Could the Northern Lights be responsible for the sinking of the Titanic?

The wreck of the Titanic which lies at 3.810 meters deep.

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What if Captain Edward Smith wasn't solely responsible for the sinking of the

 ?

According to the accounts of the time, the northern lights would have lit the sky on the evening of April 14, 1912. James Bisset was the officer of the

, the first boat to respond to the SOS signal from the

.

He wrote in his logbook, published in 1959: "There was no moon, but the northern lights twinkled like moonbeams bursting from the northern horizon".

For the researcher of the University of California, Mila Zinkova, this phenomenon could explain the sinking of the liner, reports

Indeed, the Northern Lights are the result of solar storms.

They occur when particles, emitted by eruptions on the surface of the sun, enter our atmosphere and interact with gases.

However, these storms, also called "geomagnetic", can disturb devices such as compasses or radios.

A discussed theory

If for Mila Zinkova, the northern lights that occurred on April 14, 1912 could be responsible for the sinking of the

, several experts dispute this hypothesis.

For them, the magnetic activity observed that night was too weak to call it a solar storm.

However, they could have disrupted radio communications, preventing neighboring ships, such as

, from receiving the SOS from the

.

But the main responsible for this sinking would remain Captain Edward Smith who wanted to sail too fast.

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The wreck of the "Titanic" now protected by a British-American treaty

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