The physical reality behind the experiment likely involved degaussing, a routine technology used to protect ships from magnetic mines.

During the war, the Navy actively used degaussing to make ships invisible to magnetic mines, not to the human eye. Degaussing involved wrapping the hull in massive electrical cables to neutralize its magnetic field. Lay observers likely misunderstood this highly technical process. They mistook magnetic stealth for physical invisibility, spinning a routine defense measure into a terrifying tale of teleportation and crew members fused to the ship's bulkheads.