus noted as having fallen
into the sea was apparently a meteor. It did not cause any particular
3	33

consternation among the crew, and was noted simply because of
its size.
By the second week in October, the crew, pressing to turn back,
was openly defiant to Columbus and his situation was desperate.
For weeks they had been seeing land birds and plants and hopes
were high that they would soon have a landfall. But each morning
they would have nothing before them except open sea and more
birds and plants. Clouds on the horizon were frequently mistaken
for land, and sailors were so often crying out that they had seen
land, only to raise and then dash the hopes of the crew, that
Columbus declared that should anyone give such notice, and land
not be discovered within three days, he would lose his claim to the
reward promised to the first to view land.
By October 11 they had seen so many unmistakable signs that
land was near that Columbus himself was watching from the deck.
About ten o'clock at night he thought he saw a light in the distance,
and fearing that he too was seeing things, called over one of the
men. He also saw the light. Another man was called, but by then
the light had vanished. Being uncertain, they did not raise the
crew's hopes by sounding the news. Four hours later Rodrigo de
Triana, aboard thePinta, signaled that land was in sight. This time
there was no doubt.
Historians have continued to speculate and to disagree about
what the light might have been. A torch in a fisherman's boat or
being carried by someone on shore or a group of luminous fish
are some of the suggested causes. The most commonly accepted
theory is that it was an illusion caused by extreme strain and wish-
ful thinking.
The region that now includes the Bermuda Triangle was thus
given an air of mystery by its first known navigator and his super-
stitious crew almost five hundred years ago. Columbus entered the
information in his logbook in a matter-of-fact manner, but it was
later exaggerated and sailors grew to fear that which they could
not understand.
34

11
August 1840
Rosalie
In August 1840 the large French ship Rosalie was found deserted but
otherwise in perfect order near Nassau. Her sails were still set, and
she appeared to have been abandoned only a few hours before being
discovered. She had no leaks, carried a valuable cargo which was
undamaged, and had only one living creature aboard - a half-starved
canary in a cage. The whereabouts of the crew was never learned.
Recent versions of the Rosalie incident are based on an account
in a 1931 book named Lot, written by Charles Fort, who spent a
good part of his life searching old newspapers for bits of informa-
tion to be used in 'books that ask questions which orthodox science
dares not answer.' Fort wrote that he took his information on the
Rosalie from a single article in the London Times.
London Times, November 6, 1840, p. 6:
SHIP DESERTED. - A letter from Nassau, in the Bahamas,
bearing date the 27th of August, has the following narrative: -
'A singular fact has tak^n place within the last few days. A
large French vessel, bound from Hamburgh to the Havannah,
was met by one of our small coasters, and was discovered to be
completely abandoned. The greater part of her sails were set,
and she did not appear to have sustained any damage. The
cargo, composed of wines, fruits, silks, &c., was of very consider-
able value, and was in a most perfect condition. The captain's
papers were all secure in their proper place. The soundings
gave three feet of water in the hold, but there was no leak
whatever. The only living beings found on board were a cat,
some fowls, and several canaries half dead with hunger. The
cabins of the officers and passengers Were very elegantly
furnished, and everything indicated that they had been only
recently deserted. In one of them were found several articles
35

belonging to a lady's toilet, together with a quantity of ladies'
wearing apparel thrown hastily aside, but not a human being
was to be found on board. The vessel, which must have been
left within a very few hours, contained several bales of goods
addressed to different merchants in Havannah. She is very
large, recently built, and called the Rosalie. Of her crew no
intelligence has been received.'
Further research on the vessel proved to be difficult.The London
Times carried no more articles on the ship, and the New York Times
and the Nassau Guardian were not yet in existence. According to
the British Library and the Library of Congress there are no
libraries that now hold copies of the August 1840 newspapers from
either Nassau or Havana. The Mus6e de la Marine in Paris had no
information on the ship, which was reported to be French, but
Lloyd's located two items that were tantalizing.
J. F. Lane, Assistant Shipping Editor, Lloyd's. August 15,
1973:1. . . regret that a search of Lloyd's Records has failed to
reveal mention of any incident involving a vessel named
Rosalie in the Bahamas in 1840.
However, I am enclosing extracts from Lloyd's Records
which contain references to a vessel named Rossini which
would appear to be the vessel in which you are interested.
Lloyd's List. September 25, 1840; Havana, 18th Aug. The
Rossini, from Hambro to this port, struck on the Muares
(Bahama Channel) 3rd inst. ;* Crew and Passengers saved.
Lloyd's List. October 17, 1840: Havana, 5th Sept: The
Rossini, from Hambro to this port, which struck on the Muares
(Bahama Channel) 3rd ult.f was fallen in with abandoned,
17th ult. and has been brought into this port a derelict.
There were enough similarities between the Rossini and the
Rosalie to suggest they might be the same ship. The names were so
close that one could have been mistaken for the other, especially
if they were handwritten, which most messages were in 1840. The
Nassau correspondent may have written Rossini but the Times
editor may have mistakenly thought it was Rosalie. The route, in
both cases, was Hamburg to Havana, and both vessels had been
found near Nassau.
* Inst, stands for 'instant', meaning 'of the current month', or in this case
August.
t Ult. stands for 'ultimo', or 'in the preceding month'.
36

The dates are also very close. It was reported on August 27 that
the Rosalie was brought into Nassau 'within the last few days', and
the Rossini was found on August 17 and towed to Nassau.
Hoping to obtain information that would indicate whether or
not the two names applied to the same vessel, I contacted the
Ministry of Education and Culture in Nassau. They were not able
to find any mention of the Rosalie, but did locate the Vice
Admiralty Court Minutes related to the Rossini. These proceed-
ings, which lasted several months, were a series of meetings
primarily concerned with the value and storage of the cargo,
insurance claims, and other business, but they did contain a brief
reference to the discovery of the ship and mentioned that it had
been towed to Nassau.
Vice Admiralty Court Minutes. 1840. August 25: The
Advocate and Procurator General appeared with Benjamin
Curry and John Baptiste, the masters of the British wrecking
vessels Resolute and Seaf/ower. and exhibited an affidavit
detailing the curious circumstances connected with the finding
of the above named vessel [Rossini], which was duly filed
and entered.
From the phrase 'curious circumstances', it appears that the
authorities in Nassau did not know that the vessel had run aground
two weeks before and that those aboard had been rescued.
Unfortunately, a search of the affidavits held by the Ministry
did not produce the one giving the details of the discovery of the
Rossini, which, if similar to those of the finding of the Rosalie, as
described in the Times, would indicate the two were the same. As
the situation now stands, there is reasonable doubt that the Rosalie
incident is a mystery, but no definite proof one way or the other.
37

10
April 1854
Bella
One of the first mystery ships of the Bermuda Triangle was the Bella,
which vanished in 1854.
There is not much information to be found on the Bella.
Although it was British, the London Times did not mention the
disappearance, and it is not listed in any of the many standard
reference works on shipwrecks.
Lloyd's Register of British and Foreign Shipping of1854 does list
a Bella, built in Liverpool in 1S52, and destined for Brazil, but does
not say that it suffered an accident.
The ship is also mentioned in Harold T. Wilkins's Strange
Mysteries of Time and Space, in a chapter about an Englishman
named Roger Tichborne. The incident is in a book of such a title
because of a mystery having to do with Tichborne's inheritance,
and his disappearance on the Bella was only incidental to the main
story. Unfortunately, Wilkins did not say where he found his
information.
According to Wilkins, six days after the Bella left Rio de Janeiro
in April 1854, bound for Jamaica, another ship, crossing the course
the Bella was presumed to have taken, sighted debris in the water.
A ship's long boat was upside down, and on its stern could be read,
'Bella, Liverpool'. The Bella itself was not seen. The flotsam was
brought back to Rio, and a number of British and Brazilian steam-
ships set out to hunt for survivors but were unsuccessful.
It was assumed at the time that the Bella had capsized, as it was
overloaded to the point that the decks were carrying cabin
furniture in order to make room for more freight. Sudden squalls
38

were known to have been in the area, and the night before the long
boat was found the weather had been rather gusty. In Wilkins's
account, no particular mystery surrounded the incident; the Bella
was simply another ship that failed to complete a voyage.
Wilkins did not say where the debris was found, but he did say
that it was discovered six days after the Bella had left Rio de
Janeiro. In the days of sailing ships a good freighter might make
150 miles on a good day, possibly as much as 200 miles if all
conditions were favorable. If the Bella had sailed for the full six
days under optimum conditions, it could have been as far as 1,200
miles north of Rio when disaster struck. If conditions had been less
favorable, or if it had not sailed all six days, it would have been
found farther south.
The distance from Rio de Janeiro to the Cape of Sao Roque is
approximately 1,200 miles, or just about as far as the ship might
have traveled if all had gone well. The Cape is 2,000 miles from
39

Barbados, and that is as close as the Bella could possibly have been
to the Bermuda Triangle.
The Bermuda Triangle should not be given 'credit' for the Bella,
as it met its fate, whatever it might have been, in a different part
of the world.
an

11
December 1872
Mary Celeste
No account of sea mysteries would be complete if it did not include
the Mary Celeste. Although the boat was discovered drifting crew-
less between the Azores and Portugal, it is frequently mentioned
in relation to the Bermuda Triangle.* All derelicts, no matter
where they are found, are compared to it, and the ultimate mystery
of any type is usually called the 'Mary Celeste' of its field. Flight
19, the five Navy aircraft that disappeared off the coast of Florida
in 1945, is often called the 'Mary Celeste of aviation'.
So many stories have been told about the famous derelict in the
century since it was found that it is almost impossible to determine
what is fact and what is fiction. Dozens of solutions to the mystery
ranging from the very simple to the bizarre have been proposed,
but no one knows, and no one ever will know, what actually took
place.
The Mary Celeste, a 103-foot-Iong brigantine of some 282 tons,
was found abandoned at sea by the Dei Gratia on December 4,
1872. The two ships had taken on their cargos in New York early
the previous month; Captain Briggs of the Mary Celeste had sailed
for Genoa on November 7, and Captain Moorhouse of the Dei
Gratia sailed for Gibraltar on the fifteenth.!
When Captain Moorhouse sighted the other ship at sea a month
later, the sails were set and it was sailing with the wind, but so
erratically that a crew was sent to investigate. The boarding party
found that the ship, which had been carrying Captain Briggs, his
* It was found at 38° 20'north, 17°15'west, to be exact, which is 590 miles
west of Gibraltar.
t There is disagreement over the dates, but Charles Edey Fay, who took
his information from original reports and is the most authoritative writer on
the Mary Celeste, gives these.
41

wife, daughter, and a crew of eight, was completely deserted. The
only lifeboat was gone, and appeared to have been launched, rather
than having been torn away.*
Descriptions of the condition of the ship vary considerably, but
it was essentially in good order, and had not suffered severely from
the weather, although some of the sails were slightly torn. Some
versions of the tale have it that a meal was about to be served,
others have the meal cooking on the stove, and still others have all
the dishes washed and properly stored. Some of the stories are so
detailed that the table was said to have been laid with half-empty
cups of coffee (still warm), tea, eggs, bacon, bread, and butter.
A vial of oil was supposedly sitting upright on a sewing machine,
indicating that the seas had been calm, and a clock was still ticking
on the wall.
The captain's personal effects were on board, and toys were
on his bed, as if a child had been playing there. The cargo of 1,700
barrels of alcohol was intact, although there was 35 feet of water
in the hold. However, the ship's papers, except for the captain's
logbook, were missing, as were the navigation instruments.
A sword was found hanging on the wall (or under the captain's
bed) with blood (or rust) stains. Some versions of the story say
there was blood (or wine) stains on the woodwork and on the sails,
while others do not mention blood at all, even on the sword.
A six months' supply of food and water was on board.
The last entry in the logbook was on November 24, when the
boat was 100 miles west of the Azores. By the time it was found,
eleven days later, it was 500 miles to the east.
Captain Moorhouse's crew brought the brig into Gibraltar,
where he was awarded a small salvage fee after a lengthy and
controversial inquiry. The court was unable to determine what had
happened to the crew. Many versions of what had happened were
told, retold, and embellished. Captain Moorhouse and his crew
were accused of being pirates, of having seized the ship for its
salvage value and disposing of its occupants. For a time it was
rumored that Moorhouse had planted some of his crew on the
Mary Celeste in New York, and that they had taken over the ship,
killed the occupants, thrown them overboard, and then waited for
Moorhouse and the Dei Gratia to catch up.
Another version was that the crew was discovered raiding the
cargo of alcohol. William A. Richard, then Secretary of the
* Some accounts have the boat still on the ship.
42

Treasury of the United States, wrote an open letter that appeared
on the front page of the New York Times of March 25,1873:
The circumstances of the case tend to arouse grave suspicion
that the master, his wife, and child, and perhaps the chief mate,
were murdered in the fury of drunkenness by the crew, who
had evidently obtained access to the alcohol with which the
vessel was in part laden.
It is thought that the vessel was abandoned by the crew
between the 25th day of November and the 5th day of Dec-
ember, and that they either perished at sea, or, more likely,
escaped on some vessel bound for some North or South
American port or the West India Islands.
A simpler theory was that the ship had been caught in a storm
and when it seemed about to sink it was abandoned by the crew,
who then disappeared in the lifeboat.
Much has been made of a forehatch that was found open, and
one theory is that alcohol fumes blew the cover off. Vapor re-
sembling smoke poured out of the hold, leading Captain Briggs to
believe the vessel was afire or about to blow up. The crew took to
the lifeboat, taking care to attach a line to the ship, but the rope
somehow became untied and allowed the Mary Celeste to sail
away from the lifeboat and its hapless occupants.
Fiction writers have made good use of the incident, beginning
with a young, unknown author named Arthur Conan Doyle, who
wrote what was at the time an anonymous article in the January
1884 issue of The Cornhill Magazine, entitled 'J. Habakuk
Jephson's Statement'. Doyle's story, which appeared eleven years
after the event, was readily believed because much of it was very
close to the truth or was deduced from true statements. He named
his fictional ship the Marie Celeste, and many later writers have
referred to the real ship by that name. Much of what is now told
about the Mary Celeste is really from Doyle's Marie Celeste.
Since Doyle's time the proposed solutions have become even
more ingenious. It has been suggested that food poisoning caused
the crew to have delusions and that they jumped into the sea to
escape some horrible hallucination; also that the cook poisoned
everyone, threw the bodies overboard, and jumped in after them.
Barratry, a calculated scheme to defraud the owners of the ship,
has been suggested as a solution. If the Dei Gratia had landed the
crew of the Mary Celeste somewhere off the beaten path, then
sailed into port with the story of the derelict, and collected the
43

salvage money, the award could have been split among the
members of both crews.
There was talk that the vessel's owner had arranged for the crew
to murder Rriggs and his family and to sink the ship for the
insurance, but that they somehow mishandled the job and lost
their lives. The plan may have called for the crew to jump as the
ship drove toward rocks near the Azores. An unexpected wind
might have blown the ship to safety, allowing it to sail on as the
crew drowned or was dashed to death upon the rocks.
It has been suggested that a waterspout,, the seagoing cousin of
the tornado, was responsible for the abandonment. Another
theory is that a submarine disturbance caused the crew to panic
and abandon ship. Yet another theory is that somewhere near the
Azores the ship became stranded on a 'ghost island', a shifting
sandbar that comes and goes, constantly changing positions. The
crew, thinking their position hopeless, took to the boat and were
lost at sea. The sandbar then shifted again and set the ship free.
Many years after the event a man who professed to be the only
member of the crew to survive claimed that the captain challenged
the mate to a swimming race around the ship, and both were killed
by a shark. As the crew looked on in horror the ship was struck by
a huge wave that dumped all overboard. The ship stayed upright
and sailed on alone while the crew, with the one exception,
drowned.
Fifty years after the incident 'confessions' were still being made
by sailors claiming to have been members of the crew. None of the
stories could be substantiated and today the fate of the occupants
of the Mary Celeste is as much a mystery as the day the ship was
found deserted at sea.
dA

11
Winter 1880
Atalanta
On January 31,1880, the British ship Atalanta sailed from Bermuda
with a crew of290 cadets and officers. She disappeared en route to
England, leaving not a trace behind.
The first public notice that the Atalanta was overdue appeared
in the London Times on April 13,1880.* After that the search for
the ship figured in the news almost every day for several months,
and the disappearance commanded world-wide attention. The
Times never lacked opinions, theories, hopes, and fears about the
fate of the ship.
London Times. April 13. 1880. p. 6:
Seventy-two days having elapsed since the Atalanta, the
sailing training-ship, was known to have left Bermuda on her
return voyage to Portsmouth without intelligence having been
received of her, it is feared that she may have been disabled by
the lately prevailing high winds and driven out of her course.
Although the Admiralty had previously ordered the Wye, store
ship, to call in at the Azores ... in search of the missing ship,
their Lordships have since deemed it advisable to order the
whole of the Channel Squadron [five ships] to . . . cruise first
to the Azores, and thence to Bantry Bay [Ireland], with the
object of picking up intelligence of the missing ship. The ships
will open out within signalling distance of each other, by which
means a large area of sea will be explored.
London Times. April 14, 1880, p. 2:
When the Atalanta left Bermuda there were 109 tons of
water on board, and an ample supply of provisions. The ship
was in all respects sound, possessed of unusual stability, and
* Many writers have erroneously called the ship the Atlanta.
45

The Atalanta
commanded by an officer of good judgment and high pro-
fessional qualifications; but the unexpected delay in her arrival
affords cause for anxiety for her safety, bearing in mind the
many disasters which have occurred during the past two
months, consequent on the very severe weather which has
been experienced in the Atlantic. There is, however, still
ground for hope that she may be only dismasted and may yet
arrive in safety.
... It is just possible that, having had the misfortune to have
46

her topmasts carried away by the easterly gales, which con-
tinued for nearly a month, the ship may have been driven off
her course, and be at the moment laboring in the North
Atlantic. An attempt has been made to connect [with the
Ata/anta] the copper-bottomed ship which is said to have
been discovered bottom-up by the Tamar.. . . but this is utterly
fallacious.... It would be impossible for the Atalanta. with her
weight of water-tanks and 43 tons of ballast on board, to float
in the circumstances stated. If she were once to turn turtle, she
would sink with, alas I. . . alacrity.. . .
... It is feared by many people in Plymouth that the ship,
bottom upwards, ... is the missing vessel. There is much
excitement here.
London Times. April 15, 1880, p. 10:
During the day more than 150 telegrams arrived [at the
Admiralty] from various parts of the country from relatives of
the crew and those on board, asking for information. . . . Their
Lordships regretted they were unable to give any information.
More than 200 persons also made personal inquiries at
Whitehall during the day.
It may reassure some to be told that a vessel took 84 days in
coming from Bermuda, whereas the Ata/anta has not yet been
more than 74 days.
The captain of the Tamar has senfa telegram . . . stating that
during his last voyage he did not, as has been reported, pass a
ship bottom upwards.
. . . This morning [Portsmouth] was thrown into a state of
excitement by a rumour that the missing ship had arrived all
safe at Falmouth. . . . [The report] was displayed at the news-
paper offices and various shopwindows, [and] the dockyard
gates were soon besieged by the anxious relatives and friends
of those on board.. . . However,... a telegram from Falmouth
was posted at the dockyard stating that a merchant vessel
called the Ata/anta had certainly arrived in the harbour that
morning, but that the rumour of the arrival of Her Majesty's
ship Ata/anta was incorrect.
London Times. April 16, 1880, p. 5:
... Although the absence of information continues to lead
us to a plentiful crop of rumours and speculations, the public
will do right to regard her for sometime longer as simply
missing. Had she, as has been surmised, foundered during a
gale, or been burnt, or come into collision with an iceberg, it
is fair to assume that she would not have been so completely
wiped out of existence as not to have left some floating
wreckage behind to tell the story of her fate. ... The popular
theory still is that she has been dismasted, and has been help-
47

lessly driven out of her course, and consequently out of the
track of steamships.. . .
The coral reefs in the vicinity of Bermuda are of an excep-
tionally dangerous kind, extending ... in some places more
than ten miles from the land.. . . These reefs shut in the islands
on three sides . . . and render access and departure from them
an extremely perilous undertaking. Should the Atalanta have
gone to pieces upon this coast. . . the wreckage would [by no
means] be washed ashore; on the contrary, it would most
probably drift out to sea and be carried eastwards by the Gulf
Stream.
London Times, April 1 9. 1 880, p. 6 :
On Saturday a report was bruited abroad to the effect that a
lifeboat had been found, with the name Atalanta painted on the
■stern. This was not confirmed, and even if it had been the boat
could not have belonged to the missing ship, as it is not a
custom in the navy to paint the names of the men-of-war to
which they belong on the stern or anywhere else.
London Times. April 20, 1880. p. 12:
The gunboat A von, from the Chile station, arrived in Ports-
mouth Harbour yesterday. She reports that at the Azores she
noticed immense quantities of wreckage floating about... in
fact, the sea was strewn with spars, etc. The harbour at Fayal
was crowded with dismasted ships, and wreckage was washed
in continually during the five days the Avon remained. Noth-
ing, however, seemed to indicate that a ship had gone down or
broken to pieces. . . . Some of the officers of the Avon do not
deem it impossible that the Atalanta has met with icebergs, but
they reject the idea of her having 'turned turtle'.
London Times. April 21, 1880, p. 8:
. . . There can be no question of the criminal folly of sending
some 300 lads who have never been to sea before in a training
ship without a sufficient number of trained and experienced
seamen to take charge of her in exceptional circumstances. The
ship's company of the Atalanta numbered only about 11 able
seamen; and when we consider that young lads are frequently
afraid to go aloft in a gale to take down sail ... a special
danger attaching to the Atalanta becomes apparent
London Times. April 26, 1880. p. 8:
There is no news to report with reference to the Atalanta,
and even those hitherto most sanguine are beginning to lose
heart. The Channel Squadron is now on its way to Bantry Bay,
its searches at the Azores having evidently proved fruitless	
48

The public will probably not rest satisfied until an examination
of the coasts of Greenland and Iceland has been made.
London Times, April 27. 1880, p. 10:
The crew of the Tamar, which arrived at Portsmouth to-day,
were not aware that any anxiety was felt as to the missing
training ship Ata/anta until they arrived in England.. . .Among
the passengers is an able seaman named John Varling* . . .
who was invalidated from the Ata/anta on the 3rd of January.
. . . Varling's account of the performance of the training ship
is far from reassuring, though the question will, of course, arise
as to the value of his opinion. She is reported as exceedingly
crank, as being overweight . . . and as having aroused the
distrust of Captain Stirling. . . . She rolled 32 degrees, and
Captain Stirling is reported as having been heard to remark that
had she rolled one degree more she must have gone over and
foundered. During the trying situation the peculiar weak-
nesses of the ship's company were brought prominently into
notice. As, with the exception of two, the officers were almost
as much out for training as the crew. Captain Stirling scarcely
ever left the deck, and the work of shortening sail and sending
down the spars was left to the able seamen on board, who,
including marines (mostly servants), petty officers, and cooks,
only numbered about 50 in a crew of 250. . . . The young
sailors were either too timid to go aloft or were incapacitated
by sea-sickness. . . . Varling states that they hid themselves
away, and could not be found when wanted by the boatswain's
mate. It took the ship 31 days to go to Barbados from Tenerife,
... or about nine days [extra], . . . The Ata/anta left Barbados
on Friday, the 9th of January, for Antigua, where they caught
the yellow fever. Two men, whose names Varling cannot
remember, had already died from the disease. . . . The ship
called in at Bermuda on the 30th of January for water and
provisions, and finally left for home on the 31st, since which
time nothing has been heard of her.
London Times. May 10, 1880, p. 8:
The Channel Squadron, under the command of Admiral
Hood, arrived at Bantry Bay this (Sunday) afternoon. The
Admiral reports that nothing was heard of the Ata/anta or any-
thing belonging to her picked up.
London Times. May 18, 1880, p. 10:
To the Editor of the Times -
Sir: The reports of the captains of ships recently arrived all
tend to confirm the previous accounts of a storm of unusual
* The Times spells the name 'Verling' in some articles, and 'Varling' in
others.
4
49

violence having prevailed in the Atlantic ... in the probable
track of the Atalanta from Bermuda.
To quote a few cases:
... the Caspaer was at Flores in a disabled state having
been on her beam ends* ... for 19 hours, in a gale, on
February 12. Second mate was killed, first mate broken legs,
and two men seriously hurt. . . .
Ulster, from St John's, was fallen in with . . . waterlogged
and a complete wreck, crew at mastheads, without food or
water. . . .
A large ship abandoned and only mizen mast standing, a
dangerous wreck to ships bound eastward, was passed. .. .
The following ships are also still missing: Winnefred. from
New Orleans, December 30; Devana, from Bankok, October 1,
and St Helena, January 9; Bay of Biscay, from Rangoon . ..
last seen on February 7.
We can gather from the above accounts, extracted from
many other reports, some idea of the fearful weather en-
countered, and the havoc caused by these gales, and those
who have experienced storms at sea, and know full well the
dire effects of heavy water breaking on board a ship, the
running into a half sunken wreck or iceberg on a stormy night
in mid-Atlantic, can form some conclusion as to the fate of the
Atalanta. ...
I am. Sir, yours most obediently,
ALLEN YOUNG, Master Mariner
London Times. June 10, 1880, p. 5:
The Accountant-General of the Navy has received instruc-
tions from the Admiralty to post up the books of the Atalanta to
the 4th. Inst, [of June], and the name of the training-ship will
be forthwith removed from the Navy list.. . . Widows of officers
will receive the award of the special pensions which is due
them in consequence of their husbands having been drowned
while in the performance of duty.
Captains continued to report the sighting of overturned vessels
that might have been the missing ship. Messages were found in
bottles and carved on barrel staves, but none appeared to be
authentic.
Many theories were proposed - some to explain why the ship
sank, others to explain why it was still afloat. Rumors spread
quickly: it has been found capsized; it had sailed into Falmouth;
it had struck an iceberg.
* A vessel is on its beam-ends when thrown over until the deck is almost
vertical.
50

It cannot be said with certainty that no trace of the ship was ever
found. The ocean was filled with debris following the severe storms
that wracked the ocean during February and March, and spars and
masts carried no identification. Even the Navy lifeboats were un-
marked. It may be that many eyes unknowingly saw parts of the
Atalanta.
After many years the details of the incident, especially those of
the weather and the other ships that disappeared at the time, were
forgotten and the Atalanta came to be remembered as the ship that
was lost in the limbo in 1880. The ship may have been lost far from
the Bermuda Triangle, as only about 500 miles of its 3,000-mile
journey were through it. Yet it is counted as a victim of the
Triangle.
51

1881
Ellen Austin and the Derelict
One of the weirdest cases of a derelict vessel occurred in 1881 when
the British ship Ellen Austin encountered a schooner in the mid-
Atlantic. It had been abandoned but was still seaworthy. A small
salvage crew went aboard and both vessels headed for St John's,
Newfoundland.
A fog descended and the ships drifted apart. They met again
several days later. Once again the schooner was deserted. The
salvage crew, just like their predecessors, had vanished.
The basic story, which stops at this point, can be traced as far
back as Rupert Gould's The Stargazer Talks, published in 1944.
There are several other versions that begin where Gould left off.
One is that the captain of the Ellen Austin attempted to place
another salvage crew on the derelict but no one would go and the
vessel was left behind. The other is that another crew did go
aboard, the vessels were parted by a squall, and the schooner and
its second crew were never seen again.
Unfortunately, Gould did not cite his source, and his failure to
mention the month of the occurrence made research difficult. I was
not able to find the original report of the incident despite lengthy
searches through the New York Times Index, the Index to the Times
(London),* and Hocking. Lloyd's had no information. The New-
foundland public library in St John's checked its files and the local
paper, the Evening Telegram, for 1881 but could find nothing.
* Although there were no articles in the London Times about the Ellen
Austin under the heading 'Shipping Accidents', the item may be one of the
hundreds of miscellaneous items under that heading. I was not able to check
them all. Gould was English, so his source of information very likely was a
newspaper from that country.
52

I checked, page by page, The Newfoundlander for 1881 and half
of 1882 but had negative results even though that paper made a
practice of describing interesting adventures of ships that docked
at St John's. There were many accounts of the travails of other
vessels that journeyed that way. It is not likely that the story of the
Ellen Austin would have been missed had the ship stopped at
St John's.
Rupert Gould was a skeptical and diligent researcher who made
authentic attempts to solve the mysteries that he encountered.
The incident may well have occurred as he said it did, but the
variations that go beyond his account are fiction.
The Ellen Austin's discovery will remain a mystery at least until
someone locates the information that Gould used for his account.
It may remain a mystery even after the source is discovered.

11
1866
1868
1884
Lotta
Viego
Miramon
In 1866 the Lotta, a Swedish bark bound from Goteborg to Havana,
vanished somewhere north of Haiti. Two years later the same fate
was waiting for the Viego, a Spanish merchantman. The chain
continued in 1884 when the Italian schooner Miramon, bound for
New Orleans, disappeared.
These are incidents for which, despite extensive research, I was
not able to find any information. In some of the cases the problem
was that the incidents, as they appear in the Legend, are very brief
and almost devoid of details such as dates and routes. There is no
proof that the ships disappeared in the Triangle, that they suffered
their fates outside it, or that they even existed.
54

11
October 1902
Freya
The Freya, a German bark, was found deserted at sea on October 20,
1902. She had sailed from Manzanilio in the West Indies on October
3, en route to Chile, and was not seen or heard from again until she
was found dismasted, lying on her side, and crewless Her anchor was
hanging free at the bow, and the captain's calendar was turned to
October 4, indicating that disaster had struck soon after the ship
had left port. The winds were known to have been light at the time.
Lloyd's Register. Wreck Returns. 1900-1904. (Section entitled
Abandoned at Sea) Number 446:
Freya. 626 net tons. German.
Point of departure: Manzanilio.
Destination: Punta Arenas.
Cargo: Ballast.
Description of boat: Wood and bark.
Circumstances and place: Near Mazatlcin.
Date of the disaster: Prior to October 21. 1902.
Nature. April 25, 1907, p. 610: The Mexican Earthquake'
Another great earthquake has been added to the series which
has marked the recent increase in seismic and volcanic activity
along the Pacific coast of America.. . .*
Seaquakes are common in this region; sometimes they are
felt by ships at sea though unnoticed on shore, and in at least
one instance seem to have caused the loss of a ship. The story
is a remarkable one On October 3, 1902, the German barque
Freya cleared from Manzanilio for Punta Arenas; nothing more
has been heard of the captain or crew, but the ship was found,
twenty days later, partially dismasted and ly.ing on its side.
There was nothing to explain the condition of the ship, but a
* Italics mine.
55

wall calendar in the captain's cabin showed that the catas-
trophe must have overtaken it on October 4, not long after
leaving port, as was also indicated by the anchor being found
still hanging free at the bow. Weather reports show that only
light winds were experienced in this region from October 3 to
October 5, but. on the other hand, severe earthquakes were felt
in Acapulco and Chilpanzingo on October 4 and 5, one of
which probably caused the damage to the Freya which led to
its abandonment.
Ail the versions of the Freya story lead back, either directly or
indirectly, to the 1907 article in Nature; no other source has ever
been reported. The article is primarily concerned with a series of
earthquakes on the west coast of Mexico. In the one paragraph on
the derelict, the cities of Manzanillo, Acapulco, and Chilpanzingo
are mentioned, all of which are on the west side of Mexico.
Mazatlan, where Lloyd's reports the derelict was found, is also on
the Pacific side.
The confusion appears to have been caused by the existence of
another city named Manzanillo, this one being a seaport on the
southern coast of Cuba. The first writer who ascribed the mystery
of the Freya to the Bermuda Triangle 'mistakenly' assumed that
the ship had sailed from the Cuban port rather than from the
Mexican city of the same name.
56

The finding of the vessel north of its starting point is due to the
action of the wind and currents after the ship was abandoned. It is
not known what became of the crew, or whether the earthquake
was in fact the cause of the wreck.
57

10
November 1909
Joshua Slocum and the Spray
Captain Joshua Slocum, the world's best known and most skilled
sailor of the day, vanished in the Bermuda Triangle in 1909. He had
previously won worldwide acclaim by being the first man to sail
single-handed around the world. The voyage, which took several
years in his superb yawl, the Spray, was finished in 1898. He was
successful despite obstacles that would have defeated most ordinary
men and boats. He outracedpirates near Morocco, survived storms
that destroyed larger ships nearby, held entire tribes of savages at
bay in the Straits of Magellan, and sailed on after his maps had been
destroyed. He was stranded for a week in the doldrums of the
Sargasso Sea, and was greeted upon his return to New York City,
at night, by the worst storm of the voyage, a tornado that damaged
much of the city.
Yet, this same man, who possessed the skill, courage, and stamina
to defy successfully the worst hazards that nature could deal him,
disappeared several years later on the relatively short journey
through the Bermuda Triangle. He set sail from Martha's Vineyard
on November 14, 1909, bound for South America, and was never
seen again.
Many who knew Captain Slocum felt he was too good a sailor, and
the Spray too good a boat, to have been defeated by any of the normal
hazards of the sea.
No one knows for certain what happened to Joshua Slocum
and the Spray, despite the many stories and rumors that have
grown since he disappeared almost seventy years ago. Some say
that he was never seen again after departing on the trip that might
have turned into another circumnavigation of the globe, while
others report that he was seen in various ports along the way.
58

Many theories have been suggested to explain his disappear-
ance. He may have finally met the gale that was capable of sinking
him. The Spray might have caught fire. He may have been run
down at night by a larger ship. It was not unusual for a small boat
to be struck by a steamer in the busy coastal waters. A sailing boat's
lights, normally dim, were sometimes hidden from view by the
boat's own sails, and a large ship could easily crush a 37-foot yawl
without anyone even feeling a bump. According to one of
America's foremost writers of sea stories, Edward Rowe Snow,
Slocum was run down by a 500-ton mail steamer near Turtle
Island, Lesser Antilles, while en route to the Orinoco River.*
Descriptions of Slocum's health varied. His son, Victor,
claimed that he was in the best of health, while others felt he was
growing old. Slocum himself felt that his mind was not as sharp as
it once had been, and he admitted to having an occasional black-
out spell. It is possible that he fell overboard, either because of an
accident or because of blacking out. He may have died a natural
death and the boat eventually foundered either with or without his
body still aboard.
The condition of the Spray was also debated and continues to be
a subject of controversy among sailors. Slocum declared it to be
completely seaworthy and able to sajl for lengthy stretches with
no one at the helm. He felt it had earned its reputation when it had
completed its trip around the world. Others disagreed, saying that
Slocum completed his epic voyage in spite of the Spray, not be-
cause of it; that his great skill carried him through situations where
lesser men in the same boat would have failed. Expert sailors dis-
couraged builders from imitating the lines of the Spray, claiming
that it was a hazard to anyone lacking the skill of a Slocum. One
sailor who saw the boat just before it sailed on its last voyage felt
that it had aged along with its master. It was no longer neat and
trim but dirty, smelly, and showing signs of wear and poor
maintenance.
Some reports say Slocum was seen in various parts of the West
Indies before he disappeared, and others state he was seen sailing
up the Orinoco River long after he had been declared missing. It
has been suggested that Slocum was unhappy with his wife and
decided to deliberately vanish in order to spend his remaining days
somewhere in peace.
The fate of Joshua Slocum and the Spray is truly a mystery of
the sea.
* Edward Rowe Snow, Mysterious Tales of the New England Coast.
59

11
March 1918
Cyclops
On March 4, 1918, the USS Cyclops, a 19,600-ton Navy collier,
sailed from Barbados, West Indies, with a crew of 309 men and a
cargo of manganese ore. The 542-foot ship, one of the largest vessels
afloat, was bound for Norfolk* but it failed to arrive. In spite of a
massive search no trace was ever found. The ship did not send an
SOS.
It was first thought that she had been torpedoed, but a search of
German records after the war proved that submarines had not been
operating in the area at the time. The Germans made a practice of
broadcasting the destruction of large enemy ships, and no such
announcement was made for the Cyclops.
It was suggested that she might have struck a mine, but it was later
shown that none had been in the area. A mine strike normally
allowed time to send an SOS, and at least some of the men would
have been able to escape in life rafts. The lack of debris also spoke
against a mine strike, as well as against the possibility of an internal
explosion, which would have littered the ocean with wreckage and
bodies.
Some felt that the ship had simply foundered, but others, including
the Navy, emphasized that the weather had not been bad, certainly
not bad enough to sink the large, seaworthy, eight-year-old ship.
The captain, George W. Worley, had been in the Navy for twenty-
eight years and had been the Cyclop'J commanding officer since her
maiden voyage in 1910.
After a lengthy investigation the Navy stated: 'The disappearance
of this ship has been one of the most baffling mysteries in the annals
* The destination has sometimes been given as Norfolk, sometimes as
Baltimore. In either case the route across the Atlantic would have been the
same, as both cities are in Chesapeake Bay.
60

of the Navy, all attempts to locate her having proved unsuccessful.
Many theories have been advanced, but none satisfactorily accounts
for her disappearance.'' President Wilson said that'Only God and the
sea know what happened to the great ship.' One highly respected
journal of the time, the Literary Digest, even speculated that a giant
squid rose out of the ocean, wrapped its tentacles around the Cyclops,
and dragged it down to the bottom of the sea.
Public announcement of the overdue ship was withheld until
the middle of the next month.
Virginian-Pilot. April 15, 1918, p. 1 :
AMERICAN NAVAL COLLIER PROBABLY LOST
FATE MAY BE ANOTHER MYSTERY OF SEA
Washington, April 14. The big American naval collier Cyclops
. . . has been overdue in an Atlantic port since March 13. The
navy department announced today that she was last reported
.. . March 4, and that extreme anxiety is entertained as to her
safety. . . .
The [Navy] statement follows:.. . 'No well-founded reason
can be given to explain the Cyclops' being overdue, as no
radio communication with or trace of her has been had since
leaving the West Indies port. The weather in the area in which
the vessel must have passed has not been bad and could
hardly have given the Cyclops trouble. While a raider or sub-
marine could be responsible for her loss, there have been no
reports that would indicate the presence of either in the
locality. ...
'It was known that one of the two engines of the Cyclops was
injured and that she was proceeding at a reduced speed with
one engine compounded. [But] even if her main engines were
totally disabled, the ship would still be capable of using her
radio plant.
'The search for the Cyclops still continues, but the navy de-
partment feels extemely anxious as to her safety.'
Virginian-Pilot. April 16, 1918, p. 8:
Washington, April 15.... Officials refused to believe that the
great 19,000-ton collier and the 293 lives she carried could
have been wiped out without leaving a trace. Orders have gone
out, therefore, for the searching vessels to 'quarter' every rod
of the route covered by the Cyclops and to visit every one of
the scores of islands which dot that portion of the sea.
Navy officials frankly confessed that no theory yet advanced
to explain the disappearance of the Cyclops ... seemed
61

plausible in the face of the facts. ... An internal explosion
might have destroyed the vessel's wireless and motive power
at one instant, but surface wreckage would have remained to
mark her grave.
The possibility that a sudden hurricane, not infrequent in
those waters, might have first disabled and then engulfed the
collier was admitted, but again it was pointed out that some
evidence of the disaster must have been left in this case.
The search was discontinued in May, all efforts having been
fruitless. The Navy calculated the stability of the Cyclops and con-
cluded that the ship would have had an uncomfortable, quick, but
not excessive roll. It might have been possible, they said, for the
heavy ore to shift enough to cause a list and to submerge the deck
edge; such a condition would have been dangerous under certain
conditions of sea and weather. The Navy noted, however, that no
unusual weather had been encountered by other vessels along the
same route.
The Office of Naval Intelligence later listed the major theories
that had been suggested to account for the loss.
1.		The crew may have mutinied, seized the ship, and sailed off
the usual trade route.
2.		The American Consul General at Rio de Janeiro, a passenger
who was accused of being pro-German, might have arranged to
hand the ship over to the Germans.
3.		The ship was torpedoed by a German submarine.
4.		The cargo of manganese dioxide, highly incendiary under
certain conditions, might have exploded.
5.		The Cyclops may have foundered as a result of excessive strain
from rolling.
6.		Captain Worley, who was born in Germany, might have
surrendered the Cyclops to the Germans or connived at her
destruction by submarines.
The Navy could find no evidence to support any of the theories.
Many supposed clues to the loss have appeared over the years,
but none were authentic. In 1919 the mother of one of the crewmen
received a telegram from New York saying that he was safe and
that the Cyclops was in a German port. A bottle message was
found near Galveston that told of the Cyclops being torpedoed
1,000 miles east of Newfoundland. Both were investigated and
found to be hoaxes.
In 1920 Lt Commander Mahlon S. Tisdale provided evidence
to support the theory that the ship had capsized. During a cruise
on the Cyclops Tisdale discovered that the manhole plates on the
62

topside tanks had all been left open. 'I fought my way to the bridge
and reported to the captain that someone had opened all of the
topside tanks. He laughed at my earnestness and said that they
were always left off in accordance with instructions from the navy
yard.
Tisdale felt that on the Cyclops's last voyage the cargo might
have shifted and allowed the sea to rush into the open tanks,
causing the ship to capsize.
'This could all occur in a few seconds and the ship would be
bottom up before any one could abandon ship. . .. With every-
thing secured for sea there would be little wreckage. . . . There
would be no debris such as in the case of striking a mine or torpedo.
There would be no time for an "S.O.S.' There would have been no
time for anything. The few men in the water could not have lived
long of their own accord. Such small gear as did float off would
have been lost in the vastness of the ocean long before the rescue
vessels started their search.'*
Although Commander Tisdale's explanation is one of the most
commonly accepted solutions, there are many who disagree, say-
ing that there are two important flaws in his argument. The first is
that it assumes heavy seas, and reports consistently show that the
weather was not bad. The second flaw is that his reasoning re-
quired that the manhole plates be left off.
Commander I. I. Yates of the Norfolk Navy Yard charged
that Worley, who was known for his jokes, had pulled Tisdale's
leg. 'When Lieut Commander Tisdale discovered the covers off
the topside tanks the Cyclops was in a light condition, and it was
immaterial whether the covers were on or off. In fact, in this condi-
tion the topside tanks are generally kept full ofwater [for ballast].'!
Yates continued that there were no such orders from the naval
yard and that Worley would not have sailed with the covers off
while the ship was loaded.
The theory of a Captain Zearfoss was that 'The Cyclops was
sunk by her cargo. Manganese . . . has a tendency to settle down,
grinding away whatever is below it. ... I think the end came
suddenly when the bottom practically dropped out.'J
Many Navy men felt that the Cyclops's top-heavy super-
* Mahlon S. Tisdale, 'Did the Cyclops Turn Turtle?' United States Naval
Institute. Proceedings, January 1920, pp. 57-59.
11. I. Yates, 'Discussion', United States Naval Institute. Proceedings,
April 1920, p. 604.
t 'Collier Cyclops Mystery Still Causes Speculation,' United States Naval
Institute. Proceedings, September 1923, pp. 1569-1570.
63

structure had been the cause. Steel derricks, designed for the rapid
loading and discharging of coal, towered high above the deck. If
the ship were to list severely the top-heavy equipment would slow
the recovery, the cargo might shift, and the vessel would quickly
capsize. Partially filled holds, like the Cyclops's, would be more
likely to shift than would cargos in full holds. The flaw in this
theory, like most of the others, was that it would happen only
during bad weather.
By 1930 the Cyclops was still remembered well enough to garner
the headlines when parts of a diary sent to the Navy revealed that
four men 'in enemy pay' had placed dynamite around the engine
and had sunk the ship. At first the Navy felt that the diary might be
genuine, but many points in the story were dubious, especially
where it told of an enemy ship with 700 crewmen that remained in
the area to clear away all the debris. The story quickly faded away,
relegated to the status of an elaborate attempt at a hoax.
As recently as 1956 it was reported that the ship was seen to have
blown up in the Straits of Florida 'just before Easter' in 1918, but
there was no explanation of why the report had been withheld for
almost forty years, or why the ship might have been so far off
course several weeks after it had been overdue.
In 1969 Conrad A. Nervig, who had served on the Cyclops on its
last voyage to South America, suggested that in view of the known
evidence he thought the ship had broken in half. 'I was mystified
at hearing a sound not unlike that caused by metal plates being
rubbed together.. . . The ship was working to the extent that where
steam or water pipes. . . were in contact with portions of the hull,
the movement could be distinctly seen. . . The deck amidships
[was] rising and falling as if the ship were conforming to the
contour of the seas. Later that day when I called it to the Captain's
attention, he shrugged it off with a superior, "Son, she'll last as
long as we do."'*
Nervig surmised that the task of loading the vessel might have
been assigned to some young, inexperienced officer who confined
the cargo to several ot the amidship holds, accentuating the ship's
inherent weakness. According to Nervig, this may have caused the
ship to break in two and sink before an SOS could be sent.
The ship, however, had been properly loaded. It was done under
the personal supervision of Captain Worley and foreman Manuel
Pereira of the Brazilian Coaling Company, who had been in
charge of loading vessels for many years. Pereira stated that the
* Conrad A. Nervig, 'The Cyclops Mystery', United States Naval Institute
Proceedings, July 1969. p. 149.
64

ship could have carried at least 2,000 more tons of ore without
being endangered, and that the cargo had been well trimmed
throughout the entire ship.
The Cyclops continues to be in the news, even apart from its,
role in the Legend of the Bermuda Triangle. It was the first large
radio-equipped ship to disappear without sending an SOS and it
was the largest Navy ship ever to be lost without a trace. Every
March, the anniversary of its disappearance, its story is retold,
the theories are rehashed, and its famous picture is shown yet
another time. Its loss continues to be rightfully called the 'most
baffling mystery in the annals of the Navy.'
Unlike other disappearances, pertinent new information con-
tinues to be received about the Cyclops. In the past few years there
have been two important new developments in the case. The first
occurred in 1968 when a Navy diver, Dean Hawes, discovered a
ship while searching for the missing nuclear submarine Scorpion.
Hawes was stunned by the strange design of the vessel. Its bridge
was high above the deck, supported by steel stilts. Upright beams
like the skeleton of a skyscraper ran almost its entire length. Before
he could explore the wreck, which was in 180 feet of water 70 miles
east of Norfolk, he was forced to surface, and bad weather drove
his ship from the area. Hawes later saw a picture of the Cyclops for
the first time and is positive that it was the ship he had stood on.
The wreck is located along the path that the Cyclops would have
followed on its journey to Chesapeake Bay.
Hawes and Representative G. William Whitehurst of Virginia
persuaded Navy officials to investigate, and divers were to attempt
to relocate the wreck as a training exercise.
The announcement of the discovery of the wreck led to the
second major break in the case. I was doing research on the
Cyclops at the time, and its possible location immediately raised
several questions in my mind. If the wreck is the Cyclops, what
could have caused it to sink so close to its destination ? Why had
it not sunk earlier in the voyage when it was heavier because of its
unburned fuel and thus more susceptible to capsizing or structural
failure ? The answer, I reasoned, had to be the one possibility that
has steadily been denied since the time the ship disappeared; a
storm had to have been responsible for the disappearance of the
Cyclops.
Because of the disabled engine the ship's speed was only 10
knots, or about 240 nautical miles a day. It would have followed
the 15-mile-a-day North Equatorial Current for about 1,300 miles
until it met the Gulf Stream, which would then carry it as much as
5	65

120 miles a day for the remaining 500 miles. Based on these esti-
mates, the Cyclops should have been where the sunken ship now
lies after a little more than six days of travel. Since it had sailed
from Barbados in the early evening of March 4, it should have
been approaching Norfolk on the night of March 10.
I confidently decided that the newspapers, the Navy, and all the
ships at sea had been wrong, and that there had been a storm near
Norfolk that day that was strong enough to sink the ship. Since a
north wind has a reputation for raising havoc with the Gulf
Stream, the storm had probably come from that direction. A north
wind strikes violently against the opposing flow of the current,
turning it into a churning, thrashing torrent that has overwhelmed
many a vessel. If there had been such a storm I felt that the wreck
might very well be the Cyclops.
The National Climatic Center in Ashville, North Carolina,
mailed the weather records for the east coast the same day they
received my phone call. These records show that the wind blew
hard in Norfolk early in March, reaching a top speed of 30 to 40
knots almost every day. On the eighth it died almost completely,
but slowly began to build in strength the next morning. By 5:00 PM
66

of the ninth, gale warnings had been issued from Maine to North
Carolina. The wind came steadily from the southwest, increasing
in strength until by 10:00 am of the tenth it had reached 58 miles an
hour. After noon the wind shifted, blowing from the north-
west at 60 miles an hour. The speed varied between 40 and 60 until
5:00 pm, then remained near 40 for the rest of the evening, finally
tailihg off about midnight.
The storm had been widespread. Peak winds of 84 miles an hour
struck New York City, where they caused one death, and the gale
warnings had been extended south to Florida. The steamship
Amolco, 375 miles northeas' of Norfolk, was caught by the storm
from noon of the ninth until the afternoon of the eleventh. It had
to heave to to ride out the gale for the entire two days, and suffered
$150,000 worth of damage.
Officer W. J. Riley of the Amolco later told a reporter for
Norfolk's Virginian-Pilot that the Navy collier was probably
caught 'in the teeth of the gale', and he felt 'positive the Cyclops
was sunk during the raging of the high winds.' Several seamen
acquainted with the rolling tendency of the vessel seconded his
opinion and added that it had probably sunk quicker than the
lifeboats could be lowered.
Statements made just after the announcement that the Cyclops
was missing suggest that the Navy thought the ship had been lost
near the West Indies. The order to 'visit every one of the islands
that dot that part of the sea', and the opinion that a hurricane, 'not
infrequent in those waters', might have been the cause, indicate
that the eyes of the investigators were focused so far away that they
had not seen what had happened directly in front of their noses.
The absence of any calls from the ship after it left Barbados also
reinforced the idea that it sank early in its journey, near the West
Indies.
Everyone was accustomed to strong spring winds, and the storm,
which was apparently worse at sea than it was on land, did not
receive much publicity. The Virginian-Pilot mentioned it only in a
half-inch notice on March 10, hidden at the bottom of page two
between ads for Conkey's Buttermilk and the Couper Marble
Works. It said only that gale warnings had been issued at 5:00 pm
the previous day from Maine to North Carolina. There were no
articles in later days that mentioned the storm of March 10.
Five weeks later when the headlines announced that the Cyclops
was overdue, the wind that had gone almost unnoticed when it
occurred had been forgotten. It was quietly tucked away in the
Weather Bureau's statistics sheets where it would remain un-
67

discovered for fifty-six years. No one at the time, including the
Weather Bureau and the newspapers, thought to mention it to the
Navy. Officer Riley and the Amolco were never heard of after the
one small article in the Norfolk paper. The nation's attention was
on the battlefields of Europe and the blackouts, morale, and
Liberty bond drives at home, not on the lost Navy ship whose
picture appeared on page one for a few days. As a result the story
has always been that the weather 'was not bad anywhere along the
route'.
Contrary to popular opinion, there never was an official inquiry
into the disappearance. The Navy was fighting a war and could
not take time out to examine the loss of every ship that occurred.
Had there been an investigation, the weather information would
surely have been discovered.
As of August 1974 it still was not known if the sunken ship off
Norfolk is the Cyclops. On July 24 Lieutenant Douglas Arm-
strong, skipper of the Exploit, reported that he had located a ship
in 190 feet of water, seventy miles northeast of Cape Henry, and
had marked it with a buoy so divers could later identify it. I spoke
with Hawes again on August 17, 1974, and learned that he had
gone out with the Navy during the first week in August and
watched on television as the ship was examined by underwater
cameras. Because of construction differences, he could tell that it
was not the same one he had found earlier.
No plans were then made for a concerted effort to locate the
ship. However, the area is used by the Navy for training and re-
qualifying divers, and it is likely that the ship that Hawes found
will soon be found again and positively identified. It might very
well be the Cyclops. In any case, the missing part of the puzzle, a
substantial reason for the disappearance, has finally been found -
the overlooked storm of March 10, 1918.
68

25
January 1921
Carroll A. Deering
The story of the Carroll A. Deering has been told so many ways
that it would not be right to call any of them the Legend except for
a very short version which goes something like this:
On a cold, gray, January dawn in 1921 the five-masted schooner
Carroll A. Deering was discovered hard aground on Diamond Shoals
with all sails set. A meal was still on the stove but the only living
things aboard were two cats. The crew-was never found. That same
year a dozen other vessels disappeared in the area and the govern-
ment of the United States investigated the possibility that pirates or
Soviet sympathizers had seized them.
At the end of the lengthy investigation into the mystery of the
Carroll A. Deering, one government official stated,' We might just
as well have searched a painted ship on a painted ocean for sight of
the vanished crew.'
Many versions stop at this point, but several continue on, giving
the full story of the Carroll A. Deering, or as much as could be
learned.*
Virginian-PHot, Tuesday, February 1, 1921, p. 3:
The Carroll A. Deering, a five-masted schooner, went
aground off Diamond Shoals Sunday night, according to
advices from coast guard stations of that vicinity. The derelict
was sighted today, and lifeboats . . . were manned to go to
the assistance of the stranded craft.
A heavy sea was beating over the shoals, making the
undertaking of the surfmen extremely hazardous. They arrived
* Some of the past writers have erroneously called the schooner the Carol
Deering.
69

within 400 yards of the schooner—close enough to observe
that the vessel had been stripped of her lifeboats and that
there were no signs of life aboard.
Virginian-Pilot. Saturday. February 5, 1921. p. 4:
Last night it became definitely known that the schooner
which was abandoned with all sails set. . . was the Carroll A.
Deering. . . . She was boarded . . . and a casual inspection of
the schooner convinced them that she could not be saved. Her
seams had been ripped open by the constant playing of the
waves, and her hold had been weakened beyond hope of
•repair by the disintegrating processes of the water. . ..
When she started on her South American trip last September
she was in command of Captain Merritt, one of her owners, the
other owner being G. G. Deering, after [whose son] the,boat
was named. A few days out and Captain Merritt was taken ill
and was forced to put back. . ..
Captain Wormwell, a [66-year-old] veteran of the sea, but
who had retired three years previously, was sent to take com-
mand. He made the trip down successfully and got back as far
as Diamond Shoals, as far as present information is indicative,
before meeting with a mishap. How the ship happened to be
abandoned, with all sails set and with apparently no damage
to her, is still as much'of a mystery as ever. No word has been
received from Captain Wormwell or any other member of his
crew.
Mutiny has been suggested as one reason for the ship's
strange plight, but it has been discounted very largely even as a
conjecture. The beach where the ship came to grief has long
been known as 'the graveyard of seamen', and it is thought by
some that an ugly squall came up when the Deering reached
a point off there, but the crew, knowing by tradition the
dangerous situation in which they found themselves, became
panic-stricken and attempted to make for shore in life-boats.
The theory is that either the lifeboats in which they set out
were upset by the gale, which was known to" be raging, or that
they were picked up by [another] ship. ...
No new developments occurred and the derelict and its crew
faded from the news, only to return several months later as the
main element in an incident with overtones of an international
conspiracy.
New York Times. June 21. 1921, p. 1 :
The crew of an American ship is missing, and what seems to
be conclusive evidence has been obtained that the men were
taken as prisoner to another-vessel and carried away to parts
70

unknown, if they were not murdered.
A second American ship is long overdue, and two other
American ships are unaccounted for under circumstances that
lead to the belief that their disappearance is in some way
connected with the capture'of the crew of the first-mentioned
vessel.
The United States Government has undertaken to solve these
mysteries of the sea, which, in the opinion of officials today,
point either to old-time piratical methods off the Atlantic Coast
or the seizure of the vessels for the benefit of Soviet Russia.
Officials concede that it is difficult to believe that acts of
piracy could be committed in and near the territorial waters of
the United States in this day, but the evidence is such that they
are unable to escape the suspicion. ...
The State Department. ... the Treasury Department,
through its Coast Guard, ... the Navy, : . . the Department of
Commerce, . . . [and] the Department of Justice . . . [are]
working on the theory that all these mysterious incidents are
interrelated.
Several months ago the five-masted schooner Carol Deering
[sic] of Portland, Me., was found abandoned off Diamond
Shoals, North Carolina, with all sails set and her officers and
crew missing. . . . Evidence indicated that she had been
abandoned in a hurry for no conceivable reason, for the vessel
was in good shape, with plenty of food. In fact, it was apparent
that she had been abandoned when a meal was about to be
served. Her small boats were gone, however.
A little later a bottle came ashore near where the ship was
found, and in it was a note . . . which read as follows:
'An oil-burning tanker or submarine has boarded us and
placed our crew in irons. Get word to headquarters of com-
pany at once.'
The crew of the Deering, including the Captain, numbered
twelve men, and not a trace of them has been discovered. . ..
The writing found in the bottle has been compared with the
penmanship of her missing mate, and handwriting experts
have declared that there is no question that the mate wrote the
message.
The steel steamer Hewitt of Portland, Me.... is also missing.
•.. She might have been off Diamond Shoals about the time
the Deering went ashore, and the authorities believe that she
is still afloat, intact.
At the Department of Commerce today the statement was
made that two other American steamers had disappeared under
circumstances that led officials ... to believe that they had not
foundered, and it was openly admitted that they suspected
that the ships had been the victims of pirates [or] Soviet
71

sympathizers. .. . The names of these vessels could not be
ascertained, and officials were extremely hazy as to details of
their disappearance.
New York Times. June 22, 1921. p. 1 :
The names of three other vessels which have disappeared off
the Atlantic coast of the United States in mysterious circum-
stances were added by the Department of Commerce today to
the list of those . . . more or less related to the supposed kid-
napping of the crew of the American schooner Carroll A.
Deering. ... It is not asserted that all the missing vessels were
the victims of pirates or possibly Bolshevist sympathizers . . .
but the fact that all these vessels disappeared at about the
same time, and that none of them left a trace is considered
significant. . . .
Ordinarily ships that disappear leave some trace either in the
way of boats, wreckage or dead bodies, but it is said that none
of the ships added to the list today left any trace whatever. . . .
For some reason the Department of Commerce officials were
unable to identify the two other vessels whose disappearance
excited suspicion. . ..
The State Department... instructed consular officials of the
United States at ports in various parts of the world to keep a
lookout for the Deering's missing crew and a mysterious vessel
on which they were supposed to have been made prisoner....
The department's statement throws suspicion on the conduct
of a steamer which passed the Cape Lookout lightship soon
after the Deering. . . .
"... On Jan. 29,1921, the . . . Carroll A. Deering. . . passed
Cape Lookout lightship. North Carolina, and on Jan. 31,1921,
it was found a few miles north of that point in such condition
that there is every suspicion of foul play having occurred.. ..
"... A man on board other than the Captain hailed the light-
ship and reported that the vessel had lost both anchors and
asked to be reported to his owners. Otherwise the Deering
appeared to be in very good condition. A short time [later] a
steamer, the name of which cannot be ascertained . . . was
asked to stop and take a message for forwarding, and, in spite
of numerous attempts on the part of the master of the lightship
to attact the vessel's attention, no response to his efforts was
received.'
New York Times. June 22, 1921. p. 10:
Senator Hale of Maine, who first asked for a Government
investigation of the disappearance of the Hewitt and of the
Deering's crew, advanced today the theory that mutiny and not
piracy was the explanation of the sea mysteries. . ..
'I think it will be found to be a plain case of mutiny in at least
72

one of the cases.' said Senator Hale. 'Possibly the mutinous
crew of one vessel boarded the other to get a navigator.'
New York Times. June 22. 1921. p. 10:
It was the courage, persistency and detective skill of Mrs
W. B. Wormwell, wife of the Captain of the schooner Carroll A.
Deering. . . which resulted in the evidence being gathered that
has convinced the authorities at Washington that the schooner
had been raided by Reds or pirates. . . .
Facing skepticism, and at times ridicule, this New England
seaman's wife . . . obtained samples of the handwriting of the
members of the Deering's crew and convinced herself that the
note [in the bottle] was written by the engineer. Henry
Bates. . . .
To establish this she obtained . .. samples of [his] hand-
writing, and submitted those, with the note found in the bottle
... to three handwriting experts, all of whom agreed that the
writing was identical.
[Mrs. Wormwell] said tonight that, in her opinion. Bates,
who was the most intelligent member of her husband's crew
wrote the note in his engine room, where he had the paper and
the bottle.
The New York Police Department revealed on June 23 that a
year before they had discovered that the United Russian Workers
of the United States and Canada had made plans for members to
seek employment on steamers, mutiny if possible, and sail the ships
to Soviet ports. It was recalled that several vessels about that time
had had trouble with their crews, and that the William O'Brien,
which had to put back to port because of a troublesome crew,
sailed the next day and was never seen again.
Despite the views of the various departments of the government,
the New York police, and Captain Wormwell's wife, the piracy
theory began to meet criticism. The most telling objections came
from another department of the United States government.
New York Times. June 24, 1921, p. 2:
Weather Bureau officials came forward tonight with the
theory that some of the dozen or more ships reported to have
disappeared mysteriously in the North Atlantic may have been
lost in the series of unusually severe storms which are known
to have swept that area in the first weeks of February. 1 921.
Records . . . show that a storm, accompanied by winds of up
to 90 miles an hour, swept the North Atlantic lanes about
Feb. 6, covering a section measuring 1,000 miles in length.
This storm continued three days. Again on February 15, a
73

storm suddenly arose in mid-ocean and raged for 72 hours.
The disappearance of the entire crew of the schooner Carroll
A. Deering . . . might be explained by the theory that they
attempted to leave her in their boats and were lost. . . .
... A number of ships . . . passed through some of the Feb-
ruary storms and reached port only after sustaining damage.
Insurance underwriters suggested still another theory. Although
the shipping business was then in a slump and owners were suffer-
ing tremendous losses, many continued their insurance policies at
artificially high rates. Insurance men called the situation a 'moral
risk' time and found that the number of sinkings began to increase.
An editor of Lloyd's List derided the bottle message, saying that
many years' experience had shown that such missives were almost
invariably frivolous. Another Lloyd's spokesman said that the
weather in the area had been extremely severe at the time, and also
that pirates would not have needed the lifeboats which were miss-
ing from the Deering.
Lloyd's also suggested that the Deering crew, after abandoning
ship, may have been picked up by the Hewitt, which later went
down with all hands. When the severe Atlantic weather was con-
sidered, Lloyd's said, the number of vessels reported missing was
not exceptional.
By July the piracy 'hysteria', as it was then being called, had
died down, and the simpler theory of the Weather Bureau pre-
vailed. The final blow came when it was announced that the bottle
message was a fake.
Christopher Columbus Gray, the man who had reported the
discovery of the bottle, admitted that the note which had started
the piracy turmoil had not come from the Deering, but from
fishermen on the North Carolina coast.
For most of the world, the controversy and the mystery had
ended, but for those who pursued the story of the Carroll A.
Deering still further, it was just beginning to get interesting*
It was learned that Captain Wormwell had confided to a friend
that both the mate and the second mate were worthless, and that
the crew was drunken and unruly. On the return trip the mate had
been jailed in Barbados, but the captain had managed to have him
released in time to leave for home.
On Saturday, January 29, the schooner was sighted off Cape
Lookout, North Carolina. A number of the crewmen were con-
* See Edward Rowe Snow's Mysteries and Adventures Along the Atlantic
Coast.
74

gregated on the quarterdeck, which was normally reserved for
officers, and a red-headed sailor with a foreign accent shouted to
the crew of the Lookout Shoals Lightship that both anchors had
been lost in a recent gale, and that they would like it reported
ashore. The radio in the lightship was out of order, but when the
men tried to pass the message on to the next vessel, a steamship,
their attempts to hail that vessel were ignored. The mystery steam-
ship, as it came to be known, has led to many questions. It was
never determined what ship it was, or why it ignored repeated
signals from the lightship. Some felt that it may have been a pirate
ship or a rumrunner, and others claimed it was the Hewitt. Some
versions have it that a tarp was draped over the side of the ship,
covering the name.
Two mornings later the Deering was found abandoned about
fifty miles to the north, its lifeboats gone, sails set, and an evening
meal on the stove. Two cats were still aboard.
Most of the luggage and clothing was missing, as were the
captain's large trunk, grip, and canvas bag. Had he abandoned the
ship in an emergency, he would not have taken these heavy objects.
A navigation chart on the table appeared to have been marked
by Captain Wormwell to a certain point, after which the writing
changed. Several pairs of rubber boots were found in the cabin,
indicating that other men had been there, and it appeared that
someone had been sleeping in the cabin's spare room.
Many questions still remain in the mystery of the Ghost-
ship of Diamond Shoals.
Were the members of the crew involved in a mutiny, or in
murder? Were they unruly and drunken, or have stories grown
after the fact, based on a few isolated episodes?
Why was the crew on the quarterdeck, an unusual place to
congregate, and why did someone other than the captain send the
message to the lightship? Was the captain ill at the time? Was he
on the ship? Why didn't the crew say anything about the captain
if he was sick or gone ? If he was all right, why wasn't he there ?
Why had someone else been marking the chart in the captain's
room?
Despite the apparently bogus bottle message, could pirates or
rumrunners have been responsible for the disappearance of the
crew? Did government officials, wishing to avoid an international
incident, coerce Gray into falsely admitting a hoax?
Was the mystery steamer the Hewitt? Did the steamer and the
schooner meet somewhere between Cape Lookout and Diamond
Shoals? Was there collusion between the two crews? Was a sick
75

Captain Wormwell transferred to another ship, which later
foundered?
What took place on the Carroll A. Deering between the time it
passed Cape Lookout and when it was found, stranded and empty,
several mornings later? Could it have happened as the Coast
Guard assumed, that the captain and crew abandoned what they
felt was a doomed ship, only to be lost at sea in their lifeboats ?
The story of the Carroll A. Deering is unique in maritime history,
and it can truly be said that the more that is learned about it, the
more mysterious it becomes.
As for the schooner itself, it was declared to be an unsalvageable
menace to navigation and was dynamited several weeks after the
stranding. The stern section was never seen again, but the bow
washed ashore on Ocracoke Island the following summer. It
remained there until 1955, when hurricane lone, which played
another role in the Legend of the Bermuda Triangle, swept it back
to sea. Remnants later washed ashore and may still be seen in
various shops in Hatteras as tourist attractions. The bell and lights
from the vessel were returned to Bath, Maine, where they were kept
by the town's most famous resident, Carroll A. Deering.
76

13
April 1925
Raifuku Maru
'It's like a dagger! Come quick' the frantic voice pleaded over the
wireless. 'Please come, we cannot escape.' Then the cries from the
Raifuku Maru* faded away into the stillness of the tranquil sea.
Other ships in the Bermuda Triangle were puzzled as to why a ship
would send such a message on so calm a day. Nothing has ever been
heard or seen of the f reighter or its crew since that April morning in
1925.
Dictionary of Disasters at Sea During the Age of Steam:\
The Japanese steamship Raifuku Maru left Boston on April
18th, 1925, for Hamburg with a cargo of wheat. Shortly after
leaving port the steamship encountered very heavy weather
and by the morning of the 19th was in distress. An S.O.S. call
was sent out which was picked up by the White Star liner
Homeric. 34,356 tons, Capt. Roberts, 70 miles distant.
Shortly afterwards another message was received stating that
all lifeboats had been smashed. A last message in broken
English, 'Now very danger. Come quick.' came just before the
Homeric sighted the derelict. The liner drove through the
mountainous seas at a speed of 20 knots to the spot indicated,
lat. 41° 43'N., long. 61° 39W. [400 miles directly east of
Boston, and 700 miles north of Bermuda], to find the Raifuku
Maru with a list of 30 degrees and quite unmanageable.
Approaching as near as she dared the liner stood by in the hope
of picking up survivors, but none could survive in such a sea.
and all 48 of the crew were drowned.
* The ship's name is usually misspelled Raiuike Maru in the Legend.
1" Charles Hocking compiled his Dictionary of Disasters. . . from the flies
of Lloyd's Register of Shipping, London, which published the book.
77

14
December 1925
Cotopaxi
In 1925 the cargo ship Cotopaxi disappeared on a voyage from
Charleston to Havana.
Although the Cotopaxi is frequently mentioned in the Legend,
no information other than its route and the year it vanished has
ever been given.
Lloyd's Weekly Casualty Reports.. December 11, 1925, p.
355, Overdue Vessels: COTOPAXI. Jacksonville, Dec. 1.
Steamer Cotopaxi, which left Charleston on Nov. 29 tor
Havana, with coal, reported to-day that she had water in the
hold and was listing badly, but did not send out a distress call.
Lloyd's Weekly Casualty Reports. December 18, 1925, p.
396, Overdue Vessels: COTOPAXI. London. Dec. 9. The
following information, dated Dec. 8, has been received: Radio
efforts [to] locate steamer Cotopaxi and [the] cutter search
[are] unavailing.
Lloyd's Register. Wreck Returns. 1925-1926:
Cotopaxi. 2351 gross tons, U.S. Registry. Steel, screw.
Charleston, S.C. to Havana. Cargo: coal. Left Charleston
November 29, 1925. In wireless communication December 1
and not since heard of.
The dates in the information from Lloyd's provide a clue to the
reasons for the ship's troubles.
New York Times. December 2. 1925, p. 17:
JACKSONVILLE, FLA., Dec. 1 (AP). While the west coast
[of Florida] was still in the grip of a receding storm tonight, on
79

the east coast storm warnings had been hauled down and the
work of repairing the damage was started. . ..
The tempest temporarily paralyzed tropical shipping, but only
one ship sent out a call for assistance. The Munson steamer Red
Bird, bound for Havana, ran into trouble in the high seas. . .and
dropped anchor to await an opportunity to enter Miami's
harbor.
Three planes were swept out to sea at Daytona Beach but no
one was injured in the mishap. . . .
The storm was described by Weather Bureau observers as
'phenomenal'.
By the next day the gale, which caused heavy damage along the
southern Atlantic seaboard, swept into New York with a velocity
that at times reached 65 miles an hour.
Although the Cotopaxi was not mentioned in the newspapers, it
was at sea in the path of the gale that forced many ships to seek
refuge and caused massive damage to harbors and cities.
80

1b
March 1926
Suduffco
The freighter Suduffco sailed south from New Jersey and vanished
in the Bermuda Triangle. At the end of a lengthy search a company
officer said that the ship might as well have been swallowed by a
giant sea monster.
Like the Cotopaxi, the Suduffco is usually included in the Legend
of the Bermuda Triangle, but details are seldom given.
New York Times. April 8. 1926, p. 2:
The Transmarine Corporation of Port Newark, N.J.,
announced yesterday that it had requested the Navy Depart-
ment to search for its freighter Suduffco. Officials of the com-
pany fear for the safety of the freighter.
The Suduffco sailed from Port Newark for Los Angeles on
March 13. She carried a crew of twenty-nine and a mixed cargo
of 4,000 tons, including a large shipment of steel pipe. She was
due at the Panama Canal on March 22 or 23, but since she
sailed no word has been heard from her.
The Suduffco was proceeding down the coast at a time when
the coast was swept by storms.
Despite a month-long search, no trace of the Suduffco was ever
found. The captain of the Cunard liner Aquitania, which was
approaching New York as the Suduffco was leaving, reported that
the voyage had been made in the 'worst seas I have ever known,'
and that gales like tropical cyclones had held the ship back.
6
81

25
October 1931
St avenger
In October 1931 the Stavenger, a Norwegian vessel with forty-three
on board, vanished near Cat Island in the Bahamas.
The loss of a ship with forty-three men on board is not likely to
be overlooked, yet the best sources of shipping information are not
able to verify the disappearance.
There was no information on the Stavenger in the New York
Times, the London Times, or Hocking's Dictionary of Disasters at
Sea. Lloyd's has no information on it, nor was there anything in
the Nassau Guardian.
In response to a query from me, the Norwegian Maritime
Museum in Oslo wrote:
As to the disappearance of a Norwegian ship named
Stavenger (Stavanger ?)* no traces have been found in the
official list of Norwegian ships lost at sea 1 931.
We have also checked the weekly lists of movements of
Norwegian vessels October and November 1931 without
result. . . .
Of the ships named Stavanger and registered in The Nor-
wegian Veritas 1931,... none ... are struck off the list in 1 932
or 1933. It seems there must be a mistake some place, either of
the name or the year.
The Norwegian Director General of Shipping and Navigation
also responded:
* The name of the ship is apparently slightly misspelled in the Legend,
although the minor variation would make no difference in finding informa-
tion on it. One of Norway's largest cities is Stavanger.
82

We regret not to be able to find any ship with that name.. ..
The only ship with a similar name - S/S Stavanger with signal
letters L D T N - was registered in 1925. As this ship - however
- was totally wrecked in 1957 it cannot be the same ship.
There were several weather disturbances in the Bahamas at the
time. The Nassau Guardian of October 14 told of a 'tropical dis-
turbance of small diameter and moderate intensity . . . about 100
miles east or east-southeast of Nassau .. . accompanied by a very
strong wind . . . [of] forty miles an hour.' Cat Island is approxi-
mately 125 miles east-southeast of Nassau.
On October 21 the Guardian reported 'a distinctly rising wind
that was blowing quite a gale.'
It could be that a ship named Stavanger encountered problems
during one of these disturbances and that incomplete reports or
incomplete research led later writers to assume that it had sunk.
It does not appear that a ship named either Stavenger or Stav-
anger sank anywhere during the early 1930s.
Ol

25
April 1932
John and Mary
In April 1932 the Greek schooner Embircos found the two-masted
John and Mary, of New York registry, abandoned fifty miles south
of Bermuda.
New York Maritime Register. March 9. 1 932, p. 1 5 :
John & Mary (Fishing schooner). Motor [vessel] Tide Water
Associated which left NY March 6 for Las Piedras [Venezuela]
picked up the crew of schr. John and Mary of New York in
lat. 38 58 N, Ion. 69 50 W [point A on map].*
New York Maritime Register. April 27, 1932, p. 9 :
John & Mary (Br aux sc) - New York. Apr. 19. - Stmr
[steamer] West Quechee reports by radio that on April 1 6,
while in lat. 31 29, Ion. 63 29 [point C on map], boarded the
John & Mary, auxiliary two-master schr of New York, which
was abandoned on March 8 [at point A on map]; the derelict's
hull was found in good condition but engine was damaged by
explosion.
An explosion in the engine or engine room caused the abandon-
ment 600 miles northwest of Bermuda and 270 miles east of Cape
May, New Jersey. Thirty-nine days later, when the vessel was
sighted by the West Quechee, it had drifted to a position approxi-
mately 100 miles southeast of Bermuda, an example of how
derelicts can drift toward the Bermuda Triangle from other areas.
1 was not able to find any information about the discovery of the
John and Mary by the Embircos, which supposedly took place fifty
miles south of Bermuda (point B on map).
* At least one previous account reported the rescue but erroneously called
the vessel the Tidewater and gave the position as 36°58'N, 69°50'W, which
is approximately 150 miles south of the correct position.
84

Although it is not stated in the Maritime Register, it appears
that the West Quechee towed the derelict to port for repairs.
According to Merchant Vessels of the United States, the John and
Mary then foundered off Cape May on July 9 of the same year.
All six persons on board were rescued.
85

25
August 1935
La Dahama
A ghost ship haunted the sea near Bermuda in 1935. The La Dahama,
masts trailing overboad and skylights smashed, rested on the gentle
swells as the men of the Aztec boarded and inspected her. There
seemed to be no reason for her abandonment, as plenty of food and
water was on board, and both lifeboats were intact. Taking charge of
the captain's log, the men returned to the Aztec and sailed on to
England, where they related the mystery of the derelict. To their
amazement, they learned that the Rex, an Italian liner, had rescued
the crew of La Dahama several days before the Aztec had discovered
her, and then all on board the Rex had watched the La Dahama
plunge into the sea! It was a ghost ship that the Aztec had found,
risen from a watery grave.
New York Times. August 28, 1935, p. 1 :
The rescue of the crew of five men from the sinking auxiliary
schooner yacht La Dahama of Philadelphia by the Italian liner
Rex was told yesterday in a radio message from Staff Captain
Alberto Ottino. . . .
'Noon today, Lat. 37.57 N.. Long. 51.55 W., we met American
yacht La Dahama of Philadelphia, sixteen tons, ownership
Welsh, flying distress signal with five men aboard. Crew taken
off. Yacht abandoned in sinking condition because of water
seeping through.' (Signed) 'Ottino.'
The position given approximately is 1,037 miles southeast of
the Ambrose channel lightship and right on the track of
vessels bound from New York for the Mediterranean.
New York Times, August 30, 1 935, p. 19 :
Five men who were rescued last Tuesday from the founder-
86

jng schooner La Dahama of Philadelphia, were landed in New
York yesterday by the Italian liner Rex. which made the rescue.
All of the men were in good health and not affected by the
five-day storm which gradually tore the sixteen-ton vessel to
pieces, flooding her and preventing the men on board from
sleeping or eating anything except canned fruit and other cold
stores.
The men were Albert R. G. Welsh, Philadelphia sportsman
and owner of La Dahama; Captain Lars M. Larsen, master; and
three seamen. ...
When the Rex sighted the schooner's distress signals flying
87

shortly before noon on Tuesday the sea was calm and the
schooner was not in immediate danger, although Captain
Larsen said she would not have survived another blow. If the
Rex had not come along the schooner would have gone down
in another two days, and the five men, exhausted by constant
manning the pumps and inadequate food, would have had to
put out in a small dinghy. . . .
On Aug. 18 they cleared Bermuda and had several days of
fairly good sailing. Then they ran into a violent storm from the
south-west. The wind ripped theforesail away. Then both masts
went, and the ship was helpless as her auxiliary engine had
already been disabled. Water seeped in rapidly for the next
four days.
Lookouts on the Rex sighted La Dahama before the weary
men knew that rescue had arrived.... An eighteen-man crew
put out in a motor lifeboat and took off the schooner's men,
their personal effects, and as much of the vessel's navigating
equipment as possible. The rescue took only 50 minutes.
London Times. September 10, 1935, p. 9:
RESCUE IN ATLANTIC
MYSTERY OF ABANDONED YACHT SOLVED
While the captain and the chief officer of the Elders and Fyffe
ship Aztec were relating at Avonmouth yesterday the discovery
by them in the Atlantic of an abandoned yacht, information was
received in London that the owner and a crew of five from the
yacht had been picked up on August 27 by the Italian liner
Rex	
On September 1 the abandoned yacht was discovered by the
British ship Aztec about 700 miles north-east of Bermuda. She
was boarded by a party from the Aztec, who found the two
masts trailing overboard and the skylights smashed. There was
plenty of food and water and both lifeboats were intact, but
there was nothing to show when or how the crew had
abandoned her. Captain Carden, of the British ship, took
charge of the log-book, the last entry in which was dated
August 23, reading, 'Wind south-east; carrying full sail:
8AM. passed British steamer Thurland Castle.' The previous
day's entry recorded a split foresail.
The Rex discovered the schooner about 875 miles northeast of
Bermuda. The Aztec found her five days later about 700 miles
northeast of Bermuda. Neither location could be considered as
being in the Bermuda Triangle, or even anywhere near it.
The passengers on the Rex did not watch the yacht sink, they
88

left it in a 'sinking condition' in a calm sea. The captain said the
boat would not float more than two days, but the water was so
still that it lasted at least five days, when it was discovered by the
Aztec. It was not then a resurrected ship, but merely a derelict
about to sink.
89

25
February 1940
Gloria Colita
The schooner Gloria Colita, of St Vincent, British West Indies, was
found mysteriously abandoned 200 miles south of Mobile in the Gulf
of Mexico. There was no apparent reason for the desertion as the
seas were calm and everything was in order.
Times-Picayune (New Orleans), Monday, February 5, 1940,
p. 1 :
A 125-foot schooner, adrift, crippled, and unmanned in the
Gulf of Mexico under unexplained circumstances, was taken
in tow about 150 miles south of Mobile, Ala., Sunday by the
Coast Guard cutter, Cartigan.
The. schooner, the Gloria Colita of St Vincent, British West
Indies, had sailed from Mobile January 21 with a cargo of
lumber for Guantanamo, Cuba, the Coast Guard said.*
What befell the schooner and her crew since then remained
just as much a mystery when the Cartigan reached her at
9:45 A.M. Sunday as when the derelict was first reported
Saturday afternoon by a passing steamer. ...
The Cartigan reported that the foresail on the Gloria Colita
was still set but torn, that her other sails were down, the deck a
mass of wreckage and the steering gear disabled. . . .
The Coast Guard said it was possible that the schooner had
been buffeted by a storm, but could advance no explanation
for the absence of the crew.
Times-Picayune. Tuesday. February 6, 1940, p. 1 :
Planes and ships of the Coast Guard searched a wide area
* Previous accounts of this incident have misspelled the names of the boats-
calling them the Gloria Colite and the Cardigan.
90

during the day for the crew of the waterlogged mystery
schooner Gloria Co/ita, but the blue waters of the Gulf of
Mexico Monday night still concealed the fate of the nine
men. . . .
The Coast Guard, towing the Gloria Colita to Mobile, re-
ported a skiff had been found upside down in the Gulf, but there
was no definite indication it had belonged to the ill-fated
schooner.
91

With planes from its Biloxi station flying over the area by day
and three ships, the Triton, Tampa, and Boutwell, searching the
waters, the Coast Guard hoped to find survivors if they are
adrift in a small boat or on wreckage in the Gulf. The chances,
however, are slim that any are still alive.. . .
Her rigging in tatters and her deck awash, the Colita was
sighted Saturday afternoon by a passing vessel. . . . There was
no one aboard and the lifeboat was gone. Chief Boatswain
Sven Halvorsen, commanding the Cartigan, radioed, 'From the
general condition of the vessel, the deck cargo of lumber
shifted and parted the main rigging,' he said.. . . 'The ship has
taken a severe punishment.'
Times-Picayune. Wednesday, February 7, 1940, p. 1 :
The battered, unmanned schooner Gloria Colita. found in the
Gulf of Mexico Saturday, was towed to port at Mobile, Ala.,
Tuesday night as officials planned a hearing for today to
determine what befell ship and crew. . . .
When the Gloria Colita sailed from Mobile she was laden
with a cargo of lumber for Guantanamo, Cuba. For the next
two days, according to reports of the weather bureau in New
Orleans, storm warnings were up in the area through which
she should have sailed.
The Coast Guard reported Tuesday night that the schooner's
three masts were still standing when she was picked up, but
that the rigging was in shreds and her rudder and steering
apparatus shattered. The deck cargo of lumber was missing,
but that in the hold was intact. The hold was nearly filled with
water, it was added. . . .
Tuesday . . . Coast Guard boats scoured the Gulf in an area
thought likely to yield some clue as to the fate of the missing
crew.
Times-Picayune, Thursday, February 8, 1 940, p. 1 :
MOBILE, ALA., Feb. 7 [AP], Captain Halvorsen discounted
the belief that the hold of the schooner would be found to
contain bodies of her crewmen. He expressed the opinion that
'they were swept overboard'.
At the same time, the United States weather bureau here
pointed out that its maps indicate a severe disturbance in the
Gulf a few days after the Gloria left here on January 21. Storm
warnings were ordered up on the 22nd from Port Eads, La., to
Valparaiso, Fla., and on the 23rd another storm was located in
the Gulf just south of Apalachicola, Fla.
Times-Picayune, Sunday, February 11, 1940, p. 20:
GULFPORT. MISS., Feb. 10. After sighting the vessel at
daybreak, volunteers from the Cartigan boarded her. only to
92

find that she had neither captain nor crew and that the lumber
cargo on deck was swishing about with the swaying of the
waterlogged derelict. . . . Captain Halvorsen said he had no
doubt that the vessel's crew was swept overboard and were
drowned during the storm of January 22 and 23.
93

14
November, December 1941
Proteus, Nereus
The story of the Cyclops continued many years later when two of her
sister ships vanished without a trace while on very nearly the same
route as their older sister. The Proteus left the Virgin Islands late
in November 1941, followed several weeks later by the Nereus.
Both were bound for Norfolk. Had it not been for Pearl Harbor, the
double disappearance would probably have been as big a story as the
loss of the Cyclops a quarter-century before.
Although the United States was not then fighting Germany, a
check of naval records after the war revealed that there were only a
few German vessels in the area at the time, and that none had re-
ported having sunk any such ships.
The following information is from the U.S. Navy's Dictionary
of American Naval Fighting Ships and Charles Hocking's Diction-
ary of Disasters at Sea During the Age of Steam.
The Newport News Ship Building and Dry Dock Company
began construction of the 522-foot colliers in 1911, and they were
commissioned in 1913. They transported coal, oil, men, and stores
to Navy ships until they were decommissioned in the early 1920s.
Both remained inactive in Norfolk until they were struck from the
Navy List in December 1940 and sold to Saguenay Terminals,
Limited, of Ottawa, to be used for hauling bauxite from the
Caribbean to the United States and Canada. Bauxite is the
main source of aluminum, which is essential to the aircraft
industry.
The Proteus left St Thomas, Virgin Islands, on November 23,
1941, headed for Portland, Maine. It never arrived, and no trace
94

was ever found. Subsequent German reports show that it was
probably a war casualty on November 25.
The Nereus left St Thomas for the same destination on Dec-
ember 10, 1941, and also was lost without a trace. The Navy
assumed that it had been torpedoed by a German U-boat.
95

14
October 1944
Rubicon
On October 22,1944, a Navy blimp reported a derelict off the coast
of Florida. Several hours later, two Coast Guard cutters were on the
scene and found that the only living creature aboard was a dog. The
ship, the Rubicon, was in excellent condition except for a missing
lifeboat and a broken hawser hanging over the bow. The personal
effects of the crew were still on board and there was no clue as to why
no one was on the ship. It appeared to be a case of a new Mary
Celeste just off the Florida coast.
New York Times. October 23, 1944, p. 21:
ONLY DOG IS FOUND ON A DRIFTING SHIP
Cuban Cargo Craft, Floating Off Florida.
Recalls Story of the Marie Celeste [sic]
HER LIFE BOATS ARE GONE
Vessel is Towed into Port - Some Think
Hurricane May Have Carried Her to Sea
MIAMI, Fla., Oct. 22 [UP]. A maritime mystery reminiscent of
that which for a long time involved the Marie Celeste [s/'c] is
recalled in the finding of a Cuban cargo ship adrift in the Gulf
Stream with a dog the only living thing aboard.
Possibly a victim of the Caribbean hurricane, the vessel was
sighted yesterday by a Navy blimp which notified the Coast
Guard here. Two boats were sent from Miami to investigate,
and found that she was the Rubicon, of about ninety gross
tons.
Her lifeboats were gone, but the personal effects of the crew
were still aboard. A broken hawser* was hanging over her bow.
* A hawser is the rope or cable used to moor a ship to the dock.
96

Early reports did not indicate whether the lifeboat moorings
had been cut. broken or slipped.
The investigating boats reported by radio while towing the
Rubicon . . . that she was apparently in excellent condi-
tion. . . .
No indication of the fate of the vessel's crew was found in a
study of the ship's log, where the last entry was dated Sept-
ember 26, when she put into Havana Harbor. The Rubicon had
apparently been trading along the Cuban coast before that
time.
It was believed by some that any crew members stationed
aboard had gone ashore when the hurricane winds hit Havana,
leaving the dog, and that the ship's moorings gave way.
Although the headlines and the first paragraph are attention-
grabbers, the remainder of the article, particularly the last para-
graph, seems to clear up any mystery.
There were no later articles to confirm or deny that the ship was
set adrift by the hurricane. This lack of follow-up contributed
somewhat to the Rubicon's being listed as a mystery.
7
97

14
December 1945
Flight 19
At 2:10 pm, December 5,1945, five Avenger torpedo bombers roared
down the runway of the Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station and
winged their way into the greatest aviation mystery of all time, an
event that was later to be called the Mary Celeste of the sky. Flight 19
was scheduled for a routine patrol -160 miles straight east, north 40
miles, then 120 miles directly back to base. Total time was estimated
to be two hours. Avengers normally carried a crew of three, counting
the pilot, but one man failed to show that day. Perhaps it was co-
incidence, possibly it was due to a premonition, but in any case it
saved his life. The other fourteen crewmen were not to return.
According to later testimony each plane had been carefully pre-
flighted and held a full load of fuel. All equipment, engines,
compasses, and instruments were in good working order. Extensive
radio gear was in each plane, including ten communication channels
and homing devices which showed the heading to take to return to
base. Each plane carried a self-inflating life raft and each man wore a
Mae West life jacket. The pilots and crewmen were all experienced.
The weather was excellent.
The first message from the patrol came at 3:45, the time they were
to have requested landing instructions. Instead, they sent a strange
message.
"Control tower, this is an emergency,'' the worried voice said. 'We
seem to be off course. We cannot see land... repeat	we cannot
see land.'
' What is your position ?' the tower asked.
'We're not sure of our position,' replied the patrol leader. 'We
can't be sure of where we are. We seem to be lost.'
How could that be ? the tower operators asked each other. Flight
conditions were ideal.
98

'Head due westcame the orders from the tower.
There was a long silence. Then the patrol leader came in, alarm
evident in his voice.' We don't know which way is west. Everything
is wrong . . . strange . . . we can't be sure of any direction. Even the
ocean doesn't look as it should!'
The tower operators were puzzled. Even if a magnetic storm had
affected all the compasses the pilots still should have been able to find
their way home. By flying directly toward the sun, which was then
approaching the horizon, they would have crossed the coast very near
the base. From the messages it appeared that the sun was invisible
to them.
Time passed as the tower men heard the pilots talking to each
other. They were confused and scared but they were keeping together.
Shortly after 4:00 the leader, obviously panicked, abruptly turned
the flight command over to one of the other pilots, indicating that a
very grave situation existed.
At 4:25 the new leader called the tower.' We're not certain where
we are. We must be about 225 miles northeast of base . . . it looks
like we are. . . '
Then . . . silence.
A giant Martin Mariner flying boat with a crew of thirteen
immediately took off for Flight 19's last estimated position. Equipped
with full survival and rescue gear, the plane was able to land on the
roughest of seas. The tower called the Avengers to let them know
help was on the way, but received no reply.
The Mariner sent several routine radio reports indicating that it
was approaching the position of the five Avengers but could not yet
see anything. Then, an ominous silence pervaded the tower as the
controllers waited for further messages from the rescue plane. None
ever came.
The controllers tried frantically to re-establish contact but it was
fruitless. The rescue plane had gone the same route as those it was
supposed to rescue.
Other planes were sent, ships were dispatched, and a general alarm
was raised. The positions of the patrol and the Mariner were thor-
oughly searched but nothing was found except the calm, empty sea.
At 7:04 pm a Miami tower operator intercepted a faint message
from far, far away. 'FT... FT.. Those were the call letters of
Flight 19, which no one else would have been using. Yet it was two
hours after the flight must have run out of fuel.
Coast Guard and Navy vessels searched throughout the night, but
no signal flares shattered the still, dark scene. The portable radio
99

units designed to transmit automatically upon contact with water
were never heard.
The next day a vast search began in earnest. Three hundred
planes and twenty-one ships criss-crossed the sea and sky; land
parties searched the Florida coastline, the Keys, and the Bahamas,
but not a clue was uncovered from the sea or from any beach, jungle,
or mountain. The search continued for weeks; all areas were checked
again and again. Although the hope of finding survivors faded,
searchers continued looking for some trace of the aircraft that might
hint at their fate. Nothing was ever found.
Military experts were completely baffled. Six airplanes and
twenty-seven men - how could they possibly have vanished in such a
small area ?
If they had run out of fuel the A vengers would have floated at least
long enough to enable the crew to launch the self-inflating rafts. The
men were well trained in sea survival procedures, and the equipment
was capable of keeping them alive for many days in the open sea.
But running out of fuel would not explain the confusion earlier in the
flight, nor would it explain the strange messages. It would not
account for the loss of the Mariner.
Each plane was well equipped with radio gear. Why was there no
SOS, either before or after they were down ? Why didn't the Mariner
send one?
One suggestion was that the winds might have blown Flight 19 off
course. Had a wind shift occurred they might have been driven far
to the south. But then they would have been over the myriad islands
of the West Indies and always within sight of land, or over the Great
Bahama Bank, a vast shallow area where the airplanes would have
been found even had they sunk.
If by some quirk of fate there had been a five-plane midair collision,
debris would have covered a wide area and would surely have been
seen.
A waterspout could not have been the cause, as they are easily
seen and avoided.
Why did the Mariner vanish as it approached the lost patrol's last
position ? One ship observed an explosion in the air at 7:50 and found
an oil slick, but that was more than three hours after the Mariner's
disappearance.
The members of the Naval Board of Inquiry, after an extensive
investigation, concluded that they 'were not able to even venture a
good guess as to what had happened.' Another officer said, 'They
vanished as completely as if they'd flown to Mars. We don't know
what the hell's going on out there.' A Navy bulletin issued at the end
100

of the search required all ships and airplanes to remain on the alert
for clues to the disappearance. That order has never been rescinded;
it is still in effect today!
There are many more questions that should be raised. Why were
all the compasses erratic ? Did the same force that threw them offalso
silence the radios ? Did the Mariner disappear when it entered the
same zone as the Avengers? Why did the sea seem strange and why
was the sun invisible ? Why was there no debris, no oil slick, not even
a telltale pack of sharks ? It is inconceivable that six airplanes and
twenty-seven men could vanish and fail to leave a trace behind. But
vanish they did. In the Bermuda Triangle.
The Navy investigation of the incident took several months, and
the subsequent report* was more than 400 pages long. I have
thoroughly examined the report many times and have concluded
that the key to understanding what occurred lies in the radio com-
munications with the pilots. These messages do not appear
together in the report but are scattered throughout - some are in
the testimony of witnesses while others are in the logs of the com-
munication stations. I have arranged them in order as they
occurred that day, along with pertinent testimony and various
facts and opinions of the Board.
To make the account more readable, several changes have been
made.
The time of day, given some places in the report as Eastern
Standard Time on the 24-hour clock and in other places as Green-
wich Mean Time, has been converted in every instance to Eastern
Standard Time on the 12-hour clock.
The names of the various stations and planes have been
standardized. For example, Port Everglades Radio, also referred
to in the report as Air Sea Rescue Task Unit Number 4, ASRTU
#4, and NHA-3, is always shown here as Port Everglades.
Similarly, plane TBM-3, BuNo. 23307, Squadron Number FT-28,
is shortened in this account to its call sign, FT-28.
The 'cast' of the drama of Flight 19, and the radio stations and
bases that played a part, are as follows:
Lt Charles C. Taylor, a flight instructor and the leader of
Flight 19. FT-28 was the call sign of his plane.
* Board of Investigation into five missing TBM airplanes and one PBM
airplane convened by Naval Air Advanced Training Command, NAS Jackson-
ville, Florida, 7 December 1945, and related correspondence. Washington,
t>.C.: United States Navy, 1946.
101

Capt Edward J. Powers, Jr, a Marine student pilot under-
going advanced navigation training in Flight 19. FT-36 was his
airplane.
Ensign Joseph T. Bossi, student pilot, flew FT-3 as a part of
Flight 19. (There were two other students on the flight.)
Lt Robert F. Cox, a senior flight instructor at Fort Lauderdale
Naval Air Station, was in radio contact with Flight 19 for a short
time. He flew FT-74.
Lt Walter G. Jeffrey, the pilot of Training 49, the Martin
Mariner search plane that disappeared.
Lt Gerald E. Bammerlin, the pilot of Training 32, the search
plane that left Banana River Naval Air Station the same time as
Training 49.
Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station (NAS), 20 miles north of
Miami, the departure and intended returning point of Flight 19.
Port Everglades, the Air Sea Rescue Task Unit at Fort Lauder-
dale.
Dinner Key, a seaplane base at Miami.
Banana River Naval Air Station, now Patrick Air Force Base,
near Cape Kennedy.
Navy Board of Inquiry Report
The Loss of Flight 19
Fact J: [The five TBMs] departed at approximately 2:10 PM,
5 December 1945, as Flight 19 on an authorized navigation
training flight from U.S. Naval Air Station, Fort Lauderdale,
Florida.
Fact 2: Flight 19 [was assigned] navigation problem No. 1
which is as follows: (1) . . . fly 091 degrees [east] distance
56 miles to Hens and Chickens Shoals to conduct low level
bombing [then] continue on course 091 degrees for 67 miles,
(2) fly course 346 degrees [north] distance 73 miles and (3)
fly course 241 degrees [west-southwest], distance 120 miles,
then returning to ... Fort Lauderdale.
Fact 16: Charles Carroll Taylor, Lieutenant, U.S. Naval
Reserve . . . was the authorized and assigned instructor in
charge of Flight 19.
Facts 4-7: Edward Joseph Powers, Jr.,. , . George William
Stivers, . . Forest James Gerber [and] Joseph Tipton Bossi
[were the four other pilots].
Facts 8-12: [Each plane except Gerber's carried three men,
counting the pilot. Gerber was one man short.]
Fact 18:. . .Stivers,. . .Powers,. . .Gerber [and] Bossi..•
102

were naval aviators undergoing instruction in VTB Type
Advanced Training.
Fact 19: [Eight of the nine crewmembers] were undergoing
Advanced Combat Aircrew Training in VTB type aircraft.
All the pilots, except Taylor, and all the crewmen, except one,
were students in training.
Testimony of Lt. Robert F. Cox. flight instructor Fort Lauder-
dale NAS: l was flying around the field at approximately
3:40 PM. ... I heard some planes or boats. One man was
transmitting on 4805 [the channel used by training flights] to
'Powers'. That is the word he used and he didn't give any
recognition. The party calling asked 'Powers' what his com-
pass read a number of times and finally said, 'I don't know
where we are. We must have got lost after that last turn.'
During this time, at approximately 3:45 PM, I called Opera-
tion Radio, Fort Lauderdale, and notified them that either a
boat or some planes were lost. They Rogered my message.
Also, I called. 'This is FT-74, plane or boat calling "Powers",
103

please identify yourself so someone can help you.'
I received no answer. Later he called and asked if anyone had
any suggestions. I called again, giving my identification as
FT-74, and he answered, giving his as MT-28.
I said, 'MT-28 this is FT-74, what is your trouble?' MT-28
came back, 'Both my compasses are out and I am trying to find
Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I am over land, but it's broken, I'm
sure I'm in the Keys, but I don't know how far down and I don't
know how to get to Fort Lauderdale.'
I said, 'MT-28, this is FT-74, put the sun on your port wing if
you are in the Keys and fly up the coast until you get to Miami,
then Fort Lauderdale is 20 miles further, your first port after
Miami. The air station is directly on your left from the port.
What is your present altitude ? I will fly south and meet you.'
MT-28 replied, 'I know where I am now. I'm at 2300 feet.
Don't come after me.'
I called. 'MT-28, Roger, you're at 2300. I'm coming to meet
you anyhow.'
I then received a call from Fort Lauderdale asking if it was
FT-28 or MT-28. and after calling MT-28 again I learned that
it was FT-28 and relayed this message to Fort Lauderdale.
I then received a message from FT-28, 'Can you have Miami
or someone turn on their radar gear and pick us up ? We don't
seem to be getting far. We were out on a navigation hop and on
the second leg I thought they were going wrong so I took over
and was flying them back to the right position, but I'm sure
now that neither one of my compasses are working.'
I called FT-28. 'You can't expect to get here in ten minutes.
You have a 30 to 35 knot head or cross wind. Turn on your
emergency IFF gear [to make the plane's image brighter on a
radar screen], or do you have it ?'
He replied that he didn't. I then told him to turn on his ZBX
gear [tells which direction to head to return to base], but re-
ceived no comment. I repeated and still received no answer.
Fort Lauderdale and Port Everglades also tried to get him to
turn it on. I don't know whether they got an answer or not.
Fort Lauderdale suggested I tell FT-28 to have one of his
wingmen take over the lead and I did this. I received no direct
answer, but heard some transmission about radar or some-
thing.
I then called FT-28, 'Your transmissions are fading. Some-
thing is wrong. What is your altitude?'
He replied, 'I'm at 4500 feet.'
At this point my MHF (ATC transmitter) went out and I had
no power for transmission on that frequency. The frequency
we had been using was 4805 kilocycles, so I tried to contact
him on all nine channels of VHF and finally got Navy Lauder-
104

dale on No. 7. As his transmissions were fading he must have
been going north. I believe at the time of his first transmissions
he was either over the Biminis or the Bahamas. I was about
forty miles below Fort Lauderdale and couldn't hear him any
longer.. . . After that I came in and landed.. . .
Question: In what direction were you flying during the period
when FT-28 transmissions became progressively weaker?
Cox: South and slightly southwest
Question: What was your approximate geographical position
when the signals from FT-28 faded out altogether ?
Cox: I was approximately twenty-five miles south of Miami	
Question: Did you observe the state of the sea ?
Cox: Yes, sir. The sea was very rough. It was covered with
white caps and long white streamers. The visibility was very
good in all directions, except directly west.
After Cox's transmitter failed Port Everglades was able to
establish contact with Taylor.
4:25. Port Everglades to Taylor: Radio check, can you
read us?
4:25. Affirmative. We have just passed over small island. We
have no other land in sight.
Testimony of Commander Richard Baxter, Assistant Opera-
tions Officer, District Coast Guard Office. Seventh Naval
District, Miami: In my estimation [the planes] were near
Walker Cay [40 miles north of Grand Bahama Island] when
they thought they were over the Keys.
4:26. Taylor: Am at angles 3.5 [altitude 3500 feet]. Have on
emergency IFF. Does anyone in the area have a radar screen
that could pick us up.
4:26. Port Everglades to Taylor: Roger. Stand by.
4:28. Port Everglades to Taylor: Suggest you have another
plane in your flight with a good compass take over the lead
and guide you back to the mainland.
Taylor: Roger.
Port Everglades: We were able to pick up particles of
messages between Flight Leader (FT-28) and other planes in
the flight concerning their estimated position and com-
passes, however as best we could tell, due to poor reception,
no other plane ever assumed the lead.
4:31. Taylor to Port Everglades: One of the planes in the
flight thinks if we went 270° [west] we could hit land.
105

4:39. Port Evergladesto Fort Lauderdale via phone: In as much
as FT-74 [Cox] has run out of communication with FT-28
[Taylor] by proceeding south, I think that this flight is lost
somewhere over the Bahama Bank and suggest that the
Lauderdale Ready Plane be dispatched guarding 4805 Kcs on
a course of 075° [east-northeast] and try to establish corn-
Flight 19: Estimated position about 4:00. A, Lt Taylor's estimate;
B, the probable position.
munication with FT-28. And if the Ready Plane can pick up
FT-28 better as he proceeds on this course we will be sure that
the flight is lost over the Bahamas. Ready Plane could also act
as relay on the frequency as it is becoming more difficult to
pick up FT-28.
4:45. Taylor to Port Everglades: We are heading 030° [north-
northeast] for 45 minutes, then we will fly north to make sure
we are not over the Gulf of Mexico.
4:45. Port Everglades to Dinner Key: Are you able to get a
bearing on FT-28?
Dinner Key to Port Everglades: Negative - advise him to
send continuously on 4805 Kc, we cannot pick up his IFF.
Testimony of Lt Commander Donald J. Poole. Flight Officer.
106

NAS. Fort Lauderdale: Port Everglades had contact with
FT-28, Lieutenant Taylor, at this time, 4:45 PM, so I immedi-
ately notified them to instruct FT-28 to fly 270 degrees [west],
also to fly toward the sun, I know this was transmitted because
I listened over Operations radio. I do not know that it was ever
acknowledged. Port Everglades also instructed FT-28 to
change to 3000 kilocycles, Channel 1 [reserved for emerg-
encies] but this was never done by FT-28. I had a pilot in the
ready plane warming it up, but was hesitant about sending it
out until I had some information as to where to send it.
4:47. Fact 27: The Gulf Sea Frontier and Eastern Frontier
HF/DF nets were alerted to obtain all possible bearings on
transmissions from FT-28. who was transmitting on 4805 kilo-
cycles.
Opinion 16: Unsatisfactory radio communication on 4805
kilocycles was due to interference from Cuban broadcasting
stations, static, the presence of a steady carrier note, and
atmospheric conditions during this time.
Opinion 20: Difficulty was experienced in obtaining the
HF/DF bearings on the aircraft of Flight 19 . . . because of
interference on 4805 kilocycles.
4:49. Port Everglades to Dinner Key. Have you been able to
get a bearing on FT-28 yet?
Dinner Key: Negative.
Port Everglades: We request you alert the DF [Direction
Finding] Net up the coast and have them attempt to pick up
this lost flight. Please let us know if you have any success.
Dinner Key: Wilco.
4:51. Fort Lauderdale to Port Everglades: If possible advise
FT-28 to turn on his ZBX [homing device]. (Attempted to
relay to FT-28 at 4:52 with no success.)
4:56. Port Everglades to any plane in flight with FT-28: Turn
on your ZBX. (No reply.)
Testimony of Lt Commander Poole: At approximately
5:00 PM I heard two different students unidentified as to
plane or person, make the following statements: 'If we would
just fly west we would get home.' The other transmission that
I heard was, 'Dammit, if we would just fly west we would get
home.'
5:07. Taylor to planes in flight: Change course to 090° [east]
for 10 minutes.
5:09. Unidentified. How long have we gone now? Let's turn
and fly east two degrees. We are going too damn far north
instead of east. If there is anything we wouldn't see it
107

5:09. Fort Lauderdale advised Port Everglades via phone that
the Lauderdale Ready Plane was held on the ground and would
not go out.
5:11 -. Unidentified. You didn't get far enough east. How long
have we been going east?
5:14. Hello [Port Everglades], this is FT-28, do you read?
Over.
5:15. Taylor to Port Everglades: I receive you very weak. We
are now flying 270° [west].
Port Everglades: Roger.
5:16. Taylor to Port Everglades: We will fly 270° until we hit
the beach or run out of gas.
5:20. Port Everglades to Taylor: If you can change to Yellow
Band (3000 Kc) [emergency frequency] please do so and give
us a call. (No reply after 3 attempts.)
5:20. Rough Crash Log: Communications with T-28 - come
in strong and fade - Port Everglades unable to get any
messages through to T-28 - Fort Lauderdale can hear planes
talking to each other - apparently still flying 270°.
5:22. Taylor: When first man gets down to ten gallons of gas
we will all land in the water together. Does everyone under-
stand that?
5:24. Taylor to Port Everglades: I receive you very weak. How
is the weather over Lauderdale ?
Port Everglades: Weather over Lauderdale clear. Over Key
West CAVU [ceiling and visibility unlimited]. Over the
Bahamas cloudy, rather low ceiling, poor visibility. (No reply.)
5:30. Taylor to planes in flight: Is that a ship on the left?
(Unable to read reply.)
5:33. Taylor to Port Everglades: Can you hear me ?
Port Everglades: Hear you strength three, modulation good.
(No reply.)
5:34. Port Everglades to Taylor: Can you change to 3000
Kcs ? (No reply after 3 attempts.)
Testimony of Lt Samuel M. Mines. Operations and Tower
Duty Operator, Fort Lauderdale NAS: There was very much
static on 4805 kilocycles from 4:10 until 5:30 at which time,
in addition to the static, music from Cuban broadcasting
stations interfered with reception. The lost planes from 4:10
until 7:04 PM alternately came in loud and clear and faded
beyond audibility. The receiver at Port Everglades was able to
receive transmissions which Operations Radio did not hear,
and vice versa. . . . Operations Radio [Fort Lauderdale] was
unable to get a Roger on any message sent to the planes.
5:50. Taylor to Port Everglades: I can hear you very faintly.
My transmission is getting weaker.
108

5:52. Fort Lauderdale to Port Everglades via phone: At 5 :51
all stations along the coast were alerted to be on lookout for
FT-28 and his flight.
5:52. Miami to all Air Sea Rescue Stations via teletype: All
stations Banana River South light up to greatest extent
Possible.
5:54. Port Everglades: Did you receive my last transmission ?
Change to 3000 Kcs.
109

5:55. Taylor: I cannot change frequency. I must keep my
planes intact.
By this time it was completely dark.
5:59. Unidentified: Cannot change to 3000 kilocycles, will
stay on 4805 kilocycles.
Fact 28: At approximately 6:00 PM, 5 December 1945. an
approximate HF/DF fix was obtained on FT-28 placing FT-28
within a one-hundred-mile radius of 29 degrees, 15 minutes,
north. 79 degrees, 00 minutes, west, at 5:50 PM.
The position of Flight 19 had been calculated! It was over the
Atlantic Ocean somewhere north of the Bahamas and east of New
Smyrna, Florida. At this time the position had only been calcu-
lated; it had not yet been transmitted either by teletype to other
stations or by radio to the planes. The fix was only approximate but
if Taylor could be informed of it he had only to head west and
Flight 19 would reach the coast.
6:02. Unidentified: We may have to ditch any minute.
6:03. Taylor to Powers: Do you read ?
6:04. Taylor: Do you read?
6:05. Taylor to Powers: This is Taylor - We are over — Don't
you think -
6:06. Unknown: Should be able to see a light -
6:07. Port Everglades to Taylor: Do you read me?
6:09. Port Everglades: Do you read me? (Long Count.)
[One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.]
Opinion 36: The courses flown by Flight 19 subsequent to
6:07 PM are undetermined.
6:10. The 5:50 H F/DF evaluated position was telephoned to
the tower at Fort Lauderdale.
The fix still had not been transmitted either by teletype or by
radio.
Opinion 21: The Air Sea Rescue . . . teletype was out of
commission south of Banana River during the critical period
of the evening.
6:15. Unidentified: Negative - what course are we on - We
are over the Gulf. We didn't go far enough east - How long we
been on this course - I suggest we fly due east until we run
110

out of gas, we have a better chance of being picked up close
to shore -
Opinion 17: The leader of Flight 19 in FT-28 was uncertain
as to in which direction lay the Peninsula of Florida and this
uncertainty influenced his later decisions.
6:17. Taylor to Powers: What is your course ? (No acknow-
ledgment.)
6:21. Miami to Banana River via teletype: Our DF [direction
finding equipment] gives fix on flight as 29° N - 79°W. which
put them north of original presumed position. Will you alert
fields north of you as far as Jacksonville. (This message was
not Rogered for.)
Testimony of Commander Claude C. Newman, Officer in
Charge, Port Everglades:
Question: Was Port Everglades in communication with any of
the lost TBMs when you intercepted the coordinates of the
high frequency direction finder fix at 6:21 PM ?
Newman: No. sir. We had been out of two-way communica-
tion for approximately one hour.
Question: Lacking two-way communications, was there any
attempt made to transmit the HF/DF fix to the aircraft in
difficulty by means of so-called 'blind' transmission ?
Newman: No, sir.
Testimony of Commander Richard Baxter. U.S. Coast
Guard, Seventh Naval District. Miami:
Question: Which of these [Air Sea Rescue] stations were avail-
able and suitable for transmitting the evaluated fix to the
TBMs?
Baxter: In my opinion, none of those stations were satis-
factory at that time of day on 4805 kilocycles.
6:24. Port Everglades to Banana River via phone: Have all
stations . . . attempt to contact FT-28 on 4805 Kc and advise
nim to maintain course of 270°. This is serious as planes have
been lost since 4:21 PM and their gas should be out by 7:30.
The TWPL [teletype] System is out north of here. Also alert
Dumbos [search planes] in your area.
Fact 30: The 5:50 HF/DF evaluated position was trans-
mitted on the. . . teletype net. . . at approximately 6:36 PM.
Opinion 22: No Air Sea Rescue activities engaged in assist-
Ill

ing Flight 19 were in successful communication with the flight
after the receipt of the evaluated fix.
Opinion 23: No activity associated with assisting Flight 19
made blind transmissions or radio broadcasts of the 5:50
evaluated position by any aircraft of that flight.
6:37. Unidentified: What course are we on now?
6:43. FT-3 [Bossi] to FT-28 [Taylor]: [Indistinguishable.]
6:44. On 4805 Kcs. Conversation garbled. Could hear FT-3
[Bossi] give his call.
6:44. Port Everglades to Bossi: Good, come in please.
6:48. Port Everglades to Bossi: We are reading you very
weak. Come in please.
6:50. FT-3 this is Port Everglades, over.
7:04. FT-3 [Bossi] called FT-28 [Taylor], No acknow-
ledgment.
Rough Crash Log: Last transmission from the flight (T-3
calling T-28). No answer.
7:46. FT-28, FT-28, this is NSO, NSO, NSO. How do you
read me, over. [NSO is Miami Radio.]
7:49. FT-28. FT-28, this is NSO, NSO, NSO. How do you
read me, over.
7:54. FT-28, FT-28. this is NSO, NSO. NSO. How do you
read me, over.
7:59. FT-28. FT-28, this is NSO, NSO, NSO. How do you
read me, over.
Opinion 39: The fuel supply of the aircraft in Flight 19 should
have permitted them to remain airborne until approximately
8:00 PM.
8:13. Air Sea Rescue Crash Boat, Fort Lauderdale, on Bimini
Patrol, to Port Everglades: We are still trying to contact FT-28
on 4805 Kcs. Negative results.
8:13. Port Everglades: You may secure for tonight.
8:37. Coast Guard Message: All ships area east Florida
coast east to 74 degrees be on alert for five planes considered
to be down.
9:52. FT-28, FT-28, this - how do you hear me, over.
(Heavy interference.)
9:56. FT-28, FT-28, this is - how do you hear me, over.
(Heavy interference.)
The Loss of the Search Plane
Testimony of Lt. Charles W. Johnson, Operations Duty
Officer. Banana River Naval Air Station: As operations duty
112

officer, I sent planes Training No. 32, and Training No. 49 on
the assigned search. ... I briefed Lt Bammerlin [pilot of
Training No. 32] and Lt Jeffrey* [Training No. 49] as follows:
Bammerlin was to take off and fly direct to 29 degrees north,
79 degrees west [the 5:50 fix of Flight 19], and then conduct
an expanding square search. Lt Jeffrey was to take off and fly
up the coast to latitude 29 degrees north and then east to
longitude 79 degrees west, where he would contact Lt
Bammerlin and then would also conduct an expanding square
search.. . . They were to send CW reports every hour. . .[and]
were also to guard 4805 kilocycles which was the voice
frequency of the TBMs.
Testimony of Radioman Second Class Vernon D. Clary,
Communications Department, NAS. Banana River: Just prior
to 7:30, Training 49 sent his departure report.. . . Training 49's
first position report was due at 8.30 PM. When he failed to call
base at 8:35 PM, the operator attempted to contact him. The
* A number of accounts of this incident erroneously name either Lt Harry
G. Cone or Lt Robert F. Cox as the pilot of the missing search plane.
Flight 19: The route of the Martin Mariner
8
113

operator called him continually for an hour and still failed to
get an answer.
Testimony of Commander William J. Lawrence. Com-
rnander. U.S. Coast Guard, NAS, Banana River: At 9.12 PM
I received information from the Joint Operations Center,
Miami, that an explosion was observed by the SS Gaines Mills
at a position 28 degrees, 59 minutes north, 80 degrees, 25 min-
utes, west at 7:50 PM. . . . The explosion had been reported
as serious and the burst of flames had lasted for several
minutes. It was assumed that it could possibly be Training No.
49 with which we were attempting to establish communica-
tion on 3000 kilocycles, but had not been able to do so. The
explosion was reported to have been observed at 7:50 PM,
exactly 23 minutes after Training No. 49 had taken off. The
position of the explosion given was 45 nautical miles from
Banana River seaplane area.
. . . The master of the SS Gaines Mills stated that a plane
appeared to catch on fire in the air and quickly hit the water
and explode and that an oil slick and debris had been seen by
members of the ship's crew. The officer in charge of the New
Smyrna surface craft reported later that he did not see any of
the debris and that if any had been located the sea was too
rough to permit picking it up.. . . No wreckage was seen other
than reported by the SS Gaines Mills who failed to pick it up
because of rough seas.
Testimony of Lt Gerald E. Bammerlin. pilot of Training 32,
NAS. Banana River: After takeoff we [Training 32] proceeded
to [the 5:50 fix] and commenced an expanding square search.
. . . When we first arrived in the area ... at about 8:18, the
ceiling was approximately eight to twelve hundred feet over-
cast. occasional showers, estimated wind, west, southwest,
25 to 30 knots, and the air was very turbulent. The sea was very
rough [and] whitecaps were visible below. . . .
About 9:45 we, were instructed to proceed to a position
about 25 miles east of New Smyrna to investigate an explo-
sion reported by a tanker. With the strong headwinds, it
required about an hour to arrive on that scene. . . . We com-
menced an expanding square search at the position of the
reported explosion, investigating numerous radar targets and
visually observed lights, all of which were proved negative....
The weather and sea conditions 25 miles east of New Smyrna
upon our arrival were ceiling estimated 1.000-2,000 feet, wind
estimated west, southwest, about 25-30 knots, air very
turbulent but, as I recall, we encountered no rain showers.
The sea was very rough.
114

Testimony of Commander William T. Murphy. U.S. Coast
Guard. Miami:\Ne received a dispatch from the USS Solomons :
'Our air search radar showed plane after takeoff from Banana
River last night joining with another plane [Training 32], then
separating and proceeding on course 045 degrees at exact
time the SS Gaines Mills sighted flames and in exact spot the
above plane disappeared from the radar screen and never
reappeared.'
Opinion 53: Training 49 [the Martin Mariner] exploded in
the sea for reason or reasons unknown in the approximate
position of 28 degrees, 59 minutes north, 80 degrees, 25 min-
utes west.
Many factors contributed to the loss of Flight 19, the most
important of which was the failure of Lieutenant Taylor's com-
passes. The report stated that none of the planes had clocks, but
it was not known if the men carried watches. Because of Taylor's
frequent questions about the time, it appears that he did not have
a watch, and there is no better way to become disoriented than to
fly for an unknown amount of time in an unknown direction.
Taylor had transferred to Fort Lauderdale not long before the
flight, and his unfamiliarity with the Bahamas could account for
his erroneous assumption that he was over the Florida Keys.
Taylor could not decide whether he was over the Atlantic Ocean
and east of Florida, or over the Gulf of Mexico and west of the
peninsula. As a result he changed direction a number of times, led
the men back and forth, and progressively moved farther north of
the Bahamas.
The second major factor that prevented the flight from being
saved was Taylor's refusal to change his radio to the emergency
channel. This resulted in his inability to maintain radio contact
with the ground stations. He apparently feared that if the planes
attempted to change channels but were unable to get together on
the new frequency, they would be out of communication and
would not be able to 'find each other' again on the radio.
Transfer to 3000 kilocycles would have provided a channel un-
disturbed by interference from other planes and from the Cuban
broadcasting stations. It would also have permitted stations closer
to the flight to have contacted them, since all radio stations were
equipped with the emergency channel, but very few could transmit
or receive on the training frequency. The use of the emergency
channel would also have permitted the direction-finding stations
to have found the flight's position much earlier.
115

The third factor in the disappearance was the weather. Althougl
it had been 'fair' when the planes took off, it rapidly deteriorated
Search planes reported extreme turbulence and unsafe flying con
ditions, and one ship in the area reported 'high winds and tremend
ous seas'. Flight 19 was not a group of experienced veterans touch
ing down on a calm sea in the middle of a sunny afternoon - it wa;
one disoriented instructor and four student pilots attempting to
ditch at sea on a dark, stormy night. It was a hopeless situation.
The strange quotations attributed to the pilots by the Legend do!
not appear in the Navy report, nor does the report suggest that the
tower operators were particularly puzzled or alarmed.
The dilemma was not that the men couldn't tell in which direc-
tion they were going, but rather that they couldn't decide which
direction was the proper one to take. They weren't sure which side
of the Florida peninsula they were on, and continually changed
direction, usually taking a heading of east or west. Another time
they flew north, as Taylor said, to be sure they were not over the
Gulf of Mexico.
Although Taylor did allow a plane with a good compass to fly
the lead position, he did not panic during the ordeal, nor did he
ever turn command of the flight over to one of the students.
It has frequently been said that it is inconceivable that the air-
planes could have vanished in such a restricted area. According to
the official report, however, they flew around, lost, for more than
four hours before finally running out of fuel. They went down in
the Atlantic Ocean somewhere east of the United States and north
of the Bahamas. Their travel was not restricted in any way.
The loss of the Martin Mariner is considered mysterious because
the plane supposedly vanished within a few minutes after Flight 19
was last heard from. The Legend has the flight's last call coming at
4:25 pm and the Mariner taking off and vanishing shortly there-
after in a clear, sunlit sky as it was about to enter the zone where
the Avengers disappeared. The 7:50 explosion, according to the
Legend, came about three hours after the plane had disappeared;
therefore the explosion and the disappearance of the Mariner
could not have been related.
In reality, the Mariner took off at 7:27 pm, and the explosion
took place on a dark, stormy night, exactly where the airplane
should have been after 23 minutes of flight. It was the only plane
missing besides the five Avengers, and officials, who did not hear
about the explosion until 9:12, immediately assumed that it was
the search plane that had failed to make its scheduled 8:30 position
report. Mariners were nicknamed 'flying gas tanks' because of the
116

fumes that were often present, and a crewman sneaking a cigarette,
or a spark from any source, could have caused the explosion.
In the Legend the impression is given that the Mariner was the
only rescue plane on the way to aid the missing flight. It almost
seems as if the 'menace of the Triangle' were swatting the first
intruder away from its domain. Other search planes, in the Legend,
took off only after the Mariner had disappeared.
The missing plane was not the only searcher, however. It was not
even the first one to take off. The Dinner Key (Miami) Dumbo was
in the air at 6:20, but its antenna quickly iced over and it was un-
able to communicate. Search planes left Vero Beach at 6:45 and
Daytona Beach at 7:21. Training 32 and 49 did not leave Banana
River until about 7:30. Other planes took off still later, and a
number of ships were also sent to the scene.
The Navy Board of Investigation did not profess to be baffled, as
the Legend claims. It listed fifty-six 'facts' and fifty-six 'opinions'
based on the fourteen days of testimony. Among them were
Opinion 37, that 'the aircraft of Flight 19 made forced landings in
darkness at sea east of the peninsula of Florida sometime after
7:04 pm,' and number 38, that 'the state of the sea . . . was rough
and unfavorable for a water landing.'
One part of the Legend is that upon terminating the search the
Navy issued orders for all vessels crossing the area to continue to
watch for debris and survivors and that 'the order is still in effect to
this very day!' It almost makes it seem as if the Navy still had hopes
of finding something after all these years. Such is not the case. It is
standard procedure as a part of the announcement of the termina-
tion of every search to include the phrase that travelers in the area
should remain on the alert. The statement is never canceled as it is,
in fact, part of an order canceling a search.
A recent addition to the story is that Lieutenant Taylor asked to
be replaced before the flight took off but that the request was
denied. Therefore, says one account, 'it is thought [that] he might
have been sick or possibly* intoxicated', f
In the report, Lt Arthur A. Curtis, Aviation Training Officer,
Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station, testified as follows:
Q. Did you notice anything unusual about the behavior of the
pilots in this flight?
A. Yes. Lieutenant Taylor did ask me to find another instructor
* Italics mine.
t Robert Marx, "The Bermuda Triangle: Mystery or Myth?' Argosy,
February 1974, p. 55.
117

to take his place, giving me no particular reason except that
he did not want to take the hop.
Q. At what time did Lieutenant Taylor make this request ?
A. To the best of my knowledge, it was about 1 :15.
Q. What was your action on this request of Lieutenant Taylor?
A. I said I would not be able to get him a relief.
Q. Do you know Lieutenant Taylor's movements from that
time until the flight was dispatched ?
A. I do not know. sir.
Q. Did you observe any unusual behavior of Lieutenant
Taylor?
A. No, sir.
Q. Did he seem normal in all respects ?
A. Yes, sir.
None of the parties to the investigation desired further to
examine this witness.
The request was not mentioned again in the report and it does
not appear in the list of Facts or the list of Opinions as having a
bearing on the incident. It seems unlikely that the investigators
would not have pursued the matter further had there been the
faintest possibility that Lieutenant Taylor had been physically or
emotionally impaired. On the contrary, a page was added to the
report on October 14,1947, in which the Navy absolved Taylor of
all blame for the loss, saying that 'some unexpected and unforeseen
development of weather conditions must have intervened; that
Lieutenant Taylor realized at an early hour that an emergency
existed; that he promptly took charge, kept his flight together, and
thereafter valiantly attempted to bring the flight home in the face
of [the] most difficult flying conditions.'
Many factors prevented Flight 19 from being saved: the failure
of Lieutenant Taylor's compasses; failure of the one radio channel
Lieutenant Cox needed to continue communicating with the flight;
the refusal to let Cox use a ready plane; bad radio reception; the
delay in sending out rescue planes; the approach of night and the
invasion of bad weather; the inability to locate the flight promptly
with radio bearings; the failure to broadcast the position of the fix
once it was known; the failure of the teletype system; the icing of
the Dinner Key Dumbo's antenna; the military discipline thatkept
the group together even though several of the pilots knew they
were headed the wrong way; the fact that Flight 19 was the last
flight of the day. Had any one of these factors not prevailed, the
flight might have ended differently. One or more of the planes
might have made it back, and the event would quickly have been
118

forgotten, rather than becoming known as the strangest flight in
the history of aviation.
The most tragic part of the incident is that when Lieutenant
Taylor first reported his predicament, he was, according to later
testimony, over the reefs and cays just north of the Bahamas.
Flight 19 was almost exactly on course when the pilots decided
they were lostl
119

14
December 1946
City Belle
Exactly a year to the day after the disappearance of the Avengers
and their rescue plane, another mystifying incident occurred in the
Bahamas. The schooner City Belle, out of Nassau and bound for
Grand Turk Island, was found deserted at sea on December 5,1946.
She was perfectly seaworthy, and everything was in order, even to
the lifeboats still hanging in their places. For some inexplicable
reason an inquest was never held, and the City Belle was quickly for-
gotten. Had the case been pursued it might have been found to be as
baffling as the Mary Celeste or the Carroll A. Deering.
Nassau Guardian. Thursday, December 5, 1946, p. 2:
It is thought that the heavy winds experienced this week
caused the passengers and crew of the City Belle to abandon
the sloop when she was en route from Nassau to Turks Island.
It was reported to the Port Officer this morning . . . that the
sloop had been sighted between Hog Cay, Exuma, and Sandy
Cay. There were no signs of any passengers or crew. We have
been unable to have the rumour confirmed that an American
crash boat had picked them up. The sloop's cargo was said to
be intact.
Several other small boats are believed to have encountered
difficulties during the recent stormy weather, but no details
are yet available.
Nassau Guardian. Saturday, December 7,1946, p. 4:
It was announced today by the Port Officer that seven
survivors of the Schooner City Belle, which was found
abandoned between Hog Cay and Sandy Cay. have been
located by an American crash boat. ... It is understood that
the survivors were taken to the American base in Exuma.
Further details, it is hoped, will be available on Monday.
120

The Nassau Guardian did not follow up on the story, so the
survivors' accounts of the mishap are not known. Despite this
unfortunate gap the coverage was adequate to show that the
incident, as it was told in the Legend, was inaccurate and sensa-
tionalized.
The newspaper reports also contradict the frequently stated
observation that the weather has never been bad during an
incident, and that there have never been survivors in the Bermuda
Triangle.
121

2A
1947
	1
Superfortress
In 1947 an American Superfortress bomber strangely vanished 100
miles off Bermuda. After an extensive search failed to find a trace,
Air Force officials speculated that a tremendous current of rising air
near a cumulonimbus cloud may have caused the bomber to dis-
integrate.
0
I was not able to find any original information on this 'vanish-
ment', but a logical explanation is included in the Legend itself.
A cumulonimbus, or thunderhead, cloud contains both updrafts
and downdrafts which may be in excess of 200 miles an hour.
An airplane passing through or near such a cloud could be
rapidly subjected to alternating up- and downdrafts, and con-
ceivably could encounter both at the same time, at opposite
extremes of its length or breadth. Although airplanes are built to
withstand severe turbulence, like all other machines there is a
limit to how much stress they can endure. Beyond that point the
weakest part of the structure will fail.
The points on any airplane that are most likely to give way are
the empennage, or tail section, and the attachment of the wings to
the fuselage. Under sufficient stress one or more of these sections
could either bend or shear off, causing a completely uncontrolled
spin and a crash.
Pilots treat cumulonimbus clouds with respect and normally fly
through them only inadvertently.
122

25
January 1948
Star Tiger
In the early morning hours of January 30, 1948, the Star Tiger, a
Tudor IV owned and operated by British South American Airways,
radioed the tower at Bermuda to give a position report, state that all
was well, and announce that its arrival would be on schedule. That
was the last message ever heard from the large airliner. A search
began before daylight; ten ships and more than thirty airplanes
methodically covered ail parts of the ocean that the plane could
possibly have reached.
Although the weather was excellent when the disappearance
occurred and during the first part of the search, no oil slicks, bodies,
or debris were found. Toward the evening of the second day bad
weather moved in and the planes were grounded. Ships continued
an unsuccessful search for several more days before admitting
defeat.
A lengthy investigation conducted by the Ministry of Civil
Aviation concluded that'no more baffling problem has ever been pre-
sented for investigation,' and that the 'fate of the Star Tiger must
remain an unsolved mystery.'' The court could only hint that'some
external cause must have overwhelmed both the men and the
machine.''
The following information on the last flight of Star Tiger is a
condensation of the report of the investigation conducted by the
Ministry of Civil Aviation of Great Britain.*
* Great Britain. Ministry of Civil Aviation. Report of the court investigation
of the accident to the Tudor IV. Aircraft 'Star Tiger' G-AHNP, on the 30th
January, 1948. (Cmd. 7517) London: His Majesty's Stationery Office, 1948.
123

The Tudor IV Type of Aircraft
The Tudor IV is an all-metal monoplane . . . propelled by
four liquid-cooled reciprocating engines. ...
The aircraft carries two identical wireless-telegraphy trans-
mitters, which have a range of several thousands of miles and
three wireless telephony transmitter-receivers having a range
of about 200 miles.. . .
[It] carries four inflatable rubber dinghies [which are]
124

equipped with appropriate emergency rations and distress
equipment, and with a radio transmitter.. , .
Maintenance of 'Star Tiger'
[From] an examination [of the maintenance records] relat-
ing to 'Star Tiger' . . . two matters have emerged. . . . Certain
defects re-appear regularly in the records, indicating not only
that they were not rectified en-route, but also that major checks
at the maintenance base failed to eliminate them. Secondly,
the aircraft not infrequently took off on passenger-carrying
flights over long distances with not unimportant defects un-
remedied. The records suggest that there was a lack of spare-
parts at stations along the route, and that, on some occasions,
time was not allowed for full servicing and testing....
The Route
The journey . . . was from London to Havana. The first stage
in the schedule was from London to Lisbon, where an over-
night stop was to be made. The second stage was from Lisbon
to Santa Maria [Azores] where the aircraft was scheduled
to re-fuel and to set off ... for Bermuda. . . . The route
lies entirely over the ocean; no islands or land masses are
crossed. . . .
In the average conditions of wind which prevail in the winter
. . . the aircraft, after completing the 1960 nautical miles
flight to Bermuda has insufficient fuel remaining to proceed to
any other airport. .. .
... There are no observation-ship stations along the route.
... Furthermore, there is in the area little commercial shipping
from which data can be obtained. The weather along the route
must therefore be inferred from observations taken on the land-
masses and islands of America, Europe and Africa and from
such data as aircraft on the route supply. The reliability of
forecasts is not as high as it is in areas where more complete
data are available. . . .
The accuracy of forecasting particularly of wind and cloud is
only moderate. ... It is a fairly common experience to
encounter head winds which are much stronger than those
forecast, particularly in the winter months. . . .
Apart from the uncertainties of the winds, the route is not
difficult for flying. It is a warm weather route, and there are no
serious troubles with,'for example, icing. ...
Use is made of astronomical navigation [astral] methods,
based on sextant observation of the stars. ... In good condi-
tions a star-fix... is unlikely to be in error by more than about
125

15 miles. Dead-reckoning navigation ... is supplementary to
stellar [astral] navigation.*
The Crew
. . . There can be no question that [the crew] formed an able
and experienced team. The witnesses who knew Captain
McMillan were unanimous in their appreciation of his high
qualities. . . . Radio Officer Tuck was described as most
experienced and capable. ... All these officers had previous
experience on the Bermuda route, but they had not previously
flown together as a crew.
The Last Flight of 'Star Tiger'
'Star Tiger' left London Airport on her last trip on 27th Jan-
uary, 1948. ... A failure of the cabin heating apparatus and
trouble with one of the compasses . . . were remedied during
the scheduled overnight stop at Lisbon.. . .
At the Azores Captain McMillan received an adverse report
from the Meteorological Office . . . and decided to stay over-
night. . . . Another aircraft of the British South American Air-
ways Corporation was awaiting a favourable opportunity for
taking off for Bermuda. This was the Lancastrian G-AGWL,
commanded by Captain Griffin.... On the next morning [the
two commanders] went together to the Meteorological office
. . . and ultimately decided to fly with one hour's interval
between them.. . . The strength of the adverse headwinds had
lessened and . . . they [proceeded] at a height of 2,000 feet...
affording a less effective adverse wind component . . . [and
taking] the aircraft below cloud base. . . . 'Star Tiger's' flight
plan . . . gives the flight time as 12 hours 26 minutes and the
estimated time of arrival at Bermuda at 3.56 A.M. the next
day. . . .
Trouble had again developed on the flight from Lisbon with
the same compass and [it] was remedied [at the Azores].. . .
Captain McMillan appears to have taken afull load of petrol.
. . . [He] instructed . . . 'fill her to the gills' and the . . . total
all-up weight was [a 936-pound overload].
This overload was soon reduced by fuel consumption and
cannot of course have had anything to do with the disaster.
Captain McMillan's insistence on full tanks does, however,
indicate that he fully appreciated the difficulties occasioned by
* Dead reckoning is calculating the approximate position based on the
estimated wind velocity and direction and the estimated speed and course of
the vessel. Should any of the factors differ from the estimate, the calculated
location could be significantly in error.
126

the prevalent headwinds. The winds on this route not in-
frequently contain such a headwind component as to prevent
a Tudor aircraft with full tanks from reaching Bermuda . . . and
the headwinds did from time to time increase en route beyond
the forecast strength.. . . Twice before on westward trips 'Star
Tiger' had had to divert to Gander in Newfoundland on account
of headwinds, and . . . another Tudor IV had encountered
winds so much stronger than forecast that it had arrived with
its petrol gauges showing 'nil' and its commander had alerted
the air sea rescue organization and had prepared to 'ditch' his
aircraft. . . . The incident had received not a little publicity and
must have emphasized the necessity of carrying all fuel
possible on this leg of the flight.
The Lancastrian took off from Santa Maria at 2.22 P.M. on
29th January and 'Star Tiger' followed at 3.34 P.M. The
Lancastrian touched down at Kindley Field, Bermuda/''at
4.11 A.M. the next day, having had an uneventful crossing.
'Star Tiger' was never seen again. She had been heard, hovfe
ever, frequently during her flight. . . . Radio conditions appeal
to have been good. . . . The prescribed hourly position reports
were duly sent out by 'Star Tiger' down to the last one at
3 A.M.. . .There are three matters dealt with in these messages
which call for comment.
The first of these concerns the height above sea level at
which the aircraft was flying. This is an important matter
because of course the lower the altitude the less opportunity
there is for dealing with any emergency which might upset the
stability of the aii jraft. The flight was planned to take place at a
height of 2,000 ft. throughout the passage. . . . [However,]
the record keep.ng was -not of a high order, [and] it is im-
possible to say with certainty at what height the aircraft was
flying when communications ceased.
The second matter. . . relates to the rule . . . that the radio
station guarding any aircraft must not allow more than 30
minutes to elapse without contact. . . . Nevertheless the radio
logs show that [at one time Bermuda] did not make contact
[for] 55 minutes, [and another time there was] an interval of
42 minutes. Thsse incidents may not be without significance
when the final loss of contact is considered.
The third matter concerns weather information. . . . Winds
... in all zones except the last were stronger than the Santa
Maria forecast. . . . [The Lancastrian's] estimated time of
arrival at Bermuda had accordingly to be recalculated [and]
Was one hour [later] than planned. ... At 1.26 A.M. the
Lancastrian navigator obtained an astral fix'which showed
him that he was considerably off course. He was then [where]
the Azores forecast was 'winds light and variable.' ... In
127

fact he was experiencing a south westerly wind of some 48
knots, and . . . during the preceding hour he had been carried
approximately 68 miles north of his intended track. . ..
Two facts emerge from [these] signals; firstly; the . . .
delays in obtaining a reply. . . . Secondly, the unreliability of
forecasts on the crucial portion of this route.
Apart from [that] there was nothing out of the ordinary in
the messages passing to and from 'Star Tiger'. . . . She had
amended her flight time . . . from the original estimate of
3.56 A.M. to 5 A.M.... Her hourly position reports ... showed
a normal progress and although it is clear that she, like the
Lancastrian, had been taken off course by the change of wind,
her position report at 2 A.M. showed that her navigator had
been able to obtain an astral fix, so that that position was a
known one, and not obtained by dead reckoning alone. . . .
Up to 3 A.M. on January 30th, therefore, it is a reasonable
inference from the known facts that 'Star Tiger' had had a
steady and uneventful flight. Her officers had received and
acknowledged the Bermuda weather forecasts . . . but they
had not (unless they overheard) received the revised winds
transmitted at the Lancastrian's request at 2.42 A.M.
'Star Tiger' was heard twice after the transmission at 3.2
A.M. of her 3 A.M. position report. At 3.4 A.M. her operator
requested a radio bearing from VRT [Bermuda], . . . The
request was repeated at 3.15 A.M. and ... the VRT operator
was able to give a first class bearing of 72°. He advised the air-
craft accordingly and obtained an acknowledgement of
receipt. This was the last signal heard from 'Star Tiger'.
... In the vicinity of the last known position of 'Star Tiger',
and in any area in which she is likely to have flown thereafter,
the weather was stable, there were no atmospheric disturb-
ances of a serious kind which might cause structural danger to
an aircraft, and there were no electrical storms.
The moon had risen at 1 A.M. . . . Cloud base [was] just
above 2,000 feet. It was broken cloud, assessed at six-tenths,
but increased in intensity towards Bermuda; the Captain of the
Lancastrian had seen stars through gaps in cloud until within
90 miles from destination. He had first seen the powerful
marine lights of Bermuda when 25 miles from it.
The VRT operator . . . admitted the two occasions when
contact with the aircraft was lost for 55 and 42 minutes
respectively.... 'I had other traffic on the air at the time - that
may be the reason.' His log, however, showed that he was not
busy at the time, and he added, 'I imagine the air was filled with
signals from other stations,' which may have been the case.
... However ... on neither of these two occasions did the
operator declare the emergency which his written instructions
128

required him to declare after a 30 minute loss of contact.
Mr Richards last communicated with 'Star Tiger' when he
gave the bearing at 3.1 5 A.M. At 3.50 A.M. when 35 minutes
had elapsed without a signal from the aircraft, he called her
again. He got no reply. ... He asked [Bermuda Approach]
Control if they had made contact. They had not. He called
'Star Tiger' again at 4.5 A.M. Again there was no response.
Fifty.minutes had now gone by since the last contact. He could
not remember if he informed the [BSAA] Corporation of loss of
contact, but said he probably had. The teleprinter sheets . . .
contain no record of any such message. At 4.40 A.M. [12.40
A.M. local time] he called again, again without response, and
then, 95 minutes after the last contact, he declared a state of
emergency. . . .
Mr Richards was asked whether by 4.40 A.M. the loss of
contact had not caused him considerable anxiety. He
answered: 'No, he was not due till 5 A.M.'
Energetic steps were taken once the emergency was de-
clared. At 4.55 A.M. the Search and Rescue Section of the
U.S. Army Air Force at Kindley Field was alerted, and by
7.16 A.M. [3.16 A.M. local time] a Fortress aircraft equipped
with a radar scanner was in the air. During the next day 25
other aircraft took part in the search. All areas of the sea where
it was conceivable that 'Star Tiger' might have come down
were scanned. The search went on until nightfall on February
3rd. Altogether 104 flights were undertaken and a total of
882 aircraft-hours was flown. . . . There were a number of
false alarms both of radio messages and of objects sighted in
the water: all were investigated, without result. Extremely bad
weather prevailed throughout the greater part of the search.
• . . After five days of continuous and intensive effort the
search had to be abandoned. ... No trace of the loss of 'Star
Tiger' was found and no trace of wreckage or of any other
object connected with her has since been seen.
Analysis of the Possible Causes of the Accident
There is good reason to suppose that no distress message
Was transmitted from the aircraft, for there were many radio
receiving stations listening on the aircraft's frequencies, and
none reported such a message. Thus there exists first the
Possibility [of] a failure of the aircraft's transmitting installa-
tion. There may then have happened an accident . . . which
the aircraft's crew were unable to report. . . . The aircraft may
have failed to find Bermuda before her fuel was exhausted,
being deprived of the navigational information which de-
pended on radio. . . . The alternative hypothesis is that an
9	129

accident occurred with such rapidity that no distress messagi
could be sent, or that no such message was thought to b<
necessary until, as it proved, it was too late.
A total failure of the radio transmitting equipment due to any
cause other than a failure of the D.C. electric power supply is
extremely unlikely, for the equipment is duplicated.. . .Normal
types of breakdown are guarded against adequately.
The D.C. power supply is provided by two independent
generators which also charge a storage battery. . . . Only a
total failure involving both the generators and the battery,
would effect a failure of radio. . . . The possibility of such an
occurrence is remote. ...
A total failure of radio is thus most unlikely. . . . Had the
radio failed shortly after 3.15 A.M. the navigator would have
[had to find] Bermuda, which was then distant some 340
nautical miles and 2i hours' flying time, without the aid of
radio bearings and without such information on the state of the
wind as might have been obtained by radio. His target was in a
small group of islands, equipped with powerful marine lights
around the coast, the visibility of which . . . was about 30
miles in all directions. He had about 3J hours in which to find
his target before the exhaustion of his fuel.*
. . . Proceeding on [the 3:15 bearing the navigator] would
set a course which, in the wind conditions actually prevailing,
would have brought him within some 30 miles of Bermuda by
5.30 A.M.. . . The aircraft could hardly have failed to find the
island in a short time, in the conditions of visibility which
prevailed.
The possibility that failure of power would interfere with the
aircraft's course-keeping can be discounted, for though the
magnetically controlled gyroscopic compass would cease to
operate, there are also available two bowl compasses of high
accuracy.. . . t
Thus it appears that, had the navigator been forced to work
without data other than those which he had available at hand,
it is very probable that the aircraft would have reached
Bermuda. . . .
There would accordingly appear to be no grounds for
supposing that 'Star Tiger' fell into the sea in consequence of
having been deprived of her radio, having failed to find her
destination, and having exhausted her fuel.
* This is misleading. Since he was 2$ hours away he would have only It
hours to search once he was in the area.
t This is a very questionable deduction by the Court. Bowl compasses are
not always highly accurate and are subject to several types of error. They are
especially difficult to use in turbulent air. Although one of the compasses
was repaired in Lisbon it failed again on the trip to the Azores and the report
does not state if it was then repaired or replaced.
130

| Causes That Can Be Eliminated
Constructional Defects. There are no grounds for supposing
that in the design of the Tudor IV aeroplane, or in the manu-
facture of the particular Tudor IV aeroplane 'Star Tiger', there
were technical errors or omissions, judged against a standard
of agreed good practice.
Meteorological Hazards. Nor are there any grounds for
supposing that the loss of 'Star Tiger' was caused by any
-meteorological hazard. . . .
Errors of Altimetry. There is little possibility that the aircraft
flew into the sea as a result of an error in the indication of
height. . . .
Mechanical Failure of Engines. The failure for mechanical
reasons of one engine is a possibility, but the aircraft could fly
entirely safely on three engines, and, indeed at her weight at
the relevant time, on two....
Causes That Cannot Be Eliminated
Fire. . . . The occurrence of fire ... is now very rare. Every
precaution is taken in design to prevent it, and this type of
aircraft is well supplied with fire extinguishing devices.. . . Had
any serious fire occurred ... it is unlikely that a distress message
would not have been transmitted . . . [unless] a fire occurred
as a separate event after a radio failure; this requires the co-
incidence of two improbabilities. .. .
Loss of Control.. . . When flying at a fairly low altitude such
as this, the time available for the recovery from any loss of
control is not great.
Loss of Engine Power.. . . There remains the possibility that
the engines were starved of fuel.. . . Not only is it very unlikely,
but [a shortage of fuel] would certainly be noticed [earlier in
the flight].
Conclusion
In closing this Report it may truly be said that no more
baffling problem has ever been presented for investigation. In
the complete absence of any reliable evidence as to either the
nature or the cause of the disaster to 'Star Tiger' the Court has
not been able to do more than suggest possibilities, none of
which reaches the level even of probability. Into all activities
which involve the co-operation of man and machine two
elements enter of very diverse character. There is.the incalcul-
able element of the human equation dependent upon imper-
fectly known factors; and there is the mechanical element
131

subject to quite different laws. A breakdown may occur in
either separately or in both on conjunction. Or some external
cause may overwhelm both man and machine. What happened
in this case will never be known and the fate of 'Star Tiger'
must forever remain an unsolved mystery.
The disappearance of the Star Tiger thwarts all explanation as
each of the suggested solutions seems too unlikely to have
occurred. It is truly a modern mystery of the air.
Although the reason for the plane's loss is unknown, the failure
to find any trace of it cannot be considered a mystery. The weather
was deteriorating during the latter stages of the flight, winds were
increasing, the aircraft's fuel reserve was diminishing, and the
sea was growing boisterous. The chances for a successful ditching
on a rough sea in the dark are not good, and debris is not as
frequently left at a crash scene as might be supposed, especially
during poor weather. The Star Tiger could have gone down as
many as five hours before the radar-equipped Fortress arrived in
the area, and as many as eight hours before daylight, when other
search craft joined in.
UFO-oriented writers have made much of the phrase in the
concluding section of the Board's report, 'some external cause may
overwhelm both man and machine,' apparently thinking that the
Court may have considered the possibility that a UFO was
responsible, but lacked the courage to openly express such a
theory. In the context of the report, an 'external cause' could be
anything other than the human or the mechanical element, such as
the weather.
It should be noted that although the Court concluded that many
of the possible causes of the disappearance were extremely un-
likely, it did not declare that any of them were impossible. Had there
been a total radio failure, however unlikely such an occurrence
might have been, the loss of the navigation equipment combined
with the strong winds and the low fuel supply would have created
a critical situation that allowed almost no margin of error. In any
case, whatever happened to the Star Tiger will forever remain a
mystery.
132

41
March 1948
Al Snider
A l Snider, internationally famous jockey, and two friends anchored
their rented cabin cruiser in the shallow water near Sandy Key, off
Florida's southern tip, and rowed a short distance away in a tender to
fish for a few hours. They never returned to the cruiser.
The Coast Guard began a search with the aid of more than a
thousand men and hundreds of boats and airplanes. The rowboat was
found several days later near a small island sixty miles to the north,
but it was empty.
After the Coast Guard ended its search Snider's wife and friends
contributed money to be used for f urther searching, and rewards
totaling more than $15,000 were offeredfor the discovery of the men
or their bodies. Despite the incentive no trace of the three men was
ever found.
Miami Herald. Sunday. March 7. 1948, p. 1, col. 4:
By Arthur L. Himbert. A new wind velocity record for March
was established here during the 24-hour period ending at noon
Saturday, the Miami weather bureau reported. The old record
■ ■ . was shattered at 7:23 P.M. Friday when a sustained
velocity of 48 miles an hour was recorded. . . .
Small craft warnings, hoisted from Melbourne south around
the Florida Keys late Friday, were ordered continued for an-
other 24 hours. . . .
During the peak winds Friday night, limbs were blown from
trees, several windows were broken . .. and a small launch was
swamped in the Intercoastal waterway.
Miami Herald, Sunday. March 7, 1948, p. 1, col. 6:
A 38-foot Coast Guard picket boat braved 'extremely heavy'
seas Saturday to rescue four Cubans from the 170-ft. barge
Virginian, as mountainous waves pounded it to pieces on the
133

north jetty of Government cut.. . . The waves tossed it up and
down like a cork.. . .
. .. . The Virginian was swept inshore by 15-foot waves
churned up by the northeaster which hit the Miami area
Friday night.... The picket boat almost capsized when a huge
wave hit it broadside.. . . The Virginian was carrying a crane, a
bulldozer, an ambulance chassis and other cargo....
Meanwhile, the Coast Guard was searching with planes and
boats for a 16-foot outboard tender of the yacht Evelyn K,
which failed to return to the keys Friday night. Three men were
aboard, but their names were not known.
Miami Herald. Monday, March 8, 1948, p. B1 :
By John Woempel. Navy, Coast Guard, and civilian planes
and boats were searching Sunday for three fishermen, includ-
ing one of the nation's leading jockeys, Al Snider* of Miami
Springs, who have been missing two days in Florida Bay.
About 30 planes scoured the wide expanse of water and islands
south of the tip of the Florida peninsula as far west as the
Dry Tortugas Saturday and Sunday. The men were reported
lost in a small boat Friday while 50-mile-an-hour winds
churned the bay. . . . They had set out at 5 P.M. Friday from
the yacht Evelyn K.. which had been anchored near Craig, a
town on the overseas hwy. No one has seen them since.. . .
Searchers, spurred on by a $15,000 reward, continued their
efforts for several weeks, although hampered by choppy seas and
high winds. Hopes for the men zoomed when the plywood skiff
was found near Everglades City, 60 miles north of Sandy Key, in
an area of mangrove trees and swamps known as the Ten Thousand
Islands.
The boat was found right-side-up. The floorboards were
cracked, the engine had been pushed overboard, and it appeared
that someone had attempted to lash himself in with a rope. The
Coast Guard and the Navy, who had pulled out several days
before, re-joined the search, along with hundreds of volunteer
boatmen, pilots, and ground searchers with bloodhounds.
Many possible clues were discovered but all proved to be
negative. Three footprints were found to be those of a small girl
who lived nearby. A message written in the sand was not believed
to have been written by the men, and arrows pointing in opposite
directions had been made, it turned out, by local fishermen. An
investigation of a 'circling buzzards' clue uncovered two dead
pelicans.
* Previous writers have erroneously spelled his name 'Snyder'.
134

Nothing was ever found to show that any of the men had
reached shore.
The Legend failed to mention one 'small' point about the dis-
appearance of A1 Snider - the gale that struck the small skiff as the
men were fishing in the dark.
135

December 1948
DCS
One of the eeriest of all the disappearances in the Bermuda Triangh
took place in the early morning darkness of December 28, 1948. A
DC-3 passenger plane chartered for a flight from San Juan, Puerto
Rico, to Miami vanished within sight of its destination. The weather
was excellent, the pilots were experienced, and there had been no sign
of mechanical problems. Captain Robert Linquist, copilot Ernest
Hill, and stewardess Mary Burks were returning twenty-seven
passengers, including two infants, to their homes after a short Christ-
mas vacation.. The passengers were still in a holiday mood and
singing Christmas carols as a tail wind gently wafted the airliner
along its way. At 4:13 am, as the glow of the city's lights began
warming the horizon, Linquist contacted Miami Control, stating that
he was approaching the field from fifty miles south, that all was well,
and that he would standby for landing instructions.
Then, whatever fate had decreed for them happened immediately
and decisively - so quickly that there was not even time for a distress
call. The tower radioed landing instructions but Linquist did not
acknowledge. While on its final approach to the field, almost within
reach of land, the plane had simply vanished.
A massive search began within a few hours. The weather was ideal.
The seas were clear and calm, and so shallow in most of the area
where the plane had last reported that large objects could be seen on
the bottom. Hundreds of ships and planes scoured the ocean from
San Juan to Florida, covering the Caribbean, the Everglades,
Florida Bay, the Gulf of Mexico, the Keys, Cuba, Hispaniola, and
the Bahamas. Not a trace of evidence was found, not even a life
jacket, a bit of debris, an oil slick, or any of the packs of sharks and
barracuda that always appear at the scene of a disaster. To this day
nothing has turned up to shed a ray of light on the mystery.
136

Civil Aeronautics Board. Accident Investigation Report. Air-
borne Transport, Inc., Miami, Florida, December 28,1948:
History of the Flight
At [10:03 PM].* December 27. 1948. NC-16002 departed
from Isla Grande Airport, San Juan, Puerto Rico, for Miami	
Eleven minutes after takeoff the flight called the airport
control tower. The control tower did not receive the call but it
was intercepted by CAA Communication at San Juan, to which
the flight reported that it was proceeding to Miami, Florida....
CAA Communications at San Juan was unable to contact the
flight again, although numerous attempts were made. At
[11 :23 PM], the Overseas Foreign Air Route Traffic Control
Center at Miami, Florida, received a radio communication from
NC-16002 stating it was flying at 8.500 feet ... and that it
estimated its time of arrival over South Caicos at [12.33 AM],
and Miami at [4:05 AM], December 28. 1948. .
* All times have been changed from the 24-hour clock to civilian time.
137

The New Orleans Overseas Foreign Air Route Traffic Control
Center intercepted a position report from NC-16002 at
[4 :13 AM], which stated it was 50 miles south of Miami. This
was the last known contact with the aircraft. Unsuccessful
attempts were made to contact the flight by CAA Com-
munications from San Juan, Miami, and New Orleans.
The Civil Aeronautics Board . . . was notified ... at [8:30
AM] that NC-16002 was considerably overdue. . . . When it
was definitely determined that the aircraft was missing, the
United States Coast Guard was alerted and an extensive
search was immediately started. ...
Investigation
On December 27, 1948, at approximately [7:40 PM],
NC-16002 landed at San Juan, Puerto Rico, after difficulty
with the landing gear.* Captain Linquist reportedly said that
when the landing gear was lowered, the landing gear warning
lights indicated that the gear was not locked. A repair agency
on the airport. .. was asked to examine the aircraft's batteries.
They were found to be discharged with the water level low.
Advised that it would take several hours to recharge the
batteries to their proper operating capacity, the Captain asked
the mechanic to add water and return them to the aircraft
without charging. The landing gear warning light system was
reported as malfunctioning but was not repaired.
At [8:30 PM], the crew of NC-16002 filed an IFR flight
plan from San Juan to Miami . .. and the Captain stated the
aircraft was in good working order. However, one hour later
the . .. aircraft was having battery trouble and [was] delayed.
Due to this delay, the flight plan became invalid. ... At
approximately [9:15 PM].t NC-16002 taxied to the end of
Runway 27 and ... the tower was unable to contact it by
radio. The Chief of the Puerto Rican Transportation Authority
.. . proceeded to the aircraft where he was advised by the
crew that the aircraft's receiver was functioning properly but
that due to weak batteries the transmitter was not. After
conferring with the crew and then with the tower by means of
the emergency car radio, the Chief of Aviation authorized the
flightto make a VFR takeoff. It was agreed that the flight would
remain in the vicinity of San Juan until sufficient power was
produced by the generators to transmit. If this was accom-
plished, a new IFR flight plan was to have been filed and the
* The same crew had flown the plane from Miami to San Juan that
day.
t The report gave this time as 22:15 [10:15 PM], an obvious error since
the plane took off at 10:03.
138

flight could proceed to Miami. The flight departed at approxi-
mately [10:03 PM]* and eleven minutes later advised CAA
Communications at San Juan it was unable to contact the
tower and was proceeding to Miami on an IFR plan. Messages
were intercepted from the flight while enroute, but further
attempts to contact the flight relative to the flight plan and to
ascertain its position were unsuccessful. . . .
Captain Linquist had flown the San Juan-Miami run for
Airborne Transport, Inc., as copilot but this was his first trip as
captain for that company. However, he had flown the route
for other companies and had had military experience in the
area.
Analysis
No examination of the wreckage was possible, as the aircraft
is still missing.... At the time of departure from San Juan the
aircraft's transmitter was not functioning, due to discharged
batteries. There was no report of any malfunctioning of any
part of the aircraft other than the electrical system....
It is known that the aircraft's transmitter was operating at
[4:13 AM] . . . when . . . New Orleans . . . intercepted a posi-
tion report which stated the flight was 50 miles south of Miami.
It is possible, however, that some fa.ilure of the electrical
system occurred subsequent to this transmission, making the
aircraft's radio and automatic compass inoperative. It is also
possible that the pilot may have been in error as to his reported
position. Since the aircraft had fuel for 1{ hours of flight, and
since the last message was intercepted approximately six hours
and 10 minutes after takeoff, an error in location would be
critical.
A review of the weather . .. indicated a change in wind
direction from northwest to northeast as the flight neared
Miami with no change in wind velocity from what was fore-
cast. Without crew knowledge of this change, the aircraft
could have drifted to the left of the course some 40-50 miles.
This information was broadcast from Miami at [12:15 AM],
but it is not known whether the flight received it.
Probable Cause
The Board lacks sufficient information in this case to
determine the probable cause.
* The report had this time as 23:03, an error which conflicted with other
information in the report.
139

Flight Personnel
Pilot R. E. Linquist, age 28, held an airman certificate with i
commercial pilot and instrument rating. ... He had a total o
3.265 flying hours.
Copilot E. E. Hill, age 22, held an airman certificate with i
commercial pilot and instrument rating. ... He had a total o
197 flying hours.
The Aircraft
NC-16002 was a Douglas DC-3. It was manufactured June
12,1936, [and] had a total of 28,257 hours.
Although the CAB did not solve the mystery of the DC-3, its
report provides important information. The Legend emphasizes
the swiftness of the disaster - the suddenness of the loss of contact
between the tower and the plane. However, the report indicates
that because of battery problems the transmitter had not worked
properly on the ground at San Juan or early in the flight. It appears
that the problem continued throughout the flight, since a number
of fruitless efforts were made to establish contact with the plane
while it was en route.
Any number of problems might have arisen within the hour and
a half between the plane's last call and the time when the fuel tanks
ran dry. More electrical trouble might have developed, and a plane
at night without lights, instruments, or navigation equipment is a
helpless creature. Linquist might have attempted to let someone
know of his difficulties but failed because of the faulty transmitter.
Although the weather was good, it may have been an important
factor in the loss. Linquist's information was that early in the flight
there would be a light wind from the southwest, and later, from the
northwest. He would have corrected for the expected wind by
heading slightly to the left of his intended course. As the plane
approached Miami the wind shifted, coming from the northeast.
Although it was not a strong wind it could have caused the plane
to drift 40 or 50 miles to the left of course, according to the CAB, if
the pilot was not aware of the change. The DC-3 may have drifted
so far south that it missed the southern tip of Florida and flew off
into the Gulf of Mexico.
Neither the CAB report, the Miami Herald, nor the New York
Times states that Linquist had reported seeing the lights of Miami.
Previous writers made that assumption. They believed Linquist
was 50 miles south because he said he was, then deduced that since
he was that close he was within sight of the city.
140

Despite the Legend, the DC-3 never was in contact with Miami
Tower. According to the December 29 Miami Herald, 'The New
Orleans station advised district Coast Guard headquarters in
Miami.. . . The message from the DC-3 was not heard here.'
The DC-3 approaches Miami. A, 50 miles south of Miami; B, 50 miles
from Miami on course. Shallow areas are gray.
A position report is never exact. It is only an estimate. A position
fix at sea was a difficult feat in the 1940s, the days of low-frequency
radio ranges. Even today, with more modern equipment, the Coast
141

Guard assumes that all position reports contain an error factotj
Before the use of omni ranges and DME (distance-measuring
equipment) there were no precise methods of plotting an exact!
position, in terms of either distance or direction. Positions were
estimates based on calculations that depended on the indicated air
speed, the altitude, the barometric pressure, the outside air tem-
perature, the estimated wind direction and speed, the weight of the
plane, and the time in flight. Calculations were aided by celestial
navigation if conditions permitted, but the process was only
approximate. When Linquist said he was 50 miles away it was only
an estimate. He could easily have been 100 miles out. Toward the;
end of a long flight pilots often report themselves closer in than1
they really are.
Similarly, when a pilot says he is south of a given point he is
giving an approximation only. Linquist might have been some-
where in a southerly direction at the time, but he was not neces-
sarily directly south.
If the DC-3 had flown a direct course from San Juan it would
have approached Miami on the path indicated by the dotted line
in the map shown below. A report from 50 miles out should have
been made from point B (on the map), which is southeast of Miami.
If he was, as he stated, 50 miles south (point A), he would have
been considerably off course. Cumulating all these approximations
and possibilities for error, the DC-3 probably was somewhere
within the pie-shaped area when it went down. It conceivably
could have been so far from Miami that it was even outside that
area.
According to the Legend it is strange that search planes and
ships were not able to find the downed plane in the water south of
Miami, which is only about twenty feet deep. Although an object
as large as an airplane would be impossible to miss, no one has ever
reported finding an old DC-3 in the area.
Nautical charts reveal that much of the water south of Miami is
shallow (gray on the map). There is a 10- to 15-mile-wide area off
the coast of Florida as well as another large, shallow area to the
east, the Great Bahama Bank. Between them, however, the ocean
drops off sharply to a depth of 5,000 feet in the Straits of Florida,
through which flows the turbulent Gulf Stream. Only a very small
portion of the area is shallow; the remainder is well beyond sight
and reach. The DC-3 might still have been sinking and drifting
north in the Gulf Stream as the search for it began many miles to
the south.
The condition of the pilots should also be considered. By the
142

time of their last report they had been in operation about twenty
hours, most of it in the air. It had been a very long day, and their
judgment and calculations could have been affected by fatigue.
The plane would have gone down by 5:45 am at the latest, as it
would then have been out of fuel. It could even have gone down as
early as 4:15. In any case Linquist would have had to ditch at sea
in the dark, very possibly demolishing the plane. If any traces had
been left behind the chance of their being found would have been
almost nil because of the turbulence and swiftness of the Gulf
Stream. Since the first search plane could not have reached the
area before 9 ot 10 am the Stream had a minimum of three hours
and a maximum of about six in which to disperse any oil or debris.
The exact cause of the loss will never be known, but there are
several important factors in the case that are not mentioned in the
Legend.

41
January 1949
Star Ariel
On January 17, 1949, the Star Ariel, a British South American
Airways Corporation airliner, vanished under conditions similar to
those under which her sister ship, the Star Tiger, had disappeared
almost exactly a year before. The four-engine plane took off from
Kindley Field, Bermuda, with seven crewmen and thirteen passengers
into a beautiful morning sky on a flight to Jamaica. An hour later
Captain McPhee radioed a routine flight report to Bermuda:' We are
at cruising altitude, the weather is good. Expected time of arrival at
Kingston as scheduled.'' The Star Ariel was never heard from or seen
again.
The plane was known to have been on course at the time of her last
radio call, and the navigational equipment assured that she would
remain on or near the proper path. Had the plane sustained structural
failure and crashed, debris would have been strewn over a large area.
Had a ditching occurred on a sea known to have been very calm, there
should have been some survivors. At the very least, the two life rafts
would have been automatically ejected from their compartments in
the wings and would have been found. Yet the intensive search, per-
formed in excellent weather, was all in vain. Not a trace of the plane
or its passengers was ever found.
An investigation by the Ministry of Civil Aviation was not able to
shed any light on the cause of the disappearance.
According to the report of the Ministry of Civil Aviation,* the
airplane had 10 hours' fuel on board for the 5^-hour flight. It was
* Great Britain. Ministry of Civil Aviation. Civil Aircraft Accident. Report
on the loss of Tudor IVb Star Ariel G-AGRE which disppeared on a flight
between Bermuda and Kingston (Jamaica) on 17 January, 1949. (M.C.A.P. 78)
London, His Majesty's Stationery Office, 1949.
144

flying with a tail wind and carrying a relatively light load. The
weather was excellent and the plane was above the freezing level,
making icing out of the question *
The crew was well qualified, Captain McPhee had 4,200 hours
of flight time, including almost 2,000 in command of BSAA air-
craft, and extensive experience on the route on which he dis-
appeared. The other officers were experienced, and the radio
operator in particular was known for his outstanding skills.
The four Rolls-Royce engines had all performed well in the past,
and there was no reason to suspect that they were at fault. De
Havilland propellers were in use, and they had never failed in the
history of the Tudor. The aircraft carried complete navigation
equipment, including several receivers and transmitters, direction
finders, a radio compass, and radar.
Safety equipment included three inflatable dinghies, each with
room for fifteen to eighteen people and equipped with distress and
sailing aids, first aid equipment, and a radio transmitter. The radio
in the dinghy stored inside the airplane carried an automatic SOS
transmitter that had an estimated range up to 75 miles. A switch in
the nose of the aircraft operated automatically should the aircraft
strike water, causing the dinghies to be ejected from their com-
partments and inflated. Life belts for all passengers and the crew
were stowed on board, and in addition to the regulai doors, five
emergency exits could be used for escaping from the cabin.
Structural failure was all but ruled out as a cause of the dis-
appearance because the past performance of the Tudor IV sug-
gested that it was most unlikely. The plane had successfully flown
more than 350 hours with no problems, and meteorologists were
certain that there could not have been turbulence along the route.
Had a structural problem occurred the amount of pressurization
in the airplane at the cruising level of 18,000 feet would have been
so slight that it probably could not have led to disintegration of the
aircraft.
While the possibility of sabotage was not entirely eliminated, no
evidence was found that it played a part in the loss.
According to the weather report of HM Meteorological Office
there were no weather complications of any kind. There were some
clouds along the route, but they were well beiow the cruising
altitude. Visibility was unlimited above the clouds and only
slightly restricted beiow them.
Although the exact cause of the loss of the Star Ariel will never
* Ice can build up on a plane only near the freezing level. Above that
altitude the water particles are frozen and will not stick to the aircraft.
lo	145

be known, there is some significant information in the report that
does not appear in the Legend.
At 9:32 am,* 51 minutes after takeoff, Captain McPhee called
Bermuda:
'I departed from Kindley Field at 8:41. My ETA at [Kingston]
is 2:10 PM. I am flying in good visibility at 18.000 feet. I flew
over 150 miles south of Kindley Field at 9:32. My ETA at 30° N
is 9:37. Will you accept control.'
The second message . . . was originated by G-AGRE [Sfar
Ariel] at 9 :42. ... It read: 'I was over 30° N at 9 :37. I am
changing frequency to MRX [Kingston].' This was acknow-
ledged. The acknowledgment was for the Captain a complete
clearance to change frequency to Kingston.
At 1 :52 PM [4 hours and 10 minutes after the last message
and 18 minutes before Star Ariel's estimated time ot arrival]
messages were originated by [Kingston] to . . . Bermuda,
requesting information about G-AGRE and pointing out that
the aircraft had not been in contact with Jamaica since the
time of its departure from Bermuda. . . .
Thus Kingston raised the first warning at 1 :52, which signal
was received at Bermuda at 2:23 and passed to 'Approach
Control' at 2 :30. . . .
At 2:45 Nassau reported . .. that G-AGRE had not con-
tacted Kingston and was now overdue and requested informa-
tion.
At 2:54 a message was sent from B.S.A.A.C. [Bermuda] by
teleprinter that nobody had any information on G-AGRE and
that all concerned were being alerted.
At 3:05 B.S.A.A.C. Operations Bermuda [ordered a] search
action to be taken by G-AHNJ (Tudor IV) which had landed at
Nassau at 1 :43 en route from Kingston to Bermuda.
At 5:08 a message was sent from New York Air Sea Rescue
to U.S.A.A.F. Bermuda planning all-out search. . . .
.. . G-AHNJ, which took off [from Nassau] at 4:25 PM for
Bermuda, was instructed to search along the presumed track of
[Star Ariel]. The track was bisected at a position 27° N 69° Wat
7:05 PM and G-AHNJ landed at Bermuda at 9:20 PM. . . .
At 4:47 PM an aircraft flew . . . from Bermuda to a point 500
miles along the course and did a 1-mile lattice search all the
way back. The same evening another aircraft flew the entire
route from Bermuda to Guantanamo (Cuba).
The Star Ariel, which was last heard at 9:42 am, could have gone
down immediately after that message, and most likely was down at
* ajl times, regardless of location, have been converted to local Bermuda
time.
146

11:00 am, when its next position report was well overdue. Although
the official report does not tell what time searchers arrived the
following morning, it would have been too dark for a visual sight-
ing until at least 7:00 am, or approximately twenty hours after the
Star Ariel probably went down. Even if the liner had stayed air-
borne until late in the afternoon without sending position reports,
it would have been down at least twelve hours before it could have
been sighted, had any of it remained to be seen.
B.S.A.A.C. Operations Officer: The inclusion of the passage
[changing to Kingston frequency] in the last position report is
unusual. The aircraft was at that time only 150 miles out of
Bermuda on [the] 1,100 mile flight to Kingston, and in my
experience aircraft on this route do not attempt to work
[Kingston] until they are abeam Nassau. ... It strikes me as
most extraordinary that G-AGRE should [transmit that it was
transferring to Kingston] before establishing satisfactory radio
contact with [Kingston], ... I also cannot understand why
147

[Bermuda] did not take any action ... in regard to an aircraf
last reported only 150 miles out of their station, as Regulation
Procedure requires that flight watch be maintained until the
aircraft is approximately at the midpoint of its journey and tha
control may not be relinquished until satisfactory radio contact
has been established with the station ahead.. . .
B.S.A.A.C. Local Representative [Kingston]: The fact that
the aircraft had not made any contact with [Kingston] was no
cause for immediate concern as the usual procedure for aircraft
at position 30° N is to . . . work Nassau . . . until approxi-
mately midway in the flight from Bermuda to Kingston when
they contact [Kingston],
Kingston was informed by cable that Star Ariel would be mak-
ing contact, but there was no concern over the absence of a call
because of knowledge that radio conditions were unusually poor
that day. Kingston assumed that the plane would continue to
contact Bermuda until it came within range. Kingston did not
know that the Star Ariel had signed off from Bermuda and
Bermuda did not know that the plane had not established contact
with Kingston.
The possibility of an aircraft signing off from one frequency
and not reporting on the new one does not appear to have been
guarded against by any of the procedures laid down by the
highest authorities up to this time.
This oversight caused the long delay in realizing that the plane
was out of contact, and the search was not begun until it was too
late to reach the suspected d'tching or crash area until after dark.
Had there been an established procedure for the transfer of control,
searchers could have been at work early in the afternoon, rather
than by dawn of the following day.
Opinion: Through lack of evidence due to no wreckage hav-
ing been found the cause of the accident is unknown.
Although the Tudor IVs were successfully operated in the Berlin
airlift, they were never used to carry passengers after the loss of the
Star Tiger and the Star Ariel.
148

41
March 1950
Globemaster
An American Globemaster disappeared north of the Triangle in
March 1950 on a flight to Ireland.
New York Times, March 24, 1951, p. 1 :
LONDON, Saturday, March 24 [AP], A United States Air
Force officer at Shannon Airport said early today that the pilot
of a search plane had reported sighting flares and wreckage
along the Atlantic route followed by a huge United States Air
Force C-124, missing for twenty-four-hours with fifty-three
persons aboard.
The vast armada of search planes that had been sweeping
the 800-mile stretch of ocean was sped to the area where the
flares had been reported, some 450 miles due west of Ireland.
The giant transport plane was last heard from early yesterday
on its routine flight from the United States to Britain. . ..
The pilot of a B-29 Superfort radioed the hope-giving report
of seeing flares and wreckage.. .. [He] also reported sighting
what he believed to be a life-raft.
The R.A.F. officer said that seas were running high and that
there were strong winds in the area. Gale warnings had been
posted along the British coast.
Maj. Horace A. Stephenson, commanding the United States
air-rescue mission at Ireland's Shannon airport, told reporters
• . .'lam afraid it will take some time - possibly hours - for the
weather ships to get there. ..." He was awaiting the return of
the B-29 'to find out from the airman that he definitely saw
what he reported he saw.'
He added that, in the darkness, the pilot may have been mis-
taken. The pilot reported he had made the sighting at 12:45
A.M., Saturday, London time . . . twenty-four hours after the
big transport had last been heard from.
149

'Further wreckage and flares have been sighted sixty mile;
from the spot where the first wreckage was sighted,' Majo
Stephenson said.
Major Stephenson said he meant that the second wreckage
and flares were sixty miles closer to the coast of Ireland....
The transport. . . took off Thursday from the Limestone, Me.,
air base and refueled at Gander, Nfld.
Reporters were told that any rescued survivors would be
brought to Shannon. . . .
A routine radio message from the transport at 1 A.M. Friday
. . . gave its position as 800 miles southwest of Ireland and
150

said it expected to land at 6 A.M. at the United States air base
at Mildenhall, England.
New York Times. March 30. 1951. p. 3:
LONDON, March 29 [UP], The United States Air Force
Globemaster missing over the Atlantic since Good Friday was
blown to bits by a terrific explosion that almost certainly killed
all fifty-three men aboard, an Air Force spokesman said today.
He announced that the aircraft carrier Coral Sea. one of the
sixty ships and planes searching for the missing transport, had
found the ocean littered with tiny pieces of debris near the spot
where a gasoline tank platform from the plane was found. He
said authorities had not yet determined whether the plane
exploded in flight or when it hit the water.
'In any investigation of this kind, the possibility of sabotage
must be taken into account,' the spokesman said. 'But it should
be stressed that so far there is absolutely no evidence to
indicate sabotage in the case of the Globemaster.'
The Air Force called off the search at the end of the eighth day
when it became obvious that there could no longer be any sur-
vivors. There was increasing evidence that the plane had appar-
ently exploded about 600 miles southwest of Ireland.
The New York Times Index, the best source of information on
incidents of this type, did not list any such incident in 1950. The
disappearance described here, which occurred in 1951, is too
similar to the one mentioned in the Legend of the Bermuda
Triangle not to be the same. It was a Globemaster, the incident
occurred in March, and search headquarters were in Ireland,
although the plane was not on a flight there, but to Britain.
The loss occurred far away from the Bermuda Triangle, and it
appeared to have been caused by an explosion.
151

30
June 1950
Sandra
The 350-foot freighter Sandra, radio-equipped and loaded with 300
tons of insecticide, sailed from Savannah, Georgia, in June 1950,
headed for Puerto Cabello, Venezuela. Thumping her way south in
the heavily traveled coastal shipping lanes, she passed Jacksonville
and St Augustine, then vanished without a trace in the calm, tropic
dusk.
The air and sea search was futile. No trace of floating wreckage
was ever found in the shipping lanes, and no debris or bodies ever
floated in to shore.
Lloyd's List. April 24, 1950: Miami, April 19 - The 185-foot
Costa Rican Sandra, with 11 men on board, has been reported
six days overdue.
Lloyd's List. May 2, 1950: Miami, April 27 - Search is being
made for . . motor vessel Sandra, which left Savannah on
April 5 for Puerto Cabello with a cargo of 340 tons of DDT in
bags and has not since been reported.
Lloyd's List. June 3. 1950: Miami. May 29 - The United
States Coast Guard has given up the search for motor vessel
Sandra and the vessel is considered lost.
Although the Legend and Lloyd's List disagree about the sailing
date and the length of the vessel, the ship is obviously the same
one.
The evolution of the Sandra's story in the Legend of the Ber-
152

muda Triangle is one of the more interesting examples of what can
happen when authors take their information from each other,
rather than from original sources.
The Sandra was first reported as part of an area-wide mystery
in a short newspaper article* in September 1950 along with the
better-known Avenger incident, the Star Tiger, the DC-3, and the
Star Ariel. The article, which was the beginning of the Legend of
the Bermuda Triangle (although the area would not receive its
name for another decade), erroneously reported that the Sandra
was a 350-foot freighter, and that the search for it was abandoned
on June 16. All later articles gave the 350-foot figure for the ship's
length (almost double its true size) and stated that it had dis-
appeared in June rather than April.
The Sandra next appeared in a Fate magazine article in 1952, in
which the author displayed a fine creative talent. He 'described'
the rust spots along its 350-foot length and told how the ship
leisurely thumped along, on course, through the heavily traveled
steamer lanes off Jacksonville. He told how the 'friendly, winking
beacon of St Augustine Light must have beenf easily visible
through the peaceful tropic dusk that shrouded the low Florida
coastline off the starboard rail.' And he told of the men, just up from
mess, drifting around the deck, smoking, talking, and reflecting on
the past day. A very peaceful scene.
Almost all versions of the story after the Fate article state that the
ship passed Jacksonville and was last seen off St Augustine in the
calm, semitropical dusk.
The actual date of the departure of the ship (April 5) provides
an important clue:
Miami Herald. Saturday. April 8. 1950. p. 1:
A storm growing from the low pressure areas which caused
thundershowers and strong winds in Florida during the past
three days approached hurricane force and buffeted Atlantic
shipping lanes Friday. . . . [Winds] reached a speed of 73
miles an hour off the Virginia Capes, two miles an hour under
hurricane strength. . . .
The Florida winds left a 40-foot shrimp boat, the St Paul.
missing at sea . .. and the Coast Guard started a search Friday.
Although Florida was not hit with winds as strong as those that
wracked the Virginia Capes, it did suffer thunderstorms and strong
* E. V. W. Jones, Associated Press article released September 16, 1950.
t Italics mine.
153

winds from the same storm system on April 5, the day the Sandra
sailed, and the next few days.
All was not placid as the steamer 'thumped' its way south in
April.

			

			

■

1 C/l

54
February 1953
British York Transport
Thirty-nine persons vanished north of the Triangle on a flight to
Jamaica on February 2, 1953. An SOS, which ended abruptly with-
out explanation, was sent by the British York Transport just before
it disappeared, no trace was ever found.
New York Times. Tuesday, February 3, T953, p. 8:
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, February 2 [AP], A four-engine
British troop transport plane with thirty-nine persons aboard
was believed to have crashed in the icy, gale-whipped North
Atlantic today. Strong winds and torrential rains restricted
search operations and little hope was held for rescue.
The plane, operated by Skyways, Ltd., of London, was
bound for Gander, Newfoundland, from the Azores. It radioed
an SOS 359 miles east-southeast of Gander. At the time winds
up to seventy-five miles an hour churned the ocean.
The British freighter Woodward reached the scene where the
transport plane was believed to have crahsed but found no
trace of it.
The plane was used by Skyways, Ltd., to ferry British troops
between London and the West Indies.
It's true, the plane did vanish north of the Triangle on a flight to
Jamaica, but several sins of omission have been committed in
order to provide another mystery for the 'Triangle of Death'.
Rather than reporting that the plane was only on the Azores-to-
Newfoundland leg of its journey, the Legend merely says that the
destination was Jamaica, which is, of course, deep in the heart of
the Bermuda Triangle. The disappearance was said to have
occurred 'north of the Bermuda Triangle', which is true; it
155

The British York Transport
happened 900miles north of it! The weather is not mentioned in the
Legend, which is often the case when it was bad at the time an
incident took place.
It is seldom that an explanation is given when an SOS is ended
abruptly.
156

41
October 1954
Navy Super Constellation
In October 1954 a U.S. Navy Super Constellation disappeared Just
north of the Triangle with forty-two persons aboard. Although it
carried two powerful radio transmitters it did not send an emergency
message. Hundreds of planes and ships searched the area but failed
to find a trace. Commander Andrew Bright, director of the Navy's
Aviation Section, admitted that there was no official explanation to
account for the loss.
New York Times: Monday, November 1, 1954, p. 1 :
A four-engined Navy Super-Constellation with forty-two
persons aboard is missing and 'presumed lost' on a trans-
Atlantic flight, the Navy announced last night. All available
ships and planes were engaged in a vast search and rescue
operation covering a path 1 20 miles wide from the New Jersey
coast to the Azores. . . .
The forty-two crewmen and passengers, including four
women and five children, made their. . . takeoff at 9:39 P.M.
The plane was headed for Lagens, the Azores, and then Port
Lyautey, Africa, but it went down somewhere en route.
Last word from the triple-tailed transport plane was a routine
position report at 11 P M. Saturday from a point more than
350 miles off the Maryland coast.. . .
Search operations got underway at 1 A.M. yesterday after
the plane had failed to make two of its scheduled hourly
contacts with shore. Joining the operation were planes and
ships from up and down the Eastern Seaboard, from Bermuda
and the Azores, and from the Mediterranean.. . .
Search conditions yesterday were reported generally
favorable. . . .
Planes and ships with special radar for night operations
157

pressed on with the search after darkness fell. The Navy s;
the plane was equipped with five twenty-man life rafts, 1
life vests, ninety exposure suits, emergency radio and a sigr
pistol with twelve shells.
The Navy continued to search for several more days, refusing
give up hope that the large plane had made a successful fore
landing on the water and that the survivors had been able to clir
into the life rafts. The search was abandoned on November 4 1
cause of'extreme weather conditions'.
158

41
December 1954
Southern Districts
The Southern Districts, a converted Navy LST used for hauling
sulfur, disappeared somewhere in the Straits of Florida in Dec-
ember 1954. No SOS was sent, and one life ring was the only trace
ever found of the ship or its crew of twenty-two.
New York Times. December 14. 1 954. p. 26 :
PORTLAND. ME.. Dec. 13 (AP). An.aerial search of coastal
waters failed to turn up a freighter overdue here three days with
a crew of twenty-four and a cargo of sulphur.
The ship is the 3,337-ton Southern Districts, out of Port
Sulphur. La., for Bucksport [Maine], and Portland. Last word
from her came from the Gulf of Mexico Dec. 3. She would have
been off the South Carolina coast Dec. 7, the day after a storm
struck that area.
New York Times. December 1 5, 1 954, p. 63:
The Coast Guard continued unsuccessfully yesterday its
search for the . . . Southern Districts which . . . last was in
radio contact with the Southern Steamship Company, the
owner, on Dec. 4. Another vessel reported seeing the ship on
Dec. 7 off Charleston, S.C., but she has not been heard of
since.
It is feared that the ship suffered the same fate as her sister-
ship, the Southern Isles, which went down off Cape Hatteras
on October 5, 1951, with the loss of seventeen lives. Six
survivors were pulled from the water.
Other ships following the Southern Isles said the vessel's
lights simply disappeared and when they reached the scene
only minutes later there was nothing but debris and the few
survivors.
159

New York Times. December 18. 1954. p. 31:
The Coast Guard abandoned hope yesterday for the . . .
Southern Districts.. . .The vessel is a sister ship of the Southern
isies, which . . . foundered so quickly that no distress signal
could be transmitted.
New York Times. January 1, 1955. p. 25:
WASHINGTON, Dec. 31 (AP). A Navy vessel, the Anacostia.
is believed to have had the last contact with the lost ship. . ..
On Dec. 7 she sighted a vessel of the Southern Districts'
description battling high seas and gale winds off Charleston.
S.C.
New York Times. January 3. 1955, p. 39:
Hearings will begin today in New Orleans on the disappear-
ance of a converted landing ship with her crew last month on
one of the world's most heavily traveled sea routes. . . . The
Southern Districts apparently met the same fate that befell a
sister ship.. . . She had broken in half in a pounding sea.
In the light of the twin disasters, the Coast Guard last Friday
ordered its officials to board all converted ships of the same
type and cancel all certificates that would allow the vessels to
engage in ocean and coastwise commerce. . . .
The Tuiiahoma picked up at 2 :30 P.M. [January 2] off Sand
Key, Fla., a life ring bearing the name of the Southern Districts.
New York Times. January 4, 1955, p. 91 :
NEW ORLEANS, Jan. 3 (UP). A seaman said today at a
Coast Guard hearing . , . that the vessel was 'just one big
bucket of rust,' and 'the first ship that I'd ever been afraid to
ride on.'... Mr Collins, who sailed three times on the Southern
Districts but left the ship a week before her ill-fated trip, said
that on a prior voyage the 'cargo was always wet. A number of
guys warned me in Houston not to get on. ... '
'The vessel groaned and creaked whenever there were rough
seas. ..." Mr Collins said the vessel was to go on to Nova
Scotia after touching port in Maine. ... 'I would never go to
Nova Scotia on that ship - I know how the seas are up there,'
he said.
The wife of a seaman who had intended to quit the vessel upon
its arrival in Maine testified that he had considered it unseaworthy.
He had told her that the engines were 'all fouled up' and that the
bottom was 'full of holes'. According to another witness, rusty
plates on the bottom of the ship had been repaired rather than
replaced.
160

After several months of deliberation the Coast Guard Com-
mandant ruled that the Southern Districts had sunk for 'cause or
causes unknown', and that no punitive action would be taken
against its owners or the inspectors who had certified it for its last
voyage.
Although the master and officers apparently did not agree,-
several of the crewmen had expressed the opinion that the ship was
not seaworthy, and at least three crew members had refused to go
on the voyage that was to be her last.
The ship's final radio contact with its owner was on either
December 4 or 5, when it sent an 'all's well' message while off the
South Carolina coast.* Although it had been instructed to com-
municate every 48 hours, it was not reported to the Coast Guard as
overdue for another week. Because of bad weather, which not only
slows down the progress of ships but interferes with radio com-
munications, the owners did not become alarmed until the ship
failed to arrive in Bucksport on December 11. They then informed
the Coast Guard, which immediately launched a massive and
thorough search.
The board of inquiry found that a north-northeast wind had
blown in the area at the time the ship was thought to have sunk.
Such a wind has a notorious reputation.in the Gulf Stream area,
as it blows against the northbound current and causes the Stream
to become choppy and violent, driving even the largest ships away
from the strongest part of the current.
The board criticized the owners for the long delay in informing
the Coast Guard of the overdue ship, and recommended that all
ships be required to report their positions every 48 hours. It also
required ships to furnish the Coast Guard with a crew list for each
voyage, as the captain of the Southern Districts had not done so,
and it was never known for certain exactly who was lost when the
ship sank. The board also criticized the inspectors for failing to
perform a more thorough inspection despite knowledge that there
were small holes in the bottom plating. The Commandant did not
uphold the board's criticisms, but said that although the exact
cause of the disaster would never be known, it appeared that the
condition of the ship may have been a contributing factor.
One remaining mystery related to the ship appears to have been
solved. Although the ship was last seen off Charleston, South
Carolina, one of its life belts was found near the southern tip of
Florida, raising the question of how it could have moved south
* Two reliable sources disagree about the date, but it is not a crucial matter
which one is correct
XI	161

against the northbound Gulf Stream. The answer generally
accepted is that since the cover of the life belt had been torn, a crew
member had thrown it overboard some time before the accident,
having considered it worn out.
1 fo

41
September 1955
Connemara IV
In September 1955 the yacht Connemara IV was found completely
abandoned between Bermuda and the Bahamas.
lone, the fourth Atlantic hurricane of the month, was first re-
ported 250 miles east of San Juan on September 14, moving
westward. The southeastern United States was warned to prepare
for the most severe storm in years.
Torrential rains and winds up to 125 mph struck the eastern
seaboard as the storm moved inland. An Air Force reconnaissance
crew reported that it was the worst storm of what had been a very
busy hurricane season, with winds as high as 182 mph and waves
up to 40 feet. Gale winds extended almost to Bermuda on the
north and to the Bahamas on the south.
The storm took an unusual turn at Norfolk. It veered out
to sea, paralleled the east coast, and struck Newfoundland on
September 21.
Lloyd's Weekly Casualty Reports, October to December, 1955,
Vol. 142. p. 5:
LONDON, Sept. 29. Agents of tank steamer Olympic Cloud
have received the following message from the master, timed
11 35 P.M., G.M.T., Sept. 26: On my course, in position lat.
31 41 N„ long. 60 19 W. [about 150 miles southeast of
Bermuda], found motor yacht Connemara IV, of London,
approximate length 22 metres, equipped with two diesels and
radio, drifting abandoned high sea. Made fast and will tow her
to Dakar.
163

LONDON, Sept. 30. From the master of the tank steal
Olympic Cloud: Towing rope broken, yacht Connemara
sunk.
164

41
November 1956
Navy Patrol Bomber
A Navy patrol bomber vanished on Friday, November 9,1956, near
Bermuda, without sending a radio call to warn of any impending
disaster. No debris was ever found.
New York Times. Sunday, November 11,1956, p. 80:
A missing Navy patrol plane with ten men aboard was being
hunted yesterday by Navy and Coast Guard units in waters
north of Bermuda,
The plane is believed to be the one .. spotted in flames on
Friday night.
An SOS message from the freighter - the Captain Lyras - at
8:51 P.M. Friday reported 'a plane overhead in flames' at a
point about 400 miles east southeast of New York.. . .
The freighter at 9:15 o'clock report[ed] that an explosion
had been heard and felt strongly aboard the vessel. Still another
message from the freighter reported the sighting about four
miles away of what appeared to be a life raft with a light on it.
The freighter's report added, however, that the raft had become
obscured by rain, heavy seas and darkness.
According to the Navy, weather conditions at the time of the
SOS were scattered clouds at 1,500 feet, showers with good
visibility and moderate seas. ...
Vice Admiral Frederick W. McMahon was quoted as declar-
ing the Navy plane 'may or may not' be the sighted craft. Other
Naval authorities in Norfolk, Va, and in Bermuda, home base
of the plane, apparently were presuming it was. There have
been no other reports of a missing civilian or military craft.
The missing plane is a Martin 'Marlin' P5M. ... It had
radioed its last position report at 8:30 P.M. Friday when
'roughly' in the area of the freighter's report.
The United States Naval Station in Bermuda, where the air-
165

plane is assigned to Navy Squadron 49, reported the craft's last
position report as 352 miles north of Bermuda.. ..
The search was begun Friday night by three Coast Guard air-
craft and a cutter.... two Navy destroyers and six Navy planes.
New York Times, Monday, November 12, 1956, p. 36:
Naval aircraft and surface ships were dispatched last night to
a point 300 miles northwest of Bermuda after the Spanish
freighter Astro reported a white flare at 6 P.M....
No trace of the airplane was ever found, and nothing was sighted
in the area where the flare was reported. Several days later the
search was terminated. The Navy summarized the incident briefly:
166

NAVSAFECEN /trser 395, 4426. NAS. Norfolk. Va :■
P-5M Flying Boat. 9 November 1956. Lost off Maryland
coast. No debris or survivors, but crash observed by merchant
ship.
The loss of the Martin Marlin was almost exactly like the loss of
the Martin Mariner during the search for Flight 19 eleven years
before. Both explosions occurred while the planes appeared to be
in normal flight well above the ocean, and both were observed by a
surface vessel. In each case heavy seas and darkness prevented the
recovery of debris and possible survivors, and by the time daylight
arrived the wind and waves had had many hours to disperse any
traces of the accident.
167

41
January 1958
Revonoc
Harvey Conover, millionaire publisher of Yachting and Aviation
Age, was considered to be the outstanding yachtsman of his time. He
and the sleek Revonoc had won the Miami to Nassau race three
times, and the vessel had the reputation of being the best sailboat in
ocean racing, as well as the last word in construction and the safest
craft afloat. Nevertheless, the Revonoc vanished on the 150-mile
trip from Key West to Miami in January 1958.
Although the intended path would have always kept them within
sight of land, Conover and his skilled crew of four completely dis-
appeared. Those who knew the captain and his boat insisted that the
storm that passed through the area could not possibly have done
them in, as it had not been that severe. Despite an extensive search
the Revonoc and her crew were never found, lt is yet another vessel
to have vanished in the Bermuda Triangle during the Christmas
season.
New York Times. Tuesday. January 7, 1958, p. 24:
MIAMI. Fla, Jan. 6 (UP). Harvey Conover. . . and four other
persons were missing in wind-lashed seas off the southern
coast of Florida today in a forty-five-foot racing yawl.
Two other boats were missing and another was in danger of
capsizing in the stormy seas.
The Coast Guard reported tonight that a life raft from the
missing yawl had been found near Jupiter Inlet, eighty miles
north of here. It was the only trace found in the day-long
search.
The Coast Guard said Mr Conover's two-masted yawl,
Revonoc* was sailing from Key West to Miami last Thursday
* Some previous reports of this incident have the name incorrectly spelled
Renovac. Revonoc is Conover spelled backward.
168

when she apparently was caught in near hurricane winds from
the worst mid-winter storm in the history of south Florida.. . .
Two fifty-five-foot shrimp boats with two crewmen each
also were missing in the same area.
'Caught in near hurricane winds from the worst mid-winter
storm in the history of south Florida.'
169

30
January 1962
KB-50
An Air Force KB-50, commanded by Major Robert Tawney, dis-
appeared shortly after leaving Langley Air Force Base, Virginia,
for the Azores. Although a single distress call was too weak and
garbled to be understood, the pilot did manage to convey the message
that he was in some sort of trouble. The exact nature of the problem
was not learned before the airplane faded into silence. No trace of it
or its nine occupants was ever found despite a 1,700-hour, six-day
search.
Virginian-PHot. Wednesday, January 10, 1962, p. 1:
LANGLEY AIR FORCE BASE - By Ed Frede. A vast air and
sea search of the Atlantic Tuesday failed to locate a missing
Air Force aerial tanker with nine crewmen aboard.
The plane, a KB50, was on a flight from Langley Air Force
Base to Lajes Field in the Azores.
The six-engine plane. . . left Langley Monday at 11 :17 A.M.,
and was due in Lajes at 6.59 P.M....
Maj. Tawney had logged almost 4,000 hours in the air and
had been qualified as a KB50 commander for a year.. . .
The last transmission from the plane was shortly after noon
Monday. The pilot gave his position as 250 miles east of Cape
Charles. He gave no indication of trouble.
When the plane failed to land at Lajes on schedule, officials
at the field started a check with other fields. An air search from
Lajes was started immediately. An aerial tanker also searched
near Cape Charles. With daylight Tuesday the Air Force pressed
the search with sister'tankers at Langley.
Virginian-Pilot, Thursday, January 11, 1962, p. 21:
NEW YORK [AP], The Coast Guard said Wednesday an oil
slick has been sighted in the area where an Air Force tanker
170

plane vanished Tuesday* during a flight to the Azores.
The KB-50.. . was last heard from about 240 miles due east
of Norfolk early Tuesday.*
The oil slick, the Coast Guard said, was sighted by search
planes about 300 miles east of Norfolk.
Taking part in Wednesday's search were 24 Air Force planes
- 18 from Bermuda and six from Langley - and several Coast
Guard planes. Three Coast Guard cutters also searched. A
Langley spokesman said weather conditions in the search area
were good. ...
More than 60 planes took part in the search Tuesday.,Snow
and reduced visibility grounded all but 26 search planes
Wednesday.
Unfortunately there is not much information available on this
incident, and the few articles that did appear leave many questions
unanswered. According to the only article in the New York Times,
Wednesday, January 10, the 'search concentrated along a 130-mile-
wide path running east from the missing plane's position toward
its destination. Weather in the area was reported as "windy but
good, with visibility ten miles".'
There are no clues as to why the plane might have gone down
and only a few minor differences between the Legend and the
incident as the newspapers reported it.
There apparently was not any 'garbled' distress call that 'faded
into silence'. On the contrary, the pilot's last transmission was a
position report in which he gave no indication of trouble.
An oil slick was found directly in the aircraft's path, about 60
miles beyond the last reported position, but it was not known if it
came from the plane, as no debris was sighted in the area.
According to the papers, a search was not begun until the tanker
failed to arrive in the Azores at 6:59 p.m., even though the plane
had last reported about noon. Normally, seven hours with no
contact would not be permitted to pass without a search being
initiated.
The two planes that began searching Monday night, one at each
end of the route, would have been searching in the dark, and it was
not reported if they carried radar scanners. If they did not, their
only hope would have been to spot a light or a flare; they could not
have seen debris. By the next morning, when the full-scale search
began, the plane could have been down as many as eighteen hours.
* The newspaper is in error. Both sentences should say 'Monday' rather
than 'Tuesday'.
171

The missing KB-50 is another case where a long delay in begin-
ning the search may possibly have contributed to the lack of its
success.
The KB-50. X, the last position report; Y, the oil slick.
172

41
April 1962
Piper Apache
On a clear, sunny day in April 1962, the Nassau control tower
received a call for guidance from a twin-engine Apache that was
approaching from the north. Despite excellent weather the pilot was
unable to determine his position and could not understand the instruc-
tions radioed to him. The tower operator later was quoted as saying
that the pilot acted as if he were flying in a dense fog.
After several minutes of confusion, radio contact was suddenly
lost. The wing of the plane was found later in the day approximately
20 miles from Nassau. The strangest part of the story is that the pilot
was easily within sight of his destination when he reported being lost.
I searched every page of the Nassau Daily Tribune and the
Nassau Guardian from January 1 through June 30, 1962, and
found no mention of the incident. Suspecting that the date might
be incorrect, I sent a letter to Nassau International Airport, giving
the above account of the mishap and requesting that they inform
me of any accident that was in any way similar. The answer came
several weeks later.
D. A. F. Ingraham, Director of Civil Aviation, Nassau Inter-
national Airport, Bahamas, 25th March 1974:
I refer to your letter, dated 11th March, 1974.
We have no record of the alleged disappearance of the air-
craft that you describe. Some of my staff and I have been with
the Department of Civil Aviation since 1946. We have no
recollection of the alleged occurrence to which you refer.
I can only assume that [it] is a figment of someone's vivid
imagination.
173

41
February 1963
Marine Sulphur Queen
The Marine Sulphur Queen and her crew of thirty-nine began a
voyage on February 2, 1963, from Beaumont, Texas, to Norfolk,
Virginia, a trip that she was destined never to finish. Her cargo, a full
load of molten sulfur kept at 275°F, was held in a huge tank in the
hold of the converted World War II vessel and was said to be no more
and no less dangerous than any other type of cargo.
In the early morning hours of February 4 she sent a routine radio
call from a position approximately 270 miles west of Key West.
Several unsuccessful attempts were made to contact her after that,
and she was reported missing three days later when she failed to
arrive in Norfolk as scheduled. A vast search resulted in the recovery
of a few life jackets and a little debris, but nothing more. The Coast
Guard held a lengthy series of hearings, but admitted that it failed to
find an explanation for the loss.
The following information is from two reports issued by the
Coast Guard*
Commandant. Item 2:
The SS Marine Sulphur Queen, a T2-SE-A1 type tank vessel
of U.S. Registry, converted to carry molten sulfur, departed
Beaumont, Texas, with a full cargo of 15,260 tons on the
afternoon of 2 February 1963 enroute Norfolk, Va. The ship and
crew of 39 men disappeared. The vessel was last heard from at
0125 EST on 4 February 1963.
* U.S. Coast Guard. Marine Board of Investigation. SS Marine Sulphur
Queen; Disappearance at sea on or about 4 February 1963 and U.S. Coast
Guard. Commandant. Commandant's Action on Marine Board of Investiga-
tion; Disappearance of the SS Marine Sulphur Queen.. ..
174

Board of Investigation, Item 38:
At 0125 EST. 4 February 1963 a personal message from a
.crew member was transmitted by the vessel. ... At this time
the estimated position of the ship was 25°45'N, 86°W [posi-
tion A on map below], ... At 1123, 4 February, RCA Radio
commenced the first of two unsuccessful attempts to contact
the vessel by radio. At this time the Marine Sulphur Queen, if
she had continued on her voyage, would have been at an
estimated position of 24°40'N, 83°1[position B], ... At
noon on 3 February, the SS Texaco California was [at position
C] estimated to be 40 miles from the Marine Sulphur Queen.
... [It] experienced generally northerly winds from force 6 to
11, Beaufort Scale,* very rough northerly seas and her decks
were awash. .. . The U.S. Navy Oceanographic Office . . .
indicates that the vessel may have encountered seas with a
maximum wave height of 16.5 feet. . . . Winds would have
[had] a maximum force of 25 knots and gusting to 46....
Board of Investigation. Item 39:
The first information that the Marine Sulphur Queen was
overdue was received by the Commander, Fifth Coast Guard
District, at 2100 EST. 7 February 1963.
Board of Investigation, Item 40:
At 0800 EST 8 February 1963". . . the search was com-
menced. ... During the period 8-13 February 1963. Coast
Guard, Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force aircraft participated
in 83 sorties, flying 499.6 hours and searched a total of 348,400
square milest with negative results. . .. The Coast Guard
Atlantic Merchant Vessel Reporting system .. . located 42
vessels that could possibly have sighted the Marine Sulphur
Queen on 4 and 5 February. All of these vessels were checked
out by Coast Guard personnel with negative results. Several
telephone calls [reported] that the ship would be found in
Cuba or in Puerto Rico. These leads were checked out by other
Federal agencies with negative results.
Board of Investigation. Conclusion 27:
The operating company failed to give timely notice to the
Coast Guard concerning the lack of communication from the
vessel. . .. The company rationalized the failure to receive the
48 hour and 24 hour arrival message on the basis of bad
weather conditions. ... As a result of this delay, very valuable
time was lost in instituting the search.. ..
* Beaufort number 11 is just below hurricane strength. The wind is 64 to
71 mph and waves can be as high as 30 to 45 feel. Beaufort number 6 is a
wind of 22 to 27 knots and the waves are 8 to 13 feet.
t Slightly larger than Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado combined.
175

Board of Investigation, item 41:
On 20 February, a U.S. Navy torpedo retriever boat operating
about 12 miles southwest of Key West. Florida, sighted and
picked up a fog horn and life jacket stencilled with the vessel's
name. The second phase of the search ... was then instituted.
.. . the probability of sighting during both search phases was
computed to be 95% for a vessel, 70% for a metal lifeboat and
65% for a life raft. The U.S. Navy conducted an underwater
search . . . with possibility of detection of 80% for the hulk.
During this period, additional debris was recovered and
The Marine Sulphur Queen. A, the last position report; B, estimated
position when first call to ship failed; C, position of the Texaco California
when it gave its weather report.
176

identified as coming from the Marine Sulphur Queen. [On]
14 March 1963 ... the search for the vessel was discontinued.
Board of Investigation. Item 42:
The material recovered and identified as from the Marine
Sulphur Queen consisted of 8 life jackets, 5 life rings. 2 name
boards, 1 shirt, 1 piece of an oar, 1 storm oil can, 1 gasoline can.
1 cone buoy, and 1 fog horn.. .. The consensus of opinion was
that possibly two life jackets had been worn by persons and
that the shirt tied to a life jacket had also been worn by a
person. Numerous tears on the life jacket indicated attack by
predatory fish.... No trace of sulphur particles was evident on
any of the material [nor was there any] trace of either explosion
or fire.
Board of Investigation. Conclusion 4:
... The failure to transmit a distress message would appear
to justify the conclusion that the loss of the vessel occurred so
rapidly as to preclude the transmission of such a message....
Commandant, Remark 4:
The Marine Board of Investigation considered many possi-
bilities which may have caused the loss of the ship and rightly
declined to assign any order of probability to these causes	
A.		An explosion may have occurred in the cargo tanks.
B.		A complete failure of the vessel's hull girder may have
caused it to break in two.
C.		The vessel may have capsized in synchronous rolling.
D.		A steam explosion may have occurred as the result of a
rapid filling of the void space with water.
The record contains ample evidence to support the Board's
suppositions.*
[Explosion in the Cargo Tanks]
Board of Investigation. Conclusion 7:
... Agitation of the mass of sulphur acts to increase the
amount of gases liberated from solution. It is concluded that
the sulphur was agitated as the vessel worked in the rough
seas which she apparently encountered on this voyage. . ..
It, therefore, follows that this agitation. .. increased the volume
of these gases liberated from the molten sulphur.
Board of Investigation. Conclusion 8:
Although each tank had [three] vents ... the fact that al|
* Italics mine. The Legend has it that the Coast Guard was not able to
suggest any reasons for the loss.

tanks had a full load of cargo . . . prevented a free flow of air.
... It appears that ... the venting arrangement was not too
effective in clearing off these gases.... In rough weather, such
as the vessel probably encountered on this voyage; the molten
sulphur would pour out of the forward vents of the cargo tanks
at least partially obstructing these vents as the sulphur
solidified.
Board of Investigation, Conclusion 9:
... It could be possible that an explosion of the gases in the
vapor space of one of the cargo tanks occurred.. . . Although a
close inspection of the debris fails to show any evidence of
charring or of an explosion, this . . . does not completely dis-
count the possibility that an explosion did occur.
[The Ship May Have Broken in Two]
Commandant, Item 3:
The ship's conversion in 1960 to a molten sulphur carrier
necessitated the removal of all transverse bulkheads* in way of
the original centerline tanks and modification of the internal
structure to accommodate one continuous independent tank
306 ft. long.... A watertight bulkhead was installed . . . which
divided the void [outside the cargo tank] into two spaces.
Board of Investigation, Conclusion 12:
The Board has extensively considered the possibility that the
casualty to this vessel was caused by a complete longitudinal
failure of the vessel's hull girder causing it to break in two.. ..
There have been ten known cases of complete fractures of T-2
type tank vessels. That this type of casualty has persisted after
the problem has been thoroughly studied and measures taken
to prevent the same, tends to support the view held by some
that this type of vessel has basic design imperfections which
cannot be feasibly corrected. . .. Additionally, it is now rather
generally recognized . . . that the age of a vessel has some
relationship to structural failure. This . . . vessel was about
17 years old at the time of the conversion [to a sulfur carrier]
and about 19 years old at the time of her disappearance.
Board of Investigation. Conclusion 21:
The sea conditions which the vessel in all likelihood en-
countered . . . have a definite bearing on another possible
cause for the vessel's disappearance. As a result of the con-
* Italics mine. A transverse bulkhead divides the interior of the ship into
watertight compartments and also strengthens the hull.
178

version, nine transverse bulkheads . . . were practically
eliminated. ... In short, at the nine frames where originally
there had been a watertight bulkhead in the amidship section
of the vessel, after conversion there was one watertight bulk-
head, two [partial] bulkheads and six top connections. How-
ever, it is apparent that the replacement members did not
possess the strength of the original watertight bulkheads. . . .
Therefore, the vessel after conversion did not possess the same
transverse strength and stiffness as it had originally. Accord-
ingly, it is considered possible that the [forces] induced by this
racking [from the condition of the sea] may have [caused a]
cracking of the bottom shell.... It cannot be discounted that
the foundering of the vessel could have occurred quite
suddenly.
[The Ship May Have Capsized]
Board of Investigation, Conclusion 20:
The concentration of the weight [close to] its centerline
[caused the ship's] period of roll [to be] faster than [that of]
another vessel of the same height. The hindcast prepared by
the U.S. Naval Oceanographic Office indicates the possibility
that . . . the period of encounter of the [waves] was within
10% of the vessel's period of roll; which was 8.5 seconds.
Under these circumstances, heavy rolling of the vessel could
be expected, accompanied by yawing, lurching and difficulty
in steering. If such a situation developed, prompt appreciation
of the danger by the watch officer and an immediate and drastic
speed and/or course change would have been most vital. If
complete resonance was approached, the vessel could have
experienced several violent rolls in a minute's time. . . . The
possibility that the vessel capsized without previous structural
damage cannot be discounted. Finally, it is possible that the
capsizing of the vessel might have been preceded and caused
in part by the partial failure of and some lateral displacement
of the cargo tank....
[Steam Explosion]
Board of Investigation, Conclusion 22:
There originally was some support for the view that the
contact of [sea water and molten sulfur] in a confined space
would result in a steam explosion. . . . However, the more
recent thinking appears to discount the possibility of this
reaction [but it cannot be completely eliminated as a possible
cause].
179

[Fumes Explosion]
Commandant. Remark 5:
Another possible cause for the loss of the vessel and one
which the Board did not comment upon concerns the possibility
of an explosion in the void space surrounding the cargo tanks.
Hydrogen sulphide and carbon disulphide gases released by
agitated molten sulphur as well as sulphur vapor could have
. . . formed an explosive mixture. The recent history of fires in
the insulation on No. 4 tank indicates that a source of ignition
existed.
Commandant. Item 6:
Commencing in the late summer of 1962 and continuing
until the vessel sailed on its last voyage, molten sulphur leaked
from the insulation at the after end of No. 4 tank. . . . The
amount of sulphur was so great that it was necessary for the
crew to remove the solidified sulphur on each return voyage to
keep it from plugging the bilge suctions. When the vessel
sailed on its last voyage, an estimated 20 to 70 tons of solidi-
fied sulphur remained in the bilges....
Commandant. Item 8:
Numerous fires had occurred in the sulphur-impregnated
insulation in the void spaces. These fires were of a local nature
seldom covering an area of more than a few square feet, and
caused little or no apprehension on the part of the crew. They
were extinguished with the steam smothering system and fresh
water. Commencing in October of 1962, these fires occurred
with increasing frequency. . . . During a voyage in the latter
part of December, 1962, fires burned almost continuously in
the insulation ... of No. 4 tank.....
Board of Investigation, Recommendation 1:
In the future, the same conversion of another T-2 type tanker
[into a sulfur carrier] should not be approved.
Board of Investigation, Recommendation 12:
In view of the complete structural failures of several T-2 type
tank vessels, and in view of the fact that such type failure may
have contributed to the [loss of the Marine Sulphur Queen], it
is recommended that ... a portable emergency radio trans-
mitter to be kept... in the vicinity of the after lifeboats.. . . lt is
also recommended . . . that all T-2 type tank vessels be
equipped with two inflatable life rafts, one ... forward ... the
other [aft].
Although the Coast Guard report considered the structural
180

importance of bulkheads it did not mention another very im-
portant function that they perform.
Bulkheads are vertical partitions which divide the interior of a
ship into a number of watertight compartments. They not only
keep the hull from flexing in a heavy sea, but also serve to prevent
the foundering of the ship should the hull be torn open by an
explosion, a collision, or by running around.
A 500-foot ship would normally have about nine bulkheads. If
Fig. 1 Ship with nine bulkheads. Above, hole in side; below, broken
in half. The bulkheads prevent water from entering adjacent compart-
ments, and in either case the ship would continue to float.
an explosion were to tear a hole through the hull, only one or
two compartments would be likely to be flooded, since the bulk-
heads would prevent water from entering adjacent compartments.
The ship would continue to float, permitting its occupants to
board a rescue ship or, depending on the weather and the extent of
the damages, to proceed to port.
Although ships have been known to break in half and remain
afloat because of their bulkheads, most vessels of this size would
be expected to remain afloat in moderate weather with, at most,
two compartments flooded. Beyond that there would be grave
danger of sinking, especially in a heavy sea.
The conversion of the Marine Sulphur Queen to a molten sulfur
carrier necessitated the removal of all watertight bulkheads in the
way of the 306-foot-long cargo tank. In their place one watertight
bulkhead was installed near the midpoint of the ship and two
partial bulkheads were constructed, one forward and one aft of the
main bulkhead. Top connections were placed at the six other
locations. The partial bulkheads and the top connections were for
structural purposes only, partially replacing the strength of the
bulkheads that had been removed. They were not watertight.
181

Fig. 2 Marine Sulphur Queen, with only one watertight bulkhead.
If an explosion or structural failure did open a hole in the side
of the Marine Sulphur Queen, one half of the ship would have
quickly filled; if it had broken in half the entire ship would have
taken on water. It would have sunk so rapidly that there would
have been no time for an SOS.
Writers on the Bermuda Triangle have made much of the lack of
debris when a ship sinks. Most of the floatable gear on a ship
plowing through a stormy sea would be below in the various com-
partments. Gear on deck would be firmly attached to the ship to
prevent its being blown or washed away; in either case it would go
down with the sinking ship. A few items did manage to break away
from the Marine Sulphur Queen and were subsequently recovered.
The Legend of the Bermuda Triangle has it that the Coast Guard
failed tr> find an exnlanatinn fnr thp lnss nf fhp Mnrinp Kulnhur
Fig. 3 Marine Sulphur Queen. Above, hole in side; below, broken in
half. In either case, the ship would have sunk.
182

Queen. In reality, the Board of Investigation listed four possible
causes and the Commandant added a fifth. Any of the suggested
causes, either by itself or in combination with any of the others,
could have caused the accident. The Coast Guard merely declined
to specify which one it felt was most likely to have occurred.
The discovery of a shattered name board* has led several re-
searchers to conclude that the ship sank because of an explosion
which occurred when seawater came into contact with the molten
sulfur. This theory has several flaws, however. The first is that it
does not explain how the water managed to reach the sulfur. The
second is that the condition of the board could have been caused by
something other than an explosion. It could have been 'popped'
off the side of the ship as it buckled after having suffered structural
failure. Of the five suggested causes of the disaster, the Coast
Guard felt that an explosion was the least likely to have occurred.
Widows and relatives of the men filed suit soon after the incident,
asking damages from the owner of the ship. The legal battle has
continued for more than ten years. On the tenth anniversary of the
Marine Sulphur Queen's, disappearance it was announced that one
of the first of the wrongful death claims had been settled, with
court approval of an award of $115,000 to the widow of an
ordinary seaman.
In 1972 the Supreme Court let stand a lower court ruling that
the ship was unseaworthy. Claims reported to total over $7 million
may now be pressed.
The rapid sinking of the ship prompted an investigation into the
use of automatic emergency warning systems and position-
indicating radio beacons.
Liquid sulfur carriers are now rare in world shipping. Only
eleven are in regular service, and none of these has suffered a major
accident in the last decade.
* A name board, made of wood, bears the ship's name and is solidly
attached to its side.
183

30
July 1963
Sno' Boy
Within a few months of the loss of the Marine Sulphur Queen, a
63-foot charter fishing boat vanished in good weather on the 80-mile
voyage from Kingston, Jamaica, to the Pedro Banks. The Sno' Boy
and her forty occupants were never heard from again, although
several bits of debris believed to be from the vessel were observed.
Miami Herald. Friday. July 5. 1963, p. 1 :
[UP] - The Coast Guard here said Thursday it is searching
the Caribbean for a ship with 55 passengers aboard which is
overdue on a voyage from Jamaica to a tiny island in the Pedro
Banks, about eighty miles to the south. . . .
At least seven air-sea rescue planes are looking for the 63-
foot Sno' Boy which was due in Northeast Cay, Pedro Banks,
shortly after noon Tuesday.. . .
The search is being conducted out of the U.S. Naval Air
Station at Guantanamo, Cuba.
Lloyd's Weekly Casualty Reports. July 9.1963, p. 23:
Vessel Sno' Boy has been found safe south of Kingston.
Jamaica, the United States Navy reported today. A Navy
spokesman said that the vessel radioed her position to United
States Atlantic Headquarters at Norfolk. The spokesman said
that the ship apparently had been held up because of bad
weather and that she had no problems.. . .
Miami Herald. Saturday, July 6. 1963. p. 1:
By Steve Trumbell. Search continued over a wide area of the
Caribbean Sea Friday for a missing 63-foot Miami-owned
motor vessel with 55 persons reported aboard. The craft, Sno'
Boy. has been missing three days.
The search was intensified Friday when a tabletop identified
184

as being from the craft was found south of Jamaica where the
Sno' Boy planned to fish.
Through an error, it was reported for a time Friday that the
craft had been found. The 'find' turned out to be another vessel
. . . held up by bad weather near Progresso. Mexico.
No one could explain the reported presence of 55 persons on
a 63-foot boat.
'I don't know how that many could make a fishing trip on the
boat,' said Boyd Snow .. . former owner who still holds a
mortgage on the boat. 'When I converted it from a surplus air-
craft rescue craft there were overnight accommodations for
seven people, including the crew.'
Miami Herald. Sunday, July 7, 1963, p. 1 :
By Lee Winfrey. A body was found floating in the Caribbean
Sea Saturday in the 'same general area' where the . . . Sno'
Boy is missing with 40 men aboard. . . .
The aircraft carrier Wasp, directing the search, found the
body. There was no immediate identification.
Several pieces of debris, all believed to be from the Sno' Boy.
were also sighted Saturday by the six Navy and Coast Guard
planes taking part in the search.
The debris included a deck house, a life jacket, a white spar,
a gasoline drum, and several bamboo poles.
The Coast Guard said the deck cargo of the Sno' Boy
included 99 35-gallon drums of gasoline and 50 bundles of
four-foot bamboo poles.
A tabletop identified as coming from the Sno' Boy was re-
covered Friday by the fishing vessel Marsutana. The debris was
scattered over an area several miles wide.. . .
Besides the men. the gasoline drums and the bamboo poles,
the vessel was also reported to be carrying 68 35-gallon drums
of water.
The Coast Guard expressed amazement at the volume of
passengers and cargo, calling the vessel 'tremendously over-
loaded'.*
Miami Herald, Tuesday, July 9, 1963, p. 10:
By Kurt Luedtke. A task force of Navy and Coast Guard ships
and planes will comb a 50-square mile area of the Caribbean
for the last time today searching for the fishing vessel Sno' Boy
which vanished a week ago with 40 persons aboard. . . .
In the seven-day search, rescuers found only scattered debris
- a deckhouse, a dinghy, a life raft - that provides the only
testimony to the ship's last voyage. A body was sighted but
never recovered. . . .
* It was also reported that 19 tons of ice were aboard.
185

The Navy said there was 'virtually no hope' for the Sno' Boy
passengers after a week in shark-infested waters, and said the
search would be 'reluctantly abandoned' Tuesday night.
A Navy spokesman said the vessel apparently swamped or
struck a reef and sunk.
There were indications that the Sno' Boy may have been
overloaded when it left Kingston harbor.
186

54
August 1963
Two KC-135s
On Wednesday, August 28, 1963, two KC-135 stratotankers left
Homestead Air Force Base, Florida, on a classified mission over the
Atlantic Ocean. KC-135s, the military version of the 707, have a
cruising speed of600 mph and a range of4,500 miles, and are used to
refuel other aircraft on long-distance flights.
The two jets made a routine report about noon from a position 800
miles northeast of Miami and 300 mile's west of Bermuda, and were
never heard from again. Debris identified as coming from a KC-135
was soon found near the last reported position, and it was assumed
that the planes had collided in midair. However, two days later more
debris was found almost 200 miles from the scene of the first find,
contradicting the theory that the jets had collided. Several days after
that the Air Force gave up the search, announcing that the debris
definitely had come from the two missing airplanes.
There are two explanations of how the planes could have vanished
without one of them being able to send a distress message. The most
obvious is that the 'flying gas stations' collided and exploded at the
cruising altitude of more than 30,000 feet. The speed of such a
disaster would preclude any emergency calls. But, if the disappear-
ance was caused by a midair collision, why was debris found in two
separate areas, almost 200 miles apart ?
If a midair is ruled out because of the distance between the debris,
each plane must have had its own individual problem and gone down
separately. This is extremely unlikely. The odds against separate
disasters overcoming two multi-million-dollar planes at the same
time are so infinitesimally small that the possibility is inconceivable.
They would have had to occur so close together that neither crew
187

would have been able to raise the alert that the other plane was in an
emergency situation. Such a call was never received.
There are two possible ways, then, to explain the incident, but logic
rules against accepting either one as the solution. Officials are still
scratching their heads over the case and will say only that'something
very strange is going on out there'. Old-timers in the area rack up
another two points for the jinx and ask each other,' Who knows what
evil lurks in the heart of the Bermuda Triangle ?'
Miami Herald. Thursday, August 29, 1963, p. 1 :
By Kurt Luedtke and Larry Miller. Two giant Air Force tankers
vanished over the Atlantic Wednesday with 11 Homestead
airmen aboard.
A search plane from Bermuda reported sighting an oil slick
Wednesday night and surface vessels recovered lifejackets.
There was no positive identification that either came from the
missing aircraft. . . .
Based at Homestead Air Force Base, the huge KC-135s were
returning from a refueling mission. They were reported overdue
at 3 P.M. and a search was launched immediately.
Planes . . . and Coast Guard surface vessels combed an area
about 800 miles northeast of Miami.. . .
At least 24 planes joined the search by midnight and the
number was to double by morning. Four Coast Guard ships
were called out to help.
The first planes in the air followed the path the tankers would
have taken to Homestead. Others flew in squares extending out
from the route, flying low with lights over the water.. ..
There was hope that survival gear aboard the planes would
allow the men to stay afloat until dawn, when visibility would
speed the search.
Last radio contact with the twin tankers came at noon. They
reported their position about 900 miles northeast of Miami and
that they expected to arrive at Homestead at 2 P.M.
The 4-million-dollar tankers, carrying a payload of more than
25,000 gallons of high octane jet fuel, had completed a
rendezvous with two B47 jet bombers from Schilling Air Force
Base, Kansas.
The next report, prescribed by Air Force routine, never came
. . . and the planes were declared missing.
Miami Herald, Friday, August 30, 1963, p. 1 :
By Leighton McLaughlin. Scattered debris pulled from the
Atlantic Thursday by searchers led to fears that two missing
KC135 Stratotankers collided in the air. Hope for the 11 Home-
188

stead crewmen aboard waned as rescuers failed to turn up any
sign of survivors.
Three empty life rafts and a flier's helmet bearing the name
of one of the 11 missing crewmen were found bobbing in the
ocean.
A freighter, the Azalea City, picked up the debris about mid-
way between Nassau and Bermuda.
Found besides the helmet and life rafts were a yellow rubber-
ized exposure suit and bits of aircraft paneling. The Air Force
said 50 planes and 36 ships would press the search for the
missing men throughout the night.
The flier's helmet pulled from the sea, had 'Gardner' stenciled
on it. One of the missing men was identified as Capt. Gerald
Gardner.
Air Force officials at the Pentagon had 'speculated' that the
planes collided as they flew toward Homestead from a routine,
but classified, refueling mission over the ocean. . . .
A collision would explain why contact was lost with the two
huge 'flying gas stations' after a routine radio check at about
noon.
No distress call was heard, and the bomber crews reported 'a
normal, routine refueling mission in good weather', according
to a base spokesman from Schilling.. . .
The bomber crews said they saw nothing amiss with the
tankers when they parted company for their flights home. The
refueling, said the spokesman, took place 'in the same general
area' the tankers were last heard from.
That was about 900 miles northeast of Miami. The sighted
debris was about 780 miles in the same direction.
Miami Herald. Saturday, August 31. 1963, p. 2:
By Lee Winfrey. Planes searching for two jet tankers . . .
sighted a second concentration of wreckage Friday, 160 miles
away from a 'floating junkyard' of debris found earlier.
Darkness fell before the second collection of debris could be
recovered by ships. A Coast Guard cutter was expected at the
scene soon after dawn today.
There was no sign at either scene of any survivors....
The wide distance between the two patches of wreckage
seemed to reduce speculation that the two planes collided in
flight. The Air Force has declined comment so far on the
probable cause of the planes' disappearances.
In the first concentration of wreckage found Friday were
fliers' helmets, life jackets, navigation charts, plane paneling
and equipment covers. A pilot said the 10-square-mile scene
some 260 miles southwest of Bermuda looked like a 'floating
junkyard'.
189

An Air Force spokesman said search directors were 'pretty
definite that the findings came from at least one of the aircraft'.
Miami Herald, Sunday, September 1, 1963, p. 2:
Search for survivors from two missing jet tankers shifted
Saturday to a single 10-square-mile area about 260 miles
southwest of Bermuda.
Another patch of debris was sighted Friday about 160 miles
away, but searchers said Saturday none of it came from either
of the two planes.
'It appears to be just large patches of seaweed, driftwood and
an old buoy,' said Maj. Fred Brent, of the Air Rescue Service at
Orlando Air Force Base.
The two KC-135s. A, the 12.10 position report; B, proposed position
at 12.37; C, first debris area; D, second debris area.
The second reported area of debris, the one that gave rise to the
mystery, was not from one of the planes, but was nothing more
than seaweed, driftwood, and an old buoy!
A report of the Military Airlift Command provided additional
information on the search.
A Narrative Report on the Search for Two SAC KC-135
Aircraft. 55th Air Rescue Squadron Historical Data Report,
1 Aug 63-31 Aug 63. Military Airlift Command:
Two KC-1 35s, Pry 38 and Pry 41 . . . reported at [point A on
map below] at [12:10 PM] with an estimate at [point B, 275
190

miles away] at [12:37 PM] and were unreported since that
time. Headquarters ARS requested ... a route search. . . .
Numerous sightings were made. ... in the general area of
[region C] . . . debris . . . was identified as coming from the
KC-1 35 aircraft. Life preserver LPU-2/P local number 314 was
identified as coming from KC-135, Pry 38, and a helmet with
the name'Gardner'. . . was identified as coming from KC-135,
Pry 41. Two radar receiver transmitting units were picked up
and later identified as one each coming from the KC-135 type
aircraft.
On Saturday, Sunday, and Monday many sightings were made
in the search area, but all those other than in the vicinity of region
C were found to be only the flotsam normally found in sea-lanes.
There is no mention in the search report of a second major con-
centration of debris, such as the newspapers reported at 'D', only
numerous sightings of debris throughout the entire region, none
of which was from the planes. The search was discontinued late
Monday afternoon.
The ARS report presents ample evidence that the planes
crashed close together, and that despite the Air Force statement
that they were in radio contact with each other and not flying close
together, they apparently collided. At the speed the airplanes were
capable of, it is possible to close a gap of a mile in just a few
seconds. If they were on a collision course it would have been too
late to react by the time it was seen, either visually or on the radar
screens.
Richard F. Gerwig, Chief of the Reporting and Documents
Division at Norton Air Force Base, where all Air Force accident
reports are housed, wrote in answer to a query from me that 'it was
definitely established that a midair collision did occur between the
aircraft in question'. Despite the Legend., the Air Force does not
appear to be 'scratching its head' over this incident.
Perhaps the only remaining mystery is why search planes re-
ported sighting a second possible area of aircraft debris when it was
nothing more than seaweed and trash. The sighting was made as
the sun was about to set, a time when visibility is not at its best. It is
difficult under even the most favorable conditions for searchers in
aircraft to be certain of what it is that they spot bobbing around
hundreds of feet below in the ocean. A good example of the type of
mistake that can be made occurred in this very search on Saturday
morning, August 31, when a FB-50, en route to the search area,
reported a raft with a body floating near it five miles south of
Kindley Air Force Base, Bermuda. Within half an hour it was
191

recovered and identified as an orange life raft discarded from a
boat, a tree trunk, and an ammunition dump sign. Erroneous
sightings are made in almost every search, and such false reports
are not at all uncommon.
192

42
June 1965
C-119 Flying Boxcar
The Legend and the newspaper version of this incident agree,
although the conclusions differ.
Miami Herald, Monday, June 7, 1965. p. 1:
A wide search was launched Sunday for an Air Force Flying
Boxcar . . . with ten persons aboard. . . .
The Coast Guard said it presumed the C-119 to be lost in
South Bahamian waters, about 280 miles from Miami.
The bulky, twin-engine plane took off from Homestead Air
Force Base at 7:47 P.M. Saturday. . . -.
The plane, based at Milwaukee's Billy Mitchell Air Force
Base, flew to Homestead early Saturday with a cargo of plane
parts for the Grand Turk installation. . . .
A Homestead spokeman said ' . . . there has not been one
sign of the craft since early last evening.'
The C-119 was due to touch down on Grand Turk at
11 :23 P.M. Saturday.
A search of over 2,000 square miles of the Atlantic began
at dawn.
Miami Herald, Tuesday, June 8, 1965, p. 12:
A missing Air Force plane with 10 airmen aboard was only
45 minutes from its Bahamas destination when it mysteriously
disappeared. . . .
Flying near Crooked Island in the southern Bahamas, the
bulky twin-engine plane was only about 100 miles from the
Grand Turk Air Force landing strip when the last radio contact
was made. This was at 11 P.M.
'There was no indication of trouble, and nothing has been
heard from them since,' a Miami Coast Guard spokesman said.
'Possibly the plane had steering trouble and veered off
course or overflew the destination.'. . .
J3
193

By Monday [searchers] were combing the 100,000 square-
mile area known to veteran pilots as the 'Bermuda Triangle'	
It is in this huge swath of water that hundreds of planes,
ships, and submarines went down during World War II. . . .
Since then ... a number of other planes have vanished
mysteriously there.
'It's strange,' said an old-timer at Homestead who has flown
in peace and war, 'that the planes that go down in the south
Bahamas never leave a trace.'
And so it has been with the C-119 - not a piece of wreckage
or evidence of life. Not a flare at night, though seven planes
scoured the area Sunday night.
The search was called off at dark on Thursday, June 10. Many
similar incidents have already been examined, and there is no
reason to repeat the same analysis here. Unless the plane was off
course, it appears to have gone down between Crooked Island and
Grand Turk, possibly because of structural failure, an explosion,
or engine failure. It was a twin-engine plane, so failure of one
engine would have immediately created a critical situation, and
the pilots may have been too busy handling the emergency to take
time to make a distress call.
If the plane ditched, the pilot would have been faced with a night
landing at sea in a disabled craft. The sky was overcast, waves
were two to three feet high,and the wind was 15 knots. Although
the weathei would be called fait, the waves and the breeze could
have caused a problem for a disabled land plane ditching in the
dark.
In late 1973 the International UFO Bureau published a series of
articles* in which it 'could not help but wonder if the C-119 had not
been captured by a UFO.' It seems that Gemini IV was in flight at
the time of the plane's loss, and astronaut James McDivitt spotted
a UFO with arms. Several minutes later both McDivitt and Ed
White observed another (the same?) object over the Caribbean.
Since it was realized that the C-119 may have been captured by the
UFO, according to the bureau, a full-scale investigation was
initiated. (The articles were not clear about whether the Air Force
or the bureau held these fears and launched the investigation.) An
examination of the films taken by the astronauts showed nothing
that looked like a satellite, and to this day, says the bureau, the
UFO has never been explained.
According to news accounts at the time, on June 4 McDivitt
reported an object that appeared to have big arms sticking out.
* Midnight, 15 October 1973, p. 11; 22nd p. 11; 29th p. 7.
194

Analysts and computers spent several days trying to discover what
it was that had flashed by at an estimated distance of 10 to 20
miles. The first guess was that it was Pegasus 2, a gigantic satellite
with 96-foot-long annlike antennae, but it was later calculated to
have been more than a thousand miles away at the time. McDivitt
described the ob)ect as white, cylindrical, and appearing to have
an arm sticking out, but that the 'arm' could have been a reflection.
According to news accounts, McDivitt said he believed it was a
rocket booster, one of the 1,390 satellites, burned-out boosters,
and assorted pieces of space junk then in orbit.
The North American Air Defense Command, which had ruled
out Pegasus 2 as a possibility, estimated that ten pieces of space
junk were in the area at the time. For a while it was also thought
that it might have been a new Russian spacecraft.
The object showed up on film as a large white spot on a black
background, but it could not be positively identified. The astro-
nauts reported sighting two other satellites during the flight, but
they were merely points of light and did not show up on the photo-
graphs. Pegasus 2 came by one time, but they missed sighting it.
I contacted James McDivitt and asked for his reaction to the
story.
In reply to your letter of January 22. I would like to say that
during my flight ot Gemini 4 I did indeed see what some people
would call a UFO. I think it is important to realize that the
letters UFO stand for Unidentified Flying Object.
The object which I saw remains unidentified. This does not
mean that it is, therefore, a spacecraft from some remote planet
in the universe. It also doesn't mean that it isn't such a space-
craft. It only means that I saw something in flight which neither
I nor anyone else was ever able to identify.
X
195

42
January 1967
Black Week
Chase YC-122, Fort Lauderdale to Bimini
Beechcraft Bonanza, Florida Keys
Piper Apache, San Juan to St Thomas
In one 'black week' in January 1967, three planes with experienced,
safety-conscious pilots and a total of eight passengers vanished on
short flights during good weather.
The first victim was a Chase YC-122 cargo plane which dis-
appeared on the 60-mile flight from Fort Lauderdale to Bimini. The
twin-engine plane had been charteredfor use in the filming of a Lloyd
Bridges movie, The Unkillables. Debris and an oil slick were found
miles apart northwest of Bimini, but it was not determined if either
came from the missing plane.
Three days later two couples took off in a Beechcraf t Bonanza
from Miami International Airport for a short pleasure flight to the
Florida Keys and back. They were not seen again.
Three days after that, a couple in a chartered Piper Apache dis-
appeared on the one-hour flight from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to St
Thomas, Virgin Islands.
In all three cases the weather had been good, no distress message
was sent, and no debris was identified.
Chase YC-122
Miami Herald, Thursday. January 12, 1967. p. B1 :
By Jon Nordheimer. A converted World War II troop glider
used in the filming of a new Ivan Tors adventure picture dis-
appeared on route to Bimini Wednesday and the four men
aboard were missing.. . . The twin engine plane took off from
196

Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport at 9:25 A.M.
and wasn't heard from again. A search plane. . . spotted debris
in the Gulf Stream about one hour later, floating about 30 miles
northwest of Bimini.
'We could see oil drums, unopened parachutes, and pieces
of the plane, but no sign of survivors,' said Joe Maugeri, pilot
of the search plane.
A large oil slick was later seen about 12 miles south of the
floating debris, the spot where the plane apparently crashed.
. . . by mid-afternoon, a Coast Guard helicopter returned to
the Opalocka base with what debris it could find from the
crash scene: a 55-gallon red and yellow drum, part of a land-
ing gear, and a safety motion picture film can.
The separate oil slick is no cause for mystery, as there are many
slicks on the ocean's surface, from many sources. Although the
crash site was found and debris from the plane was recovered, the
reason for the crash was not determined.
Beechcraft Bonanza
Miami Herald, Wednesday, January 18, 1967, p. B2:
By Robert Reno. A $3000 reward was posted Tuesday for the
discovery of a single engine plane-missing with four Miamians
aboard. Hope . . . waned as the Coast Guard failed to find a
trace of the plane after three days of search. . . .
[The Beechcraft Bonanza] vanished after takeoff from Miami
International Airport Saturday afternoon. [The Miamians] were
bound for North Key Largo and possibly Marathon, and had
planned to return via Flamingo and the southern Everglades.
Three Coast Guard planes criss-crossed an 8000 square mile
area between Miami and Key West all day Tuesday despite
limited visibility and rain. The weather cancelled plans for 12
planes of the Civil Air Patrol to join the search.. . . Most of the
area being searched is either open water or swamp where the
wreckage of the plane could easily be concealed from air
searchers.
Miami Herald, Saturday, January 21, 1967, p. B2:
The Coast Guard continued its extensive air search for two
Miami couples.. . . There were reports Friday that the couples
had lunched at the Ocean Reef Yacht Club on Key Largo.
Upon taking off again, the plane developed engine trouble,
reports say. . . .
Miami Herald, Sunday, January 22. 1967, p. B1, col. 4:
By Miller Davis. John Rawson. an investigator for the Civil
197

Aeronautics Board, was asking . . . guests at North Key
Largo's Ocean Reef Club ... if they remembered seeing [the
Beechcraft Bonanza]. ... A man and his wife, out fishing,
remember a small blue and white plane. ... It soared off the
runway and the couple reported a sputtering noise as it headed
out to sea.... If it went down at sea, 'it wouldn't stay up very
long,' Rawson said. The plane is not designed to float. When
the waters near the key clear up the area will be searched again.
For now, however, the Coast Guard has officially suspended
its search.
Piper Apache
Miami Herald, Saturday, January 21, 1967, p. B2:
A large contingent of aircraft and ships converged on waters
around Puerto Rico to help in the search for the daughter of the
American ambassador to Britain, her husband, and the couple's
pilot. . . .
[The Ambassador said] the search for the plane and survivors
seemed 'pretty hopeless'. There are some indications the plane
may have run into bad weather on the 70-mile flight that
usually takes one hour.
Miami Herald, Sunday, January 22, 1967. p. B1, col. 2:
By James Buchanan. How, within a week, could [two]
safety-conscious pilots, their airplanes, and their [five]
passengers, virtually disappear in thin air ? The question upper-
most in the minds of aviation officials today is: 'Could these
[seven] persons have been saved by additional precautions
prior to the crashes, or could they have been saved after the
crash ?'
The answers to their disappearance may never be known.
But they could lie in part with the . . . Flight Plan.... A flight
plan, filed with the FAA, is a simple document that has saved
more pilots than can be counted. It tells, briefly, when the air-
plane will leave, where it is going and over what route, and
more importantly, when it will get there. Should an airplane
be as much as 15 minutes late in reaching its destination the
FAA then begins tracking it down. . . .
'[The Bonanza pilot].' the FAA said Saturday, 'was one of
our staunchest advocates of flight safety. He attended safety
meetings regularly. He urged fellow pilots to file flight plans
wherever they went.' Yet [he] took off for a two to three hour
flight without telling anyone where he was going or when to
expect him back. . . . The . . . plane was not reported missing
until 12:35 A.M. last Sunday morning, more than 12 hours
after its takeoff and some six hours after the foursome had
Planned to return to Miami.
198

'[The Apache pilot] always filed a flight plan,' FAA officials
at San Juan said. 'Always except this time." [The plane] wasn't
reported missing until nine hours had elapsed after [the]
scheduled landing time.
In each case, had they filed flight plans the search would
have begun almost immediately after their scheduled landing
time. In each case, the possibility exists the aircraft could have
been spotted before it sank in the water or the occupants could
have been rescued as they clung to the wreckage. . . .
[The searchers'] batting average for finding the missing plane
is abnormally high. Providing the pilot filed a free Flight Plan.
Like many other disappearances, such as the Star Tiger, the
Star Ariel, and the Marine Sulphur Queen, a long delay in starting
the search may have contributed to the failure to find any trace of
the missing planes. Of the three planes that disappeared in the
'black week' of January 1967, the crash scene was found only in
the case of the Chase YC-122, in which a search was initiated
minutes after it became overdue.
199

54
December 1967
Witchcraft
Christmas week claimed more victims for the Bermuda Triangle in
1967 when two Florida men disappeared while only a mile out to sea,
off Miami Beach. They had gone for an evening jaunt in a 23-foot
cabin cruiser, the Witchcraft, to view the Christmas lights of the
city from the ocean. At 9:00p.m. on December 22 the Seventh District
Coast Guard Office in Miami received a call from the men that the
boat's propeller had struck a submerged object and the engine could
not be run without excessive vibration. The hull was undamaged, and
the boat was virtually unsinkable in any case because of the built-in
flotation chambers. The Coast Guard was told that there was no
immediate danger, but that a tow back to port would be necessary.
Within minutes a crew was on the way, and the two men at Number
Seven life buoy had nothing to do but relax and watch the scenery.
The Coast Guard reached the location in nineteen minutes, but
found nothing - no boat, no men, no life jackets. The men had some-
how vanished while still within the glow of the lights they had gone to
watch.
The Coast Guard gave up a vast search several days later, announc-
ing that the men were'presumed missing but not lost at sea'.
Miami Herald. Friday, December 22, 1967, p. 2:
SMALL BOAT FORECAST . . . winds 10 to 20 knots. Seas
four to six feet and inland waters choppy.
Miami Herald. Sunday. December 24, 1967, p. B1 :
By Arnold Markowitz and Pat Sealey. A retired hotelman and
a priest friend who took a boat ride to look at Miami's holiday
lights Friday night still are missing in spite of a massive search
by the Coast Guard, the Civil Air Patrol and private boats and
aircraft.
200

Dan Burack . . . and the Rev. Father Padraig (Patrick)
Horgan of . . . Fort Lauderdale were missing with Burack's
23-foot boat. Witchcraft.*
Burack radioed the Coast Guard Friday night that the boat
had become disabled about a mile off Miami Beach.. . .
The Coast Guard said a radio-telephone distress message
was received Friday night, and that Burack was told to fire off
a flare in about 20 minutes, in order to guide a rescue boat to
his location.
The rescue crew never saw the flare, and there was no further
radio contact with the Witchcraft.
Stiff winds blowing from the north and northeast whipped
the surface of the Atlantic into a carpet of foam against which a
white boat like Witchcraft would have been well camouflaged.
The search Friday covered 1.200 square miles, reaching from
Miami to Delray Beach and Bimini. . . .
'Dan's an expert sailor and a good navigator,' said [a friend].
'I don't know if Father Horgan can swim, but Dan can, and
neither of them is the type to panic in an emergency.
They were carrying all the safety devices on the boat, too.'
Miami Herald, Thursday, December 28, 1967. p. B2:
The Coast Guard Wednesday called off a five day air-sea
search. . . . The men . . . and the Witchcraft were never
spotted.
The search covered an area from Islamorada north of St
Augustine, and out to sea as far as 120 miles - about 24,500
square miles, the Coast Guard said.
After reading the version of the Witchcraft incident as it appears
in the Legend of the Bermuda Triangle it would be easy to picture
the two friends sitting on the deck of the boat, feet up on the side
rails, enjoying the still, silent beauty of the lights of the city.
In reality the weather was rather rough and continued so for
several days. The wind was strong enough to form whitecaps a
mile out at sea, and the waves were forecast to be as much as six
feet high. Without the use of its engine the boat would have had no
power for maintaining the proper heading into the waves, and
could easily have been swamped.
The boat was not at a specified location, as the Legend goes, but
was supposed to fire a flare to show the Coast Guard where it was.
Without the flare the Coast Guard would have had to search ah
enormous area. On a dark night with the sea 'whipped into a
carpet of white foam', the chances of finding a white boat in an
unknown location would be almost nil. The noise of the wind and
* Burack's name has often been incorrectly spelled 'Burrack'.
201

the waves would have drowned out any cries for help, and survival
time in the ocean in winter, even in Florida, is very limited.
It is not likely that the Coast Guard would announce that the
boat was 'presumed missing, but not lost at sea', after having
searched in vain for it for five days. Many of the statements
attributed to the Coast Guard and the Navy in accounts of the
Bermuda Triangle mystery have proved to be untrue in the cases
where accident reports are available. Unfortunately, no such re-
port is available for this incident, so the statement can be neither
proved nor disproved. For the same reason the nature of the dis-
tress message and the purported location of the boat at a specific
buoy also can be neither proved nor disproved, but the newspaper
version differs considerably from the version told in the Legend.
202

54
May 1968
Scorpion
The Scorpion, a nuclear-powered submarine with ninety-nine crew-
men aboard, broke radio silence about midnight, May 21, 1968, to
make a routine position report to her Norfolk base. She was then
near the Azores on a run home from the Mediterranean where she
had been on duty with the U.S. Sixth Fleet. When she failed to arrive
on schedule a massive search was begun, but no sign of her was found.
She was officially listed as 'presumed lost'.
Five months later the research ship Mizar located and photo-
graphed a shattered wreck 400 miles southwest of the Azores that
was believed to be the Scorpion. It was in water more than 10,000
feet deep. The Navy was unable to find the reason for the loss, but
old-time seamen in the area knew that the path of the doomed sub
led through the infamous Bermuda Triangle.
It was first hoped that Commander Slattery of the Scorpion had
delayed his approach over the shallow waters of the continental
shelf because of the storms and waves up to 20 feet that were lash-
ing the area. As these hopes faded a search for survivors and debris
began, and a court of inquiry was appointed to investigate the
incident.
On May 29 a U.S. Navy plane off Norfolk picked up a radio
message that included the Scorpion's code name, but it was
labeled a hoax. A submarine hull found 100 miles off Norfolk
proved to be a casualty of World War EL In June the Navy notified
the families of the crewmen that the submarine was presumed lost,
but that the search would continue.
The depth to which the Scorpion could submerge had been
restricted because safety improvements recommended after the
loss of the Thresher in April 1963 had been only partially com-
203

pleted. The submarine had been considered safe even though the
adequacy of the regular surfacing system was debated, and the
emergency surfacing system was known to be defective and in-
operative. The sub had collided with a barge in Naples, but a survey
had found no damage.
As the number of search vessels was being reduced in June,
Newsweek reported that the Navy had tapes from underwater
sound-detecting devices that had recorded the implosion of the
hull on May 21 about 450 miles southwest of the Azores. The
Department of Defense remained silent as Newsweek further
reported that the Navy was searching the area with photographic
equipment. In October Admiral Moorer disclosed that the ocean-
ographic research ship Mizar had photographed part of the hull 400
miles southwest of the Azores, but that it was unlikely that debris
would be recovered. The court of inquiry reconvened to give the
matter further study.
Arizona Republic, February 1, 1969. p. 1:
WASHINGTON [Washington Post Service] ... The Navy
disclosed that a seven-member court of inquiry was unable to
explain the sinking of the Scorpion, which went down last
May. . . .
So far, the only evidence of the Scorpion comes from pictures
taken by underwater cameras from the research vessel Mizar.
In the unclassified portion of the findings released yesterday,
the Navy said it had eliminated two possible causes of the
sinking:
Running into a seamount or ridge rising from the ocean
floor, or a mishap with the submarine's nuclear power plant.
It said there were no seamounts in the area where the sub-
marine sank and it concluded after hearing expert testimony
that a nuclear mishap could be 'dismissed' as a possible cause.
The court was also satisfied that 'the loss of Scorpion is not
attributable to the delayed completion of her full subsafe
(submarine safety) program'. . . .
'No evidence of any kind to suggest foul play or sabotage
was found by the court,' the report said.
It also found no evidence to support a possible collision with
another sub or a surface vessel because 'no U.S. ships have
reported such a collision, nor have those of any other nation'.
Throughout the report, the Navy stressed that the crew was
highly experienced and stable, and that it would have re-
sponded quickly to any emergency.
'A flooding accident would normally be brought quickly
under control by a crew as well-trained and experienced as
Scorpion's.' the report said.
204

'Although the photographs gave no indication that loss of
the submarine was due to an explosion of one of her own
torpedoes.' the report said, 'the court probed this possibility.'
Photographs taken by the Mizar showed the sub's 'sail' or super-
structure intact but lying on its side more than 100 feet away from
the Scorpion's bow.
Although the loss of the Scorpion is often considered to be a part
of the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, the incident occurred
much closer to Africa and Portugal. The Thresher, which is
occasionally mentioned in relation to the Triangle, sank 220 miles
east of Cape Cod on April 10,1963. Its shattered hull was found a
few months later by the bathyscaph Trieste. A Congressional
205

investigation revealed that a water pipe failure in the engine room
was probably the cause of the accident.
Several other submarines have vanished well outside the
Triangle. A few months before the loss of the Scorpion two subs,
the French Minerve and the Israeli Dakar, disappeared in the
Mediterranean. No trace of either was ever found.
Two years later the French submarine Eurydice vanished within
a few miles of where the Minerve had disappeared. Although a
geophysical laboratory recorded a violent explosion and the Mizar
later located a major section of the submarine, the cause of the
accident could not be found.
Like other expensive machines, a nuclear submarine could be
lost because of the failure of a relatively inexpensive part. In
March 1973 the USS Greenling, operating near Bermuda, dived
far beyond its normal depth but was able to return safely to port
when the error was discovered in time. A crewman alleged that the
submarine was within 200 feet of being crushed in water more than
three miles deep. The near-tragedy, which almost gave the Green-
ling a place in naval history alongside the Thresher and the
Scorpion, was caused by a sticky depth gauge. It would also have
given it a place in the Legend of the Bermuda Triangle.
206

54
July 1969
Five Abandoned Vessels
On July 10,1969, the Teignmouth Electron, a 41-foot three-hulled
yacht, was found abandoned between Bermuda and the Azores. A
number of planes and ships searched unsuccessfully for the vessel's
only crewman, Donald Crowhurst, the leading yachtsman in a round-
the-world race.
The boat was the fifth* abandoned vessel to be found in that area
in eleven days, prompting a spokesman for Lloyd's to exclaim,'It's
rare to get reports like this in such a close area in such a vast ocean.
It is rather odd.'
There had been no bad weather for some time in the area, which
incidentally was very near where the Mary Celeste had been found
almost a century before. One expert who had been studying the
Bermuda Triangle for many years said he would not be surprised if
all the crews had been saucer-napped, as there would be no better
place in the world to find a specimen than on a small boat in the
middle of the vast, lonely ocean.
Several weeks later it was announced that there was overwhelming
proof that Crowhurst had committed suicide by jumping overboard,f
but the four other derelicts, including the Vagabond, sailed by Peter
Wallin of Sweden, were never explained.
The Teignmouth Electron
London Times. July 11, 1969, p. 1 :
By Jonas Smith. Donald Crowhurst. the lone round-the-
* Some of the previous writers have stated that four boats were found in
the area, others have reported five. The latter figure is correct.
t At least one writer who told of the Crowhurst incident neglected to
mention his suicide.
207

world yachtsman, was feared lost last night only a few days
from completion of the voyage.
His trimaran Teignmouth Electron* in which he was ex-
pected to win the £5.000 for the fastest circumnavigation of
the world in the Sunday Times Golden Globe race, was found
abandoned 700 miles south-west of the Azores.
There was no sign of the yachtsman nor anything to suggest
what had happened to him. Books, papers, films and tapes, and
Mr Crowhurst's log were found intact. . . .
The yachtsman's dinghy and emergency liferaft were still
on the trimaran. . . .
He was [the] favourite to collect the £5.000 prize for the
fastest non-stop circumnavigation. . . .
Last night Teignmouth, which was preparing a 'Welcome
Home Donald' banner, a civic reception, champagne party and
a general hero's welcome, was grief-stricken. The carnival
gaiety had already given way to mourning.
London Times. July 12. 1969, p. 4:
The search for Mr Donald Crowhurst. . . was called off late
last night. . . .
New York Times. July 27. 1969. p. 21:
LONDON. July 26 - Donald Crowhurst. the missing British
yachtsman who had been thought to be on the last stage of a
solo voyage around the world, never left the Atlantic during the
243 days he was at sea, it was disclosed tonight.
The Sunday Times of London, sponsor of the round-the-
world yacht race, said . .. that examination of the entries in his
log showed that he had sent 'misleading' radio messages on
his position and was 'under considerable mental strain toward
the end of his voyage'.. . .
Until July 10, when the trimaran.. .was found. . . Mr Crow-
hurst was the favorite to win the prize of £5,000 ($12,000)
offered by the Sunday Times for the fastest time.
Had he returned, said the paper, he would not have qualified
for any prize.
In fact, he had sailed all together 4,500 miles in the Atlantic
on an erratic course to South America. He also put into land
for two days somewhere . . . whereas the yachtsmen in the
race had to sail around the world without touching land.
An investigation! of the logbooks, tape recorder, and movie
camera found on the yacht proved beyond a doubt that Crowhurst
* Some writers have erroneously spelled it Teignmouth Electronic.
t The investigation was performed by Nicholas Tomalin, editor of the
Sunday Times (sponsor of the race), and Ron Hall. The details were reported
in their book, The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst.
208

had not sailed around the world as he had been claiming, but had
spent eight months cruising about the South Atlantic Ocean put-
ting false entries in one set of logbooks and sending phoney
position reports by radio. Sir Francis Chichester, one of the judges
of the race, had begun to suspect Crowhurst even before his
abandoned boat was found.
According to investigations, Crowhurst grew increasingly
anxious as he approached England, and vacillated between want-
ing to win the race and allowing someone else to have the prize so
that his logbook and its false entries would not be checked. The
irony is that Crowhurst's false reports had him gaining so rapidly
on Nigel Tetley, the one man ahead of Crowhurst, that Tetley
14	209

pushed his boat too hard and it broke apart and sank near the
Azores, making Crowhurst a sure winner.
The thought of a fraudulent victory and the subsequent em-
barrassment apparently overwhelmed Crowhurst. His last entry
in the logbook, written on July 1, was that at 20 minutes and 40
seconds past 11 o'clock in the morning he would 'resign the game'.
Since the chronometer was missing it appeared that he had carried
it with him to the edge of the deck and stepped into the sea at the
appointed time.
The Four Other Derelicts
June 30. The British ship Maplebank discovered an abandoned
60-foot vessel a few hundred miles northeast of Bermuda. No
survivors could be found.
London Times. July 12. 1969, p. 4:
On July 1 the British motor vessel Maplebank reported see-
ing a 60 ft vessel floating bottom-up off northwest Africa.
July 4. The Cotopaxi encountered a 35-foot yacht sailing along in
fine weather with no sign of anyone aboard.
London Times, July 12, 1969. p. 4:
On July 4 a yacht set on automatic steering was seen head-
ing easterly in mid-Atlantic. No one was in the cockpit of the
35 ft yacht But Lloyd's say it was not necessarily abandoned.
July 6. The Swedish ship Golar Frost found the yacht Vagabond on
July 6, sails set and in perfect order except that she lacked a crew.
No solution was ever found for the disappearance.
London Times. July 12, 1969, p. 4:
A Swedish sailing yacht, the Vagabond, was picked up by a
motor vessel after being found abandoned on July 2 some 200
miles from where the Teignmouth Electron was found.
New York Times. July 13. 1969. p. 11 :
[It] was the 20-foot Vagabond, in which Peter Wallin* of
Stockholm was sailing alone to Australia.
* Wallin's first name is sometimes given as William. I was not able to
establish which one is correct.
210

July 8. The British tanker Helisoma found a crewless 36-foot yacht
between Bermuda and the Azores. There was nothing to indicate why
the crew had left her.
New York Times. July 13. 1969, p. 11 :
[The drifting boat was] an overturned 36-footer.
The iNFO Journal, Fall, 1969, p. 5:
July 8,1969 -The British tanker Helsona passed an upturned
yacht, size unstated, whose bottom was encrusted with
barnacles.
Extensive research shows that the weather was good when the
boats were found. There were no accounts of storms in the area,
nor of any ships that reported problems. The first hurricane of the
season, Anna, was not reported until July 31. The Tomalin and
Hall book on Crowhurst also confirms the weather situation.
Previous accounts of this incident, however, have failed to
mention that the vessel found on June 30 was bottom-up and that
it was found near Africa, not Bermuda.
The July 4 vessel was apparently on 'automatic pilot' and had
no problems.
The abandonment of the Vagabond, the 20-foot sloop, was never
explained. It has not been verified that the last entry in the log was
made on July 2 and there is no way to know how many days or
miles it might have drifted.
Previous accounts do not point out that the July 8 yacht was
overturned and covered with barnacles. It had apparently been
floating around for some time.
The Teignmouth Electron was found by the Picardy at 33°11 'N,
40°28'W, or about 700 miles southwest of the Azores and 1,300
miles northeast of Bermuda. The locations of the other derelicts
wet'e not precisely given, although all indications are that they
were in the same general area as Crowhurst's boat, which was far
from the Bermuda Triangle.
211

54
August 1969
Bill Verity
In August 1969 ocean voyager Bill Verity of Fort Lauderdale,
Florida, vanished north of Puerto Rico in the 20-foot sailboat,
Brendan the Bold. He had previously crossed the ocean alone in a
12-foot boat, and was an experienced sailor.
In 1969 Bill Verity set out from Ireland in a boat styled after the
craft he thinks may have been used by Brendan the Bold, an Irish
monk, to sail to Florida in a.d. 550.
On August 21, 1969, the Coast Guard issued a request for all
ships to be on the lookout for Verity, who was known to be
dangerously near the path of hurricane Debbie. Nothing was
heard until he arrived safely on San Salvador Island on September
14, saying that he had thought he was 'a goner'.
On November 30,1973,1 spoke by telephone with Verity, who
was then in his Bounty Launch, Inc. headquarters at the South
Street Seaport in New York City, building a boat in which he
intended to duplicate the voyage of Captain Bligh.
He told me of his experience with hurricane Debbie and how he
had been witness to five days of the finest display of wind, waves,
and lightning that anyone could ever wish to see, but that he had,
indeed, completed the voyage.
He was amused to learn that he was being reported as a victim of
the Bermuda Triangle, but said that it was nothing new as he had
previously been reported missing in several other places.
212

54
November 1970
Jillie Bean and the Piper Comanche
The Bermuda Triangle took two more victims in November 1970. The
cabin cruiser Jillie Bean disappeared near the Bahamas and a Piper
Comanche vanished on a flight from West Palm Beach to Jamaica.
Neither sent a distress call.
Miami Herald. Thursday, November 26, 1970, p. 22D:
'TRIANGLE' CLAIMS PLANE. BOAT
The infamous Bermuda Triangle of the Atlantic Ocean has
apparently claimed two more victims, a single engine airplane
and a 42-foot cabin cruiser, off the Bahama Islands.
Coast Guard and Air Force search planes are looking for the
missing craft, which have not been heard from since leaving
South Florida. . . . The cabin cruiser left Miami on Nov. 15.
bound for Andros Island and the airplane left West Palm Beach
Airport Monday afternoon en route to Jamaica.
Aboard the cruiser were its owner... his wife, and possibly
another passenger and a pet dog. The Coast Guard said ... a
cargo of 5 tons of soda pop [was] aboard.
The airplane, a Piper Comanche owned by an Orlando flying
service, left West Palm Beach Airport at 3:45 Monday on a
four-hour flight, with enough gas to stay airborne for six hours.
Along with the pilot. . . were two other Atlantans.
Miami Herald. Saturday, November 28, 1970, p. 28:
BERMUDA TRIANGLE RELEASES CRUISER
By Richard Wallace. The Jillie Bean casually cruised into
Miami as darkness fell Friday, with three persons aboard the
42-foot boat unaware that they were providing a happy but
213

anti-climactic ending for an intensive Coast Guard air-sea
search.
'One of our helicopters spotted them leisurely cruising to-
ward Government Cut just before sundown." a Miami Coast
Guard spokesman said.
Six reconnaissance aircraft. . . two cutters and three smaller
boats had been scouring a 30,000 square mile patch of the
Atlantic off the Bahamas in a combined search for the JiHie
Bean and a missing small plane.
No trace of the aircraft cariying three men from Atlanta, had
been found. . . as of Friday night. The search for the plane was
suspended and will not be resumed unless the Coast Guard
receives new clues to its location.
The three aboard the JiHie Bean . . . were in no trouble and
had no idea they were being sought. . . .
'It was reported missing by the owner's son,' the Coast
Guard spokesman said. 'He was a little over-anxious.'
It had been thought that both the JiHie Bean and the missing
aircraft .. . had become victims of the infamous zone of the
Atlantic known as the Bermuda Triangle.
The Jillie Bean episode demonstrates how readily the Bermuda
Triangle is blamed for any incident in the area. The news that the
boat returned safely has not received as much publicity as the
initial report of the 'disappearance'. The incident also shows that
searchers can fail to find a target even though it is within the search
area. The Jillie Bean hunt had been in progress for at least three
days, but the boat was not seen until it sailed back into its home
port.
The Piper Comanche was never found. This is apparently
another case of a search's being delayed by darkness. The weather
was, from all available accounts, good at the time of the dis-
appearance. The plane took off at 3:45 pm on the four-hour flight
and was last heard from 31 minutes later. Although specific details
are not given in either the FAA or the Military Airlift Command
report, there would not have been any concern for the plane until
at least 5:30 pm, when its position report would have been overdue
(provided the pilot had filed a flight plan), and possibly not until as
late as 8:00 pm, when it would have been overdue at Jamaica. All
accounts of the incident are sketchy, but it appears that the search
was not initiated until the following morning, by which time the
ocean had at least 12 hours to dispose of debris.
The time of the day is important for several other reasons. First,
according to the FAA accident report, the pilot held only a private
pilot's certificate with no instrument rating. The pilot who flies
214

away from lighted areas at night needs an instrument rating almost
as much as the pilot who flies during bad weather, as the conditions
are very similar. In either case he is deprived of all outside visual
references and must keep his plane under control and headed in
the right direction entirely by the use of instruments. The non-
instrument pilot who encounters anything less than good condi-
tions at night is immediately in a critical situation.
The second factor related to the time of day is that if the Com-
anche's trouble developed after 5:00 the pilot would have had to
ditch in the dark, greatly increasing the chances for a disastrous
crash.
215

42
April 1971
Elizabeth
The Elizabeth, a 191-foot convertedLST, left Fort Lauderdale early
in April 1971, bound for Venezuela with a cargo of scrap paper. The
Orinoco Shipping Company, owners of the New Jersey-based 2,000-
ton ship, received a message on April 5 that she was passing the
Bahamas. She never reported again. No trace of the ship was ever
found despite a large search along the entire route.
Since she was an old tub, the rumor was that she broke apart and
sank. But if she had, the search area would have been covered with
hundreds of bales of floating scrap paper that surely could not have
been missed. What could possibly have happened to the Elizabeth?
Well, for one thing, it might have sunk without breaking apart -
then the area would not have been covered with paper.
I was unsuccessful in my search for information on the Elizabeth.
Lloyd's could find nothing in its records. There were no references
to it in the New York Times, and there was nothing in the Miami
Herald as late as April 15. The Casualty Review Branch of the
Coast Guard reported that although there were many vessels by
that name, none had a gross tonnage of approximately 2,000, none
were converted LSTs, and none were listed as casualties. The
American Bureau of Shipping could find no record of the vessel or
of the Orinoco Shipping Company.
I searched the ship owners section of Merchant Vessels of the
United States and did not find the company, nor was it listed in
several other shipping directories.
It could be that both the company and the ship, even though
New Jersey-based, were foreign owned. In that case neither would
have been listed in the Coast Guard and American Bureau of
216

Shipping publications. It is possible that the name of the ship was
given incorrectly in the Legend.
There were no reports of storms at the time. On the contrary, in
April Florida was in the midst of its worst drought in fifteen years.
Fires were raging in the Everglades and water rationing was
necessary in the cities.
I
217

42
October 1971
El Caribe
On the night of October 15,1971, the Caribe, bound from Colombia
to the Dominican Republic, radioed that she would enter port at
7:00 the next morning. The 338-foot freighter, the largest vessel in
the Dominican merchant marine, was never seen or heard from again.
San Juan Star. Saturday, October 16, 1971, p. 1 :
By Yvonne Beltzer. The owner of the freighter Ei Caribe. four
days overdue on a run from Barranquilla, Colombia to Santo
Domingo, said Friday he believes the ship may have been
hijacked to Cuba.
Diego Bordas, owner of Bordas Lines, the Dominican ship-
ping firm that operates the 339-foot vessel, said ... he has
been trying to telephone Havana to inquire about the missing
ship.
Meanwhile, the vessel has been the object of an intensive
search . . . [of] a 36,000 square-mile area of the Caribbean
since Thursday.
The vessel, with a crew-of 28 Dominicans and two Colom-
bians on board, was last heard from at noon [Sunday] Oct. 10,
the day after it sailed from Barranquilla with a cargo of cement
clinkers.
Ship Capt. Celso Esquea radioed Santo Domingo Sunday he
was 240 miles out of Barranquilla and expected to arrive in the
Dominican port at 5 A.M. Tuesday.
Bordas said Esquea always called the company every 24
hours and this is one of the reasons he believes the vessel may
have been pirated.
If the ship had foundered or sunk, he said, its radio auto-
alarm system would automatically send out a distress signal.
The ship's two inflatable life rafts are also equipped with radio
beacons. . . .
'My impression is that the El Caribe was hijacked the day
218

after it left Barranquilla,' he said. 'When a vessel is hijacked
there is no radio communications.'
Bordas theorized that several Colombian guerrillas may have
hidden on his ship because 'it is very difficult to hijack an air-
plane in Colombia, but very easy to get on board a vessel.'
Meanwhile, the Coast Guard said it planned to continue
hunting for £/ Caribe.. . .
There has not been too much sea traffic along the £/
Caribe'% 580-mile route because of the East Coast dock strike.
San Juan Star. October 19, 1971, p. 3:
By Margot Preece. The whereabouts of the cargo vessel El
Caribe . . . may remain a mystery since the Coast Guard called
off its search Monday and Havana sources say it is not in
Cuba. . . .
Bordas has made repeated attempts to telephone Cuban
Prime Minister Fidel Castro . . . but he has not been able to
get through to him.
San Juan Star. October 23, 1971, p. 14:
By Yvonne Beltzer. A ship aground on the Quitasueno Bank
of Nicaragua believed to be the missing Dominican freighter
£7 Caribe. was identified ... as the SS Nicodemos, a Liberian
freighter. . . .
Now. according to the Coast Guard, the fate of the ship 'is a
mystery',
Lloyd's List. November 23, 1971 :
CARIBE. London, Nov. 22. In reply to inquiry, Lloyd's
Agents at Barranquilla write under date of Nov. 16: There is no
further news of motor vessel Caribe.
Rumors have spread, but the fate of the ship has not been
learned. A retired Dominican sailor was quoted as saying it sank,
since it would not have been possible for enough hijackers to sneak
aboard to hijack such a large ship. The February 1974 hijacking of
an 11,000-ton freighter in Pakistan, however, showed that it would
not have been too difficult to overtake the El Caribe, a much
smaller vessel.
In January 1974 I received a letter from the Administrator
General of a newspaper in Santo Domingo, named, by coincidence,
El Caribe. He stated that friends of Captain Esquea reported that
the ship had suffered serious damages on its last journey and that
they also felt it had sunk. The damages were not specified.
On November 18,1971, friends of the crewmen asked President
Balaquer to take the necessary steps to learn if the ship had been
219

hijacked to Cuba, but as of January 1974 neither an affirmation
nor a denial had been received.
According to the Legend the ship sent a message on the night of
October 15 saying that it would arrive in port early the next morn-
ing. The newspapers, however, report that the last radio message
was sent at noon, October 10, telling that the ship would be in port
early on the morning of October 12. The ship was not close to port
at the time of the radio message, but somewhere in the open
Caribbean between Venezuela and Santo Domingo.
1 have not been able to find any reports of storms in the area at
the time El Caribe disappeared, but this is not positive proof of
good weather.
220

54
February 1972
V. A. Fogg
The 572-foot V. A. Fogg disappeared somewhere south of Galveston
on or shortly after February 1, 1972. The tanker was scheduled to
journey into the Gulf of Mexico, flush out her tanks, and return. A
search began shortly after she failed to arrive on schedule. Although
some debris was found almost every day, the ship itself was not dis-
covered until February 14, when a team of divers located the wreck
south of Freeport in 90 feet of water.
The Coast Guard could not say what had happened to the crew-
men, as all thirty-eight had disappeared. The blood-chilling part of
the story is that the thirty-ninth man, the captain, was found sitting
in his cabin, a coffee cup still in his hand.
What caused the ship to sink so quickly that the automatic SOS
was not sent, the crewmen were unable to use their lifesaving gear,
and the captain's life was ended with no warning ? The mystery, it
seems, has no earthly explanation.
Galveston Daily News. Monday, February 14,1972, p. 1 :
By David Lyons. The mystery of the V. A. Fogg was at least
partially solved Sunday when a team of divers made positive
identification of wreckage found earlier on the floor of the Gulf
of Mexico.
The underwater wreckage is located in 90 feet of water
approximately 50 miles southeast of here.
Divers from the Miss Freeport. . . which located the tanker
Saturday with its sonar searching equipment, found the name
of the ill-fated ship on the side of the wreckage.. . .
The V. A. Fogg left Freeport Feb. 1 to sail 50 miles offshore
and clean out empty tanks that had contained benzene, an
explosive hydrocarbon. The ship also carried a load of xylene.
After cleaning the tanks, the ship was to proceed to Galveston.
221

but the ship and those aboard were never heard from after its
departure from Freeport.
Galveston Daily News. February 15, 1972, p. 1 :
By Joel Kirkpatrick. Divers Monday spotted bodies aboard
the blast-shattered tanker V. A. Fogg.. . .
One source in Freeport said divers, who brought up some of
the wreckage. . . . spotted one fully clothed body floating in
the tanker's chartroom, and the arm of another protruding
from debris.
222

Neither body appeared blast-damaged .. . but no identifica-
tion attempt was made at the time.
'It must have been one hell of an explosion,' the source said.
The forward deck is bent to the right at a 45-degree angle.
A big chunk of the bow was blown to one side.'. . .
It appeared . . . that the V. A. Fogg had been blasted open
from midship forward and was not salvageable. . . .
What had been a 572-foot jumboized T-2 tanker .. . now
shows up on the side-scanning sonar as being debris 450 feet
in length.
Galveston Daily News. Februaiy 16, 1972, p. 1 :
By Joel Kirkpatrick. A two-mile tall mushroom of smoke with
a luminescent top grew up through a cloud layer before a
NASA flight instructor's jet on the afternoon the tanker V. A.
Fogg disappeared. . . .
He testified he first thought there had been an underwater
volcanic eruption. The top of the mushroom was more than a
mile across, and growing. . . .
[The] first report of the mushrooming smoke came at
4:04 P.M. on Feb. 1. ... 'It looks like an explosion in the
water.... It was the biggest thing I had ever seen.' . ..
[One witness] told of. . . hearing a tremendous boom com-
ing from out of the Gulf southeast-somewhere.
There was a boom and then rumbling continued for about
five rumbles,' he said, 'and there was not a second in between
them.'
Galveston Daily News. February 19, 1972, p. 1 :
Scuba divers ... recovered one body and . .. were bringing
it in. . . .
At Friday's hearings ... another former crewman of the
shattered and sunken tanker told of seeing sparks and smoke
belching from the stack of the vessel while it carried highly
flammable chemicals.
Galveston Daily News. February 20, 1972, p. 1 :
The body recovered from the sunken V. A. Fogg has been
tentatively identified as that of [the] captain, Lt Toney Solano
of, the Sheriff's Department said. . . .
Identification probably was made from dental records.
The incident occurred so far from the Bermuda Triangle that
most writers have not mentioned it. Of the two who did, one
reported it without any suggestion of mystery, while the other
presented it as I have shown. It is the latter version that I investi-
223

gated, since it is the one most likely to be repeated in future articles
on the Triangle.
Although the final results of the Coast Guard inquiry and many
lawsuits are still pending, there is no doubt that the loss of the ship
was due to an explosion of its volatile cargo. Although the exact
cause is not known, a number of possible ignition sources on the
ship have been suggested.
The remaining question is whether the captain was found sitting
in his cabin still clutching a coffee cup. The newspapers did not go
into detail on the circumstances surrounding the discovery of the
bodies. The February 15 Galveston Daily News said 'one fully
clothed body was found floating in the tanker's chartroom', and
the February 20 Houston Post said the captain's body 'had been in
the ship's chartroom'. Adding these together it would seem that
the captain's body was found floating in the chartroom.
To be certain that the deduction was correct I contacted several
individuals who were involved in the case, explained the story of
the captain, and asked if it were true.
Lieutenant Solano, the investigator for the Galveston County
Medical Examiner, replied that he was at the dock when the three
bodies were brought in. AH had been recovered from the chart-
room, and fingerprints later proved that one was the captain.
Solano said that the statement about the captain was ridiculous.
Joel Kirkpatrick, City Editor of the Galveston Daily News,
replied:
From the beginning 1 did all the writing here about the loss of
the, SS V. A. Fogg.
That's from the first 'ship overdue' story to the initial report
of an explosion; Coast Guard hearings; the lawsuits: the battle
by scuba divers to preserve the superstructure of the ship for a
tourist attraction - the whole thing.
In all that time, I have never heard of anyone who said [the
captain] was still 'clutching his coffee cup' when found.
The body was not found in his cabin, but in the wheelhouse
[next to the chartroom], floating against the ceiling. U.S. Coast
Guard divers brought him up. There was no report of anything
clutched in his hand.
I can only conclude that business about the coffee was a
pure work of fiction.. . .
The cold facts in the continuing story of the SS V. A. Fogg
were dramatic enough without [someone] having to fictional-
ize them.
On January 16,1974,1 received a telephone call from Lt Arthur
224

Whiting of the Coast Guard's Casualty Review Branch in Wash-
ington, D.C. Although the final report of the investigation had not
yet been issued, Whiting checked into the situation at my request.
He learned that the captain had been found floating in the chart-
room up against the ceiling in a corner, his arms and legs hanging
down. Part of a wooden chart table was floating near him but there
was no mention of a coffee cup. Two other bodies were found, one
of which was identified.
On March4,1974, Commander F. A. Rice, Chief of the Casualty
Review Branch, wrote me that Commander W. E. Whaley, Jr., the
Recorder for the Marine Board of Investigation on the V. A. Fogg,
verified this account of the discovery of the body which was later
identified as being that of the captain.
One of the most difficult problems there is is to show that some-
thing did not occur when someone else says it did. In this case it
was relatively easy because the event occurred recently and many
of the individuals involved were still available to comment. Had
the incident happened a number of years ago it might have been
impossible to discover that what was reported as fact was really
only fiction.
225

42
March 1973
Norse Variant and Anita
Had it not been for the 'one in a million' rescue of a crewman, the
Bermuda Triangle would have claimed its biggest prize of all time
in March 1973. As it was, one man lived to tell the tale.
On Wednesday, March 21, the Norse Variant sailed from
Norfolk, bound for Hamburg, with a load of coal from the
Appalachian mountains. Two days later, just after noon, the
541-foot, 13,000-ton freighter radioed that it was foundering 150
miles southeast of Cape May, New Jersey, and the crew was taking
to the lifeboats. The winds were 85 miles an hour at the time, and
the sea was running 35 to 45 feet high.
Rescue ships and aircraft sped to the stormy scene, but the
Kittiwake, the first ship to arrive, reported no trace of the freighter
or any debris or survivors. To allow for possible error in the ship's
reported position, the Coast Guard began a methodical search of
an area of 6,400 square miles, a square 80 miles on a side, centered
on the vessel's reported position.
On Sunday a twenty-three-year-old Norwegian seaman was
sighted 'waving and jumping' on a large orange raft amid the
towering waves, 300 miles due east of Cape Henry, Virginia.
Although he was exhausted and dehydrated from this three-day
ordeal in the cold winds and high seas, Stein Gabrielsen was in
excellent condition. An observer in another Air Force rescue plane
working 40 miles farther down the drift line of debris thought he
saw another survivor clinging to a floating door, but repeated
crossings of the area failed to confirm the sighting.
Gabrielsen told that a 40- by 40-foot hatch cover had been
ripped off by the storm and the towering seas had quickly flooded
two cargo holds. The ship sank within five minutes after the order
had been given to abandon it.
226

As Gabrielsen was resting in the hospital in the aircraft carrier
Independence the search continued for other survivors of the Norse
Variant, and for survivors of a second Norwegian ship that had
been reported missing just as Gabrielsen was being rescued.
The other ship, the Anita, was not only a sister of the Norse
Variant, it was an identical twin. It, too, was carrying coal to
Hamburg; it had left Norfolk two hours after the Norse Variant
and had met disaster in the same storm. Unlike the first ship, no
SOS was heard from the Anita. The ship's representative in
Norfolk notified the Coast Guard that he had not been able to
establish contact with the ship since it had left port.
A life ring with the name M/S Anita turned up later, but this was
the only debris recovered from either vessel, said to be the largest
cargo ships ever to disappear.
The Anita has been given a start toward becoming a part of the
Legend of the Bermuda Triangle. One recent account included the
loss of the ship as an unexplained mystery while neglecting to
mention the storm or the Norse Variant and its survivor.
227

42
October 1973
Linda
In the fall of 1973 I heard from several sources that the Coast
Guard had just issued orders that all traffic through the Bermuda
Triangle was to cease because of the dangers in that area. One of
my informants had heard the news on the radio while traveling
through Canada, and another had supposedly read it in 'the news-
paper'.
According to the Arizona Republic, the Miami Herald, and the
Public Information Office of the Coast Guard's Seventh District
in Miami, however, the true story was quite different.
The sequence of events began early in the month when two
Cuban fishing boats were found crewless and afire north of Cuba.
Shortly thereafter an American fishing boat, the Linda, dis-
appeared from the same area. This prompted the State Department
to issue a warning through the Coast Guard that the Old Bahama
Channel, north of Cuba, 'may be hazardous'. The warning went to
all American-flag vessels operating in the channel, recommending
that they use alternate routes around Cuba until the reasons for
the incidents were learned.
A Coast Guard spokesman stated that the unusual warning had
been issued because there had been 'two incidents with not too
many answers'.
A typical map of the Florida-Cuba-Bahamas area is deceiving;
it does not show water depths, and thus gives the impression that a
vessel could cruise just south of the Bahamas while on its way from
Miami to the islands of the West Indies and remain a safe distance
from Cuba. Although small boats might be able to travel that
route during good weather, most vessels could not because of the
Great Bahama Bank. The bank, south of the Bahamas and
approximately the size of Florida, is a shallow-water region of
228

cays, rocks, shoals, and sandbars that poke out of the water or are
just barely hidden beneath its surface.
The only deep-water routes leading southeast from Miami are
the Providence channels, north of Nassau, and the Old Bahama
Channel, near Cuba. The Old Bahama Channel is approximately
100 miles long, varies from 12 to 20 miles wide, and is immediately
adjacent to the north side of Cuba. Large vessels must use the
channel and are unable to give Cuba a wide berth as they pass.
Shortly after the Coast Guard warning was issued the National
229

Liberation Front, a Cuban exile group, took credit for the attack
on the Cuban fishing boats, saying that they had been destroyed
because they carried electronic monitoring equipment. One of the
crewmen had been killed and the other eleven had been set adrift in
lifeboats. Havana radio reported that they had been rescued.
The Swiss embassy in Havana later notified the Coast Guard
that the Linda had been taken into Cuba, where it was being
detained along with its three-man crew. Three weeks later the
Linda and the men were released unharmed, along with the Gracia
a Dios, another U.S. vessel that had been apprehended at the same
time.
The State Department lifted the warning on October 23.
Although the temporary disappearance of the Linda was
apparently a case of detention in retaliation for the loss of the two
Cuban fishing boats, the episode demonstrated how quickly any
incident in the region is credited to the Bermuda Triangle. For
those who had heard of the Triangle and had no concept of the
geography of the area, it was a simple step to assume that a warn-
ing issued to ships traveling north of Cuba was an order to shut
down the Bermuda Triangle.
230

54
The Devil's Sea
The Bermuda Triangle is not the only area where ships and airplanes
disappear at a rate well beyond the laws of chance. Southeast of
Japan is the treacherous Devil's Sea, which has long been feared by
the Japanese because of the many strange disappearances that have
occurred there.
Japanese authorities previously paid little attention to the stories,
assuming that most of the lost vessels were small fishing craft, easily
upset by storms of any strength. But they began to listen when nine
ships, an incredible number for any area, vanished between 1950 and
1954. These were not tiny fishing boats, but large freighters equipped
with good engines and radios - and they all vanished during perfect
weather. Only one is known to have made a distress call. Alarmed,
the Japanese government began a survey of the region. The result ?
One of the investigating ships, the Kaiyo Maru, was blown up by an
underwater volcano. Recognizing that volcanic activity could not
account for all the losses, especially those of the airplanes, the Japan-
ese government declared the Devil's Sea to be a danger zone.
Experts frequently point out the similarity between the Devil's
Sea and the Bermuda Triangle, both of which are off the southeast
coast of the nearest land, and both of which have an insatiable
appetite for unwary vessels.
The original source of the information on the Devil's Sea
appears to be four articles that appeared in the New York Times in
the early 1950s.
New York Times. Saturday, September 27, 1952. p. 35:
TOKYO, Sept. 26 (AP). Japanese authorities said tonigh
either a tidal wave or suction from an underground volcano
231

must have sunk a Japanese observation ship that vanished
Tuesday with thirty-one aboard.
Japanese Coast Guard boats and United States Air Force
planes found no trace of the 210-ton No. 5 Kaiyo Maru. which
vanished Tuesday 200 miles southeast of Tokyo. She was on
an inspection tour of the Myojin Reefs, which rose from the
ocean floor two weeks ago in a violent submarine explosion.
The missing vessel carried nine scientists and a crew of twenty-
two toward the seething cauldron.
A spokesman for the Central Meteorological Observatory
said the Kaiyo Maru 'must have been sucked into the sub-
marine volcano crater.'
Yonekichi Yagisawa, director of the Maritime Safety Board
(Coast Guard), said: 'It is highly probable that a tidal wave
washed the vessel to the bottom.' He recalled that a tidal wave
was seen north of the reef Wednesday. The volcano erupted
Tuesday and again today.
New York Times. Sunday, September 28, 1952, p. 30:
TOKYO, Sept. 27 (AP). The Japanese Coast Guard said
tonight it had definitely decided that a scientific observation
ship . . . had been blown to bits near the scene of a boiling
underseas volcano.. . .
Far East Air Force planes and Japanese ships combed the
area in vain. One ship spotted bits of wreckage, and today a
Japanese patrol boat picked up a buoy off the ill-fated craft
New York Times. Tuesday, September 30,1952, p. 2:
TOKYO. Sept 29 (Reuters). A second Japanese vessel may
have been swallowed up by the volcanic explosion and tidal
wave last week on Myojin Reef, 200 miles south of here,
maritime authorities said today. They reported the sixty-ton
Toshi Maru, with an undisclosed number of persons aboard,
had been missing in the area since the explosion. . . and [the]
tidal wave that followed.
No further accounts of the incident, the fate of the Toshi Maru,
or the area appeared for more than two years, until:
New York Times. January 16, 1955, V, p. 8:
TOKYO, Jan. 15 (Reuters). A faint radio signal heard here
today told fear-stricken Japanese fishermen that the 'devil's
sea', mystery graveyard of nine ships in the last five years, had
at last been cheated of a victim.
The signal came from the Japanese Coast Guard survey ship
Shinyo Maru.* for which a full-scale search was ordered
* The correct name of the boat is Shihyo Maru.
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yesterday, ten days after it was reported missing with its crew
of fourteen. The ship vanished in the same perfect weather
that had marked previous disappearances.
Contact was lost with the ship as it reached an area, about
seventy miles off Japan's east coast, where nine other ships
and 215 men have been lost. Only one of the ships - a fishery
patrol vessel that was the third to disappear - left any trace of
wreckage or bodies.
Fear struck through every nearby Japanese fishing village
when it was known that the 144-ton Shinyo Maru was miss-
ing. Fishermen spoke of a 'devil' lurking off the shore. Coast
Guard authorities have designated the area a 'special danger
zone'.	'
Today's unexpected radio signal from the survey ship told
the anxious searchers that radio trouble alone had prevented
her from making contact before. The crew were well and the
ship, undamaged, was making for Uraga, about thirty miles
from here, under her own steam, the message said.
Several parts of the Legend of the Devil's Sea seemed curious
to me.
First, there did not seem to be any particular mystery about the
Kaiyo Maru, as some writers have suggested. Although the
destruction of a ship by an underwater volcano was unusual, it
could hardly be considered mysterious.
Second, a comparison of many accounts of the Devil's Sea
showed them to be very much alike. The basic information in all
of them seems to have come from the New York Times articles or
from writings based on the articles. Apparently no additional
research had ever been done.
Third, the only time period ever mentioned is 1950 to 1954. If
the region was so dangerous, mysterious, and well known, why had
nothing new been written about it for twenty years?
Fourth, the time sequence in the disappearance of the Kaiyo
Maru had been changed in the Legend. According to the Legend,
the Japanese government became alarmed after a number of ships
had disappeared in the Devil's Sea and sent the Kaiyo Maru, a
scientifically equipped vessel, to investigate. It was then blown up!
Actually, the Kaiyo Maru was dispatched to investigate the new
volcano several years before the other boats were supposedly lost.
Fifth, although it was said that nine ships and many planes had
vanished, nothing specific was ever told about them, except for the
Kaiyo Maru.
With the intention of updating the twenty-year-old information
233

I sent many letters to Japan and to nearby islands, and received a
number of replies:
Embassy of the United States of America. Tokyo, Japan,
October 31.1973:
We have not heard of the Devil's Sea. The Japanese Govern-
ment Maritime Safety Agency [Coast Guard] informed us they
have no knowledge of such a place and that no danger zone
appears on their chart of Iwojima and Marcus Island.. . .
Similar answers came from Guam, Wake Island, the Bonin
Islands, the Consulate General of Japan in Los Angeles, the Com-
mander in Chief of the United States Pacific Fleet, and the
Honolulu Star-Bulletin - they knew nothing about, nor could they
find any information on the Devil's Sea, danger areas near Japan,
or disappearing ships or planes in the region.
Mr Shigeru Kimura, Associate Editor, Science Department,
Asahi Shimbun (Japan's largest newspaper), October 30,
1973:
l inform you that there is no such an area called the Devil's
Sea near Iwo Jima. But, in September, 1952, there was a big
eruption of an undersea volcano called Myojinsho. ... A re-
search ship Daigo Kaiyo-maru. which was dispatched by the
Japanese government to the sea, was sunk by a blast of the
eruption and the lives of 31 persons on board were lost. Up till
now the Myojinsho becomes active intermittently. Recently
. . . another undersea volcano erupted near Myojinsho. . . .
It is still active.
Generally speaking, the neighborhood of these volcanoes is
thought dangerous, but after the tragedy of the Daigo Kaiyo-
maru there has been no ship wrecked near the volcanoes. So
we do not think the area the Devil's Sea.
On November 18.1973, Mr Kimura wrote again:
I surveyed all the articles of the Asahi Shimbun on the
accidents of ships from 1954 to 1955, but I could not find any
articles which had used the words 'Devil's Sea'. So I think the
article of the New York Times on the Devil's Sea was written on
a kind of misunderstanding. In 1954 to 1955, Japan was not a
rich country, so there were many fishing ships which had no
radio transmitter or had only a very poor one. Then if such ships
were wrecked or sunk, they appeared as if they had suddenly
vanished. Such vanishment of ships occurred in every district
of sea around Japan. In fact we cannot point out any particular
district that was specially dangerous or specially feared by
fishermen. . . .
234

There was a ship named No. 2 Tosui-Maru [reported missing
in the September 30, 1952, New York Times article] that was
missing just after the disaster of the Kaiyo-Maru. But the ship
was only in a trouble of the engine, and was found and saved
on September 30. . . . In this case also the ship had no radio
transmitter, so the crew could not send SOS.
Yasuchika Ohno, Foreign Liaison Officer, Maritime Safety
Agency, Tokyo, January 10, 1974:
As for the newspaper clipping [the 1955 New York Times
article] enclosed in your letter, we are afraid that [it] includes
several misunderstandings and confusion. First of all. it is
stated in the article that nine ships were mysteriously lost dur-
ing the five years in the Myojin Sho Reef area. However, as far
as our records are concerned, the Kaiyo Maru No. 5 was the
only survey vessel lost in the same area.
As for your question: [is] the area . . . still considered
dangerous? we might say that ever since the declaration of
'Dangerous zone' was made in 1953 in our Notice to Mariners
at the time, the area has remained dangerous to date. Mariners
have been strictly cautioned not to be within ten miles of the
Myojin Sho Reef due to possible submarine volcanic activity.
Feeling that the Legend of the Devil's Sea had to somehow have
been based on fact, I pursued the matter further and finally found
someone who had heard the term 'Devil's Sea'.
Unsigned letter from 'Action Line', Mainichi Daily News
(Tokyo), December 26. 1973:
'Devil Sea'. . . is a pseudonym of the area about 70 miles off
Japan's east coast [named] by fishermen. The number of the
missing or wrecked ships in the other areas such as the Inland
Sea (Seto Naikai). . . is much more than that ofthe'Devil Sea'.
Namely 'Devil Sea' is not the only dangerous area for ships in
Japan.
Also, staffers of the Guard and Rescue Department of the
Maritime Safety Agency in Tokyo and Yokohama branch said
they don't call the area a 'Devil Sea' nor designate [it] as a
'special danger zone'.
The area is not specially dangerous in comparison with the
other areas. In summer it's rather safe except typhoons and in
winter the sea is rough, if any.
Although Reuters, the news agency that supplied the 1955
article to the New York Times, had no record of the source of
information, 'Action Line' of the Mainichi Daily News sent the
following article from another newspaper that did provide specific
235

facts about the nine vessels that were lost. It appears that the basis
for the entire story of the Devil's Sea may have been several articles
that appeared in Japanese newspapers in January 1955.
Yomiuri Shimbun, January 14, 1955:*
THE DEVIL'S SEA. WHERE 'SHIHYO MARU' IS LOST
NINE BOATS LOST DURING FIVE YEARS
REASONS REMAIN UNKNOWN
Since January 4, 1955, when radio contact with the fishing
inspection boat Shihyo Maru failed, a search has continued.
For more than ten days the fate of the 14 crewmen has re-
mained unknown. The approximate location of the disappear-
ance was about 30 miles southeast of Mikura Island. In the last
five years about nine fishing boats disappeared and the area
became called the Devil's Sea.t
It was assumed that these fishing boats disappeared because
of wind, rough seas, or engine trouble. . . .
In September, 1952. an inspection boat, the Kaiyo Maru.
disappeared. Since then it has been indicated that this area is
dangerous. Since no bodies of the crewmen were found and
only a little debris was seen, it was assumed that these missing
boats were sunk in deep water by rough seas. Because it was
not the monsoon season the reasons for the missing boats are
completely unknown, but there is a rumor that it may be
because of some unknown power connected with the 'Atomic
Age'. The loss of the Shihyo Maru was completely unexpected
because it was well-equipped to survive any possible
difficulties, t
The list of boats missing in the area in the last five years is
shown next:
1.		April 4,1949. No. 1 Guro Sio Maru, 145 tons. 23 crewmen,
missing in the vicinity of the Ogasawara [Bonin] Islands.
2.		April 21,1949. No. 2 Guro Sio Maru. 24 crewmen, missing
after leaving the seaport of Miyake.
3.		June, 1952. Chyo Huku Maru. 66 tons. 29 crewmen,
missing 120 miles east of Mikura Island after sending SOS.
* The same information appeared in the January 11 through 16 Asahi
Shimbun.
t The Japanese character for 'devil' could also be translated as 'ghost' or
'magic'.
t The next day the Shihyo Maru sailed into Uraga. The crew had not been
able to report because of a radio failure, and they were surprised to learn
that they were the object of so much attention.
236

4.		September 24. 1952. Kaiyo Maru. missing near Mikura
Island. Some debris was found.*
5.		January 6, 1953. Shin Shei Maru. 62 tons. 17 crewmen,
missing near Sumisu Island.
6.		February, 1953. No. 3 Guro Shio Maru. an inspection boat,
145 tons, 18 crewmen, was missing east of Nishino Island.
7.		September 25.1953. The Fu Ya Maru. 189 tons. 26 crew-
men. was missing near Miyake Island.
8.		October 10. 1953. The Shei Shyo Maru. 190 tons. 25
crewmen, was missing 20 miles east of Mikura Island.
9.		December, 1953. The Ko Zi Maru. 150 tons. 22 crewmen,
was missing east of Iwo Jima.
Several conclusions may be drawn from the information sent
from Japan:
Two of the nine vessels are accounted for. The Kaiyo Maru was
demolished by a volcano or tidal wave, and the Chyo Huku Maru
sank after sending an SOS.
The other seven boats were lost in the four and a half years
between April 1949 and October 1953. They were not lost in a
small, restricted area, but in a 750-mile stretch of sea between
Miyake Island and Iwo Jima.
The lost vessels were not 'large freighters with good engines and
radios' as the Legend has it, but small fishing boats ranging from
62 to 190 tons. According to Mr Kimura of the Asahi Shimbun, it
is doubtful that they all had radios. The weather was not perfect,
as in the Legend, but on the contrary those who wrote the Japan-
ese articles felt that wind and rough seas were to blame for the
losses.
The writers of the Legend do not know the size of the Devil's
Sea or even where it is located. Some say it is 70 miles off Japan's
east coast (which part of the coast?). Others place it near the
Myojin Reefs, which are about 300 miles from the coast. Still
others place it near Iwo Jima and the Bonin Islands, or about 750
miles from the coast. Although the Yomiuri Shimbun lists boats
that disappeared in all three locations, it appears that the area
known, at least in the 1950s, as the Devil's Sea, is between Japan
and Miyake Island. Four of the nine boats that supposedly van-
ished in the Devil's Sea were within several hundred miles of
Miyake.
The Maritime Safety Agency has issued periodic Notices to
Mariners warning boatmen to approach no closer than ten miles
* This is an error, as the boat was lost 150 miles south of Mikura. This
account also fails to mention that it was destroyed by a volcano.
237

to the Myojin Reefs. The agency denies having ever issued any
warning about the Devil's Sea.
The disappearance of a few fishing boats is not viewed with awe
by those who are familiar with the ocean. A Maritime Safety
Agency white paper issued in 1973 (sent to me by the Mainichi
Daily News) showed that 471 fishing boats went missing around
Japan in 1972, 435 in 1970, and 531 in 1968. The Japanese do not
238

blame magnetic anomalies, UFOs, and mysterious forces, how-
ever, but realize that the losses are due to nothing more than the
normal hazards of the sea.
Although a part of the Legend is that planes regularly disappear
between Guam and Japan, no specific information has ever been
presented to support that claim.
It appears that the Devil's Sea, known in the United States as a
counterpart of the Bermuda Triangle, is virtually unknown in
Japan. The story is based on nothing more than the loss of a few
fishing boats twenty years ago in a 750-mile stretch of ocean over
a period of five years. The tale has been reported so many times
that it has come to be accepted as fact.
No one, until now, ever took the trouble to ask the Japanese
about their Devil's Sea. It was hard to find anyone who could
remember ever having heard of it.
239

42
Vile Vortices
Armed with the knowledge of the existence of the Bermuda Triangle
and the Devil's Sea, researchers began a systematic investigation to
ascertain if there might be other anomalic regions in which the
number of disappearing vessels is all out ofproportion to that in other
areas. In spite of their skeptical approach to the problem they found
that there were three other such areas in the northern hemisphere,
areas in which disappearance rates were far and away above what
could be accounted for by the regular hazards such as weather and
faulty equipment. These areas were near the Mediterranean Sea,
Afghanistan, and northeast of Hawaii, in the Pacific Ocean. To their
amazement, the scientists found that by plotting all these anomalic
areas on a globe, not only were they all the same distance above the
equator, but they were evenly distributed around the globe, precisely
72 degrees apart. As the positions of more lost vessels were plotted,
each area began to take on an oval, or lozenge, shape, and each one
was tilted up on the eastern end by exactly the same amount.
Further investigation revealed five similar lozenge-shaped areas
in the southern hemisphere, evenly spaced around the globe, all
tilted upward at the eastern end, and all the same distance south of
the equator as the others were north of it!
The only correlation that could be found between the ten zones
(that is, eight, since the Mediterranean and Afghanistan areas are
obvious exceptions) is that they all are located near well-defined
warm ocean currents. These same areas are also famous, incidentally,
for other strange phenomena, most notably a high incidence of
poltergeist manifestations and UFO sightings.
It would seem that the atmospheric and maritime disturbances
caused by the ocean currents in these regions, which also fall near
heavily populated land masses and hence are well traveled, might
240

account for the especially high rate of disappearances. But Lloyd's,
the U.S. Navy, and other maritime agencies continue to be baffled
by the losses. Even the special geographical situations do not explain
the large number of complete disappearances in the ten areas, as
compared to regular founderings and ditchings.
Mathematicians and engineers have found evidence that the two
polar areas should also be considered as anomalic regions. If all
twelve areas were to be marked on a globe, and lines drawn from one
The twelve 'Vile Vortices'
to another, it can be seen that the globe is divided into a number of
equilateral triangles.
Surely, there must be some scientific explanation for nature work-
ing in such a manner.
The winds, ocean currents, rough water, and temperature differ-
entials in these areas might explain a large number of accidents and
founderings, even UFO sightings, but they do not account for the
many complete disappearances. Nor do they explain spinning com-
passes, loss of radio and radar contact, and aeromagnetic and
gravitational anomalies.
Until it can be explained where all those lost airplanes, ships, sub-
marines, and people have gone, such theories as UFO kidnappings,
reverse gravity fields, and time warps must be considered as possible
explanations.
The Vile Vortices concept was first introduced by Ivan T.
i6
241

Sanderson and his Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained
(SITU) in 1968. Five articles or book chapters have now been
written on the subject by Sanderson, one each year since the initial
article, except for 1972 when there was none. Each succeeding
article appears to have been based on its predecessor but contains
updated and revised material.
An examination of all evidence presented in the five articles in
support of the Vile Vortices concept shows that the Bermuda
Triangle was accepted as the first vortex because it was known to
be the scene of many unusual disappearances. The Devil's Sea was
the second vortex because 'we knew already that there was such an
area alleged to exist' off Japan, and because 'plane after plane
vanished en route to Guam'. No further substantiation was ever
given, nor have any specific examples of disappearing ships or
planes been presented for the Devil's Sea.
The loss of two submarines in the Mediterranean and four small
boats in the Atlantic near Portugal was the only proof given to
show the existence of a third anomalic area.
The loss of 'a number' of military planes in the mountains of
Afghanistan during World War II proved another, and the dis-
appearance of one plane between Hawaii and the United States
proved that region to be anomalic.
The five southern vortices were presented with no proof, merely
the statement that correspondence and research showed that they
existed, and were all 72 degrees apart.
The north and south poles were added because 'several space
and time anomalies have been alleged' to have occurred at the
north pole. No reason was given for including the south pole.
The writings that tell of the Vile Vortices show that the re-
searchers first 'suspected' where the areas were and that evidence
that any kind of'incident' had ever occurred in the area was proof
that it was 'anomalic'. There is, according to SITU, a good deal of
evidence' for some of the areas, a 'fair amount' for others, and
'almost nothing' for a few. Because the supposed arrangement of
the vortices 'seemed so regular' it was assumed that the other parts
existed. All the parts, assumed or 'proven', were then joined to
form the corners of equilateral triangles, and the creators marveled
at the 'orderliness of Nature'.
Computer people use the acronym GIGO - Garbage In,
Garbage Out - which means that if bad information is given to the
computer, the output will be equally, or even more, unreliable.
There is no possible way that vague, estimated input can lead to
precise, accurate answers. How, by plotting the estimated posi-
242

tions of a number of vessels that disappeared in unknown loca-
tions, would it be possible to compute lozenge-shaped areas, all
tilted up at the same angle and evenly spaced around the world ?
How, for instance, would the position of the Atalanta be plotted ?
- it might have sunk anywhere on the 3,000-mile voyage to
England. Was it assumed that it sank in the Bermuda Triangle?
Were the Contiemara IV and the Rubicon included as part of the
data to show that the Bermuda Triangle is a Vile Vortex? Re-
search shows that these vessels, formerly considered to be victims
of some unknown mystery, were found shortly after the passage of
hurricanes. Was the loss of A1 Snider in a 16-foot plywood skiff
during a 50-mile-an-hour wind part of the evidence?
Several other efforts to account mathematically or geometrically
for the losses of vessels are under way, but the results cannot be
anything but erroneous if they are based on the same faulty data
that was used to 'prove' the 'anomalic properties' of the Bermuda
Triangle, the Devil's Sea, and the other Vile Vortices.

42
Magnetism, Mystery, and the Bermuda
Triangle
Many types of magnetic aberrations have been reported in the
Bermuda Triangle, and it is thought that they may play a part in the
mystery. Pilots have told of compasses that pointed in the wrong
direction or spun wildly. Veterans of the area have witnessed
magnetic storms that could lead navigators astray.
One of the most logical of all the theories that have attempted to
account for the many disappearing vessels in the Triangle is that
magnetic variation may be responsible. As most high school physics
students know, the compass does not point to the true north pole, but
to the magnetic north pole, which is some distance away. The differ-
ence in direction from any point to the two poles is called magnetic
variation. The amount of variation differs from place to place, and
is as much as 20 degrees in some localities. Should a na vigator neglect
to account for the variation in his area he could very well end up
hundreds of miles from where his calculations show him to be.
The Bermuda Triangle is unusual in that it is one of the few places
on the earth where the compass points to true north instead of to
magnetic north. Another area where this occurs is the Devil's Sea,
off Japan, where an inordinate number of vessels have also dis-
appeared. The Coast Guard has stated that this is only a coincidence.
Many attempts have been made to determine the nature of the
magnetic aberrations in the Bermuda Triangle. One of these is the
Navy's Project Magnet, which is using Super Constellations
equipped with highly sensitive magnetometers to study the dis-
turbances.
A number of 'magnetic aberration' theories have been sug-
gested to account for the losses, but they all are faulty, as anyone
with a basic knowledge of the compass could attest. The various
244

'aberrations' ascribed to the Bermuda Triangle that supposedly
show it is an unusual region are nothing more than the normal
properties of magnetism and the compass that can be observed
throughout the world. They are so fundamental that they are dis-
cussed as a part of the most elementary course in navigation.
Even if there were some substance to any of the magnetic
aberration theories they would explain only how a vessel might
deviate from its course. They would not account for the dis-
appearances. In addition, the statement that the variation in the
Bermuda Triangle is zero has only a grain of truth. Although it is
zero close to Florida it gradually increases toward the east and is
15 degrees at Bermuda.
Magnetic Variation
The belief that magnetic variation may be 'the most logical of
all the theories' put forth to explain the disappearances has no
basis whatsoever. Ironically, magnetic variation would have to be
considered as a possible reason for vessels becoming lost in almost
every part of the world except near Florida and the Devil's Sea.
Compasses do not point to the north pole, but to the magnetic
north pole, which is near Prince .of Wales Island in northern
Canada, 1,300 miles from the north pole. The difference between
the direction to the magnetic north pole and the direction to the
true north pole varies from place to place on the earth's surface.
The difference at any given point is known to pilots as magnetic
variation.*
For example, magnetic variation at the Azores is 20 degrees,
since, in pointing to the magnetic north pole, the compass points 20
degrees away from its true north pole. The variation for Phoenix,
Arizona, is 14 degrees, since from Phoenix, the north pole and the
magnetic north pole are 14 degrees apart. From the part of the
Bermuda Triangle near Florida, however, the variation is close to
zero. There is no difference in the direction to the two poles from
Florida, since Florida, the magnetic pole, and the north pole are
in a straight line.
There are other locations that are also in line with the two poles.
The line connecting all these points is called the Agonic Line, and
although it is affected somewhat by irregularities in the earth's
magnetic field, it is essentially a straight line running from the
magnetic pole across Canada and Lake Michigan, across the
* Geologists and geographers refer to it as magnetic declination.
245

eastern United States, Florida, Cuba, and South America.*
Navigators near the Agonic Line need not be concerned with
magnetic variation because there is none in the area.
The farther a vessel is from the Agonic Line, however, the larger
the magnetic variation which must be reckoned with. The varia-
tion for each area is prominently shown on navigation charts, and
it is a simple matter to apply the appropriate correction. Pilots
must adjust their headings accordingly or they will head off course.
Near Phoenix, for example, a pilot wishing to fly a course of true
west (270°) must correct for the 14-degree variation in that area by
Fig. 4 Magnetic variation: Phoenix, Florida, the Azores.
steering a magnetic course of 256°. If he were to forget to com-
pensate and were not paying attention to landmarks, he would fly
14 degrees to the right of his intended course, and after 500 miles
would be about 124 miles north of where his calculations told him
he was. A pilot near the Azores who forgot to make the necessary
20-degree correction for that area would end up 173 miles off
course after a 500-mile flight.
* Since the earth's magnetic field is continually changing, the magnetic
variation in any given area changes over a period of several years. Naviga-
tion charts made at different times show the Agonic Line in slightly different
locations.
246

Although correcting for magnetic variation is a basic procedure
that not even the rankest beginner would be likely to overlook,
there is no denying that neglecting to perform this simple correc-
tion would lead the navigator astray. However, a pilot near
Florida or the Bahamas would not fly off course by forgetting to
compensate for magnetic variation, since there is none in that area
for which to compensate.
Although a compass near Florida does point toward the north
pele, it is actually attracted to the magnetic north pole. The north
pole just happens to be in a straight line with Florida and the
magnetic pole. Using the same logic as in the Legend, it could be
claimed that compasses near Florida all point to Kalamazoo, since
Kalamazoo is also on the Agonic Line and all compasses near
Florida point toward it.
Magnetic Disturbances, Anomalies, and Storms
The earth's magnetic field is produced by strong forces emanat-
ing from its magnetic core. Although these forces are fairly regular
across the surface of the globe, there are certain places where local
magnetic forces interfere. These places are usually areas with high
iron ore deposits, such as in northern Minnesota and over Lake
Superior, or extensive lava beds, such as those near Grants, New
Mexico. Because of the disturbances near local magnetic fields,
compasses in the region cannot be relied on, and notices on aero-
nautical charts warn pilots of the situation. Such areas are not
considered strange or mysterious.
According to the Navy, which has conducted tests in the area
(not while investigating the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, as
is often stated, but as a part of a regular world-wide program for
updating navigation charts), there are no local magnetic distur-
bances in the Bermuda Triangle.
In contrast to a local magnetic disturbance which can cause an
appreciable irregularity in the earth's magnetic field, a magnetic
anomaly is a very small force caused by a submarine or other ferro-
magnetic objects. It is too slight to have an effect on the compass
of a passing boat or plane.
Magnetic storms are caused by streams of charged particles from
the sun which interfere with the earth's magnetic field. The storms,
which occur irregularly, are intense for several hours, during which
time a compass might be in error a maximum of one or two degrees.
An error of this magnitude would have no appreciable effect on
navigation.
247

Spinning Compasses
One characteristic of the compass that is well known by the
navigator is its instability in unsmooth air or water.
The compass needle is mounted on a small pivot, which allows
it to rotate almost friction-free as it seeks the magnetic pole.
Although the needle is housed in a bowl containing a light oil
which dampens down its sensitive movements, gravity will cause
it to rotate if the compass is not perfectly level. As long as the air-
plane or boat lists from side to side, as in rough weather, the needle
will swing back and forth. The stronger the turbulence becomes, the
more the needle swings. The weather need not be extremely rough
for the needle to swing too widely to give a usable reading, and it
may spin completely around in violent weather.
Much of the time a navigator steers by interpolating the extreme
readings of the compass. For example, if the needle swings
regularly from 30 degrees to 50 degrees and back, the vessel is
heading on a course of 40 degrees. This flaw in the compass's
character is the reason why electric or air-driven gyroscopic
compasses are used. Although they have a few problems of their
own, they remain relatively steady during turbulent weather.
Any pilot who has ever rocked his wings or any sailor who has
ever ridden the waves knows how easy it is to spin the compass
needle. It requires almost no more effort than that necessary to
rotate an ice cube in a glass.
Project Magnet
Project Magnet was supposedly a secret until 1963, when a
reporter for the UFO Investigator 'revealed' its existence.* Accord-
ing to the reporter, who 'discovered' one of the project's planes 'on
an auxiliary runway' at the San Francisco airport, the 'carefully
unpublicized program' was 'significantly linked' with a Canadian
Government UFO investigation. The project was using specially
equipped Super Constellations and nonuniformed pilots (to help
keep the project secret?).
The article included a picture of the tail of the plane, on which
appeared in huge block letters the words PROJECT MAGNET.
A strange way to 'unpublicize' the project 1
According to the reporter, who 'managed to enter into a dis-
cussion' with the men, the 'one important result' of the project at
that time had been the discovery of 'peculiar magnetic forces'
* 'U.S. Special Project Linked to UFOs.' U.F.O. Investigator. June-
September 1963, p. 1-2.
248

coming from above the Caribbean area, where, although 'no
connection has been proved', five Navy airplanes once vanished
just after reporting unexplained interference with their compasses.
The reporter noted that it was obvious that the civilian scientist
and pilot realized that their project was merely a cover for its true
purpose, which was to search for information on UFOs. He
strongly suspected that the Navy, which was financing the entire
operation, was attempting to launch its own program for discover-
ing how UFOs were powered and controlled, since the Air Force
was not willing to share what it had already learned. The reporter
ended by assuring his readers that although he had managed to
take several photographs in addition to the one of the tail of the
plane, he was not printing any that might be of value to an enemy
power.
The Navy, upon being questioned about the project, denied
that it was secret, or that unusual forces had been discovered in the
Carribbean area. According to a pamphlet distributed by the
Oceanographic Office, Project Magnet is an airborne geomagnetic
survey of all the accessible ocean areas of the world. The data is
being used to construct improved navigational and magnetic
maps, many of which are thirty years old, for ships and aircraft of
all nations. Cosmic rays emanating from outer space are also being
measured.
It is not unusual for a study being conducted in the Caribbean
to be reported as another secret attempt to solve the mystery of the
Bermuda Triangle. Such studies always have a cover story,
according to the reporter, and officials always deny, of course, the
true purpose of their work.
cp.a
dept. book shop
central street
basseterre st. kitts
249

Epilogue
Many theories have been proposed to solve the mystery of the
Bermuda Triangle. Time warps, reverse gravity fields, even witch-
craft have been suggested as possible causes of the disappearances.
Atmospheric aberrations. Magnetic and gravitational anomalies.
Strange forces that silence radios, block radar, and affect com-
passes.
Seaquakes. Waterspouts. Tidal waves. Freak seas. Death rays
from Atlantis. Black holes in space. Underwater signaling devices
to guide invaders from other planets. UFOs collecting earthlings
and their vehicles for study in other galaxies, or to save them from
an approaching holocaust.
The area has been described as a 'Vile Vortex', or an anomaly, a
place where events and objects do not behave as they normally
would. It has been said that a murky mantle of death, or a jinx,
lurks about the Triangle.
Some theorists have attempted to find a connection between all
the lost vessels or their passengers. Perhaps an analysis of the
cargos or a vast computerized genealogical survey of all the
victims would provide a clue.
Did the incidents occur at the same time of day, or during
eclipses or solar flareups? Might there be a relationship between
the disappearances and earthquakes ? Could the cause be astro-
logical - a certain arrangement of the planets ?
No theory so far proposed has been able to account satis-
factorily for all or even most of the incidents. It has been suggested
that to solve the mystery once and for all the area should be closed
for a time to allow the government to send in remote-controlled
vessels with monitoring equipment that would detect unusual
phenomena. It has also been suggested that clairvoyants be called
250

in to give their impressions of forces at work.
Such measures are not necessary.
My research .which began asanattempttofindas much informa-
tion as possible about the Bermuda Triangle, had an unexpected
result. After examining all the evidence I have reached the follow-
ing conclusion: There is no theory that solves the mystery. It is no
more logical to try to find a common cause for all the disappear-
ances in the Triangle than, for example, to try to find one cause for
all automobile accidents in Arizona. By abandoning the search for
an overall theory and investigating each incident independently,
the mystery began to unravel.
The findings of my research were consistent.
1.		Once sufficient information was found, logical explanations
appeared for most of the incidents. It is difficult, for example, to
consider the Rubicon a mystery when it is known that a hurricane
struck the harbor where it had been moored. It is similarly difficult
to be baffled by the loss of the Marine Sulphur Queen after learning
of the ship's weakened structure and the weather conditions as
described in the report of the Coast Guard investigation.
2.		With only a few exceptions, the mishaps that remain unsolved
are those for which no information can be found. In several cases
important details of the incident, and in other cases, entire
incidents, are fictional.
3.		Disappearances occur in all parts of the ocean and even over
land. During my research I found nearly two hundred vessels that
disappeared or were found abandoned between the New England
states and northern Europe since 1850.
Although the disappearances that took place in the Bermuda
Triangle are the ones that have been widely publicized, some losses
that occurred elsewhere have been 'credited' to the Triangle. The
most notable of these are the Freya, which was found abandoned
in the Pacific Ocean in 1902, and the Globemaster that crashed
near Ireland in 1951. If all the locations of 'Bermuda Triangle
incidents' were plotted on a globe it would be found that they had
taken place in an area that included the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of
Mexico, and most of the North Atlantic Ocean. The Bermuda
Triangle is hardly unique.
4.		Some of the lost vessels passed through the Bermuda Triangle
but it is not known that they vanished there. The Atalanta, for
example, may have sunk anywhere between Bermuda and
England.
5.		In many cases the place where a vessel met its end was almost
completely unknown and searchers were required to spread them-
251

	selves thinly over vast areas. The only information known about
the Star Ariel is that it went down somewhere between Bermuda
and Jamaica.
6.		Many incidents were not considered mysterious when they
occurred, but became so many years later when writers, seeking
reports of additional incidents in the Bermuda Triangle, found
references to them. It is often difficult to find complete information
(even when one wants it) on an event that occurred many years
before.
7.		Contrary to the Legend, the weather was bad when many of
the incidents occurred. In several cases highly publicized
hurricanes were responsible.
8.		Many of the mishaps occurred late in the afternoon or at
night, making it impossible for searchers to attempt visual sight-
ings until the next morning and thus giving the sea many additional
hours to disperse whatever debris there might have been.
9.		Many of the writers who publicized the events did no original
research but merely rephrased the articles of previous writers,
thereby perpetuating the errors and embellishments in earlier
accounts.
10.		In a number of incidents writers withheld information that
provided an obvious solution to the disappearance.
With the exception of point 9, the above statements also apply
to the region known as the Limbo of the Lost. Moreover, the fact
that the Limbo of the Lost encompasses an area at least half as
large as the North Atlantic Ocean (see map, page 27) makes it
difficult to sustain the point that it, like the Bermuda Triangle, is
somehow unique.
The Legend of the Bermuda Triangle is a manufactured mystery.
It began because of careless research and was elaborated upon and
perpetuated by writers who either purposely or unknowingly made
use of misconceptions, faulty reasoning, and sensationalism. It was
repeated so many times that it began to take on the aura of truth.
I, like everyone else, like a good mystery, an enigma that
stretches the mind. We all seem to have an innate desire to remain
in awe of those phenomena for which there appears to be no
logical, scientific explanation. Yet we also exult in seeking and in
finding legitimate answers to these same puzzles.
Perhaps we are beginning to grow a bit weary of being con-
stantly bombarded by spectacular unsolved mysteries. It is satis-
fying to know that we need not remain forever baffled by all
phenomena that seem to be beyond explanation.
252

TIRPITZ
by David Woodward
The Tirpitz was the biggest warship in the Western
Hemisphere and her influence on the war was immense.
The British did not dare leave her alone for fear that she
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achieved the seemingly impossible task of sinking the
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then the frogmen. Yet still the Tirpitz survived and it was not
until the R.A.F. had carried out three attacks with 10,000
bombs that sheflnally, but slowly, turned over, taking the
lives of all but seventy of her crew of a thousand.
'A first-rate story of adventure' - Daily Telegraph
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MUSTANG PILOT
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This book also show how a young generation endeavoured
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courage of the older generation, whose exploits in the
First World War first captured their imagination.
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