The Disappearance of USS Cyclops

Record summary

USS Cyclops, a large United States Navy collier, vanished with more than 300 people in March 1918 without a confirmed wreck or distress signal. It is relevant to comparison with missing-time and anomalous-disappearance narratives because uncertainty, wartime secrecy, weather, cargo stability and retrospective folklore all shaped the case. Conventional explanations include structural failure, overloading, severe weather and possible enemy action, but no single account has been conclusively established. The often-repeated Bermuda Triangle association is later popular framing, not contemporaneous evidence.