The Bermuda Triangle

[chris_gerrib]

There are days that I dispair over the loss of critical thinking in America. Today is one of them. For some reason, a 2003 scientific paper about methane gas eruptions sinking ships is back in the news. (Hat tip to Rand Simberg.)

Now, yes, if your ship happens to be right over an eruption of methane hydrates, the ship could sink. And yes, these hydrates do erupt from time to time. But the great amount of luck to be at exactly the right place at exactly the right time suggests that the odds are in line with getting struck by lightening. Which does happen, but not very often.

No, having sailed in, around and through the Bermuda Triangle a lot, here's the real reason a lot of ships sink there. (All of these reasons apply to the North Sea, the other region mentioned in the linked article.)

1) Heavy shipping traffic. The Triangle is a geographical choke point, connecting a lot of busy ports.
2) Heavy recreational and light plane traffic. Lots of light planes flying to various islands, and lots of small yachts and fishing boats crossing to and fro. Trust me - if a 100,000 tanker hits a 20-foot boat, nobody on the tanker will even feel it.
3) Bad weather. The Triangle not only has hurricanes, but thunderstorms, fog, squalls and winter weather. The North Sea is notoriously rough as well.
4) Dangerous coastlines. Underwater rocks don't show on radar. A lot of the coast (for example, Haiti and Scotland) is cliffs with off-shore rocks just awash.
5) Currents. The Gulf Stream sweeps through the Triangle, taking debris north. If it doesn't get hung up at Cape Hatteras (~300 miles north of Jacksonville, FL) next stop is Ireland.

In short, asking why their are a lot of "mysterious" shipwrecks and light plane crashes in the Bermuda Triangle is the same as asking why their are a lot of car wrecks on a busy, winding and poorly-lit stretch of road.

ETA: I am reminded by a commentor at Simberg's site of Larry Kusche's book The Bermuda Triangle Mystery Solved, which is well worth the read.

Comments

[daveon.livejournal.com]

I seem to recall reading years ago that actually the rate of loss of shipping in the "so called" triangle wasn't actually all that different from other tricky sea areas or busy ones.

So they concluded that it was largely a media created notion, caused in part by the shear amount of shipping that had been going there for so long.

I am not surprised.

I'm also not surprised that since the advent of widespread radio and geo-location systems, there doesn't seem to be all that much activity there at all.

[chris-gerrib.livejournal.com]

Don't forget that even modern ships may not have the most up-to-date equipment, or know how to use it. Besides which, electronics dies at the most inopertune times...

[daveon.livejournal.com]

I think it's still generally much better than even a few decades ago. The idea that even a modest yacht will have GPS and Sat Phone is pretty wild when you think about it.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

I am reminded by a commentor at Simberg's site of Larry Kusche's book The Bermuda Triangle Mystery Solved, which is well worth the read.

Indeed. It analyzes the legends and points out everything you said, plus

(6) Many of the "mysterious disappearances" are of ships which didn't actually "disappear," save perhaps in the sense of changing names or owners,

(7) Many of said disappearances took place outside of the Triangle and have been incorrectly located by rumor, and finally

(8) Some of the more famous ones took place in or right after wartime, when there were enemy submarines, mines, and inexperienced recruits adding to the likelihood of air and shipping losses. (For instance, the Cyclops was almost certainly torpedoed).