Case file · Anomaly hotspot
High Aim 6, the empty fishing boat
On 8 January 2003 the Taiwanese tuna boat High Aim 6 was found drifting off the Rowley Shoals, Western Australia, with fuel, food and the crew's belongings aboard but none of its 14 crew.
2003 CE · -17.40, 119.40 · status: disputed
The account
The Indonesian engineer was later found in Indonesia and the case was treated as a likely mutiny in which the captain was killed, though not all the facts were established.
The researched reading
An empty boat explained by a probable mutiny, backed by one crew member’s admission. The details and motive remain uncertain, but not the kind of event.
| Explanation | Weight | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Something known, misidentified | 50% | A known human cause read as a mystery. The one crew member traced, arrested in Indonesia, admitted that the captain and engineer had been killed. Calls from the engineer’s phone in Indonesia point to a mutiny in which the crew sailed home. |
| Undetermined | 35% | The share a generic explanation had beyond what has been shown for this case: it fits many cases like this one, but has not been demonstrated for this one. |
| A known natural phenomenon | 6% | An accident at sea that took all 14 is very unlikely with the boat intact. |
| A hoax or fabrication | 4% | Insurance or smuggling motives are possible additions to the mutiny story. |
| Genuinely anomalous | 2% | The motive is unclear, but a confession exists. |
| Perception, memory or mind | 1% | Not applicable. |
| A poorly understood natural phenomenon | 1% | Not applicable. |
| Secret human technology | 1% | Not applicable. |
Official position: Australian and Taiwanese authorities treated it as a probable mutiny.