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Mindblowing study claims Northern Lights may have played a role in the Titanic sinking

In a shocking find, researchers have found a link between the fateful night of Titanic's crash and the beautiful aurora borealis.

BY TIYASA BISWAS

PUBLISHED 4 DAYS AGO

A sailor standing on the dock of a ship sailing under the night sky lit up by the majestic Northern Lights. (Representative Cover Image Source: Getty Images | Anton Petrus)

The devastating history of the Titanic is one people will tell for ages. While there is a clear-cut explanation for why it sank claiming the lives of nearly 1,500 passengers aboard, a new research study has revealed something sinister at play. In April 1912, the lavish British passenger ship crashed into a mammoth iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic Ocean. That was all about it. But independent weather researcher and photographer Mila Zinkova suggested that the aurora borealis also called the Northern Lights, might also be responsible for the tragic event, as per her study published in the journal Weather.

Historic passenger ship Titanic on the high seas at sunset. (Representative Image Source: Getty Images | MR1805)

How could something so beautiful and admirable influence such bloodshed? Well, that is the Earth’s elements for you. The heavenly colors lining up in the sky, aurora borealis, is a site of intense energetic reactions. To explain, an aurora event is caused when charged particles from the sun, or solar winds, travel to Earth and react with the magnetic field and atmospheric gases like oxygen to impart the colors. It typically occurs in high-latitude regions. So was the sky adorned in the Northern Lights while the Titanic was ripped apart by the giant shard of ice? Zinkova mentioned accounts of eyewitnesses who confirmed its presence that night.

Northern lights crown bursting with color, Iceland. (Representative Image Source: Getty Images | Arctic-Images)

James Bisset, second officer of the rescue ship RMS Carpathia, noted in his log at the time, “The Aurora Borealis glimmered like moonbeams shooting up from the northern horizon.” This entry was made only five hours after the historic incident. The researcher first suspected the presence of the Northern Lights as she reconsidered the weather conditions the night of the accident. Drawing from ships’ records and eyewitnesses, she deduced that the geomagnetic effect of the aurora may have interfered with the Titanic’s communication and navigation systems that night. As a result, the errors caused by the effect could have possibly steered it towards the iceberg.

Bow of Shipwrecked Titanic. (Representative Image Source: Getty Images | Ralph White)

“This apparently insignificant error could have made the difference between colliding with the iceberg and avoiding it,” she wrote in the study. Moreover, not only was the aurora present but was in full force, indicating the high magnetic activity in the region. Connecting the dots, Zinkova theorized that if the geomagnetic storm was powerful enough to produce the Northern Lights, it is likely that it must have affected the compasses and wireless communication systems on the British liner sailing out with about 2,200 passengers. Initially, it was thought that amateur radio enthusiasts had caused the signal interference, thus, making it difficult for the rescue ships to reach via the emergency signals, mentioned in the official report for Titanic’s sinking, per the source.

A representative image of the Northern Lights. (Cover Image Source: Getty Images | Photo By Vincent Demers Photography) — A representative image of the Northern Lights. (Representative Cover Image Source: Getty Images | Vincent Demers Photography)

However, this theory was debunked in 2020 with Zinkova’s study which acknowledged the gaps in knowledge about geomagnetic storms. According to the expert, the SOS signals sent out by the Titanic to the nearby ships went unheard and the Titanic never received responses from the other end. “It is proposed here that the ongoing moderate to strong geomagnetic storm near the aurora had a negative impact upon the receipt of accurate SOS signals by nearby vessels, as well as interference from amateur radio operators,” the study stated. Titanic survivor Lawrence Beesley wrote in one of her entries that the glow "arched fanwise" over the northern sky visible from the lifeboats at 3 a.m.