Is it a simple fear of the unknown or what you can’t see under the water? Maybe the fear of the destruction and decay of these objects represents the people who made them and the eventual fate of mankind to succumb to nature’s reclamation of Earth? Is it the visible destruction of objects that traditionally represent safety and shelter from nature’s elements that freaks us out so much? Perhaps when the human mind instinctively detects a foreign object in an otherwise natural environment, it triggers a fight-or-flight response. It’s hard to pinpoint the exact reason why submerged man-made objects trigger such a response, but theories about what causes it are endless. There are dozens of articles online, as well as an entire Reddit community dedicated to this phobia, as more and more people are realizing they suffer from Submechanaphobia. In researching this phenomenon online, it’s clear that I’m not alone in suffering from this fear.
My encounters with the sights of multiple real-life shipwrecks triggered a fear of submerged or partially-submerged man-made objects a condition known as Submechanophobia. While vacationing along the coast of the Pacific Ocean recently, I came face-to-face with a phobia I hadn’t realized was so real for me until it hit me.
