Bermuda Triangle

The Bermuda Triangle, also known as the Devil's Triangle, is a geographical area in the Atlantic Ocean which has been made infamous for the many people, aircraft, and surface vessels said to have disappeared within its bounds. Many of these disappearances involve a level of mystery which are often popularly explained by a variety of theories beyond human error or acts of nature, often involving the paranormal, a suspension of the laws of physics, or activity by extraterrestrial beings. An abundance of documentation for most incidents suggests that the Bermuda Triangle is a mere legend built upon half-truths and tall tales from

individuals who sailed the area, then later embellished on by professional writers.

1.The Triangle area

The boundaries of the Triangle vary with the author; some stating its shape is akin to a trapezium covering the Florida Straits, the Bahamas, and the entire Caribbean island area east to the Azores; others add to it the Gulf of Mexico. The more familiar, triangular boundary in most written works has as its points Miami, Florida, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and the mid-Atlantic islands of Bermuda with most of the incidents concentrated along the southern boundary around the Bahamas and the Florida Straits.

The area is one of the most heavily-sailed shipping lanes in the world, with ships crossing through it dailyfor ports in the Americas and Europe, as well as the Caribbean islands. Cruise ships are also plentiful, andpleasure craft (boats and aircraft) regularly go back and forth between Florida and the islands.

The Gulf Stream ocean current flows through the Triangle after leaving the Gulf of Mexico; its current offive to six knots may have played a part in a number of disappearances. Sudden storms can and do appear,and in the summer to late fall the occasional hurricane strikes the area. The combination of heavy maritimetraffic and tempestuous weather makes it inevitable that vessels could founder in storms and be lost withouta trace — especially before improved telecommunications, radar and satellite technology arrived late in the20th century.

A title of the Triangle,is the "Graveyard of the Atlantic" is in fact formed of two places: the area of continental shelf near Sable Island, Canada, and just off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. Of the two, Sable Island is nowhere near the Triangle, but it did claim one alleged Triangle victim: the steamship Raifuku Maru (a more famous case would be the recent loss of the Andrea Gail). Both places are known for the intensity that a severe storm brings to the area, especially in the winter months, with the relatively-shallow water making the waves worse than they would be in the deep ocean. The most famous victim of a Cape Hatteras gale was not a Triangle vanishing: the American Civil War ironclad USS Monitor went down in a severe gale while under tow to Charleston, South Carolina on December 31, 1862. A number of alleged

Triangle incidents have included this area.