Only Connect Put Three Completely Ordinary Angles On Screen — But The Triangle They Belong To Is Definitely Not The One You’re Thinking Of

The first clue looks like a straightforward geometry problem, but working out the three angles is only the beginning

There are few things more dangerous on Only Connect than seeing a clue you actually understand.

Because sometimes knowing exactly what you’re looking at is what sends you completely in the wrong direction.

One particularly clever question from the notoriously difficult BBC quiz began with three numbers:

Internal angles:

~55.9°
~63.1°
~62.6°

That’s all contestants were given to begin with.

And if your first instinct was to add them together, congratulations — you’ve just walked straight into the trap.

The numbers total approximately 181.6 degrees, although the values are rounded and, as becomes important later, this isn’t quite the ordinary flat triangle you might initially imagine.

But what does that actually have to do with the connection?

See if you can get it from one clue

Unlike a conventional general knowledge quiz, Only Connect asks teams to find connections between apparently unrelated pieces of information.

In the opening Connections round, clues are revealed one at a time.

Spot the connection from the first clue and you can score five points.

Need another clue? The available points start dropping.

That creates a particularly cruel dilemma when something like three internal angles appears on screen.

You can understand the clue perfectly and still have absolutely no idea what answer the programme wants.

So take another look:

~55.9°
~63.1°
~62.6°

What do those angles describe?

If you’re stuck, here’s the second clue:

Perimeter: ~4,871 km

That should immediately change things.

We’re clearly not dealing with a triangle somebody has drawn on a piece of paper.

We’re dealing with something enormous.

Still nothing?

The third clue was:

Area: ~1,146,796 km²

And by this point, there’s a decent chance a particular place has started creeping into your head.

One more clue effectively gives the game away:

Type: Scalene Spherical

Got it?

It’s the Bermuda Triangle

@undeniablyalex This is one of the first ones I ever came up with, but as you can see it took a while to work the maths out. #quiz #trivia #gameshow #onlyconnect #victoriacorenmitchell #puzzle #quizshow ♬ original sound – UndeniablyAlex

All four clues describe properties attributed to the Bermuda Triangle.

And suddenly that first clue makes considerably more sense.

The programme took something almost everybody has heard of and stripped away everything normally associated with it.

No missing aircraft.

No mysterious ships.

No supernatural theories.

Not even a map.

Instead, contestants were effectively asked to recognise the Bermuda Triangle from its geometry.

The three figures in the opening clue represent its approximate internal angles, while the later clues give its approximate perimeter and area before describing it as a scalene spherical triangle.

That’s what makes the opening clue so effective.

You see degrees.

You see three angles.

Your brain says geometry problem.

Technically, it is.

But the real challenge isn’t working out what kind of shape those numbers create.

It’s realising that the shape corresponds to one of the most famous triangles on Earth.

And that’s very Only Connect

This is precisely the kind of question that makes Only Connect so brutal from the sofa.

The information isn’t necessarily obscure.

Most people know what the Bermuda Triangle is.

Most people know what an internal angle is.

But putting those two pieces of knowledge together from three decimal-heavy measurements is another matter entirely.

And unlike a question where you either know a fact or you don’t, seeing the answer makes this one feel frustratingly gettable.

The triangle was staring you in the face from the very first clue.

It just wasn’t the triangle you thought you were looking for.