Page 64 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - February 2023 Edition

64 Lake Ontario’s Bermuda Triangle

‘Strange things out there’:

Inside Lake Ontario’s
‘Bermuda Triangle’

Continued from Page 62

“I said, ‘Hey, come on, get up on the deck

here, you’ve got to see this!’”

For what felt like an eternity — in reality
only a few minutes — the guests stared
in awe at the glowing white mass that
hung over the lake, close to the horizon.

“We knew we were watching something
very special.”

Then, as if someone had flipped a switch,
it was gone.

can cause ships and even entire out at the beach when they heard a Jet Ski
For Wells, now 76, the experience was
landmasses to appear upside-down or in ripping past.
life-changing, and it spurred an ongoing
some cases as if they are floating in the
interest in ufology. He would go on to
air. “We looked out and he was upside
witness at least a half-dozen more strange
down,” says Kellough. “We knew what it
sightings over the years in Prince Edward
Typically the higher you go in elevation, was, it was an inversion, but it was just so
County.
the cooler it gets. Sometimes, however, distinct. It was crazy.”
the air at ground level can cool more
“I don’t believe in conspiracies at all. But
quickly than the air at higher elevations. When conditions are just right, thermal
I believe in things happening that there
This creates what meteorologists call a inversion can produce a rare type of
are no explanations for. And we need to
thermal inversion, and can have some mirage known as a fata morgana, which
find out explanations,” he says.
bizarre optical effects. Light hitting the is about as ghoulish as it sounds. With a
warm layers of the atmosphere will curve fata morgana, the image on the horizon is
Wells isn’t the only area resident to see
downward due to refraction, and this can not merely flipped or lofted up, but is
something over the lake they can’t
make distant objects loom high above the often completely jumbled to the point of
explain. During the course of our
horizon. unrecognition. An island in the distance
reporting, Global News came across two
might be transformed into a cluster of
previously undocumented accounts of
“Inversions can be a regular occurrence disembodied shapes that appear to float
UFO sightings from local fishermen.
on the Great Lakes,” says Global News and dance above the horizon.
meteorologist Ross Hull. “It’s all about
On Nov. 14, 2017, pilots on a Toronto-
temperature contrasts, and we live in a Of course, seafarers have historically not
bound Porter Airlines flight from Ottawa
part of the world that sees frequent air received specialized training in optical
noticed a large “unidentified airborne
mass changes during each season.” physics and atmospheric chemistry, so
object” directly in their plane’s flight
it’s not surprising that fata morgana
path, 9,000 feet over Lake Ontario. The
On Aug. 16, 1894, residents of Buffalo, mirages have been the source of many
pilots jerked the plane into a dive to
N.Y., woke up to the sight of Toronto myths among mariners.
narrowly avoid a mid-air collision, giving
hovering high over the horizon,
two flight attendants minor injuries.
according to a Scientific American article The legend of the Flying Dutchman, a

published later that month. Despite being floating ghost ship doomed to roam the
The Transportation Safety Board has yet
located more than 90 kilometres to the open seas for all eternity, is believed to
to figure out what the pilots saw that day,
south, Buffalonians were treated to a have been fuelled by these sorts of optical
but they don’t believe it was a drone.
panoramic view of the Toronto skyline in effects.
immaculate detail. Even “the church
“We have no idea,” a TSB investigator
spires could be counted with the greatest (Continued on Page 65)
told CTV News.
of ease,” the Scientific American article
said.
Mirages common on Lake

Ontario Kellough, too, has witnessed the effects
of a thermal inversion in the Marysburgh
Many fantastic sightings on Lake Ontario Vortex firsthand.
have clear explanations. A weather
phenomenon known as thermal inversion On one occasion, she and a friend were