Anyone looked into this sea story?

[Graham2001]

I have a moderate interest in strange stories about lighthouses and this is one that I first heard of in Charles Berlitz's 'Without a Trace'. Namely that the two keepers at the Great Isaac lighthouse in the Bahamas disappeared without a trace in August 1969.

Unlike the Flannan Island lighthouse affair (which took place in 1900), information is extremely sketchy online. Web-searches for the obvious things bring up variations of the following line:

1969, August: The 2 light house keepers from Great Isaac’s Rock lighthouse, near Bimini, abandon their posts without reason. Gian QuasarMore recently I found a (non-skeptical) site (http://tinyurl.com/2gt38z) that provides a (very) little more information including names and a date (4th August 1969) for the event.

What I'm looking for is a skeptical resource covering this event, does anyone know of such online or offline that is available to someone in Australia?

[Big Al]

I like the "without reason" bit. This is a circular argument, i.e., one that presupposes the conclusion. Who can say that the keepers did not have a reason, or that they were not forcibly abducted, say, by smugglers looking to sneak into a bay without someone raising the alarm?

[richardm]

I think there are a few cases of lighthouse keepers disappearing en masse.


Could they have fell (sic) into the sea while fishing or maybe drowned by the strong tidal activity? Why didn’t any one of the two keepers make a distress call from the lighthouse should an accident have occurred?


It is not hard to imagine a situation where one of them fell into the sea while fishing (or whatever) and the other fell in while trying to drag him out. It's happened before. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cornwall/3767633.stm)
It would leave no opportunity to make a distress call and no signs of anything untoward in the lighthouse but is, of course, much less eerie that way.

[Cuddles]

Like Big Al says, "we don't know the reason" is not the same as "no reason". There are any number of good reasons two people working alone in a dangerous area with little contact with the outside world could disappear.

[Hellbound]

Like Big Al says, "we don't know the reason" is not the same as "no reason". There are any number of good reasons two people working alone in a dangerous area with little contact with the outside world could disappear.

And to continue Cuddles excellent thought, "we don't know the reason" is not "space aliens!!! Atlantians!!!!! GHOSTS!!!!one!!!eleven!!".

:D