56: Ghost Ships, Sunken Cities, And a Triangle of Doom - Disappearances from the Deep Blue Sea

2022/9/28

Chapters

Explores the fear of the ocean and the mysterious disappearance of the Mary Celeste, a ghost ship with no living crew members on board.

This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

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Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

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Hi friends, I hope you're having a wonderful day today. My name is Bailey Sarian and I'd like to welcome you to my study or just maybe my podcast, Dark History. Hi! Now if you don't know, this is a chance to tell a story like it is and to share the history of stuff we would never think about. So all you have to do is sit back, relax, and I'm gonna tell you that hot, juicy history gas. Now today's story is kind of fun because we all love a mystery. Do we? I don't know. But

But I like a mystery. And there are mysteries lurking on Earth that literally no one will ever solve, right? Now it doesn't matter if you're in the military or a scientist or a researcher, the ocean scares like millions of people, right? A lot of people have a fear of the ocean. So much so that there's actually a word for it. It's called thalassophobia. Thalassophobia.

Thalassophobia. Thalassophobia. Thalassophobia. It's called thalassophobia. Nailed it. Fear the sea. So hey, it's a valid phobia. You're allowed to be afraid of it. I mean, after all, did you know that like experts say that more than 80% of the ocean has never been explored? Never seen? Never touched?

by humans. There are even parts of the ocean that light can't penetrate. So who the hell knows what could be hiding deep down in those blue waters. Also, if you're watching this on YouTube, my lights are out back here. I just turned them on. You're welcome. So back to the story, human bodies, ships, airplanes. Maybe there's like a whole island utopia.

out there, I mean, we don't know. And many believe where there's darkness, there is terror and mystery. So tonight, maybe, you know, we're all gonna go sleep with the fishes. Sometimes it feels like no one is safe if water is involved, right? I mean, it's a substance we need to live, but who knew that sometimes it's guided by a demonic presence reaching its murky claws out of the waters to claim another soul.

Ooh, this is spooky. The first mystery we're gonna talk about is very creepy. It's a ghost ship. Spooky sound effect. I know, have you ever heard of a ghost ship? Well, it's the name of a ship that's been found usually under mysterious circumstances, just slowly floating around the waters with no living people on board. Some ghost ships are just ghost stories or stories from like the Pirates of the Caribbean.

you know, the Black Pearl. Honestly, no, I don't because I've never seen the Pirates of the Caribbean, but I've been on the ride. So I kind of get it, right? Anyways, what I'm actually getting at is there's a really famous, famous ship that had some very mysterious circumstances around it. And that is the Mary Celeste. I know, I know.

This is a mystery that even experts who've studied the case for years and years, they can't seem to figure it out. And boy, does it give you the heebie-jeebies. So this story, it starts with a man named Captain Benjamin Briggs. Now by 1872, Captain Briggs had been a captain for like a...

A long time, okay? He was tired. The sea life is very rough and he's ready to just turn in his captain's hat and just work as a businessman like all his other friends. You know, he got married, he was a father, he's turning into a family man. He's just ready to settle down and start this new chapter of his life.

But when he saw this really beautiful ship named the Mary Celeste, it was up for sale. Oh man, he just, he was like, it's speaking to me. I cannot resist. I need to get this ship. I mean, it was beautiful. It was like the 1800s version of a freaking yacht. Mary Celeste was originally built in 1861, but had just had a $10,000 renovation, which today is like spending over $300,000 on a renovation. So,

It was noise. It was real noise. It was a massive 100 foot long ship made of solid cedar wood and weighed like 282 tons. Which like side note, how do you even build a ship that big? How do you get it into the water? I don't get it. Do you build a ship directly in the water? Do you scoot it in? I got a lot of questions. Let's ask Noah. He had a big ship and animals. It was a big ass ship. And this ship was something called a merchant ship.

and this is a ship that would take anything you needed to buy, sell, or trade locally or internationally. So getting this was a good business opportunity for the seasoned seaman, Captain Briggs. You know, it's like good money. He was hired by a wine merchant to bring 1,700 barrels of alcohol to Genoa, Italy on the Mary Celeste. I guess the wine merchant needed extra barrels of alcohol to make his wine stronger, which good for him.

You know, great. So with the wine barrels on board, Captain Briggs and his crew make a pit stop in New York City to pick up his wife, Sarah, and their two-year-old daughter, Sophia. Captain Briggs wanted to bring his family along for the journey. This was just supposed to be a very, you know,

laid-back, easy business trip that could double as a cute little vacation for the family. So, on a rainy morning in November of 1872, Captain Briggs and his family, as well as seven crew members, button up their coats and excitedly board the Mary Celeste.

On the ship was Briggs' first mate, Albert, second crewmate, Andrew, Edward, the ship steward or manager, and four German seamen, Arian, Gottlieb, and two brothers named Volkert and Boz. So Briggs himself actually chose his team and they all had great reputations and were described as

peaceable and first-class sailors. So like we've said before, this wasn't Briggs' first rodeo. He knew the ocean and he knew how to handle a ship. And also he had a great track record. I mean, he had led many successful voyages. And unlike many other captains at the time, he wasn't a drunk. I mean, that was rare. That's not like me being shady. That was rare. In fact, Briggs was something called a teetotaler. And this was like an

old-timey way of saying that he was straight edge you know like they don't drink don't do drugs or anything i was gonna make like a straight edge joke but honestly good for them they're doing the lord's work out there keeping their bodies pure let them have that what i'm getting at is that briggs wasn't dipping into any of the booze that he was taking to italy but someone would this

Visit BetterHelp.com slash Dark History today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Dark History. The journey to Genoa should have only taken like a few weeks, but I guess the weather turned out to be pretty rough.

I mean, they were sailing at the end of November, so basically winter, not exactly the ideal time to be sailing around the world, but you know, it's all right, here we are. A few days into the journey, something much worse seemed to have happened to Mary Celeste. Okay, so picture this, it's December 5th. A British captain named Morehouse is sailing his ship

through Portugal, it's a different ship, okay? Now it's a chilly foggy day, okay? He decides to go above the deck and check out the seas real quick. He looks to the ocean and in the distance he sees something moving. He's like, "What's that? What is that?" The fog, it clears and he's like, "Oh, it's a ship."

Great. And it's not just any ship. He actually recognizes it. He's like, hey, I know that ship. That's the Mary Celeste. He continues to watch the ship and he can tell that the movements seem to be all over the place. Like the captain is drunk or maybe something's off. So he calls to his men to come and look at the ship and they're just as confused. You know, why would it be moving like that in the ocean? And as the ship gets closer, they notice their sails are all messed up.

They're all in the wrong direction. Some of them are even missing. The ship floats closer to them, and now all of Morehouse's crew are jumping up and down, sending signals to Mary Celeste like, hey, are you guys okay over there? You good, man?

"Man, you good, bro?" Asking if they need any help, but they're not getting any type of response from the Mary Celeste. And that's when they start kind of maybe putting pieces together and they're like, "Oh, I think something might be off here." The captain realizes that the Mary Celeste left New York eight days before their ship.

and it shouldn't even be in the middle of Portugal. And why are there ropes hanging off the side of the ship? That's when the crew looks at each other and realizes something is very, very wrong. Now, Captain Morehouse decides to send a few of his crew over to investigate the situation. So two seamen hop in a raft and paddle on over to the Mary Celeste. They climb aboard.

And they look around and realize that no one's there. No one's manning the wheel. No one's steering. The whole ship was completely empty. There was no sign of a captain, no sign of the captain's wife, the crew, the two-year-old Sophia. What in the world was going on? Aliens. That's what everyone thinks, I know. I know. Aliens, always. If it ain't aliens, it's women, you know? Welcome to dark history.

Right away they noticed that the two of the hatches, you know those trap doors that lead down to the rest of the ship, well they were left open. Now this isn't a great sign, but they are there to help so they make their way below the deck. Maybe they're down there and you know, right? I mean anything could be there. Blood, bodies, the kraken, jaws. Well it's weirder than any of that because at least they'd have some answers.

But all they find is a few feet of water, which I guess isn't a bad thing for a ship this big. But there are no bodies and no other clues as to what happened. In Captain Briggs' room, they find a sword stashed under his bed and the ship's log. But the last entry was made on November 25th, nine whole days before. And this entry didn't say anything about like a storm or cause any type of alarm.

Briggs had noted their location, which was 400 nautical miles away from where they were now. Nothing is adding up and nothing's making sense. The seamen realize that the Mary Celeste's lifeboat is missing. So, okay, you know, maybe, maybe there was a storm and they took the lifeboat. But if there was a storm that scared the crew into leaving,

Why hadn't they taken any food with them? And why hadn't they mentioned it in the ship's log? So the whole thing, too many questions, you know? So there are actually a few theories out there as to what happened to the Mary Celeste. One of them was the thought that maybe a storm rolled in, forcing the ship completely off course. And if that happened, the captain probably told his crew to abandon ship.

This doesn't make a whole lot of sense because again, there was nothing physically wrong with the Mary Celeste, which most likely would have happened during a crazy storm. There's another theory out there that some people think some sort of giant sea monster must have jumped out of the ocean and swallowed everyone whole, which sounds fun, but you

but there were a lot of myths about the sea monsters back then. And with no evidence about where the Mary Celeste passengers went, people were like, "Yeah, it's gotta be sea monsters then." Many can't get on board with that one because the ship would have been destroyed in some kind of way if a big sea monster jumped up and ate everyone on the ship. But I'm not saying it's not possible, right? There's another interesting theory, which are pirates.

I know. I know what you're thinking. Like, Bailey, pirates? Come on. But it's actually not a stupid theory because back then pirates were a very much real threat, especially if they came across a merchant ship. The pirates, they could shoot at you, jump on board, rob you, kill the captain, take over. And that was actually what Captain Morehouse, who found the Mary Celeste, said. He believed that pirates did it.

And that one kind of seems to make sense, but let me further explain, because here's my theory. You ready? It's a good one. I solved it. Thank you. You're welcome. The sailors that found the Mary Celeste were the pirates. A theory, not a fact. Theory. Plot twist, right? Bet you did not see that one coming, but hear me out. First of all, there was no signs of violence, right? Pirates, pervert.

Pretty violent, can't be pirates. They would have like left some, they would have stole everything and everything was still on the ship. Second, the Mary Celeste was found in great condition, no leaks, no major issues. And again, the captain was great about filling out the ship's log, updating it all the time like he was supposed to. And then suddenly it just stopped. The food was left on board along with everyone's personal stuff like jewelry. And here's the even crazier part. The day before the Mary Celeste set sail,

Captain Briggs had dinner with the other captain, Captain Morehouse. Coincidence? I think not. Now I'm not gonna say Captain Morehouse and his sailors murdered everyone on the Mary Celeste, but hey, anything's possible if you just believe, you know? But to me, it sounds like Morehouse and his crew boarded the Mary Celeste,

maybe forced everyone into like the lifeboat, told them to go suck a dick and fuck off and like go into the ocean. And they took the ship to cash in on like the sweet reward if they turned in that ghost ship. Because when Captain Morehouse found the ship, that's exactly what he and his crew did. They brought the Mary Celeste to a port city nearby.

And while there, the British authorities questioned Captain Morehouse and were like, "Oh, you just found this super valuable ship out in the ocean?"

That's a little suspicious. It's kind of like someone saying they just found a Ferrari on the side of the road with the keys in the ignition and now they want to sell it. Would you buy it or would you have some questions? I'd be like, how much? You know, there's always a price. Another interesting piece of information. Remember the booze that Captain Briggs was transporting to Italy? Well, by the time Morehouse turned the ship in, nine of those booze barrels were empty.

And like I mentioned earlier, Captain Briggs, he was straight edge. And since he was in charge, it was very likely his crew wasn't drinking either. So that leaves his wife and two-year-old, which I'm gonna just go ahead and say they probably weren't drinking either, but I don't know. So plenty of reasons for the British authorities to be a little suspish, right?

But they end up giving Morehouse and his crew a modest little consolation prize for hauling the ship to shore. It was a very valuable ship and the booze especially was still worth like a pretty penny. On board was about $30,000 worth of alcohol barrels and today that would be like $800,000. Would you push some people overboard for that amount?

I'm laughing because I think some of us would. And maybe that's exactly what happened. You just never know. All we know for sure is that the ocean seems like the perfect place to, I don't know, get rid of 10 people and their bodies. I'm not suggesting anything like for you to do, but back then maybe. Listen, the ocean is a very big, large place. It's a body of water, right? So it makes sense like some people would go missing over the years. But...

What if I told you whole civilizations have disappeared into the ocean? This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customer survey who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary. Discounts not available in all states and situations. This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? The things you know make you feel better even when it's impossible to make time for them.

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere. And the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash darkhistory today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash darkhistory. Like...

sucked in, gone. And one of the most famous of these lost civilizations, Atlantis. Now that we've touched a little bit on a ghost ship, let's talk about a ghost town. And one of my favorites, and a lot of people's favorites, Atlantis. And no, not that fun Disney movie that still holds up. I'm talking about a real city that was written about

our good friend, Greek philosopher Plato. He's not my good friend, I don't know him. I'm just kidding. Plato wrote lots of books in his time, and in one of them he talks about a perfect civilization, something he called a utopia made up of half gods, half humans. Now I'm imagining a whole society of hotties. No, I'm not.

Anyway, the utopia he was writing about was called Atlantis. Atlantis was a huge island in the Mediterranean, almost a million square miles, which is like six Californias, okay? It was huge. Like you would have to try really hard to miss that thing. The Atlantis empire was actually made up of a bunch of smaller islands with little canals and moats between. Think of Venice.

Which, irony, is also a sinking city. Anyways, the Atlantis Islands were lush, green, and beautiful, full of exotic animals. And the thing that really sets Atlantis apart was how advanced it was. I mean, for starters, they had running water, which is huge. Not really a thing back then. But not just that, they had hot and cold running water. Groundbreaking. Groundbreaking. Now, this place, Atlantis, even had a racetrack for horses that circled the entire island.

And because of their strong naval base and godlike warriors, Atlantis basically dominated the lands around them in the Mediterranean. Most Atlanteans, besides being ripped and godly, were also famously good people. They were pure of heart, super moral, just absolute angels living in paradise. But nothing good lasts forever, they say.

The Atlanteans got comfortable. They even got greedy. And these good people became morally bankrupt. The legend goes that Zeus... Oh, are you Zeus? No, Zeus didn't have a triton, did he? Oh, you're Poseidon. Okay, I don't know.

I thought you were Ariel's dad. The legend goes that Zeus, who was basically the big daddy Greek god, he sees this and he's like, "No, you guys, you're having too much fun. You're not being good people. You had to let all this go to your head. Now you have to pay the price." So Zeus curses the land. He brings in huge earthquakes, raging firestorms, complete and utter destruction. Could you imagine?

minding your own business and fireballs start flowing at your face and like the heavens are falling from up above, buildings are collapsing and just crushing crowds of people and the whole time the ground is splitting below their feet. The ocean around them starts rising higher and higher just swallowing people along with it and you only have a few minutes before seeing nothing but water all around you.

Ocean swallowed Atlantis right up, never to be seen again. And that's why they call it the lost city of Atlantis. Whole civilization, poof.

Gone, never heard from again. I know you're thinking, Bailey, Bailey, Bailey, this sounds so fake. Zeus, an angry ocean swallowing up people? There's no way that's real. Well, shut up, okay? But let me tell you something. Plato, the guy who wrote about Atlantis in the first place, you see, he loved combining fact and fiction in his writing. I mean, he was a pretty poetic guy. This Plato guy was huge in the study of philosophy. And so if everything else he did is studied today as fiction,

fact why is this singled out as complete fiction maybe there's some truth in there maybe if we squint it'll come to light plus back then people really thought natural disasters were like a punishment from the gods above okay so um

Look you guys this chair isn't comfortable and if you've been following me for a while, you know my chair struggles I am not satisfied with any chair ever available on the market I just had to tell you that because you're gonna see me moving around a lot if you're watching this on YouTube my butt hurts Okay, but let me get back to the story. Okay, so look if you're a sinner God punishes the people and gets rid of your land like that's what you know,

Great. So there's a good chance that there's some fact to the story of Atlantis, or at least like some version of it, right? I mean, there are people so sure that Atlantis is out there that they've dedicated their whole lives to finding it. Explorers have looked in the oceans of Scandinavia, Spain, Greece, the Canary Islands, wherever the hell that is, just searching for these lost islands. Here's the kicker, it may have already been found. Atlantis?

It might happen. You see, with all of the mystery and cool stories surrounding Atlantis, people are obviously gonna build it up in their heads. It's kind of like when your friend, your friend Deb or Joan is like, hey girl, like I've met this amazing guy. He's so hot. Oh my God, he's so hot. And he's got like a six pack. And like, you know, he's just incredible. And he like does things for me. Like takes me out for dinner at In-N-Out or something. And then you finally meet this guy and you're like,

That guy? That one? Like Joan, are you all right, girl? You need some glasses? Are we looking at the same person? You know, it's because we have on the love goggles, right? And they, yeah. Anyways, it's possible that this has happened with Atlantis. I mean, over time, it's been so overhyped to the point that people are out there looking for like this whole utopia, this whatever they've created

created in their minds. But the thing is, like, there have been lots of sunken cities found that could have been Atlantis. I mean, they were in the right area of the world. They were from the right time period. But maybe people were just underwhelmed or, like, let down. And they're like, there's no way that's Atlantis. Atlantis wouldn't look like that. You know?

You know? So if it happened to so many other cities, why couldn't Atlantis be one of them? Before you say I've completely lost it, let's talk about the cities we have cold hard proof about. Hey everybody, look at my socks. Aren't they cute? You know who sent them to me? Best Fiends, not sponsored, but you know I have worked with Best Fiends before. They're like, bitch, you love this app so much, we're gonna send you some socks.

I live in them, best fiends. I live in them. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking. Yep, while you're listening to me talk, you're probably also driving, cleaning, exercising, or maybe even grocery shopping. But if you're not in some kind of moving vehicle, there's something else you could be doing right now. Getting an auto quote from Progressive Insurance.

BetterHelp Online Therapy makes it easy to get started with affordable phone, video, or live chat sessions you can do from anywhere, and the option to message your therapist between sessions if anything comes up. Never skip therapy day with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash Dark History today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Dark History. So,

We're back. These cities that have been found underwater, you ask? Well, I'm here to tell you that they're actually so cool. I spent hours on Google just looking at the pictures because they're so cool and it's so freaky. There's literally whole cities underwater.

The fish must love it. Because you know, like when you get a new goldfish and then you put little castles and stuff in the bowl and you watch them and you're like, oh my God, I know you're living just going in and out of that little castle. Like they love it, right? I bet the fishes love it. Oh yeah, okay, back to the story. They're just whole cities underwater. Like one second, everything's fine. La dee fucking daaah.

And then the next thing, giant tsunami, gone, donezo. Now, one of the reasons experts believe that Atlantis could be real is because there's a long history of whole villages, islands, and cities getting completely wiped out. This was kind of a common occurrence for ancient Greek civilizations. I mean, earthquakes, tsunamis, and even volcanic eruptions completely destroyed entire civilizations. I mean, there's Pompeii, hello, we know Pompeii, and Crete.

I didn't know about Crete. I just learned about it right now. It's very second. Oh my God, wait, let me tell you, because there's actually another city, ancient Alexandria. Yep, she's a full ass sunken city in Egypt. Underwater, buildings, statues, everything. Look up the pictures, wow. Divers and researchers have documented it and the pictures are so cool.

cool. This city is perfectly preserved underwater, but again, nobody really knows how it got there in the first place. So if this whole city is underwater, why can't Atlantis be, right? Also kind of related, but there was this huge library in Alexandria, Egypt,

that burned down and thousands of years of ancient knowledge burned up with it. Many claim that the answer for Atlantis could have been in there. I highly recommend a good Google of it, or maybe I can do like an episode about it because it's wild. Yeah, it's really interesting. Of course there are theories. There's always theories, of course. There's one theory that a volcanic eruption in 1500 BC destroyed a bunch of Greek islands.

And Atlantis could have been one of them. Another theory that people believe is that in 2010, people think that they found Atlantis's ruins near the coast of Spain. So this got people thinking, well, maybe we're just looking in the wrong place or maybe we already found it. Or maybe we're just being impatient because on top of that, we are still discovering new things, new islands,

Like in 2021, a new island was just discovered off the coast of Greenland. And now all the maps have to be updated. Maybe we just need to like wait it out or something. I don't know. Okay, look, we can't talk about mysterious oceanic disappearances, or as I'm calling them, damp disappearances, without talking about the Bermuda Triangle.

Now you've probably heard about this one before, right? Everybody has heard of the Bermuda Triangle. And if you haven't, then I don't know what you've been doing. What have you been doing? I feel like it was...

all anyone talked about in middle school. And then we all just kind of forgot about it and decided to go to Turks and Caicos was worth the risk? Well, I haven't forgotten. You'll never find me in Turks or Caicos. Either way, the Bermuda Triangle is still snatching ships and taking names. It's not a thing of the past, Barbara. To this day, it's still taking lives. So what I'm asking you to do is pack your water wings because we're gonna deep dive into the Bermuda Triangle.

Great. So our story begins December 5th, 1945. As part of a U.S. Navy training exercise, 14 men in five different planes take off from a naval air station in Florida for a routine training mission. Now this training mission was called Flight Number 19. That's what this mission is called. So it was a very routine thing that they were doing and it was nothing new, right? Okay, great.

The planes that they were flying were called torpedo bombers because they could go, they could go so fast, I guess up to 300 miles per hour fast. These planes did not look around. They were considered the workhorses of World War II because they were so reliable and the military could always count on the bombers and their pilots to get the job done. It was said that on the day of the training mission, the weather was like super sunny

and unseasonably warm. What we do know is that around 3 o'clock p.m., everything was going according to plan. People were out fishing on their ships, and they see the planes like in the sky heading safely east around that time. But then everything changes.

Around 3:40 PM, a distress call comes in from one of the lead pilots on this mission. Now this was strange because this pilot had thousands of flight hours under his belt and had flown through World War II. I mean, this guy knew what he was doing. Anyways, so this lieutenant calls in saying both of his compasses are out and that he was lost.

He's freaking out because without his compasses, he had no idea how to get back to Fort Lauderdale and he had no idea where he was in the first place. So he's asking for help from the naval base. They're going back and forth just in emergency mode and then all of a sudden, silence. One plane after another goes dark and then all five planes in the training exercise just poof, vanished.

Everybody back on the base was listening for updates and they're just scratching their heads. Like what the hell is going on? What's happening? Nobody could explain how 14 very experienced airmen in five legit planes, like some of the best airplanes ever, could just vanish into thin air. No trace. Where'd they go?

Nobody knows. Despite this being one of the biggest air and sea searches in history, that would be the last time anyone had ever heard from them ever again. That sucks. Could you imagine? Where'd they go? That's so weird. Anyways, this wasn't the first time some weirdness was documented in this particular area of the Atlantic Ocean. You see, all the way back in 1492, everyone's favorite rapist and murderer, Christopher Columbus,

He was out sailing, crossing the ocean blue unknowingly towards the Bermuda Triangle. Yeah, get 'em Bermuda, get 'em! At night, I guess he's out there, he sees like some bright, mysterious lights moving around in the distance out in the ocean. He calls his crew to take a look, but every time they would, the lights seem to vanish and disappear. And they really thought nothing of it.

Maybe it was just a ship in the distance. Mary Celeste, is that you? But then Christopher Columbus said that a glowing object came out of the water and started shooting towards the sky. This obviously freaked everybody out. I think all of us would be scared. Or maybe they were on drugs. I mean, to be fair, we could all take this with a grain of salt. I think we all know that Christopher Columbus isn't that credible. He was known to get a little creative with his stories, add a little flavor to them.

But my point is the Bermuda Triangle has been suspish for quite some time. And Christopher Columbus's little journal entry marks the first time somebody had written down that there was something fishy going on beneath the waters in this little area. It wasn't just some like normal part of the ocean. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Most of you listening right now are probably multitasking.

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Visit BetterHelp.com slash Dark History today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com slash Dark History. And then we go to March of 1918, okay? The USS Cyclops is a ship that was used by the United States Navy. And it's like this big old ship and it made it all the way through World War I.

They named it Cyclops because it was a freaking beast. And this isn't a ship that just goes missing. It's huge. It's got sharp corners. It looks like the Tin Man. It's indestructible. You couldn't even put a dent in this bad boy. This ship honestly looks aggressive. If you see a picture of it, it's like, woo.

I'll fuck you up, man. Like that's how this ship looks. So in order to operate this beast, the ship had a huge crew made up of 306 people. It was used for all sorts of things. But on this particular voyage, the Cyclops was carrying 11,000 tons of man. It was like carrying manganese. It was carrying manganese. 11,000 tons of this chemical element that was used to make steel at the time.

So it's like the silvery metal, it's on the ship. And then there's a lot of it. So on March 4th, 1918, the Cyclops sent out a message back to their home base saying, weather fair, all is well. Now this would be the last time anyone would ever hear from the USS Cyclops. The hundreds of people on board vanished along with the ship without so much as an SOS signal. Now this baffled the Navy. What happened?

You know, they ended up searching for months. And on June 1st, 1918, the Cyclops was declared lost and the crew officially deceased. Not a single shred of evidence from the wreck could be found. I mean, there's not a shred of the chemical, nothing from the ship, nothing, just .

Once again. In an article about the disappearance, it was said, "She just disappeared as though some gigantic sea monster of the sea had grabbed her, men and all, and sent her into the depths of the ocean." It's still the deadliest unsolved mystery in the history of the Navy. Bermuda strikes again.

After decades of mysterious disappearances, a magazine finally gives this creepy area the official name, which is the Deadly Bermuda Triangle. Now, there are no official boundaries of this triangle, but if you look at a map, you'll see it goes from the tip of Florida to Puerto Rico to Bermuda and then back to Florida. It's a huge area of the North Atlantic Ocean, about 500,000 square miles, or like a...

two times the size of Texas. A big old triangle. To make things even spicier, the Bermuda Triangle is smack in the middle of something called Hurricane Alley, which, as you may have been able to guess, is a very stormy area. It's said that the waters can get very choppy, huge waves will come out of nowhere, and it's just overall extremely dangerous. You're not going fishing in the Bermuda Triangle is what we're getting at.

One of the first theories is fun and has to do with something we already covered. Some people think that the Bermuda Triangle is actually the location of the lost city of Atlantis, which if you think about it, kind of actually makes sense.

Has anyone looked into this? They think that the people of Atlantis maybe had some like powerful crystals that were filled with tons of energy, like batteries, along those lines. Anyways, they think these crystals may have had the power to pull any ships or planes that cross over them all the way to the very bottom of the ocean. There's another theory, if you don't like that one. As always, America comes through with the aliens.

Not even in America. People come through with the alien theory. I mean, again, when in doubt, you gotta point the finger at somebody. Aliens, you can't prove that it isn't aliens. And when there's no women to blame, you gotta look to the little green man. And some people believe that aliens are using the Bermuda Triangle as a portal into our world, kind of like a black hole in the ocean. They believe the lights Christopher Columbus saw in 1492 was a clear sign that this portal was real.

Yeah, for sure. So it's believed that these aliens are like capturing humans and ships and planes into the Bermuda Triangle, take them to the alien portal, and then bring them up to their alien spaceship for research. Yeah, that sounds legit. I mean, it explains how a bunch of ships, planes, and people go missing without a trace. Aliens. Pfft.

You know? Sure. I don't like that theory. I think that one's a little boring. The next theory, and probably the most scientific, compasses. Comp-asses. Oh yeah, comp. We're gonna talk compasses. Compasses were the only thing people had to navigate the ocean at the time. Now get this.

Compasses, if you don't know, work based on the magnetic pull of the earth. And whatever freaky power is beneath the surface of the Bermuda Triangle is messing with it. It's throwing people way off their course. Some people think the high iron content that's left over from a volcano in the area is what throws this magnetic field off.

No matter what the real issue is, people to this day can't rely on their compasses or other tools for navigation in Bermuda. All of the machines start malfunctioning. Where am I? My comp ass is no longer working. To further expand on that, there's a, but there's actually videos you can see on YouTube where people go to the Bermuda Triangle with an old school compass and you'll see the compass spinning around and around and around. Like there's something going on, like a mad

And not only that, the waters in the area were known to have rogue waves, which are essentially massive waves, waves that come out of nowhere and could reach up to a hundred feet high and just wipe ships out. So the theory is that these waves were powerful enough to destroy all evidence of a ship or airplane, but like there's nothing to prove that this was the case for the USS Cyclops or the guys on mission flight 19. Plus if it was a powerful wave, there would be like

you know, debris. It would end up somewhere. Anyways, look, all of these are theories and nothing is proven. Nobody knows exactly what is going on there. But what we do know is that the Bermuda Triangle continues to drag victims to their watery grave to this very day. Oh yeah. More than 50 ships and 20 airplanes have mysteriously disappeared, leading to hundreds of people just vanishing. Except for Christopher Columbus, though. He made it through for some reason. Come on, Burmy. We were

We were rooting for you. We were all rooting for you. You could have gobbled him right up. To this day, an average of four planes and 20 ships are said to vanish in the zone every year, leaving no trace behind. Not a boot, not a body, not a piece of wood, and even a button. Nothing. Poof. Gone. The theory, my theory, the Bermuda Triangle has some kind of weird magnetic pool going on underneath of it, right? And it's sucking down all these ships and stuff because...

It makes sense. Just go with me. Visualize. You're with me. Great. So that USS Cyclops was carrying a bunch of that

chemical compound which maybe the magnet was super attracted to and they had so much of it that it sucked it sucked the thing right down there was so much of it on the ship pretty powerful magnet that's my theory it's just a magnet there's something on there's something going on down there it sucked everything up and if we could just get down there i'm sure we could find what's going on but for some reason nobody wants to go like scuba over there i'll do it no

Never hear from me again. At least I'll have the answers. Anyhow, so the ocean is badass and it demands to be respected just like corn. Okay, so this part always bothers me because it's like, why are our nipples so hard for going to outer space? I'm like going to Mars and going to other planets and stuff when there are literally terrifying things

mysteries and things that we haven't even seen as humans right here on earth maybe just lurking in the bottomless abyss of our ocean waiting to be discovered but instead you guys want to go to like mars big

Well, everyone, thank you so much for hanging out and learning with me today. Remember, don't be afraid to ask questions to get the whole story because you do deserve that, don't you? Stay curious. It's good for your noggin. I'd love to hear your reactions to this story, so make sure to use the hashtag Dark History over on social media so I can follow along. Join me over on my YouTube where you can watch these episodes on Thursday after the podcast airs. And while you're there, don't forget to check out Murder, Mystery, and Makeup.

Yippee-ki-yay. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. You make good choices, please. Don't go fishing out in the Bermuda. And I'll be talking to you next week. Goodbye. This podcast is executive produced by Bailey Sarian, Kimberly Jacobs, Junia McNeely from 3Arts, Kevin Grush, and Claire Turner from Maiden Network. Writers, Katie Burrs, Alison Filobos, Joey Scaluzzo, and me, Bailey Sarian.

Shot and edited by Tafadzwa Nemarundwe and Hannah Bakker. Research provided by Ashley Spurgeon. Big thank you for our special expert, Zeus. Round of applause. And I'm your host, Bailey Sarian. Upside down, jumping through the ceiling, inside out. I can't wait to go to bed.

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56: Ghost Ships, Sunken Cities, And a Triangle of Doom - Disappearances from the Deep Blue Sea