Featured Image Credit: Ocean Research Project / YouTube
Whether you believe in the supernatural or not, you've got to admit there are some pretty spooky things out there. Forget creepy dolls from the Conjuring movies, Freddy Krueger murdering you in your dreams, or Pinhead climbing out of a demonic puzzle box, there's some real-world terror out there in the seven seas.
It's not just thalassophobia giving us an intense fear of the oceans, as we've seen enough episodes of Blue Planet to see there are some truly terrifying monsters lurking beneath the surface. If that wasn't enough, the ocean can be a lonely place where we wouldn't be surprised if your mind plays tricks on you.
Sailors have been keeping their bored selves entertained with ghost stories for centuries, and while most would write them off as old wives' tales, there's sometimes evidence that even the most die-hard skeptics might struggle to argue with.
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It's not just ancient ghost ships like the Mary Celeste that you're in danger of coming across, with modern 'ghost ships' also being a regular occurrence. Even if you don't believe in ghost ships, sailor Matt Rutherford has proof to suggest otherwise.
Rutherford once undertook what others dubbed a 'suicide mission' when he circumnavigated the Americas on his own, but back in 2013, he came across a 'ghost ship' near the Bermuda Triangle. Although not like the one filled with vengeful spirits from Steve Beck's 2002 Ghost Ship movie, the footage shows Rutherford his colleague from Ocean Research Project boarding the vessel some 800 miles outside of Bermuda.
Noticing that the sailboat was behaving 'strangely' without its sail up or its motor running, the mystery of 'Wolfhound’ deepened.
With the pair worried something terrible had happened, they first looked for survivors or to see if anyone was injured. In the video, Rutherford says: "'I have no idea what's inside, I'm going to go and search around and I hope I don't find any dead bodies or anything."
No bodies were found, although he said it looked like someone had left in a hurry due to things being strewn everywhere.
Speaking in a 2013 podcast discussing the incident, Rutherford explained he expected someone to pop out and say 'hello' but he was shocked by its condition: "Parts of the ceiling had fallen down in some places, some drawers had popped open, you could hear the water sloshing around.
“It was just the spookiest thing. It looked crazy in there, like people had abandoned it in the middle of something."
Although Rutherford and his colleague towed the Wolfhound for 50 miles, they eventually had to cut it loose.
Even though the mystery remained unsolved for nearly a decade, internet sleuths connected the dots between Wolfhound and the Royal Irish Yacht Club's Alan McGettigan when the footage was eventually shared in December 2022. The Daily Mail reports that back in 2013, McGettigan and his crew hit headlines when they were rescued by a Greek freighter after their yacht was damaged 400 miles off the coast of Delaware.
It's unclear where Wolfhound is now and there's no update about whether McGettigan went after her, so for all we know, she's still out there and is haunting other sailors.
