A gigantic geological formation of unknown origin is detected beneath the islands, calling into question knowledge of the composition of the planet’s layers.
December 17
2025
– 3:37 p.m.
(updated at 3:41 p.m.)
Famous for its stories of mysterious ship and plane disappearances, the Bermuda Triangle in the North Atlantic Ocean is the target of a new geological study that has revealed unprecedented facts about its formation. The work detected a gigantic geological structure beneath the islands that challenges traditional knowledge about the composition of the Earth’s layers.
Volcanic islands undergo gradually due to the movement of tectonic plates. This is what is happening in Hawaii, for example. But the island of Bermuda – one of the vertices of the triangle – is an exception. The island’s volcanoes have been inactive for 31 million years, but the island remains high above the waters.
A group of American seismologists discovered that on the island of Bermuda, under the crust, there is an additional layer of rock twenty kilometers thick. The work was published in the specialist journal Geophysical research lettersin late November, and shows that the extra layer functions as a platform, lifting the island about 500 meters off the ocean floor and preventing it from sinking.
The famous place is located between Florida. the Bahamas and Puerto Rico.
“Normally, after the oceanic crust, we find the Earth’s mantle,” explains one of the study’s authors, William Fraser of the Carnegie Institute. “But on the island of Bermuda, there is this other layer, between the crust and the mantle. This thickness has never been observed in any other similar layer in the world.”
Scientists believe this extra layer formed during the last volcanic eruption, when rocks from the Earth’s mantle penetrated the crust where they solidified.
Geologist Sara Mazza, who was not involved in the study, said the rock’s composition indicates it comes from the mantle and likely formed during the formation of the supercontinent Pangea (between 900 and 300 million years ago).
“The fact that it is located in an area that was the heart of the last supercontinent is part of the history that makes this place so unique,” said the geologist from Smith College (in Massachusetts, United States) in an interview with the magazine Live Science.
The researchers now plan to study other islands around the world to understand if Bermuda is the only one with such a geological base.
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