Benjamin Boster

Subsequent writers did not necessarily follow this definition.

Some writers gave different boundaries and vertices to the triangle, with the total area varying from 1.3 to 3.9 million square kilometers.

Indeed, some writers even stretch it as far as the Irish coast, according to a 1977 BBC program.

Consequently, the determination of which accidents occurred inside the triangle depends on which writer reported them.

Larry Kusha, author of The Bermuda Triangle Mystery Solved, 1975, argued that many claims of Gattas and subsequent writers were exaggerated, dubious, or unverifiable.

Kusha's research revealed a number of inaccuracies and inconsistencies between Berlitz's accounts and statements from eyewitnesses, participants, and others involved in the initial incidents.

Kusha noted cases where pertinent information went unreported, such as the disappearance of round-the-world yachtsman Donald Crowhurst, which Berlitz had presented as a mystery, despite clear evidence to the contrary.

Another example was the ore carrier, recounted by Berlitz as lost without trace three days out of an Atlantic port, when in fact it had been lost three days out of a port with the same name in the Pacific Ocean.

Kusha also argued that a large percentage of the incidents that sparked allegations of the triangle's mysterious influence actually occurred well outside it.

Often his research was simple.

He would review period newspapers of the dates of reported incidents and find reports on possibly relevant events, like unusual weather, that were never mentioned in the disappearance stories.

Kuchuk concluded the number of ships and aircraft reported missing in the area was not significantly greater, proportionally speaking, than in any other part of the ocean.

in an area frequented by tropical cyclones, the number of disappearances that did occur were, for the most part, neither disproportionate, unlikely, nor mysterious.

Furthermore, Berlitz and other writers often failed to mention some storms and sometimes even represented the disappearances having happened in calm conditions, when meteorological records clearly contradict this.

The numbers themselves had been exaggerated by sloppy research.

A boat's disappearance, for example, would be reported, but its eventual, if belated, return to port may not have been.

Some alleged disappearances were in reality not mysterious.

Burlitts found that one plane believed to have disappeared in 1937 had in fact crashed off Daytona Beach, Florida, in front of hundreds of witnesses.

The legend of the Bermuda Triangle is a manufactured mystery, perpetuated by writers who either purposely or unknowingly made use of misconceptions, faulty reasoning, and sensationalism.

When the British Channel 4 television program The Bermuda Triangle 1992 was being produced by John Simmons of Geofilms for the Equinox series, the marine insurance market Lloyd's of London was asked if an unusually large number of ships had sunk in the Bermuda Triangle area.