I'm Maggie Smith, and this is The Slowdown.

I was a child in the 80s. It was a lot like the show Stranger Things, minus the monsters

and wormholes, of course, kids riding their bikes in suburban neighborhoods, listening

to music on cassette, playing board games with their friends.

One thing I remember fearing as a kid based on my reading and on television shows at the time was the Bermuda Triangle.

I definitely watched too many episodes of unsolved mysteries as a kid and read

lots of Choose Your Own Adventure Books. The Bermuda Triangle is a section of the North Atlantic Ocean

off North America. It shaped, well, like a triangle,

stretching from the Atlantic coast of Florida to Bermuda to the islands known as the greater Antilles.

More than 50 ships and 20 planes are said to have mysteriously disappeared in the area.

And although theories of supernatural causes have become lore, geophysical and environmental factors are most likely irresponsible.

Okay, then, so we can consider that debunked.

The Bermuda Triangle isn't what I thought it was as a child.

A big part of growing up is reevaluating what we once believed, fact-checking our news sources,

and becoming more discerning in general, and not just about stories we read, but about our

own lives, too. Today's piece is collaborative, written by Sophie Clare and Corey Zeller. I love the way it

begins with the legend of the Bermuda Triangle, but then turns toward the incredibly personal,

though there isn't a single person's perspective or experience behind it.

An excerpt, from there is only one ghost in the world, by Sophie Clare and Corey Zeller.

Despite legend, the Bermuda Triangle does not have a higher rate of disappearances than other

geographical sites. It does not appear on a single world map.

At present, Alaska ranks as having the most disappearances per capita,

...