The Bermuda Triangle is a patch of the Atlantic Ocean, out at sea. It is roughly the sea between Florida, Bermuda and Puerto Rico. Its edges are loosely defined. Writers draw it a little differently. Many ships and planes travel through it. So it is a busy part of the ocean. Why do so many people know its name? Let us start with the stories.
The name Bermuda Triangle comes from a 1964 magazine article. A writer named Vincent Gaddis wrote it. For many years, people have told stories and written books about the Bermuda Triangle. A 1974 book by Charles Berlitz became a best seller. It made the Bermuda Triangle famous.
What do the groups that watch the sea say? NOAA is the U.S. ocean science agency. It says there is no evidence that unexplained trouble happens more often in the Bermuda Triangle than in other busy parts of the ocean. The U.S. Coast Guard does not treat the Bermuda Triangle as an area of special danger to ships or planes. Lloyd's of London is the ship insurance company. It is reported not to see the Bermuda Triangle as an especially dangerous place.
Here is how one person checked. In the 1970s a librarian named Larry Kusche looked at the original records behind the Bermuda Triangle stories. He did not just retell them. He read the records themselves. Checking the records is one way to find out what happened.
What did Larry Kusche find? He found that ships said to be lost in calm weather had actually met storms. He also found that some of the incidents in the stories happened far outside the Bermuda Triangle. Some of the incidents did not happen at all.
Storms matter here. A hurricane is a big storm with strong winds. It forms over warm ocean water. A storm is called a hurricane when its winds reach 74 miles per hour. Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 to November 30. Before weather forecasts got better, ships in the area had less warning about storms than ships have today.
The ocean can be tricky in other ways. The Gulf Stream carries warm water north along the coast of Florida. Then it carries it across the Atlantic Ocean. The Caribbean has many islands. They make wide areas of shallow water. That water can be hard for big ships to steer through.
Then there is the compass. A compass needle follows Earth's magnetism. That helps people tell which way is north. Magnetic declination is also called magnetic variation. It is the angle between magnetic north and true north. Magnetic north is where a compass points. True north is the direction of the North Pole.
A busy sea. Big storms. Warm water that moves. A compass that follows magnetism. Stories that were checked against the records. NOAA says there is no evidence of more unexplained trouble there. The U.S. Coast Guard does not treat the Bermuda Triangle as an area of special danger. What other famous story could you check against the records?
Words to know
- records: written proof
- evidence: facts that show
- insurance: money protection
- declination: compass angle
- shallow: not deep
