From: cherkaue@zomma.cs.wisc.edu (Kevin J. Cherkauer)
Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors
Subject: Re: Apparent Em Interference By Ufos
Summary: The Bermuda Triangle Mystery: Solved
Date: 5 Nov 92 18:22:37 GMT
Organization: University of Wisconsin, Madison -- Computer Sciences Dept.

In article <1992Nov2.221249.18950@netcom.com> payner@netcom.com (Rich Payne) writes:
>>Does anybody have information about "time dilation".  This thought has crossed
>>my mind before also.  It might explain a lot of other things as well.  Imagine
>>proving the unified field theory.  Solving the Bermuda Triangle mystery.
>>And other phenom.

>Long ago, when I had just gotten Appleworks for my 64K //e, I took several
>of Frank Edwards books and entered all the stuff about the Bermuda Triangle
>that I could find (hmm, maybe not Frank Edwards, but). Next I used the database
>to see what I could find. Mostly, I found nothing. But the most usefull
>seemed to be the counts of dissaperanced by month. It seems that almost
>all dissaperances were reported during December and (July, August?). There was
>a noise level of a few dissaperances during all other months.

>I concluded that this made sense if the dissaperances were the results of
>winter storms and summer storms. I never double checked, wonder if I still 
>have the files?

I have a book called _The Bermuda Triangle Mystery: Solved_, but unfortunately
I do not remember the author offhand and the book is not here with me. It was
published in the mid to late 1970's. At any rate, anyone with an open mind who
currently thinks there is anything mysterious about disappearances in the
Bermuda Triangle will probably change their mind upon reading this book. It is
the only book about the Triangle I have read which examines *original* sources
(unlike sensationalists like Charles Berlitz). It covers many famous cases of
disappearance within the Bermuda Triangle and shows that the legendary stories
do not match at all with the facts.

One discrepancy that shows up over and over is the claims in the legend of how
ships and planes disappeared in clear weather. Almost always it turned out that
when the original sources are consulted (newspapers, weather records, and
maritime trade sheets and records of the time of the incident), in actuality
there was severe storm weather, hurricanes, etc.

As for the flight of five Navy Avenger torpedo bombers (Flight 19, I think), it
is clear from the transcripts of the radio conversations that the planes
experienced a few moments of disorientation (the cause is unclear, but it is
possible it was some local weather or some other natural cause) and then the
leader panicked, convinced that they were west of Florida instead of east of it
somehow, and thus turned them toward the open ocean where they eventually ran
out of gas. (I remember hearing in recent years that the five planes have now
even been found on the ocean bottom. Anyone know any more about this?)

The most tragic irony of all is that if the leader had thought in more than the
four cardinal compass directions, they could have found land even without
knowing whether they were over the Atlantic or the Gulf of Mexico. To wit,
their actual position was east of Florida. The leader had them fly due east and
then due north to try to hit either Florida or the mainland north of the Gulf.
Result -- flying into the Atlantic. However, if they had flown northwest, they
would have hit land whether they were in the Atlantic or the Gulf. See what
panic can do to your reasoning abilities?

Another irony is that two of the last transmissions received were those of one
of the other pilots complaining, "If we just flew west, we would get home!" and
"Damn it, if we just flew west, we would get home!" (from memory).

-- 
Kevin Cherkauer
cherkaue@cs.wisc.edu

Disclaimer: The above opinions are solely the responsibility of my owners.
Newsgroups: alt.alien.visitors