In August of 1840, the French ship, Rosalie, was found deserted.  It was left in perfect order.  Several animals were found aboard, including half-starved canaries, a cat and some fowl.  The vessel’s crew is still missing.  It may have been the Rossini, which the London Times editor may have mistaken for the Rosalie.  Some people are trying to find out whether or not the two names apply to the same vessel.

   The   Mary Celeste, found in 1872, was a ship that was abandoned at sea.  It was 103 feet long.  It was found abandoned at sea after it had been lost from radar.  There was no sign of the crew at all.  No clue was given to what happened to them - except for these facts:  The lifeboat on the ship was missing.  The crew may have misjudged the stormy weather and thought the boat would tip.  So, they may have gotten into the lifeboat and started to leave.

But the lifeboat may have toppled and sank.  The crew would have drowned.  Plus, the harshness of the weather and the harshness of the sea would have left little, or no, remains of them or their lifeboat.  This would have been another solved mystery of the Bermuda Triangle, except for the fact that this did not even happen near the Triangle.  The Mary Celeste was found between the Azores and Portugal.  Not all of the ocean mysteries happen in the Triangle.  In fact, most of them don’t.  If you count up the abandoned ships and sunken ships, you’ll find that most of them are outside the Triangle; making the Bermuda Triangle Mystery a hoax. 

Any mystery in the Bermuda Triangle is usually called a “Mary Celeste”.  A lot of rumors surround the abandonment of the Mary Celeste.  Some were very detailed.  One of them claims that bread, butter, bacon, tea, warm coffee and eggs were still on the table!  Another claims that there was a bloody sword under the captain’s bed!                                                                                                             

There have been lots more disappearances than you may think. For instance, the earliest recorded disappearance of a United States vessel occurred in 1918, when the U.S.S. Cyclops vanished.  This was one of the biggest ships afloat at this time.  This 542 foot long ship was headed for Norfolk, Virginia.  The ship did not send an S.O.S.  It was first thought that this vessel was torpedoed.  A search of German records after the war proved she wasn’t torpedoed.  Then it was thought she had struck a mine.  It was later shown that there were no mines in the area.  Another discrepancy with this theory was that there would have been wreckage all over the ocean.  In addition, there would have been enough time (if it had struck a mine) to send an S.O.S. and get a lifeboat ready.  The Navy said that this is the most puzzling mystery of all time.  They are still looking for this ship today.