Throughout history, there have been hundreds of events and phenomena that just can't be explained. From Area 51 to vanishing planes, these are the most mysterious occurrences in history...

Bermuda Triangle

Over the course of half a century, airplanes and ships have vanished inside a triangular portion of the North Atlantic Ocean known as the Bermuda Triangle. In 1964, Vincent Gaddis wrote "The Deadly Bermuda Triangle," which asserted that the disappearances were all strangely connected to the region.

The first known instance of a ship disappearing in the area was the USS Cyclops in 1918. After departing the island of Barbados, the ship and its crew of 309 vanished without a trace. Those who believe in the legend of the Bermuda Triangle stand by a number of theories, including extraterrestrial activity and paranormal explanations.

Voynich Manuscript

The Voynich Manuscript is a 240-page book that is written in a completely unknown language. Its pages are filled with strange, colorful drawings and diagrams, as well as bizarre events and plants that cannot be identified. The original author remains unknown, but the manuscript is dated somewhere between 1404 and 1438.

Theories have circulated about the nature of the "world's most mysterious manuscript." Some believe it is a pharmacopeia from medieval times used to keep track of early modern medicines. It also may have been a textbook for an alchemist, or, as other theorists believe, come from alien origin.

Havana Syndrome

Havana syndrome is a bizarre set of medical symptoms experienced by the U.S. and Canadian embassy staff in Cuba between 2017 and 2018. Symptoms included hearing strange grating sounds, hearing and memory loss, nausea, and headaches. Studies of the affected diplomats revealed that all suffered some form of brain injury, but it was unclear or how or why this occurred.

There was speculation of sonic weaponry being used against the staff, but the claims were unfounded. Several diplomats who were impacted by the illness became severely ill. Although a singular cause has yet to be determined, possible origins include toxic pesticides, ultrasounds, microwaves, or mass psychogenic illness.

Lost Colony of Roanoke

The island of Roanoke was established in 1585 by English settlers, right off the coast of North Carolina. 115 people were members of the colony, including the pregnant daughter of the settlement's new governor, John White. White left for England to procure more supplies. When he returned in 1590, nothing of Roanoke remained.

When White made landfall, he found fresh tracks in the sand, and the word "CROATOAN" carved into a post. The houses had been dismantled and all items had been removed. Although White attempted to locate the colonists, they were never heard from again.

Kryptos

This mysterious encrypted sculpture was designed by Jim Sanborn. It currently resides outside of the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. In fact, the statue is so complicated and puzzling that not even the CIA itself has been able to crack the code.

The sculpture contains four inscriptions. Three have been cracked, but the fourth remains unknown. In 2006, Sanborn hinted that there are clues in the first inscription that may crack the last one. Four years later, he released another clue—letters 64 through 69 (NYPVTT) in the final inscription translate to the word "BERLIN".

Stonehenge

This prehistoric monument is located in England. Stonehenge is one of the most famous landmarks in the United Kingdom. It remains unclear as to how or why the structure was built.

The bluestones—which weigh about four tons each—were sourced 200 miles away from Stonehenge. How were these heavy stones transported so far, and with such little technology available? There are no definite answers when it comes to this mysterious rock formation.

Naga Fireballs

Naga fireballs, also known as "ghost lights," are a phenomenon said to be seen annually on the Mekong River. Balls of glowing light supposedly rise from the water, floating several hundred feet in the air before disappearing entirely. The phenomenon is said to be caused by a giant serpent that lives in the Mekong known as phaya nak.

Written accounts from those who claim to have witnessed the Naga fireballs date back hundreds of years. Every October, the Nong Khai Province hosts the Phayanak Festival. On the final day of the celebration, attendees gather near the riverbank to watch the mysterious balls of fire rise from the waters and shoot up into the sky.

Beale Ciphers

The Beale Ciphers are a series of three ciphertexts that allegedly reveal the location of a buried treasure worth roughly $43 million as of 2017. The treasure was thought to belong to the mysterious Thomas Jefferson Beale, who buried thousands of pounds of gold, silver, and jewels in 1818 while prospecting in Colorado.

Only the second Beale Cipher has been cracked. Strangely, the key was the Declaration of Independence, signed by none other than Thomas Jefferson, with whom Beale happened to share a name. The cracked cipher stated that the treasure was buried somewhere in Bedford County, Virginia, where people still search for it today.

Phaistos Disc

The Phaistos Disc sounds like it's straight out of an Indiana Jones movie. Italian archaeologist Luigi Pernier discovered the clay-fired disc in 1908, which was inscribed with mysterious symbols which may be an unknown form of hieroglyphics. The artifact dates back to the second millennium B.C.

Some scholars believe that the hieroglyphs on the disc resemble Linear A and Linear B, scripts once used in ancient civilizations during the second millennium. Unfortunately, Linear A still has not been deciphered, making it impossible to read the Phaistos Disc.

Patomskiy Crater

This strange rock formation is located in Siberia. It was first discovered in 1949, and its origins have been the subject of scientific debate ever since. Hypotheses include meteorites or volcanic activity, but no evidence can definitively point toward a conclusion.

Trees nearby the formation seemed to have experienced rapid growth, which is theorized to be the result of radiation. According to scientists, the crater is between 300 and 350 years old. While some believe it is of earthly origin, others believe alien activity might be connected to the Patomskiy crater.

Flight MH370

MH370 was a Malaysia Airlines flight that vanished without a trace while traveling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, 2014. There was no inclement weather or distress signal when the plane suddenly disappeared from reader screens. A search operation combed the Indian Ocean for any of the 239 passengers on board, but the plane, nor any of its debris, was never located.

Loch Ness Monster

The Loch Ness Monster, according to legend, is a mythical aquatic creature who resides in the Scottish Highlands. It is generally described as a large, long-necked cryptid with one or more humps that protrude from the water. Since 1933, evidence of the creature's existence has been widely disputed.

Dancing Plague of 1518

In July 1518, a woman began suddenly dancing on the streets. Within a month, 400 others had joined her—and nobody could stop. Many died from exhaustion. It is thought that the phenomenon was caused by mass hysteria, or an act to please divine powers, but no definite conclusions have ever been reached.

King Arthur

One of history's most disputed figures was King Arthur, who was said to have led the defense of Britain against Saxon invaders in the late 5th and early 6th centuries. The details of Arthur's existence are based on folklore and legend; historians agree that Arthur most likely did not exist. Regardless, Arthur's mythic power only grew stronger with each passing century.

Amelia Earhart

Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. However, in 1937, on the last leg of her trip around the world, Earhart's plane mysteriously vanished over the Pacific Ocean. Nobody knows what happened to Earhart, her navigator Fred Noonan, or her aircraft.

Area 51

This top-secret Air Force facility is located in the deserts of Nevada. Conspiracy theorists believe that Area 51 is the storage site for alien UFOs that crash-land on Earth. It is also rumored that the military base specializes in the underground research of alien technology.

Antikythera Mechanism

This ancient device is believed to have been created by Greek scientists somewhere between 150 B.C. and 100 B.C. The device, which mimics an ancient computer, was found in the wreckage of a 2,000-year-old ship off the coast of the Greek island of Antikythera. The device has been able to predict astronomical positions as well as eclipses. "Nothing comparable to it is known from any scientific text or literary allusion," wrote Derek J. de Solla Price, a historian at Princeton University.

Shroud of Turin

The Shroud of Turn is a piece of linen cloth that bears the image of a man. It is believed to be the burial shroud of Jesus of Nazareth. Scientists have studied the cloth, which has undergone a number of tests to determine its origin. The cloth is a religious icon that boasts substantial mythological and spiritual power.

William Shakespeare

While you've certainly heard of William Shakespeare, it might be surprising to find that he may not have existed. Scholars have yet to figure out how a glover's son from the countryside managed to enter the literary world. Theorists suppose that he may have been a ghostwriter, Francis Bacon, or Christopher Marlowe, an essayist and a playwright from the same era.

Jack the Ripper

Between August and November of 1888, at least five prostitutes were mutilated and violently murdered in London. These crimes introduced the mystery of Jack the Ripper, who sent an anonymous letter to a London news agency confessing to the murders. Although it has been over a century, the identity of the killer is still under wraps.

The Late Bronze Age Collapse

Sometime around 1200 B.C., the entirety of the Eastern Mediterranean, Anatolia, and Aegean region suddenly collapsed. All cities were destroyed and the Dark Ages began. It is unclear as to what caused the collapse, but evidence points toward a variety of reasons, such as climate change, drought, famine, earthquakes, invasions, and internal rebellions.

Mohenjo Daro

This UNESCO World Heritage Site was once home to an ancient civilization that emerged around 4,500 years ago. Mohenjo Daro was discovered in 1911, and excavations didn't begin for a decade. The city was equipped with advanced drainage systems and grid-style construction, but the fate of its inhabitants remains a mystery.

Mary Celeste

The Mary Celeste was an American merchant brigantine found adrift and crewless in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean on December 4, 1872. The ship's only lifeboat was missing, but the ship itself was undamaged and its provisions had not been ransacked. None of the seven crewmen or the captain were ever seen again. Theories have ranged from waterspouts to attacks by deep-sea creatures.

Mirny Diamond Mine

The Mirny diamond mine, also known as "The Mir", is the second-largest mine in the world. It is located in Siberia and operated from the 1960s until the early 2000s. No outsiders can enter the town without a permit, and Russia forbids helicopters from flying over the mine for fear that the air currents would cause the formation of a vortex. There are a number of unsubstantiated reports that some aircraft have actually been sucked into the vortex, never to be heard from again.

Walter Collins

In 1928, nine-year-old Walter Collins went to the movies, but he didn't make it home. At the time, the LAPD was dealing with several bizarre disappearances, so when the Illinois police claimed they had located Collins, they turned the boy back over to his mother. She insisted that the boy was not her son, but the police forced her to take him home with her. Later, the boy admitted that he was impersonating her son; the real Walter Collins was never heard from again.

Georgia Guidestones

Also called the "American Stonehenge", this granite monument was constructed in a Georgia field off Highway 77 in 1979. It features ten commandments for "an Age of Reason", written in eight different languages. However, these commandments don't align with the original—one of the controversial carvings reads, "Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature"—but it is unclear who paid for the construction of the monument, or what it stands for.

Boston Heist Paintings

On March 18, 1990, two art thieves disguised themselves as police officers and ransacked the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, making off with thirteen famous paintings by artists like Rembrandt, Vermeer, and Flinck, all estimated to be around $500 million in total value. The culprits were never caught, and the museum recently extended a $10 million reward indefinitely for anyone who helps to recover the stolen artwork.

5,000 Dead Birds

On New Year's Ever in 2010, a small Arkansas town was terrified when 5,000 blackbirds suddenly began flying into buildings, trees, and telephone poles, dying instantly. The town wrote it off as a one-time instance caused by fireworks. However, the very next year, it happened again, despite the fireworks ban. Many took it as an omen signaling the end of the world.

Wow! Signal

In 1977, astronomer Jerry Ehman used a radio signal detector to scan the stars around the constellation Sagittarius. Ehman picked up a 72-second radio frequency that appeared to be coming from deep space. He wrote "Wow!" in the margin of his computer printout, leading the bizarre sound—which is theorized to be aliens attempting contact—to be dubbed the Wow! Signal.

The Phoenix Lights

On March 13, 1997, the people of Phoenix, Arizona saw something that remains unexplained to this day. That night, bizarre lights appeared overhead in a V-formation that silently moved overhead and occasionally stopped to hover over one location. It was allegedly the size of several football fields. Even Kurt Russell admitted to having witnessed the strange phenomenon in real life.

The Zodiac Killer

For several decades, the Zodiac Killer terrorized the San Fransisco Bay area, committing at least seven confirmed murders—although he claims to have killed 37. The killer sent taunting messages in code to the police and the newspaper, which offered chilling information about his identity and his victims. "I am not sick," he wrote in one letter. "I am insane." The case remains cold to this day.

Disembodied Feet

On August 20, 2007, a disembodied human foot—still inside an Adidas sneaker—washed up on a beach near Vancouver. A week later, another foot washed ashore, this time clad in a white Reebok. In the years since, a total of thirteen feet, most in sneakers, have appeared on the beaches of British Columbia.

The Death of Harry Houdini

The famed magician and escape artist Harry Houdini's death was ruled an accident. He allegedly suffered complications from a ruptured appendix. However, days later, headlines begged the question: "Was Houdini Murdered?" It is theorized that Houdini was killed by a group of Spiritualist assassins who believed that they could communicate with the dead. Even devoted Spiritualist Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the author of Sherlock Holmes, promised that Houdini would "get his desserts very exactly meted out...I think there is a general payday coming soon."

Lizzie Borden

"Lizzie Borden took an ax / And gave her mother forty whacks / When she saw what she had done / She gave her father forty-one." It's a popular children's rhyme, but it also tells the story of Lizzie Borden, 32, who was accused of murdering her parents with an ax in 1892. Lizzie was acquitted, but the town turned against her, believing her to be the killer. Did Lizzie get away with murder? We may never know.

The Disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa

It's not entirely unlikely that someone like Jimmy Hoffa—an infamous labor leader and Teamster president who went to prison for a litany of unsavory reasons—would be murdered. Despite this, Hoffa's body was never found. The only evidence of Hoffa's murder was a strand of hair that matched his DNA in the backseat of a car. Even his own daughter said, "It would be a comfort to find his body, but I don't think we will."

Max Headroom TV Hack

In 1987, two Chicago television stations were "hacked" for the first time. A mysterious individual interrupted the broadcast signals and appeared on screen wearing sunglasses over a Max Headroom mask. The first hack only lasted 25 seconds, during which the person said and did nothing. However, during the second hack, he mooned the audience and was spanked by a fly swatter.

Taos Hum

In this small New Mexico town, the same low-frequency buzzing sound has been annoying its residents since the early 1990s. The townspeople complained about the strange sound to Congress in 1993, but despite the numerous studies that have been conducted, scientists have repeatedly come up empty-handed. Almost thirty years later, nobody knows what the noise could possibly be.

The Black Dahlia

In 1947, 22-year-old actress Elizabeth Short was found brutally murdered in a vacant Los Angeles parking lot. Several people took credit for the crime, but none of them were charged. Short was dubbed "Black Dahlia" because she loved black dresses.

The Moon Landing

Alright, so the moon landing definitely happened... or did it? Since 1969, theorists believe that the moon landing was staged in a Hollywood studio and directed by Stanley Kubrick, who had released 2001: A Space Odyssey only a year earlier. The flag even seemed to ripple in the breeze.

Bigfoot

The legend of an enormous, hairy creature that leaves huge footprints in the dirt has been around for as long as anyone can remember. There have been alleged Bigfoot sightings in every state except Hawaii. In 2014, Bigfoot hunter Rick Dyer claimed to have shot and murdered the Sasquatch, but it was proven to be a prop made from latex, foam, and camel hair.

DB Cooper

On November 24, 1971, a man known as DB Cooper boarded a flight from Portland to Seattle. He then hijacked the plane with a briefcase that he claimed to contain a bomb. In Seattle, Cooper let all 36 passengers disembark and demanded $200,000 and several parachutes from authorities. He instructed the pilots to fly to Mexico remaining slow and low to the ground with the rear door unlocked. Nobody ever saw or heard from him again. The FBI claimed he couldn't have survived the jump, but in 2017, they issued a new composite of what DB Cooper might look like today.

Alcatraz Escape

For nearly 30 years, Alcatraz was thought to be inescapable. Everyone who tried was either caught or died—except for three bank robbers who escaped in 1962. It is unknown whether or not they drowned in the water; their bodies were never found. However, in recent years, a letter from one of the escapees was recovered. It read: "My name is John Anglin. I escape from Alcatraz in June 1962 with my brother Clarence and Frank Morris. I'm 83 years old and in bad shape. I have cancer. Yes we all made it that night but barely!"

The Murder of Bugsy Siegel

This notorious gangster helped to create the Las Vegas Strip. His body was found riddled with bullets, leading people to believe that he had been whacked by mob boss Meyer Lansky for spending too much on his Flamingo resort. However, recently, the family of a now-deceased Slavic truck driver claimed that he killed Siegel to stop him from... murdering the husband of the woman he was sleeping with. A complicated legacy, indeed.

Judge Crater

Deemed "the most missingest man in New York," 41-year-old Joseph Crater, a Supreme Court Justice, was last seen leaving a restaurant on August 6, 1930. After that, he vanished without a trace. Nobody knew whether he had fled with a mistress or been killed by an enemy, and for a while, the phrase "pulling a Crater" became slang for suddenly disappearing.

Missing 18 Minutes

Richard Nixon's presidency was legendary, mostly due to the Watergate scandal that ended with his resignation. It is known that Nixon made secret recordings of every conversation that took place in the Oval Office, but there are 18-and-a-half minutes on one tape that are still unaccounted for. Nobody knows who he was speaking to, or what information he revealed.

Ghost Road

There's something strange about the mysterious light that floats near the railroad tracks in Gurdon, Arkansas. The Gurdon Light has appeared for hundreds of people—so many residents have seen it that they no longer consider it an anomaly. There is no rational explanation for the light.

Did Babe Ruth Call His Shot?

Don't tell any Yankee fans, here's no evidence that Babe Ruth called his shot during Game 3 of the 1932 World Series against the Chicago Cubs. Legend has it that the Great Bambino went up to bat, pointed at the bleachers, and then hit the ball right where he said it would go. The footage shows that he does point—but is it only toward center field?

The Grave(s) of Billy the Kid

Billy the Kid sure has died a number of times. The gunslinger's first grave is in New Mexico, where he was allegedly gunned down in 1881. Another grave is in the town of Hico, Texas, where a man who claimed to be Billy the Kid died in his 90s. Another man, John Miller, who insisted that he was the real Billy the Kid, is buried in Arizona.

The Void in Egypt's Great Pyramid

Ancient Egypt's Great Pyramid has been the subject of conspiracy theories for centuries. Recently, the discovery of a mysterious void has added even more fuel to the fire. The void is 153 feet long and 26 feet tall; it leads to the burial chamber of Khufu, an Egyptian pharaoh. Nobody knows what purpose the void serves or what lies inside. Archaeologists have never seen it in person.

The Octopus March

In October 2017, over two dozen octopi were seen walking on land in Wales. One local who had lived in the seaside town for his whole life said that nothing like that had ever occurred before. According to experts, the octopi were going through senescence—basically meaning that they had gone senile.