Posted on 03/15/2016 12:48:13 PM PDT by nickcarraway
A new discovery has revived an old theory about ocean water gobbling up ships in the Bermuda Triangle—if, that is, the Bermuda Triangle even exists.
Researchers from the Arctic University of Norway say they’ve spotted large craters apparently created by methane buildups off Norway’s coast, Atlas Obscura reports.
“Multiple giant craters exist on the sea floor in an area in the west-central Barents Sea … and are probably a cause of enormous blowouts of gas,” they tell the Sunday Times. “The crater area is likely to represent one of the largest hotspots for shallow marine methane release in the Arctic.”
Other experts have said gas blowouts from such craters, which measure 150 feet deep and up to a half-mile wide in Norway, could explain the sinking of ships in a region between Puerto Rico, Miami, and Bermuda dubbed the Bermuda Triangle.
“There is a version that the Bermuda Triangle is a consequence of gas hydrates reactions,” Russian scientist Igor Yeltsov said last year, per the New Zealand Herald.
Ice-like underwater methane can break away and form gas that bubbles to the surface, Live Science explained in 2014; Yeltsov says it erupts “like a nuclear reaction, producing huge amounts of gas.”
Research has shown that such eruptions could sink sea vessels, as NBC News reported in 2003, and this YouTube video appears to confirm that. But it’s not clear these blowouts even occur in the Bermuda Triangle, the Guardian notes.
And skeptics say the Gulf Stream’s many tropical storms would better account for the Triangle’s lost ships and planes.
The very term “Bermuda Triangle” is questionable: Still dismissed by the US Navy, it was invented in a dramatic 1964 article that probed the “mysterious menace” behind ships and airplanes lost in the area.
So the answer is: Earth Farts.
No.
Sea Dragons
Beat me to it.
And the Greenies though that cow farts were bad.
Good think the cratered seafloor wasn’t damaged when the minesfields were installed (and mines detonated) off the Norwegian coast during World War II.
I knew that while spending hours in the air in the Triangle with the USCG
Whatever you do, don’t strike a match.
Jumpin’ Jack Flash! It’s a gas, gas, gas.
I flown over that area 1000s (ok, probably 100s) of times.
Violent storms happen pretty quickly there with little warning.
Bad enough in an airplane where you can generally outrun or overfly them; given the fairly large number of shallow reefs in the area (as I understand it; not a sailor), I would think it would rather difficult.
How would these gasses create the loss of navigational equipment, compos, and such?
It wouldn't. But the bubbling gas would make the water less dense, and thus less buoyant, and a ship could suddenly sink.
Inject enough bubbling methane into the Sea water and the ship hits the bottom in seconds. It’d be over fast.
That I understand. But according to those who experienced incidents in the vicinity also spoke of navigational equipment not working in a number of instances. Both magnetic and electronic. Could it be possible that more than 1 abnormality occurs at the same location? Possible but highly unlikely. JMO There are few coincidents.
Giant herds of Sea Monkeys!
[[I flown over that area 1000s (ok, probably 100s) of times.
Violent storms happen pretty quickly there with little warning.
Bad enough in an airplane where you can generally outrun or overfly them; given the fairly large number of shallow reefs in the area (as I understand it; not a sailor), I would think it would rather difficult.]]
I have spent a lot of time fishing there and can tell you that storms do happen pretty quick there and so do huge waves .
My uncle had a 29 foot cabin cruiser rigged up for fishing.
He and I were out fishing one day when an enormous wave came up on us out of no where , it took both of us grabbing the wheel to steer the boat into the wave to keep it from capsizing.
I have heard that ships in those circumstances don’t so much sink as fall...
Great science! Just take a discovery thousands of miles away and apply to to a different area and assume that the cause is the same without looking.
I thought it was only Justice that was supposed to be blind ...
Now that sounds like a really fun institution of higher education.
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