Chapter One The Mystery of Flight 19 What happened to Flight 19 How is it connected to the Bermuda Triangle Something odd happened It happened on December 5 1945 Five Navy planes took off They left from Fort Lauderdale Florida They flew over the Atlantic Ocean They were training Training means practicing They practiced flying They practiced dropping bombs The mission was called Flight 19 A mission is a job It wasn’t special Training happens all the time Flight 19 was going well Then something went wrong Their compass stopped working A compass is a tool It helps pilots find places 4
The Flight 19 planes were torpedo bombers 5
Consider the EviDeNCE Flight 19 made the Bermuda Triangle popular But many disappearances happened before it The USS Cyclops was a large ship It weighed 19,000 tons It carried materials The materials were needed to make weapons It had over 300 people on board It crossed the Bermuda Triangle It disappeared on March 4 1918 Nothing was left behind It made a record in U S naval history It’s the largest loss of life not caused by war Some believe Germans took the ship The Germans said they didn’t Some believe it had engine trouble Some believe it sank in a storm But no one really knows 6
The planes flew the wrong way There was rain There were winds There were clouds One of the airmen said I don’t know where we are We must have got lost after that last turn Airmen are pilots and crew members Fourteen airmen were on the planes The planes and airmen disappeared They were never seen again Another plane went after Flight 19 It had 13 airmen It flew over the same area It also disappeared Navy experts studied what happened They said this plane exploded It blew up in the air The plane was not safe It was known to catch on fire The Navy sends out search-and-rescue teams 7
