Hidden Detail on The Bermuda Triangle by Sudip

Everyone knows Flight 19 — five US Navy Avenger bombers that vanished on 5 December 1945. Almost nobody mentions what happened to the plane sent to find them. ▎ ▎ A PBM Mariner flying boat with 13 crew took off to search for Flight 19, and it disappeared too. The usual story counts this as a second "mysterious" vanishing. ▎ ▎ But that same evening, the crew of the tanker SS Gaines Mills reported seeing flames shooting up and a burning oil slick on the water, near where the Mariner should have been. Mariners had a reputation for fuel vapour building up inside the aircraft, and crews nicknamed them "flying gas tanks". A spark could cause an explosion. ▎ ▎ So the most famous "second disappearance" in Bermuda Triangle history probably wasn't a disappearance at all. It was very likely a mid-air explosion, seen by witnesses.