Monday 1 February 2010

Great Mysteries - Bermuda Triangle (Part 2)


The second in our two-part series, looking at disasters and strange occurrence's that have happened in the Atlantic Ocean within an area known as the Bermuda Triangle.
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Douglas DC-3
On December 28, 1948, a Douglas DC-3 aircraft, number NC16002, disappeared while on a flight from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to Miami. No trace of the aircraft or the 32 people on board was ever found. From the documentation compiled by the Civil Aeronautics Board investigation, a possible key to the plane's disappearance was found, but barely touched upon by the Triangle writers: the plane's batteries were inspected and found to be low on charge, but ordered back into the plane without a recharge by the pilot while in San Juan. Whether or not this led to complete electrical failure will never be known. However, since piston-engined aircraft rely upon magnetos to provide spark to their cylinders rather than a battery powered ignition coil system, this theory is not strongly convincing.

Star Tiger and Star Ariel
G-AHNP Star Tiger disappeared on January 30, 1948 on a flight from the Azores to Bermuda; G-AGRE Star Ariel disappeared on January 17, 1949, on a flight from Bermuda to Kingston, Jamaica. Both were Avro Tudor IV passenger aircraft operated by British South American Airways. Both planes were operating at the very limits of their range and the slightest error or fault in the equipment could keep them from reaching the small island. One plane was not heard from long before it would have entered the Triangle

Carroll A. Deering
A five-mast
ed schooner built in 1919, the Carroll A. Deering was found hard aground and abandoned at Diamond Shoals, near Cape Hatteras, North Carolina on January 31, 1921. (Pictured left: The Schooner Carroll A. Deering as seen from Cape Lookout lightship on 29 January 1921, two days before she was found deserted in North Carolina). Rumours and more at the time indicated the Deering was a victim of piracy, possibly connected with the illegal rum-running trade during Prohibition, and possibly involving another ship, S.S. Hewitt, which disappeared at roughly the same time. Just hours later, an unknown steamer sailed near the lightship along the track of the Deering, and ignored all signals from the lightship. It is speculated that the Hewitt may have been this mystery ship, and possibly involved in the Deering crew's disappearance.
KC-135 Stratotankers
On August 28, 1963 a pair of U.S. Airforce KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft collided and crashed into the Atlantic. The Triangle version (Winer, Berlitz, Gaddis) of this story specifies that they did collide and crash, but there were two distinct crash sites, separated by over 160 miles (260 km) of water. However, Kusche's research showed that the unclassified version of the Air Force investigation report stated that the debris field defining the second "crash site" was examined by a search and rescue ship, and found to be a mass of seaweed and driftwood tangled in an old buoy.
SS Marine Sulphur Queen
SS Marine Sulphur Queen, a T2 tanker converted from oil to sulfur carrier, was last heard from on February 4, 1963 with a crew of 39 near the Florida Keys. Marine Sulphur Queen was the first vessel mentioned in Vincent Gaddis' 1964 Argosy Magazine article, but he left it as having "sailed into the unknown", despite the Coast Guard report, which not only documented the ship's badly-maintained history, but declared that it was an unseaworthy vessel that should never have gone to sea.
Raifuku Maru
One of the more famous incidents in the Triangle took place in 1921 (some say a few years later), when the Japanese vessel Raifuku Maru (sometimes misidentified as Raikuke Maru) went down with all hands after sending a distress signal that allegedly said "Danger like dagger now. Come quick!", or "It's like a dagger, come quick!" This has led writers to speculate on what the "dagger" was, with a waterspout being the likely candidate (Winer). In reality the ship was nowhere near the Triangle, nor was the word "dagger" a part of the ship's distress call ("Now very danger. Come quick."). Having left Boston for Hamburg, Germany, on April 21, 1925, she was caught in a severe storm and sank in the North Atlantic with all hands while another ship, RMS Homeric, attempted an unsuccessful rescue.
Connemara IV
A pleasure yacht was found adrift in the Atlantic south of Bermuda on September 26, 1955; it is usually stated in the stories (Berlitz, Winer) that the crew vanished while the yacht survived being at sea during three hurricanes. The 1955 Atlantic hurricane season lists only one storm coming near Bermuda towards the end of August, hurricane "Edith"; of the others, "Flora" was too far to the east, and "Katie" arrived after the yacht was recovered. It was confirmed that the Connemara IV was empty and in port when "Edith" may have caused the yacht to slip her moorings and drift out to sea.
Carolyn Cascio
A Cessna piloted by Carolyn Cascio, on June 6, 1969, with one passenger, attempted to travel from Nassau
, Bahamas to Cockburn, Grand Turk Island. The plane was witnessed by many air traffic controllers in Cockburn's airport to circle the island for 30 minutes, after which, it flew away apparently for another island. All attempts from the ground to raise Cascio on the radio failed.

Funny Signs


News Headlines



Lack of brains hinders research.
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New vaccine may contain rabies.
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Two convicts evade noose, jury hung.
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Safety experts say school bus passengers should be belted.
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Man run over by freight train dies.
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Smokers are productive, but death cuts efficiency.
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How to combat that feeling of helplessness with illegal drugs.
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Juvenile court to try shooting defendant.
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Clinton wins on budget, but more lies ahead

Celebrity Homes

John Travolta

Halle Berry


Oprah


J-Lo and Mark Anthony


Eddie Murphy


Billy Joel


Hugh Hefner


Sylvester Stallone


Tiger Woods




Baltic -The Lone Mariner

This incredible heartwarming rescue story appeared in the Mail Online last Friday. It proves once again how being in the right place at the right time can save a life ..... even a dogs life.
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A dog was rescued from an iceberg floating 18 miles from land in the Baltic Sea.
Sailors plucked the animal to safety after it got trapped on ice on Poland's Vistula river and drifted for more than 70 miles.
Rescuer Adam Buczynski said: 'He didn't even squeal. There was just fear in his big eyes.'


Trapped at sea: Baltic perched on an ice flow after drifting for four days before being rescued.

It’s thought Baltic’s problems began when he got trapped on ice on the Vistula River near Torun on Friday.
A day later he was spotted in Grudziadz, 40 miles upstream, where fireman tried to reach the German shepherd-type mongrel.
But thick ice made it too risky to launch a rescue craft despite Baltic floating just a few yards from the river bank.
Another bid to save the stranded mutt was made at Kwidzyn, 22 miles further on towards Poland’s coast.
After sightings dried up it was assumed the dog had perished.
But incredibly Baltic had travelled a further 50 miles to the river mouth before heading out to the ocean where finally his luck turned when scientists on a research boat spotted something odd moving amid the broken ice.
Natalia Drgas, of the Institute of Meteorology and Water Management, said: 'One of the sailors thought they had seen another seal but then he noticed it had legs, ears and a tail.'
However the men on board the Baltica soon found saving the stranded dog was by no means plain sailing.
First they tried to catch the dog in a net on a pole but when that failed they had to drop a pontoon with crewmen.
Seaman Adam Buczynski said: 'We tried to sail as close as possible but as we approached the boat pushed the ice and the dog was sliding off.
'The dog didn’t even yelp but you could see the fear in his eyes.'
With darkness falling and time running out Baltic was finally hauled on board in sub zero temperatures late on Monday.
Captain Jan Jachim said if his ship had passed that way a few moments later the dog would never have been spotted amid the gloom.
He said: 'We were just at the right place at the right time.'
And he added that few boats chart those waters at that time of year.
'Baltic was drifting with the current further and further out to the open sea. He would have gone further if we hadn’t seen him.'
But Captain Jachim may not have seen the last of the Baltic, the salty seadog. If no-one claims him, the lucky hound will be adopted as the ship's mascot.