Bermuda Triangle

Overview

A loosely defined region in the western North Atlantic Ocean, roughly bounded by Miami, Bermuda, and San Juan, where ships and aircraft are popularly said to have disappeared under mysterious circumstances.

Details

Origin:

Western North Atlantic Ocean, generally bounded by southern Florida, the island of Bermuda, and Puerto Rico, including the Florida Strait, the Bahamas, and the open Atlantic out to roughly 65°W.

Regions:

Florida Strait, Bahamas archipelago, Sargasso Sea (western edge), Caribbean approaches, Bermuda island shelf

First Reported:

1950-09-17

Full Account

The Bermuda Triangle is a loosely defined area of the North Atlantic Ocean, with widely varying boundaries that produce total areas ranging from roughly 1.3 to 3.9 million square kilometres. The region is most often described as a triangle whose vertices lie near Miami (Florida), Bermuda, and San Juan (Puerto Rico). Beginning in the 1950s and 1960s, popular writers — including Edward Van Winkle Jones, George X. Sand, and Vincent Gaddis — assembled a roster of disappearances of vessels and aircraft and presented them as evidence of unusual activity. Charles Berlitz's 1974 bestseller The Bermuda Triangle established the phenomenon in mainstream culture, while Larry Kusche's 1975 book The Bermuda Triangle Mystery: Solved offered a methodical debunking, showing that many of the cited cases were exaggerated, omitted relevant weather, or occurred outside the area entirely. The U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, and Lloyd's of London do not recognize the Triangle as an unusually dangerous area; statistical analyses indicate the region's accident rate is comparable to other heavily-trafficked stretches of ocean.

Also Known As

• Devil's Triangle (United States)
• Hurricane Alley (North Atlantic)
• Limbo of the Lost

Etymology

Origin:

The phrase 'Bermuda Triangle' was coined by writer Vincent Gaddis in his February 1964 Argosy magazine article 'The Deadly Bermuda Triangle'. Earlier press treatments include Edward Van Winkle Jones's Associated Press article (Miami Herald, 17 September 1950) and George X. Sand's October 1952 piece in Fate magazine, which first sketched the triangular shape.

Meaning:

Refers to the triangular shape formed by drawing lines between Miami, Bermuda, and San Juan.

First Use:

1964 (Argosy, Vincent Gaddis); the alternate name 'Devil's Triangle' was popularized by Richard Winer's 1974 book of that title.

Timeline

• 1950-09-17 — Edward Van Winkle Jones's Associated Press article on Atlantic disappearances appears in the Miami Herald (First wire-service collation of the area's disappearances)
• 1952-10 — George X. Sand publishes 'Sea Mystery at Our Back Door' in Fate magazine (First account to define the triangular shape)
• 1964-02 — Vincent Gaddis publishes 'The Deadly Bermuda Triangle' in Argosy (Coins the term 'Bermuda Triangle')
• 1965 — Vincent Gaddis publishes Invisible Horizons (Expands the Argosy article into book form, embedding the term)
• 1974 — Charles Berlitz publishes The Bermuda Triangle (Best-selling popular treatment that fixes the legend in mainstream culture)
• 1975 — Larry Kusche publishes The Bermuda Triangle Mystery: Solved (Methodical debunking showing many cited incidents were exaggerated, mislocated, or had mundane explanations)
• 1992 — U.S. Coast Guard public statement: no statistical anomaly in the area (Government position consistently reaffirmed)

Cultural Significance

Popular belief in unexplained disappearances persists despite a century of mundane explanations; the Triangle functions as a modern maritime myth.

Related Phenomena

• Dragon's Triangle (Devil's Sea) — Pacific equivalent off Japan, popularized by Charles Berlitz
• Mary Celeste — Famous abandoned-ship mystery often cited alongside Triangle lore
• Phantom ships — Vanished and ghost-ship maritime phenomena
• Bennington Triangle — Vermont disappearance cluster invoking the same triangle metaphor
• Bridgewater Triangle — Massachusetts paranormal hotspot cluster

Tags

Sources

• Invisible Horizons: True Mysteries of the Sea — Chilton Books
• The Bermuda Triangle — Doubleday
• The Bermuda Triangle Mystery: Solved — Harper & Row
• Limbo of the Lost — Phillips Publishing
• The Devil's Triangle — Bantam Books
• The Deadly Bermuda Triangle — Argosy
• Sea Mystery at Our Back Door — Fate
• Sea's Puzzles Still Baffle Men in Pushbutton Age — Miami Herald (Associated Press)
• Bermuda Triangle — Wikipedia
• Bermuda Triangle FAQ — U.S. Coast Guard Historian's Office