SUBJECT: THE UNDERWATER CIVILIZATION THEORY FILE: UFO2789 From UFOs and the Limits of Science by Ronald D. Story c. 1981 Reproduced for educational purposes only. The Underwater Civilization Theory Reports of unknown objects entering or leaving large bodies of water or proceeding through them have been made from time to time and have been labeled unidentified submarine objects (USOs). Numerous theorists have consequently speculated that secret UFO bases might be located on the ocean beds, far from man's activities and possible detection. By moving underwater, UFOs would have access to all continents, and, by proceeding up major rivers and tribituaries, could reach many inland locations without risking detection by atmospheric flight. Vehicles capable of interstellar flight, some proponents of the extraterrestial hypothesis point out, would certainly be able to withstand the pressures and stresses of deep oceanic environments. This point has some validity, and it can also be stated that some of the most remote areas of the planet are located in parts of the southern Pacific and Indian oceans, providing easy access from the atmosphere with minimum chance of visual or electronic detection. At the same time, it could be asked why the UFO operators go to such lengths to remain unobserved, only to display their vehicles so blatently in such populated areas as the U.S. and Europe. One of the proponents of the Underwater Civilization Theory was the late naturalist, Ivan T. Sanderson, who proposed not only that an extraterrestial civilization could be using the ocean depths, but that a native civilization, one having evolved underwater long before man, could also be doing so. He concluded, in fact, that "it is much more likely that both suggestions apply." Although he provided no sources or references, Sanderson stated that more than 50 percent of all UFO reports concerned objects over, coming from, or going toward (or into) bodies of water. Related to the "Underwater Civilization" idea for UFOs is the popular explanation for the disappearances of ships and planes in the so-called Bermuda Triangle. During the past thirty years, more than 100 ships and planes with more than 1,000 persons on board have supposedly disappeared - some say "mysteriously, without a trace" - in an area variously dubbed "The Bermuda Triangle," "The Devil's Triangle," "The Hoodoo Sea," "The Triangle of Death," and "The Graveyard of the Atlantic." It is actually a large area of undefinable shape around and including the triangle formed by Florida, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico, where sea and air traffic is said to be the greatest. For reasons which are to follow, some writers have "theorized" a UFO connection to explain the "strange" disappearances. The Bermuda Triangle-UFO link to missing vessels was perhaps first hinted at in the 1930s by Charles Fort (1874-1932), who, as his biographer Loren Gross writes: "played with the notion that mysterious vanishments of ocean vessels and their crews...may be due to wanton seizures by spacemen." Two decades later, astronomer Morris K. Jessup (1900-1959), in his book, The Case for the UFO, wrote: "To attempt to postulate motive for space inhabitants kidnapping crews from ships..is in the realm of pure speculation. On the other hand...our space friends would want to know what has happened to us since they left, or what has happened to us since they put us down here. Again, there is always the possibility that the open seas provide an easy catching place." More recently, author Charles Berlitz capitalized on the triangle and a possible UFO connection by quoting in his best-selling book, The Bermuda Triangle, his friend, J. Manson Valentine, who reported several UFO sightings in the area. Berlitz also quoted a reporter by the name of Art Ford, who claimed that a final radio transmission, picked up by a ham operator from one of the doomed pilots (in this case, Lieutenant Charles Taylor, flight leader of the five Navy torpedo bombers that disappeared on December 5, 1945), contained the warning: "Don't come after me...they look like they are from outer space." But according to a transcript from the Navy Inquiry Board, what Taylor actually said was" :I know where I am now. I'm at twenty-three hundred feet. Don't come after me." Also, there are claims of unusual electromagnetic effects occurring in the triangle, a common feature of many UFO reports. Actually, none of the "magnetic anomalies" reported in the area appear to be true. Reports of compass needles spinning crazily have never been substantiated. The fact that the compass points to true north from the triangle does not cause confusion, but rather, simplifies navigation. The compass points to true north from many other places in the world. The only part of the triangle from which it does point directly north is at the southern tip of Florida. Those who claim that the north- pointing compass is strange or confusing lack even the most fundamental knowledge of magnetism, compasses, or navigation. The presence of a "space\time warp" (whatever that means) is, again, unsubstantiated. Popular author John Wallace Spencer in a revised version of his book, Limbo of the Lost, offered a provocative theory. He reasoned that: "Since a 575-foot vessel with 39 crew member disappearing 50 miles offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, and commercial airliners disappearing while coming in for a landing cannot happen according to earthly standards and yet are happening, I am forced to conclude that they are actually being taken away from our planet for a variety of reasons." In a 1975 version of the book, retitled Limbo of the Lost - Today, Spencer modified his UFO theory so that the extraterrestials were no longer carting the captives away from Earth but were taking them to hidden underwater facilities, where the ETs conducted experiments on the earthlings and their machinery. However, Spencer offered no evidence that UFOs had been present or were even sighted in conjunction with any of the incidents he described. Consequently, many think that these authors, in order to attempt to make a bigger story, are "dressing up" their accounts by including UFOs. The UFO-capture theme was again used in the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind: The five Navy torpedo bombers that disappeared in 1945 had been taken aboard a gigantic "mother ship"; all of its captives (unaged over the years) were released at the end of the movie to demonstrate that the extraterrestials are friendly after all. In reality, the "Bermuda Triangle Mystery" has been shown to be a sham -an accumalation of careless research, misconceptions, sensationalism, and downright falsification of data - and is so regarded by most leading UFO researchers. For example, the 575-foot ship that Spencer claimed had disappeared was found within two weeks, sunken in shallow water. Volatile fumes in the holds had exploded, nearly tearing the ship in two. The airliner that Spencer said had disappeared while on a landing approach was a chartered DC-3 that lost its way at night in 1948, out of sight of land, because of radio navigational problems. Thorough investigations of other incidents by Larry Kusche (author of The Bermuda Triangle Mystery - Solved) led to similiar down-to-earth explanations. According to the April 1978 issue of J. Allen Hynek's International UFO Reporter: "the Bermuda Triangle stories...are NOT relayed by the pilots or sailors who experience them; they are the fraudulent literary distortions of a small handful of authors. All triangle mysteries so far have been examined. Would that the more baffling UFOs (which are themselves the mysteries) were so easily resolved." ********************************************** * THE U.F.O. BBS - http://www.ufobbs.com/ufo * **********************************************