A scientific explanation for the centuries-old Bermuda Triangle anomaly. Bermuda Triangle: secret disappearances and scientific explanations The disappearance of the Martin Mariner seaplane

There is one incredibly mysterious place in the Atlantic Ocean with the terrifying name “Devil’s Triangle” (“Bermuda Triangle”) - there, under a strange set of circumstances, people, planes and ships disappear without a trace. In the article we will look at several cases of loss of transport and aircraft, and also try to explain the reason for this phenomenon.

This mysterious zone is bounded by a triangle whose vertices are the southern cape of Florida in the southeastern United States, the island of Puerto Rico in the Caribbean Sea and Bermuda in the northwestern Atlantic Ocean.

Mysterious disappearances in the Bermuda Triangle

It’s not without reason that sailors call this place the “triangle of death” and the “cemetery of the Atlantic”: for several hundred years, travelers who find themselves here find themselves in suddenly formed fierce storms, unpredictable whirlpools, unexpected calms and a strange yellow fog.

According to eyewitnesses, in this place of the Atlantic Ocean, light spots covered with foam sometimes form on the water, emitting a glow. Sometimes the glow is so bright that astronauts can observe it from space. Even Christopher Columbus, crossing this part of the ocean, wrote in his ship's log about this unusual glow.

Supporters of the existence of anomalous phenomena in the Bermuda Triangle area claim that over the last hundred years, about 100 ships and aircraft have disappeared in this area. They also report on other features of this territory: here you can find serviceable ships abandoned by the crew or move in space and time.

According to some reports, about a thousand people disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle area - their corpses were never found.

Disappearance of the Avengers flight aircraft

The disappearance of the Avengers flight on December 5, 1945 is often associated with the Bermuda Triangle phenomenon. The squadron consisted of four torpedo bombers, whose pilots were undergoing a retraining program for this type of aircraft, as well as a fifth torpedo bomber, piloted by experienced instructor pilot Charles Taylor - it was this pilot, who flew about 2,500 hours on the Avengers, who became the leader of the entire flight.

Five torpedo bombers were to make a standard training flight over the ocean: a typical exercise included two turns and practical bombing. The route was well studied, the weather forecast was favorable, the cars were perfectly equipped for those times.

On board the planes there were life jackets, inflatable boats with food supplies, flares and emergency radios; The fuel reserve on the vehicles was enough for five and a half hours of operation, while the duration of the training flight, according to all calculations, should not have exceeded two hours.

Information about what happened to the cars after takeoff is quite contradictory. It is known that the problems for the Avengers began about an hour and a half after takeoff: the leading torpedo bomber, piloted by Taylor, had both compasses out of order, and the entire “five” strayed from the intended route.

The flight wandered over the Bahamas for several hours in search of the right direction, and when fuel supplies ran out, it was forced to land on water. Communication with the pilots was unstable, and by the time they splashed down, it had completely broken off.

Nothing is known about the further fate of the squadron; the wreckage of the aircraft was never found. During the hearing of the case of the disappearance of the Avengers, one of the speakers said: “They disappeared, as if they had flown to Mars!”

Disappearance of the Martin Mariner seaplane

That same night, two Martin Mariner aircraft were sent to search for the Avengers, and communication with one of them, aircraft No. 49, was lost in the area of ​​the approximate location of the missing torpedo bombers.

The coast guard team saw an explosion in the air (presumably from this same plane), after which they observed a column of fire over the water for about 10 minutes.

Aircraft No. 32, sent to the area of ​​the explosion due to difficult weather conditions, arrived at the site of the alleged crash only 3 hours later; Several coast guard ships were also sent to search. However, the search operation was unsuccessful: no traces of the plane that crashed into the ocean could be found.

On the morning of December 6, 300 aircraft and 21 ships were sent to search for the missing Evegers and Martin Mariner; A group of volunteers searching the coast also joined the large-scale search and rescue operation. 5 days after the planes went missing, the active phase of the search was stopped, and the crew members were officially declared missing.

Disappearance of S-119

20 years later, in June 1965, approximately 400 kilometers from Miami, the C-119 plane disappeared under unknown circumstances; there were ten crew members on board.

The investigation was unable to establish the exact cause of the disappearance of the C-119, which gave rise to several versions of what happened among researchers, journalists and ordinary people, the most unusual of which is the theory of the plane being abducted by aliens.

The fact is that during the same period, a spaceship was in orbital flight over the Bahamas with astronaut James McDivitt on board, who, in the disappearance square of the C-119, saw and photographed an unidentified flying object with something like hands.

Some sources claim that McDivitt subsequently retracted his UFO claims and also said that he had nothing to do with the pictures.

Perhaps the media simply made up this whole flying saucer story, but perhaps the reason lies elsewhere: NASA simply forbade the astronaut to talk about this topic.

Possible causes of mysterious incidents

There are dozens of different hypotheses explaining the mysterious incidents in the area of ​​the devil's triangle.

Some experts put forward a version about the influence of unusual weather phenomena, others talk about the abduction of ships and aircraft by aliens or inhabitants of the mythical Atlantis, others are confident in the existence of so-called holes in time and faults in space.

There are also many people who are confident that the mystery of the Bermuda Triangle does not exist, since according to their calculations, disappearances in this territory occur with the same frequency as in other places of the World Ocean. And searching for debris at sea is not an easy task, especially in the Bermuda Triangle, where there are many shoals and storms and cyclones often form.

So why does this place inspire so much horror in pilots and sailors? Why do navigation devices fail here? How can we scientifically explain the disappearances of people, planes and ships?

Causes of extinction in the Bermuda Triangle:

Some scientists suggest that the so-called wandering waves are “to blame” for the mysterious incidents. These lonely 20-30-meter rogue waves arise completely suddenly and have nothing to do with tsunamis: their appearance in the ocean is not associated with underwater earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, landslides, and in general does not depend in any way on catastrophic geophysical processes.

For a long time, scientists did not believe in the existence of abnormally high waves, because according to science, waves higher than 20.7 meters cannot form in the oceans. Only in 1995 was the first wave recorded in the North Sea, the height of which reached 25 meters.

This fact contributed to the emergence of a project called “Wave Atlas”, the main task of which is to monitor the ocean surface, compile a worldwide atlas of wandering waves and statistically process the data obtained.

After the research, some experts began to argue that rogue waves could well have caused the death of large ships in the area of ​​​​the terrifying triangle and throughout the World Ocean.

According to one version, a possible reason for the appearance of so-called ghost ships (i.e., abandoned by the crew of ships) on the high seas is infrasound generated on the water under certain conditions.

There are natural and man-made sources of infrasound.

Natural ones include:

• earthquakes
• hurricanes,
• storms,
• lightning strikes.

And the work of various equipment is considered man-made:

• heavy machines,
• fans,
• turbines,
• jet and ship engines, etc.

Infrasound has a depressing effect on the nervous system and can harm the organs of the endocrine system and the internal organs of a living creature. According to research, infrasound waves cause dry mouth, dizziness, coughing, choking, ringing in the ears and other signs of problems in the body.

Many scientists are convinced that under the influence of infrasound, the crew, succumbing to panic, can leave the ship, which is not in physical danger.

3. Human factor

It is quite easy to lose your course in the Bermuda Triangle area, especially considering the fast currents, frequently changing weather and the huge number of islands scattered throughout the area, similar to each other like twin brothers.

For the disappearance of the Avengers, for example, many blame Lieutenant Taylor: having gotten lost, he mistakenly determined that the flight was flying over the Florida Keys, so the center advised him to steer north, guided by the sun.

But it is quite possible that the Avengers were much east of the Keys and therefore, moving north, they flew parallel to the coast for some time. The decision to fly west was made by Taylor too late: fuel supplies were running low and darkness was creeping up. The “Five” was forced to splash down, and the sea that evening was extremely rough.

4. Imperfect technology

Presumably, many incidents in the Bermuda Triangle are associated with imperfect ships and aircraft.

For example, the mysterious disappearance of the Martin Mariner is usually explained as follows: fuel vapors from this type of aircraft penetrated into the cockpit, and it was enough to simply light a match for an explosion to occur; Rumor has it that the pilots of these planes called them “flying tanks” among themselves.

One of the hypotheses explaining the disappearances in the “triangle of death” is the formation of bubbles filled with methane hydrate in the depths of the ocean; The “ripe” bubble rises to the surface of the water and, bursting, forms a funnel into which the ship is drawn.

Methane rising into the air can also contribute to plane crashes: its interaction with a hot engine leads to an explosion.

6. Comet on the ocean floor

According to this hypothesis, 11 thousand years ago in a place that is now called the Bermuda Triangle, a comet fell to the bottom of the ocean. According to some experts, the electromagnetic properties of this celestial body can distort the data of navigation instruments and even disable aircraft engines.

For centuries, pirates have terrorized sailors crossing the Atlantic Ocean. This theory can explain many mysterious incidents in the Bermuda Triangle area, but not the disappearance of planes.

In the 70s of the last century, pilot Bruce Gernon from Florida, flying over the Bermuda Triangle, fell into a strange, rapidly growing cloud, gradually transforming into a tunnel.

According to the pilot, he had to fly into a tunnel that was rotating counterclockwise. A few minutes later, the plane emerged from the cloud and found itself in the Miami area. It is noteworthy that the flight took 28 minutes less time than usual.

9. Compass malfunctions

In the Bermuda Triangle area, the compass needle points not to the magnetic north of the planet, but to the true (geographical) one, so ships can, without even knowing it, start moving in the wrong direction. But usually the difference in compass performance is taken into account by sailors when plotting a course in this area.

Warm and cold air masses colliding with each other, the fast flow of the Gulf Stream, tropical cyclones in summer and sudden storms in winter all create difficult conditions for the movement of aircraft and ships.

Bermuda Triangle: an insoluble phenomenon or a great hoax?

Disputes between supporters of the existence of anomalous phenomena in the Bermuda Triangle area and skeptics have not subsided for many years. Some of the events that happened there remain a mystery without a solution to this day, but most of them are still either amenable to logical explanation or are fiction.

Science fiction writers and hoaxers (this includes some writers, as well as journalists) love to embellish and modify information: they confuse dates, places, names of ships, and deliberately suppress any facts that could easily explain the tragedies in the Bermuda Triangle. There was a case when information appeared in the media about one missing ship, which in fact did not disappear anywhere, but was calmly plowing the expanses of the Atlantic Ocean.

We, ordinary people with our inherent curiosity, have one weakness: a love for all sorts of mysterious, terrifying stories. This is probably why we so like to believe that the Bermuda Triangle hides something mysterious and fantastic.

The Bermuda Triangle is the region of the Atlantic Ocean whose “peaks” are Florida, Puerto Rico and Bermuda. This place is famous throughout the world not for its good deeds. The zone is known for the fact that something supernatural and inexplicable is happening within its boundaries: everything that comes within the attention radius of this “devil’s hole” simply disappears! How? Why?

The paranormality of this section of the water surface has long haunted humanity. Thousands of people, both from the world of scientists and from among caring and inquisitive ordinary people, have been struggling in vain for decades to solve the so-called “Bermuda Triangle riddle.” The solution to this puzzle is still considered one of the most intractable to the human mind.

There are a huge number of very diverse theories devoted to the topic of the Bermuda Triangle, or more precisely, to the reasons for the emergence of its “cursed” features. Some of them are quite logical, more or less adequately explaining the existing oddities, while some are simply funny and frankly smack of idiocy.

The most popular judgments about the mystery of this “magnet of troubles and misfortunes” are voiced by the following options:

1. Comet

About 11 thousand years ago, a comet fell to the bottom of the ocean, in the very place now known as the “Bermuda Triangle”. According to those who adhere to this point of view, this celestial body could have such unusual electromagnetic properties, the force of which could well have a negative impact on navigation instruments, engines and other equipment of ships, aircraft and other floating and flying objects. In particular, rendering these systems inoperative.

2. Pirates

For many hundreds of years, the wards of the “Jolly Roger” struck fear into sailors, including those who traveled in this region of the Atlantic. It is a fact. And in relation to missing ships, it can be recognized as the truth. However, the version of piracy in no way explains the disappearance of flying technology.

3. Methane hydrate

The bottom line is this: in the very depths of the “Bermuda problem” there is a process of formation of giant bubbles filled with methane hydrate, i.e. water-methane compound. When such a “vessel” reaches its maximum size, it rises to the water surface and is thus transformed into a kind of huge “hill.” A ship that encounters such an “obstacle” seems to “slip.” The bubble bursts, thereby forming a funnel, which eventually pulls the ship into the “hole.” In the case of airplanes, the “absorption” scheme is represented as follows: gas from the bubble penetrates the air, contacts the hot engine, followed by an explosion.

4. “Time Funnel”

The following story is known: in 1970, an American pilot flying to the island of Bimini flew over the Bermuda Triangle area. Out of nowhere, a very strange “cloud” appeared in front of him. At first it grew at a rapid pace, and then it turned into a kind of “tunnel”. The pilot had only one choice - to fly inside the “cloud”. The instruments seemed to have gone crazy, sparking and flashing from all sides, and the “tunnel” itself was rotating counterclockwise. Then an even more strange thing happened: the plane jumped out of a “crater” in the Miami area. Instead of the standard 75 minutes, the flight time was 47 minutes. This is exactly what Bruce Gernon, the main character of this story, said.

5. Secret government tests

Proponents of this theory claim that it is in the area of ​​the “devil’s hole” that one secret government base is located, called AUTEC, i.e. Atlantic Underwater Testing and Evaluation Center. Inside its “walls,” the government tests various alien technologies and also comes into contact with representatives of extraterrestrial civilizations.
It is worth noting that this unit actually exists. True, his field of activity is somewhat different. Thus, according to the official legend, the center is engaged in testing submarines, sonars and weapons.

6. UFO

An alien ship is located under the waters of the “hole”. The aliens living there study the inhabitants of planet Earth, their technologies and achievements. It is for this purpose that they “steal” ships and planes.
Also, “other gates” may be hidden in this place, i.e. passage into a dimension inaccessible to earthlings, who sometimes open up and “invite into the unknown” ships and planes.

7. Atlantis

The bottom of the Bermuda Triangle is the cemetery of the legendary ancient island. Solar energy within this mythical territory was generated through the use of certain mysterious crystals. Their power is so great that it causes failures in the control systems of swimming and aircraft.

8. Compass error

The triangle zone is the place where an ordinary magnetic compass points not to magnetic north, but to the geographic pole. Scientific evidence suggests that the deviation between the North Magnetic and North Geographic Poles is more than 700 miles, or approximately 1,300 kilometers. In the standard state of affairs, sailors, when plotting a course, take into account the difference between these indicators. However, forgetting about existing similar exceptions, i.e. about the so-called “magnetic anomalies”, it is quite possible to become a victim of a disaster.

9. Adverse weather conditions

The climatic features of the “devil zone” are characterized by restless behavior. A characteristic feature of this oceanic area are storms and hurricanes, which are a derivative of the collision of warm and cold air masses. The fast flow of the Gulf Stream also causes a lot of trouble. Taken together, these “whims” of the weather represent an increased risk factor for any vehicle.

The “Bermuda Triangle” is the name given to the area in the western Atlantic Ocean, off the southeastern coast of the United States. It is “famous” for the fact that over a hundred ships have disappeared without a trace here over the past two hundred years, and after the Second World War, 14 aircraft “went missing.” Extensive literature is devoted to the mysteries of the “Bermuda Triangle”. There are many hypotheses, including the most fantastic ones, regarding the causes of disasters in this area. Charles Berlitz’s book “The Bermuda Triangle,” recently published in the United States, aroused great interest in the West, excerpts from which were published by a Swiss weekly. It describes the largest shipwrecks and aircraft accidents that occurred under mysterious circumstances in the “triangle” area.

No corpses or wreckage of crashed ships and planes have ever been found in the Bermuda Triangle. Some aircraft maintained normal radio contact with the airport or military base until the last second; others transmitted strange messages: the instruments suddenly stopped working, the compass needle began to spin wildly, the sky turned yellow, fog appeared (in clear weather), the sea looked “somehow unusual” - no one had time to give more specific information...

Many planes, including passenger ones, disappeared right during a communication session with ground services, “as if falling into some hole in the atmosphere,” as one of the conclusions of naval experts figuratively said. The ships disappeared instantly, as if suddenly dissolving. Such giants as the Marine Sulfur Queen, a ship 129 meters long, or the American liner Cyclops with a displacement of 19 thousand tons with 309 passengers on board, disappeared without a trace. There were also those that were later discovered drifting in the Bermuda Triangle area without a single person on board.

Many tried to find out the causes of mysterious disasters and deaths. Various hypotheses were put forward and seriously studied, including many of the most fantastic ones. The version of storms caused by earthquakes was discussed; they talked about meteorites, attacks from sea monsters; there were also those who came up with the idea of ​​“a displacement of time and space leading to a transition to another dimension”; the possibility of electromagnetic and gravitational storms plunging planes and ships into the abyss was studied. Some argued that we were talking about unknown flying or underwater vehicles, controlled by representatives of surviving ancient civilizations or aliens from outer space, who attacked planes and ships, capturing crew members and passengers as examples of the inhabitants of the Earth.

“We've lost our way. Everything is mixed up..."

The Bermuda Triangle got its name after six US Navy aircraft disappeared along with their crews on December 5, 1945. The five planes that were the first to crash were on a routine training flight, the route of which was a triangle6 from the Fort Lauderdale naval base in Florida, 256 kilometers east, then 64 kilometers north and finally back to the base in direction to the southwest. The area they flew over was previously called the “Devil's Triangle,” the “Triangle of Death,” the “Sea of ​​Ghosts,” or the “Graveyard of the Atlantic.” This area received the name “Bermuda” because the maximum point of removal from “Fort Lauderdale” lies on the same parallel with Bermuda, which, in addition, is located in the northern corner of the zone where, both before and after 1945, planes and planes disappeared under unusual circumstances. court. But they disappeared one by one.

This time a sad fate befell a whole group of five aircraft. It was also separated by a sixth seaplane sent to search with a crew of 13 people. He also mysteriously disappeared, leaving no trace.

“Flight-19” was the designation for the training flight of the “five” bombers – torpedo bombers of the “TBM 3 Avenger” type of the American Navy. Each car had a fuel supply that would be enough for more than 1,600 kilometers. The thermometer showed 29 degrees, the sun was shining, rare clouds were floating across the sky, and there was a weak nor'easter blowing. The pilots, who had already completed their flights that day, reported that the weather was ideal. The flight was scheduled for two hours. At 14.00 the planes rolled out onto the runway and took off 10 minutes later. At about 15.15, when the bombing practice was completed and the flight headed for the airfield, the radio operator at the control tower at Fort Lauderdale received a strange message from the flight commander. A tape recording of their conversation has been preserved:

"Commander(Lt. Charles Taylor). Earth... We are on the verge of a catastrophe... We seem to have lost our course... We don’t see the earth... I repeat... We don’t see the earth.

Dispatcher.What are your coordinates?

— It’s difficult to give coordinates. We don’t even know where we are... It looks like we’ve lost our course.

— Turn towards the west.

“We don’t know where west is.” Everything is mixed up... Strange... We can’t determine the direction... Even the sea looks somehow unusual..."

The instructor then managed to contact the commander of the lead aircraft. The latter reported: “Both compasses are out of order. I’m trying to head for Fort Lauderdale... I’m sure we flew over Case, but apparently a little further south, no land in sight.”

This was a sign that the presenter's plane had not flown over Case. Otherwise, continuing to follow their course, the planes would soon reach land.

Due to atmospheric interference, radio communication with the “nineteenth” deteriorated. The Five planes apparently stopped accepting dispatcher commands. Meanwhile, in the control room, the alarming voices of the radio operators were still heard, communicating with each other. From their abrupt remarks a disappointing picture emerged. Fuel is running out, there is a strong wind outside, compasses on planes - both gyroscopic and magnetic - are out of order, the needles are dancing like crazy, showing different directions. During all this time, the powerful radio station of the naval base could not establish contact with the aircraft, although conversations between them were heard quite well.

The news that the crews of Flight 19 were in distress excited the personnel of the naval base. Search planes were equipped. A military seaplane with 13 crew members on board took off from the Banana River Naval Air Station.

At 16:00, the control tower was surprised to hear that Lieutenant Taylor had transferred his authority to another pilot, Captain Stiver. The latter’s message was received despite significant radio interference and the speaker’s excited, slurred speech.

“We don’t know where we are... Perhaps 360 kilometers to the northeast... We must have flown over Florida and are now somewhere over the Gulf of Mexico...” Then, probably, the commander decided to change course 180 degrees to again fly over Florida, but as a result of this maneuver, radio communications began to deteriorate, indicating that the flight had taken the wrong course and was moving away from the Florida coast to the east, into the open sea. According to the testimony of some witnesses, the last words received from Flight 19 were: “It seems that we ...” Others claim that they heard a little more: “We are enveloped in white water ... We have completely lost our bearings.”

Meanwhile, the control room received a report from Lieutenant Koum, one of the officers of the search aircraft, which flew to the area where it was supposed to find the link. Koum said there were strong winds at 1,800 meters. This was the last news received from the search aircraft. Then the connection with him was lost.

Now not five, but six planes were on the list of missing ones. No traces of the plane and its 13 crew members could be found.

"They disappeared without leaving a trace"

At about 7 p.m., the radio station at a naval base near Miami received a weak radio signal consisting of only two letters: “...FT...FT...” This was part of the code designation for the missing flight, since the lead aircraft was listed as “FT-28.” Was this an attempt by the missing to make themselves known? In this case, they transmitted their message two hours after they ran out of fuel.

The next day, the most ambitious search operation in history began. It involved 240 US Navy ships, 67 aircraft from the USS Salomon, four destroyers, numerous submarines, 18 coast guard ships, search and rescue boats, hundreds of private aircraft, yachts and fishing schooners, units of the British Navy and the Bahamas Air Force. But the search turned out to be fruitless; everything that could lead to a trace was carefully studied. Crew members on one cargo plane reported seeing a red flash over the mainland on the day Flight 19 disappeared. Maybe the seaplane exploded? However, this assumption had to be rejected. Then a merchant ship reported that at 7:30 p.m. that day, “something like an explosion” was seen in the sky. If this had to do with the five "Avengers", then we would have to assume that they were in the air several hours after the fuel ran out. In addition, one would have to assume that all five planes collided and exploded at the same time. It is interesting to note that neither Flight 19 nor the seaplane received an SOS signal. The version of a forced landing on water also disappeared. The Avengers were able to stay on the surface for 90 seconds. The crew members were sufficiently trained to evacuate the aircraft within 60 seconds.

Many hypotheses were raised by the strange mention of “white water” in the last message from Flight 19. It could be due to the unusually thick white fog that often appears in the area. This fog could explain the lack of visibility, as well as the radio operator’s words that “the sun looks somehow abnormal.” But the fog could not affect the compass needles. True, there is a “dead zone” between Florida and the Bahamas where radio communication is impossible, but something else happened to the planes before it was interrupted.

A special Navy commission studied the information collected: the materials of the investigation of the military tribunal in the case of one of the officers responsible for checking the instruments were also taken into account (he was later acquitted, since it was proven that the instruments had passed the checks required by the instructions before the launch). But, despite all the efforts of the commission, the causes of the incident were never established. The experts' conclusion said: "Judging by radio reports, the planes were off course and their compasses were out of order." Captain Wingard, in an interview with reporters, expressed himself more clearly: “The commission members failed to offer any acceptable version of what happened.” One of the commission experts remarked, not without drama: “They disappeared without leaving traces, as if they had flown to Mars.”

Lieutenant Wirsching, who at that time worked as an instructor at the Fort Lauderdale base, and subsequently devoted many years to studying this issue, believes that when figuring out the fate of the crews of 6 aircraft, one must proceed from the fact that they “disappeared”, and not died because there is no evidence of the latter.

Lieutenant Wirsching recalls that on the morning of the same day another training flight was made, during which unusual phenomena were also noted. On this flight, the compasses also failed, and the landing took place not at the base, but 76 kilometers to the north. These details then fell out of sight, pushed aside by the sensational incident with Flight 19.

"Sea of ​​Lost Ships"

The largest number of unexplained shipwrecks in the Bermuda Triangle occur in the Sargasso Sea in the western Atlantic. This sea itself has been a source of mystery ever since Spanish and Portuguese sailors first arrived there five centuries ago.

This sea of ​​algae is bounded by the Gulf Stream, which first moves north and then turns east. The southern border is formed by the returning Gulf Stream and the Northern Trade Wind Current. However, the exact contours of the sea are not defined. Relatively speaking, it extends from 23 to 35 degrees north latitude and from 30 to 68 degrees west longitude. At the bottom of the Sargasso Sea there is the steep Bermuda Plateau and numerous underwater hills that do not reach the surface of the sea and form flat plateaus, as if they were once islands. At its northern border, part of the North Atlantic Ridge runs along the bottom, a gigantic chain of seamounts whose individual peaks rise above the surface of the sea, forming the Azores.

Thus, the Sargasso Sea is “stagnant”; there are almost no currents in it, except for those that go around it. It begins approximately 320 kilometers from the Greater Antilles, approximately 420 kilometers from the Atlantic coast to Cape Hatteras. The Sargasso Sea then extends towards the Iberian Peninsula and Africa to the North Atlantic Ridge.

This sea is famous not only for its algae, but also for its calms, which probably gave rise to such picturesque but terrifying legends as the stories of the “Sea of ​​Lost Ships”, “The Graveyard of Ships” or the “Sea of ​​Fear”.

The first legends about the Sargasso Sea were probably composed by the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, who are believed to have visited these places thousands of years ago and landed in America. In any case, Phoenician rock inscriptions were found in Brazil, Phoenician coins were found in the Azores, Carthaginian coins were found in Venezuela and on the southeastern coast of the United States, and drawings apparently made by Phoenician or Carthaginian newcomers were found in Mexico. And the description of the calm and algae of the Sargasso Sea, belonging to the Carthaginian Himilkon, who lived in 500 BC, sounds quite convincing:

“Not the slightest breath of wind will move the sails, so still is the heavy air of this dead sea... Numerous algae float on the surface and cling to the ship... The sea is not too deep, the surface of the earth is only slightly covered with water... Sea monsters scurry between the lazily crawling ships...”

The stories about the “sea of ​​lost ships,” like other legends, are based on real facts, although the imagination of the storytellers has left its mark on them. Australian Allen Villiers, who crossed the Sargasso Sea on a sailboat in 1957 and actually spotted the missing ship bound by seaweed, wrote in his diary:

“A ship, which, due to lack of wind, is forced to stand motionless until all supplies run out... in all likelihood, begins to become overgrown with algae and shells, which in the end completely deprive it of the ability to move... Tropical wood borers will eat away the hull... and the decayed frame , inhabited by skeletons... will slowly disappear under the flat surface of the sea.”

Calm is not dangerous for modern ships. However, this makes the disappearance of ships in the Sargasso Sea area even more mysterious. In a sense, all shipwrecks are mysterious, since no captain intends to wreck his ship. As soon as the fate of a particular ship, or at least the circumstances of its death, is clarified, all mystery disappears. But this cannot be said about all the ships that “disappeared” in the Sargasso Sea.

In the footsteps of the filibusters

When further reports of ship disappearances appeared in the Sargasso Sea and adjacent sections of the Gulf Stream, much of the blame was placed on the weather and pirates.

Spanish ships came from Mexico, Panama and present-day Colombia, calling at Havana and sailing from Florida, often becoming victims of hurricanes. Their treasures fell to the seabed and were recovered by divers in subsequent centuries. Other ships were sunk by marauders or pirates.

But long after pirate fishing had ceased to be a profitable activity, ships continued to disappear in the area just as regularly, and even in good weather. In subsequent years, attention was increasingly drawn to the fact that neither shipwrecks nor corpses had ever been found either on the islands or on the coast of the western Atlantic.

Many of the missing ships belonged to the navies of the United States or other countries. The series of disappearances began in 1800, when the USS Insurgent went missing with 340 passengers on board, and continued until May 1968, when the US submarine Scorpio, with its crew of 99, disappeared under "unexplained" circumstances. Is it true. She was soon found: the Scorpio sank about 740 kilometers southeast of the Azores at a depth of several thousand meters.

When they begin to list how many deserted ships have been discovered in the Sargasso Sea or its neighboring areas of the Atlantic Ocean, they almost always remember the Mary Celesti, the most “famous” ship in the history of navigation among those that were abandoned by the crew and passengers. The misfortune happened to the Mary Celesti in the Sargasso Sea, although the ship, heading to the place north of the Azores Islands where it was spotted by the English brig Dei Grazia in November 1972, passed only at the northern tip of the Sargasso Sea. The brig noticed the uncontrollable Mary Celesti and gave her a signal. Since there was no answer, it was decided to board. The Mary Celesti was captured as a "trophy".

The group boarded the Mary Celesti to find the sails raised and a cargo of liquor securely locked in the holds. The ship had a sufficient amount of fresh water and food, but ten crew members, including the captain, his wife and little daughter, disappeared without a trace. Money, pipes, personal belongings and even pilotage were still on board, although for some reason there was no sextant. The large cabin was boarded up, as if someone had barricaded themselves there against attack.

This mysterious story even became the subject of legal proceedings, but the mystery of “Mary Celesty” could not be resolved. The disappearance of the crew was explained by a pirate attack or a mutiny, during which the sailors killed the captain and fled the ship. It was also suggested that the sailors feared the possibility of an explosion, that everyone was struck by a contagious disease, or that the entire crew was captured. The Lloyd's insurance company, which paid the premium, was inclined to believe that an unexpected fire in the hold with alcohol plunged the crew into such panic that they abandoned the ship. The fire later went out. In fact, alcohol has the property of suddenly spontaneously igniting, burning with a blue flame, and then going out. It is possible that the crew could not simply return to the ship when the fire went out.

Another possible explanation for the team's strange behavior was the presence of ergot in grain supplies. The ergot present in bread has repeatedly created terrible situations on ships before: people lost their minds and control over themselves and died as a result. Such collective insanity could be the reason that the crew abandoned the ship in panic, and the same could have happened on those ships that disappeared in other seas.

In his book Mysterious Adventures in Time and Space, Harold Wilkins put forward a plausible hypothesis according to which the Mary Celesti was boarded by an unknown ship, her crew was killed, and the pirates subsequently claimed that they had “found a ship at sea” and were paid for this is a bonus. Developing his theory, Wilkins points out some contradictions in the testimony of the captain and crew of the Dei Grazia.

Ten minutes of nothingness

Researchers of the “Bermuda Triangle” have long paid attention to another mysterious area of ​​the World Ocean. It is located southeast of Japan, between Japan and the Bonin Islands, and has earned a reputation as a dangerous area for ships and aircraft. Just like in the Bermuda Triangle, underwater volcanic eruptions and other natural phenomena may explain the mysterious incidents that occur here. This area, also called the “Devil's Sea,” enjoys, at least officially, even worse fame than the “Bermuda Triangle”, since it has been declared a danger zone by the Japanese government. This measure was taken after Japanese experts conducted a series of studies in the area in 1955.

The “Bermuda Triangle” and the “Devil's Sea” have one common pattern: at 80 degrees west longitude, which intersects the “Bermuda Triangle” along its western border, the magnetic and geographic north poles coincide. The 80th meridian of western longitude, passing through the pole, changes its designation and becomes the 150th meridian of eastern longitude, which comes from north to south past Japan, crossing the “devil's sea” right in the middle. At this point of the “Devil’s Sea” the compass needle points simultaneously to the geographic and magnetic poles, just as in the western part of the “Bermuda Triangle”, in the other hemisphere of the globe.

The continued disappearance of planes and ships was the reason that in 1955, with the support of the Japanese government, an expedition was sent to this area, during which scientists were supposed to make various measurements and experiments. For this purpose, the research vessel Kaiyo Maru No. 5 cruised in the “devil's sea.” The expedition ended in the most incredible way - the ship, along with the crew and a group of scientists, disappeared without a trace.

The existence of one or more areas in the World Ocean where mysterious incidents occur has given rise to a number of strange allegations. Theories have been put forward regarding anti-gravity displacements, and it has been proven that there are places where the laws of gravity and magnetic attraction do not function as is commonly believed. The author of The Great Mystery in the Air, Ralph Barker, notes that new discoveries by physicists point to the existence of anti-gravity particles of matter. He believes that “matter, not subject to the laws of gravity, the nature of which is opposite to the nature of the matter of the Earth, has colossal explosive force if it comes into contact with terrestrial matter ... and that it is localized in certain regions of the Earth ...” he suggests that this matter may have is of cosmic origin and sometimes “accumulates” under continents, but mostly under the seabed.

When you study this theory in more detail, you find a possible explanation for electronic and magnetic deviations in various parts of the globe, but the disappearance of such a large number of ships and aircraft still cannot be justified by this. Information about magnetic anomalies was also obtained in other seas. There are places where the force of attraction of an energy source under water is stronger than the pull of the north magnetic pole.

Ivan Sanderson published an article in Saga magazine where he spoke about the results of a thorough study of the Bermuda Triangle and other similar marine areas. In the course of their research, Sanderson and his collaborators discovered that most of the mysterious incidents with planes and ships occur in six areas that have almost the same elliptical configuration and are located between 30 and 40 degrees north and south latitude. These include the “Bermuda Triangle” and the “Devil's Sea”.

Sanderson developed his theory and compiled a grid of anomaly areas at 73-degree intervals covering the entire globe. Five of these regions are located in the northern hemisphere, five in the southern hemisphere, including the pole. The Bermuda Triangle, in his opinion, is the most famous of these areas, since ships and planes often find themselves in it. Other areas, although less well known, exhibit equally powerful magnetic deviations.

Most of these areas are located east of continental coasts, where warm, northward sea currents meet southward currents. In addition, these areas represent nodal points where sea currents on the surface and at depth move in opposite directions. Powerful deep tidal currents, influenced by different temperatures, create magnetic storms that cause radio interference, affect the magnetic field, and possibly change the force of gravity. It is acceptable that under certain circumstances these phenomena are capable of causing the movement of ships and aircraft to other points in space and time. Sanderson in this regard refers to the interesting phenomenon of uneven passage of time observed in these areas. We are talking about those cases when planes, after completing a mission, landed much earlier than scheduled. This would be understandable if they were flying with a tailwind, the speed of which would be 760 kilometers per hour. But the winds recorded by meteorological services during flights could not cause such deviations. Most often, these phenomena occur in the Bermuda Triangle area. It seems that planes, when faced with such an anomaly, slip past or rush into the “hole in the sky.”

A similar time jump occurred five years ago at an airfield in Miami. He never received a convincing explanation. We are talking about a National Airlines passenger plane, which, with 127 passengers on board, was approaching the runway from the northeast and was monitored by ground radar. Suddenly he disappeared from the screen and appeared only ten minutes later. The plane landed without any complications. The pilot and crew were surprised by the ground crew's concern as they believed nothing unusual had happened. One of the controllers said to the pilot: “Oh my God, buddy, you simply didn’t exist for ten minutes!” the team compared the time on their watches and on all the timepieces in the car and found that all the watches were equally ten minutes behind. This was all the more strange because when checking the clocks on the plane and on the control tower, made twenty minutes earlier, no discrepancies were noted.

VELTVOHE, ZURICH.

Abroad No. 41 1975

About this region of the Atlantic Ocean, experienced sailors say: “It’s a bad, damned area. It’s better not to go there.” But you have to walk, because it lies in a lively place, off the coast of North America. In the neighborhood are the Florida Peninsula, Cuba and Bermuda. These islands gave it its name: the Bermuda Triangle.

Of course, you won’t see any such triangle in the ocean. Even if viewed from a great height. It can only be drawn on a map or imagined in the mind. But all sailors and pilots know well the boundaries of this “devilish” triangle and tell terrible stories about it. Yes, here is one of them.

It happened a long time ago, back in early 1945. On that fateful day, five American torpedo bombers were on a training flight. The flight was commanded by an experienced pilot, Lieutenant Charles Taylor. Having completed the task, the planes were already returning home. When they were in the Bermuda Triangle area, at the base they heard the commander’s confused voice: “We have lost our course... We don’t know where to fly.” The radio operators at the base later recalled that the last words they heard were generally strange and incomprehensible: “They look like us... These are some kind of aliens from outer space... We are dying.”

There was no further news from the planes. All five torpedo bombers and all their pilots disappeared without a trace.

A flying boat immediately took off to search for the missing. However, she too disappeared. Then it was decided to send not one, not two, but more than three hundred aircraft and over two dozen warships to help. This armada explored a huge area of ​​the ocean, but returned with nothing. Only after more than forty years on the seabed, it was there, in the triangle, that divers discovered the wreckage of the missing aircraft. The pilots, or at least their remains, were never found.

Meanwhile, disasters in those places continued. One day, in the fall of 1971, English sailors noticed a sailboat, yawing strangely, as if not being controlled by anyone. Suspecting something was wrong, the British approached the ship and called out to the people. Having received no answer, they climbed aboard the sailboat. It turned out that it was indeed empty. By all indications, the crew abandoned the ship in panic, abandoning everything, even money.

And such wandering, deserted ships were encountered in this enchanted place more than once. No one could explain what happened, what frightened and killed the sailors, and there was no one to tell. There are simply countless cases when radio communication was lost on ships and planes in the Bermuda Triangle, when instruments stopped working. It was also noticed that for those who found themselves in the area of ​​the triangle, time seemed to begin to pass more slowly, or even stop completely.

When they asked those who had been there, they heard amazing things. For example, the pilots of one passenger plane said that the surface of the ocean suddenly rose up. And only when the plane moved away did the ocean calm down again. Astronauts from outer space have also seen water mountains there.

All sorts of assumptions have not been made to explain the evilness and strangeness of those places. Some said that mysterious ball lightning was to blame. Others blamed unknown sea monsters. Still others saw the reason in sudden surges in gravity. Still others believed that this was the machinations of some intelligent creatures living under water or arriving from other planets.

There are many assumptions, but there is still no exact, definite answer. We only know that there are similar deadly places in other parts of our planet. One of them is located in the east, off the coast of China. It is called the Devil's Sea. And not by chance. Over several centuries, hundreds of ships, large and small, disappeared there. Disappeared along with the people.

Scientists have revealed many secrets of nature, often deeply, as they say, hidden behind seven seals. Probably, the time will come when they will reveal this secret too - the secret of the Bermuda Triangle.

Duty captain Gennady Chernenko

Anomalous zone

The infamous Bermuda Triangle is in an area bounded by lines from Florida to Bermuda, on to Puerto Rico and back to Florida through the Bahamas. The most mysterious and incredible events occur within these borders.

Already at the dawn of navigation, this area earned itself the most notorious reputation - “the cemetery of the Atlantic”, “the sea that brings misfortune”, “the triangle of death”. Here the most severe storms raged, then protracted calms suddenly began, then unexpected whirlpools appeared, pulling ships into the depths of the sea.

Christopher Columbus wrote in his ship's log that in this part of the ocean he observed strange spots on the water that emitted light. These mysterious spots continue to appear today, and their light is so bright that it can even be observed from space.

But this is not all the oddities of the Bermuda Triangle. In this zone, navigational instruments break down, radio transmitters fail, and compass needles stop pointing north and spin as they please. In addition, here you can often watch the terrible sight of schools of fish swimming belly up...

Disappeared ships

But the worst thing about the Bermuda Triangle is that sometimes ships disappear completely without a trace...

In January 1880, the training frigate Atlanta sailed from Bermuda to England, carrying 290 people, mostly cadets. The ship disappeared without a trace, and several months of active searches yielded nothing.

In 1881, the cargo ship Helen Austin discovered a schooner without a name and without a crew in the Burmuda Triangle. But on board there was a cargo of rare and expensive mahogany. The captain of the Helen Austin decided to tow the schooner to the shore and sent several people to it. Suddenly a storm came and the schooner was blown away. Only two days later she was found again. But all the sailors from the Helen Austin, sent to the schooner before the storm, were dead...

The captain, however, did not give up his desire to bring the schooner to England and sent another team of sailors to it. A storm began again, and the mysterious schooner disappeared into the ocean again, this time forever...

But all these cases were just the beginning of the terrible stories taking place in the Bermuda Triangle. In the 20th century, the number of victims of this terrible place increased significantly...

On March 4, 1918, the American warship Cyclops, 500 feet long and displacing 19,500 tons, sailed from Barbados to Norfolk. The Cyclops crew consisted of 309 people. The Cyclops never arrived at its destination port...

At first, the Navy command decided that the ship had been hit by a mine or had been destroyed by a German submarine. But according to German archives, there were never any mines or submarines in the area. The US military's summary was as follows: "The disappearance of the Cyclops is one of the most mysterious mysteries in the history of our fleet."

In 1925, an American cargo ship departing Charleston for Havana disappeared. The following year, an English cargo ship did not arrive at its destination. In 1931, a cargo ship from Norway disappeared along with its crew.

In 1932, the schooner John and Mary was found in the Bermuda Triangle. To the surprise of those who discovered it, there was not a single person on board, but all the sails were neatly folded.

In 1944, the Cuban cargo ship Rubicon was found off the coast of Florida, also without a crew...

None of these ships gave an SOS signal, with the exception of the missing Japanese cargo ship Raifuku Maru. He sent a terrible radiogram: “The danger is incredibly great... Hurry... We cannot escape”... Since then no one has seen or heard of this ship...

And the Bermuda Triangle continued to reap a terrible harvest of victims. In 1950, the American ship Sandra disappeared. In 1955, the yacht Connemara IV was found without crew or passengers. In 1963, a fishing ship with 40 crew members disappeared without a trace. In 1967, a sports yacht disappeared. In 1973, the Anita cargo ship with a displacement of 20 thousand tons disappeared... And these are not all the victims of the mysterious Bermuda Triangle...

The Lost Squadron

It’s not only boaters who are faced with the eerie features of the Bermuda Triangle. The airspace here has the same strange properties. Pilots of the very first airplanes discovered that flying here was life-threatening.

On February 13, 1828, the famous American aviator Charles Lindbergh flew over the Bermuda Triangle. With surprise, he discovered that the arrows of the navigation instruments suddenly spun at breakneck speed. At the same time, a thick fog rose from below, in which Lindbergh lost his orientation in space.

With great difficulty, he raised the plane to a height and escaped from the poor visibility zone. Fortunately, he was not far from the shore. Based on the sun and the terrain, the pilot determined where he was. It turned out that he was 300 miles off course.

Lindbergh flew towards Florida and, as soon as he escaped from the Bermuda Triangle, all the instruments began to work. In his memoirs, he wrote that he miraculously escaped death. But not everyone was as lucky as Lindbergh...

On December 5, 1945, as many as five aircraft of the 19th Squadron of the US Navy disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle area.

At 2 o'clock in the afternoon the planes took off from the base to participate in the exercise. The squadron, led by Lieutenant Charles Taylor, turned towards the Bahamas. An hour later, Taylor sent a message: “Alarm! We’re off course and can’t see land.” Later there were reports that the compasses had failed and that the ocean did not look the same as always. The last message was: “We are plunging into white waters”...

Several ships and planes were sent to search for the squadron, but no traces were found, moreover, the Martin Mariner seaplane disappeared...

Two years later, an American transport plane disappeared near Bermuda. In 1948, a British airliner with 32 passengers on board disappeared without a trace.

In 1949, an English plane carrying people from London to Chile did not arrive at the airport. In 1962, a US Air Force cargo plane disappeared.

Both small light airplanes and large airliners disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle, and no traces of them were ever found...

Naturally, all researchers of the Bermuda Triangle are haunted by the question - what is happening in this mysterious place, where and why do ships and planes disappear? Many versions have been put forward, including the most exotic ones.

This includes the abduction of ships by aliens, and the existence in the Bermuda Triangle of gates to parallel space or another time. Scientists greet these assumptions with indignation, but still cannot intelligibly explain what is happening in the Bermuda Triangle... The greatest mystery of our time remains unsolved...