The Great Lakes Triangle: Lake Michigan Mysteries and Shocking UFO Encounters

The Great Lakes Triangle: Lake Michigan Mysteries and Shocking UFO Encounters

by Bill Knell

The Great Lakes Triangle is an area in and around Lake Michigan in the US where ships, planes, and people disappear under mysterious circumstances and various unexplained events occur including those linked to UFO and alien activity. It is just one of many triangular areas around the world where the impossible seems to happen on a regular basis. The Great Lakes (or Lake Michigan) Triangle is defined by three points: Manitowoc, Wisconsin; Ludington, Michigan; and Benton Harbor, Michigan.

The legend began and became known to European settlers in 1679 when a ship known as the Griffin was built near Niagara, NY, by a French fur trader named René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle to expand his business.

It was a sturdy vessel equipped with a six man crew and everything needed to traverse Lake Michigan. However, it disappeared soon after being launched. Months went by without any contact, so the owner consulted a local native tribe hoping they could help locate his ship. He was told that the great spirit of Lake Michigan likely claimed the vessel or caused it harm because he failed to ask permission to sail the lake or provide an offering to the lake spirit. Later in 1679 the ship was briefly spotted off of Green Bay, WS, but was unoccupied and It was never seen again.

The Lady Elgin shipwreck was a devastating disaster in Lake Michigan on September 8, 1860, when the sidewheel steamship, chartered by Milwaukee's Irish Union Guards, collided with an unlit schooner (the Augusta) in stormy weather, leading to over 300 deaths, making it the worst Great Lakes maritime disaster of all time. Many victims were from Milwaukee's Irish community, and the wreck's discovery in 1989 off Highland Park, Illinois, sparked legal battles and added to Great Lakes lore, with artifacts like muskets and coins recovered, though the site remains protected.

In 1921 the schooner Rosa Belle was found capsized with no one aboard. Its hull was intact, but the lifeboats and crew of 11 were missing. Nothing was ever found of the ship or crew. However, at least two crew members were said to have refused to board after their wives said they had strange dreams about the ship.

George R. Donner, captain of the freighter O.M. McFarland vanished from his locked cabin while the ship was in calm waters. No one else disappeared from the ship. On April 28, 1937, the O.M. McFarland, a coal-filled lake freighter, successfully navigated through icy waters on Lake Michigan. After guiding his ship through the difficult stretch, Captain Donner retired to his cabin for rest. Around three hours later, a crew member went to alert the Captain that they were nearing port. His cabin door was locked from the inside. When the mate broke into the cabin, it was empty. A thorough search of the ship and an immediate search by the Coast Guard and other vessels in the lake found no clues. He was 58 years old at the time.

In 1950 Northwest Orient Flight 2501, a commercial DC-4 plane carrying 58 people, disappeared over the lake during a severe storm. Despite extensive searches, no main wreckage was ever found, making it the deadliest commercial plane crash at the time. It should be noted that during Prohibition short flights of small aircraft regularly flew over that area carrying illegal alcohol and many never made it to their destinations.

One of the first persons to propose the theory of the Great Lakes mystery in modern times was Jay Gourley in his 1977 book titled “The Great Lakes Triangle”. Gourley was an aviator and scholar. He looked at everything from a scientific standpoint, yet was unable to solve these mysteries. His book sold well and gained further traction in the 1990s through Chicago ghost hunter Richard Crowe's supernatural tours.

One of the most amazing aspects of the Triangle is its archeology. The "Underwater Stonehenge" in the is a 9,000-year-old submerged stone formation discovered by sonar and studied by archaeologist Dr. Mark Holley. It features stone alignments and a possible mastodon carving, suggesting ancient use for hunting or ceremonial purposes when water levels were lower. Its precise location is protected to preserve it.

The site was first detected by sonar in 2007 and explored by underwater archaeologists. It's located in Grand Traverse Bay, Lake Michigan, around 40 feet below the surface. A circular arrangement of stones, a long line of rocks, and a carved mastodon on one boulder can easily be seen. Mastodons were thought to be extinct by that time.

In 1969 four men were in a boat fishing on the lake early on a July morning. Out of nowhere they all heard a slight buzzing sound. About 100 yards from their thirty foot boat there were several flashes, then a disc-shaped UFO appeared. The object moved slowly across the water, then stopped and came to surface level. All the fishermen could see some sort of creatures inside through a translucent area. A hose dropped from the craft and began to collect water from the lake. This went on for about two minutes, then the hose went back up into the craft and it flew straight up at tremendous speed.

On March 8, 1994, a clear night, 300 hundred 911 calls in West Michigan reported colorful, fast-moving lights over Lake Michigan. These sightings were confirmed by a National Weather Service meteorologist on radar. The lights were flickering, colorful lights (red, blue, green) hovering, moving erratically, and heading over the lake.

Jack Bushong, a meteorologist, tracked multiple objects on radar, noting they moved impossibly fast (tens of miles in seconds) and weren't precipitation. The objects were described as cylindrical or circular, with blinking lights, sometimes in V-shapes, resembling "Christmas lights". Holland, Michigan, was a key point in the sightings and the event remains officially unexplained, with theories ranging from aliens to advanced military craft, and was featured on Unsolved Mysteries.

In 2025 there have been a series of large, dark objects with small bright lights reported landing, floating and taking off from the lake in various areas covering it.

In July-August of 2025 a series of unexplained small animal deaths and pet disappearances took place in the Ludington area along with glowing balls of light seen in the same area at the same time. Some of the animals were later found strangely mutilated.

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