Unexplained Disappearances Trivia Quiz

Answer: Lord Lucan

Since his disappearance there have been several "sightings" of Richard Bingham, the seventh Earl of Lucan, although none can be confirmed as him. The last confirmed sighting of him was as he left the house of Ian and Susan Maxwell-Scott shortly after midnight on 8 November, 1974.

What happened to Lucan after that night has been the subject of the most intense speculation. His car was found abandoned in Newhaven, East Sussex three days after the murder, leading many to believe that, despite not having his passport, he had escaped the country. Many police involved in the investigation have stated that they believe the abandoned car was a red herring, being left there by someone other than Lucan.

One book published in 2003 claimed that Lucan had been living in Goa, India from 1974 until his death in 1996 using the name Barry Halpin. However, this claim was soon rubbished as Halpin was a well-known figure from the folk music world in 1960s and many of his acquaintances demonstrated that he could not have been Lucan.

The most commonly held view is that Lucan committed suicide out of shame and a desire to protect the family's honour.

In absentia, Lucan was found guilty of the murder of Sandra Rivett, nanny to his children, by a coroner's jury. It is believed that his intended victim was his estranged wife, Veronica, Lady Lucan, who lived in the house in which Rivett was murdered. The motive was suspected to be the custody of his children. Lucan believed their mother was unfit to care for them and by getting rid of her, custody would revert to him.

Answer: No

The novel is written is such a way as to suggest that it is based on a true story and Lindsay did her best to make sure that people believed that it was, refusing to confirm that it was a work of fiction. However, fiction it was.

Had Lindsay stuck to her original draft of the book, there would probably have been little doubt of that as the final chapter explained the fantastical manner in which the disappearance happened. Lindsay decided not to include this chapter in her final draft and the unexplained mystery contributed to the success of both novel and film.

The final chapter was published as "The Secret of Hanging Rock" after Lindsay's death and explained that due to supernatural phenomena, the missing girls had been transformed into small creatures who crawled through a small hole in the rocks which was then covered by another boulder trapping them inside.

Answer: Harold Holt

Harold Holt was known as a strong swimmer but the currents off Cheviot Beach, where he chose to go swimming despite his companions at the time urging him not to, were very strong. Holt was suffering with a damaged shoulder and a possible heart condition at the time. A massive sea search operation was mounted but two days after his disappearance it was announced that he was presumed dead. He had been Prime Minister for less than two years.

There were many theories expounded about the true nature of his disappearance. Examples are that he committed suicide or was abducted by aliens, picked up by a Chinese submarine (as he was a secret agent for the Chinese Secret Services), or was kidnapped by the Russians. The official verdict was accidental death.

Answer: Mary Celeste

The Mary Celeste's intended destination was Genoa in Italy, having left New York in November 1872 with a cargo of industrial alcohol. One month later she was spotted by another ship, the Dei Gratia. After monitoring the Mary Celeste for two hours, a boarding party was sent to examine the ship. It was found deserted but with the cargo intact. The lifeboat appeared to have been launched and the navigational tools were missing, suggesting that the ship was abandoned intentionally, but no trace of the crew was ever found.

Inevitably there was plenty of speculation as to the reasons for the crew abandoning the Mary Celeste. Most theories involve the cargo in some way, from the suggestion that the crew mutinied and murdered the captain in order to get to the alcohol for themselves (nine barrels were found empty) and escaped via lifeboat, to the build up of fumes in the hold convincing the captain that the ship was about to blow up, causing him to order abandonment at haste.

The Octavius was another ghost ship; an English trading ship that was found drifting in the Northwest Passage on its return from China in 1775. The ship that found it adrift boarded it assuming it was a derelict but the crew was found to be on board; all frozen and dead. It was calculated from the ship's log that The Octavius had been drifting for 13 years but had traversed the Northwest Passage posthumously at a time when it was still unconquered.

The Demeter was a ship from Bram Stoker's "Dracula" that sailed into harbour undamaged but with its captain dead and tied to the wheel.

The Black Pearl was a ship from the "Pirates of the Caribbean" series of films.

Answer: Agatha Christie

The newspaper headlines of December 1926 read "Agatha Christie Vanishes" and for the eleven days that she was missing, the story remained at the forefront of the public's mind. The imagination of the public and the journalists suggested all sorts of possibilities to explain her disappearance. Her abandoned car was found near a natural spring where it was thought she may have drowned herself. Others suggested that she had met her end at the hands of her husband whilst the more cynical simply suspected a publicity stunt.

It all happened at a very difficult time for the author; her mother had recently died and when she discovered that her husband, Archie, was having an affair, she confronted him and after their argument wrote two letters - one to her husband and one to her secretary instructing that her weekend engagements be cancelled. Then, she climbed into her car and disappeared. When she was found, at the Harrogate Hydropathic Hotel booked in under a false name, she claimed she had amnesia and could not explain the events that led her there.

Subsequently, biographer Andrew Norman has claimed to have solved the mystery by stating that Christie had been in a fugue state, a sort of amnesia in which she assumed a new identity, an identity she believed to be true. This was caused by an emotional overload that required she stepped away from her troubles by "becoming" someone else.

Answer: Manic Street Preachers

The speculation is that Edwards, known to have suffered from depression, jumped to his death from the Severn Bridge but many believe he merely wanted to get away from it all and is still alive. Numerous sightings have been reported in places as far apart as India and the Canary Islands though no sighting has been corroborated since he walked out of his London hotel on February 1, 1995. His car was given a parking ticket at the service station on February 14 and was declared abandoned on the 17th. The police stated that the car showed signs of having been lived in.

His family, despite having the option to legally declare him dead since 2002, maintain his official status as that of a missing person and his fellow band members still pay royalties into an account set up for him.

Answer: Amelia Earhart

Having become the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean in 1932 and set many subsequent records, Earhart set her sights on circumnavigating the globe in 1937. She disappeared towards the end of her second attempt to complete the feat; her first, flying westward, ended when her plane was damaged on take-off from Hawaii.

The second attempt was an eastward route, beginning at Oakland, California, flying first over the USA to Florida before crossing the Atlantic and proceeding over Europe, Africa and Asia to reach Papua New Guinea. By this stage Earhart had completed 35,000km of her route, some three quarters of the total distance.

On July 2, 1937 Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, left Lae in Papua New Guinea on course for Howland Island. What happened after departure from Lae is not known but her plane never reached its intended destination and no sign of Earhart or Noonan was ever found.

Like so many of the subjects of this quiz, there have been many myths espoused about what happened to Earhart. Radio communications prior to the disappearance suggested that they could not find Howland Island and were running out of fuel. Whether they crashed, ditched or landed elsewhere is open to debate.

Some alternatives are that they landed on Saipan Island and were executed by the occupying Japanese, that they landed on nearby Gardner Island where bones of a tall woman of European ancestry were discovered (but have since been lost) and that they simply ran out of fuel and crashed into the sea.

A 1970 book suggested she had survived and assumed a new identity, Irene Bolam, becoming a banker in New York. Bolam successfully sued the publisher and the book was withdrawn.

Answer: Glenn Miller

Miller, already a hugely successful band leader, decided to join the US Army in 1942 to help the war effort, having already been rejected by the Navy. For two years, Miller led a band based in Connecticut, making live performances and broadcasting to troops and the country via radio. In late 1943, Miller and the band moved to England in order to be closer to the troops.

In late 1944 Miller's band was booked on a six-week tour of Europe including a Christmas concert for some of the troops who had recently liberated Paris. On December 15, Miller boarded a plane to Paris to join his band which had traveled ahead. The plane disappeared somewhere over the English Channel in terrible weather conditions; the wreckage has never been found. Despite the loss of their band leader, the band performed the Christmas concert as scheduled.

The official military report explained that the plane had crashed due to either engine failure or over-iced wings. However, many do not believe this explanation. One theory, based on logbooks sold at auction in London in the 1990s, is that Miller's plane was accidentally bombed by a Royal Air Force flight that was returning from an aborted bombing mission and was jettisoning excess bombs in order to guarantee a safe landing. Miller was possibly flying beneath and was struck by the dumped munitions.

However, Clive Davis, a British diver, claimed, without corroboration, in 1985 that he had found the wreckage of the airplane off the coast of France and it was undamaged. This gave wings to the idea that Miller had successfully crossed the channel but had died (according to different theories) in either a German concentration camp or a Parisian brothel and the US military had covered up the truth to protect morale.

Answer: Open Water

It took two days for anyone to raise the alarm, after a bag of their possessions, including their passports, was found on the dive boat. Three days of searching failed to find any sign of them and their bodies have never been recovered.

In the weeks and months following the disappearance, numerous stories attempting to explain the circumstances were aired including the suggestion of a murder/suicide pact (inspired in part by extracts taken from Tom's diary) and even alien abduction.

Inevitably, sightings of the couple were reported after their disappearance. Combined with the fact that, despite no trace of their bodies being found, many of their possessions, such as diving vests, belts and cameras were recovered or washed ashore, the theory was propounded that the event was all an elaborate hoax designed to allow Tom and Eileen to start new lives with new identities. Stories of an unidentified boat speeding away from the area on the day were soon reported to further enhance the claim. A satisfactory motive for this, however, has never been established and a police investigation into the possibility came to nought.

The Coroner's report stated that the couple died at sea from either drowning, exposure or shark attack.

"Open Water", written and directed by Chris Kentis, was released in 2003. For the film Tom and Eileen became Daniel and Susan and the venue was changed from the Great Barrier Reef to the Caribbean Sea. The film speculates on their last hours after the boat has left them behind. Its conclusion is that despite seeing two ships pass them, Daniel succumbs to the sharks within the first 24 hours after they are left behind. Susan, mentally exhausted and resigned to her fate, allows herself to slip under the water.

Answer: George Mallory and Andrew Irvine

The last sighting of the pair was on the North East ridge of Everest, a few hundred metres from the summit. Despite several expeditions to try and find them, Mallory's body wasn't found until 1999 when it was discovered by the Mallory and Irvine Research Expedition within hours of the start of their search. His body was found at 8,155 metres altitude and thanks to the freezing conditions, was in remarkably good condition.

The major question that needs answering is did he fall on the way up the mountain or on the way down? Plenty of evidence has been supplied by the discovery of Mallory's body but, as yet, no firm conclusion can be drawn that will answer the tantalising question of when he fell. The key discovery that all expeditions hope for, but has not been found, is Mallory's camera which, it is hoped, would provide photographic evidence of whether the summit had been reached or not.

Despite a reported sighting in 1960 by Chinese climber, Xu Jing, Andrew Irvine's body has never been recovered.