{"id":331230,"date":"2025-12-05T12:27:03","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T12:27:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/aerospace\/flight-19-vanished-in-1945-fueling-the-myth-of-the-bermuda-triangle\/"},"modified":"2025-12-05T12:27:03","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T12:27:03","slug":"flight-19-vanished-in-1945-fueling-the-myth-of-the-bermuda-triangle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=331230","title":{"rendered":"Flight 19 Vanished in 1945, Fueling the Myth of the Bermuda Triangle"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Eighty years ago, five planes vanished during a training run off the Florida coast. A patrol plane sent to search for the men went missing, too, giving rise to a host of conspiracy theories<\/h2>\n
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Francine Uenuma<\/a><\/p>\n

– History Correspondent<\/span><\/p>\n

\n \"Walter
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Walter Reed Parpart Jr. (right), the radioman on one of the missing planes, poses in front of a Fort Lauderdale sign in 1945.
\n Courtesy of Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale Museum<\/span>
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\u201cI don\u2019t know where we are,\u201d a voice on the radio said. \u201cWe must have got lost after that last turn.\u201d<\/p>\n

This message was the first inkling that something was amiss with Flight 19<\/a>, a routine United States Navy training run off the coast of Florida on December 5, 1945. In the confusing hours that followed, the five torpedo bombers\u2019 radio transmissions grew fainter as their fuel supply dwindled. Soon, the men\u2014a mix of Marines and naval aviators\u2014were no longer able to communicate with land, and two naval patrol bombers were dispatched to search for them. A short time later, one of the rescue planes abruptly dropped off radio contact and disappeared, too.<\/p>\n

In total, six aircraft carrying 27 men (14 from Flight 19 and 13 from the patrol bomber) vanished over the so-called Bermuda Triangle<\/a> that day. No confirmed trace of them has ever been found<\/a>. Eighty years later, Flight 19 remains one of aviation\u2019s most notable<\/a> mysteries<\/a>\u2014and where answers are elusive, legions of theories have emerged to fill in the blanks<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Five Avenger torpedo bombers flying in formation over Norfolk, Virginia, in September 1942<\/p>\n

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

From alien abductions to the lost continent of Atlantis<\/a>, magnetic anomalies, methane eruptions and time travel, highly improbable explanations for the disappearances of planes and ships lost in the Bermuda Triangle<\/a> have gripped the public\u2019s imagination. Flight 19 has even appeared in both a Steven Spielberg<\/a> film<\/a> and a Scooby-Doo mystery<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Yet the real postwar tragedy that inspired these fictionalizations is a mystery that denies the imagination a satisfying explanation, supernatural or otherwise. Instead, false assumptions, fleeting communications and a hastily scrambled rescue search left behind clues as to what transpired in the final moments of Flight 19\u2014and exposed a series of decisions that, if they\u2019d unfolded differently, might have brought the men home safely.<\/p>\n

A minute-by-minute breakdown of the disappearance of Flight 19<\/h2>\n

At 2:10 p.m. on December 5, flight leader Charles Carroll Taylor<\/a>, a 28-year-old lieutenant known as \u201cC.C.,\u201d took off from Naval Air Station (NAS) Fort Lauderdale. He was accompanied by four other planes. The squadron\u2019s flight plan<\/a> advised the men to practice bombing<\/a> on a small grouping of rocks near the Bahamian island of Bimini, a distance of 56 miles, then fly up over the northern islands of the Bahamas before turning back east to Fort Lauderdale\u2014a routine navigation exercise intended to last around 2 hours and 40 minutes.<\/p>\n

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\"How

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A map of Flight 19’s planned route and navigational fix, in addition to the likely path of the Mariner \/ Illustration by Meilan Solly
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Lieutenant Robert F. Cox, the pilot of an unrelated flight coming out of the same air station, picked up that first concerning transmission shortly before 3:45 p.m., according to declassified records<\/a> digitized by the National Archives. In a later interview with investigators, Cox recounted establishing contact with Taylor, who informed him that \u201cboth my compasses are out. \u2026 I am over land, but it\u2019s broken. I\u2019m sure I\u2019m in the [Florida] Keys, but I don\u2019t know how far down, and I don\u2019t know how to get to Fort Lauderdale.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cox, who didn\u2019t yet realize that Flight 19<\/a> couldn\u2019t have made it as far south as the Keys, advised Taylor to fly north, with the setting sun visible to the west on his left wing. He also offered to fly toward the lost pilot\u2019s location to pick the men up. Taylor waved Cox off, reassuring his fellow lieutenant that he now knew where he was. \u201cDon\u2019t come after me,\u201d Taylor said\u2014a statement that would later assume mythical significance in the supernatural theories<\/a> that proliferated after Flight 19 vanished.<\/p>\n

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\"Lieutenant

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Lieutenant Charles Carroll Taylor<\/p>\n

Courtesy of Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale Museum<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But Cox noticed something strange: The squadron\u2019s transmissions were growing weaker. He realized that Taylor\u2019s formation couldn\u2019t be flying north from the Keys, which would have brought the group closer to his own position off Fort Lauderdale, on Florida\u2019s east coast. Instead, the five Grumman TBF Avengers<\/a> seemed to be straying farther from the coastline, toward the Bahamas and the vast expanse of the Atlantic Ocean.<\/p>\n

A flurry of confused communications ensued among ground units and those trying to advise Flight 19. Around 4:25 p.m., Taylor asked if anyone in the area had a radar screen that could pick up the group\u2019s location in real time, but no such technology<\/a> was readily available. An air-sea task unit based in Port Everglades, a seaport in Fort Lauderdale, alerted pilots<\/a> and potential rescuers along the Florida coast of the squadron\u2019s situation, simultaneously asking about available navigation equipment and requesting that<\/a> Taylor switch to a less-trafficked emergency radio frequency.<\/p>\n

The sheer volume of radio communications makes it difficult to know how much of the back and forth actually got through to Flight 19, but subsequent accident reports<\/a> highlighted efforts to advise Taylor and his men to fly west, \u201cinto the sun.\u201d \u201cIf these directions had been heard and carried out,\u201d investigators later concluded, \u201cwe are certain this flight would have returned to base safely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Around 4:45 p.m., Taylor relayed that the group planned to \u201cfly north to make sure we are not over the Gulf of Mexico,\u201d off Florida\u2019s west coast. Half an hour later, he seemed to concur with outside observers\u2019 advice, stating that the men would fly west \u201cuntil we hit the beach or run out of gas.\u201d Taylor reminded the other Avengers to remain in formation and, if gas got low, to ditch together.<\/p>\n

At 6:04 p.m., Taylor made a crucial decision\u2014one that likely doomed Flight 19. He concluded that they \u201cdidn\u2019t go far enough east\u2014turn around again\u2014we may just as well turn around and go east again.\u201d As lights were being lit at air stations and on ships up and down the Florida coast in hopes of guiding the men home, they were unknowingly flying in the opposite direction.<\/p>\n

When ground units were finally able to calculate a navigational fix<\/a> (an estimate of the squadron\u2019s coordinates) around 6 p.m., it was estimated to be within 100 miles of 29 degrees north latitude, 79 degrees west longitude\u2014well north<\/a> of the Bahamas and roughly east of Daytona Beach, Florida.<\/p>\n

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Map of Navigation Problem No. 1, the training exercise undertaken by Flight 19<\/p>\n

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In retrospect, it is an agonizing irony that by this point, rescue units could no longer reach Flight 19 directly, but they could still hear garbled transmissions between the five planes. The last known message<\/a> came from Ensign Joseph Bossi<\/a>, one of the planes\u2019 pilots, who tried to reach Taylor at 7:04 p.m. No response was heard.<\/p>\n

What happened to Flight 19?<\/h2>\n

Exactly what happened next remains a mystery. Did the men stay together, run out of fuel and successfully ditch their planes? If so, how long did they survive in the water? Taylor had been involved in three previous ditches<\/a>, and the Avengers were almost certainly equipped with life rafts.<\/p>\n

The Navy\u2019s Board of Investigation later concluded<\/a> \u201cthat the state of the sea in the area in which Flight 19 was presumed to have landed was rough and unfavorable for a water landing.\u201d<\/p>\n

The most likely outcome is that the men \u201cran out of gas and went into the ocean,\u201d says John Bloom, director of the Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale Museum<\/a>, which hosts an annual memorial ceremony<\/a> on the anniversary of the disappearance. But any certainty of what transpired after all communications ended was lost along with the men<\/a> who died on Flight 19.<\/p>\n

Those killed included five pilots and nine crew members and trainees, some of them still teenagers, yet also<\/a> veterans<\/a> of World War II, which had ended just three months earlier<\/a>. Taylor had more than 2,500 hours of flying experience, 61 of them in combat operations. Edward Joseph Powers Jr.<\/a>, a 26-year-old Marine captain, left behind a wife and child.<\/p>\n

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Private First Class William Earl Lightfoot, gunner on one of the missing planes<\/p>\n

Courtesy of Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale Museum<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The tragedy of losing these 14 men was soon compounded after a fellow Navy pilot, Lieutenant Walter G. Jeffrey<\/a>, volunteered to fly one of two Martin PBM-5 Mariners<\/a> that departed from NAS Banana River<\/a>, around 150 miles north of the Fort Lauderdale station, at 7:27 p.m., in the direction of the Avengers\u2019 last presumed location.<\/p>\n

Within half an hour, the Mariner suddenly fell off radio contact. Later that night, a ship in the vicinity reported seeing a \u201cburst of flames<\/a>\u201d estimated to be 100 feet tall around 7:50 p.m. By the time searchers reached the site, no trace of the Mariner or its 13-man crew could be found. (Mariners were sometimes dubbed \u201cflying gas tanks<\/a>\u201d due to their high fuel capacity and propensity to experience onboard fires.)<\/p>\n

With yet another plane missing, the search took on an additional layer of complexity. It lasted five days, with more than 200 planes scouring the Atlantic each day in hopes of finding the 27 men. Sightings of flares and flashes, of life jackets and rafts, fueled hope, even if they turned out to be imagined or unrelated debris. The cycle of hope and disappointment made headlines: On December 9, for example, the United Press<\/a> news agency reported the discovery of six rafts, but officials soon retracted<\/a> the sighting as a mistake. The Associated Press<\/a> deemed the rescue mission \u201cthe most extensive search ever undertaken along the Atlantic Seaboard.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

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A Martin PBM-5 Mariner in flight<\/p>\n

Public domain via Wikimedia Commons<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A mother\u2019s fight to clear her son\u2019s name<\/h2>\n

When Taylor\u2019s mother, Katherine Taylor<\/a>, received a telegram informing her that her son was missing, she was at the front of her classroom in Corpus Christi, the Texas city where she\u2019d raised him. She was so devastated by the news that she walked out, never to return.<\/p>\n

One of the central questions asked by both Katherine and the Navy was how Taylor, a seasoned pilot with extensive flying experience, could become so disoriented that he believed he was over the Keys. Within days, the Navy convened an investigation board, which focused on the testimony of those involved in the search along the coast.<\/p>\n

Investigators\u2019 initial report<\/a>, issued internally in January 1946, acknowledged that elements of the search protocol could have been improved, including coordination between units and rescuers\u2019 ability to get a bearing on the flights. But it heavily weighted Taylor\u2019s disorientation, noting that he wasn\u2019t sure where the Florida peninsula was at the time, and that \u201cthis uncertainty influenced his later decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bloom points out that the area was unfamiliar terrain for Taylor, who had transferred up from Miami the previous month. This may explain the pilot\u2019s belief that he was over the Keys instead of the Bahamas. The squadron \u201cnever said another word about their compass not working,\u201d Bloom says. \u201cBut then they did fly north thinking they\u2019d see the peninsula, and when they didn\u2019t, they thought they were out over the Gulf, so [Taylor] flies east.\u201d What would have been obvious to aviators who had been based at the air station longer\u2014that it would have been impossible for the group to be over the Keys so soon after taking off\u2014seemed to be less apparent to the members of Flight 19 in their duress and confusion.<\/p>\n

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A group of Avengers from NAS Fort Lauderdale<\/p>\n

Courtesy of Naval Air Station Fort Lauderdale Museum<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Navy was less magnanimous in its assessment of Taylor. \u201cThe leader of the flight became so hopelessly confused as to have suffered something akin to a mental aberration,\u201d the chief of naval air training wrote.<\/p>\n

That conclusion did not sit well with Katherine. She believed there were holes in the Navy\u2019s official version, which relied heavily on rescuers\u2019 testimony in the absence of physical evidence and the aviators\u2019 own accounts. As Katherine wrote in a letter to the mother of Walter Reed Parpart Jr.<\/a>, the 18-year-old radioman with Taylor on his plane, she didn\u2019t believe the planes had been properly instructed to come west, or that their approximate location was ascertained and communicated to searchers in a timely fashion.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just can\u2019t be possible that so many could disappear without a trace,\u201d Katherine told a reporter<\/a> in March 1946, after taking a trip to Florida to interview those involved in the rescue effort. \u201cI shall never give up until I find out why!\u201d She proved to be a tenacious advocate for this viewpoint, and officials concluded that she could not be swayed. \u201cIt is believed that Mrs. Taylor is emotionally unstable as a result of this disaster,\u201d the Navy noted in its report.<\/p>\n

One of Katherine\u2019s key contentions centered around the ready plane, a standby aircraft that could have been sent up quickly from NAS Fort Lauderdale. In his testimony, Cox\u2014the pilot who\u2019d first realized Flight 19 was lost\u2014testified that he\u2019d returned to the station and asked Lieutenant Commander Donald J. Poole, the officer in charge of training flights there, if he could take the ready plane and fly northeast to the squadron\u2019s likely position. Cox recalled that Poole \u201cvery definitely said no, that he didn\u2019t think there was any use in sending it out then.\u201d<\/p>\n

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History’s Greatest Mysteries: Flight 19 Vanishes in the Bermuda Triangle (Season 2) | History<\/p>\n

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