The Ourang Medan, The Mystery of the Deadliest Ghost Ship in History

In June 1947, the Dutch freighter S.S. Ourang Medan was traveling along the straits of Malacca, when the ship suddenly sent out a chilling distress signal.

"All Officers, including the Captain, are dead. Lying in chartroom and bridge. Possibly whole crew dead."

This first message was followed by a series of indecipherable Morse code sequences until finally, a last ominous transmission:

"I die." 

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Ourang Medan's grim SOS was picked up by British and Dutch listening posts around Sumatra and Malaysia, who worked together to determined where the signal was coming from and alerted nearby ships.

American merchant ship Silver Star was first to reach Ourang Medan. They waived and shouted at the vessel to check for signs of life above deck. But there was no answer. Only eerie silence.

The US ship decided to send out a rescue team to board the ship to look for survivors. But what they found was a blood-curdling nightmare.

The entire Dutch crew was a ghastly pile of corpses – eyes wide open in horror, mouths are frozen in an eternal scream, arms stretched out as if saying stop as if saying no more.

Inside, they found the captain with the same twisted expression on his face as that of his men, dead on the bridge of the ship. Now nothing more than a dead captain, leading a dead ship.

His once strapping officers are now cold corpses straggled on the wheelhouse and chartroom floor. Even the ship’s dog wasn't spared a horrific death.

But the most harrowing is finding the radio operator, fingertips still on the telegraph where he sent his dying message.

After seeing the chilling devastation on board, the Silver Star decided to tow the Ourang Medan to port. But it wouldn't make it to shore, as thick clouds of smoke started rising from the lower decks and interrupted the rescue.

The crew barely had time to sever the line and move to safety, before the Ourang Medan exploded. The blast was apparently so big that the ship “lifted herself from the water and swiftly sank,” taking with it all the answers to its mysterious end to the bottom of the sea.

Or so the story of the Ourang Medan goes.

Some details may differ slightly in each version of the story. Like it happened in February 1948 instead of June 1947. Or that the waters that day were choppy instead of calm. And that the crew wasn't just dead, but they were decomposing at a faster rate. 

While in some versions, the details are, well, too detailed. Like one of the two American ships that heard the distress signal was named The City of Baltimore. That the smoke from the lower deck before the explosion came exactly from the Number 4 hold. Or that the poor canine aboard was a small terrier.

But whichever version of the story you've heard (or told), the basic plot points remain the same - Ourang Medan's entire crew met a gruesome and inexplicable death, and then very conveniently blew up and sank to the bottom of the ocean, leaving us all with an unsolved nautical macabre mystery.

So what happened to the Ourang Medan?

Theory #1: It was a cover up.

The most commonly pointed out loophole in the tale of the Ourang Medan is the vessel's lack of paper trail.

The Lloyd's Shipping registers don't have any mention of the ship. It's not in The Dictionary of Disasters at Sea that covers the years 1824-1962. It wasn't in the Registrar of Shipping and Seamen either.

There's no trace of it in the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. Nothing in the Dutch Shipping records in Amsterdam. The Maritime Authority of Singapore also doesn't have the ill-fated ship in any of their records. 

In other words, the Ourang Medan was a ghost ship, even before it gained notoriety as one. Because there's no tangible proof that it even existed.

But as espousers of this legend would explain, it's because the Ourang Medan is part of a transnational government cover-up involving the Netherlands, Japan, Germany, China, the United States, and possibly many others.

They believe that the ship was deliberately expunged from all maritime records because it was being used to smuggle a secret cargo of lethal nerve gas to Japan.

Saying the Ourang Medan's voyage is linked to Army Unit 731 founded by Japanese bacteriologist Shirō Ishii, whose main objective was to bring back a weapon of the chemical, gas, or biological variety, that could win the war in their favor.

But as the Geneva Protocol of 1925 prohibited the use of all chemical and biological weapons in war, the only way a large shipment of poisonous gas could make it across the other side of the world without raising any suspicion from authorities is by loading it as inconspicuous cargo, in an old, beat up Dutch freighter.  

This theory also provides a convenient and somewhat plausible explanation for the grisly death of the Ourang Medan's crew. With that much hazardous chemicals on board, a gas leak would've certainly led to the immediate death of everyone in the ship.

However, it wouldn't explain why the rescue crew from Silver Star wasn't affected by the poisonous gas when they boarded the ship.

Or why, like the Ourang Medan, there’s no mention of the Silver Star in Lloyd's register.

Theory #2: It was carbon monoxide poisoning.

American author and inventor of the term Bermuda Triangle, Vincent Gaddis, speculates that it was carbon monoxide poisoning is the answer to the mysterious deaths of the Ourang Medan crew.

According to his theory, burning fuel from a malfunctioning boiler system produced carbon monoxide fumes that poisoned the crew.

When breathed in carbon monoxide enters the bloodstream and prevents red blood cells from carrying oxygen around the body. At high levels, carbon monoxide can cause dizziness, vomiting, seizures, loss of consciousness, and even death. 

The trouble with this theory is that Ourang Medan is not an enclosed space. Fumes could've simply escaped into the atmosphere, and lives of the crew working the upper decks of the ship would've been spared.

Theory #3: It was pirates.

What's a story about a ghost ship without pirates, right?

There are theories claiming that pirates invaded the Ourang Medan and killed everyone on board, which although doesn't explain some accounts saying that there were no visible wounds on the victims' bodies, it does fit with the Strait of Malacca's long history with piracy as far back as the 14th century.

Because of its geography - narrow and dotted with many islets - it makes it ideal for a surprise attack towards ships using it as the trade route to China and Europe.

Theory #4: Ghosts

One of the most repeated, but arguably, also the most inconsequential detail in the story of the Ourang Medan is the extreme chill the rescue team felt as soon as they entered the hull of the ship, despite it being 110°F outside.

Inexplicable drop in temperature plus the frightened expressions on the crew's faces set in a vast, unforgiving sea, equals ghosts did it.

There aren't many supporters of this theory, but what's a ghost ship story without a ghosts-did-it theory?

Theory #5: Aliens

You might think that the alien theory is the most far-fetched, the most uncreative, the most cop out theory explaining the phenomena of the Ourang Medan, but it's a very popular theory, with entire books dedicated to it.

The story of the Ourang Medan has all the elements of a good mystery - inexplicable deaths, unknown assailants, world powers, war, pirates, ghosts, and multiple highly-plausible conspiracy theories. 

Which is probably why it still fascinates us to this day, even if it's already been dismissed by historians, researchers, and the casual internet fact-checker alike as a hoax.

But if it's good enough for the CIA to release a document in 1959 saying, that the Ourang Medan holds the key to many of the sea's mysteries, including that of sightings of huge fiery spheres that come from the sky and descend into the sea, then, it's certainly a hoax worth retelling.

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Sources:
1. Death Ship: The Ourang Medan Mystery, http://mysteriousuniverse.org/2011/11/death-ship-the-ourang-medan-mystery/
2. The Myth of the Ourang Medan Ghost Ship, 1940, http://skittishlibrary.co.uk/the-myth-of-the-ourang-medan-ghost-ship-1940/
3. S.S. Ourang Medan, http://www.crime-mystery.info/great-mysteries/ss_ourang_medan/the_hoax
4.S.S. Ourang Medan, https://www.historicmysteries.com/ourang-medan/
5. CARGO OF DEATH, https://web.archive.org/web/20070205223141/http://www.neswa.org.au/Library/Articles/A%20cargo%20of%20death.htm
6. LETTER TO<Sanitized> FROM C.H. MARCK, https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP80R01731R000300010043-5.pdf
7. Did the Ourang Medan “ghost ship” exist?, https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/20263/did-the-ourang-medan-ghost-ship-exist
8. The SS Ourang Medan: Death Ship (Updated), https://shortoncontent.wordpress.com/2015/01/15/the-ss-ourang-medan-death-ship-updated/
9. Mysterious Death at Sea: the Disturbing Discovery at the S.S. Ourang Medan, http://weekinweird.com/2011/07/17/mysterious-death-sea-disturbing-discovery-s-s-ourang-medan/
10. The Mammoth Book of Unexplained Phenomena: From bizarre biology to inexplicable astronomy, https://books.google.com.ph/books?id=YHCeBAAAQBAJ&lpg=PT263&dq=Vincent%20Gaddis%20ourang%20medan&pg=PT263#v=onepage&q=Vincent%20Gaddis%20ourang%20medan&f=false
11. Vincent Gaddis, http://self.gutenberg.org/articles/eng/Vincent_Gaddis
12. Crime on the high seas: The World's Most Dangerous Waters, http://www.cnbc.com/2014/09/15/worlds-most-pirated-waters.html
13. The World's Most Dangerous Waters, http://time.com/piracy-southeast-asia-malacca-strait/

Blood Splatter Discovered On Shroud Of Turin, Could Belong To Jesus Christ

Along with the Holy Grail and the Spear of Destiny, the Shroud of Turin is one of the most sacred religious relics on the planet. The piece of linen, measuring 53 square feet and containing the faint image of a man, is believed by millions of Christians from around the world to be the cloth Jesus himself was buried in after death.

Ever since a photo negative of the linen captured by Italian amateur photographer Secondo Pia revealed an image of a body over 100 years ago, scores of researchers have analyzed the image as well as the blood stains and fabric to try and confirm or dismiss the linen’s authenticity. But after years and years of studies, tests, and debates, they came to the conclusion that it is still hard to tell. No one knows for sure. Some say the blood on the cloth belongs to Jesus while some claim that the face of Jesus was painted on by counterfeiters in medieval times. 

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The biggest focal point for skeptics is a carbon-14 dating conducted in 1988 where a small piece of fabric from the corner of the shroud was sent to labs at the University of Oxford, the University of Arizona, and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. All three places confirmed that the material dated back to 1260 and 1390, which is more than a thousand years after Jesus was alive. That seemed like a huge piece of evidence to dismiss the authenticity of the shroud, but soon researchers found that the carbon dating that came from the top edge of the shroud produced a much different date than a piece taken from the bottom edge of the cloth. 

But here’s the thing: even if the image was from medieval times and not from the time of Jesus, there is still the mystery of how the image of the man was created in the first place. Every scientific attempt at replicating the image has failed so far. This has caused the shroud of Turin to become not only one of the most sacred relics but also one of the most mysterious.

Recently, researchers in Italy analyzing the shroud of Turin have discovered the blood of a torture victim on the cloth, thus supporting claims it may have been used to bury Jesus. The new findings, titled New Biological Evidence from Atomic Resolution Studies on the Turin Shroud, was published in a US scientific journal that was carried out by The Instituto Officina dei Materiali in Trieste and the Institute of Crystallography in Bari.

The study says that the cloth contains 'nanoparticles' usually not found in the blood of someone healthy. According to Elvio Carlino, a researcher at the Institute of Crystallography in Bari, Italy the cloth reveals the 'great suffering' of a victim 'wrapped up in the funeral cloth.'

According to professor Giulio Fanti of the University of Padua, the blood contained high levels of creatinine and ferritin, substances found in patients who have suffered from devastating traumas like torture. According to him, 'the presence of these biological nanoparticles found during our experiments point to a violent death for the man wrapped in the Turin Shroud.'

The Shroud of Turin has been an intensely debated topic in the world of science ever since. If these findings are true, then they will completely shatter the skeptic theory that image on the cloth was forged by counterfeits.

Elvio also said that 'these findings could only be revealed by the methods recently developed in the field of electron microscopy' and  'the nanoscale properties of a pristine fiber taken from the Turin Shroud.'

Even though this study sheds a bit of light on this ancient mystery, there are still numerous questions that we have yet to answer. Was this shroud the same exact cloth Jesus Christ was buried inside when he died? How was the image of the man created on the cloth created?

Italian physicist Paolo Di Lazzaro told National Geographic: “It is unlikely science will provide a full solution to the many riddles posed by the shroud...A leap of faith over questions without clear answers is necessary—either the ‘faith’ of skeptics, or the faith of believers.”

If you want to see the shroud for yourself, it is currently on display at St. John the Baptist Cathedral in Turin. At the moment, we can only wait for more evidence regarding the Turin's Shroud before we fully reveal it's mysterious origins. 

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Sources:

• https://www.rt.com/viral/396609-turin-shroud-blood-torture/ 
• https://www.livescience.com/52567-shroud-of-turin-dna.html 
• http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/04/150417-shroud-turin-relics-jesus-catholic-church-religion-science/ 

Hundreds Of Giant Mysterious Tunnels Discovered In Brazil

Brazil – a tropical paradise and home to some of the best athletes in the world.

It is the largest country in both South America and Latin America and boasts a beautiful culture and stunning scenery. In Brazil, you can find the iconic Christ the Redeemer statue and the awe-inspiring Corcovado and Sugarloaf Mountains. Travelers and explorers will find a wonderful slate of fauna such as the giant anteater, several varieties of sloths, armadillos, otters, and even capybara in the country.

However, Brazil has more than meets the eye. In fact, the country has its fair share of mysteries.

In 2010, geologist Amilcar Adamy from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, found a giant hole a few miles north of the Bolivian border. Upon investigation, he realized that the hole could not have been naturally made. None of the caves Adamy explored looked like anything the tunnels featured, with their round passages and smooth floors.

The mysterious tunnels have since then been discovered by various experts around the country and have opened up an entirely new realm of possibilities for geological studies.   

The Tunnels

source: Disclose.tv

Geologist Heinrich Theodor Frank stumbled across the tunnels while driving on the national Novo Hamburgo Highway. While driving, a hole of around one meter in diameter caught his attention. The hole was located at a construction site, and after further investigation, Frank discovered that the hole led to a complex underground tunnel. The tunnel was about 70 centimeters high and a few meters in length, with what appeared to be strange scratches on the ceiling of its walls. 

After further exploration, Frank realized that hundreds of similar tunnels existed all over Brazil. The state of Rondonia alone has a large complex of 600 meter-long tunnels. Not only that, 2,000 burrows with similar characteristics have also been found. 

Not even the locals in the area knew about the origins of the tunnels. Further tests showed that the tunnels were not man-made in origin. 

The Mysteries

Urban legends point towards various "historical" and even supposed "mythological" origins of the mysterious tunnels. Some say the tunnels were created by Indians, Jesuits, slaves, or even revolutionaries. Others believe the tunnels are a giant anthill or were even made by bears. Very rare few point towards a great mythological serpent that may have used the tunnel as its home.

Regardless, geological evidence alone proves that the tunnels were not created by Brazilian natives. The Indians who lived in Brazil even before the Europeans arrived did not use iron, and therefore had no means of digging through the hard rocks around the tunnels. 

According to Frank, there is no natural geological process known to man that can produce the features of the tunnels. These features include the circular or elliptical cross-sections that branch, rise, and fall around the area.

The geographic distribution of the tunnels is another mystery to scientists. The tunnels were only found in the southern parts of Brazil - particularly in the states of Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina. They don't exist anywhere else. 

source:Earth Touch News Network

The claw marks on the walls of the tunnels are also peculiar.

Prehistoric animals such as giant armadillos or possibly mega-sloths are thought by many to be possible creators of such marks.

The biggest burrows, with sizes of up to five feet in diameter, may have been dug by ground sloths that have adapted to the area’s environment and developed digging skills.

Giant armadillos, though shorter than sloths, may also have the skills necessary to dig these tunnels as well. The grooves along the ceiling may, in fact, be marks the animals have left whenever they pause or stop working. 

Unfortunately, there are no specific indications of these animals living in the country. Moreover, the sheer size of the tunnels cannot possibly be made by any “giant” armadillos or sloths – at least, ones that we know of.

The giant armadillo, the largest existing member of its family, weighs between 65 and 90 pounds and is native to South America. However, its burrows are about 16 inches in diameter, and only up to 20 feet long. If the tunnels’ five foot wide and 250-feet long burrows are in fact dug my animals, then it should be one extremely big creature – one that has not been discovered yet. 

However, it seems there is still another possibility.

Historical Evidence

source: Ancient Origins

Frank eventually sent photographs of the tunnels to Marcelo Rasteiro of the Brazilian Society of Speleology. He introduced the notion of "paleoburrows" excavated by living organisms in any geological age.

Examples of these organisms include worms in the Cambrian Era, mollusks in the Mesozoic Era, or rats in the Pleistocene. These are all organisms that have lived millions of years ago.

Until the early 2000s, hardly any burrows attributed to extinct animals can be found in scientific literature. In fact, it was only in 2015 that Adamy himself had the opportunity to extensively explore the mysterious tunnels. 

If this paleoburrow theory is to be believed, then the tunnels in Brazil may have been created between 10,000 and 8,000 years ago. If this is the case, then the Rondonia tunnels Frank have discovered may be the first - and the largest - paleoburrow in the Amazon.

These tunnels can actually be found all over the world, which adds even more depth to the mystery. Frank said similar caves could be found in countries such as Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile, Bolivia, and Argentina. 

Until scientists can figure out who, what, or how these paleburrows were made, they will remain an unfathomable enigma.

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Sources:

http://www.ancient-code.com/experts-baffled-discovery-hundreds-mysterious-tunnels-brazil/
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2017/03/28/paleoburrows-south-america/#.WPiI9tKGOUk
http://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/extinct-megafauna-dug-these-incredible-tunnels-in-brazil/
http://www.ufrgs.br/paleotocas/Producao.htm

The Deadly Enigma of the Devil's Sea

We all have to respect the ocean; not just because it is the foundation of many forms of life, but because this massive body of water can also be quite ruthless when it comes to claiming lives. Many of us know better than to underestimate how many human lives could be lost in an ocean-related tragedy, and needless to say, mankind has had too many of them. Thousands of years of maritime history can attest to the harsh realities that humans have had to face when navigating through Earth’s “final frontier.” 
 
While the vast expanse of the Ocean promises treasures just as much as it forbodes tragedies, certain parts of the planet's hydrosphere pose deadlier dangers to those who dare pass through their waters compared to other sea and ocean regions. And one of those most dangerous stretches of water which is shrouded in curious mystery can be found in the gigantic Pacific Ocean. This region of the Pacific goes by many names. Aside from “The Dragon’s Triangle,” it is also referred to as the “Devil’s Sea,” “Formosa or Taiwan Triangle,” and the “Pacific Bermuda Triangle.” 

The name “Dragon’s Triangle” can be traced back to old Chinese fables which originated from around 1000 BCE. These tales spoke of dragons that lived underwater and, from time to time, capsized and sank naval vessels along with the seamen aboard them for these mythical creatures’ consumption and to satisfy their hunger.

On the other hand, the oceanic area’s name the “Devil’s Sea” or “Ma-No Umi” in Japanese was actually coined by the natives of Japan a long time ago because of the local legends that speak of the area’s notoriety in subduing and consuming even the strongest and the most buoyant of ships, and for being the home of terrifying sea monsters that drowned people to death. 

The “Dragon’s Triangle” is located in the region of the Pacific Ocean near the Japanese volcanic island of Miyake, which is just around 100 kilometers south of Japan’s capital, Tokyo. It is a triangle-shaped danger zone found between the coast of Japan and the Islands of Bonin, and it covers a large part of the Philippine Sea. Although this region is well-known by Japanese fishers, the Devil’s Sea is still not officially labeled on nautical maps, and reports on its size and the area it occupies have provided conflicting estimations that has yet to be reconciled conclusively. 

From the names referring to this part of the Pacific, we can already tell that there is something dangerous about this oceanic area. The reason why people regard the Dragon’s Triangle as a deadly enigma is because of reports of its unpredictable and sometimes violent weather. There are also claims of random and unexplained occurrences of ocean phenomena such as maelstroms, ocean swells, and rogue waves. Another interesting reason is the alleged disappearances of several maritime vessels and aircraft along with many other strange events in the region. 

Because of the perils, it poses to the vessels and the seafaring individuals that pass through it, the Dragon’s Triangle has gained significant notoriety that Japanese authorities went so far as to brand it as hazardous for marine travel and expeditions. 

What is also fascinating about the Dragon’s Triangle that makes it worthy of discussion is that it is one of the 12 Vile Vortices that exist today. Paranormal expert Ivan Sanderson coined the term “vile vortex” in his 1972 article titled “The 12 Devil’s Graveyards Around the World.” A vile vortex is an area found in different parts of the world, where the pull of Earth’s electromagnetic waves is thought to be at its strongest. Five of these vortices are situated on the same latitude below the equator, while five of them are on the same latitude above the equator. The remaining two vortices are the north and south poles of the planet. These 12 areas are said to be prime sites of magnetic anomalies, unexplained disappearances as well as other bizarre phenomena.

The Dragon’s Triangle, in particular, is located above the equator and is aligned opposite to where its Atlantic counterpart – the Bermuda Triangle – is situated. And just like the Devil’s Sea, this region in the western portion of the North Atlantic Ocean is also notorious for being the subject of similar cases of mysterious disappearances and paranormal phenomena. 

Legends, Stories, and Strange Incidents in the “Dragon’s Triangle

Kublai Khan and his men at sea

There are many legends, stories and cases of mysterious disappearances of boats, ships, and aircraft as well as other strange incidents in the Dragon’s Triangle that we know of today.

One popular tale supposedly took place back in the 1200s. According to this story, Emperor Kublai Khan of the Yuan Dynasty attempted to conquer Japan twice by crossing the Devil’s Sea. Both efforts to take over the country did not succeed, and they resulted in the loss of the Yuan emperor’s sea-faring vessels, as well as the demise of more than 40,000 crewmen of these ships in the initial attempt alone.

There is a famous Japanese legend dating back to 1803 that talks about another eerie incident in the Dragon’s Triangle. This Japanese Utsuro-Bune legend involves a hollow boat that’s shaped like a box and resembles an incense burner or “kou-hako.” Inside this boat was a foreign-looking female who bore unique physical features. Fishermen who found her brought the woman inland to investigate her, but she did not know how to communicate in Japanese. This has led for some people to speculate that this particular story is an actual case of a close encounter with an extraterrestrial or interdimensional being.

Modern linguist and author Charles Berlitz, in his 1989 book “The Dragon’s Triangle,” made a sweeping declaration that there were a lot of fishing boats, tankers, Japanese and American warships and aircraft, and Soviet submarines that had fallen prey to the harsh waters and weather conditions of the Devil’s Sea. In fact, there are even much-wilder speculations that link the Dragon’s Triangle to the world-famous disappearance of the renowned female pilot Amelia Earhart.

Another popular case of a ship’s disappearance in the Devil’s Sea is that of the Kaio Maru No. 5 back in 1952. The Kaio Maru No. 5 was a research vessel of the Japanese government that investigated the undersea activities of the region. The ship supposedly disappeared in the Dragon’s Triangle along with its crew of 31 people who were never seen or heard from again. 

 

Explanations on the Strange Mystery of the Dragon’s Triangle

As is usually the case with most mysterious phenomena, many theories have been put forward which took a crack at explaining the strange stories and incidents that have taken place within the danger zones of the Devil’s Sea. Some of the explanations are more scientific and rational, but there are also those who fit the realm of the supernatural, paranormal, and speculative science. 
 
There are those who believe that the Dragon’s Triangle could be housing a secret or hidden doorway or a black hole that leads to another dimension or a parallel universe. Some also connect the oceanic region with the lost city of Atlantis, while others have raised the possibility that extraterrestrials have something to do with the sudden and unexplained disappearance of many vessels and sea-faring individuals that passed by the area.

Of course, rational and natural explanations have also been presented to put the questions surrounding the controversial and strange mystery behind the Dragon’s Triangle to rest. For one, deep-sea fishing has always been a dangerous line of work, which is why it should not come as a surprise that many fishing boats have sunk in the region of the Devil’s Sea and other surrounding seas and oceans near Japan. Some even say that the number of incidents of fishing boats that sank in the Dragon’s Triangle is no higher than the average, and so, there could be no big mystery after all. 
 
Another explanation for the disappearance of the boats and ships in the area could be the vast field of methane hydrates that lies at the bottom of the ocean within the zone of the Devil’s Sea. According to this theory, methane hydrates – or ice-like deposits that detach from the bottom of the ocean floor – turn into the gaseous form of methane clathrates which, in turn, produce bubbles on the water’s surface. When methane clathrates surpass the temperature of 18 °C (64 °F), they result to gas eruptions that mess with buoyancy and consequently leave ships vulnerable to sinking easily. 
 
Some of the other natural explanations related to the disappearance of various vessels and people in the Dragon’s Triangle have something to do with undersea volcanic activities, the movement of tectonic plates, as well as agonic lines and magnetic anomalies.
 
The scientific and natural explanations mentioned above should have been sufficient enough for everyone to tear off the shroud of mystery and inexplicability surrounding the Dragon’s Triangle. Even then, many still prefer to believe in more unconventional theories of the paranormal. But regardless of whether or not you choose to believe the scientific or the supernatural explanation, it cannot be denied that the Dragon’s Triangle or the Devil’s Sea is among the world’s most compelling mysteries about the oceans and high seas and that much of it remains to be thoroughly understood.  
 
And so, for those who might find themselves cruising somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, perhaps it would be in your best interest for the time being that you steer clear of this region.

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Sources:

http://www.crystalinks.com/bermuda_triangle.html
http://www.unexplainedstuff.com/Places-of-Mystery-and-Power/Japan-s-Dragon-s-Triangle.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil%27s_Sea
http://edition.cnn.com/2011/TRAVEL/05/31/sea.legends.bermuda.triangle/index.html
http://listverse.com/2013/05/10/10-places-as-mysterious-as-the-bermuda-triangle/
http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/beyond-bermuda-triangle-devils-sea/
http://www.wisegeek.org/what-is-the-dragons-triangle.htm
http://www.marineinsight.com/maritime-history/unexplained-mystery-the-devils-sea-the-dragons-triangle/
http://mysteriousfacts.com/mystery-of-the-devils-sea/
http://www.paranormal-encyclopedia.com/d/dragons-triangle/
https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4337

Five Space Mysteries Science Still Can't Solve

It’s not a big secret that the vastness of space is filled with puzzling mysteries.

Mankind has barely gone past our planet’s moon, and only one of our probes – the Voyager 1 – has managed to leave the solar system. A lot of what we have learned about deep space came from falling objects and telescopic views that have been pierced together by the brightest minds in astronomy.

Some of the more well-known mysteries involving space have already been resolved by various experts in the field. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that space remains full of wonder and unexplained phenomena. Some of these mysteries may eventually be resolved by means of astronomical observations, but others may never actually be given an accurate answer.

The prestigious journal Science selected several of the most puzzling questions that leading astronomers are still baffled with today. They have enlisted the help of different experts in deciding which mysteries have the staying power of remaining unanswered in the distant future, while also weeding out those questions that might soon be answered in the years to come.

And so, in no particular order, let me tell you about five of the most compelling space mysteries that science has so far been unable to solve.

The Mystery of Dark Energy

It was back in the 1920s when astronomer Edwin Hubble made the stunning discovery that the universe is not in a static state, but is in fact, expanding. This was corroborated and expanded further in 1998, when the Hubble Space Telescope – which incidentally is named after the same iconic astronomer – provided the data from distant supernovas that allowed scientists to reach an even more astounding conclusion that the universe is expanding at a slower rate in the past compared to the rate of its expansion at present.

This earth-shaking discovery threw off many scientists from their balance as they long believed that the gravity of matter would gradually decrease the speed of universe’s expansion. It was even believed that gravity would also be responsible for making the expanse of the universe contract. In order to explain the universe’s accelerated expansion, the widely-debated dark energy was conceptualized. This dark energy is what is believed to be the mysterious force that is expanding the universe at ever-increasing speeds.

Although dark energy is theorized to make up around 73 percent of everything that exists in our universe, it is still unseen and unmeasured by mankind. And though the energy is needed to balance out the mathematics of the universe, it is also likely that we may never get to detect and uncover its true nature.

 The Mystery of Dark Matter

Back in the 60s and the 70s, astronomers came up with the hypothesis that universe contains more mass than what can be perceived physically. Vera Rubin, in particular, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution of Washington, thoroughly studied and researched the speeds of stars at different locations in various galaxies, and she discovered that there was virtually no difference between the velocities of stars located at the center of a galaxy and those which are found at the farther parts of the same galaxy. These results somehow deviate from basic Newtonian physics, which suggested that stars which are located on the outskirts of a galaxy should orbit more slowly compared to those found at its center.

To explain this unusual phenomenon, astronomers theorized an invisible mass which then came to be known as “dark matter.” Though it cannot be seen, dark matter possesses mass, and its existence is supposedly supported by the gravitational pull that this invisible mass exerts on ordinary matter. This makes dark matter the “glue” which theoretically holds everything in the universe together. Dark matter is believed to make up approximately 23 percent of the universe, and while scientists are still not so sure what dark matter actually is, modern technology may soon allow scientists to detect some of its particles, hopefully in the foreseeable future.

The Mystery Behind the Missing Baryons

Credit: University of Wisconsin- Madison

 Dark energy and dark matter combined makes up roughly 96 percent of the universe, while regular matter only makes up around 5 percent of our cosmos. However, more than 50 percent of the particles of regular matter – referred to as baryons – is said to be missing. These baryons are particles composed of protons and electrons, and according to astronomers, the count of these baryons from the early formation of the universe to its current state has been dropping from some unknown reason, as if they were gradually but inevitably erased from cosmic history.

Tracking down the location of these missing baryons in the universe continues to be an important priority in the scientific field of astronomy, as the discovery of where they are could help scientists and researchers to paint a much clearer picture on how galaxies and other structures in the cosmos evolved as time went by.

The Mystery Behind Supernovas

Do you know how do stars explode? Many of the processes that have something to do with how stars and the solar system are formed are essentially understood by modern science now. What is not clearly known by researchers, however, is what happens in a star in the event that it finally explodes.

In the untimely event that a humungous star completely depletes its fuel and perishes, it triggers a massive explosion referred to as a “supernova.” This spectacular explosion is known to shine very brightly – in fact, much brighter than the glimmer of an entire galaxy. In recent years, significant strides achieved in supercomputing have made it possible for astronomers to research about the stars’ and supernovas’ internal conditions, and to recreate them by designing complex computer models. But even with these advanced technologies that are available for use by the brightest minds of science, many details about what goes on inside a star before its explosion, and how this explosion happens, continue to endure until now as a challenging astronomical puzzle.

The Mystery Behind the Peculiarity of the Solar System

While astronomers and space observatories have preoccupied themselves with discovering new planets which are located in proximity of other stars, some researchers have dedicated their intelligence and their resources in the pursuit of fully understanding the unique characteristics that our solar system possesses.

For example, the four innermost planets found in our solar system – including Earth – while very different from one another, all share the same feature of having rocky outer shells as well as metallic cores. On the other hand, the four outermost planets are immensely distinct from the innermost planets and from each other, with each possessing their own identifiable as well as distinctive characteristics.

And so, in the hopes of finally figuring out how our solar system was formed and how it came to existence, scientists have dedicated much of their time and exerted significant efforts into the study and exploration of the processes involved with planetary formation. Unfortunately, despite their dedication, the exact answer to the mystery of how our solar system came to be has remained elusive, and the answers that have been postulated in an attempt to explain it are not so simple.

According to experts, all existing attempts at cracking the mystery behind the diversity of each planet in our system is clouded by the uncertain nature of random chance. This line of reasoning is supported by the results of computer simulations which demonstrated that that the un-sequenced fusion of planetesimals in planetary system when it was still forming could just as likely have resulted to the formation of three or five terrestrial planets in contrast to the four planets we currently have.

But as the search and study of alien worlds which orbit other stars go beyond the stamp-collection of planets according to their orbit and mass, more insights can potentially be gained from these distant worlds in our effort to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the nature of the planets within our solar system. In learning about these alien worlds, scientists are given a higher number of planetary outcomes to assess when it comes to explaining how the solar system came to be.

The five space mysteries we have listed are not the only existing enigmas about the universe that science has yet to give a full-proof answer to. Other mysteries such as the re-ionization of the universe, the source of cosmic rays, and the reason behind the heat of the sun’s corona, have continued to motivate men and women of science to come up with various theories and hypotheses that could provide the best explanations that would possibly resolve such difficult, cosmic questions. And while there are those who propose ideas to explain these phenomena, there are also those who have dedicated much of themselves to refuting such theories and providing an alternative and more plausible explanation to these mysteries.

For some of these questions, we have gotten – even by just a little bit – somewhat closer to giving the most scientifically verifiable answers that will resolve and put an end to these space mysteries. However, it cannot be denied that many of them are expected by most to remain unsolved in the foreseeable future. And while we may never really know the complete truth behind these mysteries, that does not mean mankind will stop trying to figure them all out. And perhaps that innate human quality instilled in all of us is the most astonishing mystery of them all.

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Sources:

http://www.businessinsider.com/mysterious-space-objects-2016-7/#the-great-attractor-5
http://www.space.com/15942-modern-astronomy-mysteries-baffling-scientists.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2153367/The-space-mysteries-science-CANT-solve--weird-heat-sun-3-4-universe-thats-gone-missing.html
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/02/160218-dark-energy-matter-universe-gravity-mysteries-space/