In the desolate territory of Alaska, there is a place that became famous for the high rate of people’s vanishing – the Alaska Triangle. It covers the parts of the country which include Anchorage, Juneau, and the northern coastal city of Utqiagvik. It has recorded more than Twenty Thousand people missing without any trace since the early 1970s, making it to be the highest record of any region in the world.
Alaska Triangle was first brought to the public limelight in October 1972 when a small plane carrying the US House Majority Leader Thomas Hale Boggs Sr and Alaska congressman Nick Begich disappeared while flying from Anchorage to Juneau. Together with Begich’s assistant Russell Brown and pilot Don Jonz, the four men disappeared and were never found despite the extensive search, which only added to multiple conspiracy theories. The event was quite interesting especially if one considers that Boggs was a part of the Warren Commission that was investigating the death of President John F. Kennedy.
Another example is that of Gary Frank Sotherden, a 25-year-old man from New York, who went for hunting in the Alaskan wilderness during mid 1970s and never came back. Twenty years later, a human skull discovered in the Porcupine River in Alaska in 2022 was confirmed through DNA test to be Sotherden and police believe that he was killed by a bear.
Explanations for these disappearances are almost as numerous as they are hypothetical. Some attribute the vanishings to peculiar magnetic activities in the area; this may affect compasses and electronic gadgets hence causing confusion in directions and accidents. Some of them have less realistic theories, such as meetings with aliens or other creatures like Bigfoot.
But rational and more realistic causes can be attributed to the unfavourable climate of the region. The Alaska Triangle is a large region that is mostly uninhabited and contains large mountain chains, freezing cold temperatures and long nights. These factors, coupled with other natural hazards like wild animals like bears and difficult terrains make it a very dangerous place for the people living there and those visiting the place.
However, as it can be seen, the number of disappearances in the Alaska Triangle cannot be explained by any of the theories mentioned above, and therefore, the phenomenon remains a mystery. As many as 2,250 people go missing every year, and this area remains an object of interest for the public and a difficult task for detectives and scientists.
While the search for the reasons goes on, the Alaskan Triangle remains a symbol of the strength and the mystery of the nature. And people have to remember that even in the twenty-first century there are places where the mystery wins.
