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5 Strange Unsolved Mysteries

By: Aleena

Have you ever felt like you’ve seen something move by itself? Or has something happened that you can’t explain? Even when we live in the most technologically productive era of humanity we still have not fully understood some incidents from our past. Some scientists, historians and enthusiasts have dedicated their entire careers to trying to solve some of the greatest unsolved mysteries of the world, however there are some that seem unsolvable. Here are some of the world’s top most unsolved mysteries.

Bermuda Triangle

Known as the Bermuda Triangle, this expanse of ocean can be found between the points of Miami, Bermuda and Puerto Rico and covers 440,000 square miles of sea. Pilots often report of their instruments going haywire and many ships have been lost at sea. With many different explanations ranging from gas bubbles to aliens, no one is sure what is behind this strange phenomena. The earliest suggestion of disappearances in the Bermuda area appeared in September 17, 1950 and an average of four planes and 20 boats have been reported lost a year, strangely with no trace of any debris, due to the Gulf Stream being believed to move them away. The biggest recorded loss in the Bermuda triangle was in 1945 when the Five US navy Avenger torpedo bombers flying from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to Bimini Island never showed up just after a radio call from the 14 Men on board who reported that their compasses had stopped working.

The Voynich Manuscript

The Voynich Manuscript is an illustrated manuscript written in an unknown writing system, it has been carbon dated back to the early 15th century (1404-1438) and may have been collected in Northern Italy during the Italian Renaissance. It was purchased by a man called Wilfrid Voynich in 1912 and is a series of paragraphs over 240 pages along with illustrations and diagrams broken into six sections. The topics describe different topics of Herbal, astronomical, biological, cosmological and pharmaceutical nature. What is so remarkable about the manuscript then? It’s written in a language unknown to anyone, the writing is composed of over 170,000 characters which are all written in similar patterns. It has been named “the world’s most mysterious medieval manuscript” however some people believe that it is a hoax as no one seems to be able to identify the language that it has been written in. It was even investigated by a team of expert code breakers during WWII who had managed successfully crack complex encrypted enemy messages, however failed to find any meaning in the manuscript.

Is there life on Saturn’s moon?

In October 2004 NASA’s Cassini spacecraft (which has been exploring Saturn since 2004) got closer than ever before to an extra-terrestrial ocean on Enceladus, which is one of Saturn’s 62 moons. An icy blast was discovered erupting from the moon’s South Pole, Cassini then sampled a spray which has suggested that there could be life lurking underneath the surface. At the time a Cassini program scientist called Curt Niebur said: “Enceladus is not just an ocean world. It's a world that might provide a habitable environment for life as we know it." There are also some similarities between Earth and Enceladus like the fact that both have lakes, rivers and seas and as a result, both have rain which affects the geology of the planet – although it’s lakes are made up of liquid methane and ethane. However even if it is full of different lifeforms, Cassini wasn’t built to detect any forms of life as it’s instruments don’t have the ability to give sure signs, like DNA, from the ice spray. Cassini’s mission will end when it runs out of fuel in mid-2017. Until then, it will be makings it’s final observations of Saturn’s moons. If life is found on Saturn it will roughly take around 6 years to arrive as the distance between earth and Saturn is 746 million miles (1.2 billion kilometres) apart.

Ghost boats: Who is sending ships filled with corpses to Japan?

Mysterious “ghost boats” (wrecked wooden ships filled with decaying corpses) were washed up just off Japan’s coast. These incidents happened in 2015 for a period of two months and nearly a dozen boats carrying decomposing bodies were found on the country's north western coast in just one month. The first boat was found in October and in November, ten bodies were discovered in three boats at Ishikawa prefecture. Later on, they found another boat with six skulls and more than 30 boats were found in 2015. Furthermore there were 65 the year before and 80 in 2013.There are several signs that pointed to North Korea as most of the boats were carrying equipment that had writing on them that was written in Korean and one boat had a scrap of cloth resembling a torn bit of the North Korean flag. However despite lots of research, authorities haven’t been able to figure out who had sent the boats and how the bodies had perished and died.

The lost city of Atlantis

The lost city of Atlantis is one of the oldest and greatest mysteries of the world. For decades people have been trying to locate Atlantis, which is believed to have submerged after an earthquake or tsunami. A Greek philosopher called Plato described Atlantis as a large island which is located near the Rock of Gibraltar which was the home of the most advanced civilisation. Atlantis was apparently also filled with high standard citizens, a Poseidon temple and concentric walls and canals. However nobody has been able to find the city, underwater or on land, though this hasn’t discouraged theories about its possible location. Numerous historians and explorers have attempted many expeditions to find the island. They have searched in many places such as South America, off the Greek islands, or near Antarctica however Atlantis is still elusive and one of the greatest human mysteries.

In conclusion no one really knows whether or not these mysteries will ever be solved or if they will remain as mysteries forever. However there will always be research and new conspiracy theories to try and find an answer as mystery intrigues us all and we are all made up of it at the deepest level.