It is the stuff of legends, pulp novels and late-night reruns of the Twilight Zone: a 140,000-sq.-mi. stretch of the Atlantic Ocean that seems to swallow unfortunate voyagers like a space-time warp. During the past 45 years, more than 100 ships and planes have disappeared in the triangular region -- roughly bounded by Bermuda, Southern Florida and the Greater Antilles -- often in circumstances as murky and mysterious as the storm-tossed sea itself.
Last week the Bermuda Triangle lost an important bit of its mystery. A New York City-based salvage company searching for Spanish galleons off the Florida coast discovered the...