Welcome back readers, after a short break, today I am back with my new post on The Top 10 Unsolved Mysteries Part -1. Many events take place around us every day, the cause of some of these are known and some are the events that can not be explained by any means and are termed as mysteries. Here I have prepared a list of 10 such mysteries, whose causes are still not explainable. some of these are fascinating while some may freak you out. So let's begin the journey.
1. Mystery of the SS Ourang Medan
In June 1947, a chilling SOS message was picked up: “All officers including captain are dead lying in chartroom and bridge. Possibly whole crew dead." This was followed by some indecipherable Morse code, and one final grisly message... "I die." Then, silence. It was picked up by nearby ships and listening posts, who identified the vessel as the Dutch freighter SS Ourang Medan and located it within the Strait of Malacca that separates Indonesia from Malaysia. The nearest merchant ship, The Silver Star, raced to her aid. The Silver Star was soon alongside the Dutch ship and their boarding party found a horrifying sight: every member of the crew lay dead, their corpses scattered on the decks. More than this, their eyes were still open and expressions of sheer terror were etched on their features. The Silver Star’s party found the radio operator dead too, his hand still on the Morse sending key, eyes wide open and teeth bared. There were no signs of wounds or injuries on any of the bodies. The decision was made to tow the mysterious ship back to port, but before they could get underway, smoke began emanating from the decks below. The boarding party hurriedly returned to their ship and barely had time to cut the tow lines before the SS Ourang Medan exploded and swiftly sank. It has been claimed that clouds of noxious natural gases could have bubbled up from fissures in the seabed and engulfed the ship; even aliens and ghosts have been cited as possible explanations for the Ourang Medan’s macabre and mysterious demise. To this day, the exact fate of her crew remains an impenetrable mystery.
It’s March 31, 1922, on a small farm located between the towns of Ingolstadt and Schrobenhausen in Bavaria, Germany. Six inhabitants of the farm, including a seven-year-old and a two-year-old, didn’t know that night would be their last. It started with a string of inexplicable occurrences: Footprints in the snow coming from the woods to the back door, but not leading back; creaking in the attic; an unfamiliar newspaper in the kitchen. Then house keys went missing and someone tried to break the lock on the tool shed.The house was checked but nothing was found. Andreas Gruber, The father, couldn’t decide what to make of it. He confided these strange incidents to neighbors and friends, but they were still stunned when, on a chilly night in 1922, Andreas and his family – wife Cazilia, daughter Viktoria, grandchildren Cazilia and Josef, and housemaid Maria Baumgartner – were slaughtered with a pickaxe in their home. Police deduced that Andreas, Cäzilia, Viktoria, and young Cäzilia were somehow lured to the livestock barn and slaughtered one by one. Afterward, the killer (or killers) entered the house and bludgeoned little Josef while he slept in his parents’ bedroom. Then he headed to Maria’s room and murdered her, too. The bodies were discovered the following Tuesday after young Cäzilia failed to show up for school. While police suspected robbery, they soon abandoned the theory after finding money in the house. Numerous interrogations turned up nothing. Meanwhile, autopsies revealed young Cäzilia survived her initial attack. While lying next to her dead family in the barn, she had torn out tufts of hair before finally succumbing to her wounds. as if that wasn't creepy enough, Imagine, The killer stuck around. Food had clearly been eaten from the kitchen; someone continued to feed the cattle. Neighbors reported smoke rising from the chimney and even the dog had been let out. Whoever slaughtered the residents of Hinterkaifeck stayed through the weekend and took care of the place before moving on. No one was charged the murder and to this day it remains an unsolved mystery.
3. Bouvet Island- The Vanished Boat Mystery
Bouvet Island is one of the most isolated places on Earth. It lies deep in the South Atlantic. Antarctica is the nearest landmass which is also situated more than 1700 kilometers to the south. There have been no inhabitants on the island and due to the unsustainability of plant life, there are no future possibilities. However, when a British expedition from South Africa arrived in 1964, they discovered an abandoned lifeboat. There were also certain other items near the boat like oars, wood, drum, and a copper tank. The boat was in a good condition but no traces of its passengers were found. The boat carried no identifiable marks, neither any shipping company nor any nation. Two years later another expedition was sent to the island but the boat had vanished. Its nearby objects also disappeared. To date no one knows about the boat and its passengers.
4. The Mystery of Eilean Mor
On the 26th December 1900, a small ship was making its way to the Flannan Islands. Its destination was the lighthouse at Eilean Mor, a remote island that was completely uninhabited the only people on the island were 3 lighthouse keepers. Captain James Harvey was in charge of the ship which was also carrying Jospeph Moore, a replacement Lighthouse keeper. As the ship reached the landing platform, Captain Harvey was surprised not to see anyone waiting for their arrival. He blew his horn and sent up a warning flare to attract attention. There was no response. Joseph Moore then rowed ashore and ascended up the steep set of stairs that led up to the lighthouse. Once at the lighthouse, Moore noticed something was immediately wrong; the door to the lighthouse was unlocked and in the entrance hall to the three oil skinned coats were missing. Moore continued onto the kitchen area where he found half-eaten food and an overturned chair, almost as if someone had jumped from their seat in a hurry. To add to this peculiar scene, the kitchen clock had also stopped. Moore continued to search the rest of the lighthouse but found no sign of the lighthouse keepers. He ran back to the ship to inform Captain Harvey, who subsequently ordered a search of the islands for the missing men. No-one was found. As Investigation took place, they found very strange entries in the lighthouse’s log. On the 12th December, Thomas Marshall, the second assistant, wrote of ‘severe winds the likes of which I have never seen before in twenty years’. He also noticed that James Ducat, the PrincipalKeeper, had been ‘very quiet’ and that the third assistant, William McArthur, had been crying. What is strange about the final remark was that William McArthur was a seasoned mariner, and was known on the Scottish mainland as a real tough guy. Why would he be crying about a mere storm? Log entries on the 13th December stated that the storm was still raging and that all three men had been praying. But why would three experienced lighthouse keepers, safely situated on a brand new lighthouse that was 150 feet above sea level, be praying for a storm to stop? They should have been perfectly safe. The final log entry was made on the 15th of December. It simply read ‘Storm ended, sea calm. God is overall’. no one knows What was meant by ‘God is overall’? Why, in the bitterly cold winter, had one of the lighthouse keepers ventured out without his coat? Furthermore, why had all three lighthouse staff left their posts at the same time, when rules and regulations strictly prohibited? and what adds to the mystery was that there were no reported storms in the area on the 12th, 13th, and 14th of December. In fact, the weather was calm. Over the following decades, subsequent lighthouse keepers at Eilean Mor have reported strange voices in the wind, calling out the names of the three dead men. Theories about their disappearance have ranged from foreign invaders capturing the men, all the way through to alien abductions! Whatever the reason for their disappearance, something (or someone) snatched those three men from the rock of Eilean Mor.
5. The Handprint of Francis Leavy
Francis Leavy was a dedicated firefighter during the 1920s. He loved his job, and his peers loved him. He was a pleasant man, always ready with a smile and a helping hand. On April 18, 1924, Francis’s colleagues became aware of a change in his demeanor. Suddenly, he was an unsmiling, grunting guy washing a large window at the Chicago Fire Department, not looking at anyone or talking. After a few minutes, Leavy suddenly announced that he had a strange feeling—a feeling that he might die that very day. At that very moment, the phone rang and broke the heavy atmosphere brought on by the fireman’s words. A fire was raging at a building quite a long way from the fire department, and no time was to be wasted. In just a few minutes, Francis Leavy and his fellow firefighters were on the scene, assessing the situation and helping those trapped on the top floors. Everything seemed to be on track to rescue everyone from the building. Then, suddenly, the flames engulfed the lower part of the building, and the roof caved in. As soon as this happened, the walls came crashing down, pinning many people under the rubble—including Leavy. Leavy’s grim premonition came true. He lost his life that day trying to save others. The very next day, trying to come to terms with the loss of Leavy, his colleagues sat at the firehouse thinking about the events of the previous day. Suddenly, they noticed something strange on one of the windows. It looked like a handprint smudged onto the glass. Eerily, it was the very same window that Francis Leavy was busy washing the day before. The firemen cleaned the window again, but the print stubbornly refused to disappear. For many years, the handprint remained on the window in spite of chemicals used to try and remove it. The strange mystery remained unsolved but came to an abrupt end when a newspaper boy threw a paper against the window in 1944, causing it to shatter into pieces.
6. The Town of The Twins
India, which has a very low rate of twinning in the world has one small village known as Kodinhi, which far surpasses the world average of twins born in a year. Located in Kerala, this small village is situated 15 miles off Malappuramand boasts a population of only 2,000 people. This nondescript backwater village in SouthIndia is freaking out scientists all over the world. In this population of 2,000 lives, a stunning number of 220 pairs of twins equates to 440 individuals. Scientists are trying to figure out the reason for this high twinning rate in this village, but so far, they have not really succeeded. The oldest twin pair that lives in the village today was born in 1949. This village has what is known as ‘The Twins and Kins Association.' It is actually an association of twins and is the first of its kind in the entire world. What’s really spooky about the whole thing is that women of the village who have been married off to faraway lands (we mean faraway villages) have actually given birth to twins. Also, the reverse is true. Men who have come and started living in Kodinhifrom other villages and married a girl from Kodinhi have been blessed with twins. In this Twin Town, of every 1,000 births,45 are twins. This is an extremely high rate compared to entire India’s average of 4 out of every 1,000 BIRTHS. A local doctor named Krishnan Sribiju has studied the twinning phenomenon of the village for quite some time now and found out that the twinning rate in Kodinhi is actually increasing. In the last five years alone up to 60 pairs, of twins have been born - with the rate of twins increasing year-on-year. Scientists have considered almost every factor that can possibly lead to a high rate of twins but failed to get an answer that properly explains the phenomenon in the Twin Town.
7. The Bridge Of Death
A series of tragic events haunt the otherwise-picturesque Overtoun Bridge near Dumbarton, Scotland, leading many to rename it the "Bridge of Death." In the past fifty years, as many as fifty dogs have leaped to their deaths from the bridge, while people have also jumped and survived the nearly fifty-foot plunge to the rocks below. The animals all leap from the same spot-between the final two parapets on the right-hand side of the historic bridge. Almost all have happened on clear and sunny days, which are relatively rare for the western side of Scotland. All of the dogs that jumped have been long-nosedbreeds such as collies, Labradors, and other retrievers. Stranger still: Of the animals that survived their leap, some have returned and attempted to jump again. According to dog behaviour consultants,the canines can't have suicidal thoughts hence there must be something below the bridge,a sensory stimulation of some sort that compels them to take the leap.No one EXACTLY knows why do these dogs jump to their Ultimate death.
8. Dan Cooper's Mysterious Case
On the November 24, 1971, a man in his midforties and giving the name Dan Cooper also known as DB Cooper hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraftand demanded two parachutes and $200,000 in ransom . His claim of having a bomb in his briefcase was verified by an air stewardess. Cooper was given the ransom money at the Seattle-Tacoma airport. He allowed passengers and some members of the flight crew to leave before ordering the plane to be flown to Mexico. Soon after theplane took off, Cooper then opened the rear airstairs and parachuted into the pitch black,rain-lashed night. A five month manhunt – said to the mostextensive and expensive of its kind – was immediately launched. Despite $5,880 of the ransom being discoveredby a boy in 1980, no other trace of the hijacker was ever found. Despite there being hundreds of leads since1971, Cooper’s identity remains a mystery and the world's only unsolved skyjacking case.
9. The Sodder Family Mystery
The story of the Sodder children's disappearance is as fascinating and mysterious as it is heartbreaking. Around 1 a.m. on Christmas Day in 1945, a fire broke out in the Sodder family's West Virginia home. Both parents and four of their nine children escaped, but five children were unaccounted for. When the father, George, attempted to reenter the house to save the children, the ladder that was always leaning against the house was missing. He thought to drive one of his two coal trucks to the house and climb it to enter through a window, but neither truck started -- eventhough they both functioned the day before. Multiple people phoned the operator for help,but the call was never answered. And while the fire station was only two milesaway, fire trucks didn't arrive until 8am. No human remains were found in the remnants of the fire. Twenty years after their disappearance, the family received a photograph of a young man in the mail who resembled one of their missing sons. On the back of the photo, there was a handwritten message that read: “Louis Sodder. I love brother Frankie. Lil Boys. A90132 or 35.” While convinced that it was Louis, they wereunable to decode the obscure message or trace who actually sent the picture. The Sodders later hired private investigatorsto help find their missing children, but at least two of them immediately went missing. Some theories suggest that the local mafia tried to recruit George Sodder, but he refused. Still, the case remains unsolved.
10. The Marlborough Shipwreck.
The Marlborough was an iron-built two-decked merchant sailing ship which disappeared in 1890. Marlborough had made 14 successful voyages with immigrants from London to New Zealand up to 1890, most often returning with cargoes of wool and frozen meat. The last recorded trip saw it sail from New Zealand in January, 1890, with 33 crew members and a small number of passengers on board. By April of that year, it had not arrived in Britain and was reported missing, assumed lost at sea. The insurance claim stated the ship had likely been sunk by icebergs, which were frequently encountered near Cape Horn. In October 1913, the Singapore newspaper The Straits Times published a story according to which the Marlborough had been discovered near Cape Horn with the skeletons of her crew on board This means the ship was eventually found 23 years after it disappeared. The report claims In 1913, a shipwreck was discovered by another crew in Puntas Arenas, Chile. They boarded the ship and discovered it to be the Marlborough, which had run aground onto an extremely craggy island. Two crew members that boarded the ship, reported that they were horrified at what they found. All in all, about 20 skeletons were found on board, and in a lot of different locations. One was found alone, directly under the wheel,and another one found alone on the bridge, with five more nearby. No less than three skeletons were found by the ladder leading below the deck. The largest group found in a single area consistedof 10 skeletons, in what is known as the “mess-room”. There was no evidence of foul play, which makes the placement of the skeletons extremely baffling. They obviously died at the same time, because you wouldn’t leave dead bodies just lying around the ship. So how did three people die in the hatchwayat once? It might suggest to some that they were running from something, but remember that bodies were found in different locations all over the ship, which says they weren’t rounded up by anyone and killed. Another fact to remember is that a person, most likely the captain, was found under the steering wheel. Steering really wouldn’t be a high priority if your crew was being killed. And apart from the fact that no damage to the bodies was reported, the captain had his sword right by him. Why wasn’t this used, and then later looted? Why wasn’t anything looted? And if the ship had simply run aground, everyone would have gotten off. To this day no one knows why or how the crew members died and it remains an unsolved mystery.
Whoa!! Weren't these mysteries astonishing and fascinating at the same time? Hope You liked the information. Please share it with your friends and family. Part 2 of the same will be uploaded soon on the blog. Till then Stay Connected, Stay Safe.
1 Comments
Such an interesting page
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