🧭 Vanished: Unexplained Mysteries from the Bermuda Triangle

The Calm Before the Storm

It was a chilly morning on November 29, 1925, when the SS Cotopaxi—a large cargo steamship—pulled away from Charleston Harbor, South Carolina. Her massive hull groaned as she began her voyage toward Havana, Cuba, carrying a full load of coal. Onboard were 32 crew members, all under the command of Captain W.J. Meyer, a seasoned sailor with decades of sea experience. The journey was routine. The Cotopaxi had made this trip before. But no one aboard could have imagined that this would be the final voyage of the ship—or that it would go on to become one of the most enduring mysteries linked to the Bermuda Triangle. Just two days into the journey, somewhere in the vast, empty blue between Florida and Cuba, the Cotopaxi transmitted a distress signal. She had encountered a violent tropical storm. According to the message, the ship had taken on water, was tilting dangerously, and the crew was in serious trouble, and then—radio silence. The SS Cotopaxi vanished without a trace.

A Fictional Discovery… or Prophetic Clue?

Years later, the Cotopaxi would resurface—not in the real world, but on the silver screen. In Steven Spielberg’s 1977 film Close Encounters of the Third Kind, the long-lost Cotopaxi is shown mysteriously reappearing in the middle of the Gobi Desert. The film suggests the ship had been abducted by extraterrestrials and deposited far from the ocean. Of course, this was fiction. But the fact that Spielberg chose this particular ship to weave into an alien abduction narrative only fueled public fascination. Why the Cotopaxi? Why this ship? Could truth have inspired the fiction?.

The Search for Answers

Nearly a century passed. The Cotopaxi became a legend of the sea—a ghost ship swallowed by the Triangle. But in 2020, one man claimed he had finally solved the mystery. Michael Barnette, a marine biologist and shipwreck hunter based in Florida, was conducting dives off the coast of St. Augustine. While surveying a wreck known locally as "The Bear Wreck," he noticed something peculiar: the vessel was significantly larger than other known local wrecks. Intrigued, he dove deeper—literally and figuratively. Michael began a meticulous investigation. He poured over dusty newspaper archives, marine insurance records, ship blueprints, and maritime logs. He cross-referenced measurements of the wreck with historical data on the Cotopaxi. What he found was astounding: the dimensions matched almost exactly. Among the wreckage, divers discovered brass valves engraved with the initials “SV”, believed to stand for Scott Valve Manufacturing Company, the supplier for parts used in the construction of the Cotopaxi.

The Case Reopens

Though Barnette’s findings were compelling, some argued otherwise. A rumor had surfaced years earlier suggesting the Cotopaxi had been found near Cuba. However, no verifiable proof ever emerged from that claim. To settle the dispute, Barnette collaborated with science journalists and shipwreck experts. Through artifact analysis, wreck site mapping, and circumstantial evidence, they collectively concluded: this was indeed the SS Cotopaxi. But why had the ship gone down? Was it truly swallowed by a supernatural force—or was the answer far more mundane?. Eventually, Barnette discovered a forgotten piece of testimony from the ship’s carpenter, found among archived shipping company records. In it, the carpenter reported that the coal hatch covers on the ship were in terrible condition before departure. The crew had been ordered to set sail despite repairs not being completed.

This detail proved crucial. If water had entered through the damaged hatches during the tropical storm, it could have easily flooded the cargo hold, causing the ship to list, lose power, and ultimately sink. The truth, it seemed, might have been tragically simple.

More Than Just a Fluke

While this case might have a logical explanation, the Cotopaxi is just one of dozens of ships and planes that have vanished within the enigmatic Bermuda Triangle. Many remain unexplained to this day. Some were lost in perfect weather. Some in mysterious clouds. And some, like the Cotopaxi, disappeared amid violent storms, leaving nothing but questions in their wake.

As the series unfolds, we’ll examine more of these bizarre cases—each one stranger than the last.

In Part 2, we investigate a plane that took off under clear skies… and never landed.