Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 10:25:08 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian For Tom Strang -- No doubt Ric will answer, but I can't resist. There's no 180 degree turn involved here. The archaeologist who's organized the Tinian search, Jennings Bunn, is an old friend and colleague of mine, and while I think it's very unlikely that he's right in his assessment, I offered to help him look into it because I think a hypothesis that can be tested ought to be. I mentioned it to Kar and she offered to help out for (I think) much the same reason. I very, very much doubt if Earhart is buried on Tinian, but I think it'll be interesting to see who (if anyone) IS buried at the spot associated in anecdote with her burial place. I think it's nice to have an anecdotal account that can actually be tested, and I intend to try to help make sure it's thoroughly and objectively tested. LTM (who says it's really OK to test alternative hypotheses) Tom ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 10:28:08 From: Jon Watson Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian Boy I wish you'd quit beating around the bush and tell us how you really feel on stuff like this - > I don't think there's snowball's chance in hell that Earhart was > buried on Tinian. The other factor in this, as I see it, is that by having known (and renown) professionals such as Kar and Tom directly involved, the veracity of whatever is or is not discovered as a result will be beyond question. > TIGHAR's participation in this exercise is purely in the interest of > seeing that even a ridiculous hypothesis is tested according to high > professional standards. It in no way represents a 180 degree, or even > a 1 degree, turn in TIGHAR's position with regard to a > Earhart/Japanese connection and has nothing whatsoever to do with the > Post-Loss Radio Study. ltm, jon 2266 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 10:28:50 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: Update from Ric Ric, > Section Five draws upon the results of the quantitative analysis and > the investigation of specific groups to divide the reported signals > into three categories: Credible, Ambiguous, and Not Credible. (Note: > these are relative terms and not intended to indicate a final judgment > as to authenticity.) The "Credible" receptions are then examined for > patterns. Ah, but are the "incredible" receptions examined as well? ;) Actually, aside from the bad pun, I mean that seriously. If the "not credible" messages follow a certain pattern, and the credible ones follow the same pattern, then that will cast a different light than if each follows different patterns. Think of the other two groups as the control groups. Hoax messages should not have the same characteristics as the alleged Earhart messages, so a different pattern between the two sets can support your analysis. Of course, it may also refute it, but that's scientific analysis for you. It's different than analyzing the different messages separately and then throwing out the bad ones (which is what you're doing already). It may take some time, but it's not like we've been waiting months already. :) This will also save you the agony of dealing with people who criticize you for ignoring post loss message 1872, which obviously came from the Electra because . Oh wait, no it won't..... Reed ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. Reed L. Riddle Thirty Meter Telescope Site Survey Team California Institute of Technology, Astronomy Department Homepage: http://wet.physics.iastate.edu/~riddle/ "This life has been a test. If it had been an actual life, you would have received actual instructions on where to go and what to do." -- Angela Chase, "My so-called life" ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 10:33:30 From: Matt Victor Subject: Re: Update from Ric Well, let's put the report up on DVD's/CD-ROM for us all to purchase-use. Please! matt > From Ric (emerging from hole, brushing off dirt, blinking) > > The Post-Loss Radio Study is coming along well. It's taking longer to > finish because I've expanded it. *********************************************************** We will. We're not sure yet what format; most if not all will run in TIGHAR Tracks, probably serialized (way too long for one issue unless you want a TT like the Sears catalog); and after that we'll just have to see what seems like the best way to get it into members' hands. Oh. You're not a member yet? Well..... https://tighar.org/membernew.html Pat ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 11:57:53 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian Jon Watson wrote: > ... by having known (and > renowned) professionals such as Kar and Tom directly involved, the > veracity of whatever is or is not discovered as a result will be beyond > question. ... You are assuming a reasonable audience who recognizes Kar and Tom's credentials. Unreasonable people will "doubt everything." If folks see TIGHAR as part of the Great Earhart Coverup Conspiracy, Kar and Tom's participation will only "raise more questions than it answers." Please note that I'm all in favor of their going. I'm just not optimistic about the reception of their work by folks committed to the Tinian hypothesis. LTM. Marty #2359 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 11:58:34 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Update from Ric Reed Riddle asks: > Ah, but are the "incredible" receptions examined as well? ;) > > Actually, aside from the bad pun, I mean that seriously. If the "not > credible" messages follow a certain pattern, and the credible ones > follow the same pattern, then that will cast a different light than if > each follows different patterns. Think of the other two groups as the > control groups. Actually, we had a big discussion about what to call the third category. Being something of a word-freak I wanted to use "incredible" (reverting to the word's original meaning) but we ultimately decided to sacrifice erudition for clarity and go with "not credible". We are, however, sticking with "occult" to describe information that could not be known to the listener unless the message was a legitimate communication from Earhart. But to answer your question, a major part of what makes a message or a group of messages "not credible" is that they follow patterns that appear to disqualify them as legitimate. Those signals and patterns are discussed in Section Four. Here's a quick example: Two ham operators in Los Angeles - Walter McMenamy and Karl Pierson - were responsible for a great many of the first reports of post-loss signals but the pattern of what they said they heard is completely at odds with what was being heard in the search area and all the information they claimed to have gotten from Earhart could have been had by simply monitoring Coast Guard radio traffic. McMenamy and Pierson were almost certainly perpetrating a hoax - perhaps with the best of intentions (i.e. to encourage a large Navy search) or perhaps just to puff their own reputations as hot-shot radio experts, or some of both - who knows? The point is that the patterns of what they reported hearing - the times, the frequencies, the content - sticks out like a sore thumb when viewed in the context of the other reports. > Hoax messages should not have the same characteristics > as the alleged Earhart messages, so a different pattern between the two > sets can support your analysis. Of course, it may also refute it, but > that's scientific analysis for you. Exactly. > It's different than analyzing the > different messages separately and then throwing out the bad ones (which > is what you're doing already). It may take some time, but it's not > like we've been waiting months already. :) I appreciate your patience and your thoughts. We'd rather have it right than have it Tuesday. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 14:00:34 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Update from Ric In your post loss analysis,are you including the Charles Hill research on the Pan Am bearings? I certainly am not qualified to evaluate his recalculaton of the bearings that in his opinion converged in the Marshalls, but they may or may not be correct. I know that Hills other research has been iffy, but the bearings may be different. If he is mistaken, other researchers should be aware. LTM, Ron Bright Bremerton,Wa ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 14:01:12 From: Jon Watson Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian For Marty: Well, except for their loose affiliation with that whacko Tighar group, their credentials are pretty impeccable... ltm jon > > You are assuming a reasonable audience who recognizes Kar and Tom's > credentials. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 14:53:09 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Update from Ric Ron Bright asks: > In your post loss analysis,are you including the Charles Hill research > on the Pan Am bearings? We're not including anyones else's research. This is a report on TIGHAR's research. Everyone is free to compare it to whatever other research they choose. Ric ======================================================================== = Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 09:05:07 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Update from Ric >We're not including anyones else's research. This is a report on >TIGHAR's research. Umm -- not meaning to be difficult, but I think one of the great problems with the great corpus of Earhart literature is that for the most part nobody ever systematically addresses anyone else's research, other than to say "it stinks." So the Japanese capture people lay out a line of reasoning and then the crashed-and-sankers lay out another without saying anything about why they think the JCP are wrong, and ..... You know, in real scientific research it's pretty common to take a look at other people's research and critique it, as a prelude to laying out your own hypothesis. I don't know anything about the research cited here, but if it's at all reputable it seems like it would be a good idea to at least reference it and provide some sort of comment on it. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 09:06:36 From: Scott White Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian To me, it makes a lot of sense for Tom and Kar to be on hand for the dig in a role as observers / assistants to others who are in charge of the project. If Tighar undertook this investigation by itself, then there would forever be criticism that Tighar found whatever it set out to find (i.e., the grave is not Earhart's). If True Believers take on the project unsupervised, then we can expect them to come up with "definitive" (but unverifiable) evidence that the grave really *is* Earhart's. Sending along a group of legitimate investigators with various and contradictory affiliations says a lot about the legitimacy of the project. And . . . speaking of other efforts . . . I just got email today from a guy named Tod Swindell. I think he probably got my email address from "The annotated skeptic bibliography," (link below) where I have a 1-parag. review of Amelia Earhart Survived (Reineck). But does anyone know if Swindell is likely to inhabit this list, and maybe found me here? His message has some wild claims. The original Irene Bolam disappeared altogether in the 1930s; following that, there were two different "Irene Bolams," one of whom was AE (though she had cosmetic surgery). It's a little disjointed, so I'm not sure I understand the whole gist of his argument. But he says he's writing a book. Best, -SW http://www.csicop.org/bibliography/home.cgi (click on "what's new" and scroll down a little) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 09:38:19 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Update from Ric Tom, I would agree although I haven't seen any other research on the post loss radio messages. If I have missed any SERIOUS and/or SCIENTIFIC analysis I apologize to the authors of such. Alan, #2329 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 09:39:21 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: How many Irenes? Scott White wrote: > there were two different "Irene Bolams" I see nothing remarkable about there being two Irene Bolams. According to my search of the Internet there are 481,000 notations. Frightening. Alan, #2329 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 10:05:57 From: Al Hillis Subject: Re: How many Irenes? Let's see, 481,000 notations. Does this smoke contain fire? Don't think so as Tighar has already discounted all 481,000 notations. > From Alan Caldwell > > Scott White wrote: > >> there were two different "Irene Bolams" > > I see nothing remarkable about there being two Irene > Bolams. According > to my search of the Interent there are 481,000 > notations. Frightening. > > Alan, #2329 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 10:55:36 From: Jeff Webb Subject: Re: How many Irenes? > According to my search of the Interent there are 481,000 notations. 481,000? Ummm, according to MY search of the internet using GOOGLE there are about 1620 instances of the words "Irene" and "Bolam" both occurring in and article, and only 51 of the character string "Irene Bolam". Whats up? Jeff Webb, formerly known as "Jdubb" ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 10:57:13 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Update from Ric Tom King says: > ...one of the great problems with the great corpus of Earhart literature > is that for the most part nobody ever systematically addresses anyone > else's research, other than to say "it stinks." Point taken. Next question. Whose research do we need to systematically address in our discussion of the post-loss radio signals? The Crashed and Sankers routinely invoke the Coast Guard statements that claim that all of the signals were investigated and found to be bogus. I deal with that early in the paper and show that those claims are demonstrably untrue. Who else has ventured into the post-loss radio question? Ron Bright has mentioned Charles Hill's supposed re-analysis of the PAA bearings. Is that included in his book "Fix on the Rising Sun"? I guess I'll have to get a copy. Back in 1986 John Luttrell wrote a paper entitled "Winslow Reef - Amelia Earhart's Crash site?" He said that while in the Air Force he had been taught "the fine art of deciphering radio transmissions". He used that art to fill in the blanks in some of Earhart's reported post-loss messages and concluded that she crashed on Winslow Reef. John no longer thinks he was right but his paper is still on file at the NASM library. And then there's Fred Hooven, the inventor who developed the advanced radio compass that Earhart removed from her aircraft prior to the first World Flight attempt. In 1982 Hooven wrote a paper (also now at the NASM library) entitled "Amelia Earhart's Last Flight" in which he tried to analyze some of the post-loss signals and especially the PAA bearings. He reached the conclusion that: "The evidence strongly supports the hypothesis....that the flyers landed in the Phoenix area, probably or McKean or Gardner, that they transmitted signals from there for the next three days, that they were removed by the Japanese, who either removed or destroyed their plane, that they were taken to Saipan, where they died sometime before the end of 1937, and that the U.S. Government knew about their fate, but for reasons of foreign relations and military secrecy were not able to make that knowledge public." Hooven's paper presents no evidence to support his conclusions about the Japanese. For that he was relying entirely upon the work of his friend Fred Goerner. By that time (the early 1980s) Goerner had been disabused of the notion that Earhart had somehow made it to the Marshalls but he couldn't turn loose of his conviction that she had ended up on Saipan. Hooven's analysis of the post-loss signals put her firmly in the Phoenix Group, probably on either McKean or Gardner. Obviously, the Japanese must have come down to the Phoenix and taken her to Saipan. Okay, so we'll review the work of Hill, Lutrell, and Hooven. Anyone else? LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 11:54:36 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: Update from Ric Wasn't there an article in Naval History on some of the post-loss message traffic, specifically the PAN-AM memos? I think I wrote a response on that. Wasn't there an earlier article in Naval History as well on the Earhart loss that might have referred to post-loss messages? The point that Ric should make is that no one has compiled a complete message database and examined it from a meta-database point of view to determine if there is anything worthy of pursuit there. The other point is that various Naval reports in Aug, 1937, discuss the radio messages to a certain degree, but none of those reports had available to them the entire database of reports to critically examine them. The Naval Reports did, to a certain extent, "report" on the messages. If I was Ric, I wouldn't spend too much effort reporting these earlier efforts, but at least acknowledge that they were limited in scope and were not critically examined for validity except in real time to help guide the search effort. > From Ric > > Tom King says: > >> ...one of the great problems with the great corpus of Earhart >> literature >> is that for the most part nobody ever systematically addresses anyone >> else's research, other than to say "it stinks." ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 13:02:11 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Update from Ric Alan, et al, One of the more serious researchers in post loss msgs is Paul Rafford Jr.,who I believe will publish a book soon. His research of the Pan Am DF networking on July 4 and 5th, indicates the Adcock system received signals on 3105, and after "considerable effort" they obtained four bearings from Wake, Midway, Hawaii and Howland. [ See Donahues book for the bearings of 213 from Hawaii, 144 from Wake and 175 from Midway] He traced the bearings to within 200 miles of Hull Is. in the Phoenix. Paul Rafford is a professional radio Engineer/operator and worked with Pan Am. He contribures frequently to another forum. Charles Hill, whose credentials I don't have a clue, claimed the bearing from Hawaii was 250.2, not 213, and the Midway bearing was off, hence the signals orginated in the Marshalls. This radio business is much too difficult for me to make any sense, so I leave it to Ric, and the Tighar experts to examine. If Hill is right, and who knows, then the signals didn't orginate in the Phoenix. I am sure Tighar's research is dependent on other expert analyses. LTM, Ron Bright ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 17:43:40 From: Ron Bright Subject: Source of Hill's Pan Am research This may help in tracking down Hill's research. Bill Prymak's March 1998 article in the Amelia Earhart Society Newsletter reported the "corrected" post loss intercepts and bearings based on Hill's research. Hill sent Prymak a 10 page report about his work on the bearings from PAA. [ Not included] According to the review, Hill analyzed a specific test of bearings from the ITASCA to Mokapu and found serious errors in those transmissions. Hill said that Cdr Thompson also had doubts and sent a msg on July 5th at 9:45PM to San Francisco requesting that Mokapu take bearings on the Itasca on 3105. He found that it was 35. 2 degrees inerror. A corrected chart appears in the AES newsletter. In brief, Hill "adjusted" bearings are based on his claim that the signals had to pass from the South Pacific "not only through the Koolalu Mountain Range but also through whatever iron (vessels) might be found in or around Pearl Harbor or the Honolulu waterfront". The convergence of Hill's "corrected" bearings of Makapu at 250, Midway at 201 and Wake at 144 is about 250 miles northeast of Mili. Another source is Almond Gray's artricle in the Naval History magazine in the U.S Naval Institute Nov/Dec 1993 issue. A former PAA flight and land radio operator in the 30's, he illustrated his bearings with a chart showing the Wake Is and Midway bearings converging in the southeastern Marshall Islands. He considered the signals to Mokapu the weakest or inferior to the others. LTM, Ron Bright ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 17:45:46 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: update from Ric Ron Bright writes: > One of the more serious researchers in post loss msgs is Paul Rafford > Jr.,who I believe will publish a book soon. His research of the Pan Am > DF networking on July 4 and 5th, indicates the Adcock system received > signals on 3105, and after "considerable effort" they obtained four > bearings from Wake, Midway, Hawaii and Howland. [ See Donahues book for > the bearings of 213 from Hawaii, 144 from Wake and 175 from Midway] He > traced the bearings to within 200 miles of Hull Is. in the Phoenix. > > Paul Rafford is a professional radio Engineer/operator and worked > with Pan Am. He contribures frequently to another forum. > > Charles Hill, whose credentials I don't have a clue, claimed the > bearing from Hawaii was 250.2, not 213, and the Midway bearing was off, > hence the signals orginated in the Marshalls. As far as I know, all of the primary source information about the Pan Am bearings is contained in the original government message traffic and in several PAA internal memoranda which are now in the Seaver Center collection in Los Angeles. I'm familiar with Rafford's theories as published in the Loomis/Ethel book "Amelia Earhart - The Final Story" but that book includes no mention of the PAA bearings. As you know, Donahue's book is not a source for anything except perhaps humor. I'll look at Hill's book but it sounds like he's changing the historical record to fit his own theory. LTM Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 17:46:21 From: Andrew McKenna Subject: Re: Update from Ric For Ron Bright Ron, I think you are referring to the recalculation of bearings based upon terrain induced error of 35 degrees to the west at Mokapu Point, Hawaii, but I don't have Hill's report / research. Can you direct me to where I can find it? One thing that is interesting is that Mokapu also reported a bearing of 175 degrees, which when "corrected" by 35 degrees to the west, converges with bearing from Wake and Midway at - guess where? So, whether or not you use the original Mokapu bearings, or corrected ones, there is convergence at Nikumaroro either way. Food for thought. LTM (who likes convergence) Andrew ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 17:47:07 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Update from Ric > Okay, so we'll review the work of Hill, Lutrell, and Hooven. Anyone > else? Do they meet the test of serious or scientific or are they just opinions? An opinion and $3.95 will buy a cup of coffee at Starbucks. Alan, #2329 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 17:47:34 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Update from Ric Thanks, Ron. I have been aware of the PanAm bearing controversy but have not seen anything definitive on that issue. I remember reading Hill's reasoning but it doesn't come to mind at the moment. Alan, #2329 ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2004 08:03:22 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Update from Ric Alan asks: >Do they meet the test of serious or scientific or are they just >opinions? An opinion and $3.95 will buy a cup of coffee at Starbucks. All three - Hill, Luttrell, and Hooven - were, I'm sure, serious. Fred Hooven had genuine credentials and was scientific in his approach. As Tom King says, we can't just dismiss someone's research by saying it stinks, even if it does. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2004 08:03:46 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Update from Ric Ron Bright says: >Hill analyzed a specific test of bearings >from the ITASCA to Mokapu and found serious errors in those >transmissions. Hill said that Cdr Thompson also had doubts and sent a >msg on July 5th at 9:45PM to San Francisco requesting that Mokapu take >bearings on the Itasca on 3105. He found that it was 35. 2 degrees in >error. A corrected chart appears in the AES newsletter. Okay. I know the bearings he's talking about. It's an interesting incident. We'll talk about it. I've now written to Charlie Hill asking him to send me a copy of his paper. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2004 08:04:39 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Update from Ric Ric, and Radio experts, I don't have any expertise in this area but I think it may be worthwhile to see if I can get the original 10 page report of Hill's research so that it can be evaluated. Bill Prymak only reported what Hill wrote. I will see if Paul Rafford wishes to comment on the PAA bearings and their convergence. As I recall none were voice msgs and many were quite weak. I don't know how much weight Tighar is giving to the PAA bearings in relationship to AE's possible post loss signals. I think one major problem with Hill is that he calculated the bearings accounting for the equatorial drift for a few days, and as far as I know, AE couldnt transmit if the plane was drifting. LTM, Ron B. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2004 09:57:01 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Post-Loss messages Although we haven't seen your analysis as of yet, I was wondering if you took into account AE's aircraft antenna's orientation while sitting on Gardner? From looking at the map of Gardner it seems likely that the aircraft may have landed either to the North or South near the Norwich City-East or West may have been very wet! You've been there what are your thoughts as to which direction is most likely? I lean towards the North basis the anecdotal recollection of aircraft sightings, etc., and I doubt that there was any taxiing around once on the ground. Now a question for the radio folks: Would the orientation of the dorsal vee antenna play a part in how/what direction the strongest signals would have been received by land stations? This assumes that the ventral antenna was lost on takeoff from Lae and the vee was the only one available to transmit on. If the ventral antenna wasn't lost at Lae and/or was repaired while on Gardner would this antenna's orientation play a role in how the signals would have been received? Further questions for the radio folks: When you folks talk about harmonics would the antenna orientation play a role in who may have/could have picked up signals e.g. Betty's Notebook and others along the West Coast of the US? In summary, from what I've read it seems that the antenna orientation played a role in who heard what. For example when AE was heading for Howland Itasca could hear her and while heading in the same general direction Lae had heard her (an East/West orientation) but those stations to the North of her route only heard her faintly. There may be more radio signal records, correlated with direction of flight, that may help in validating the post loss messages. Ted Campbell ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2004 11:56:23 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: Post-Loss Messages A couple of notes from an old operator over here: 1. Todays Aircraft antennas are situated to transmit and receive on a forward and rearward bias in vhf am. that is simply a fact of engineering and necessity as we receive and send forward to our destination and back to our starting point. 2. but in the past, a longwire transmitting the best reception and transmit 90 degrees from the wire means that the best reception and transmission is on an angle to the fuselage centerline dependent upon the angle of the wire as designed and installed. 3. A longwave antenna on the bottom of the airplane if either repaired [doubtful, if she carried parts due to her trying to keep weight down] or not broken is subject to using ground wave, which is a good thing especially If the electra did in fact land with the gear down and it would travel a long distance and the best at night. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2004 12:07:03 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re Update from Ric Although not the same, I used RMI bearings for many years both over land and out at sea and never encountered any significant deviations of some unknown nature. I would be surprised if the PanAm bearings were not fairly accurate. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 3 Nov 2004 12:38:36 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Post-Loss messages Ted Campbell asks: > Although we haven't seen your analysis as of yet, I was wondering if > you took into account AE's aircraft antenna's orientation while sitting > on Gardner? We know that the dorsal vee antenna was the transmitting antenna. We know that the plane could not transmit if afloat. We know that if the plane made a reasonably safe landing the antenna should be intact. We've modeled the antenna and have a good handle on its probable capabilities but its precise orientation is not a significant factor. The most important question is whether any of the reported receptions were legitimate calls from the lost plane. If some of the signals were legitimate then Crashed And Sank is crashed and sunk. The next question is whether it is possible to say, in a general sense, where the signals were coming from. Pinning the origin point down to a specific island, let alone a specific place on a specific island, is much less certain. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 08:08:25 From: Jon Watson Subject: Re: Post loss messages > If some of the signals were legitimate then Crashed And Sank is crashed > and sunk. If ONE of the signals was legit.... ltm ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 08:10:15 From: David Billings Subject: Electra in New Britain Dear Tighar Organisation, For the enlightenment of your members I offer the following website address: http://www.electranewbritain.com I see no reason why the address should be witheld from your members in the interests of all round knowledge concerning the search for the Electra. Best Regards, David Billings Nambour Queensland Australia. ***************************************** Old news. P ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 10:24:45 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: Post loss messages From Carl Peltzer, who might have enuf money soon to become a full fledged member and do some flying also. Yep, just one is all it takes! So redouble the efforts, chums! There must be some more radio techs with this type of experence out there that we haven't brought into the fray as yet, so keep extending the forum outward. Wish there were tape recordings or sound movies setup during these post loss receptions as with todays technology we could be sure whose voice was speaking. Science has cleaned up many mysteries so the question come up for the panel: can technology solve it? ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 10:25:21 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Electra in New Britain For David Billings Certainly a fascinating story, and I'm sure I speak for many of us when I wish you good luck in pursuit of your hypothesis. LTM (who says: "Let a thousand hypotheses bloom") Tom King ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2004 17:30:00 From: Lawrence Talbot Subject: Re: Post loss messages "If one signal is legitament then the crashed and sank is crashed and sunk". May be not. Although it is not known what equipment AE carried on her last flight, her husband did mention several items. He said they had a small life rift with a portable radio. The antenne could be raised with a kite which would act as a colorful beacon. I sure don't know much about radios, but could a small portable radio be heard in Hawaii, Los Angeles or Florida? **************************************************** Her husband did not know what they carried. Everything points to a landing on more-or-less dry land and use of the aircraft's radio. So far as we can determine, there was no "portable" or emergency radio. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 6 Nov 2004 09:01:52 From: John Harsh Subject: New law impacting aircraft recovery from water From the EAA's weekly e-letter, news of legislation that may impact recovery of military airplanes from rivers and lakes. First the link and then the text. http://www.warbirds-eaa.org/news/2004%20-%2010_29%20-%20EAA%20Reacts%20to%20Aircraft%20Salvage%20Language.html 2004 - 10/29 - EAA Reacts to Aircraft Salvage Language in Defense Authorization Bill EAA and its Warbirds of America division are responding to a measure that could end underwater salvage operations of abandoned military aircraft, removing the possibility that some vintage warbirds could be saved and restored instead of lost forever. The provision, included in the Ronald W. Reagan National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2005, would ban any U.S. citizen from engaging in any activity "that disturbs, removes or injures any sunken military craft," including airplanes. This would halt attempts, for instance, to pull World War II-era warbirds from waters and restore them to airworthy condition. Although there is language in the provision that allows the Department of Defense to issue permits for salvage operations on a historical or educational basis, EAA and Warbirds of America officials are concerned that such permits may be nearly impossible to obtain or issued in an arbitrary manner. The provision is listed under Title XIV-Sunken Military Craft, Sections 1401-1408, located on pages 721-728 of the document. "There are numerous cases of individuals or groups using their own time and money to save aircraft that the U.S. military had abandoned and had no intention of recovering," said Doug Macnair, EAA's vice president of government affairs and Washington Office Director. "These airplanes pose no military threat and had basically been left to rot by the Pentagon. People who want to invest the time and money to resurrect these aircraft and perhaps return them to the air should be encouraged, not banned." There are examples of individuals restoring such aircraft, then being ordered by the U.S. Navy to return them after having invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in restoration, with no recompense by the military. Although Congress has officially adjourned until the new House and Senate are seated in January, there is always the possibility of a lame-duck session after the Nov. 2 election to finish some legislative business. EAA and Warbirds of America representatives will continue to work on the issue and use the groups' many strong relationships in Washington to ensure no last-minute legislation closes this resource for historical warbird restorations. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 6 Nov 2004 11:01:00 From: David Billings Subject: Re: Electra in New Britain Pat Thrasher, Your disparaging remark about "old news" in reference to my website: www.electranewbritain.com does you no credit at all. I doubt that you or your partner in business have read the website as it is in conflict with the Nikumaroro Hypothesis to which you stick like glue to a blanket. You do that despite there being no evidence in that regard and you spend OPM like it is going out of fashion, which for you, it is. Anything which detracts from your own pet hypothesis is blatantly disregarded. However, in 1995, your partner Richard, wanted to know the details of our project and I have the Fax to prove it. We were not prepared to give out information at that time. You say our project is "old news", well, I'll bet now that you wish you had it yourself. You are locked in to Nikumaroro and have painted yourselves into a corner. The New Britain Project has evidence Madam, both Visual (the bare aluminium wreck) and Documented (the wartime map). You have none. You have a hypothesis only, we have evidence. Some of your members have already contacted me wishing me well. You see, it might be "old news" to you, but it is "new news" to a lot of them. Some of them may even have the intestinal fortitude to ask you Madam, the reason as to no discussion on the New Britain Project if you knew all about it before my post on your Forum. Your Forum provides information, discussion and very rarely, humour. As moderators you take a delight in trashing everyone else's thoughts and are downright insulting to newcomers on the scene. Your use of symbols representing a foul word was in itself demeaning to your members. How you have lasted so long is a complete mystery in itself. Arrogance is displayed often on your site, humility never. Carry on with Nikumaroro, please do. You will find nothing of the Electra there. I did expect some sarcastic comment and I was right. You can't get off that treadmill can you ? David Billings Nambour Queensland Australia. ********************************************************************** From Ric David, Pat posted your website address as you requested. There's no need for you to attack or insult her or me. No information has been withheld. She characterized it as "old news", which it is. If anyone wishes to discuss it we'll be happy to do so. LTM, Ric ******************************************************************** > Your use of symbols representing a foul word was in itself demeaning > to your members. Could you be referring to the line of asterisks with which we have for many years now separated postings from moderator comment? Pat ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 6 Nov 2004 11:02:19 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Post loss messages Lawrence Talbot says: > "If one signal is legitament then the crashed and sank is crashed and > sunk". > > May be not. Although it is not known what equipment AE carried on her > last flight, her husband did mention several items. He said they had a > small life rift with a portable radio. The antenne could be raised with a > kite which would act as a colorful beacon. I sure don't know much about > radios, but could a small portable radio be heard in Hawaii, Los Angeles or > Florida? Expanding on Pat's reply: Putnam never said that Earhart had a portable life raft or an emergency radio. The Itasca got that mistaken impression early in the search from a badly-worded and misinterpreted exchange of messages with Coast guard headquarters in San Francisco. Several days later the confusion was cleared up. "Plane carried no emergency radio equipment except one spare battery in cabin. Dynamotors all mounted under fuselage and would positively be submerged if plane was in water." (Message from COMFRANDIV to Itasca 09:15Z, July 6, 1937) ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 6 Nov 2004 11:54:11 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: Electra in New Britain Dear David, > I did expect a sarcastic comment and I got one. > Situation normal, I suppose. Yes. In order to live normal human lives, we have to make decisions about what we will spend our resources on: this spouse, not that one; this job, not that one; this country, not that one; this hypothesis, not that one; etc. TIGHAR attracts all kinds of Ameliaholics. Pat and Ric have been slogging along, figuring out how to piece together enough funds to support research on the Niku hypothesis for something like 16 or 17 years. They have amassed and assimilated an enormous amount of information on the decades before and after 1937. They have been forced to make hundreds of thousands of decisions about what they will value and what they won't value as a clue to where they should invest their limited and irreplaceable personal energies. "Writing to a friend on September 18, 1861, Charles Darwin reflected on how far the science of geology had come since he first took it up seriously during his five-year voyage on the HMS Beagle: 'About thirty years ago there was much talk that geologists ought only to observe and not theorise; and I well remember some one saying that at this rate a man might as well go into a gravel-pit and count the pebbles and describe the colours. How odd it is that anyone should not see that all observation must be for or against some view if it is to be of any service!'" Scientists do not treat all theories with equal respect. They mentally sort them out on a gradient that runs from highly persuasive to utterly absurd. Then they pick the theory that they judge (intuitively and without perfect proof) that they can test with the resources they have at their disposal. If they make wise choices, the experiments they conduct will teach them something, whether or not they confirm the original hypothesis. I think you have excellent evidence that there is a wrecked aircraft out in the bush that can be located and identified, given enough time and money to do a thorough search. You will also need luck, of course. It is amazing how big the earth is and how small aircraft are. At a wild guess, there must be many thousands of aircraft missing, even though people know roughly where they crashed and have searched for years to find them. I hope you find the wreckage you are searching for. If it is AE's plane, then TIGHAR will have to concede that the Niku hypothesis has been falsified. This would be a crushing emotional disappointment for those of us who have invested in the Niku hypothesis, but it will be a lesson about how historical investigation works. And TIGHAR has tried very assiduously to position its work as an example of good historical investigation. At this point, you find the pencilled notations on the map persuasive and TIGHAR does not. TIGHAR finds the anecdotes about a pre-1939 wreck on Niku persuasive and you do not. If we're lucky to live long enough, time may tell which theory is true and which false. I was happy to share the photos I took of the NZ Electra with you. Those pictures were taken on a trip fully funded by TIGHAR. As far as I'm concerned, they are simply data (facts) that may be shared freely among Ameliaholics. If the photos help you raise money and complete your research, I hope you will recognize that you owe a small debt of gratitude to TIGHAR for the part they play in your success. I find Ric and Pat quite amazing people. I have spent many happy hours in the company and have been a guest in their home. We are worlds apart politically, religiously, and, at times, philosophically, but they have been kind, gracious, and generous to me with their own and TIGHAR's resources. To paraphrase a text from Alcoholics Anonymous, they are not saints, but I do find them willing to grow up mentally. They have put together a most amazing team of experts with world-class credentials along with amateurs who are willing to work like draft animals under their direction. I feel honored to be counted among their friends, associates, and followers. I look forward to the day when Ric can tell the whole story of TIGHAR as he sees it. It's been a great adventure. If you prove TIGHAR wrong--or if TIGHAR proves the Niku hypothesis right--the time will come for telling about the ups and downs of organizing the motley crew. I'm happy to make your acquaintance and, with TIGHAR's funding, to have made some small contribution to your research. I wish you all success with your efforts and hope that you, too, can soon tell the full story of how you located and identified the wreck in New Britain. Marty ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 6 Nov 2004 18:26:34 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: New Britain For David Billings: Sir, I perused your website; thanks for providing us with the link. Yours is a theory that is new to me. It is quite fascinating. I read your note taking umbrage with Pat and Ric. I'm puzzled, frankly. Please tell us what sort of reception to your first posting would have been acceptable to you. This group (TIGHAR) is, at the moment, deeply involved in testing the hypothesis that Miss Earhart put NR16020 down on Nikumaroro. You can certainly subscribe to your hypothesis, but, in my opinion, you can't legitimately gripe at Pat or Ric or any of us for our interest in a different one. You seem to be interested in why Ric never told us about your hypothesis. If you'd like the answer to that question, feel free to ask. I'll bet Ric will provide an answer. (By the by, if you think that there were posted symbols that represent swear words directed at you, you are mistaken. In my opinion, on that score, you owe Pat & Ric an apology.) As to evidence to support your hypothesis, you have a map with some markings on it, and the stories from the soldiers, do I have that right? Are the soldiers' stories in the form of a report written down at the time of the discovery of the plane? Or are you relying on their memory? (My apologies if that is stated in your website - I missed it). Your website states, "There will be those who will postulate that it was not possible that Earhart, Noonan and the Electra could have made it back to the vicinity of Rabaul. In the main those people will be those who have their own agendas." Oh. I see. If I doubt you, I have an agenda. Hmmm. You doubt us, too. Does that mean that you also have an agenda? I think so. We're agreed, then? You and I each have an agenda? You continue, "The fact remains that there is evidence of aircraft wreckage in that area from persons who saw this wreckage and there is documentary evidence which identifies that wreckage. This is the only evidence in the World of where the Electra rests. I have tried to show here, within this story, that there is merit in continuing to search for this aircraft wreckage in New Britain, which I firmly believe is the elusive Electra." I'm not sure I buy your assertion that yours is the only evidence, but I'll agree, you certainly have evidence supporting your hypothesis. And now, I'm not sure what you are after. Can you please tell us what you want? Do you want us to assist you in some way? Do you want donations? I'll consider making a donation to you, okay? I'm asking Pat to post this to the Forum, and I'm copying you separately so you can respond to me on-Forum or off. LTM, Alfred Hendrickson, PE TIGHAR Sponsor Member #2583 PS: LTM is not a swear word. It means (I'm not just making this up) "Love to Mother". Ahh, heck with it, perhaps I should have just left the LTM off, but here at TIGHAR, we have our standards along with our odd customs. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:23:22 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: New Britain > From Alfred Hendrickson, for David Billings: > ... You seem to be interested in why Ric > never told us about your hypothesis. If you'd like the answer to that > question, feel free to ask. I'll bet Ric will provide an answer. Two points to note: 1. I'm not unfamiliar with Ric's view of the New Britain hypothesis. I presume that I found it out by reading the website, though I may be mistaken (I often am). I'm sure I've heard Ric comment on the pencil marks from under the tape. 2. I would recommend that folks stand out of swords' reach when asking Ric to "provide answers." I think it's a Scottish-guy thing. > PS: LTM is not a swear word. It means (I'm not just making this up) > "Love to Mother". Ahh, heck with it, perhaps I should have just left > the LTM off, but here at TIGHAR, we have our standards along with our > odd customs. LOL! You wanna watch out for the bagpipers at a TIGHAR party, too. The healing war pipes are best appreciated at a certain distance. LTM & all Ameliaholics. Marty #2359 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:24:03 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: The New Britain Hypothesis Ric wrote: "If anyone wishes to discuss [the New Britain Project] we'll be happy to do so." Can anyone tell me how NR16020 could have made it all the way back to New Britain? If I have the place correctly located, it's darned near back to where she started from. Ric, what's your opinion of the New Britain Hypothesis? Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:26:24 From: Jackie Tharp Subject: Re: Electra in New Britain To: David Billings Your unwarranted attack on Pat Thrasher does you no credit, sir. The fact is, your hypothesis IS old news(1995?), and here on the Tighar Forum we all have the freedom to express our opinions whether we be moderators, lurkers, dues paying members, or folks with their own personal agenda. The other side of the coin is that once you post your opinions, you have to step up and accept the opinions of all the other forum members. When I read you forum posting, and visited and read your website, I was fascinated with your hypothesis, how well organized your reasoning is, and how enjoyable it is just to read and think about your story. But after reading you're latest posting, I find myself wondering what it is you hope to gain from posting on the Tighar forum. You accuse Ric and Pat of spending OPM like its going out of fashion, and yet your website comes across as a desperate plea for OPM to spend the same way on your theory. Implying some possible with-holding of information not akin to Tighar's isn't exactly the way to gain cooperation or help from Tighar or any other organisation. It seems you posted on our forum: 1. In hopes of winning some of our members' help with OPM and research for your project. 2. In hopes of undermining the relationship between Tighar and its members, which I would find underhanded and foolish. 3. Finding some excuse to go off on that little tirade in your last posting, to try to accomplish #2 above. Both of your posts come accross as aggressive, mean spirited, and written by someone very jealous and spiteful. Pat posted your message in the spirit of cooperation and friendship which is common on this forum. She just doesn't deserve to be personally attacked like that. When you attack one Tighar, you attack 'em all, bud. Jackie Tharp #2440 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:27:16 From: Tom Strang Subject: Re: Electra in New Britain For David Billings Surprise, Surprise -I've waited a long time for you to surface on this forum - But I am disappointed that you choose to stick your head in Tighar's mouth with you caustic critique of Ric and Miss Pat - Unfortunately that caustic critique puts you and your theory of flight at a great disadvantage on this forum for the foreseeable future. Your theory of flight I feel has some merit but is limited by the underlying support of human memory of an war time incident long past. You also find yourself at a disadvantage without that "metal tag". I do wish you the best of luck with your quest - But do keep in mind there are several posses chasing Amelia and her sidekick Fred and the law of averages suggests that one of those posses maybe on the right solution trail. Last but not least, don't give up on this forum, even if at times we look like we eat our young. Respectfully: Tom Strang # 2559 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:27:59 From: Jack Thomas Subject: Re: New Britain > From Alfred Hendrickson, for David Billings: > > question, feel free to ask. I'll bet Ric will provide an answer. (By > the by, if you think that there were posted symbols that represent > swear words directed at you, you are mistaken. In my opinion, on that > score, you owe Pat & Ric an apology.) I believe he was referring to the use of "RTFM" directed at newcomers recently. -Jack Thomas ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:30:00 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: New Britain David Billings wrote: > Pat Thrasher, > Your disparaging remark about "old news" in reference to my website: > www.electranewbritain.com > does you no credit at all. I read your web site, and it is in fact, "old news". I have been aware of that story for quite some time, so obviously you had some publicity quite some time ago. I was quite interested in the limited amount of information that was released at the time. Ric and Pat did post the link to your site. That has to tell you something. They could have simply ignored it as "off topic", which it is, as it does not specifically relate to TIGHAR's NIKU hypothesis. They did post it, and there were no disparaging remarks. Ross Devitt. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:31:18 From: Tom King Subject: Tinian Dig: Preliminaries 11/7/04, 5 PM Tamuning, Guam Hafa Adai from Guam, Forumites. I arrived here yesterday for a three-day teaching stint before meeting Kar Burns and flying up to Tinian to help with the excavation of the putative Earhart/Noonan burial site. The sky is as blue as ever in the western Pacific, the clouds as white, the sun as hot, the breezes as scented, though on Guam's lee side the scent is as much of carbon monoxide and particulates as it is of flowers and sea salt. This morning's Pacific Daily News, the major newspaper in the area, had a couple of related articles about the Tinian dig; should be on the web at www.guampdn.com. The coverage seems quite accurate and fair, and took up a bit of the front page and all of pages 2 and 3. "Pretty slow news day," I thought, but then I was interviewed over lunch by the articles' author, Katie Worth, who said that her article last year on the Earhart-Tinian connection had been THE most popular thing the paper had done in terms of website hits from around the world -- over a million. The enduring appeal of Earhart. For those who aren't up on the story -- St. John Naftel, now 82 and a resident of Montgomery, AL, was a Marine gunner on Tinian after it was taken from the Japanese in 1944. He says he was shown a set of graves where Earhart and Noonan had been buried after being executed. Last year he returned to the island accompanied by then-U.S. Navy archaeologist Jennings Bunn and pointed out the site. Bunn, now retired, has put together an excavation project, funded out of his own pocket and staffed by volunteers, obtained a permit from the Northern Marianas Historic Preservation Office, and the work will begin on Thursday the 11th. Naftel and Bunn will arrive Wednesday night, and join Saipan archaeologist Mike Fleming and various colleagues, including Kar and me. The first step, I believe, will be a certain amount of backhoe stripping, followed by shovel-scraping to look for grave shafts, and then controlled hand excavation untill either bones are found or we give up. Ms. Worth asked me for my own opinion of the likelihood of finding Earhart, and I explained why I feel that the Nikumaroro hypothesis is far more likely to be correct, giving her a copy of AE's Shoes (2001 edition, the new one still being hung up at the printer). But I also explained that in our view it's always worth testing alternative hypotheses, and praised Jennings Bunn for putting together an objective, scientifically sound project to test this one. Northern Marianas Historic Preservation Officer Epiphano Cabrera and his senior staff, who are attending my class and sat in on the interview, stressed that they'll have a representative on site to make sure the work is properly done. I'm told I should be able to get internet access on Tinian; if so, I'll report in when I can. If that doesn't work out, I'll at least try to file a report when I return to Guam the evening of the 16th. LTM Tom ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 10:32:16 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Radios Lawrence Talbot said: "Although it is not known what equipment AE carried on her last flight, her husband did mention several items. He said they had a small life rift with a portable radio. The antenne could be raised with a kite which would act as a colorful beacon. I sure don't know much about radios, but could a small portable radio be heard in Hawaii, Los Angeles or Florida? " Pat replied: "Her husband did not know what they carried. Everything points to a landing on more-or-less dry land and use of the aircraft's radio. So far as we can determine, there was no "portable" or emergency radio." Not to mention that the emergency radio and the unidentified radio that sent the "intercepts" operated on different frequencies. If memory serves me, didn't all emergency radios operate on 500 kcs? Theintercepts were on 3105 and (?) 6210, weren't they? LTM, who no longer chases dittys. Dennis O. McGee #1049EC ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 11:06:22 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Alfred asks: > Ric, what's your opinion of the New Britain Hypothesis? There are so many problems with the hypothesis that it's hard to know where to start. The big one, as you've noted, is that there is simply no way to get the airplane back to New Britain. The one piece of alleged documentation specific to the Electra - information from the supposed tag (found under the tape) - is wrong and requires convoluted and unsupported speculative explanations. >The interior sheet metal surfaces (of the nacelle) were painted in a >yellow paint. I'd be interested to hear the explanation of how zinc chromate wash (which did not come into use until 1939) got on Earhart's nacelles. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 11:07:08 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Less than 1000 total Gallons of fuel available make it absolutely impossible for that to happen unless, for example, they had on board a very strong transmitter to make the folks on the Howland feel they were close [in daylight!] and if they had approximately 4 hours of fuel available in the morning they could have gotten perhaps 600 statute miles in the wrong direction. What? Personally I find it very hard to go with this idea at all. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 14:01:33 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Radios Dennis asks: > If memory > serves me, didn't all emergency radios operate on 500 kcs? The > intercepts were on 3105 and (?) 6210, weren't they? That's correct. In fact, when Itasca put out the first "all ships, all stations" bulletin that afternoon asking everyone to listen for possible distress calls form Earhart they mentioned only 500 kcs (not knowing that, due to antenna changes, the airplane actually had no meaningful ability to transmit on that frequency). Unwittingly, the Itasca set a trap for would-be hoaxers. Had alleged distress calls been reported on 500 kcs they would, by definition, be bogus. But there were none. Throughout the post-loss signal phenomenon not one reception on 500 kcs was reported. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 14:02:12 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: New Britain I remember many years ago on passing a newpaper stand, seeing the headline in a British tabloid: "World War II Bomber Found on Moon". Jog my memory Ric. Was David Billings in any way associated with the recovery?? Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 14:02:58 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis The only thing one can say for sure is that an unidentified aircraft wreck has been discovered in New Britain. It cannot possibly be Amelia Earhart's. There have been too many position reports indicating her progress and it's impossible she would have had fuel to fly all the way back to New Britain. LTM (who always loves a good story) ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 14:03:54 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis I thought Mr. Billings had inferred something from the way Pat posted his note. But he referred to RTFM when he said "Your use of symbols representing a foul word was in itself demeaning to your members." I thought RTFM was funny; a humorous way to remind folks to read before posting, in the same vein as the KISS principle. Mr. Billings feels otherwise. But, on to the meat and potatoes of his hypothesis . . . I communicated a bit with Mr. Billings over the weekend. He seems to me to be a sincere individual and he is quite convinced that he has the answer to the AE/FN disappearance. With a magnetometer survey (a hundred large), he says he can wrap this up. I'm still trying to assimilate all of his information. The patrol soldiers remember this event, but their contemporaneous report (and the tag) has not been located. The map markings are quite interesting indeed. I asked Mr. Billings if there was any chance they were not genuine. He says no chance at all; the map and the marks are the real McCoy. Further, he has the original map in his possession. On the question of whether AE could have made it to New Britain, it sounds like Mr. Billings has NR16020 being blown off course by the wind as they head towards Howland, and then, going back to New Britain, that same wind lowers their fuel consumption and stretches their range. Putting her on New Britain would require some pretty phenomenal gas mileage. Hmmmm. LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 14:04:46 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis I have spent a lot of time exchanging emails with David Billings off forum. I have found David to be quite genuine and enthusiastic about his project. I am convinced he believes in the New Britain project wholeheartedly. He and I have had heated discussions over our disagreements but I still count him as a friend. I probably hope he resolves his quest almost as much as he does. All of you are quite correct in that David gets a bit upset when he meets with some of our opposition but he cools off and recognizes TIGHAR members and AES folks have pretty strong beliefs also. All of us have little holes in our theories that don't quite close the door on all others. Not to put a weight on relative evidence but we have anecdotal evidence of aircraft wreckage on Gardner and no smoking gun as of yet. I think our rationale is pretty good and certainly post loss radio traffic and our fuel analysis give us some measure of support. The Marshallites also have anecdotal evidence and no smoking guns. They have a problem getting the plane to the Marshall's just as David has a problem getting it to New Britain. The Marshall supporters want to put the plane on a seaplane tender or somehow fly it to the Marshall Islands. I have not seen just how they support those ideas with any kind of reasonableness. They would disagree. David would also disagree but is so convinced his evidence is so good he doesn't worry all that much about the fuel issue. That is not to say he doesn't have a good explanation. The crashed and sankers MUST dispute ALL of the post loss radio traffic and without finding the plane on the bottom somewhere have to simply continue to speculate. They can fuss with TIGHAR's work but they cannot provide anything of substance of their own. But then no one has much in the way of substance. Certainly David is trying to raise money and so are we. I suppose everyone connected with various AE groups have that same goal. Things grind to a halt without money. What most folks even within TIGHAR have difficulty comprehending is that TIGHAR is dedicated to resolving whether AE and FN landed and perished on Gardner. We are not looking in the Marshall's, the Gilbert's, New Britain or on the bottom of the ocean. Other folks do that. So when some of us don't jump at alternate theories please understand that's not our job. If anyone thinks the plane is on New Britain go help David. If you think it crashed at sea or went to the Marshall's there are groups who would love to have your help. That doesn't mean you have to buy into Gardner. It just means that's what we do and that's where we want your help. We aren't in the business of putting David down or his theories or his evidence. We aren't in the business of disproving the crashed and sank theory or the Marshall or Gilbert theory. This group won't even let me land the plane on Winslow Reef. We aren't saying Gardner is 100% right and everyone else is wrong. Gardner just happens to be our project and we think we have good reasons for that belief. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 15:06:47 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Herman says: > The only thing one can say for sure is that an unidentified aircraft > wreck has been discovered in New Britain. You can't even say that. No wreck has been discovered. There is an account that an engine and possibly a wreck was found 60 some odd years ago. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 15:07:12 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Alfred says: > With a magnetometer survey (a hundred large), > he says he can wrap this up. A magnetometer survey? A magnetometer will only respond to ferrous metal and there is precious little ferrous metal in a Lockheed 10 (the gear legs and retraction torque tubes would probably be the best magnetic targets. The engines are mostly aluminum.) You'd probably see an Electra wreck with the Mark One Eyeball before you'd "see" it with a magnetometer. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 15:19:55 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Alan says: > Gardner just happens to be our project and we think we have good > reasons for that belief. With all due respect, we didn't pick Gardner out of a hat. We've devoted 15 years to that hypothesis because it's the only one that makes sense to us and the closer we've looked the more sense it has made. More to the point, discerning individuals have examined the evidence we have uncovered and have provided financial support - whether it's a $20 T-shirt or a $200,000 grant. If others have difficulty raising money to test their hypotheses it may be because not enough people share their opinion about the validity of their evidence. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 15:32:17 From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Hello Alfred, I remember reading a bit about this New Britian thing some time ago somewhere. If I remember correctly, one idea was that Amelia suffered some type of aircraft trouble and wanted to return to Lae, but obviously never made it -- something like the "old take a left and turn back to Lae" situation, thus potentially flying over (or into New Britian). Unfortunately, it appears that we'd have to discount the radio reports both during and post loss to make the puzzle pieces fit this hypothesis. Very interesting though - thanks to all for your work and to TIGHAR for posting the link! Bob Lee > Can anyone tell me how NR16020 could have made it all the way back to > New Britain? If I have the place correctly located, it's darned near > back to where she started from. > > Ric, what's your opinion of the New Britain Hypothesis? > > Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 18:42:05 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis > From Herman De Wulf > The only thing one can say for sure is that an unidentified aircraft > wreck has been discovered in New Britain. It cannot possibly be Amelia > Earhart's. I would restate the two propositions differently for the sake of precision: 1. An unidentified wreck WAS discovered in N.B. in WWII. David would like to find it again to determine its identity. 2. If the N.B. wreck turns out to be NR16020, we will have to dramatically revise our understanding of what happened on the fatal flight. > There have been too many position reports indicating her progress and > it's impossible she would have had fuel to fly all the way back to New > Britain. Instead of "impossible," I would say "extremely unlikely" or "highly improbable." Strange things do happen. Bottom line: Billings seems to have good evidence that a wreck was found in WWII. It seems likely to me that he may be able to relocate that wreck. I doubt very much that it is AE's plane, but, if it is, I'll have to change my mind about the Niku hypothesis. LTM. Marty #2359 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 18:44:03 From: Pete Backlund Subject: Re: New Britain This kind of sarcastic comment is unworthy of TIGHAR. Pete From Angus Murray > I remember many years ago on passing a newpaper stand, seeing the > headline in a British tabloid: > "World War II Bomber Found on Moon". > Jog my memory Ric. Was David Billings in any way associated with the > recovery?? > > Regards Angus. ********************************* I don't write 'em, Pete -- I jest posts 'em. We actually ran a small story in TIGHAR Tracks about the bomber on the moon; I believe it was supposed to be a B-29 but we decided the picture was of something else. A long time ago, now. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 18:45:27 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis > From Alfred Hendrickson: > I thought Mr. Billings had inferred something from the way Pat posted his > note. But he referred to RTFM when he said "Your use of symbols representing > a foul word was in itself demeaning to your members." I thought RTFM was > funny; a humorous way to remind folks to read before posting, in the same > vein as the KISS principle. RTFM Read The Friendly Manual. Of course in some circles, the manual isn't really friendly.... "Th' WOMBAT" ********************************************** Well, of course. What did you *think* it meant? Pat ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 18:46:17 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: the New Britain Hypothesis > From Ric > > You can't even say that. No wreck has been discovered. There is an > account that an engine and possibly a wreck was found 60 some odd years > ago. > LTM, > Ric I seem to recall a tale of a skeleton lying near a beach, women's shoes and an Irish magistrate sparking off a search.... Th' WOMBAT ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 19:15:01 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis I'll agree with extremely unlikely. I suspect that it will be quite difficult to locate a pre-WW II wreck in the jungle of New Britain. The fact that they could locate it at all in that era suggests to me that it was not AE's, but a fresher wreck of some other aircraft. Dan Postellon ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 19:38:35 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: New Britain Pete Backlund writes (in reference to Angus Murray's facetious question about David Billings being involved in the "World War II Bomber Found on Moon": <> I agree, but Angus is not a TIGHAR member and does not speak for TIGHAR. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 20:00:26 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Angus and the plane wreck on the moon In defense of Angus (whose postings I enjoy immensely), if the Forum's sarcasm threshold is going to be adjusted down so low that the man ain't free to talk about plane wrecks on the moon, I'll be hatin' life. LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ********************************************************** Fear not. Do not adjust your set. Sarcasm levels will soon return to normal. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 20:00:56 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis The Wombat says: > I seem to recall a tale of a skeleton lying near a beach, women's shoes > and an Irish magistrate sparking off a search.... Not exactly. We recognized the Floyd Kilts story about bones being found as an interesting anecdote that might contain elements of truth. We did not, however, use it as the basis of a search because the story itself did not suggest that there was anything to search for. A better example would be Coast Guard veteran Dick Evans' story about seeing a "water collection device" somewhere on the island's northeast shore. We searched very hard for that site in 1991 without success. We finally found it 1996 with the help of some very hi-tech forensic imaging of old aerial photos, but we didn't understand the significance of what we had found until the British files describing the whole bones incident came to light in 1997/98. It wasn't until 2001 that we were able to make a reasonably conclusive identification of the site (now known as the Seven Site) as the place where the castaway's bones had been found. The lesson? All searches usually start with a story. Nothing wrong with that. But successful searches start with stories that make sense and are backed up by solid documentation. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 20:01:54 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Ric wrote: > With all due respect, we didn't pick Gardner out of a hat. OK, so much for playing straight man. Alan ****************************** ba-da-bing ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 20:23:23 From: Al Hillis Subject: Re: Angus and the plane wreck on the moon I didn't see them change. lol Just teasing Pat. BUT, Does Ric live in a glass house when speaking for someone like the Surgeon General of the United States? From Tighars Home Page - Warning: The Surgeon General has determined the Amelia Earhart Search Forum to be a potentially addictive activity. It is a dynamic and active research tool which typically generates a dozen or more postings each day. Many forum subscribers soon become hopelessly hooked. Others whose interest is more casual or who do not normally check their email every day find that the volume of traffic is more than they can handle. See Ric, we do read the forum notes. :) Enjoying it all. > From Alfred Hendrickson: > > In defense of Angus (whose postings I enjoy immensely), if the Forum's > sarcasm threshold is going to be adjusted down so low that a man > ain't free to talk about plane wrecks on the moon, I'll be hatin' life. > > LTM, > > Alfred Hendrickson #2583 > ********************************************************** > > Fear not. Do not adjust your set. Sarcasm levels > will soon return to > normal. > > Pat ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2004 20:44:07 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: Angus and the plane wreck on the moon gee, and I thought the sarcasm was already at record levels: sure hope it doesn't increase ************************************** Perhaps our disclaimer ought to mention the fact that a small but deadly number of our members are incurable smart-asses..... And why am I suddenly thinking of Dennis McGee? Pat ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:09:55 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: bombers on moon I saw that at the newsstand and recall that it was supposed to be a B24 liberator. One of the National Enquirer type rags or somesuch. ********************************* The Weekly World News, our favorite. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:10:25 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Angus and the plane wreck on the moon > Does Ric live in a glass house when speaking for someone like the > Surgeon General of the United States? The website doesn't say anything about the Surgeon General of the United States. It mentions "the Surgeon General". We're an international organization. We have our own Surgeon General. And of course I live in a glass house. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:12:30 From: Pete Gray Subject: Re: planes on moon Let us not forget the HANNEBAU ship the Nazis put on Mars in 1947, since we all know Bermuda Triangle losses are on the dark side of the moon. Mother thought herding cats would be so easy.... Ad Astra! pete former #2419 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:17:25 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: New Britain > From Pete Backlund > > This kind of sarcastic comment is unworthy of TIGHAR. > > Pete As Ric says, I don't speak for Tighar. Anyone with a theory of the Earhart disappearance who expects to be taken seriously had better get their facts straight. If they don't, they shouldn't feel too upset if they make themselves a laughing stock. You should also be aware (as I understand it) that no public mention was ever made of C/N1055 by the proponents of this idea before that information was provided by Ric. My guess is that David Billings has had the wool pulled over his eyes. As Ric correctly pointed out, the theory is so replete with problems, it is difficult even to know where to begin in pointing them out. --The Lockheed Electra 10E would in no circumstances operate at 25gph on both engines in level flight. --The land in sight ahead message was not at 00:30 GMT. --00:30 GMT was not 11:00 am at Nauru. --Higher Octane fuel will not increase BMEP. (It allows you to use operate at a higher manifold --pressure for the same rpm without detonation). --Salt on the cowlings would be rapidly removed by the frequent downpours that happen in New Britain. --The 1936 Lockheed 10E did not use a yellow chromate finish. --Ontario was an ocean going tug not a USCG cutter. --Lockheed never said in 1937 the aircraft would be held at 8000ft for ten hours (and if they did recently they were wrong). --An immediate climb to 10,000ft would without doubt use more fuel per mile than a staged climb to lower altitude especially when headwinds are higher at altitude. --Lockheed's claim of a 4000 mile range was a pre-delivery nominal figure estimated from a rule-of-thumb formula. The range they actually claimed in 1937 as practical was not in excess of 3,600 s/miles. --Since we can be fairly sure FN reached the sun line through Howland, it is impossible that they were short of Howland by 140 or 150 miles. I could point out some more but I think you get the point. I could well have believed that that the aircraft was eg a Ki 54 or similar but that story of seeing the Pratt & Whitney name plate and the business about the cowl joint rivets, the heavy corrosion and the error over the 600hp make me think that someone wanted the world to believe that this was a Lockheed Electra. If that is indeed the case then this story can only be a hoax. As it happens I do know what happened (as will eventually be revealed) to AE's Electra and I can categorically say that it did not wind up on New Britain. The probable reason that no aircraft of the sort described has been found after nine searches on New Britain is that such an aircraft simply does not exist. So don't give me too hard a time about sending up what is almost certainly a hoax. Another hoax was of course the wreck photo. Do you notice any curious parallels? In a clearing One engine attached The cockpit section smashed back to the mainspar Unpainted Tall trees In a tropical island setting Food for thought. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:18:21 From: Alan Hall Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis A Night at the Opera ... the Marx Brothers http://www.nightattheopera.net/qtclips.html "QuickTime Movie clip of Fiorello (Chico Marx) disguised as one of the greatest aviators in the world, describing how they came to America" "So now I tell you how we fly to America. The first time-a we start-a, we get-a half way across when we run out of gasoline and we gotta go back. Then I take-a twice as much-a gasoline. This time we were just about to land, maybe three feet, when what do you think? We run out of gasoline again. And back we go again and get-a more gas. This time I take-a plenty gas. Wella we getta half way over ... when what do you thinka happen? We forgota the airplane. So we gotta sit down and we talk it over. Then I getta the great idea. We no taka gasoline. We no taka the airplane. We taka steamship. And that, friends... is how we fly across the ocean." ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:20:04 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Marty Moleski objects to my writing that that Amelia Earhart would have had insufficient fuel reserves to turn back to New Britain, writing : > "Instead of "impossible," I would say "extremely unlikely" or "highly > improbable." Strange things do happen." At one time Earhart radioed "We are upon you but can't see you". This was the last of several position reports indicating she was on her way to Howland. At no point in the flight was there ever a broadcast indicating she had made a 180 degree turn and was heading back West or to New Britain. And so far into the flight as to announce to be over or near Howland there just couldn't have been sufficient fuel left to return. I think we all agree with the fuel burn calculations which left her with something like four hours of gas left. That could perhaps have brought her to Gardner Island, which is what TIGHAR believes and is investigating, but there is no way she could have flown all the way back to New Britain after having said "We must be on you but can't see you". Her "possibly" having done so after all and "possibly" have reached it is -to put it mildly- unrealistic. I do agree with Marty's statement that strange things sometimes do happen. The good Lord is known to have put the Azores near a Canadian Airbus A330 running out of Jet A over the Atlantic as was the case recently. An previous to that He put a deserted airbase near a Canadian Boeing 767 who had also run out of gas over Canada. Mind you, this kind of interventions seem to be limited to Canadian airplanes. Earhart's was registered in the US. Let's stick to Marty's bottom line: "Billings seems to have good evidence that a wreck was found in WWII. It seems likely to me that he may be able to relocate that wreck. I doubt very much that it is AE's plane, but, if it is, we'll all have to change our minds about the Niku hypothesis. LTM. Herman (#2406) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:22:09 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Angus and the plane wreck on the moon Sarcasm is unworthy of TIGHAR? Have I stumbled into some alternative reality? ********************************** No, Tom, relax and keep digging. TIGHAR has not suddenly reformed . Pat ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:23:21 From: Tom King Subject: TIGHARs on Tinian 2 Not a great deal to report on the Tinian project, since we're not there yet, but it may be worth noting that I found myself on a radio talk show this afternoon with Jim Sullivan, one of the project organizers and host of a science/exploration/nature call-in show here on Guam with some very interesting links to other parts of the broadcasting universe; a nice fellow with whom I think it will be both useful and enjoyable for TIGHAR to remain in touch. The work that he and his colleagues have done to pin down the "burial site" is actually pretty impressive, and Jim maintains a healthy skepticism about who's likely to really be buried there. A press release that's been put out about the project, that outlines what they've done to date, is at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/11/prweb176381.php Kar and I should be on Saipan, where it now appears we won't even have telephone service in our rooms (though I'm told there's a phone in the lobby). Then to Tinian on Thursday. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:31:42 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Bombers on moon Carl Peltzer says: > I saw that at the newsstand and recall that it > was supposed to be a B24 liberator. Actually the plane in the supposed photo was a B-32 "Dominator". (I wish I could forget this stuff.) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 10:42:56 From: Bill Shea Subject: Re: New Britain Angus Murray wrote "Since we can be fairly sure FN reached the sun line through Howland, it is impossible that they were short of Howland by 140 or 150 miles." ... unless, of course they were 140-150 miles north or south on that line. And do we know fairly sure they reached that sun line? - or that they THOUGHT they reached the sun line? A big difference. Cheers from Bill Shea ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 13:16:24 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: New Britain Bill Shea says: > ... unless, of course they were 140-150 miles north or south on that > line. True. > And do we know fairly sure they reached that sun line? - or that they > THOUGHT they reached the sun line? A big difference. I think it's fair to say that we're very sure that they THOUGHT they reached the sun line (after all, AE said "we must be on you" and later "we are on the line 157 337"). Given the information that SHOULD have been available to Noonan I think that we can be "fairly sure" that they did reach the sun line within a tolerance of 10 miles or so. LTM Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 13:17:01 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian 2 Well, it sure sounds like someone was buried there. I wish I were there to help. Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 13:17:39 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Well, with the 600 hp engines, AE was able to climb to a MUCH higher altitude and pick up the jet stream with 300 mph plus tail winds - of course she had to hold her breath since the Electra was not pressurized and she didn't have oxygen on board, but that is a small detail, I'm sure - maybe that's why they crashed at New Britain. They ran out of oxygen, passed out, and the plane ran out of gas and crashed with them asleep at the controls. Their skeletons will be found still strapped in their seats. LTM - who loves wild rumors (or was that wild roomers?) Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 14:40:34 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Dave Bush wrote: "With the 600 hp engines, AE was able to climb to a MUCH higher altitude and pick up the jet stream with 300 mph plus tail winds - of course she had to hold her breath since the Electra was not pressurized and she didn't have oxygen on board, but that is a small detail, I'm sure - maybe that's why they crashed at New Britain. They ran out of oxygen, passed out, and the plane ran out of gas and crashed with them asleep at the controls. Their skeletons will be found still strapped in their seats". Good thinking Dave ! This will allow some to speculate on secret compressors that must have equipped AE's twin 600 hp Wasps to allow her to operate at these altitudes. And she must have been in on secrets, including the existence of the high altitude jet streams which were discovered with the advent of jet travel in the Fifties. LTM (who always loves jokes) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 14:47:34 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian 2 For Dan Postellan: >Well, it sure sounds like someone was buried there>> Yeah, but this being Tinian, there are people buried all over. I was cheered yesterday to learn that according to people who've dug there, most WWII Japanese graves are shallow. Wish you were here, as does Mother. Tom ***************************************** Note to Forum: Tom's reports (all two of 'em so far) are now up on the TIGHAR website, with maps and so on. Note to Tom: Can you give me any sort of general indication as to where on Tinian you folks will be working? Pat ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 14:56:44 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: New Britain I think it is much more likely that someone missed a broadcast from Amelia and Fred saying they were turning back, early in the flight. The "We must be on you" broadcast would have been made as they thought they were getting closer to Lae, and might just put them near New Britain. "We are on the line 157 337" was probably referring to a celebratory drink, and misinterpreted by the listeners. What was really said was "We've been drinking wine since 1:57. It's now 3:37". Problem solved. It's amazing what a little scientific research (4 years of TIGHAR forum) and a spot of lateral thinking can do! Th' WOMBAT > From Ric > Bill Shea says: >> ... unless, of course they were 140-150 miles north or south on that >> line. > > True. > >> And do we know fairly sure they reached that sun line? - or that they >> THOUGHT they reached the sun line? A big difference. > > I think it's fair to say that we're very sure that they THOUGHT they > reached the sun line (after all, AE said "we must be on you" and later > "we are on the line 157 337"). Given the information that SHOULD have > been available to Noonan I think that we can be "fairly sure" that they > did reach the sun line within a tolerance of 10 miles or so. > LTM > Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 14:57:20 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian Coverage of the Tinian dig is now up on the TIGHAR website. Just go to the homepage at TIGHAR.org and click on "TIGHARs on Tinian". (Note: Before somebody jumps all over us, we know that the map of the Pacific has Niku way the heck down by Samoa. It's just a freaky projection.) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 15:10:58 From: Ed Rollman Subject: Re: Tinian dig preliminaries Can the peanut gallery ask a legitimate question? Not being familiar with the sun line AE said she was right on-which point is closest to that line Tinian or Nurak? (Meaning thew former Gardner Island? Ed Rollman,Bremerton,Wa. ***************************************** http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/LOPMap.html http://www.tighar.org/forum/FAQs/noonannav.htm http://www.tighar.org/forum/FAQs/navigation.html http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/worldflight.html It's Nikumaroro. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 20:58:32 From: Andrew McKenna Subject: Earhart presents For those who have been looking for that AE related Xmas present, the Historic Aviation catalog has a wooden model Electra in Earhart colors that can be purchased with or without the print Lost! by Jack Fellows. I happen to have and enjoy both. The print goes well hanging right next to my copy of Final Approach by Scott Allbee depicting the Electra on approach to Niku. Makes for a nice visualization of the sequence of events. For the model aircraft and print of Lost! go to http://www.historicaviation.com/historicaviation/product_info.po?ID=4947 The print of FInal Approach can be purchased through TIGHAR Central http://www.tighar.org/TIGHAR_Store/electrapainting.html LTM Andrew McKenna Harbor Lights Villa A Special Place In the Caribbean www.harborlights.vi 720-635-1166 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 20:59:19 From: Bill Shea Subject: Impurities in fuel tanks? One of two things happened. the Electra either crashed or set down. Tighar believes they could have set down (even a controlled crash) on Gardner). OK, but also consider what might have been going on a few minutes before they might have crashed into the sea due to running out of fuel. They were running out of fuel, and with AE trying to get a hold of the Itasca, Noonan would probably have been going around the tanks and trying to use any remaining fuel in each tank. If that was the case, wouldn't these tanks have a certain amount of "impurities" in the bottom of each one? One could imagine that if they were down to that contaminated fuel that the engines might have shut down or coughed enough for them to crash into the sea as they were apparently at 1000ft - a few minutes before they thought they would have to go down. A while ago Ric mentioned that the tanks were vented properly and probably would not have caused an explosion or a crash, well how about the dregs at the bottom of the tanks? Maybe this might have caused the Electra to crash just a minute or two before they thought they would be going down. Ric, as they went around the world I wonder if this possible dregs would have been allowed to build up or had been flushed out. Any info on this? This does provide a reason that if they did crash from being out of fuel that they might have crashed a minute or two before they thought they were going to do a controlled crash. Maybe they were a lot closer to Howland, Baker, or Gardner than us 'crashed and sankers' would put them - just out of sight of land. Cheers from Bill Shea ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 21:05:38 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Interesting that the jet stream, which operates at mid-latitudes, would be found near the equator...NOT! > From Herman De Wulf > > Dave Bush wrote: > > "With the 600 hp engines, AE was able to climb to a MUCH higher > altitude and pick up the jet stream with 300 mph plus tail winds - of > course she had to hold her breath since the Electra was not pressurized > and she didn't have oxygen on board, but that is a small detail, I'm > sure - maybe that's why they crashed at New Britain. They ran out of > oxygen, passed out, and the plane ran out of gas and crashed with them > asleep at the controls. Their skeletons will be found still strapped in > their seats". > > Good thinking Dave ! This will allow some to speculate on secret > compressors that must have equipped AE's twin 600 hp Wasps to allow her > to operate at these altitudes. And she must have been in on secrets, > including the existence of the high altitude jet streams which were > discovered with the advent of jet travel in the Fifties. > > LTM (who always loves jokes) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 21:07:15 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Actually, the Japanese knew of the jet stream before then, which was the reason they launched the Fu Gos balloon attacks. A few balloons reached as far as my state of Michigan. They were unknown to the US throughout WW II, however. Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 LTM (loved the Michado) > From Herman De Wulf > > Dave Bush wrote: > > "With the 600 hp engines, AE was able to climb to a MUCH higher > altitude and pick up the jet stream with 300 mph plus tail winds - of > course she had to hold her breath since the Electra was not pressurized > and she didn't have oxygen on board, but that is a small detail, I'm > sure - maybe that's why they crashed at New Britain. They ran out of > oxygen, passed out, and the plane ran out of gas and crashed with them > asleep at the controls. Their skeletons will be found still strapped in > their seats". > > Good thinking Dave ! This will allow some to speculate on secret > compressors that must have equipped AE's twin 600 hp Wasps to allow her > to operate at these altitudes. And she must have been in on secrets, > including the existence of the high altitude jet streams which were > discovered with the advent of jet travel in the Fifties. > > LTM (who always loves jokes) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 21:18:31 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: New Britain > From Bill Shea > > Angus Murray wrote "Since we can be fairly sure FN reached the sun line > through Howland, > it is impossible that they were short of Howland by 140 or 150 miles." > > ... unless, of course they were 140-150 miles north or south on that > line. Bill, I don't think you understand the point I was making. David Billings attempted to salvage his theory from fuel exhaustion by suggesting that AE & Co never travelled the whole west-east distance to Howland and were short of it by 140 or 150 miles hence allowing enough fuel (as he claims) to return to New Britain. If AE joined the 157 line south of Howland, she would inevitably be east of Howland and therefore could not be short of Howland in a west to east sense. In fact she would have travelled further than the direct distance to Howland. If she joined it north of Howland, this would reduce the easting but she would have to reach the line some hundreds of miles north of Howland to be 140/150 miles west of it and the actual distance travelled to that point would be very little less. Reaching the line 140-150 miles north or south of Howland still of course leaves them in a sense "short of Howland" by 140-150 miles but this is not in a direction that helps minimise the distance travelled. When I say that it was impossible that they were short of Howland by 140-150 miles, I mean short in the west-east sense that would save the fuel that David Billings needs for his theory to work. > And do we know fairly surely that they reached that sun line? - or > that they > THOUGHT they reached the sun line? A big difference. I think Ric has answered this point. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 08:07:47 From: Scott White Subject: Howard Hughes article In case anyone is interested, the Los Angeles Times ran a short feature article on Howard Hughes on Sunday (7 Nov 04). It focuses on the 30s and 40s, and his interest / involvement in aviation. You should be able to find it on their web site, latimes.com via a simple search. They used to require registration, but it seems they don't any more. Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 08:09:29 From: Tom Hickcox Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis > From Dan Postellon > > Actually, the Japanese knew of the jet stream before then, which was > the reason they launched the Fu Gos balloon attacks. A few balloons > reached as far as my state of Michigan They were unknown to the US > throughout WW II, however. Didn't the USAAF become aware of the jet streams during the B-29 bombing campaigns against Japan? That claim is made in Time/Life's Bombers over Japan volume of their WW2 series, pp. 101-103. I am wondering if Mr. Postellon was referring to knowledge of the Fu Gos balloons or the jet streams? Tom Hickcox ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 08:10:51 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Another illusion lost > From Randy Jacobson > > Interesting that the jet stream, which operates at mid-latitudes, > would be found near the equator...NOT! ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 08:11:28 From: Dave Bush Subject: Wartime balloons From what I have gleaned from History Channel, the US Gubmint knew, but elected to keep quiet regarding the balloons in order to prevent a panic among the citizens. We did have some forest fires created by the balloons, but it was all minor. LTM, Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 10:27:29 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis >> From Randy Jacobson >> >> Interesting that the jet stream, which operates at mid-latitudes, >> would be found near the equator...NOT! The jet stream operating at mid-latitudes is of course the subtropical jet stream but have you forgotten the Easterly Equatorial Jet Stream of the Indian Ocean whose origins lie in the Western Pacific? Of course once one recognises that she was travelling at the 50,000ft necessary to reach the Equatorial Jet Stream, it is easy to see why she needed those three pairs of socks and the size ten shoes. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 10:38:22 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Impurities in fuel tanks? Bill Shea asks: > how about the dregs at the bottom of the tanks? Maybe this might have > caused the Electra to crash just a minute or two before they thought > they would be going down. I can't speak for state-of-the-art aircraft today but, in my experience, no pilot knows within "a minute or two" when an engine is going to quit from fuel exhaustion. I've often seen engines run for 10 or 15 minutes after the gauge was on dead empty. Also, Earhart's fuel system included a hand-operated "stripper" pump that allowed her to use the last dregs from each of the tanks. Speculating about the exact moment the engines quit, when there isn't even any evidence that they did quit in flight, is in my opinion pointless and silly. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 10:39:49 From: Peter Polen Subject: Earhart books I am building up my library on Earhart and would like to know your views on which books to get that are most accurate and factual. I only want 2 or 3 books and the TIGHAR library lists several. Your help is greatly appreciated. PS: Is there a way that I can get on the list or prepay an amount to receive the first copy of the post loss radio book you will be bringing out shortly? Peter Polen Director Piper Aviation Museum ************************************************************************ From Ric Of course, you'll want the new 2nd edition of "Amelia Earhart's Shoes" by Tom King et al. For a general biography of AE I'd recommend "The Sound of Wings" by Mary Lovell (St. Martins Press. 1989) You might also want to have a copy of "Last Flight", the book that Putnam assembled from Earhart's notes and press releases. As soon as we know for sure just how the Post Loss Radio Study will be published will give you and everyone else a chance to get your order in. Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 11:23:49 From: Mike Holt Subject: The New Britain Hypothesis, explained with the help of a previous discussion Let's assume the Electra found was AE's airplane. How it got there is not at all difficult to understand. First of all, one must assume none of the existing hypotheses are correct. Second, one must hark back to (I always wanted to write that) a discussion of some time ago, concerning the whereabouts of the carrier Akagi. Third, one must assume AE and FN were on a spying mission. Consider: AE and FN were recruited by FDR to spy, but on the Germans, who were suspected to have been building submarine supply bases on Mandate Islands. After all, the Germans had owned those islands until that embarrassment at Versailles. The Japanese Navy was a part of this. AE and FN were launched from the Akagi, after landing at a temporary beach airstrip near Lae. The airplane was then loaded onto the Akagi. The carrier took the plane near the German bases, where it launched the airplane. Col. Doolittle was there as a military technical advisor. Intercepted by Bf109s, AE and FN were chased back toward New Britain, where they crashed. They died trying to walk out of the jungle. Eaten by cannibals, perhaps? The messages from NR16020 were recorded prior to the flight, so no one realized the flight was not going on as advertised. Those transmissions could have been staged from a Japanese seaplane, of course. What did I miss? I'll quit now. LTM, who made 'em for her kids, too. Mike Holt ****************************************************** You obviously lead a rich fantasy life. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 11:30:59 From: Andrew McKenna Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Angus Says > As it happens I do know what happened (as > will eventually be revealed) to AE's Electra and I can categorically > say that it did not wind up on New Britain. Angus, you sound about as sure of yourself as David Billings does. Perhaps it is time to start revealing. Playing cat and mouse games isn't very productive. LTM (who likes to see the cards on the table) Andrew McKenna ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 12:54:46 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: Impurities in the fuel tanks? We seem to need more aviation enthusiasts around here to help explain these terms for them so here goes: Aiircraft piston Engines are very susceptible to water and dirt so they all have at least two places in the system to take out impurities. The new production Cessnas have approximately 10 today. In the case of older planes, For example, one on each tank has a low drain to let bad stuff sit there and be removed during preflight, one upstream to clean out any that get that far which is why we walk around with a cup- to take out water and dirt before we go flying. Believe me She, after all her time in the air, knew enough to do these very carefully. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 13:12:11 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Me??? Pat said: > Perhaps our disclaimer ought to mention the fact that a > small but deadly number of our members are incurable smart-asses..... > > And why am I suddenly thinking of Dennis McGee? Ah, my lovely, 'tis not that I'm a smart ass by nature :-) , it's just part of my training for my second career as a curmudgeon, which I hope to start in 2006. Got any Oreos? LTM, who is occasionally a bit cranky, too Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 14:27:31 From: Bill Shea Subject: Re: Impurities in the fuel tanks Carl Peltzer writes: > In the case of older planes, For example, one on each tank has a > low drain to let bad stuff sit there and be removed during preflight, > one upstream to clean out any that get that far which is why we walk > around with a cup- to take out water and dirt before we go flying. > > Believe me She, after all her time in the air, knew enough to do > these very carefully. All very well and good but the bottom line is they were running out of fuel so she would have had Noonan try and "squeeze" any extra fuel he could out of the tanks. I dont know enough about how the early engines would cope with sediments in the fuel tank but I can imagine that the engines would have coughed and shut down and crashed (being only at 1000ft altitude - probably a minute or two before they thought they were going down. All this pointless and silly, Ric? Well, I would think that trying to figure out their options before crashing is no more pointless and silly any more as the New Britain or Tinian theory. I think it all should be addressed. Cheers from Bill Shea ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 14:52:58 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: The New Britain Hypothesis Andrew McKenna wrote: >> As it happens I do know what happened (as >> will eventually be revealed) to AE's Electra and I can categorically >> say that it did not wind up on New Britain. > > Angus, you sound about as sure of yourself as David Billings does. > Perhaps it is time to start revealing. Playing cat and mouse games > isn't very productive. I can see you find my remark frustrating and I can sympathise because its just as frustrating for me because I can't reveal the whole story at present for a number of reasons. It is very understandable that I should attract some flak because of my reticence but I will just have to weather that for the time being. What I can tell you is that I discovered the solution to the Earhart mystery some years ago. This is not some crackpot, speculation-based theory either. It derives from contemporary documented evidence and the evidence is surprisingly detailed. The key to the solution lies in 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 8410 453 When I am able to reveal the answer, I will return to these numbers and show you their significance. In the meantime make a permanent note of them somewhere so that you can be sure they are indeed the same numbers. Its not my intention to play games and the above is the best I can do at present. It is not a wind up or a joke. I will not refer again to what I have discovered except in the event of some new development. Regards Angus Murray ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:09:03 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Impurities in the fuel tanks Bill Shea says > All this pointless and silly, Ric? Well, I would think that trying to figure > out their options before crashing is no more pointless and silly any more as > the New Britain or Tinian theory. I agree. It's just as silly and pointless as the New Britain and Tinian theories. We're helping to investigate the Tinian theory because it's a testable hypothesis (dig here) and it wasn't going to get tested without expertise that only we could provide. We would not participate in any attempt to test the New Britain hypothesis because it is not testable in any practical sense. Wandering around the jungles of New Britain based on some notes on an old map case looking for an airplane that can't be there is almost as pointless as searching hundreds of square miles of ocean bottom. For the life of me I can't figure out what difference it could possibly make whether the Electra's engines ran out of fuel at, for example, 11:23 or 11:24. If you're flying at 1,ooo feet and the engines quit you have ballpark two or three minutes to figure out where you're going to put the airplane. If you're within gliding distance of land you head for the land. If you're not you have to decide whether to bail out or ditch (assuming you have a 'chute). If you elect to ditch you look at the waves and the wind and set up your approach so as to minimize the impact. But again, there is no evidence that she ran out of gas and, even if she did, there is no way to know when the engines quit, so it's just piling speculation on top of speculation. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:10:10 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Did somebody skip his meds? Angus Murray said: > What I can tell you is that I discovered the > solution to the Earhart mystery some years ago . . . The key to the > solution lies in //numbers stream// . . . Ahhh, sheesh! Not another one. Here's my reply (hint: it's a simple one-for-one reversed substitution system using a codeword.): ZKSBD AJBFV UBMMJ UPCVF AZAPK LTM, in plain text Dennis O. McGee #1049EC ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:11:09 From: Ed Rollman Subject: Re: Wartime balloons Dave Bush: if you are talking abour Japanses ballons,several reached the Oregon coast in the early part of World War Two,exploded and caused forest fires along the Oregon coast and i read a few years back where our government did,indeed, know about them but cloaked it all in secrecy to keep the public from going into panic and hysteria. Ed Rollman,Bremerton,Wa. ****************************** I believe that's just what Dave said. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:11:38 From: Jim Preston Subject: Re: Me?? AH, but a forum where everyone agree's and doesn't have a bit of wise-acres would be boring and people would be turned off. Jim Preston I think she is on Siapan ! ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:12:46 From: Ray Brown Subject: Re: Wartime balloons Sad to say the damage was more than minor. It is some time now since I read about this, but if I recall correctly ,a family out picnicking in Oregon, I think, came across one of these incendiary devices and began to examine it out of curiosity. It exploded,killing one of them and injuring others. LTM, Ray # 2634. > From Dave Bush > > From what I have gleaned from History Channel, the US Gubmint knew, > but > elected to keep quiet regarding the balloons in order to prevent a > panic among the citizens. We did have some forest fires created by the > balloons, but it was all minor. > > LTM, > Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:13:40 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: A numbers game Angus wrote: "The key to the solution lies in 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 8410 453" Pat, how'd Angus get hold of all my credit card numbers? LTM, who paid in cash, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ******************************************* Hey, I'll never tell. But how do you think we've stayed afloat all these years? ;-) Pat ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:14:03 From: Jackie Tharp Subject: Re: Impurities in the fuel tanks To: Bill Where do you get the fact that they were running out of fuel. I remember one radio transmission that was questionable about whether or not she said "running low on fuel". If she ran out of fuel, how did she send all those post-loss messages? She could send without running her engine, but she would have had to run it to recharge her batteries. LTM, Jackie Tharp #2440 ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:14:51 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: Wartime balloons The Government knew about the balloons, but they didn't know about the jet stream. Dan Postellon > From Dave Bush > > From what I have gleaned from History Channel, the US Gubmint knew, > but > elected to keep quiet regarding the balloons in order to prevent a > panic among the citizens. We did have some forest fires created by the > balloons, but it was all minor. > > LTM, > Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:47:39 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: Wartime balloons From "Ballooning: The complete guide to riding the wind. Dick Wirth and Jerry Young 1980 ISBN 0-394-51338-X p 47: "..small hydrogen balloons, carrying loads of between 5-15 kg of incendiaries and explosives, designed to cause random havoc.... In all some 9,000 of the Fu-Gos were launched in the five month period commencing November 1944...only 285 balloons made recorded landfall on America...from Alaska to Mexico. Only six deaths and minimal damage occurred." I can't find the reference to the jet stream that they flew in. Can anyone document that it was known in the US before the Earhart flight? I'm sure that somewhere there is a reference that says that Japanese meteorologists planned the flights, and that the US didn't know about the jet stream then. Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 20:48:13 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: A Numbers Game > Angus wrote: "The key to the solution lies in 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 > 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 8410 453" Oh no!!! Do you mean that she really was captured by space aliens? Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 21:18:04 From: Tom Hickcox Subject: Re: Wartime balloons > From Ray Brown > > Sad to say the damage was more than minor. > > It is some time now since I read about this, but if I recall correctly > ,a family out picnicking in Oregon, I think, came across one of these > incendiary devices and began to examine it out of curiosity. It > exploded,killing one of them and injuring others. This happened near Lakeview, Oregon on May 5, 1945 according to a couple of the sites found by Googling "Japanese-incendiary-balloon-Oregon." One site said a woman and five children were killed; another one adult and four children. Tom Hickcox ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Nov 2004 21:37:43 From: Tom Hickcox Subject: Re: Wartime Balloons > From Dan Postellon > > From "Ballooning: The complete guide to riding the wind. Dick Wirth > and Jerry Young 1980 ISBN 0-394-51338-X p 47: "..small hydrogen > balloons, carrying loads of between 5-15 kg of incendiaries and > explosives, designed to cause random havoc.... In all some 9,000 of > the Fu-Gos were launched in the five month period commencing November > 1944...only 285 balloons made recorded landfall on America...from > Alaska to Mexico. Only six deaths and minimal damage occurred." > > I can't find the reference to the jet stream that they flew in. Can > anyone document that it was known in the US before the Earhart flight? > I'm sure that somewhere there is a reference that says that Japanese > meteorologists planned the flights, and that the US didn't know about > the jet stream then. > > Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 The reference I saw said the USAAF became aware of the jet stream during the first B-29 mission bombing Tokyo on Nov. 24, 1944. It gave them considerable problems with navigation and being able to bomb with precision. Tom Hickcox ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 08:26:40 From: James Burnett Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis Angus wrote: > The key to the solution lies in > 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 > 8410 > 453 When I am able to reveal the answer, I will return to these > numbers and > show you their significance. In the meantime make a permanent note of > them > somewhere so that you can be sure they are indeed the same numbers. The Imperial Japanese Navy's code was known by Joe Rochefort and his crew as JN-25. It was a combination of code and cipher. The code book contained five-digit numbers for nearly every word or phrase the navy anticipated needing to send meaningful messages: ATTACK(ED, ING) = 73428 BATTLESHIP(S) = 29781 CRUISER(S) = 58797 DESTROYER(S) = 36549 ENEMY = 38754 "Destroyers attacking enemy cruisers" would thus begin encoding as 36549 73428 38754 58797. Before sending the message, however, the commo officer would encipher it by choosing a number from a cipher table, itself a random listing of fibe-digit numbers. Suppose the number he chose was 20036. He would subtract it from the first number in the message and the result would be the new first number (16513 for "destroyers"). He would subtract the cipher immediately belot 20036 from 73428, and so on. In the message itself, he would indicate the page, column, and line of the cipher table for the first cipher. The receiver would reverse the process. I think you can see the problem if this is that kind of cipher. In fact, there are several problems: 1. We don't know if this is the entire message. 2. If it is not, we don't know if it's the beginning, the end, or something in the middle. 3. We don't know what the initial cipher is. 4. We don't have the cipher table, anyway. 5. We don't have the code book where we would find the unencoded words. I really need more to go on. James ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 08:27:23 From: Pete Backlund Subject: Re: Wartime balloons An irrelevant aside, but I do remember my grade school teachers here in Minnesota cautioning us to be on the lookout for the balloons, and I assume the Ground Observer Corps was on the alert for them as well. I guess it was assumed they could travel well inland. Pete ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 08:28:37 From: George Werth Subject: Re: Wartime balloons Being a nosey old fart (79 in January) I ran a search on 'Fu Go balloons' and came up with a couple of matches right off the bat. The one more interesting is from the 39th Bomb Group Historian's Corner. It may be found at: http://39th.org/39th/hc/fugowarhazard.htm It seems to meet the criteria of TIGHAR researchers, i.e., a documented source with an Email address. Have a BEER, Mate George Ray Werth Member # 2630S PS. LTM ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 08:33:30 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: the numbers game No, not captured by aliens, thats numerology (the science of how to take random numbers and make them mean something to someone even when they have absolutely no correlation to anything except how much money one can make from taking the suckers for a ride)! LTM, Dave Bush > From Dan Postellon > >> Angus wrote: "The key to the solution lies in 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 >> 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 8410 453" > > Oh no!!! Do you mean that she really was captured by space aliens? > Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 08:34:17 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Wartime balloons Well, I meant minor in relation to the potential and other things happening at the time. By Pearl Harbor standards 5 deaths is minimal - unless you are one of the dead or one of their relatives or close friends. LTM, Dave Bush > From Ray Brown > > Sad to say the damage was more than minor. > > It is some time now since I read about this, but if I recall correctly > ,a family out picnicking in Oregon, I think, came across one of these > incendiary devices and began to examine it out of curiosity. It > exploded,killing one of them and injuring others. > > LTM, ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 09:13:59 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: Wartime balloons Very interesting. Perhaps the Japanese figured out the jet stream just before the US did, and both classified the information. Dan > The reference I saw said the USAAF became aware of the jet stream > during the first B-29 mission bombing Tokyo on Nov. 24, 1944. It gave > them considerable problems with navigation and being able to bomb with > precision. > > Tom Hickcox ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 10:14:34 From: Anne Springer Subject: Re: A numbers game I think the answer to this puzzle is in the song by Evanescence called "My Immortal". Its got morse code in the background... And the answer was right under us all this time! It was aliens! LTM, who wishes she knew how to read morse code Anne >> Angus wrote: "The key to the solution lies in 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 >> 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 8410 453" > > Oh no!!! Do you mean that she really was captured by space aliens? > Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 10:15:11 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis I'm afraid I'll have to step in here with a couple of comments. 1. The whole Japanese balloon/jet stream thread is totally off topic and my recommendation to the moderator would be to cut it off. 2. Angus approached us some time ago with his claim to have solved the Earhart mystery. He wanted money. We said no. His supposed solution has nothing to do with Japanese codes nor has he uncovered any new primary source evidence. His solution to the mystery is the product of his own brilliant deductions for which he believes he should be compensated before disclosing them. If anyone has a checkbook handy and a burning desire to know the answer to the Earhart mystery I'll be happy to put them in touch with Angus. We won't even take a commission. We also have a limited time offer on the Brooklyn Bridge. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 10:16:03 From: Jeff Webb Subject: Re: Wartime balloons Another interesting site about the balloon bombs: http://www.seanet.com/~johnco/fugo.htm This site confirms what I remembered from my college geology classes, specifically that the United States Geological Service examined the sand in the balloons and determined where the were coming from. Jeff Webb *************************************** And as Ric suggested, this is the last post on this topic. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 11:54:37 From: Andrew McKenna Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis > From Angus Murray > ... What I can tell you is that I > discovered the solution to the Earhart mystery some years ago. This is > not some crackpot, speculation-based theory either. It derives from > contemporary documented evidence and the evidence is suprisingly > detailed. > > The key to the solution lies in > 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 > 8410 453 > When I am able to reveal the answer, I will return to these numbers and > show you their significance. In the meantime make a permanent note of > them somewhere so that you can be sure they are indeed the same > numbers. > > Its not my intention to play games and the above is the best I can do > at present. It is not a wind up or a joke. I will not refer again to > what I have discovered except in the event of some new development. > > Regards Angus Murray Angus Rrrrriiiiiiggggghhhhhttttt. Surely (or is it Shirley), you jest!?! I hate to tell you, but in this arena, until you pony up some justification of your "solution", your theory is nothing more than a "crackpot, speculation-based theory". Your offering up a mysterious string of numbers and some vague reasons you cannot reveal the answer can only be interpreted as an invitation to forum members to engage in the game you profess not to be playing. What legitimate reason prevents you from revealing your answer, oh great and mysterious one? National security? You writing a script too? Personal pride? Afraid of the scrutiny? Never mind, we don't really want to hear about it. LTM (who says "stop calling me Shirley!") Andrew McKenna ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 13:37:21 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis > From Ric > > I'm afraid I'll have to step in here with a couple of comments. > > Angus approached us some time ago with his claim to have solved the > Earhart mystery. He wanted money. We said no. It seems strange to me that Tighar has spent millions of dollars over many years to dig up a limited amount of inconclusive evidence and yet when offered wholly conclusive information on a no-win no-fee basis had no interest whatever in pursuing the matter. A sum was never even discussed. This is in spite of the fact that armed with this information they would have no difficulty in finding substantial sponsorship for investigating the matter far far exceeding my fee. It makes no economic sense at all. Perhaps there is some other agenda. Whilst Tighar may be a non-profit organisation, it certainly doesn't expect that those people working full time on the project should do it for nothing, and certainly expects to pay someone working for example on forensic imaging a substantial amount. I have spent something like 3000 hrs researching this and a considerable amount in expenses and I see absolutely no reason why I should not be compensated for it. I need to eat too. However, this is Tighar's decision and I have no problem accepting that because there are certainly other interested parties. The loss is Tighar's. > His supposed solution > has nothing to do with Japanese codes nor has he uncovered any new > primary source evidence. How Ric comes to this conclusion is beyond me as I have never discussed the evidence I have with him. And yes I have entirely new information that Tighar is unaware of. > His solution to the mystery is the product of > his own brilliant deductions for which he believes he should be > compensated before disclosing them. > > If anyone has a checkbook handy and a burning desire to know the answer > to the Earhart mystery I'll be happy to put them in touch with Angus. > We won't even take a commission. We also have a limited time offer on > the Brooklyn Bridge. There are plenty of deluded people making all sorts of claims to know the answer - that is quite true - and so your scepticism does not at all surprise me but I can easily handle that because I know I will have the last laugh. I don't hide behind any pseudonym and consequently I would be foolish indeed to make such a claim if I was never able to substantiate it. You will just have to wait and see. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 13:52:55 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis James, If you value your time, don't waste it trying to make anything of the numbers. Its a cipher coded by a one-time pad which is in the public domain but that leaves you with rather a lot of documents to choose from. Even if you knew which key to use, you would never know when you had the answer as the decrypt only has meaning when you understand its significance. The idea is not to encourage anyone to try to crack it. If you know anything about ciphers you'll know it is essentially uncrackable. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 14:54:03 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Angus' Hypothesis Folks, don't bother your pretty little heads over the "code." You aren't going to figure it out and it is just a teaser or Angus would not have written it. He is just trying to gin up monetary support for a project that has a dubious value. I know what his project is and I have urged and continue to urge Angus not to give little hints. He has the opportunity to make something of it and if that is his primary goal he needs to guard his information more carefully. The code is simply his way of giving us sufficient information (when eventually decoded) to allow us to confirm he and he alone had long ago solved the Earhart mystery. It is a project Angus has put a great amount of work into but which we have shown no interest in that there is nothing he could provide that we feel has any value to TIGHAR. Am I correct, Ric or overstating? Angus will eventually tell all or will find someone to buy his information. I wish him well. Angus is a bright person and I personally think his talents could be put to far better use than his current project but that is only my personal opinion. Angus and I disagree as you would guess. As you all can see from his current posts he has a lot to offer although he is not a TIGHAR member. He catches all the errors and knows this Earhart business well. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 18:57:13 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis Andrew McKenna wrote: > Rrrrriiiiiiggggghhhhhttttt. Surely (or is it Shirley), you jest!?! I jest not. > I hate to tell you, but in this arena, until you pony up some > justification of your "solution", your theory is nothing more than a > "crackpot, speculation-based theory". > > LTM (who says "stop calling me Shirley!") Tell you what Shirley. Lets see if you'll put your money where your mouth is. I'll bet you £100 I am right. Gentlemen's agreement. If I haven't revealed the answer within 3 years, I will pay you £100. If on the other hand I do reveal the answer within that time AND the general consensus on the forum is that I am right, you pay me £100. In the event you dispute a consensus, Ric (that arch sceptic) will decide the issue. (I'd make it a bigger sum but think I've more chance of collecting if its not too large!) Regards Angus. ****************************************************** At today's exchange rate £100 is about US$184. Seems to me the only way to protect both parties to such a wager would be for each to put the money on deposit, winner-take-all plus interest, with an agreed set of stipulations including right of inheritance. Or of course you could just decide the whole thing is silly. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 19:01:03 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis Alan Caldwell wrote: > Folks, don't bother your pretty little heads over the "code." You > aren't going to figure it out true > and it is just a teaser or Angus would > not have written it. > He is just trying to gin up monetary support for a > project that has a dubious value. Since Alan knows absolutely zilch about my present intentions I wonder how he reaches this conclusion? > I know what his project is Ha! (No he doesn't) > and I have > urged and continue to urge Angus not to give little hints. Just when pray? > He has the > opportunity to make something of it and if that is his primary goal he > needs to guard his information more carefully. Alan, you simply don't understand that a symmetric cipher is completely secure. Not even the US military could crack it. (Well.........maybe in a few millennia) > The code is simply his way of giving us sufficient information (when > eventually decoded) to allow us to confirm he and he alone had long ago > solved the Earhart mystery. Ah Alan.... my alter ego. (He knows all my thoughts) > It is a project Angus has put a great amount of work into but which we > have shown no interest in that there is nothing he could provide that > we feel has any value to TIGHAR. Am I correct, Ric or overstating? How can you judge the proof of the pudding without tasting it? You know zilch, zero, nada about it! A priori you have in all arrogance decided that no-one could know any more than Tighar does. After all, have you not collected a bunch of "experts" to pontificate on all the relevant subjects for the last n years. How could anyone know more?? You evidently don't understand that experts are highly fallible and very few real experts actually exist. Nor are many of them very original. Most know just enough to fool the majority of people who know slightly less than they do. Nauticos has another bunch of experts, with (in theory) dazzling qualifications - and yet they haven't a clue what happened either. Its laughable. Tighar's experts will have to eat humble pie on quite a few topics I can assure you! (You included!) > Angus will eventually tell all or will find someone to buy his > information. I wish him well. Angus is a bright person and I personally > think his talents could be put to far better use than his current > project but that is only my personal opinion. We shall see! > Angus and I disagree as > you would guess. As you all can see from his current posts he has a lot > to offer although he is not a TIGHAR member. He catches all the errors > and knows this Earhart business well. If I can catch all the errors, (not of course that anyone can), why I wonder, does Tighar think I have nothing to add? Or does Tighar really believe itself immune to error? The forum knows only too well that quite a number of items have been trumpeted as important evidence, only for them to have subsequently fallen by the wayside as proved invalid, intrinsically impossible to substantiate or irrelevant. I'll let the forum decide on the immunity question. Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 19:02:22 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis Angus, If you have anything to say, say it. Withholding information about dead persons and wanting money for it is something that could land you in jail in some parts of the world. LTM ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 19:03:08 From: Rusty Metty Subject: Re: Angus' hypothesis Angus, If you don't mind my asking what is it that will determine your letting us all in on your new theory? Now that we have all of this hub-bub can we expect anything anytime soon? Personaly I think any theory anyone has is worth a look and heck anything to derail the usual banter of rehashing old news is a welcome change : ) Rusty long time lurker...I'm going to join though I promise! I love this group! P.S. Any Seattleites in the group? ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 20:13:07 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Angus' Hypothesis Angus writes: > It seems strange to me that Tighar has spent millions of dollars over > many years to dig up a limited amount of inconclusive evidence and yet > when offered wholly conclusive information on a no-win no-fee basis > had no interest whatever in pursuing the matter. A sum was never even > discussed. Of course not. TIGHAR's entire effort has been, and continues to be, based upon the free and open exchange of information. Even if we believed that you had the answer we would not pay you for it. > This is in spite of the fact that armed with this information they > would have no difficulty in finding substantial sponsorship for > investigating the matter far far exceeding my fee. That would seem to be a testable hypothesis. We turned down your offer nearly a year ago. > It makes no economic sense at all. Perhaps there is some other agenda. What makes no economic sense is that you have not yet found substantial sponsorship for investigating your solution to the mystery - unless you're having the difficulty you say we would not have. > Whilst Tighar may be a non-profit organisation, it certainly doesn't > expect that those people working full time on the project should do it > for nothing, and certainly expects to pay someone working for example > on forensic imaging a substantial amount. TIGHAR has three paid employees. I get paid to manage volunteer research, write, raise money and, on occasion, lead expeditions. Nobody is paying me for my genius and insight. As Pat says, I can't find the mustard in the refrigerator, let alone find Amelia Earhart. Pat gets paid to run the business side of the organization, make excuses to creditors, edit and lay out TIGHAR Tracks, maintain the TIGHAR website, and find the mustard. We also have a very nice lady who comes in once a week to do filing and mailings. Everything else in this organization is done by volunteers except for highly specialized essential services we contract for, i.e. ship charters, satellite imaging, laboratory work we can't get donated, etc. You mentioned forensic imaging. Photek has charged us for a tiny fraction of the work Jeff Glickman has done for us. > I have spent something like 3000 hrs researching this and a > considerable amount in expenses and I see absolutely no reason why I > should not be compensated for it. I need to eat too. We all need to eat. I don't know how many hours Randy Jacobson spent assembling and data basing 3,000-plus government messages but I do know that it took him years and that he gave himself carpal tunnel syndrome doing it. Tom King wrote a book, with the help of three other volunteers, and donated all the proceeds to TIGHAR. And let's not even talk about the people who quite literally have risked their lives on TIGHAR expeditions. And how long do you think it takes the 800 subscribers to this forum to tally up 3000 hours of research? > However, this is Tighar's decision and I have no problem accepting > that because there are certainly other interested parties. The loss is > Tighar's. We'll somehow bear it. >> His supposed solution >> has nothing to do with Japanese codes nor has he uncovered any new >> primary source evidence. > > How Ric comes to this conclusion is beyond me as I have never > discussed the evidence I have with him. And yes I have entirely new > information that Tighar is unaware of. Since you ask, back when we were first discussing this you wrote: > I have been lucky enough to find some evidence not hitherto discovered, > which once understood, very neatly and convincingly answers all the > questions that have perplexed researchers for so long. I replied: > That sentence could be a T-shirt for every Earhart researcher that > ever came down the road. > >> I don't hide behind any pseudonym and consequently I would be foolish >> indeed to make such a claim if I was never able to substantiate it. >> You will just have to wait and see. I can't think of anyone who is hiding behind any pseudonyms. And as for your offered wager with Andrew - you suggest that it be decided by me, the arch skeptic. Good Lord man. If it was up to me to decide who is right about what really happened to Amelia Earhart we would have wrapped up this dog and pony shows years ago. If anybody is going to solve the Earhart mystery it is going to be done with conclusive evidence that is accepted by the general public, not with somebody's interpretations and computations. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 20:14:55 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Angus' Hypothesis > Angus, > If you don't mind my asking what is it that will determine your letting > us all in on your new theory? Now that we have all of this hub-bub can > we expect anything anytime soon? Rusty, I don't mind you asking at all but I can't say it will be very soon. (Incidentally it isn't new and I don't consider it to be a theory). Imagine yourself in my situation - there are numerous options and avenues to pursue. What would you do if you knew you held the solution to one of the world's greatest mysteries - unsolved for nearly 70 years - tell all before you had investigated all your options?? I simply don't want to compromise any of them at the moment. What I can say is that you WILL discover the answer. That I promise. Nor will you be disappointed. Sceptics will undoubtedly believe that further discussion on this topic will lead nowhere. They are right - but for the wrong reasons. In view of that I suggest we move on as there are plenty of issues to discuss which could further understanding of the Earhart mystery. Although I have made massive progress over the years there are still a few peripheral unanswered questions and in some sense it seems probable that every last question will never be answered. That said, I myself am surprised just how many questions (the important ones) can be answered with a high degree of confidence. You'll forgive me if do not answer any further posts on the topic at present. Regards Angus. ************************************ Ask and ye shall receive. This thread is now dead. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 12 Nov 2004 07:45:44 From: Pat Thrasher Subject: No Forum until Monday Due to a long-standing commitment which begins today and continues through the evening on Sunday, there will be no Earhart Forum until Monday. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:19:49 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: A numbers game It's perfectly clear to me. The numbers must be the winning combination for the next National Lottery. I'll make use of them and If I win -which I surely will- I'll send Billing a postcard from the somewhere in the Carribean. LTM Dan Postellon wrote: >> Angus wrote: "The key to the solution lies in 3621 7000 6356 4910 4429 >> 0002 7949 5295 4220 9491 4857 6001 9718 8961 8410 453" > > Oh no!!! Do you mean that she really was captured by space aliens? > Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:27:37 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: A FINAL post on Angus' hypothesis Angus is probably right about all he says about me. He is quite perceptive. The bottom line, however, is that Angus has only three possibilities of evidence. It could simply be, as Ric suggests, an analytic theory. It could be anecdotal or it could be substantive. There is nothing else. No analytic theory in this case is worth the paper it is written on. We already have anecdotal evidence that there was wreckage on Gardner. To be substantive evidence it could only be part of the Electra or something of the two crew members. In both of those cases it would be necessary to have proof the item came from the plane or crew member and prove it was found on Gardner and prove it was deposited on Gardner on July 2, 1937. That is all Angus could possibly have. The first two are worthless and the third has an impossible burden of proof. For all your huff and puff Angus that's where this all rests. BTW, I have never suggested your little code could easily be broken and to the contrary I have suggested it isn't worth the trouble trying. TIGHAR already believes the plane landed on Gardner. Whether you prove it is so or we do or anyone else proves that fact is of no consequence. It doesn't tell us where the plane is and the possibilities are so great even given it landed on Gardner that further search would be financially prohibitive for even Bill Gates. Proving the plane landed some place is not going to produce a bunch of fools to throw zillions down a rat hole. We are conducting a scientific research project with a great learning and teaching curve. Actually finding the Electra in the process is gravy on a full plate. Wonderful but not fatal to the project. What we learn here will apply to many future projects and make them far more successful and easier to conduct. It is a childish game you are playing and you will not find any takers is my guess. There is simply no value to what you think you have to offer. I have not played with codes since I ordered a Captain Midnight secret decoding ring during the mid 1940s and have no interest in such play now. Alan ********************************************* Gee, you mean all those TIGHAR secret decoder rings we ordered for the holiday season are USELESS? Rats. Another marketing disaster..... Pat, who had a fantastic weekend and is ready to work again. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:30:37 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: AE's fuel Ric wrote: > For the life of me I can't figure out what difference it could possibly > make whether the Electra's engines ran out of fuel at, for example, > 11:23 or 11:24. (....). But again, there is no evidence that she ran out > of gas and, even if she did, there is no way to know when the engines > quit, so it's just piling speculation on top of speculation. The point where the Electra would run have run out of gas is relevant only to those who believe in the crashed and sank theory. Since TIGHAR is investigating the possibility of the Electra having landed on Gardner Island having had sufficient fuel to divert from Howland, the matter is not relevant. I disagree with Ric that there is no way of knowing when the engines quit. We know she took off with 1,100 US gallons of Avgas and that Kelly had calculated fuel burn and rpm settings for the climb and the cruise. Monitoring fuel consumption was of paramount importance. Charles Lindbergh had set the example having prepared his trans-Atlantic flight meticulously and monitored fuel consumption throughout the flight, knowing exactly how much there was left when he landed at Paris. So did Amelia Earhart in 1932 and there is no doubt she calculated fuel consumption just as meticulously on the world trip in the Electra. I'm sure she was aware all the time of the exact amount of fuel remaining in the tanks. After all isn't this what we have all learned in flying training? Fuel consumption would have been marked on her map together with the headings, altitude and times. I remember my own calculations used to be so reliable that the engine one day quit at the precise the time I had calculated and at exactly the place I had marked on my map ( I had overlooked switching tanks in time...). I was surprised at how reliable the fuel consumption figures were of Continental engine then. I'm sure Kelly's figures for the Wasps were just as reliable. Wasps were known engines. We know how much fuel she had on board when she left Lae. Why would Amelia Earhart's calculations have been less reliable than others would? After all, she already had long distance experience. I'm confident she had calculated her fuel consumption carefully and checked repeatedly. This being said I agree with Ric that WE don't know how much fuel was left when she approached Howland. SHE did. Anyone speculating on her returning to New Britain should realise this was technically impossible. By the way, there is the old saying "Any attempt to stretch fuel is guaranteed to increase headwind"... There was another popular saying: "Any pilot who relies on terminal forecast can be sold Brooklyn Bridge. If he relies on winds-aloft reports he can be sold Niagara Falls". By 1937 aviators were fully aware of these eternal truths and therefore Fred Noonan could be counted upon to have checked their position and therefore their ground speed carefully in order to calculate the amount of fuel remaining. Don't you ever believe any pilot would rely on the fuel gauges of his airplane on such a flight. We have all learned never to trust them. That was true in 1937 too. Ric is right: WE'll never know and they most probably never did. OTHERWISE, TIGHAR would be losing its time searching the Gardner Island hypothesis. LTM (who says good judgment comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgment). ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:33:17 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian The availability of electronic communication from Tinian turned out to be less than advertised so Tom King had to wait until he got back to Guam before filing his reports. I talked to Tom by phone last night - which was about 15 minutes from now, his time (the Dateline is terminally weird). The story of the Tinian dig for the graves of Earhart and Noonan is a fascinating example of well-planned and executed archeological inquiry, and Tom's daily reports are - as always - engaging and entertaining. I won't spoil the tale by giving away the ending. We'll have Tom's reports posted on the TIGHAR website along with photos later today. Just go the TIGHAR homepage (www.tighar.org) and click on "TIGHARS on Tinian". *********************************************** "Later today" means probably in the neighborhood of 2 to 3 p.m. EST. Pat ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:47:20 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian 11/11/04, 5 am, Saipan As my class on Guam wound down yesterday, University of Guam archaeologist Hiro Kuroshina appeared, bearing maps for me to bring along to Tinian today, all copied from the files of the Micronesian Area Research Center (MARC), with which he's affiliated. One is a pre-World War II map of Tinian, showing what was there when it was essentially a sugar cane plantation with processing mills and a complex of light gauge railroad lines. Another is a relatively modern topographic map, and the third a detailed 1956 map of roads, runways, and other facilities. He showed me where the putative grave site is -- on the southwest side of the island, overlooking old Tinian Town (now San Jose Village), Tinian Bay, and Pepeninguro Bay. We discussed excavation strategy. Hiro's idea, which I think is a good one, is to cut a vertical trench at one end of the target area to get a handle on the stratigraphy, and then to strip back from the trench. I was also able to spend some time talking with Epiphano Cabrera, the CNMI Historic Preservation Officer, and his associates Genivieve Cabrera and John Mark Joseph -- John Mark is the CNMI staff archaeologist. As a condition of their permit to excavate, they're requiring that an HPO staff member be on site during the work. I questioned the realism and necessity of this policy, considering the density of archaeological and forensic expertise the project will be putting on the ground, but it's my expectation that we'll be able to work things out. They can't be at the site today, Thursday, but neither will Hiro and his students, so we wouldn't be able to get serious excavation started anyway, and will need to spend the time getting organized, clearing the site, and laying it out in preparation for a fast start on Friday. The CNMI folks kindly took me to buy some gear I'd forgotten to bring, and then delivered me to the airport, where Kar Burns arrived awhile later on Continental Flight One from Honolulu, looking a bit stunned after 16 hours or so in the air, but still standing. We boarded the little puddle-jumper shuttle to Saipan, and landed here at about 2030 last night. Scott Russell collected us in his pickup -- Scott is basically the father of historic preservation in the CNMI, organizer of the historic preservation office, now program director of the Marianas Humanities Council, a historian by training with a great many publications on Marianas history under his belt, and incidentally a famous spear fisherman. We drove down to the beach on Saipan's lee side -- where the Marines came ashore 60 years ago -- and had a beer (well, I was a good alcoholic and drank water); Scott told stories of the early days of Micronesian historic preservation, and Kar slowly sank into the west. Lights twinkled offshore -- chartered military supply ships, Scott said, loaded to the gills with equipment for the troops and pre-positioned to support -- well, whatever. Scott bemoaned the fact that he could no longer fish the reef in their vicinity. "They open up on you with 50 caliber," he chuckled. Up then to our digs at the Stanford Hotel -- a basic sort of island facility, cinder block and tile floors, functional aircon-- where Kar slid gratefully off to her room and I tried for awhile to call home -- a long and largely fruitless effort. Now after a good enough night's sleep, the roosters are beginning to crow, and it's time to get organized for the jump over to Tinian. Impression: There are quite a number of different interests represented in this enterprise -- St. John Naftel and Jennings Bunn, who naturally are believers in the Tinian burial hypothesis; Jim Sullivan and Bob Silver, who've had a lot to do with putting the project together and developing support for it from sponsors like Continental Airlines, who are enthusiastic about the project but not necessarily believers in the hypothesis, Hiro and his students, looking to do some interesting archaeology and(in the case of the students) get some training, folks like Kar and me, and presumably supervising archaeologists Mike Fleming, Marilyn Swift, and Randy Harper, here to do a good, objective piece of research, and the HPO staff concerned about quality control and protecting the government's interests. I anticipate a certain cat-herd quality to the work, at least initially, but hope everyone can work together effectively. This morning if all goes well we'll fly over and meet Mike -- well-known as the first Northern Marianas resident of indigenous descent to become a fully qualified professional archaeologist, and an old friend of mine -- and his associates Marilyn and Randy, as well as Jennings and Mr. Naftel, who should be on Saipan by now, and Jim Sullivan and Bob Silver who should be on Tinian. We'll get checked in at the Fleming Hotel, transmit this to TIGHAR Central if it's possible, and get up to the site and start getting organized. Assuming things go according to plan, which is, of course, very, very unlikely. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:50:10 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian, 11/12-A San Jose Village, Tinian, 11/12/04, 5 PM By the time we reached the site this morning -- it's only about half a mile from the hotel, up a bit of a terrace just outside town -- the guys from the local government had already set up big canopies and were bringing in picnic tables on which to spread out gear and set up water jugs and such. Mike knows how to run a dig. Mike and others plotted the route of the old road from which Mr. Naftel says he saw the graves, while Naftel himself and Bob Silver confirmed the locations of the two depressions they'd located last year. We then ripped out the last of the vegetation over an area 4 meters on a side embracing the two depressions, which were pretty apparent once the veggies were gone. Mike wanted to maintain their integrity, so we excavated within them, rather than digging squares across them. Mike put Randy in charge of "Pit One," me in charge of "Pit Two." Hiro and his students arrived, and we had more than enough people to dig, haul, and screen. After Marilyn Swift and some of the students did a contour map of the area, we were ready to begin digging. Excavation was primarily by trowel, though Randy also used a cut-off entrenching tool he'd gotten years ago for digging pithouses in the Southwest. In essence, we troweled everything loose into dustpans, thence to buckets, which were carried downslope to the screens. Mike took charge of the screening most of the time. Marilyn did notes, kept track of level bags (though we didn't really have "levels" to dig, as it turned out), and generally kept things organized. Kar screened and stood by to deal with bones. To cut to the chase -- no bones, except a mouse bone or two in Pit Two. A few prehistoric artifacts -- late prehistoric plainware sherds, a stone pounder fragment -- and a few pieces of bottleglass and very thin aluminum, but that was it. Bedrock -- highly contoured coral limestone, old reef surface -- appeared at between ten and thirty centimeters depth, with holes and gaps going down to perhaps fifty cm. in places. We cut a one-meter extension off Pit Two to the northeast and then extended it to the southwest to connect up with Pit One -- same results. Meanwhile, a number of us had been eying a sort of ridge or berm that extends across the site more or less parallel with the limestone cliff face, and the more we looked at it the more we became convinced that it was bulldozer spoil. Then (as I understand it from Mike's rather shorthand account), Carmen Sanchez, the Tinian Historic Preservation Officer, located a guy who'd farmed the area, who said that yes indeed, there'd been bulldozing in the area. Whether the site of Pits One and Two was bulldozed isn't clear, but there's certainly been dozing in the very near vicinity. Mike also wonders whether Mr. Naftel might be mistaken about exactly where he was on the road when he saw the graves, or exactly where the road ran, and whether as a result the graves might be farther down the slope, below the berm in the lower field next to the existing road. So he brought in the tractor and mower again and had the area cut. Nothing leaped out and hit us in the face, except what looks like another low berm running diagonally across the field, with some big coral blocks in it, more or less aligned with the old road. Maybe the old road itself, maybe a bulldozer windrow, maybe nothing. All the government's backhoes are broken down, but Mike scored one from the privately operated quarry, and it'll be on site tomorrow morning. We've exhausted the specific locations identified by Mr. Naftel, and are now down to testing the general area. The current plan is to begin by slicing through the big berm and getting a handle on its stratigraphy, and what it can tell us about what's been done in the area. Then probably some trenching across the lower field, and maybe elsewhere. Tonight, we're all invited to dinner at Carmen's cousin's house -- a Chamorro feast with lots of fish and beef, red rice and other good stuff. Video cameras were everywhere today, and although we haven't exactly been swamped by CNN and Fox News, there's been a steady flow of media folks. The Mayor stopped by, and later his office brought food and drinks. Police guard the entrance, and are keeping watch on the site tonight. There were repeated light rain squalls, but with the canopies they presented no problem. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:49:23 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian, 11/12 5:30 AM, Fleming Hotel, San Jose Village But for Hiro and his students, the whole group was assembled around the table in the Fleming Restaurant last night. I don't have all the names memorized -- there's Joe the charter pilot, former sailor (following in Noonan's footsteps), but I didn't retain his last name. Similarly with Arthur, "expedition coordinator" for The Deep radio show -- nice guy with a fascinating travel background -- and several members of the video team. As I've seen happen before, there was great concern about "controlling the release of information," and as has happened before, I got upset and became overly aggressive in promoting an open-communication policy. When will I learn? The leadership expects big discoveries and doesn't want them misrepresented; therefore they impose a release policy that turns out to imply that the archaeologists have to get management sign-off on their technical photos, that we can't send reports (like this one) home to our friends, colleagues, (in Kar's case) financial supporters, and people with a need to know (like, in this case, Amy Kleppner). And that if a reporter pops out from behind a rock and asks one of us a question we've got to refer them to management. I find this kind of thing -- which happens innocently, I'm sure, very, very irritating, and have difficulty controlling the sarcasm with which I let people know it. Kar, Marilyn, Randy and Mike had similar concerns, but were more polite about it, and I think we eventually reached agreement that we can talk to folks and have control of our own notes and images, but will not represent ourselves as sharing the "official" output or statements of the project. I remember similar arguments like this early in TIGHAR's days in the field, similarly resolved, and I recall kicking myself afterwards for being such a nasty, offensive, arrogant SOB. Some things never change. Mike also explained his plans for the fieldwork. He's expecting Bob and St. John to point out the depressions they found last year, which Mr. Naftel is sure are the ones he saw back in '44, and we'll then clear them of vegetation, map them in, and dig them as expeditiously as possible. He says there's physical and anecdotal evidence of bulldozing at the site, which is worrisome. Are the depressions really artifacts of grave digging in the 1940s, or tractor-tread gouging in the 1980s? Breakfast at 7; on-site by 8. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:48:19 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian, 11/11 11/11/04 5 PM, San Jose Village, Tinian It doesn't look like it WILL be possible to transmit -- from the Fleming Hotel, anyhow, because the Fleming Hotel has no telephones. Maybe I can work out something else tomorrow. Scott collected us promptly at 8 this morning and delivered us to the airport, and we bundled aboard a little 6-seat single-engine plane for the hop over to Tinian. Kar rode in the copilot's seat and the pilot pointed out the sights -- the atom bomb pits, the VOA transmitter -- while I rode in back with a very quiet businessman and a lot of luggage. Landing, we looked around for transport and ran into a polite gentleman who asked if we were associated with "Bunn Jennings." Yes indeed, I said, and found that Jennings had reserved three cars, one of which I took responsibility for. We promptly got lost in the welter of roads that snake around San Jose Village -- old Tinian Town -- and thus got to see the sights, notably the big but rather seedy looking Dynasty Casino, and the quite lovely beaches. Eventually found our way to the Fleming, another cinder block and tile affair with a well-equipped store and a perfectly adequate restaurant. Here we met Bob Silver, and his partner Audrey, recently returned to Guam from sailing the s/v Arctic Lady from Vancouver, BC to Beirut (see bandacorp.com/ArcticLady.htm). We were shortly on our way back to the airport (old West Field, decorated with a Japanese coastal gun and AA battery) to pick up Jennings and St. John Naftel. Waiting at the airport was the media team, headed by Rlene (must get her last name), poised to videotape The Arrival. It reminded me of Russ Matthews taping us as we disembarked in Fiji for the first time back in '89; when we were much younger and more innocent. Mr. Naftel turned out to be a spry, white-haired, distinguished gentleman, and a great story teller. We had to drag Kar away from him to pack up the cars and head for the site, where it turned out Mike Fleming had been waiting since 8:30with a brush clearing crew. I should say that Mike -- besides being the area's first indigenous advanced-degreed archaeologist -- is a member of a very important Tinian family, which of course owns the Fleming Hotel, Store, and Restaurant, among other things. So he can do things like getting a crew with a tractor and huge brush-cutting mower from theMayor, and he had. It was good to see Mike again; he's an old friend and a respected colleague, and he'd spent his time well tramping the site and figuring out how to handle it. Several young guys from the CNMI and Tinian Historic Preservation Offices (HPO) are on hand to help out -- all with much appreciated archaeological field experience, as are Epi Cabrera and John Mark Joseph. The site is a rather nondescript piece of land covered with tangentangen (the local equivalent of Scaevola) and tall grasses, sloping up into a limestone escarpment, just off a north-south tending road on the southwest side of the island. A brief discussion on-site was sufficient for Mike to confirm with Jennings, Bob, and Mr. Naftel how big an area needed to be cleared; he then encouraged us to leave him and his crew to it. We returned to the hotel for lunch, and he joined us an hour or so later, reporting that they'd cleared an acre or so, that we'd need to pull a lot more stuff up by the roots to allow accurate observation of contours, and that to his practiced eye, the soil doesn't look to be more than a couple of feet deep, overlying limestone bedrock. So the plan for tomorrow is to mobilize on site early to strip the remainder of the vegetation, search for evidence of pits or mounds, and then stake out excavation units and begin to dig. If pits or mounds aren't visible, then we'll consider Hiro's idea of an exploratory backhoe trench, or maybe several. Remains to be seen. Anyhow, Mike seems to have field operations very well in hand. The project's leaders and media people clearly wanted some time by themselves, so Kar and I tootled off to sight-see, visiting the A-bomb pits at North Field, the limestone forest on the south end of the island (where there were Buka trees!) and the poignant Japanese peace memorial on Suicide Cliff at the island's southeast point, where a plaque bearing a prayer for the wisdom never to repeat the madness of war -- placed there in 1996 -- is already rusting and rickety. Arriving back at the hotel, we found that Jim Sullivan and several others involved with The Deep had arrived, and huddles were continuing about various administrative matters from which I was happy to be excluded. There's a full-team planning meeting scheduled for 7 this evening, and it's now 5, so I think it's time for a snooze. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:54:56 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian 11/13 11/13/04, 5:30 PM, Fleming Hotel, San Jose Village, Tinian The machine Mike had gotten, which was waiting for us at the site at 8:30 this morning, could be called a "backhoe" only in the most euphemistic way. It was a HUGE Hitachi excavator with a bucket about two meters across, piloted by one of the most skilled operators I've ever had the pleasure to work with. It seems counterintuitive, but generally speaking, the larger the machine the better, for archaeological work, provided the operator knows what he's doing, and this guy -- who'd worked with Mike, Randy, and Marilyn on a couple of cemetery projects -- certainly did. He could remove grass without disturbing the ground; he could cut the ground in 5 cm. levels. Wonderful guy. He began by stripping the upper part of the lower field to bedrock, carefully monitored by at least two or three archaeologists at all times. The clay soil turned out to be only about 20 cm. deep, over coral limestone. Meanwhile Hiro's students dug into the berm, from which he'd stripped vegetation, finding lots of WWII era bottles, Japanese porcelain, even a woman's shoe (the source of some hilarity, but it looked to be from the '50s). Then the excavator operator turned his attention to the berm, cutting it apart in neat chunks. Meanwhile, Carmen had come up with a report that there'd been another Japanese road down through the escarpment besides the one Bob, Jennings, and Mr. Naftel had traced out, so I bushwhacked off down the cliff face with a couple of the HPO guys to see what we could find. We found a couple of already known Japanese caves and the remains of what looked like a 4 or 5 year old meth lab, but that was it; the cliff was sheer but for the area just behind the site. If the old road wasn't where Naftel recalls it being it was close to the escarpment, literally across where we're digging, and the graves would have been up in the scree at the base of the cliff, which seems unlikely. By lunchtime the excavator had stripped the whole area we'd dug the day before, all with negative results. After lunch we began on the lower part of the lower field, and pretty soon things changed. The bedrock ended and we found ourselves stripping into reddish brown beach sand. Mr. Naftel gestured to me to come over. "That's what was on top of the graves!" he said, pointing at the sand. Which makes sense; the sand would be a whole lot easier to dig in than the coral bedrock. And very soon the excavator exposed a more or less circular dark stain about a meter and a half across -- a pit of some kind. Mike was concerned that we were running short on time; he had the excavator only for the day, and had to restore the ground to more or less its original contours. But he said to go ahead and strip as much of the area as we could, and asked me to take charge. Experienced reef fisherman that he is he'd obviously seen the clouds building up. So everyone but me huddled under the canopy as the rain began to bucket down, and I stayed out like a fool following the excavator operator as he stripped the field. In the end we found two pit features, both quite shallow, more or less circular, and empty. Almost certainly prehistoric earth ovens or storage pits. Marilyn and the students mapped them in as the HPO guys did measured sketch maps and collected soil samples. The excavator stripped virtually the entire lower field, and went to work backfilling and smoothing the landscape back into shape. I can imagine more things to do, but it seems to be the consensus that we're done; to do more would be shooting in the dark. So we gathered under one of the canopies, there were various speeches of thanks, and we packed up and adjourned. There's another party at still another of Carmen's relatives' house tonight. Tomorrow we'll all begin heading for home, except for those who live here. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 10:56:21 From: Tom King Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian 11/15 11/15/04, 7 a.m., Saipan Having understood the fieldwork to be at an end and with Mike, Randy and Marilyn packing up to catch the 1 pm ferry to Saipan, it was a surprise to learn -- when we more or less stumbled over Jennings, Mr. Naftel, Bob and others at Sunday breakfast yesterday -- that they were planning to re-engage the equipment operator and do some more digging. The machine was still on site, and they had John Mark to provide archaeological oversight on behalf of the HPO, and Hiro and his students were still around, so, the implicit conclusion was, why not do some exploration? The idea was to run some trenches in the field east of the site, perpendicular to the cliff face, to see if they could intersect the old road, establish where it turned toward the west -- it being in this turn that Mr. Naftel said he'd been shown the graves -- and then explore the area around the turn. Mike had washed his hands of it, viewing the project as no longer a piece of archaeological research but mere stabbing in the dark. He, Marilyn and Randy were concerned about possible damage to prehistoric sites in the area. But, as Mike put it, if Jennings and his colleagues wanted to do it under their permit, and the HPO -- represented by John Mark -- was willing to go along, he just hoped they'd keep proper records of what they found. I drove to the site and found work in progress, and Hiro and his students carefully mapping in what was being done, so things appeared to be under reasonable control. From what I saw in a couple of visits over the course of the morning, they dug four long trenches across the field, and may or may not have uncovered some evidence of a road. Right where the talus slope from the cliff meets the sand, there was a strip of small-sized more or less crushed coral, but whether this was road metal or just talus deposit wasn't clear, and even the equipment operator, who works on roadbuilding projects, couldn't seem to verify that there was really a road there. If there WAS a road, and it was at the foot of the talus slope, it was hard to see how there could have been graves between the road and the escarpment; they'd have been dug into the coral talus itself, and not into the sand deposit that would have created the sorts of mounds Mr. Naftel described. A pit did turn up in the first trench, just southeast of the site we'd stripped -- a somewhat irregular pit in the sand deposit, with a bottle and some Japanese porcelain sherds in it. It was diagnosed as a refuse pit, and not excavated, but Hiro and his students mapped it. To the best of my knowledge, all operations concluded at about noon. By 1 pm the high-speed ferry was zooming out of the harbor bound for Saipan with Randy, Marilyn, Mike, and the pickup load of shovels and screens, water coolers and other gear. At about 2 pm, Kar and I crawled into a plane with a couple of Japanese businessmen, and shortly afterwards landed on Saipan. Kar was able to get on a 4:10 island hopper to Guam via Rota, while Scott collected me and brought me to his house here on Mt. Topochau, above the "Capitol Hill" area so vividly described in Fred Goerner's book. I'm scheduled to head for Guam tomorrow, and be homeward bound on Wednesday. Conclusions: Like other pursuits of anecdotal accounts, this one was thwarted by ambiguities. It turned out that the location of Mr. Naftel's road was not as certain as it had seemed. The landscape of the area has been pushed around and reorganized, and of course heavily overgrown. As a result, the depressions he had identified with such certainty as representing the graves most likely did not -- though of course, it's always possible that someone dug up whoever was in them years ago. I don't think that bones were bulldozed up and deposited in the berm, or in any other area we scraped. Bones preserve well in this environment, and if a couple of skeletons had been bulldozed up, at least a bone or two should have popped up during the grading and dissection of the berm. The students collected dozens of artifacts -- bottles, porcelain, some quite hard-to-spot ferrous items -- so they should have seen a bone if it had been there. The graves could of course have been in one of the patches we didn't dig -- right under the canopy where Hiro and his students sorted the artifacts, for example, or under the roots of one of the big trees that we didn't remove. But they could be in innumerable other places, too. Did Mr. Naftel see graves? I trust him; I think he did -- or at least, he saw mounds that he was told were graves. Were they at the site we dug? Maybe. Were they Earhart's and Noonan's? Well, all I can say is that nothing's happened on the Tinian project to lessen my belief that the Nikumaroro Hypothesis is the best game in town. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 11:09:33 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Herman says: > I'm confident she had calculated her fuel consumption carefully and > checked repeatedly. It is reasonable to assume that she carefully monitored fuel consumption during the progress of her world flight and, by the time she embarked upon the Lae/Howland leg, she should have had a good handle on what to expect. I personally doubt, however, that she could have predicted the consumption of 1,100 gallons of fuel over a flight of many, many hours and many, many different power settings down to a tolerance of a few minutes - especially given the fact that she had never before operated the aircraft at that takeoff weight. Dick Merrill and Jack Lambie were pilots whose expertise certainly equalled (and probably far exceeded) Earhart's but when they landed after their two nonstop transatlantic flights in an Electra virtually identical to AE's they didn't know for sure how much gas they had left until they were able to "stick" the tanks. (Even though both NR16059 and NR16020 had fuel tanks installed in the cabin, the filler necks went to the outside of the fuselage and there was no way to "stick" the tanks in flight.) LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 14:35:40 From: Pat Subject: TIGHARs on Tinian Tom's notes and photographs are now up on the TIGHAR website: http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Tinian/tigharstinian.htm ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2004 19:52:33 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian An interesting read; Tom's notes. In the end, no human bones at the Tinian site. None. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Curses! This has to be evidence of a very sophisticated cover-up. Amelia wins again. She is one tough customer! LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 10:08:27 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian My initial reaction was, "Boy, that was a waste of time and money. Especially since they only spent three days on site." Then after about 10 minutes all of lessons of the world famous Gillespie Indoctrination Process - Procure Evidence Rationally (GIPPER) kicked in and I realized that NOT finding something is as important as finding it. Either way, we'd learn something. Also, I was disappointed that they spent only three days (?) on site but after re-reading Tom's notes the rationale was clear: they were there for one purpose, to search for the graves. To spend time, energy, and money on anything else would just be a wild goose chase. So we have two very valuable lessons here. Thanks for the opportunity to learn something new. LTM, who continues to learn Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 10:27:09 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian Dennis refers to: > the world famous Gillespie Indoctrination Process - Procure Evidence > Rationally (GIPPER) I stole it from an old guy by the name of Socrates. (He ran that little Greek restaurant next to the pool hall down on Second Street.) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 11:01:31 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Re: TIGHARs on Tinian Yeah, great souflokie but the carpuzie was never ripe enough. LTM: yasou, ya'll Dennis O. McGee #0149EC > From Ric > > I stole it from an old guy by the name of Socrates. (He ran that little > Greek restaurant next to the pool hall down on Second Street.) ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 14:36:18 From: Daryll Bollinger Subject: Re: AE's fuel I've read Ric and Herman's comments regarding AE's fuel. I've mentioned this before but it just doesn't seem to sink in for some reason. It's about "Flight Control". Not about the ATC part of flight control but the part about managing your own onboard resources. A howgozit chart was part of "Flight Control" in the early years of Pan Am. I have not maintained a howgozit chart or have ever run across anyone that has actual experience doing it. The earliest documentation with the name 'howgozit' was on a weight & balance chart for Pan Am in 1940. Howgozit charts became widely known during WWll because the government made Pan Am give up their long distance flying technics for the good of the cause. Before the war Pan Am didn't see the need to help the competition with their navigation technics. This is one reason it hasn't turned up in Earhart research. One eye-witness, one of the first on the scene at the Luke field crack-up, noted how closely Noonan looked after his charts and paperwork before getting clear of the fuel laden aircraft. I believe Noonan maintained a howgozit chart, in whatever rudimentary form it took in '37'. Part of Noonan's job, besides finding Howland, was not to let the airplane get out of fuel range from land. Winds have the biggest effect on a given fuel load and getting to where you want to go. The farther you fly the more important the actual effects of wind becomes AND the more important it becomes to monitor fuel consumption in real time. Recall that KJ didn't recommend long distance flight without a working Cambridge analyzer. This was one reason why it was so important to get it fixed in Bandung (sp?). Noonan needed accurate fuel comsumption to plot on the chart he maintained. This is the same philosophy used today for IFR flight requiring fuel to your alternate plus. Theoretically it was possible for the winds to have increased during the Lae-Howland leg to cause them to turn back to Lae. That PNR (point of no return) was past Nukumanu and probably close to where the Ontario was stationed. Past that wind dependant PNR it was a crash landing in the Gilberts. The purpose of the howgozit chart was to be able to predict that circumstance and then make decisions based on the plot on the graph. There are documented situations where a Clipper had to turn back to the departure point because of what the Howgozit chart indicated. I don't think I would get much of an argument if I use 25 hours as the endurance of the Electra in still air. The Navigator has to use that endurance over the surface of the earth and compensate for how the wind affected that situation. At 19:12 GMT AE made the call in which "half hour of fuel" was heard. 19:12 GMT translates to about 19.25 hours of flying. Adding in the half hour would make that 19.75 hours into the flight that the crash & sankers believe fuel exhuastion occurred. There should be 5.25 hours of fuel left or safety factor of 21%. The last transmission was heard at 20:13 GMT or 20.25 hours into the flight which means 4.75 hours of fuel endurance left or a 19% safety factor. Noonan was keeping that 4.75 (19%) reserve fuel hours to get them back to the Gilberts which he could see on his howgozit chart. The 281 message proves that he did that part of his job. Daryll ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 18:34:13 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Daryll says: > I believe Noonan maintained a howgozit chart, in whatever rudimentary > form it took in '37'. I have a brother who believes in Creationism. Believe anything you want but this forum is not a faith-based initiative. > Part of Noonan's job, besides finding Howland, was not to let the > airplane get out of fuel range from land. Oh really. Is this Received Wisdom or can you cite a source? > 19:12 GMT translates to about 19.25 hours of flying. .....The last > transmission was heard at 20:13 GMT or 20.25 hours into the flight ... Say what? The flight departed Lae at 00:00Z. 19:12Z was 19 hours 12 minutes into the flight. 20:13Z was 20 hours 13 minutes into the flight. This is like really basic stuff Daryll. > Noonan was keeping that 4.75 (19%) reserve fuel hours to get them back > to the Gilberts which he could see on his howgozit chart. The 281 > message proves that he did that part of his job. Hey Daryll, I've got a question for you. If AE landed in the Marshalls did she land on a reef or on the beach? If she landed on the reef, where did she find one smooth enough for a safe landing? Remember, the airplane has to be on its gear after several high tides when the 281 message was sent. If the airplane was on a reef or on land how did the Japanese get it onto the boat? Do you have any idea what that would involve? LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 18:37:00 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Earhart's Fuel Earhart didn't say anything about "half hour of fuel" - she is recorded to have said "fuel running low", which could mean anything, but most likely means she was into her "reserves" which should have been 10% of her fuel or about 2 - 1/2 hours of flying time. Get it right, people! Yours, Dave Bush > At 19:12 GMT AE made the call in which "half hour of fuel" was heard. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 18:37:50 From: R. C. Sherman Subject: Re: AE's fuel Daryll Bollinger wrote [in part]: > I have not maintained a howgozit chart or have ever run across anyone > that has actual experience doing it. Meet RC, Daryll. He made and used 100 or more, over several oceans in 2 & 4 eng. pistons. Wouldn't have been without one [also drawn in was the pnr and last point to turn to an alternate, if there were any and other items. It was a visual presentation of fuel used/fuel remaining vs time and distance flown, and as such, indicated trends based on the immediate past. [The gauges of the B-747: fuel burn, fuel left, gross weight, and INS, providing in addition to position, miles flown, miles remaining. We had an accurate pictorial of the flight, outmoding the venerable howgozit.] It depicted an accurate account of the fuel used -- well, almost accurate. The potential errors were: the amount of fuel in the tanks at T.O., the accuracy of the fuel gauges, and the accuracy of interpreting the reading on the fuel gauges. The end result was an approximation based on approximations, much better than nothing to be sure, but nothing like the accuracy of a clock. The fuel left in the tanks was plotted above the distance, that was along the X axis at the bottom of the chart. In addition to time, it was interesting to see how fuel remaining related to distance flown and to the estimated fuel that would be used, put on the chart at the beginning. The latter point assumed that one had at least found some positions along the way -- which by the way, also carried an accuracy limitation. Landing at the destination with some fuel left indicated that one had accomplished the flight with an acceptable degree of accuracy. Not finding the destination indicates that there were some errors somewhere; probably in navigation*; maybe in fuel as well? * The life saver if one did not arrive within sight of the destination was the DIRECTION FINDER, manual, or automatic. Confucius could have correctly said, "One direction finder worth 10,000,000 Howgozit's." > Part of Noonan's job, besides finding Howland, was not to let the > airplane get out of fuel range from land. Fair statement. > The purpose of the howgozit chart was to be able to predict that circumstance > and then make decisions based on the plot on the graph. There are documented > situations where a Clipper had to turn back to the departure point because of > what the Howgozit chart indicated. True > I don't think I would get much of an argument if I use 25 hours as the > endurance of the Electra ... Potential .. possibly even greater > At 19:12 GMT AE made the call in which "half hour of fuel" was heard. > 19:12 GMT translates to about 19.25 hours of flying. Adding in the > half hour would make that 19.75 hours into the flight that the crash & > sankers believe fuel exhuastion occurred. Facts end there. What fuel was left and where she went, is what has not been conclusively proved. Cheers, RC ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 19:12:05 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Required reading I would ask all of those who have the time and interest should read parts of Fate is the Hunter penned by Ernest K Gann. Written in the late 50's about his experiences flying circa 1939 to the mid 50's in Commercial Aviation from DC-2s, 3s and 4s along with many others including Lockheed models, and made into a not very good movie. The info within will answer a great many questions which the forum members have brought up over the years and I believe increase their satisfaction, knowledge and the pleasure of reading one great writer and wordsmith. ************************************************************************ From Ric Amen. Ernie Gann was that greatest of rarities - a true creative artist and pilot who died in bed. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 10:34:00 From: Don Jordan Subject: Re: AE's fuel What ever happened to the Daryll vs Ric challenge that was being discussed on the forum some time back? Don Cal City > From Daryll Bollinger > > I've read Ric and Herman's comments regarding AE's fuel. ************************************************** I dunno. Ric? P ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 10:34:56 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: AE's fuel > From Ric: > > Daryll says: > >> 19:12 GMT translates to about 19.25 hours of flying. .....The last >> transmission >> was heard at 20:13 GMT or 20.25 hours into the flight ... > > Say what? The flight departed Lae at 00:00Z. 19:12Z was 19 hours 12 > minutes into the flight. 20:13Z was 20 hours 13 minutes into the > flight. This is like really basic stuff Daryll. Er, Ric, did you want to read that statement again? If they left at 00:00Z, they left at 00:00 GMT, and at 19:12 they had been flying for 19h 12m. True, 19:12 hours is only 19.20 decimal hours, not 19.25, but I don't see a big difference in the numbers the two of you are quoting here. :) I think we all can also agree that, in some manner, Earhart and Noonan were keeping track of their fuel as they went along. To say otherwise is, well, pretty stupid. We can also presume that their past experiences, and those of the people who supervised or advised in their preparations, determined what this manner was. Now, Noonan was a Pan Am navigator, so he would have experience using their methods. How did Earhart track her fuel consumption on her flights? What instruments or other advice would they have received (from Johnson, Mantz or others)? Do we know how they tracked their fuel on the other legs of the flight? This is a key thing. There they are, not sure of their position, and having to make a decision on which way to go to find land. On the one hand, they could try for the islands behind them, on the other go for the Phoenix islands (I'm presuming they gave up on finding Howland at some point, and didn't crash). The decision probably would have rested on fuel and the likely distance to each place from their presumed position near Howland. How they (might have) tracked their fuel would have had a huge effect on this decision (based on how accurate they were). So, please quit nattering at each other and find some facts that explain how they tracked their fuel, or point us to the FM so we can R and see for ourselves. Reed ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 10:35:21 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Jet stream > The reference I saw said the USAAF became aware of the jet stream > during the first B-29 mission bombing Tokyo on Nov. 24, 1944. It gave > them considerable problems with navigation and being able to bomb with > precision. > > Tom Hickcox I always thought Wiley Post discovered the jet stream in his high altitude flights in the Winnie Mae. He at least discovered high winds over the US at altitude...maybe that was just the first indication of the idea of a jet stream. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 10:36:24 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Dave Bush writes: > Earhart didn't say anything about "half hour of fuel" - she is > recorded to have said "fuel running low", which could mean anything, > but most likely means she was into her "reserves" which should have > been 10% of her fuel or about 2 - 1/2 hours of flying time. > > Get it right, people! It's not that simple. I would be the first to agree that AE never said "half hour gas left" but that is based upon an assessment of conflicting evidence, not clear-cut documentation. At the time of the transmission in question, Itasca was standing two simultaneous radio watches. Radioman 3rd Class Thomas O'Hare at position One was tasked with handling all of the ship's routine radio traffic. Seated behind him at Position Two was Radioman 3rd Class William Galten who sole job was to communicate with Earhart. Each operator kept a log. Although it wasn't his job, O'Hare listened in on transmissions from Earhart when the workload permitted and noted them in his log along with the other traffic. O'Hare's notations of Earhart's messages are sporadic and much briefer than Galten's. They are also written as third person commentary whereas Galten logs verbatim quotes. The two operators, seated back to back in the narrow radio room, apparently had separate clocks because their logged times for identical messages are consistently two minutes off. At 07:42 local time, Galten logs: "KHAQQ calling Itasca. We must be on you but cannot see you, but gas is running low. We have been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying at 1000 feet." At 07:40 local time, O'Hare logs: "Earhart on now; says she is running out of gas, only 1/2 hour left, can't hear us at all. We hear her and are sending on 3105 and 500 at the same time, constantly." Which one is right? If Galten logged the message correctly what did Earhart mean when she said "gas is running low"? According to the report of U.S. Army Air Corps Lt. Dan Cooper who was aboard Itasca and later filed his report, the standard fuel reserve for long distance flights at that time was 20%. By TIGHAR's calculation Earhart's probable fuel situation she had begun the flight with a total of 24 hours of fuel and at that time - 19 hours and 12 minutes into the flight - had just begun to burn into her 5 hour (20%) reserve. Gas was, indeed, running low. If O'Hare was right then Earhart was wrong because she was clearly still in the air an hour later when her final transmission was heard at 08:43. If O'Hare was wrong was he making it up? Probably not. So how did he get it wrong? Where did the "half hour gas left" come from? Galten had logged Earhart's previous transmission at 06:45 as "Please take bearing on us and report in half hour". (She almost certainly said "on half hour" because for her the time was 18:15 GCT.) O'Hare did not log the transmission. Perhaps he heard someone say that AE had said something about a half hour and he combined the two messages - but that's just speculation. In any event, O'Hare's version of the 07:40 (or 07:42) message is the one that Commander Thompson acted upon. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 11:19:02 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's Fuel Don Jordan asks: > What ever happened to the Daryll vs Ric challenge that was being > discussed on the forum some time back? I don't remember any challenge. As I recall Todd Swindel and I were supposed to fight a duel or something but he never contacted my second. I have nothing against Daryll. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 12:48:23 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's Fuel Reed Riddle says: > True, 19:12 hours is only 19.20 decimal hours, not 19.25, but I don't > see a big difference in the numbers the two of you are quoting here. My apologies to Daryll. I should have read more closely. > Now, Noonan was a Pan Am navigator, so he would have experience using > their methods. But here's a question. The Clippers had the luxury of a relatively large crew - captain, first officer, junior flight officer, engineering officer, navigation officer, radio operator, and a purser/clerk. Who monitored fuel consumption (which is, after all, a function of engine management)? Would it not most likely be the engineering officer or one of the flight officers? Noonan may have had little direct experience in calculating fuel consumption and reserves. > How did Earhart track her fuel consumption on her flights? What > instruments or other advice would they have received (from Johnson, > Mantz or others)? We know that the plane was equipped with a Cambridge Exhaust Gas Analyzer and that it was considered crucial to fuel management. We also know that they completed all of their previous legs without running out of gas or even having to make an unplanned landing enroute to refuel, so it seems safe to say that they were able to monitor their fuel situation adequately and that, by the time they got to Lae, they had lots of experience doing it. > Do we know how they tracked their fuel on the other legs of the flight? As far as I know, AE never specifically wrote about it but it seems safe to assume that she (not Noonan) tracked her fuel the same way everybody else did. You how much gas you started with. You know from the book, verified by experience, how much fuel your engines use at given combinations of manifold pressure and mixture. You subtract what you presume you have used from what you started with and that's how much you've got left. If the fuel gauges pretty much agree with your calculations so much the better. If not, you either have a leak or the gauges are wrong. It ain't rocket science. > There they are, not sure of their position, and having to make a > decision on which way to go to find land. On the one hand, they could > try for the islands behind them, on the other go for the Phoenix > islands (I'm presuming they gave up on finding Howland at some point, > and didn't crash). The decision probably would have rested on fuel > and the likely distance to each place from their presumed position > near Howland. You describe a moment that I'm not convinced ever existed. The last we hear from them at 20:13Z they are on the 157 337 LOP and are "running on line north and south" or "running on north and south line" depending on how you want to read the Itasca log entry. If they are running on the line they have not turned back for the Gilberts. If the line they are running on is anywhere near Howland they are ballpark 450 nm from the closest of the Gilberts. At 130 kts it will take them three and three quarter hours to get back there. At that point they will have been aloft for 24 hours. If they left Lae with 24 hours of fuel then turning back to the Gilberts at 20:13 (when she specifically said she was doing something else) would be counting on hitting the closest of the Gilberts dead-on from an unknown starting point. Even if they believe that they have a total of 25 hours (or more) of endurance, every minute they continue running on the line is a minute less they will be able to search for land once they reach the vicinity of the Gilberts. By contrast, every minute they run southeastward on the line they believe passes through Howland (and Baker and Gardner) is a minute of searching for land on a line that should produce land. I don't think there was ever a moment of decision or, if there was one, it had already passed by 20:13Z. We know what she was doing at that moment and, by that time, turning back for the Gilberts was no longer a viable option. She has to continue searching for Howland by flying southeastward on the LOP. By the time they are able to determine that they must already be south of Howland (if, indeed, they reached that conclusion before sighting Gardner) it was too late to turn back. We are not going to be able to nail down how much fuel they had or thought they had no matter how many FMs we R. I think we have to accept that we're stuck with broad parameters and then look at what little we know about what she actually did to make a reasonable guess about what she did next. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 12:49:06 From: Tom Hickcox Subject: Re: Jet stream > From Reed Riddle > >> The reference I saw said the USAAF became aware of the jet stream >> during the first B-29 mission bombing Tokyo on Nov. 24, 1944. It >> gave them considerable problems with navigation and being able to >> bomb with precision. >> >> Tom Hickcox > > I always thought Wiley Post discovered the jet stream in his high > altitude flights in the Winnie Mae. He at least discovered high winds > over the US at altitude...maybe that was just the first indication of > the idea of a jet stream. I'm sorry if I gave the impression that the USAAF "discovered" the jet stream during the B-29 bombing campaign. They found that something was messing up their navigation and precision bombing, and this turned out to be a jet stream. Sorry for any misunderstanding. Tom Hickcox ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 13:22:21 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: AE's fuel Refresh my mind again. If the weather was good southeast of Howland, and AE decided to run southeast on the LOP, why didn't she opt for Baker some 40 miles southeast in the exigent circumstance she found herself in regard to her fuel "running low"? Surely Baker must have been considered an alternative. Sorry if you have addressed this before. Ron B. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 13:35:01 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel I agree with the broad parameters comment. We are trying to make this more complicated than it is. I also agree with Ric that there was little likelihood of any kind of specific scientific decision making. They thought they were close to Howland and couldn't locate it. Nearest land was to the SE if they were correct. If they weren't it didn't matter. I would imagine the only decision was land on the first dirt they spotted. There was NO alternative to doing that. Ric is also right about the fuel analysis. It wasn't rocket science. By the time they left Lae they knew how much fuel the plane used IF they didn't already know that long before they started the entire flight. I can also tell you there is little a pilot can do to effectively change the fuel flow of all that mechanical stuff. The engines use what they need to produce X amount of power. Period. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 18:54:28 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Ron Bright asks: > If the weather was good southeast of Howland, and AE > decided to run southeast on the LOP, why didn't she opt for Baker some 40 > miles southeast in the exigent circumstance she found herself in regard to her > fuel "running low"? Surely Baker must have been considered an alternative. The weather was good everywhere in the region. She obviously didn't see Baker. That means that: A. the original advanced LOP was significantly off (unlikely in my opinion) or B. she hit the advanced LOP far enough south of Baker so that their brief run to the northwest (I'd guess a half hour) was not sufficient to bring them within sight of the island. If you figure that you have to be within 10 nm to see the island and you figure that she's making a groundspeed of about 110 kts while searching along the line, that means she originally hit the line at least 65 nm below Baker at around 19:00Z. Not seeing Howland, Noonan has her run northwest on the line. At her regularly scheduled transmission time she tells Itasca, "We must be on you but cannot see you, ...". Itasca hears her at Strength 5 (maximum) and correctly judges her to be somewhere within 100 miles. Sometime around 19:30 Noonan has her reverse course because they must head southeast with enough fuel to make sure they reach an island. (Remember, at this point they still have no idea whether they are north or south of Howland.) This is the time when AE asks for a signal on 7500 kcs and hears the morse code "A"s sent by Itasca. In his later report, Commander Thompson expressed the opinion that: "In view of signal strength it is believed that Earhart was closest to Howland at this time." He was right. She is about 50 miles to the southeast. Maybe it was her failure to "get a minimum" on the "A"s that convinced Noonan that it was time to implement the one course of action that stood the best chance of saving their bacon - run southeastward on the LOP. In any event, thirteen minutes later she's running southeastward retracing her steps when she says: "We are on the line 157 337...running on line north and south" (she had run north and now she's running south). Itasca hears her at just about the same strength they heard her an hour ago because she's just about back to the same spot. My best guess - at 20:13Z they are on the LOP roughly 100 nm southeast of Howland and 250 nm northwest of Gardner. Chugging along at 110 kts brings them to Gardner at about 22:30Z (11:00 Itasca time). They don't need to know what island they're looking at to know for sure that they're way south of both Howland and Baker. In the immortal words of Bugs Bunny, "I knew I shoulda took that left turn at Albuquerque." In order to make a return to even Baker (315 nm away) a reasonable proposition, they need to be sure where they are and believe that they can stay aloft another three hours for a total of 25.5 hours aloft. I don't think it's reasonable to suppose that either of those conditions were met. So there never were any real options. They did what they had to do and ended up where they had to end up. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 18:55:18 From: Stephen Murray Subject: The Natal, Brazil to Dakar, Senegal leg On Tighar's "Earhart's Around the World Flight Route," has it ever been discussed or figured out why there was a navigation error on the Natal, Brazil to Dakar, Senegal leg that turned out to be the second longest leg of the trip? According to the paperwork, Fred Noonan missed Dakar and they landed in Saint-Louis, Senegal, 103 miles or so north of their intended point of landing-Dakar. There were no references of weather, airplane, or crew problems and all note # 3 says is 'Unscheduled (landing); navigational error.' Was this a possible preview of things ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 17 Nov 2004 18:56:44 From: Ed Lyon Subject: Re: Jet stream The 1937-38 high-altitude balloon flights sponsored in part by the National Geographic Society reported the strong high-altitude wind stream (They didn't call it a jet stream) crossing the US from Northwest to Southeast, and speculated on its extent and sporadicity. Their reports are available in antiquarian book stores. Ed Lyon ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 08:55:51 From: Don Jordan Subject: Re: The Natal, Brazil to Dakar, Senegal leg I think they did pretty darn good considering that they were flying on instruments nearly the whole way across. And their radio wasn't working. They were still in bad weather when they reached the coast. I think visibility was about half a mile. . . if I remember correctly. Don Cal City > From Stephen Murray > > On Tighar's "Earhart's Around the World Flight Route," has it ever > been discussed or figured out why there was a navigation error on the > Natal, Brazil to Dakar, Senegal leg that turned out to be the second > longest leg of the trip? According to the paperwork, Fred Noonan > missed Dakar and they landed in Saint-Louis, Senegal, 103 miles or so > north of their intended point of landing-Dakar. There were no > references of weather, airplane, or crew problems and all note # 3 > says is 'Unscheduled (landing); navigational error.' Was this a > possible preview of things ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 08:56:55 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: The Natal, Brazil to Dakar, Senegal leg Stephen Murray asks: > has it ever been discussed or figured out why there was a navigation > error on the Natal, Brazil to Dakar, Senegal leg that turned out to be > the second longest leg of the trip? We should update that notation. There was no navigational error. It's very clear from the notations on the map Noonan was using (now on file at Purdue University) that Earhart's version of what happened, as released to the press shortly afterward and included in Last Flight, is a fabrication. Dakar was intentionally bypassed for safety reasons. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 08:59:51 From: Mark Guimond Subject: Re: Required reading Am also in process of re-reading my original, yellowed 35-cent copy of Ernest K. Gann's "The High And The Mighty" (1953) in which he describes the use of the Howgozit plot on a Honolulu - San Francisco flight in which they are counting down the miles vs. gallons much as AE & FN must have. A true classic. Anybody out there remember the Les Baxter Orchestra's instrumental piece of the same title? ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 09:14:26 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: Required music with the movies? The music for High and the Mighty was written by the same guy who composed the score for High Noon and the original 1937 Lost Horizon among a great many others including some John Wayne westerns of the 50's: Dimitri Tiomkin And who said that tv was a vast wasteland: look what we have all learned. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 09:20:12 From: Mar Guimond Subject: Re: Required music with the movies? Carl, You are right about the original movie score, but I was referring to the best selling Hit Parade rendition. A good day to all. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 12:59:39 From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: AE's Fuel I've always been bothered about the possibility that when AE was flying northeast on the LOP, could the signal she heard from Itasca have been behind her. As I recall, the same thing happened to "Lady Be Good" when they heard from Ben Gazi tower they had already overflown the tower and were hearing the signal "over the shoulder". Just a troublesome thought. LTM, Mike Haddock, #2438 ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 12:59:57 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel Ron, I think the easy answer is she didn't see Baker either Alan ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 13:00:24 From: Tom King Subject: CNN and the Peliliu breakin It's been reported that CNN had a segment sometime last weekend on the breakin to a WWII bunker on Peliliu that was discussed here on the Forum a few weeks back -- but nobody can seem to find anything about it on CNN's website. I've been asked to inquire as to whether anyone on the Forum happened to see and record it. If so, the National Park Service and Palau Historic Preservation Office wants to talk with you. Thanks, and LTM, who must have been asleep in front of the TV when it came on. Tom ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 13:01:07 From: Daryll Bolinger Subject: Re: AE's fuel "....I have a brother who believes in Creationism. Believe anything you want but this forum is not a faith-based initiative....[RG]" I feel blue about your comment and object to the association to that particular political party. Back on topic.... Can you ever recall a Clipper floating on the open sea waiting for someone to bring them some fuel? The howgozit was only part of Pan Am's over all scheme to get air transport out of the realm of stunt flying and make it safe and technical. Noonan was part of that. The howgozit took the decision making off the shoulders of the Captain. To become a captain for Pan Am a pilot would have already done a lot of solo flying. During that time of solo flying there were situations where a decision was made whether to press on and hope the fuel would last. That was fine because there was only one person onboard. Your impression of the cockpit environment of the Clipper was as one boss described "flight by committee". Someone would bring to the attention of the Captain that the howgozit indicated insufficient fuel remaining. Everyone in the cockpit would then know that the Captain was obligated to turn back. His ego was never challenged. There were two people in the Electra. This is the minium number for a committee. We all know what happened at Dakar. I can't lay my hands on the source but I recall in my reading of the explanation of the howgozit, in an example that was being made, it was recommended to use 00:00 GMT to start the plot on the graph. Hmmm, how coincidental that AE&FN waited to take-off at 00:00 GMT. In your discussion with Ron B. I found myself agreeing with a lot of what you said EXCEPT in my mind it was taking place north of Howland. I think there was more planning that went into the flight than is generally given credit. Baker island represented an endpoint of a ~ 40 mile LOP that Noonan was heading for. There were Army personnel there so it's location was known. Noonan knew he should be able to celestial nav within a 20 mile accuracy. They were out of that tolerance using a LOP and Baker should have acted as a stopgap . Daryll ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 14:25:46 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: AE's fuel > Can you ever recall a Clipper floating on the open sea waiting for > someone to bring them some fuel? Wasn't that the idea behind using Kingman Reef? > In your discussion with Ron B. I found myself agreeing with a lot of > what you said EXCEPT in my mind it was taking place north of Howland. I > think there was more planning that went into the flight than is > generally given credit. Baker island represented an endpoint of a ~ 40 > mile LOP that Noonan was heading for. There were Army personnel there > so it's location was known. I think these were a few high school graduate "colonists" from King Kamehameha High School. I don't think there was a landing strip. Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 LTM (let's try mahe-mahe) ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 14:26:13 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: AE's fuel Mike; Mistaking dunes for waves at night in the desert, curious! That, to my knowledge is a distinct possibility in this case: also, except that Fred was far more experienced than the crew of Lady be Good even if they got half way around the world successfully, they goofed on their first mission and paid the ultimate price fo their mistakes. It also seems to me that the Lady's pilot should get all the blame for their loss not just the navigator as well as Group Commander for allowing a new crew to go without at least some help for their first trip, that seems to be a custom and was what happened in the European theater. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 14:26:56 From: Jack Thomas Subject: Re: CNN and the Peliliu breakin A search of CNN transcripts shows a segment mentioning the battle at Peleliu on CNN Sunday Morning for November 14, 2004, but no mention of the bunker break in. Perhaps someone saw a portion of the show and mistakenly believed they were talking about the break in. Here's one relevant portion: -------------- CHINOY: The Japanese made their last stand in a network of hundreds of caves carved out of the limestone ridges just off the beach. (on-camera): Hunkered down in these caves the Japanese inflicted horrendous casualties on the Americans. Today you can still see the debris of that hellish time, canteen, bowl, an ammo clip, rusted hand grenade. That's still live by the way. -------------- -Jack Thomas ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 14:27:34 From: Jack Thomas Subject: Re: CNN and the Peliliu breakin I failed to include the URL in my previous post: http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0411/14/sm.01.html The relevant portion is about 3/4 of the way down. -Jack Thomas ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 14:27:55 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Mike Haddock says: > I've always been bothered about the possibility that when AE was flying > northeast on the LOP, could the signal she heard from Itasca have been > behind her. You mean northwest. Of course it could have been coming from behind her but she had no idea where it was coming from in any event. Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 14:28:17 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: AE's fuel Ric, In plotting out your nicely explained LOP intersection and why AE subsequently missed Howland and Baker, I wonder about a time difference between the 1930 signal and her last at 2013. At 1928-30 you have her southeast of Howland about 50 miles after running north on the LOP [S-5, and her closest to Howland] when she radios "we are circling..." and shortly thereafter asks for signals on 7500. At this point she reverses course. Okay. She wants to get to dry land. But you wrote that only" thirteen" minutes later she sent out "We are on the line 157-337..." signal, S-5. If that last msg was received at 2013, that is about 43 minutes later than 1930 Z. Is that right? She is now roughly 100 miles southeast of Howland. Are those signals strengths consistant? LTM, Ron Bright ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 21:59:03 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Darryl says: > Can you ever recall a Clipper floating on the open sea waiting for > someone to bring them some fuel? No. What's your point? I don't see what difference it makes whether Noonan was keeping a Pan Am style howgozit chart or not. I think we all agree that they were keeping as close track of their fuel as was possible given the circumstances. > There were two people in the Electra. This is the minium number for a > committee. We all know what happened at Dakar. What happened at Dakar? Are you referring to the myth that Earhart vetoed Noonan's navigational instructions? Noonan's chart shows quite clearly that it never happened. They hit the coast south and east of Dakar (which sits on a peninsula) and turned left. As they flew northward in very low visibility due to haze, Dakar was off to their left. It was late in the day and the sun was going down. Trying to find Dakar would have meant flying into the sun in heavy haze. Ever done that? Your forward visibility is zilch. If they missed Dakar they would be heading back out over the Atlantic. So instead of trying for Dakar they continued up the coast to St. Louis which was much easier to find under the circumstances. Of course, they were supposed to land at Dakar and there were no customs facilities at St. Louis. The French were known to have a poor sense of humor about such infractions and they could have impounded the airplane. That's probably why AE made up the story second-guessing Noonan which made the landing at St. Louis a mistake rather than an intentional act. > In your discussion with Ron B. I found myself agreeing with a lot of > what you said EXCEPT in my mind it was taking place north of Howland. It makes no sense for it to take place north of Howland. She had run southeast to be assured of finding land. Had she been northwest of Howland to start with she would have reached Howland. > I think there was more planning that went into the flight than is > generally given credit. You're entitled to your opinion. > There were Army personnel there (on Baker) so it's location was known. There were no Army personnel on Baker. There were some Department of Interior employees. > Noonan knew he should be able to celestial nav within a 20 mile > accuracy. They were out of that tolerance using a LOP and Baker should > have acted as a stopgap . Daryll that's ridiculous. If he could establish his position to within a 20 mile accuracy they would have landed at Howland. According to Noonan himself he should have been able to establish an LOP to within about a ten mile accuracy. That is not at all the same thing as establishing his position on that LOP. He could be on the LOP a hundred miles or more either side of Howland and have no way of knowing it. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 21:59:37 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Ron Bright says: > At 1928-30 you have her southeast of Howland about 50 miles after running > north on the LOP [S-5, and her closest to Howland] when she radios "we are > circling..." and shortly thereafter asks for signals on 7500. At this point > she reverses course. Okay. She wants to get to dry land. She never said "we are circling." This has been discussed ad nauseum. The operator originally logged it as "we are drifting but cannot hear you" then erased drifting and changed it to "we are circling but cannot hear you." Neither makes any sense. She almost certainly said, ""we are listening but cannot hear you". > But you wrote that only" thirteen" minutes later she sent out "We are on > the line 157-337..." signal, S-5. If that last msg was received at 2013, that > is about 43 minutes later than 1930 Z. Is that right? Yes. I should have said 43 rather than 13. Thank you. > She is now roughly 100 > miles southeast of Howland. Are those signals strengths consistant? All of the signals between 19:12 and 20:13 were logged at S5. In his later report Commander Thompson expressed the opinion that the aircraft was within 100 miles of Howland during that time. He also felt that "in view of signal strength" she was closest at 19:30, so apparently the signal was even stronger at that time. Obviously, there is no way to know whether she hit the LOP 100 miles or 80 miles or 120 miles south of Howland. Also, the 19:12 transmission was made very close to her scheduled transmission time so there is no way to know how long she had been on the line when she said "we must be on you....". Here are the facts we have to work with: - We have a one hour period between 19:12 and 20:13 during which the airplane apparently remained on the LOP within 100 miles of Howland and was closest at 19:30. - If the correct interpretation f the 20:13 message is "we are running on line north and south" we know that the plane did not travel in only one direction along the LOP. - We know that all of the alternative islands on the LOP (Baker, Mckean and Gardner) are southeast of Howland, therefore the only direction it makes any sense to run for an extended period of time is to the southeast. -We know they didn't see either Howland or Baker The only way I can make those facts fit is to put the airplane on the LOP well south of Baker at 19:12, run it north until 19:30, turn it around and bring it south so that at 20:13 it's roughly back where it started from. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 22:00:37 From: Jack Thomas Subject: Re: CNN and the Peliliu breakin For Jack Thomas Thanks, Jack. I've passed your posts on to the National Park Service guy who's coordinating their response to this business; he says... Tom, Thank you for sending me the partial text. This also gives me a confirmation of the date. I saw the footage, which did not talk about the break-in. The main story light was all the artifacts they found in this cave--sort of a World War II time capsule. There was no mention of the break-in or that the cave had been recently opened. This will make it much easier to try to obtain a copy of the footage. This will be very useful. /s/ David David W. Look, FAIA Deputy Lead, Cultural Resources Oakland Office National Park Service ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 22:02:24 From: Wink Butz Subject: Re: CNN and the Peliliu breakin I did see the article and was ticked off to put it mildly... I didn't save it but will now try to trace my steps to locate it and post if possible. Something bugging me for a couple of years, The Internation Date Line. I believe A & F had to cross it going to Howland and when Fred plotted out his orignal course with whatever plotting book he used, did he flip the page forward or backward (forgot if you gain or loose a day) in his course plotting. Has anyone taken this into consideration to see what kind of error you would come up with if you overlooked that info? OR, When Howland didn't come into view (slite apprehension setting in) maybe in rechecking his calcs, Fred forgot the time differental and sent Amelia off on another dirrection. Anyway, it might be interesting for someone to replot the course with the Dateline situation both way's to see what kind of error? the two plots would come up with. Would it be many many miles off or not. Wink Butz ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 18 Nov 2004 22:04:29 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel Daryll Bolinger writes: >Can you ever recall a Clipper floating on the open sea waiting for >someone to bring them some fuel? Daryll, I'm worn out driving back and forth between Houston and Austin taking care of my son as he recovers from surgery so cut me some slack if I miss your points. I DID miss the point on the clipper. >The howgozit was only part of Pan Am's over all scheme to get air transport >out of the realm of stunt flying and make it safe and technical. Noonan was >part of that. The howgozit took the decision making off the shoulders of the >Captain. To become a captain for Pan Am a pilot would have already done a lot >of solo flying. During that time of solo flying there were situations where >a decision was made whether to press on and hope the fuel would last. >That was fine because there was only one person onboard." I spent many years as an aircraft commander and at no time was I ever relieved of any decision making. Does the above paragraph have a source? Also I wondered how you know those things. I have no knowledge that Noonan had some or any part in a "howgozit" whatever that is. How did you find out that Pan Am pilots did a lot of solo flying? Finally what is the significance? >Your impression of the cockpit environment of the Clipper was as one boss >described "flight by committee". Someone would bring to the attention of the >Captain that the howgozit indicated insufficient fuel remaining. Everyone in >the cockpit would then know that the Captain was obligated to turn back. His >ego was never challenged. I don't understand this paragraph either. The captain knew before take off how much fuel was on board and how far he could fly. What does his presumed ego have to do with fuel flow? >There were two people in the Electra. This is the minium number for a >committee. We all know what happened at Dakar. Daryll, what is it you think happened at Dakar? >I can't lay my hands on the source but I recall in my reading of the >explanation of the howgozit, in an example that was being made, it was >recommended to use 00:00 GMT to start the plot on the graph. Hmmm, how >coincidental that AE&FN waited to take-off at 00:00 GMT. I'm lost again, Daryll. Are you suggesting all flights had to take off at 00:00 GMT in order for the fuel plot to start at that time? I might add that we have accepted 10 AM L as their take off time but one report said 10:20. I don't know how that time was used in 1937 at Lae Aerodrome. Commercial/cargo planes use block out time whereas military generally uses actual take off time. Even in the military on passenger and cargo runs I have used block out time. MAC did. >In your discussion with Ron B. I found myself agreeing with a lot of what >you said EXCEPT in my mind it was taking place north of Howland. I think there >was more planning that went into the flight than is generally given credit. >Baker island represented an endpoint of a ~ 40 mile LOP that Noonan was >heading for. There were Army personnel there so it's location was known. Noonan >knew he should be able to celestial nav within a 20 mile accuracy. They were >out of that tolerance using a LOP and Baker should have acted as a stopgap. Daryll, you may be right about where they were as being north of Howland. I sure don't know. I have suggested they were slightly north and east of Howland, maybe 10 to 20 miles. It would take very little to miss the islands. I don't follow your comment, "Baker Island represented an endpoint of a ~ 40 mile LOP that Noonan was heading for." The LOP was simply a line drawn on Noonan's chart angled at 157/337 degrees. It had no specific length. Baker had no connection to the LOP. It was drawn through Howland on Noonan's chart. It went through whatever was on that line. Finally, the LOP was not the problem. The LOP we talk about was NOT the result of a sun shot or a moon shot. It took its angle from a previous celestial shot. The error, if any, was the accuracy of the previous celestial calculation and determining the time of travel between the previous shot and the line Noonan drew through Howland. The infamous LOP is simply a line Noonan drew on his map. IT was not in error. I went smack dab through the middle of Howland Island. If there was a problem it was Noonan thinking he had arrived over that line when in fact he had not. If his ground speed was off or his celestial calculations were in error on the previous shot then he could have arrived late or early to his "LOP" and actually have been east or west of Howland. Where he was north or south we can't determine. What that means, however, is that when Noonan turned to track the "LOP" it did not in reality track over Howland OR Baker. He thought he was at the line he drew but he was probably ten to twenty or so miles short or long. Ric's explanation could be valid also if Noonan was considerably south of Howland. In that case his flight position could have actually been on the line that went through Howland. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 08:54:18 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: AE's fuel > There were no Army personnel on Baker. There were some Department of > Interior employees. 4 of them, to be exact. And no airfield until 1943-44. Dan Postellon ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 08:55:25 From: Christian Duretete Subject: Re: AE's fuel > From Ric > > The only way I can make those facts fit is to put the airplane on the > LOP well south of Baker at 19:12, run it north until 19:30, turn it > around and bring it south so that at 20:13 it's roughly back where it > started from. Is it indeed quite necessary? I remember we had lots of discussions about visibility, and it sounded like they could easily just not see Howland and Baker if they were... was it 10 or 15 miles off... A tiny low-lying bare island, and what with scattered cloud shadows... So it seems also very possible that Noonan's actual LOP could have been a bit less accurate than usual, say 10-15 miles off east or west? Christian D ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 08:56:06 From: Adam Marsland Subject: Re: AE's fuel Questions: (1) Given the length of time she was at S5, is it at all possible that she overflew (or flew past on an advanced LOP that was a few miles too far one way or the other) Howland and Baker and didn't see them? How close would she have to be to see the islands? (2) I'd be curious to know how close Ric thinks she was to Howland at the closest point, and if she in fact just missed having a successful flight by turning around too soon. > The only way I can make those facts fit is to put the airplane on the > LOP well south of Baker at 19:12, run it north until 19:30, turn it > around and bring it south so that at 20:13 it's roughly back where it > started from. ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 12:05:49 From: Daryll Bolinger Subject: Re: AE's fuel >> Can you ever recall a Clipper floating on the open sea waiting for >> someone to bring them some fuel? > > No. What's your point?....[RG] The point I was trying to make was that Pan Am's nav technics, that Noonan used in pioneering the Manila route, avoided that embarrassing situation. Manning had no experience in that part of "flight control", which would tip the scale in favor of Noonan being critical to the "World Flight". I used the term celestial nav, to mean a star fix. The difference between a star fix and an LOP is the difference between night and day. Pan Am said that it should be expected that Noonan would have taken a star fix every hour during the night. He himself said that the accuracy of the star fix would be 10-15 miles. If he waited until the last of 'dark' to take that last fix, that means there was about an hour to DR during dawn to the point of taking a sun shot to establish the LOP. You claim he DR'd to Howland's coordinates while some say he set up for an off-set because they couldn't establish radio contact. It's obvious he missed either north or south of Howland. If he missed south, taking into consideration the tolerance of the star fix and the DR errors to the LOP, they should have seen Baker at sometime. Baker is about 40 miles and 157 degrees south of Howland. The geographical distance between Howland and Baker must be taken into consideration as to which side of Howland they missed on. Missing south of Baker would mean that 40 miles plus the visability of the day would have to be added into the navigational error that he made. The hour or so spent on the LOP was trying to resolve why they didn't see either Howland OR Baker. They had enough fuel to once again turn around on the LOP but that would compromise the fuel for plan B. Noonan with Pan Am's technics was suppose to add disipline in the cockpit. If they had radio communication that would be a worthy gamble to keep searching, without radio communication it was too much of a gamble to burn the fuel for plan B. Daryll ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 13:42:27 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: AE's fuel By now I could probably write a book after almost 45 years on this subject and, it is Friday.so, Which way would Fred plan to run? North or South of courseline is the question and that is the way to navigate when you have no landmarks on the surface and neerd to know which way to turn when you arrive at your end of course, but: Why do that if you have starsights all night and if you are that good and within a circle 10-15 miles or so and you know you location before daylight it should be a piece of cake just run down your new course and voila! There is what you seek, Howland! Should this be shown or plotted to show this on both ways of navigation: I'm sure this has been already been done. According to sources the winds are light most of the year down near the equator so will have little effect either way. ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 20:55:53 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel It looks like we are going over old ground for a few who have forgotten all the discussions by several forumites on this issue. OR never got it in the first place. 1. There is no evidence of the existence of a plan B. Third party anecdotes without any support are not evidence. 2. Noonan's navigational techniques had no bearing on Pan Am avoiding the embarrassment of running out of gas. Can anyone point out the Clippers were habitually doing that? 3. The reasons Noonan and not Manning was on board have long ago been discussed and whatever implication you are trying to make is nonsense. 4. Apparently some have never understood the navigation issues that have been beat to death here. Without going over all of that again I would suggest a review of the archives might be in order to reduce the erroneous and nonsensical posts. DR is NOT devoid of navigational techniques and to imply they were flying for hours blindly through the sky is totally incorrect. Celestial navigation cannot be redefined for someone's convenience as only the use of stars. It includes the sun, moon and planets. Noonan typically shot two star fixes whereas I used three. In either case the result is a point on the map. That point is the plane's position at fix time. It consists of either two LOPs or three. Their intersection is the relevant location. In the case of a sun shot there is only one LOP and the plane is located ON that line some place. Where is not known. The sun was in front of Noonan so his LOP was at right angles to his direction give or take depending on his heading. He would know he was on the line but not how far left or right. Noonan could have also shot the moon in the wee hours and arrived at the same LOP. Subsequent sun or moon shots would provide him with a ground speed. Using that ground speed he could estimate when he would reach a parallel line drawn through Howland. Again that alone would not tell him whether he was north or south on the line. His DR techniques could help him verify his wind speed and direction. In order to locate his north or south position he would have had to shoot a celestial body that was at a reasonable angle to the sun. Such was available. In the short time he had from his last star fix, if he got one, was not a long enough time to wander from course very much. In my opinion he arrived near Howland fairly close. Maybe 10 to 20 miles. It would take no more to miss the island. He could have been off in ANY direction, Daryll, not just north or south. Having said all that there is certainly a possibility Noonan made a gross error in his navigation. We will never know that unless we find his map case. It is not necessary to speculate on that possibility as missing the island within his CEA will still have the same result. For that matter speculating on any of this is tilting at windmills as there does not exist sufficient data to resolve any of it. It didn't exist at the time and doesn't now. Just as Angus claims to have found new evidence we know that cannot be so. New evidence could only be part of the Electra or something from the crew. If that was the case Angus would know for an absolute 100% certainty and he denies he can be that positive. Ergo, no substantive evidence has been found. None of us can find new meteorological data as none existed on July 2, 1937 so none exists now yet to be found. Further speculation will not result in some miraculous revelation. Particularly if most of it is in error. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 20:56:59 From: Tom Strang Subject: Regional weather Ric you said "weather was good every where in the region" - Howland Island region I assume - Based on what do you make this blanket statement? Respectfully: Tom Strang # 2559 ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 20:57:38 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: AE's fuel Sometimes comments on the forum seem to suggest that Noonan invented the offset navigation method of flying to one side or the other of a line of position through the destination. The technique of flying a considerable distance off to one side of the island you are looking for, then turning and flying along a position line to find the object of your search was first tested and documented over the open ocean by (Sir) Francis Chichester around 1933. By the time Fred Noonan began using it, the technique was well tested and established. I have mentioned before, that Chichester did this over open ocean in a single seat biplane, sometimes flying with his knees while holding the airplane in a circle to take a celestial shot through a hole in the clouds. As a matter of interest, he practiced the technique while travelling in a moving car. Anyway, my point is that Noonan was floating around in Clippers fine tuning the technique long before he headed out with Amelia. I really think the likelihood of his navigation being out by a whole lot is absurd. Th' WOMBAT. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 10:17:43 From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Radios > From Ric > That's correct. In fact, when Itasca put out the first "all ships, all > stations" bulletin that afternoon asking everyone to listen for > possible distress calls form Earhart they mentioned only 500 kcs (not > knowing that, due to antenna changes, the airplane actually had no > meaningful ability to transmit on that frequency). Unwittingly, the > Itasca set a trap for would-be hoaxers. Had alleged distress calls > been reported on 500 kcs they would, by definition, be bogus. But > there were none. Throughout the post-loss signal phenomenon not one > reception on 500 kcs was reported. I would not lend too much weight to this argument. Even if a possible hoaxer wished to transmit on 500 kc., this would be quite difficult. This 500 kc. "low frequency band" frequency was so out of the usual land-use realm that not many transmitters were about. They would all be either on ships, on military posts, at large coastal airfields, or in a few of the larger ocean crossing aircraft. Additionally, the physical requirements for a wire antenna at this frequency are a lot more difficult for the average hobbyist-type person than when using the shortwave bands. An antenna that worked great on the short waves might not get you more than a 2 digit mile range on the low frequency. Therefore, i would not put too much emphasis on the fact that no signals of possible hoaxer origin were recorded from 500 kcs. -Hue Miller ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 10:18:35 From: Steve Murray Subject: AE & FN -- Fuel and weather Alan Caldwell had a recent comment stating 'None of us can find new meteorological data as none existed on July 2, 1937, so none exists now yet to be found'- good point- all AE and FN had regarding wx. rpts. according to Tighar's, The Chater Report, were the ones that were sent to LAE as they departed (fm Fleet Base Pearl Harbour-Navy). And these were supposedly sent to AE and FN during each hour by radio until 5:20 P.M. In essence they said 'dangerous local rain squalls about 300 miles east of LAE and scattered heavy showers remainder of route.' If AE and FN received these reports, it should have given them some preview of things to come-especially the part of scattered heavy showers remainder of route which should have given them a heads up as to the probability of wx. in and around Howland. With this in mind, I also think that they may have exceeded their forecast fuel burn figures the entire route if; 1- They avoided wx. on departure east of LAE and flew southeast over Bougainville and then back up to Nukumanu; 2- Flew north and south of course en route at different altitudes avoiding wx.; and, 3- flying at lower altitudes up and down the LOP looking for Howland or any other place to land also avoiding the wx. Basically, I think they had more wx. en route and burned more fuel than we think and didn't get any help from the Itasca for arrival weather-no meteorologist on board (amazing). ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 10:18:58 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Regional weather Tom Strang asked: > Ric you said "weather was good every where in the region" - Howland > Island region I assume - Based on what do you make this blanket > statement? The weather observations taken on Howland and the weather observations logged by Itasca both when the ship was on station at Howland until 10:40 local and when it was north and west of the island searching later in the morning and afternoon. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 11:10:23 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel We seem to have slipped into another round of speculation about why AE and FN didn't see Howland. As Alan has pointed out, unless we find Fred's map case we're never going to know whose guess is best, but it seems to be an irresistible exercise. My own approach is to accept as accurate the information provided at the time by the people who were there and then try to fit those puzzle pieces together into a picture that makes sense. - When Earhart says "we must be on you" it's clear that Noonan believes that he has accurately advanced the LOP to fall through Howland. I have no reason to think that he's wrong so I accept that he's right. - When Earhart says, "we are on the line 157 337" I take that as further affirmation that Noonan is confident that the LOP has been accurately advanced. - When Thompson says that he believes the airplane was within about 100 miles of Howland between 19:12Z and 20:13Z and was closest to Howland at 19:30Z, I have no reason to think that he's wrong so I accept that he's right. My speculation that they hit the LOP well south of Baker is the only picture I can make out of those puzzle pieces. It seems to me that those who want to put the airplane closer to Howland are creating a picture out of puzzle pieces they have invented. They speculate that Noonan must have been able to get a star fix or a moon shot, so he couldn't have been that far off. Or they speculate that his advanced LOP was actually short of Howland or that they somehow flew past Howland. All of these speculations require the assumption that some piece of available evidence is wrong. That is, of course, possible - but I submit that a picture assembled from genuine pieces of primary source information is more likely to be true than is a picture constructed of must haves and would haves. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 12:12:57 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Radios Hue Miller says: > Even if a possible hoaxer wished to transmit on 500 kc., this would be > quite difficult. This 500 kc. "low frequency band" frequency was so > out of the usual land-use realm that not many transmitters were about. > They would all be either on ships, on military posts, at large > coastal airfields, or in a few of the larger ocean crossing aircraft. All of the alleged post-loss messages must fall into one of three categories: - intentional hoaxes - misunderstood receptions - genuine distress calls from the plane Because we have excellent records of what transmissions were sent by the searchers and when, it is relatively easy to check for reports of post-loss signals that were, in fact, misunderstood receptions of the searchers' attempts to contact Earhart. There were no such occasions. None of the reported post-loss signals was a misunderstood transmission by the seachers. Some of the faint carrier waves heard on 3105 may have been powerful foreign commercial stations heard at great distances but all of the many occasions when the reception contained Earhart-related information had to be either hoaxes or genuine transmissions from the plane. Most of those signals were heard by stations in the Central Pacific where the vast majority of the potential sources for hoaxes were, as you put it, "either on ships, on military posts, at large coastal airfields, or in a few of the larger ocean crossing aircraft." > Therefore, i would not put too much emphasis on the fact that no > signals of possible hoaxer origin were recorded from 500 kcs. On the contrary. The absence of signals on 500 kcs is an indication that the most numerous sources of potential hoaxers were not perpetrating hoaxes. By the way, the handful of shortwave listeners stateside who heard long, intelligible messages on harmonic frequencies (Betty and Nina and Mabel, et al) are a completely separate phenomenon. The key to assessing the validity of the post-loss messages is in the cataloging of who heard what, when and where on the primary frequencies. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 12:13:26 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE & FN -- Fuel and weather Steve Murray says: > Basically, I think they had more wx. en route and burned more fuel > than we think... This is a classic example of the sort of thinking I referred to in my earlier post. You think something different happened than what the available primary source information suggests. You're creating a picture out of puzzle pieces you have invented. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 12:14:05 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: AE's fuel Even if you find the map case, you can't solve the mystery. If Fred plotted himself as on target, on course, but actually made a mistake in his readings, you are still stuck with a mystery. Unless you had a device installed on the plane that would plot its actual location, you cannot really know where it was, despite all the documents that Fred had with him. Now, that's not to say that they wouldn't have the key to the mystery, just that you can't know for sure. LTM, Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 12:58:05 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: AE's fuel > From Ric > > ...I submit that a picture assembled from genuine pieces of > primary source information is more likely to be true than > is a picture constructed of must haves and would haves. I'm a dues-paid TIGHAR member because I trust Ric's judgment, even when dealing with reasonable guesses (not with spelling, philosophy, or other non-TIGHAR topics :o). The scientific method requires hunches, intuition, guesses, and formation of hypotheses that cannot be known to be true until they are tested. Ric is one of the best hypothesis-generators I've ever had the pleasure to meet. LTM. Marty #2359 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 13:48:30 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel Marty says: > Ric is one of the best hypothesis-generators I've ever had the > pleasure to meet. That's high praise indeed. I'm flattered. My hypothesis-generator is actually a small steam-powered device that sits over in the corner. Of course, the best test of how good a hypothesis-generator you are is how often your hypotheses test positive. In our line of work that usually takes the form of: "Based on what we've found out so far, I think thus and so may have happened. If I'm right, then if we look in spot X we should find Y." So far, our success ratio is probably something like 2 percent but that's 102 percent better than everybody else in the Earhart game. Like Einstein said, "It's all relative." LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 18:44:32 From: Tom King Subject: New Shoes I just received a copy of AE's Shoes, updated paperback edition, from the publisher, AltaMira Press, with the assurance that it should be in their warehouse within days for shipment to those who've ordered it or do so from www.altamirapress.com. Or from Amazon, or your local bookstore. I'm happy to report that the photo quality is a good deal better than in the first edition. And of course, there's the 41-page addendum chapter at the end, bringing the story of the search up through early 2004 -- including the 2001 expedition, the research on Tarawa, the 2003 Wheel of Fortune expedition, the 2003 Fiji Bones Search, Arthur Rypinski's work with the Kanton data, and much, much more. Even a silly picture of Ric and me. LTM (who recommends it for Christmas stockings) Tom ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 18:45:31 From: Greg Moore Subject: Re: Radios Thanks Hue and Ric, I like these comments, as they validate a basic fact about MF, and that is, if someone were in "hoax mode" they wouldn't think of using 500, or if they did, would have screwed it up and both became instantly detectable as a hoaxer. First off, while the construction of a transmitter capable of operation on 500Khz is not hard, it is a rather specialised animal, because, as the wavelength gets longer, so does component size, and the all important antenna length. Note that in the explanantion of the mods to the xmir to allow operation on 500, there were significant tradeoffs made for antenna length, first with the trailing wire, and then with the Gurr modification using the loading coil (If there are any pictures extant, anywhere, of this coil, this "sparks" would seriously enjoy seeing them). The hoaxer would have to be pretty dedicated to want to put up an antenna array and construct the equipment for a one shot hoax, unless they were trying it from an established station. Just a word on 500....the AN/CRT-3 survival radio transmitter, better known as the "Gibson Girl", transmitted on two frequencies, 500 and 8364. The antenna reel is 306" in length, and the xmtr loads nicely on these frequencies. Any trailing wire of the same approximate length would work just as well... Now, back in that day, and up until recently, the world of MF was "CW and MCW (Modulated CW ) only" or, in designation A1 and A2. I have never heard voice on 500, and I have some years of experience sitting watch on MF. I believe that a hoaxer, possibly not aware of this would have tried to xmit on 500 using voice and simply been ignored, simply because of the range of AM at that frequency. Sure, our intended hoaxer could have gotten a rock to fit a broadcast transmitter, and retuned it 50Khz from the bottom of the AM band, but this would have been difficult, and not worth the risk. If said hoaxer were to simply hook a key up and attempt to key the 'mitters output the resultant signal would have been poor in quality, and I believe instantly detectable, as the removal of all radiotelegraph equipment from the aircraft is well known.. Just wanted to add my 2 cents Greg Moore Tighar #2645 former RM1, USN ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 18:46:18 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: AE's fuel Ric wrote: > Of course, the best test of how good a hypothesis-generator you are is > how often your hypotheses test positive. I believe there is a vaccine against positive tests for hypotheses...it's called faith. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 19:35:01 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE & FN - fuel and weather Steve, a big problem AE had with WX information was the lack of intermediary reporting stations along her route. Given that your local weatherman has a lot of difficulty telling you what tomorrow's weather will be it seems to me that Hawaii trying to forecast 2500 miles of weather was a bit iffy. To make clearer my statement I'll add that there WAS weather information in 1937 albeit rather skimpy and to the best of my knowledge we know what all of that was. Itasca reports, Ontario, Nauru and Ocean Island for example, but not really any long range wind and weather forecasts or confirmations as we have today. The significance is that we don't know what the weather and winds were at AE's altitude, whatever that was, at any point on her route. Given the time and distance figures for her flight, there doesn't appear that any significant weather deviation was made that would have adversely affected her fuel. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 22 Nov 2004 19:36:02 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel > When Earhart says "we must be on you" it's clear that Noonan believes > that he has accurately advanced the LOP to fall through Howland. I > have no reason to think that he's wrong so I accept that he's right. > - When Earhart says, "we are on the line 157 337" I take that as > further affirmation that Noonan is confident that the LOP has been > accurately advanced. So that some of our newer folks aren't confused let me make this clearer. Noonan could not advance his LOP erroneously to be technical. He shot his sun line and drew an LOP on his chart. Then he drew a parallel line or LOP (and this is the one we are really talking about when we refer to the infamous LOP) on his chart smack dab through Howland. Not short. Not long. Exactly through Howland. When Ric refers to advancing the LOP through Howland what he is saying is that Noonan measured the distance between the two parallel lines, applied his ground speed or what he thought was his ground speed and determined what time he would reach that second line which went through Howland. If he was flying slower than he predicted his time would expire short of that second line and he would believe he was ON the line and thus over Howland. If he was flying faster than he thought his time would expire AFTER he passed Howland but again he would believe he was ON the line and again over Howland. What were the possible errors that could have caused one of these two possibilities? Noonan's sun shot could have been in error or he could have had a plotting error thus making the first LOP erroneously placed. His ground speed could have been calculated wrong or the winds could have changed. Having explained all of that I caution you that Noonan COULD have done everything right and there WAS NO error. He could have simply been too far south on his LOP and never reached Howland in his subsequent search. This is where Ric comes down on the issue. Noonan was an excellent navigator and there is no reason to believe he made any large errors. It is more likely he was just too far left or right of his course as he had little north/south capability but rather only east/west celestial information. It is for this same reasoning that Ric picked the Electra to the South. Had it been to the North it should have overflown Howland and/or Baker. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 09:20:36 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Hypotheses Ric wrote: > Of course, the best test of how good a hypothesis-generator you are is > how often your hypotheses test positive. There is a world of difference between a hypothesis and the pure idle speculation we sometimes see on the forum. Anyone can speculate anything. That doesn't advance the ball. Gaming DOES help wherein several hypotheses are proposed and TESTED for reasonableness or possibility or the like. Ric just went through such an exercise in brief where he gave his reasoning for believing the Electra reached the infamous LOP to the south of Howland by a significant amount. We need to pursue this idea more. We have been laboring under the general idea that Noonan ONLY had east/west position information but that is not necessarily true. We need to look into what he could have done to somewhat define his track or north/south position on the last leg into Howland. As we have recently seen it is easy to make up factors that could have altered the navigation and fuel reserve. In doing that we need to be careful not to go against known facts and most importantly have a good rationale for the speculation. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 09:22:06 From: Scott White Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather In this discussion about navigation, I haven't heard anything about the probability (if any) that Earhart and Noonan might have flown by Howland and just not seen it. I think I remember reading that the island should have been visible for about 10 miles in any direction. I don't know if this is an all-purpose guesstimate, or whether it is supposed to apply to the specific circumstances (the sun had just come up, so the light would be bad for visibility in any direction, especially looking into the sun). Some of you guys [generic term/ no geneder implied] have flown to teeny little islands in the Pacific. Don't know if you've done so at daybreak. But just how easy is it to see an island? If the sun is high in the sky in clear weather, I would think that an island would be surrounded shallow green-looking water, while the deeper water would be dark blue. I doubt you could see that at daybreak. Also, if there is enough wind to put a chop on the water, then breaking waves on shore would be a lot less conspicuous. So, does anyone have an estimate of how close they needed to be before they really could see the island? It seems to me that if they were on the 157 / 337 LOP but just a few miles east or west, they could easily have gone by it without seeing it. Another unrelated thing, reg. weather -- I remember reading in AE Survived something about a falsified storm report northeast of Howland, I think on the day EA was to arrive or perhaps the following day. I can't remember the details, but I think Reineck described it as being really outlandish . . . heavy snowfall at sea level in the tropics, something like that. I don't have the book here so I can't check on it. Anybody remember anything like this, or know anything about it? And one other thing -- Alan, you've said that Angus claims to have new evidence, but that he can't possibly have any unless it's actually a piece of the plane (or something similar). I don't understand what you mean. Since we're talking about radio logs these days, what if Angus had a radio log from a source not previously known? That would be new evidence, wouldn't it? I don't want to get into a discussion of what (if anything) Angus might have or what he should do with it. I'm only trying to understand your view on what constitutes evidence. Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 10:42:53 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Scott White wrote: > it. I'm only trying to understand your view on what constitutes > evidence. Scott, Alan has evidently decided that he has complete knowledge of what information is available to Earhart researchers and what could theoretically be available. This can hardly be because Alan is all-knowing - its just because he imagines he is. Consider the bones documentation. Before the file on the bones was found, officialdom denied that such evidence even existed. Yet the evidence existed all along. It just took some determined person to find it. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 11:10:34 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Conjecture, Hypothesis, and Theory There was an editorial in yesterday's Philadelphia Inquirer by a science professor who was trying to address charges by advocates of "Intelligent Design" that evolution was "just a theory." His point was that most people don't understand the differences between conjecture, a hypothesis, and a theory. Here on this forum we have used those words (and others like "speculation") pretty much interchangeably and it strikes me that our discussions might benefit from a clearer, more disciplined use of language. With the help of the Unabridged Oxford English Dictionary (blessings be upon the forum contributors who made it available) I've assembled some definitions and distinctions which should prove useful. First, shocking as it may be, we must dispense with the notion of "proof." There is nothing in the scientific or historical world that is unequivocally proven. If you want absolute certainty you must turn to either mathematics or faith. Everything else is always subject to amendment. The best that science (or history) can provide is "theory", best defined in this context by the OED's definition: "4. a. A scheme or system of ideas or statements held as an explanation or account of a group of facts or phenomena; a hypothesis that has been confirmed or established by observation or experiment, and is propounded or accepted as accounting for the known facts; a statement of what are held to be the general laws, principles, or causes of something known or observed." Some theories are more solid than others. The Theory of Gravity checks out so consistently and reliably that we refer to it as the Law of Gravity but it's really "just a theory." Other theories, such as Evolution and Global Warming, although "confirmed or established by observation or experiment" are not as widely accepted, especially by those outside the scientific community. Economic, business, political and historical theories experience the same range of acceptance, but the important distinction to keep in mind is that a theory must be "confirmed or established by observation or experiment, and is propounded or accepted as accounting for the known facts." The best OED definition hypothesis for our purposes is: "3. A supposition or conjecture put forth to account for known facts; esp. in the sciences, a provisional supposition from which to draw conclusions that shall be in accordance with known facts, and which serves as a starting-point for further investigation by which it may be proved or disproved and the true theory arrived at." So we can think of an hypothesis as an explanation, based on known facts, that aspires to be a theory but must first be tested. If observation and experimentation support the hypothesis it becomes a low-confidence theory. The more it is tested and the more support is found, and assuming that no contrary information arises or a better theory doesn't emerge, the more accepted the theory becomes. Before there can be a hypothesis there must be "conjecture" which the OED defines as: "4. The formation or offering of an opinion on grounds insufficient to furnish proof; the action or habit of guessing or surmising; conclusion as to what is likely or probable." So....the steps are: 1. You get an idea based on conjecture. 2. You gather the known facts and if they seem to fit your conjecture it becomes a hypothesis. 3. You test your hypothesis through research, observation, and experimentation. 4. If the test results support your hypothesis you now have a low-confidence theory. 5. You continue to do research, make observations, and conduct experiments. If results continue to be positive, then confidence in the theory grows. If not, then you take what you learned and form a new hypothesis and begin the process all over again. Let's apply this language discipline to the Earhart mystery and see what we get. Japanese Capture Conjecture based entirely upon anecdote and interpretation of some documents. The known facts do not support the conjecture. Tests of specific hypotheses have all been negative. Crashed and Sank Hypothesis based on known facts. Tested three times, so far - 1937 Coast Guard/Navy (surface search), 1999 Howland Landing (bottom search) and 2002 Nauticos (bottom search). All tests negative. Successful tests of competing hypothesis (Niku Landing) shed further doubt on validity. Niku Landing Low-confidence theory. Tests of several subordinate hypotheses by observation and experimentation have been successful. No contrary or disqualifying information has arisen. There will, of course, be those who dispute this characterization of the three competing explanations for the Earhart disappearance, but to do so requires that conjecture be represented as fact. There are those who say (repeatedly) that TIGHAR has found nothing to support the idea that Earhart landed on Nikumaroro but the truth is that several subordinate hypotheses have been tested and found to be supported. Here's one example. 1. Conjecture : Earhart may have died as a castaway on Nikumaroro. 2. Hypothesis: Some parts of the Floyd Kilts anecdote about bones being found on the island and suspected, at the time, as being Earhart's might be true. The British were meticulous record keepers. If the story is true there should be an official British record of the event. 3. Test: Search for official British records of such an event. 4. Test results positive. Records found. 5. Further testing found additional records and experimentation on the island found a site that matches the description of the place where bones were found. That in itself does not establish Niku Landing as a theory, but it is unquestionably a successfully tested subordinate hypothesis - one of many in our on-going investigation - and it is the successful testing of those many and varied subordinate hypotheses that does elevate Niku Landing to the status of theory. You won't find anything remotely similar in Japanese Capture or Crashed and Sank. So let's try to call things by their right names - conjecture, hypothesis and theory. And let's top talking about proving what really happened to Amelia Earhart. Nobody is going to do that. The best anyone can hope for is to establish a high-confidence theory about what happened, and we're well on our way to achieving that goal. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 11:46:55 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Angus, You are making me curious. Where did you say the bones were found ? LTM (who believes people who bring proof) *************************************************** I will step in here and say that Angus did not say that the bones had been found; just (quite correctly) that *evidence of their existence* was found: > Consider the bones > documentation. Before the file on the bones was found, officialdom > denied that such evidence even existed. Yet the evidence existed all > along. Interestingly enough, the person who found the documentation wasn't looking for it. He was looking at stacks of files, involved in his own research concerning WWII and Tarawa, and happened to come across the file. Because he is a TIGHAR member and reads TIGHAR Tracks, he knew of the bones story and thought to himself, "Self, I bet TIGHAR would be interested in this." So when he had a chance, he sent us an email mentioning it. LTM, who believe in serendipity, and also that Lady Luck waits upon those who show up and look interested... Pat ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 11:47:53 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Conjecture, Hypothesis, Theory Nicely argued, Ric. Let me just add one sort of caveat to your formulation of steps, at: > 2. You gather the known facts and if they seem to fit your conjecture > it becomes a hypothesis. > 3. You test your hypothesis through research, observation, and > experimentation. Sometimes, though, there aren't any relevant known facts, and there's nothing for it but to jump immediately to research, observation, and experimentation. At which point it's a matter of semantics whether you're testing an hypothesis or a conjecture. For instance, we once had a psychic tell us to look for specific stuff at a specific place on Nikumaroro (where we've yet to look), based on a vision she had. If we ever had the spare time to do it, I think we ought to look, because looking is the only way to gather any facts relevant to the conjecture. LTM (a vision, herself) TK ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 11:48:34 From: Mike Juliano Subject: Re: Conjecture, Hypothesis, Theory Thanks, Ric. With your permission I'd like to use your post in Tech and Physics classes. Happy Thanks Giving to all. LTM Mike Juliano ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 11:49:07 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Scott White asks: > So, does anyone have an estimate of how close they needed to be before they > really could see the island? It seems to me that if they were on the 157 / > 337 LOP but just a few miles east or west, they could easily have gone by it > without seeing it. Possibly the best model is Ann Pellegreno's 1967 recreation of Earhart's flight in a Lockheed 10. She and her crew had a devil of a time finding the island and finally spotted it at distance of "about 10 or 12 miles". They had several advantages - more eyes (3 crew members), better celestial gear, and radio bearings - but their weather was worse (a 300 foot ceiling and frequent rain squalls). Their navigator, Bill Polhemus, used a northwest offset and ran southeastward down the LOP. When they reached their ETA and saw no island they wondered whether they might have gone too far east so they turned around and flew west for ten minutes but didn't see anything. A bearing taken on the nearby Coast Guard cutter "Blackhawk" told them they were west and still north of Howland so they then backtracked to the east until they were on the LOP and turned southeast again. Soon afterward they saw the island "about 10 or 12 miles" dead ahead. It's interesting. Even with the advantages Polhemus had, he was not able to accurately judge his north/south position on the LOP. As it turned out, his advanced LOP was dead on but he didn't trust it. Had it not been for the bearing on the cutter they probably wouldn't have found Howland. >I remember reading in AE Survived something about a falsified storm report >northeast of Howland, I think on the day EA was to arrive or perhaps the >following day. It was that next night and don't listen to Rollin. There is no reason to doubt the official report. > what if Angus had a radio log from a source not previously > known? That would be new evidence, wouldn't it? Yes, and it would be interesting but it would only be yet another piece of evidence. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 12:18:35 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Angus says: > Before the file on the bones was found, officialdom denied that such > evidence even existed. Yet the evidence existed all along. It just > took some determined person to find it. Let's be accurate. No one who had knowledge of the Bones File ever denied that it existed. People who felt that they should know about such a file, if it existed, told us that they didn't think it existed. As it turned out, the secret was more closely kept than they imagined. Also, the file was not ultimately found by determined searching. One part of the file was found by accident by a researcher investigating something else entirely. Once we had part of the file we were able to track down where the rest of it was. Had the researcher who found the first part shared your sense of ethics we would still be wondering what he found. The Bone File, important as it is, does not establish anything more than that certain bones and artifacts were found that were suspected at the time as belonging to Earhart. Any conclusions we draw are based upon our own interpretation of that information. If you have found a document or file of similar importance which also relies upon interpretation for its significance to the investigation, you're kidding yourself if you think that it's some kind of smoking gun. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 12:19:13 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, Hypothesis, Theory Tom King says: > Sometimes, though, there aren't any relevant known facts, and there's > nothing for it but to jump immediately to research, observation, and > experimentation. At which point it's a matter of semantics whether > you're testing an hypothesis or a conjecture. For instance, we once > had a psychic tell us to look for specific stuff at a specific place > on Nikumaroro (where we've yet to look), based on a vision she had. > If we ever had the spare time to do it, I think we ought to look, > because looking is the only way to gather any facts relevant to the > conjecture. Semantics are important. That's sort of my point. Conjecture can be tested but that doesn't make it a hypothesis. That's why we haven't devoted time to chasing psychic visions. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 12:19:38 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, Hypothesis, Theory Mike Juliano asks: > With your permission I'd like to use your post in Tech and Physics > classes. Enjoy. It's just the ramblings of a guy with an undergraduate degree in history from a state university. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 12:20:01 From: Skeet Gifford Subject: Hypothesis generator I second Marty's rationale for belonging to TIGHAR and his assessment of Ric's scientific approach to problems. I would add that his contagious sense of humor has served TIGHAR well, acting to balance the most difficult and contentious situations. On my last trip to TIGHAR Central, I saw the obfuscation filter but missed the steam-powered hypothesis-generator. I'll look for it next trip. Skeet ************************************************************************ From Ric That's because the Obfuscation Filter is so big that it takes up half the floor space. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2004 14:50:45 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Ric wrote: > ... No one who had knowledge of the Bones File ever denied > that it existed. People who felt that they should know > about such a file, if it existed, told us that they didn't > think it existed. ... Roger and I had very illuminating experiences along these lines. The first six or eight people we spoke with at the University of South Pacific denied that they had a collection of fossils donated by Dr. Kenneth J. Gilchrist; one professor in particular was quite snotty about it (although his response may, in part, have been triggered by my inadequate description of what we were looking for). After Roger obtained a letter of thanks from USP to Gilchrist, thanking him for the donation, we were then--and only then--able to find the person who had the key to the storage bin down in the basement of the science building. I heard from a moderately reliable source that Dr. Verrier donated his "diary" to a bureacracy charged with administering native land claims (big business in Fiji). I made a half-hearted effort to track down the "diary." The two officials behind the desk wouldn't even consider the possibility that they might have something like that in their possession. Without consulting any records, the simply declared "we don't keep things like that." I'm morally certain that what Verrier gave them was his study of the history of the various tribes and fiefdoms on the Fijian islands--and I'm confident that this is, indeed, the kind of material that would be in the possession of the Land Bureau. The folks behind the desk just aren't familiar with that part of the collection, I imagine. I was feeling moderately confident, too, that nothing in what Verrier might have given them would disclose anything about the Gardner materials, so I left them in peace. I've seen the bones file myself in Auckland. I know the history of how the files were reorganized in WWII, and I've seen for myself how hard it is to find anything through a topical search. The various indices produced for various parts of the filing system at different times are unsystematic, to say the least. Perhaps some day the materials will be more comprehensively indexed, but I understand why the people asked about the bones in the 60s or 70s would have reflexively decided that there was nothing in the files about them. In all likelihood, the material containing the bones file was boxed up and being held in the nascent archives when the question was asked. My fond hope is that the Gardner material has similarly been lost inside the British system--it's the best hope we have for its survival. Everyone that we have asked has given us the world-weary shrug of the petit bureaucrat, but I doubt that many of them have done any kind of vigorous search. This is the "Raiders of the Lost Ark" scenario. Someone, somewhere, someday may open an old trunk or crate and start asking "where did this stuff come from"? If that happens, I hope that they or someone whom they ask thinks of TIGHAR. LTM. Marty #2359 ======================================================================== = Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 11:55:27 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Ric wrote : "Possibly the best model is Ann Pelegreno's 1967 recreation of Earhart's flight..." The scenario he then describes could have been Earhart's but for the finding of Howland. It is interesting to note that Ann Pelegreno had the advantage of state of the art radio navigation equipment and still found it difficult to find the island. The problem encountered by Ann Pelegreno in 1967 shows exactly how things went wrong in 1937. Contrary to Earhart, Pelegreno had the advantage of being able to take a bearing on the "Blackhawk". Earhart could not take a bearing on Itasca because her ADF equipment wasn't working. I have never understood how anyone could ever take off from Lae for Howland so light heartedly having discovered during the test flight the day before that the ADF (with which to locate Itasca) wasn't working. If she decided to go it seems to indicate she relied completely on Itasca being able to take a bearing on her (which Itasca couldn't) to give her a heading by radio. Eventually they were down to DR which is not the most reliable way to find such a tiny spot after 20 hours in the air... Pelegreno found Howland the way Pan Am's flying boats found their destinations in 1937. This was exactly the way Noonan expected also to find Howland. ADF did the job for Pelegreno. Earhart's not being operational was disastrous for her and for Fred Noonan. LTM ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 11:55:50 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Radios I thought one clear example of misuderstood receptions was those of the Achilles. When the Itasca and Achilles got back to Pearl, they compared tranmissions time and found that they explained the receptions. As I recall there was some evidence brought up by Ric that a third transmitter was involved and unexplained. Any more data on the Achilles reception re the authenticity? Ron B ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 11:56:41 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: hypothesis generator Skeet Gifford wrote: > I second Marty's rationale for belonging to TIGHAR and his assessment > of Ric's scientific approach to problems. I would add that his > contagious sense of humor....... "contagious sense of humor......." We're talking about Ric? Alan ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 11:58:55 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: AE's fuel and weather >Angus says: > >> Before the file on the bones was found, officialdom denied that such >> evidence even existed. Yet the evidence existed all along. It just >> took some determined person to find it. > > Ric said: > Let's be accurate. No one who had knowledge of the Bones File ever > denied that it existed. If they had knowledge of it, of course one wouldn't expect them to deny it existed. I never suggested such a thing. It was the fact that they had no knowledge of it that made them claim it did not exist. > People who felt that they should know about > such a file, if it existed, told us that they didn't think it existed. This "improved explanation" seems like splitting hairs to me - especially when my comment was merely to illustrate a point and was designed to avoid being long-winded.. > Also, the file was not ultimately found by determined searching. One > part of the file was found by accident by a researcher investigating > something else entirely. Just because they weren't a determined searcher for Earhart related material doesn't mean to say they were not determinedly searching. > Once we had part of the file we were able to > track down where the rest of it was. Had the researcher who found the > first part shared your sense of ethics we would still be wondering what > he found. I think this comment is entirely unjustified. It seems to me to be inspired by petulance rather than reason. Tighar witholds evidence from the public which they only make available when people either pay to become Tighar members or simply pay.. This is of course is "to fund the hunt". Why then should I not do the same? After all, I am still researching peripheral issues. Have I not actually promised that the information I have would eventually become available?? Your attitude is simply hypocrisy. Regards Angus. ************************************************************************ From Ric We have never demanded money for information we have discovered that pertains to the Earhart mystery. When publicity about our work brought us the Chater Report - a truly landmark piece of primary source documentation - we put it up on our website for anyone to see for free. Ditto for the Bones File. Betty's Notebook. Etc., etc. So far there are 32 documents on the TIGHAR website. We do, in some cases, charge for our own writing (as in the Project Book or the new edition of Shoes) or for our compilation and organization of otherwise available data (as in the Research CD) but we have never held primary source documents or information for ransom. If want to write a book or a research paper detailing your thoughts and reasoning about what became of Amelia Earhart nobody would fault you for trying to sell it. But to try to extort money for access to an important primary source document is, to me, repugnant. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 11:59:42 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Scott, Angus makes a good point as usual. I often come off quite dogmatic which I freely admit but most on the Forum also know I am quick to accept corrections to what I write. As an attorney, I like to make things as simple and black and white as possible knowing full well that is rarely attainable. I frequently nick at Angus and he always fires back in kind. I have no doubt there may be documents and anecdotes that TIGHAR has not yet become aware of but as Ric pointed out it will only be more information and not a smoking gun as Angus seems to imply. One of the main points of contention I have with Angus is he wants us to buy a pig in a poke. He won't tell us what we would be buying. By that I mean Angus has said, "I have been lucky enough to find some evidence not hitherto discovered, which once understood, very neatly and convincingly answers all the questions that have perplexed researchers for so long." I don't want to know what evidence Angus claims he has discovered. What I want is a list of those "questions that have perplexed researchers for so long." I fear we mere mortals will not be able to "understand" what he is presenting but in any case I don't want him to reveal his valuable answers just the questions. Angus doesn't seem amenable to doing that so there is no way to determine whether his "deal" is of any value. I've tried to come up with such a list to no avail. The only significant question I can think of is "Where is the Electra now?" I don't much care about anything else. Unfortunately and to the best I can determine from what Angus has said, that is NOT one of the questions he can answer. So, as you can see, Scott, Angus is correct. I am NOT all knowing. As to my idea of evidence, Scott, keep in mind I view this subject slightly different from Ric, although not significantly. I deal with evidence in the courtroom and as such we give the term a bit more finality than Ric explained. In truth he is more correct but in the practical terms of the legal system we frequently nail someone's hide to the wall based on "evidence" that sometimes is faulty. Soon we will have Ric's post loss radio traffic to fuss about. Some will be delighted that it "proves" beyond a shadow of a doubt the crashed and sankers have been finally sunk. Others will refute ALL the transmissions in that we can't prove AE made the calls. They will be correct but that is a nonsense argument. Only AE can testify to their authenticity and they know that. It is a non argument. So are they evidence, proof, conjecture or what? All I can say is you will need to look at the totality of the information and decide for yourselves. Also keep in mind that to refute the contention that AE made it to land you will have to find ALL of the messages are hoaxes, misinterpretations or what have you. If only one message is authentic she made it to land. The opposition has a very heavy burden. Ric, made a statement long ago that in order to "disprove" the Niku theory one has to come up with an incredible number of opposing theories to explain away all of the accumulated evidence. One theory won't do it. So what do we have? Circumstantial evidence so far and a lot of it. Proof? Not hardly but circumstantial evidence puts a lot of criminals behind bars. (Yes, I know. Sometimes in error) Finally what is probably lost in all of this is the bottom line in Ric's definitions. Any idea is welcome but it not only has to be testable and not fly in the face of known facts. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:00:25 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Having too much time on one's hands even for one evening is dangerous. I've been meaning to do a little figure checking for a while and finally got to it. I have always found it difficult to get Noonan way off track. It never made sense to me. I've always assumed (dangerous) that he did everything right and got close but just didn't see the island. I still think that. I started my exercise from the Myrtlebank at 10:30 GMT. This was based on iffy facts as you all know that they reported lights ahead or ship ahead at that time and a Myrtlebank crewman way later claimed he heard a plane fly over. Pretty shaky but we have no similar report from the Ontario. If it was a ship it could have even been some unknown ship if there was a shipping lane in that area. I didn't check. Also the time rules out the Ontario as that would give a very unrealistic ground speed. So on these wobbly grounds I started my exercise. I also accepted the native report of hearing a plane fly over Tabiteuea. I ran the exercise assuming the plane flew over the North Island and again assuming the South Island. North doesn't work at all. It puts the Electra about 8 nm south of Baker. Too close. South Tabiteuea puts the Electra 81 miles south of Howland or 41 miles south of Baker. That fits Ric's theory somewhat. It also requires a T.C. of about 82 degrees which should have been a red flag. Now I don't know how far anyone could see on July 2, 1937 in that area or specifically what the conditions were. The nautical calculators, all agreeing, say that at 1,000 feet one can see about 36 nm. My experience flying into Lajes, Kindley, Guam and Wake tells me that's ball park. However we have the sun glare and perhaps some degree of early morning haze to contend with that would certainly reduce that figure somewhat. If I recall correctly the cloud base was 2400 feet so that should not have been a factor. In my own mind I have always felt they could have been around 20 miles off and not seen the island. Hardly scientific though. Just something to think about. Next I checked the almanac to see where they were when they first could see the sun. That figured out to be a little over 220 nm out from Howland or wherever. Not nearly as far west as I think we all supposed. At 10,000 feet they can see about 116 nm ahead so I took that into consideration for deciding where they had to be to take the first sun shot. That makes the ground speed determination difficult with so little time to check and recheck subsequent sun shots. Not impossible but certainly more conducive to error. AE reported at 1,000' at 7:42 but we don't know when she descended. The Tech Order calls for the descent to be 500fpm at 120 somethings and I'm too lazy to go check. That doesn't mean that's what they did. Noonan could have got the same 067 degree LOP from a moon shot at about 1620 GMT. We'll never know. Also in those early hours after passing Tabiteuea he had good cuts on celestial bodies for fixes. Beside the moon he had Venus. Jupiter was up but on his tail. Good stars, however. Whether he had the weather to shoot is another unanswerable question. I can find no reason to place the aircraft long or short at 1912 GMT. Using the average ground speed from Lae to the Myrtlebank for the last half of the flight puts the plane on the Howland LOP. That could be off if the average GS changed significantly of course. The bottom line is that although Ric's idea is supportable that the plane ended up way to the South I'm troubled as to why. Noonan should have had sufficient information to fix his north/south position far better than that. This was fun but no cigar. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:01:08 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Hypothesis generator Ric wrote: > That's because the Obfuscation Filter is so big that it takes up half > the floor space. --- Is that the Acme OF-2000 model, with the built-in bullshit detector? If so, how do you calibrate it? I've had some trouble with my BS detector since I started reading about AE. The needle seems to stay pegged much of the time, and just waves back and forth over the scale almost randomly the rest of the time. Smoke came out of it once, and I think I may have damaged it. It was reading pretty high when I read Reineck's claim about the falsified weather report. Thanks. -SW ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 12:38:37 From: Dennis McGee Subject: New data? Angus Murray said: > Scott, Alan has evidently decided that he has > complete knowledge of what information is available to Earhart > researchers and what could theoretically be available. This can hardly > be because Alan is all-knowing - its just because he imagines he is. > Consider the bones documentation. Before the file on the bones was > found, officialdom denied that such evidence even existed. Yet the > evidence existed all along. It just took some determined person to find > it. That "determined person" I believe was a member of TIGHAR. And, also if my memory is correct, that very valuable, very expensive information was posted for FREE on the TIGHAR web site. Do you see where I'm going with this Angus? Until you display publicly your information, I'm afraid many people here will just toss your comments and "theories" into the circular file. Unlike Ric and Alan, I lack the common sense, grace, and manners NOT to say what I think. So, until you can lay some facts on the table, don't bother me with your woulda, coulda, shoulda stuff. As we say here, put up or shut up. The ball's in your court. LTM, who is working on tact Dennis O. McGee, #0149EC ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 14:18:14 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Herman De Wulf wrote: > ... Pelegreno found Howland the way Pan Am's flying boats > found their destinations in 1937. This was exactly the way Noonan > expected also to find Howland. ADF did the job for Pelegreno. Earhart's not > being operational was disastrous for her and for Fred Noonan. Herman's analysis oughta go in the FAQ or become the seed of a research bulletin. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 15:03:32 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Radios Ron Bright says: > I thought one clear example of misuderstood receptions was those of > the Achilles. When the Itasca and Achilles got back to Pearl, they > compared tranmissions time and found that they explained the > receptions. Where did you get the information that Itasca and Achilles compared tranmission times when they got back to Pearl? As far as I know they never figured out what had happened. > As I recall there was some evidence brought up by Ric that a third > transmitter was involved and unexplained. Any more data on the > Achilles reception re the authenticity? Achilles only heard two transmitters. She heard Itasca asking Earhart to send dashes and she heard dashes from a second transmitter apparently in response to that request. She then heard Itasca call Earhart again. Achilles didn't know who the two stations were but thought that one of them might be Earhart. We can match the Itasca's transmission times and see that it was definitely Itasca asking for dashes and trying to call Earhart. Who it was that was sending dashes in response to the request is unknown. Itasca heard the dashes too but described them as "heard something like a generator start and then stop". A few minutes later they heard it again and described it as "Signals off and on. Think it is plane? Signals unreadable (but) heard word Earhart." Apparently Achilles did not hear this second set of dashes and the unintelligible voice message that contained the word Earhart. In short, Achilles seems to have overheard a two-way exchange between Itasca and somebody who was either Earhart or was pretending to be Earhart. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 15:04:05 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather One way to end up so far south is to have the pilot take into account the projected winds along the track. Mostly, they came from the ESE. If these winds were less in speed or more easterly, the adjustment to the projected winds vice the actual winds would place the aircraft more southerly than expected. Most people suggest the winds were stronger and from the NE quadrant, pushing them to the south. In both scenarios, however, navigation along the way would determine how far off course they were. The winds forcing them southward or plane shooting more southward than necessary implies almost total dead reckoning without the use of celestial navigation. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 15:05:14 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: AE's fuel and weather > From Ric > > We have never demanded money for information we have discovered that > pertains to the Earhart mystery. You sold the publicity rights for potential discovery to Mike Kammerer for $300,000. That's party to witholding primary evidence for ransom to the press. Tighar were handsomely paid for it as a willing partner. How repugnant! Kammerer of course got nothing for his investment. > When publicity about our work brought > us the Chater Report - a truly landmark piece of primary source > documentation - we put it up on our website for anyone to see for > free. Since Placer Dome have it on their website for free, you wouldn't have much success in trying to claim it belonged to Tighar and charge for it. Regards Angus. ************************************************************************ From Ric You're wrong. Our deal with Mr. Kammerer very specifically did not give him the right to control the release of information about whatever discoveries we might make nor did it in any way restrict our ability to inform our membership and the general public. We reported the results of the expedition freely and openly as we always do. The Chater Report went up on the TIGHAR website long before Placer Dome decided to put it on theirs. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 15:06:51 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: New data? Dennis McGee wrote: > That "determined person" I believe was a member of TIGHAR. And, also if > my memory is correct, that very valuable, very expensive information was > posted for FREE on the TIGHAR web site. Do you see where I'm going with > this Angus? I think I see that you aren't very good at reasoning. I made a commitment to put the information in the public domain eventually. It will cost you nothing except a wait! So what are you whinging about? Tighar has withheld plenty of information from the public on the grounds unless they pay on the grounds that it has taken someone's time to organise or collate it. Well its taken me a lot of time and effort too. You are simply petulant because you want to know now! Understandable but unreasonable. > Until you display publicly your information, I'm afraid many people here > will just toss your comments and "theories" into the circular file. I have no problem with that. A prophet, as they say, is never recognised in his own country. > Unlike Ric and Alan, I lack the common sense, grace, and manners NOT to > say what I think. The double negative implies that someone brimming over with common sense and grace (like Ric and Alan for example) - say what they think. Well I'll agree that they say what they think. > So, until you can lay some facts on the table, don't > bother me with your woulda, coulda, shoulda stuff. the woulda coulda sounds very much like the party line to me. As I said some time ago, I'm very happy not to discuss the matter further but I shall certainly respond to unfair criticism. I'll make you a deal, you don't mention it - nor will I. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 15:44:25 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Mystery Message I found a new post-loss message and it's pretty interesting - but I'm not at all sure what to make of it. It is recorded in the official message traffic and was there all along. I just wasn't observant enough to spot it. For those of you who have the Research CD it's Record No. 1792 in MSG10. It was sent by "Kirkby" (no explanation of who or what Kirkby is) and was addressed to "U.S. Navy Department Honolulu". It was received at 02:24Z on July 9, 1937. The entire content of the message was: 593 MELBOURNE 12 9 1224 P VIA RCA; NAVY DEPARTMENT HONOLULU; PLANE BETWEEN HOWLANDS SAMOA GROUP TEN HOURS WEST; KIRKBY The message is mentioned on page 5 of the report by the commander of the Lexington Group under a list of "Possibilities Arising From Rumor and Reports". "8. Report from Melbourne signed "Kirkby" "Plane between Howland Samoa group ten hours west" (8 July)" No mention of when the message had been supposedly been heard or on what frequency. It's not even clear that it was a post-loss radio message. It could be a psychic's opinion. It was apparently sent by an individual by the name of Kirkby via the commercial RCA network. I don't think there was such a thing as " U.S. Navy Department - Honolulu" so the sender was apparently guessing about the address. It seems to have been delivered to the Commandant of the 14th Naval District, which seems logical. What is interesting is that it is the only instance we've found of a post-loss radio message (if that's what it is) being heard anywhere in Australia or New Zealand. Of course, a position between Howland Island and the Samoa Group puts it roughly on the 157 line somewhere in the Phoenix or Tokelau Groups. The "ten hours west" is cryptic. What could it mean? LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 21:47:53 From: Mike Holt Subject: Re: Mystery message > From Ric > > 02:24Z on July 9, 1937. The entire content of the message was: > > 593 MELBOURNE 12 9 1224 P VIA RCA; NAVY DEPARTMENT HONOLULU; PLANE > BETWEEN HOWLANDS SAMOA GROUP TEN HOURS WEST; KIRKBY What do "593" and "12 9" mean? > The message is mentioned on page 5 of the report by the commander of > the Lexington Group under a list of "Possibilities Arising From Rumor > and Reports". > <<8. Report from Melbourne signed "Kirkby" "Plane between Howland > Samoa group ten hours west" (8 July)>> I take they didn't try to explain what it might mean. Any action taken? > What is interesting is that it is the only instance we've found of a > post-loss radio message (if that's what it is) being heard anywhere in > Australia or New Zealand. Of course, a position between Howland Island > and the Samoa Group puts it roughly on the 157 line somewhere in the > Phoenix or Tokelau Groups. The "ten hours west" is cryptic. What > could it mean? Where was Amelia ten hours after takeoff? How far off course might she have been, if she were in that location? Why does it say "Howlands" with an "s" added? Is there an island (or any geographical feature) named Kirkby? Would RCA's files be of any use? (Do they exist?) LTM, who keeps all her copies of telegrams Michael Holt ======================================================================== = Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 21:48:31 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: New data? Let me put it this way : how much did Isaac Newton ask for divulging the Law of Gravity ? LTM ((who always says there are limits to decency) ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 21:50:12 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: New data? Folks, I nick at Angus maybe more than most but I have no trouble with Angus wanting to make money on his research. He has put in a lot of work and feels it is worth something in exchange. The fact that most of us do this freely doesn't mean Angus has to do the same. He should feel free to ask what he wants just as we have felt free to decline to pay for information from him or most anyone else. Angus is not an ogre but a good man whether we agree with what he is doing or not. This is a free playground and Angus can do what he wants. My only problem with Angus is that he doesn't say what he has to offer in terms that are meaningful. Consequently it can't be determined whether his information has value to us or not. He claims he can answer all the questions that have perplexed researchers all this time and maybe he can but I don't know what those questions are. Other than where the plane is now I have curiosity but little real interest in any other aspect of the Earhart flight. Although I may not be framing this accurately I believe Angus thinks he can provide information that will make it a certainty that Earhart landed at Niku thus allowing us to successfully solicit adequate funding to search the ocean area for the plane. I don't think that is so. If we could present a video of the plane landing on Niku it is hardly likely anyone would through huge amounts of money down a rathole searching a completely undefined area of ocean for the plane. Angus has the information and has had no takers. It is not likely we would either. If I have misinterpreted Angus' position I apologize but that's where I think he is at. The problem is, assuming the plane DID land at Niku, there is no way to know where it went afterward. It could have been washed off the reef reasonably intact and floated an unknown distance and direction before finally sinking. It could have sunk almost immediately of course. Look how long it took to find the Titanic and they KNEW where it went down. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 21:51:10 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather > From Randy Jacobson > > In both scenarios, however, navigation along the way would determine > how far > off course they were. The winds forcing them southward or plane > shooting > more southward than necessary implies almost total dead reckoning > without > the use of celestial navigation. What if the winds changed? From the information we have, Noonan had them right on course during the night...presumably he was able to keep that up until he lost the stars. At that point, he had one celestial source to use (the Sun), and was limited in how accurate his north-south position would be. If the winds changed at sunrise, or a bit before, then he would not have been able to correct for them as well as he could during the night. That's my conjecture, at least. :) Now, the question is if we have any weather data that suggests the winds either changed direction or died down during the last three hours of their flight (both of which send them south). If we have that information, then we can make some guesses on what that would have done to the flight, assuming they saw the same changes. Big assumption there, since their winds could have been much different than any weather stations in the area.....but, a large enough change could have easily put them off course. Reed ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. Reed L. Riddle Thirty Meter Telescope Site Survey Team California Institute of Technology, Astronomy Department Homepage: http://wet.physics.iastate.edu/~riddle/ "This life has been a test. If it had been an actual life, you would have received actual instructions on where to go and what to do." -- Angela Chase, "My so-called life" ======================================================================== Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 22:27:44 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Come on guys, put this little bit of info into the equation. With a little training [and I had 4 years of that!] even I can estimate wind direction and speed on the ocean's surface and come quite close-then formulate the difference by your known altitude and you know what your heading should be- until it changes again! And don't forget the drift sighting aparatus fitted to older airplanes used to to look down on the water to get theis info and also to check the bottom of the plane to see if everything was in the proper place. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 10:31:08 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Carl, I mentioned in one recent post that we were selling Noonan short in supposing he had no north/south capability. Using white caps was long a technique for determining drift, wind speed and direction. Noonan may have also had other celestial bodies to shoot even in that short time after sunrise before hitting Howland. In the lengthy piece I wrote yesterday I presented a worst case scenario in that I didn't allow Noonan to alter course nor did I change the winds. If I remember correctly Itasca winds showed a slight shift from ESE to E and a slight drop off of winds. Neither should have had a significant effect on his track. We don't know enough about the weather to know where, when or if Noonan could have shot ANY celestial toward the end of the flight. Personally I think he was quite satisfied with his track and position. Although Ric ably offered an alternative to my reasoning I believe AE's transmission "We must be on you" signified Noonan was confident of his navigation. If he had not been able to get a fix during the last several hours and was relying solely on DR I believe the radio call would have been less certain such as "We must be close." or "We should be within 20 to 40 miles." or something to that effect. Having flown in those same conditions many, many times over the ocean I know that morning haze, sun glare and cloud shadows make finding an island very difficult. I think they were close and just missed it. Nothing more complicated than that. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 10:32:54 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: New data? Isaac Newton did not divulge the Law of Gravity. But it cost God one apple! LTM, Dave Bush Houston, Texas > From Herman De Wulf > Let me put it this way : how much did Isaac Newton ask for divulging > the Law of Gravity ? > LTM ((who always says there are limits to decency) ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 10:33:19 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather The winds, as measured on the Itasca, indicated a die-down of speed during the midnight-to-dawn timeframe. Since they were about 1-2 hours away from Howland at dawn, a change in wind speed from 13 to 3 knots would put them at most 20 miles off from LOP projection, mostly in the east-west direction, not North-South. If they were on track just prior to dawn, it is hard to see how they could have been so far off North-South at "arrival" ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 10:36:39 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather > From Ric > > You're wrong. Our deal with Mr. Kammerer very specifically did not give > him the right to control the release of information about whatever > discoveries we might make nor did it in any way restrict our ability to > inform our membership and the general public. OK - So just what DID Mr Kammerer get for his $300,000 (or what did he hope to get?). In other words, what was he buying? > We reported the results > of the expedition freely and openly as we always do. The cynical amongst us might wonder if that was because you found no smoking gun? > The Chater Report went up on the TIGHAR website long before Placer Dome > decided to put it on theirs. That may well be true - but because you had no monopoly on it and didn't even own it, the idea that you could in theory have charged a fee for it is patently absurd. Angus. ************************************************************************ From Ric Kammerer bought the rights to the commercial exploitation of the project. He could make and sell documentaries, charge for the exhibition of artifacts, etc. He had the exclusive motion picture, television, internet, video and other audiovisual media rights. He also had the exclusive rights to merchandising, clothing and music (i.e. the Tom Kng action figure and the Ric Gillespie tropical pith helment). In other words, he could exploit TIGHAR's fame but he could not control what we did or what we said about what we did. During the term of the contract (which, by the way, expired a year ago)we could not, for example, charge money for a media interview but we could give all of the free media interviews we wanted. (We have never charged for an interview anyway.) > The cynical amongst us might wonder if that was because you found no > smoking gun? Wonder all you want but I'll point out that in 1992, when we believed that we had found adequate evidence to declare the Earhart mystery solved, we announced that news in a free and open press conference in Washington, DC. As it turned out, we got a hard lesson in what it will take to solve the Earhart mystery but the point is that we thought we had smoking gun evidence and we didn't try to hold it for ransom. Justify yourself any way you can but don't claim that I'm like you. > because you had no monopoly on (the Chater Report) and didn't > even own it, the idea that you could in theory have charged a fee for > it is patently absurd. When Hugh Leggat, the manager of corporate communications at Placer Dome, first called me in December of 1991 and said that he had found a letter in the old company files that might be of interest to us, I could have asked him to help us use it as a fund raising tool by restricting its release to anyone but TIGHAR. At that moment, he and I were the only people in the world who knew about that report. He may or may not have agreed - I don't know - but I do know that the thought never crossed my mind. Years later, Elgen Long used his own interpretation of the report as a keystone of his alleged solution of the mystery without once mentioning that it was publicity about TIGHAR that brought the report to light and it was TIGHAR that first made the report public. We just smiled. Whatever document you have found you probably don't own it, unless you purchased it from an individual. It's more likely that you found it in an official archive of some sort. If you have a monopoly on it it's only because no one else has stumbled upon it. This sort of thing happens all the time and everyone who finds a new piece of evidence in the the Earhart case instantly assumes that it is the "key to mystery". You could have distinguished yourself as a fine researcher (which, in my experience, you are) and an admired contributor to the solution of the puzzle. Instead you have chosen to play a different role. That's a pity. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 10:37:19 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Mystery message Mike Holt asks some good questions. > What do "593" and "12 9" mean? I don't know. Probably technical notations having to do with the sending of the cable. They're not part of the text. Randy? Any ideas? > I take they (the Navy) didn't try to explain what it might mean. Any > action taken? Not specifically. At the time the message reached COM 14 (Commandant 14th Naval District, Rear Admiral Orin Murfin in Honolulu) the Colorado was just about to begin its aerial search of the Phoenix Group. The message implies that the plane might be in the Phoenix Group so, in that sense, the Navy was already doing what it could. > Where was Amelia ten hours after takeoff? She should have been just coming up on the Ontario's position south of Nauru. By no stretch of the imagination is that between Howland and the Samoa Group. > How far off course might she have been, if she were in that location? She seems to have seen either the Ontario or the Myrtlebank and was heard by Nauru so she was probably pretty much on course at that time. > Why does it say "Howlands" with an "s" added? Little mistakes like that are fairly common in telegraphic communications. I wouldn't ascribe any great significance to it. > Is there an island (or any geographical feature) named Kirkby? Not that I know of. > Would RCA's files be of any use? (Do they exist?) This seems to be a regular old telegram. I doubt that any records exist. The most we could expect from such records might be Kirkby's full name and address. However, we do know that this message originated in Melbourne on or about July 8. Assuming (safely I think) that Kirkby is an individual, we know that he (or she) was willing to go to some trouble and expense to make his/her information known to the U.S. Navy. It is not a stretch to think that he or she may have also made the news available to the local press. A search of the Melbourne papers for that period might well produce a story about Kirkby's Klue. International telegrams were expensive and Kirkby's was almost certainly as brief as possible. There was probably more, less essential, information that might be included in a newspaper story. Do we have anybody who has access to Melbourne newspaper archives? LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 11:00:49 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Mystery message The unexplained "Kirkby" signature reminds me of cables I got copies of back in the '70s, dealing with the discovery of a prehistoric site in Chuuk, that were signed "Kissinger." I was pretty bemused about what the then-Secretary of State was doing out in what was then the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, but then learned that this was the way the State Dept. did such things; EVERYTHING was "signed" by the Secretary. Or maybe everything in particular categories. All of which makes me wonder who from the US Ambasador to Australia was in '37. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:32:59 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: New data? Ric, On 12th November Ric you told me the thread was dead and refused to post my reply. By way of explanation you wrote: I believe AE's transmission "We must be on you" signified Noonan was > confident of his navigation. If he had not been able to get a fix > during the last several hours and was relying solely on DR I believe > the radio call would have been less certain such as "We must be > close." or "We should be within 20 to 40 miles." or something to that > effect. I think that it's worth remembering that it was AE, not Fred, who said, "We must be on you." AE's perception of the situation relied upon Noonan's ability to communicate it to her. Communication aboard the Electra in flight was problematical to say the least and, to the best of our knowledge, was accomplished primarily by passing notes back and forth. The examples we have of the notes Noonan passed to Earhart are very simple instructions to hold such and such a heading until such and such time. He told the pilot what to do. He didn't explain why. I can very easily see Noonan passing Earhart a note that said something like, "Descend below cloud base, hold 78 degrees, ETA Howland 19:00." I just can't see Fred being able to explain to her that he was confident of their east/west position but less so of their north/south and that he woudn't be terribly surprised if they didn't immediately see the island when they reached the advanced LOP. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:34:32 From: Seth Brenneman Subject: Re: Hypothesis generator Scott, Sorry to hear about your BS detector. The problem is most likely that the sensor itself was damaged due to overload, judging by the smoke. BS sensors aren't cheap, good luck finding another one. I'm proud of Ric for owning a good old Steam powered hypothesis generator. I understand that both gasoline powered and electric powered hypothesis generators exist, but the gas powered ones just spew out a bunch of polluted air. Electric powered models, although they may provide a good shock, generally do not turn up anything that is testable. I believe that Col. Reineck owns both a gasoline and an elecric model. And more recently, nuclear powered hypothesis generators also exist. However, these models are very expensive to operate, and quite dangerous. No information may be released from this type of hypothesis generator, but all must be kept sealed tightly inside a safe container, to prevent the release of harmful radiation. I believe this is the model that Angus Murray owns. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:35:30 From: Rick Metzger Subject: Re: Mystery message Head of Australia's Mission in Washington DC 3 May 1937 to 31 January 1940 FK Officer, OBE Australian Counsellor British Embassy ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:36:03 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Alan; I thoroughly enjoy the give and take on the forum. What I sent yesterday was for those who don't have this knowledge and experience and might therefore have missed or never knew of it. We are attempting in our own and separate ways to solve a mystery and that is satisfaction enough for me. Adding any and all to the store of knowledge just could be the one piece of the puzzle mecessary to arrive the final solution. The only other ways I know of are for one of us to either make time travel possible or die, go to them, ask and return. Regarding the other posting Most of my over water flying was during the midday over the Gulf of Mexico and I had the absolute positive benefit of loran. The stakes were enormous, seemed to be underrated, and I find it to their loss that confidence was very high, perhaps on the verge of over the top. Happy Thanksgiving to all ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:36:30 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Mystery message Tom King says: > All of which makes me wonder who from the US Ambasador to > Australia was in '37. There was no U.S. Ambassador to Australia in 1937, probably because Australia was still seen as a part of the British empire rather than an independent nation. There was a American Consul in Sydney. His name was Doyle. The reports of the Nauru intercepts were sent to the State Dept. in Washington via a cable from Doyle. Our mysterious Mr. Kirkby mis-addressed his cable to "U.S. Navy Dept - Honolulu". If he was a State Dept. functionary it seems like he would have sent it to the State Dept. as Doyle did. Kirkby is a guy with enough education and awareness of current events to know that the the U.S. Navy is controlled by a "Navy Department" but he doesn't know that the Navy Dept. is only in Washington DC and that the Navy boss in Honolulu is the Commandant of the 14th Naval District. In other words, he's well-informed but not intimately well-informed about the organization of the U.S. Navy. He is also a guy who can afford to send an international cable and has the assertiveness to do so. None of the other amateur reports were made by sending a cable to the government. Betty's father went down to the local Coast Guard station. The others contacted a local newspaper. This guy has moxy and he feels very strongly about seeing that his information gets to the searchers. He may be just the kind of guy who could afford a good shortwave set. He could also be a psychic, or "medium" as they were called back then, with a strong desire for recognition. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:37:12 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather I think some good points were expressed in Ric and Angus' exchange. Although I defended Angus's choice to do as he pleased that should not be construed to mean I agree with his game. Angus appears to be using someone else's work, some document he didn't create and has no exclusive right to and trying to sell it with his own analysis. I know of no one else who has done this. Angus certainly has exclusive rights to his own analysis but not to public documents. Only if his document is a private letter could he "own" it and such a document is worthless as evidence. So is anyone's analysis. You all will notice Angus continues to neglect answering my challenge to post the many perplexing questions his solution can answer. He foolishly thinks someone will buy his pig in a poke but I can opine as to why. He can't answer the only question that has value. Where the plane is. Nothing else about the Earhart flight has any significance other than satisfying curiosity. I think by now the Forum can see why TIGHAR has continued to decline Angus's offer. 1. Since he can't say where the plane is his information has no value to TIGHAR. 2. TIGHAR's policy of not buying information. 3. Our belief that if this is an attempt to sell someone else's work and/or documents it is not ethical. 4. Theories and clever analysis are a dime a dozen. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:37:32 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: Mystery message Sorry, but I've no idea what these numbers mean, although 12 or 9 may represent the number of words in the telegram. 593 may represent the message number from this station. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:38:11 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Re: Mystery message Ric, What is the time zone differance between Howland and Aust. or NZ? ************************************************************************ From Ric Whoa! I think you may be on to something. Howland, at that time, was Greenwich minus 11.5. No help there. But eastern Australia (Melbourne), I believe (but I'm not 100% sure) was Greenwich plus 10 which might be expressed as "ten hours west". Kirkby may have been describing his own location. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 12:38:39 From: Rick Metzger Subject: Re: Mystery message Kirkby, Australia is an unincorporated town in the center of Melbourne around Swanston St and Flinders St. No "Kirkby" found for a high ranking person in 1937 so far... ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 13:16:42 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Alan says, > He can't answer the only question that > has value. Where the plane is. Ahhh but perhaps he can, or at least thinks he can. In our original exchanges back in February he wrote: >I think I know where the Electra came to rest immediately after its >landing. My reply to him at the time was "So do we." Now, let us ask ourselves, what kind of information one would have to have to be able to speak with confidence about where the Electra came to rest immediately after its landing? As we've said many times, we think the plane was landed on the reef just north of the Norwich City. We reach that opinion from a wide variety of clues that all seem to point to that location ( Emily's anecdote, our own survey of the reef surface, 1953 aerial photos that seem to show an aluminum debris field on the reef surface downstream of that location, etc.). Angus, on the other hand, cannot possibly reach a conclusion about exactly where the plane came to rest based on general information about weather or fuel. Nor can he reach that conclusion by digging up anecdotal accounts by later visitors to the island. He claims to know where the plain came to rest "immediately" after landing. To make a statement like that it seems like he would have to have primary source information that was contemporaneous to the moment in time he claims to have knowledge of. The only thing I can think of that could possibly meet that requirement would be a heretofore undiscovered report of a post-loss radio message sent immediately after landing and describing, in far greater detail than anything we've seen yet, just where they landed. The other possibility is that Angus was blowing smoke, but I doubt it. Angus has clearly come across something that he believes is very big and worth a lot of money. If he has something like I've described above I can understand why he'd feel that way. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 13:17:08 From: Subject: Re: Mystery message Rick Metzger says: > Kirkby, Australia > is an unincorporated town in the center of Melbourne > around Swanston St and Flinders St. Good work Rick. So we may have an anonymous message. Then again, Kirkby was probably named for the Kirkby family that first settled it and the place may be dirty with Kirkbys. Kirkby could still be the name of the sender. The name appearing at the end of the message was certainly interpreted as a signature at the time. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 13:27:04 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: Mystery message If the number 9 or 12 corresponds to the words in the telegram, the signature normally does count. The 9 corresponds to the actual text plus Kirkby; the 12 corresponds to the text plus Kirkby plus Navy Department Honolulu. Note that the information contained doesn't necessarily imply a radio receipt; it could also represent a belief or vision of where AE is. There simply isn't enough information to assert that this telegram represents a radio reception. ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 14:06:11 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Mystery message > Note that the information contained doesn't necessarily imply a radio > receipt; it could also represent a belief or vision of where AE is. > There simply isn't enough information ti assert that this telegram > represents a radio reception. I think I said that a couple of times. All we can say so far is that it might be a radio reception. A check of the Melbourne newspaper archives would seem to be a good idea. Do we have anybody who can do that? LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 18:17:27 From: Jackie Tharp Subject: Re: AE's Fuel, weather > From Carl Peltzer > Alan; I thoroughly enjoy the give and take on the forum. > What I sent yesterday was for those who don't have this knowledge and > experience and might therefore have missed or never knew of it. > Happy Thanksgiving to all To Carl and all the rest of you guys: I want to thank Carl, Angus, Dennis, Alan, etc for all the fascinating discussions about navigation. Carl explained LOP in such an easy way that I almost believe I could debate someone on the subject. I KNOW I'd be able to tell when someone doesn't know what he's talking about on the subject... And he made it fun and interesting, too. Fine job, Carl. All of you guys are just the best, and if I'm ever lost over the pacific, I'd sure like one of you with me..... Thanx, Guys, Jackie #2440 ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 10:19:41 From: Jack Clark Subject: Re: Mystery message Melbourne is and as far as I know was 10hrs EAST of Greenwitch. Re the Melbourne newspaper archives I am in Melbourne and am prepared to see what I can find out although it may take a little time. But I will give it a go unless anyone else has direct access to newspaper archives. There are only two major newspapers in Melbourne. There was a third in 1937 but it is long since defunct. Rick, I would be interested to know the source of your info re "the unincorporated town in the centre of Melbourne" What exactly is an unincorporated town ? Do you mean a local municipality which are often named City of...... The Melbourne street directory lists no locality named Kirkby. Jack Clark #2564 ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 10:20:12 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Ordinarily the note passing scenario sounds good and we know that's how their communication system worked ......... when Noonan was in the back. During the run in to find Howland Noonan must have certainly been in the cockpit to help find the island. His navigation duties were over and would not have restarted if they had spotted Howland. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 10:21:04 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Carl Peltzer wrote: > Most of my over water flying was during the midday over the Gulf of > Mexico and I had the absolute positive benefit of loran. Carl, you remind me of the first time I found out my oldest son was sailing a 20 foot cat in the Gulf out of sight of land. I told him that was dangerous and he said that if he got lost he would just turn north. The US was hard to miss. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 10:21:56 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: New data? Certainly Angus wants to cut off the thread so he has an excuse not to respond to my challenge to list the questions he can answer. Proof positive he has NOTHING to offer. Everyone watch. He will silently slip away without even a comment on that issue. That one fact shows Angus for what he is. I would also say that I inserted a comment about Angus' theory or whatever he claims to have in another thread by way of illustration of a point I was making. I had not intended to continue the thread Pat had cut off. So Angus can blame me for inadvertently getting it restarted. I did not mean for that to happen and underestimated the interest of the Forum members who took it up. I would be delighted if the thread ended. Angus is unable and unwilling to respond and post the questions he claims he can answer it is plain to see. To do so would show everyone he has found nothing of value to sell. No one in their right mind would accept his offer and buy without knowing what was being offered. Also I have no interest in trying to ferret out Angus' mysterious documents. They cannot possibly have any value to an Earhart researcher. They cannot possibly answer the only question of significance and the very one Angus cannot answer. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 10:22:34 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Ric, reread what I wrote. I didn't say Angus couldn't answer the question of where the plane landed or came to rest although I don't think he can even do that. What I wrote was that he couldn't answer the question of where the plane is now. If we had a video of the plane landing on Niku it still wouldn't tell us where the plane is now. Angus thinks money will flow freely for great ocean search efforts if it is a proven fact the plane landed on Niku. If it would Angus would be rolling in dough right now given his "proof." I could almost guarantee Angus doesn't have a previously unknown post loss message. Angus, in my estimation, is an honest man and would not perpetrate a hoax but he may be the victim of a hoax. If you want a post loss message saying "We are on Gardner Island, plane is intact but FN is injured." I'll be happy to make one and age it properly. No, Angus has only an analysis, no substance. Keep in mind he said he could not be 100% certain. Look what that statement eliminates. It eliminates a post loss message from Gardner, any artifact and anything else of substance. Angus said he could present his information to any academic and that person would agree with him about his discovery. An academic, not an engineer, not Lockheed, not an aeronautical expert, not a meteorologist but an academic. Some brain who could follow Angus' reasoning whereas it is unlikely we regular folks could. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 10:26:59 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Conjecture, Hypothesis, and Theory Ric wrote: > There was an editorial in yesterday's Philadelphia Inquirer by a > science professor who was trying to address charges by advocates of > "Intelligent Design" that evolution was "just a theory." . . . Here's a link to one published in the LA Times this week. Good chance it's the same article. The Times used to make you register for their web site, but I don't think they do any more. If necessary and you prefer not to register, I can give you a signin name and password. http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-oe- larson24nov24,1,2817260.story > First, shocking as it may be, we must dispense with the notion of > "proof." There is nothing in the scientific or historical world that is > unequivocally proven. If you want absolute certainty you must turn to > either mathematics or faith. Everything else is always subject to > amendment. Right. This is a point that the public & media seem to misunderstand. When evidence seems overwhelming, then the theory can be considered "proven" in an informal way, and almost everyone (scientists included) use the P word. They really shouldn't, but they do anyway. Every scientific notion is (and has to be) subject to revision if faced with credible, conflicting data. Hypotheses are only useful if they are testable. In most views of experimental design, "testable" means "falsifiable." That is, you design an experiment that, if it yields negative results, will falsify your hypothesis. The only way I can think of to falsify the Niku hypothesis is to find the airplane somewhere else. I don't think it's falsifiable by working on Niku. Even if we could search every grain of sand and identify every human-related artifact on that island and prove that there is absolutely no sign of Earhart, Noonan, or the plane, the hypothesis would be weakened but not falsified. There still would be the possibliity that the plane was washed off the reef and floated away. Earhart & Noonan either floated away with it or they died on the island where their remains decomposed without leaving any trace. As we understand it right now, the crashed/sank hypothesis is testable, but prohibitively expensive. I didn' think Ric was completely objective in ranking the competing AE hypothesis/theories below: > Crashed and Sank > Hypothesis based on known facts. Tested three times, so far - 1937 > Coast Guard/Navy (surface search), 1999 Howland Landing (bottom search) > and 2002 Nauticos (bottom search). All tests negative. Successful > tests of competing hypothesis (Niku Landing) shed further doubt on > validity. C/S is somewhat testable, but we can't claim that it's truly been tested so far. The post-loss surface search was far from exhaustive, doesn't even address the "sank" part of c/s, and hardly counts as a test. Experiments (i.e., ocean floor searches) to date haven't come close to covering the whole area that Long suggests, and also hardly count as tests. There may also be other shortcomings of the equipment. But this explanation remains viable until the the entire area Long mapped has been searched using a dependable technique. > Niku Landing > Low-confidence theory. Tests of several subordinate hypotheses by > observation and experimentation have been successful. No contrary or > disqualifying information has arisen. Now, wait a darn minute. The island was searched from the air in the days immediately following the disappearance. I would bet that a far greater % of island was viewed than of the ocean surface search (cited earlier as a "test" of the c/s explanation). The island was also searched on the ground in the following years, wasn't it? Without results? I realize that there is a secondary hypothesis to explain this. But it still is strongly contrary to the Niku explanation. Likewise, no unambiguous physical artifacts have been recovered from Niku, despite several well-planned efforts to find them. Again, this is contrary evidence. > 1. Conjecture : Earhart may have died as a castaway on Nikumaroro. > 2. Hypothesis: Some parts of the Floyd Kilts anecdote about bones being > found on the island and suspected, at the time, as being Earhart's > might be true. . . . [search for records, which do exist . . .] > That in itself does not establish Niku Landing as a theory, but it is > unquestionably a successfully tested subordinate hypothesis - one of > many in our on-going investigation . . . I see this as one of many tantalizing but unresolved lines of reasoning. But the fact that bones existed on the island is only very loosely tied to the possibility that they may have been Earhart's or Noonan's, and there are a multitude of other possibile explanations. It takes several more steps of hypothesis / experiment to get anywhere close to Earhart. To me, the fact that bones were discovered should be considered "consistant" with the Earhart on Niku explanation, but not very important *unless* the bones can really be tied to the flight. Likewise, even if the bones are found and somehow proven *not* to be Earhart's or Noonan's, that will not falsify the Niku explanation. It will just be one more line of investigation that didn't pan out. > You won't find anything remotely > similar in Japanese Capture or Crashed and Sank. From what I've seen of the Japanese Capture explanation, I have to agree. Quite a bit of stuff gets trumpeted as "evidence" but it turns out that the stuff was either misrepesented from the start or has alternate, better explanations. But I can't agree on C/S. The fact that no direct evidence has been found to support it is not the explanation's fault, it's the ocean's. You just can't make up "subordinate hypotheses" to go with c/s, the only way to test any of them is to search the ocean bottom over a gazillion square miles. > And let's stop talking about proving what really happened to Amelia > Earhart. Nobody is going to do that. No, but finding the airplane somewhere could come damned close. Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 10:27:43 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Mystery message Again, you don't get the underlying tones and secret messages - Kirkby - Capt. Kirk, of the spaceship Enterprise, BYE or sent by Capt. Kirk - AE and Fred were taken into outerspace by the crew of the Enterprise. Shees - you guys! LTM, Dave Bush Houston, Texas ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 11:00:45 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: Ae's ending At night I try to go over evidence and share moments of triumph and tragedy with them. I ditched and survived one so have first hand knowledge: If that is the way they left this life I know all about it: watch a plane disappear and leave you alone and If that was the way it finished, I did that right and they did it wrong, much like other stories this had an ending that, if just one thing had gone different, wouldn't have ended in that way, so now, a few of us are still searching for finality. Many people have died in much the same way thru shipwrecks, drowning ditching and disappearances who were far from famous, but this is one that simply will not go away, thanks to people such as Ric and this company. We need more information on those bones, Betty's notes and other puzzle pieces, but that keeps this group going, good day to all. ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:13:20 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Ae's fuel, weather Alan says: > Ordinarily the note passing scenario sounds good and we know that's how > their communication system worked ......... when Noonan was in the > back. During > the run in to find Howland Noonan must have certainly been in the > cockpit to > help find the island. I submit that the note passing scenario was the routine method of communication even when they were sitting elbow to elbow. The noise level in the 10E cockpit was punishing. Linda Finch reported that it defeated her state-of-the-art active noise-cancelling headset and Merrill and Lambie were deaf as posts after each of their transatlantic hops. By the time AE and FN were looking for Howland they were both almost certainly reduced to doing Harpo Marx impressions. LTM (who knows that Harpo wasn't really deaf), Ric ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:13:42 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Ric, I would like to add that on the run in to Howland Noonan HAD to be in the cockpit to shoot sun lines. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:14:12 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's ending Carl, you are exactly right. Change any one tiny factor in the Earhart adventure or any one of thousands of other calamities and the outcome is entirely different. During my flying career I arbitrarily used the number three as a guide. I could survive one thing going wrong or even two but the third one was tough to beat. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:14:55 From: Clayton Davis Subject: Remote Viewing Has anyone employed Remote Viewing techniques to discern the location of Amelia's airplane? My wife and I both retired from the National Security Agency and have some insight to "black" projects, including remote viewing. There are many links about remote viewing similar to this on Google. http://www.farsight.org/ Keep up the good work! ************************************************************************ From Ric One way we keep the work good is to recognize Remote Viewing for what it is - pure bunk. We've been approached many times by Remote Viewers and have always offered them the opportunity to demonstrate their ability. None have been able to do so. If the NSA has blown taxpayers' dollars on such nonsense it's yet another demonstration of the agency's incompetence. ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:15:21 From: Daryll Bolinger Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Randy Jacobson wrote: >....Since they were about 1-2 hours away from Howland at dawn, a >change in wind speed from 13 to 3 knots would put them at most 20 miles >off from LOP projection, mostly in the east-west direction, not >North-South. If they were on track just prior to dawn, it is hard to >see how they could have been so far off North-South at "arrival". Alan Caldwell wrote: >If he had not been able to get a fix during the last several hours and >was relying solely on DR I believe the radio call would have been less >certain such as "We must be close." or "We should be within 20 to 40 >miles." or something to that effect...." Ric Gillespie wrote: >...I just can't see Fred being able to explain to her that he was >confident of their east/west position but less so of their north/south >and that he woudn't be terribly surprised if they didn't immediately >see the island when they reached the advanced LOP...." "...LOP projection..." "...advanced LOP..." These terms are important in Earhart's 17:44 and 18:15 GMT transmissions. In both transmissions AE gave an estimated distance to Howland. It can also be said that this was also an estimated distance to Noonan's "advanced LOP".."LOP projection". To advance the LOP he would have to have done that from his last fix. There should be a high degree of confidence that Noonan got his last fix a little before 17:44 GMT. The light conditions would have been conducive to get the fix at this time. If Noonan termed this a "fix", to advance his LOP from, that should indicate he was within the "celestial nav tolerance" of 10- 20 miles of his Rhumb Line plot on the chart. That fix was the start of the last rhumb line segment of the course line to the LOP. Noonan should have had a good handle on the wind from his fix's during the night. He could deduce wind speed and direction from his fix's and speed lines. I don't know how you can entertain an East / West LOP error beyond the measurement error in taking the sun shot. At 20:13 AE implies that Noonan has taken a recent sun shot and they are ON the LOP. Her reference to flying at 1000 feet suggests that Noonan had also gotten an accurate wind drift reading from the sea state. The problem with the "too far south" conjecture is Baker island. Daryll ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:15:46 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory One item left out of this equation is the Sextant box, which has numbers that correspond to a similar box in the Naval Air Museum at Pensacola and is known to have come from Noonan. That, to me, is a very astounding piece of evidence and is much harder to explain away thananything else that we know of. LTM, Dave Bush Houston, Texas ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:16:12 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Mystery message Apparently, Kirkby is an very old and prominent name in UK circles. There is a town in England, on-line news letter, many references to singers, educators, ministers, etc. It would seem quite possible that someone in Australia may have heard AE's transmissions. So, is this an area of research that should be followed for more post-loss messages. Do any of the post-loss messages that are recorded come from Australia or New Zealand? LTM, Dave Bush Houston, Texas ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:21:06 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Alan says: > I would like to add that on the run in to Howland Noonan HAD to be in > the cockpit to shoot sun lines. What was that? Shoot what? They didn't have gun. You'll have to shout louder. ======================================================================== Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 15:32:46 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Mystery message Dave Bush asks: > Do any of the post-loss messages that are recorded come from Australia > or New Zealand? No. That's what makes the "Kirkby" message so interesting, but - as we must say again - at this point we don;t even know if it is an alleged radio reception. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:41:45 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: New data? What is painfully obvious from Alan's patronising bletherings, is that he is frustrated and angry that he cannot know the answer NOW - a bit like some spoiled child denied some sweets. By turns he is wheedling, dismissive, disinterested or angry. Of course his intention is to try to provoke me into revealing more information, so he makes categoric statements about things he knows nothing of in the hopes that I will deny them - and so learn more. You might as well forget it Alan. All you're doing is confirming to new members of the forum exactly the opinion that older ones have of you. You are shooting yourself in the foot. Your comments are more suited to the nursery than any adult arena. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:42:48 From: Ron Metty Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory I agree Dave. To me all things considered the sextant box is the lone puzzle piece that keeps me on board with the entire theory. It's the single thing I can in no way get my mind around as not being attributed to FN and AE. Dave Bush wrote: > One item left out of this equation is the Sextant box, which has > numbers that correspond to a similar box in the Naval Air Museum at > Pensacola and is known to have come from Noonan. That, to me, is a > very astounding piece of evidence and is much harder to explain away > than anything else that we know of. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:45:02 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Daryll wrote: > The problem with the "too far south" conjecture is Baker island. That's a good point, Daryll. Baker gets in the way of a number of error theories. Keep in mind that from the time AE claimed to be over Howland and the time she was running north/south on 157/337 was only an hour. If she was at a reduced airspeed she could maybe search 50 miles SE and NW. If they could see Howland around 10 to 15 miles away she would have had to have been a minimum of 50 miles off course to the South and made her first search turn to the SE. That's hard to swallow. If she made her first turn NW she would have had to be off course to the South by 100 miles. Just not reasonable. Now if she was short or long by say 15 miles they could have been dead on course and no SE/NW search would have found the island. That would have been within Noonan's CEA and an easier scenario to accept. Finally let me reiterate something about the infamous LOP. Noonan could have drawn that on his map several days before taking off from Lae. In any case there is no advancing anything. All there is was measuring the distance from any LOP to the line drawn through Howland and applying his estimated ground speed to that distance to get an estimated time of arrival. (ETA) Alan ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:46:34 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather > From Daryll Bolinger > > That fix was the start of the last rhumb line segment of the course > line to the LOP.... For the uninitiated, who are not familiar with navigational terms. Rum is spelled without an "h" in it. R U M. It was a popular drink among sailors, which was Noonan's trade before he got mixed up with aircraft. He would have divided his rum bottle into portions, one for each portion of the journey when he got a good shot of the celestial bodies, by marking equally spaced lines on the bottle. These are "rum lines", and the portion he drank each time he succesfully recorded his position was a "fix". After a number of such fixes, Earhart's body would probably look quite celestial..... Th' WOMBAT ******************************************* First days of spring getting to you there, Ross? Pat ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:48:34 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather > From Ric > > I submit that the note passing scenario was the routine method of > communication even when they were sitting elbow to elbow. The noise > level in the 10E cockpit was punishing. Linda Finch reported that > it defeated her state-of-the-art active noise-cancelling headset and > Merrill and Lambie were deaf as posts after each of their transatlantic > hops. By the time AE and FN were looking for Howland they were both > almost certainly reduced to doing Harpo Marx impressions. We've never really looked hard at the implications of this. We are pretty certain that one of Earhart's antennae (well, the airplane's at least) was missing, and we sort of assume she could not reply to messages because of that. Maybe she simply could not hear some of the calls to her, and that is why she doesn't appear to have heard instructions and messages. I recall doing some time in a factory that produced nuts, bolts, screws and chains among other things when I was travelling, back in the days before workplace health and safety laws. After a while subjected to the general din, it was hard to hear something yelled by a person three feet away. I suppose the other side to that argument though is that had she not understood she would have requested repeat messages. Th' WOMBAT -- We don't use Windows - so You get less Viruses. Mepis Linux, Mozilla and OpenOffice.org. **************************************************** I can't stand it any more. Ross, PLEASE change that "less" to "fewer." ;-) Pat ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:49:11 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Ae's fuel, weather A testable hypothesis? While reviewing the clash of exchanges from various Tighars over Angus' alleged Hypothesis, there are as we speak two researchers that claim with a certain degree of certainty that they know where the Amelia's Electra is at this moment. I had forgotten. But Woody R and Mike Harris both have set forth evidence (I haven't seen it) based on Army reconasiance photos taken in 1945, that the Electra is in a revetment on TAROA under about 8 feet of coral.They haven't asked for a nickel for the hypothesis. I would say this is a testable hypothesis. Go to the spot,dig down twenty feet or so, and you either have a nice hole or Amelia's Electra. Note: This may sound like Brinks Electra, but they insist that that aircraft pictured in Brinks book is not an Electra and that their revetment is on the other side of the island. LTM, Ron Bright ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:49:50 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Remote viewing For Clayton Davis -- Just for the record, Clayton, not all of us active on the Earhart search regard things like remote viewing with quite the -- er -- attitude that Ric does. However, he's quite correct that we've yet to have a remote viewer give us anything we could really check out, and of course it's also a fact that it would be irresponsible for us to use up a whole lot of time and money pursuing a "lead" based only on somebody's psychic vision. But if somebody can give us a location on Niku that we ought to check out, and a description of what we ought to find there, I know there are plenty of us regular expeditionaries who'd spend one or more of our "days off" (We do have them occasionally on the island) beating the bushes to check it out. LTM (who encourages visionaries) Tom ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:50:30 From: Mike Holt Subject: Re: Mystery message > To: Ric and Rick Metzger > > Melbourne is and as far as I know was 10hrs EAST of Greenwitch. What's ten hours on the other side of the location stated in the telegram? Mike Holt ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:50:52 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather I flew in a Lockheed 10A Electra. The noise in the cockpit is worse than you can imagine, especially when it is hot outside and the crew decide to leave the cockpit windows open to get some fresh air in... Try to imagine sitting between two 450 hp AT-6 Texans flying formation, propeller tips turning near the speed of sound inches away. Then remember AE's L10E had 550 hp engines... The only guys who can stand the ordeal are the pilots because they wear their headphones to communicate with ATC and... to talk to each other. It's like sitting in a tank. But noisier... LTM (who relives flying the L10 every day) ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 08:51:42 From: Suzanne Flowers Subject: Re: Remote viewing I'm a history buff who's always been intrigued by the Earhart story, and heard about your work on TV a few years back. I'm ignorant on the scientific topics that could actually contribute something to this discussion, but enjoy reading everyone's posts. I'm learning a lot as a result. Having said all that, I have read a little about Remote Viewing. Yes, the U.S. (as well as the Russian govt and numerous private international organizations) has spent mucho bucks on RV, for military/espionage purposes. RV experiments started in the 1970s in the Electronics and Bio-Engineering Lab of the Stanford Research Institute (now independent of Stanford Univ and named SRI International). They were directed by physicists (!), who worked with psychics. RV is nothing more than shamanism that's dressed in the more respectable contemporary garb of "scientific psychic research." Modern practitioners of RV are no different from the shamans of primitive societies or witches who "see" events and acquire knowledge separated from them by impossible distances of space and/or time. It's occultic, then, in nature. I don't know if the govt is still messing with RV. Goodness knows, I hope my hard-earned tax dollars aren't being thrown down this rat hole. Suzanne Flowers ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 09:04:36 From: Tom King Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather For Ron Bright >I would say this is a testable hypothesis. Go to the spot,dig down >twenty feet or so, and you either have a nice hole or Amelia's >Electra. For what it's worth, Taroa has been the subject of a quite intensive archaeological survey, funded by the National Park Service back in the 1980s, and no Electras were found. Nobody dug down 20 feet, but if you did, on an atoll like the one Taroa is part of, you'd be underwater. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 11:49:52 From: Colm O'Higgins Subject: Re: Earhart's fate I read all of your sanguine comments every day in Toronto. As for 'Angus'...who knows? Only he himself, apparently. Pity he is so selfish. Above all, the impact of TIGHAR's deliberations and efforts is always... FRUSTRATION PERSEVERANCE and a sense of OVERWHELMING SADNESS Only by their demise does the worry of Amelia & Fred's fate continue. Colm ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 11:50:20 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Ron Metty says: > To me all things considered the sextant box is the lone puzzle piece > that keeps me on board with the entire theory. It's the single thing I > can in no way get my mind around as not being attributed to FN and AE. It's interesting. We all have our favorite pieces of evidence we hold onto like relics of the True Cross. For some it's the sextant box. For some it's the dados. One of mine is the fragment of a shoe sole that Gallagher was sure was from woman's shoe. As I've said before, the only way I can explain that conclusion is that there must have been something about it that could only be attributed to a woman's shoe. It wasn't the size because Gallagher thought it was pretty big (he guessed a size 10). It wasn't that it had a high heel because he specifically says "sole" and makes no mention of a heel, but he does think that it might be from a sandal. I think it was the cream colored rubber sole of AE's comfortable "spectator shoes" that we see her wearing in photos taken during the world flight. The low heel was molded as part of the sole - just like a sandal. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 12:27:11 From: Dave Carter Subject: Re: Remote viewing Hasn't this path been traveled many times? I recall some discussion some years ago about PSI Tech, their "remote viewing" efforts, and their claims. I also recall that PSI Tech contacted TIGHAR with something similiar to "Well, there it is. All you have to do now is go get it." I went to the PSI Tech website and sure enough, there is some project report that places the Electra off the west shore of Kuria in the Gilberts. And I agree with your sentiments regarding "remote viewing"... Maybe not as bunk-filled as "recovered memories," but darned close. LTM, Dave Carter (#2585) ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 13:22:03 From: Angus Murray Subject: 20 GPH Ric, Some time ago there was much discussion about whether AE was "throttled back" to under 20 gph per engine or 20 gph the pair on the Oakland Hawaii flight. You were puzzled because her fuel consumption was actually higher than the 38 gph estimated for that part of the trip by KJ and yet AE seemed to think they were throttled back and that the figure was good. Your explanation was that one prop was stuck at 1700 rpm and so they had to run the other one at the same speed increasing fuel consumption but largely compensated for it by reducing mp. Elgen long tells a different story. He says that after starting the 1600 rpm leg and re-leaning, a beat was noticed between the engines which AE tried to quell by adjusting the rpm but one prop was found to be stuck at 1600 rpm. Elgen quotes the US army Luke Field crash report for the source of this information. Does this change your opinion at all? ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 13:38:46 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Ae's fuel, weather > Daryll wrote: > >> The problem with the "too far south" conjecture is Baker island. > > Alan wrote: > That's a good point, Daryll. I'm not gonna hammer at this. I've already posted my opinion. I see no reason why they could not have hit the advanced LOP at ballpark 19:00Z some 65 miles south of Baker, flown NW on the line for half an hour (about 55 miles), turned around at 19:30Z after failing to "get a minimum" with the loop, and proceed SE from then on. That scenario fits every opinion expressed at the time by Earhart and by the radio operators aboard Itasca. The only thing it doesn't fit is present-day opinions about what what Noonan "must have" and "couldn't have" done. LTM Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 13:39:15 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Ron Bright says: > I would say this is a testable hypothesis. Go to the spot,dig down > twenty feet or so, and you either have a nice hole or Amelia's > Electra. We have an excellent relationship with the Historic Preservation Office in Majuro which would have to approve any excavation on Taroa. Approval would require supervision by people with the proper credentials. We have such people. We helped out the folks on Tinian. We'd be happy to help Woody and company. Just cover our expenses. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:25:52 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: Remote viewing > From Clayton Davis > > Has anyone employed Remote Viewing techniques to discern the location > of Amelia's airplane? > > My wife and I both retired from the National Security Agency and have > some insight to "black" projects, including remote viewing. Is that how they found Osama? Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:26:24 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: new data? Sorry, Angus you have no information I want now or any other time. You don't know where the Electra is and that is all anyone wants to know. I needle you not to provide any hint of your "information" but to simply tell everyone what your information could possibly answer so they will know whether it has value or not. You won't do that so I can only assume you have nothing to offer that has any value at all. I can also do this civilly which you are not capable of doing. I suggest you look up the definition of childish. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:29:57 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Scott says: > C/S is somewhat testable, but we can't claim that it's truly been > tested so > far. C/S can never be truly tested. To test it at all requires stacks upon stacks of assumptions in order to constrain the search area to a manageable size. That said, millions of dollars have been spent searching many square miles of sea floor without success. > The post-loss surface search was far from exhaustive, doesn't even > address the "sank" part of c/s, and hardly counts as a test. The post-loss surface search covered 262,281 square miles. If that's not exhaustive I don't know what is. It literally hundreds of thousands of square miles greater than even the most optimistic bottom search and was made during a time when it was entirely reasonable to expect that some kind of floating debris might remain. > Experiments > (i.e., ocean floor searches) to date haven't come close to covering the > whole area that Long suggests, and also hardly count as tests. There may > also be other shortcomings of the equipment. But this explanation remains > viable until the the entire area Long mapped has been searched using a > dependable technique. And since when is Long's area the only C/S hypothesis? Timmer (the Howland Landing group) insists that his area is different. The C/S search area possibilities are, for all practical purposes, limitless. >> Niku Landing >> Low-confidence theory. Tests of several subordinate hypotheses by >> observation and experimentation have been successful. No contrary or >> disqualifying information has arisen. > > Now, wait a darn minute. The island was searched from the air in the > days immediately following the disappearance. Yes, and things were there that shouldn't have been there. > I would bet that a far greater % of > island was viewed than of the ocean surface search (cited earlier as a > "test" of the c/s explanation). Depends on what you mean by viewed. Unlike the sea, very little of the island's surface is viewable from the air due to the dense vegation. > The island was also searched on the ground in the following years, > wasn't it? Without results? Wrong on both counts. Aside from Gallagher's successful search for the bones in 1940, the island was never searched for signs of Earhart until we got there in 1989. > no unambiguous physical artifacts have been > recovered from Niku, despite several well-planned efforts to find them. > Again, this is contrary evidence. That's a bit like saying that - a hundred years ago - a detective who visited a suspected crime scene and found blood stains and shell casings had found contrary evidence. > ...the fact that bones existed on the island is only very loosely tied > to the possibility that they may have been Earhart's or Noonan's, and there > are a multitude of other possibile explanations. Such as.......? > It takes several more steps of > hypothesis / experiment to get anywhere close to Earhart. What sort of evidence would you consider "close" but not yet "there"? > To me, the fact > that bones were discovered should be considered "consistant" with the > Earhart on Niku explanation, but not very important *unless* the bones > can really be tied to the flight. This is the old chimera of you got nuthin until you've got everything. The bones are an extremely important clue. They may or may not ever be tied to the flight but have already allowed us to refine the hypothesis and discover more clues that may point to the identity of the castaway(s). > Likewise, even if the bones are found and > somehow proven *not* to be Earhart's or Noonan's, that will not falsify the > Niku explanation. It will just be one more line of investigation that > didn't pan out. True. >> You won't find anything remotely >> similar in Japanese Capture or Crashed and Sank. > > From what I've seen of the Japanese Capture explanation, I have to agree. > Quite a bit of stuff gets trumpeted as "evidence" but it turns out that the > stuff was either misrepesented from the start or has alternate, better > explanations. > > But I can't agree on C/S. The fact that no direct evidence has been found to > support it is not the explanation's fault, it's the ocean's. You just can't > make up "subordinate hypotheses" to go with c/s, the only way to test any of > them is to search the ocean bottom over a gazillion square miles. As you yourself said, >Hypotheses are only useful if they are testable. In most views of >experimental design, "testable" means "falsifiable." By that standard, C/S is not even a useful hypothesis. >> And let's stop talking about proving what really happened to Amelia >> Earhart. Nobody is going to do that. > > No, but finding the airplane somewhere could come damned close. No argument there. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:30:23 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Ron, the first test would be to ask Woody and Mike to explain how the Electra could fly 1009.124 miles on low fuel. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:30:56 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Remote viewing Suzanne wrote: > I'm ignorant on the scientific topics that could actually contribute > something to this discussion........... Suzanne, that hasn't stopped any of us yet. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:31:24 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Earhart's fate Welcome Colm. Should I say into the lion's den? I wouldn't categorize Angus as selfish. Nasty tongue perhaps but he actually thinks he has something of value that he can make money from. More power to him if he can but he has nothing to offer TIGHAR. You notice he is quick to respond with an acid tongue but he will not say what he has to offer. Everyone sees that as strange I am sure. I have never known anyone to ask for money but refuse to say what folks would get in return. He can do that without revealing a single secret but he refuses. It is obvious to me that if he said what questions his information could answer everyone would see it was not worth buying. Possibly he thinks that would give his secrets away but I don't see how. This is like me saying for a thousand dollars I will give you something you might like or think was worth it but I won't tell you what it is. Only an idiot would bite. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:31:43 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: 20 GPH I honestly don't remember what I said about the 20 gph. I do know, from the Army report, that they had prop trouble for the last part of the flight and I know that they made such good time on the crossing that they intentionally backed off on the power so as to not arrive before daylight. >Elgen long tells a different story. He says that after starting the >1600 rpm leg and re-leaning, a beat was noticed between the engines >which AE tried to quell by adjusting the rpm but one prop was found to >be stuck at 1600 rpm. Elgen quotes the US army Luke Field crash report >for the source of this information. Does this change your opinion at >all? I have the Army report and I can find nothing in it about 1600 rpm, or re-leaning, or noticing a beat. Elgen's misattributed speculation only reinforces my opinion of his scholarship. I don't see any analogy to the Lae/Howland flight anyway unless you're suggesting that, having arrived at where they thought Howland should be and not seeing an island, they backed way off the power and loitered there to see if maybe the island would show up. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:32:13 From: Ron Reuther Subject: Re: Taroa Tom King and Ron Bright, Tom, Could you please cite the references for the summations of the archeological surveys of Taroa? Would be appreciated if you can. Assuming that the highest elevation on Taroa might be at least 20' it then would be possible to dig down 20' and not be underwater. Another possibility would be that the Japanese when in control of the atoll might have mounded sand and coral up to cover any revetments and or structures. I understand that one of the difficulties and/or hazards of excavating on Taroa is the possibility and concern of contacting unexploded munitions. Would it be possible to utilize any sensing technologies to determine location of aircraft below a cover of sand and coral on such an island? Ron Reuther ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:32:53 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Taroa Woody as you know is a longtime researcher and has posted on the Tighar forum. He is aware of the credentially process and the permissions required but he has made a couple of trips to scout out the area, particularily where Brinks airplane was located. Mike Harris is more positive but agrees it is a hypothesis and that he would like to resolve it one way or the other. Funding the expedition is of course the major problem, but the sum is not out of reach. I wouldn't doubt he would take up Tighars offer to assist in the search, which the way I understand it, is not more that a football field or so in area. Woody brought clothes and trinkets for the Taroians. LTM, Ron Bright ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:33:14 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: Mystery message From Reed Riddle > From Mike Holt > >> To: Ric and Rick Metzger >> >> Melbourne is and as far as I know was 10hrs EAST of Greenwitch. > > What's ten hours on the other side of the location stated in > the telegram? I believe Hawaii is at 10h West. Reed ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:34:24 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather > Angus said he could present his information to any academic and that > person would > agree with him about his discovery. An academic, not an engineer, not > Lockheed, not an aeronautical expert, not a meteorologist but an > academic. Some > brain who could follow Angus' reasoning whereas it is unlikely we > regular folks could. If you have read my signature (which sneaks through into these messages once in a while, though it shouldn't), you'll see that I'm an astronomer at Caltech, currently doing academic research for a large, ground based telescope project. It is part of my job, actually part of the fiber of my being, to examine evidence and determine it's validity. I have posted on this forum several times about what scientific evidence means and how to evaluate it. I am also not a TIGHAR member (though I will probably sign up to get the radio message write up), so I have no bias for or against the Niku hypothesis or the leadership of TIGHAR. I offer my services to Angus in order to evaluate his evidence. I will not divulge the evidence to the forum, and will keep it in confidence, since it is not mine to share (though I will very strongly encourage Angus to do so). However, I will share my evaluation of its validity with the forum, and explain my reasoning as best I can without divulging the details. That won't be easy, but an outside examination can only help the interpretation. Angus, if you are willing to allow your evidence to undergo an unbiased examination by an outside observer, please let me know and we can make arrangements accordingly. Reed ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. Reed L. Riddle Thirty Meter Telescope Site Survey Team California Institute of Technology, Astronomy Department Homepage: http://wet.physics.iastate.edu/~riddle/ "This life has been a test. If it had been an actual life, you would have received actual instructions on where to go and what to do." -- Angela Chase, "My so-called life" ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:34:47 From: Adam Marsland Subject: Re: Mystery message Keeping in mind the human ear's tendency to project meaning onto garbled communication (which topic got me posting here in the first place), could it be "ten hours LEFT?", perhaps referring to the life of the battery? I seem to remember that the messages ended rather abruptly right around or soon after that time, or am I confused? << "ten hours west" >> ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:35:12 From: Ron Reuther Subject: Re: Taroa Tom King, Perhaps these are the references you suggested? Ron Reuther 1997 Taroa in Maloelap Atoll, pp. 1-12. The Japanese Airbase on Taroa Island, Republic of the Marshall Islands, 1937-45: An Evaluation of the World War II Remains. National Park Service, Pacific Great Basin Support Office, San Francisco, CA. 1997 Taroa's Place in Military History, pp. 13-24. The Japanese Airbase on Taroa Island, Republic of the Marshall Islands, 1937-45: An Evaluation of the World War II Remains. National Park Service, Pacific Great Basin Support Office, San Francisco, CA. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:36:01 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Oz Actually, it's getting pretty close to the middle of summer.... Th' WOMBAT Pat Thrasher wrote: > First days of spring getting to you there, Ross? > Pat -- We don't use Windows - so You get lots lesser Viruses. (How's that Pat?) Mepis Linux, Mozilla and OpenOffice.org. ************************************************* AAAARRRRGGGGHHHHHH ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:37:58 From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Electra cockpit noise >> From Ric >> >> .... The noise > > level in the 10E cockpit was punishing. Linda >> Finch >> reported that it defeated her state-of-the-art active >> noise-cancelling headset >> and Merrill and Lambie were deaf as posts after each of their >> transatlantic >> hops. By the time AE and FN were looking for Howland they were both >> almost certainly reduced to doing Harpo Marx impressions. > > From Ross Devitt > > We've never really looked hard at the implications of this. We are > pretty certain that one of Earhart's antennae (well, the airplane's at > least) was missing, and we sort of assume she could not reply to > messages because of that. > > Maybe she simply could not hear some of the calls to her, and that is > why she doesn't appear to have heard instructions and messages. Very interesting to me, this additional factor. This might help explain why with the radio antenna gone, the flyers did not notice the reduced level of background, normal radio noise in the headphones - did not notice something apparently wrong with their radio. Also, and i am just guessing here, but also based on my own limited experiments with high-frequency direction finding, this extreme noise level and punishment to the hearing, might influence how well one negotiated the procedure of rotating the loop antenna to try to detect subtle minimums and maximums of signal level. I would not like to try that, being tired, with less than ideal radio ionospheric conditions ( sky wave interference complicating reception, causing the "null point" direction to continuously shift about the true nullpoint direction ), and punished hearing. That would be a terribly frustrating experience. To me, this could go a long way to explaining the direction-finding failure near Howland. I am still pondering whether this could have been a factor in the failed d-f test back at Lae. I cannot imagine how someone could subject their hearing to that punishment, knowing that in later years it would catch up with them. But it's probably the same logic with rock musicians onstage: hey, we'll pay for it tomorrow, but until then, it's okay. Or, did flyers on such noisey aircraft routinely stuff their ears with cotton? -Hue Miller ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:38:29 From: Kerry Tiller Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory > From Ric > > It's interesting. We all have our favorite pieces of evidence we hold > onto like relics of the True Cross........ My favorite piece of evidence is the one we haven't found yet. You know the one I mean. I love the smell of gun smoke. It's the piece of evidence that keeps me paying my TIGHAR dues. I continue to be excited by the trials, foibles, triumphs and disappointments of the group as we strive to maintain sanity by applying scientific method to the "Girls Gone Wild" arena of Amelia Earhart research. I just hope we turn that piece of evidence up before we are all too senile to remember why it is important. Whoa...too much wine with dinner. LTM (who can't remember the last time she had a senior moment) Kerry Tiller ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:44:28 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: TAROA Ron Reuther asks: > Would it be possible to utilize any sensing technologies to determine > location of aircraft below a cover of sand and coral on such an > island? Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) should work well down to the water table. ======================================================================= Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:49:14 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Mystery message Reed Riddle says: <> It is now, but in 1937 Hawaii was using 10.5h west 10h west of Greenwich in 1937 would be in the neighborhood of Tahiti - way, way further east than Earhart could possibly be. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:51:23 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: 20 GPH > From Ric > I don't see any analogy to the Lae/Howland flight anyway unless you're > suggesting that, having arrived at where they thought Howland should > be and not seeing an island, they backed way off the power and > loitered there to see if maybe the island would show up. > LTM, > Ric I guess the island could have been late for the appointment... RossD. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:57:36 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Electra cockpit noise > From Hue Miller > Or, did flyers on such noisey aircraft routinely stuff > their ears with cotton? > -Hue Miller Not as funny as it might sound. I've seen references to that somewhere. Th' WOMBAT ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:57:58 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Mystery message Adam Marsland wonders: > Keeping in mind the human ear's tendency to project meaning onto garbled > communication (which topic got me posting here in the first place), could it > be "ten hours LEFT?", perhaps referring to the life of the battery? IF it was a post-loss radio message and IF the word was "left" instead of "west" it doesn't make any sense for it to refer to battery life. No aircraft battery in 1937 would support ten hours of transmissions without recharging. Nor can it refer to fuel. Even at idle they can't possibly have ten hours of fuel left. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 22:00:13 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Electra cockpit noise Hue Miller asks, > Or, did flyers on such noisey aircraft routinely stuff their ears > with cotton? Amelia did. I've seen newsreel film of her removing the cotton from her ears after exiting the Electra. Cotton would help some, but only some. ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 22:08:05 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Remote viewing Suzanne Flowers wrote: > I don't know if the govt is still messing with RV. Goodness knows, I > hope my hard-earned tax dollars aren't being thrown down this rat hole. Unfortunately, they are. A gentleman named Robert Park publishes a weekly online newsletter called "What's New," on behalf of the American Physics Society in which he tries to keep scientists up to date on doings in Washington (legislation & appropriations that affect the way the govt. regulates / funds / portrays science). It's quite entertaining, and he often points out pseudoscience and patently bad science we are paying for. Anyone who can find Earhart via "remote viewing" should also apply for the "Randi Prize" in advance of proceeding with the effort. If they can find Earhart by psychic means, they may as well make themselves a few 100 thousand dollars richer in the bargain. For some reason, the Randi Prize has never been awarded, despite the zillions of supposedly real psychics out there. I'm sure anyone interested can find "What's New" and the Randi Prize online without much effort. Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Sat, 27 Nov 2004 22:39:04 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: 20 GPH Come on guys, I can't get my lycoming 0-320 to run on less than 8-9 gph now take R-985's times two and ask them to run on 20 gph! I daresay impossible to do today and even then never!!!! 985x2 = 1970 cubic inch displacement it simply will not work even today. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:22:39 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Scott writes: > The island was searched from the air in the days immediately > following the disappearance. I like the way some spin the facts. What Scott says is so but the reader comes away with a false impression. "days immediately following" is actually a week later. Lambrecht flew over Gardner on the ninth of July. Day ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:23:02 From: Mark Guimond Subject: Re: 20GPH Uhhhh, Carl - those were R-1340s on the L10-E. Likewise on the North American SNJ/Texan, not R-985s, as someone mentioned earlier. At least they were on the "Harvard" version we built up here in the Great White North. Regards, M.G. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:23:45 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Reed, it is my guess Angus will not take you up on your generous offer. Any one of us could make the same offer from the stand point of various disciplines and all could make the same guarantee to Angus. He will not take the deal. If you give a little thought to the possibilities of what Angus thinks he has you'll quickly see it would not take a rocket scientist to comprehend it. This is not something we need to be spending time musing about. The whole focus of TIGHAR is that the Electra landed on Gardner. In other words TIGHAR already believes what Angus is trying to convince us of. He believes he can prove the Electra landed there but not to a 100% certainty. Well, that's where we are already. One more voice in the wind doesn't help. The hard facts of this theory is that the ocean search area is too large and cannot be reasonably limited in scope to make an ocean bottom search feasible financially. No one would toss large sums of money into a bottomless pit even if we had a video of the plane landing there. Angus has said he can answer all the perplexing questions about the Earhart mystery. I have no clue as to what they could be but in any event I couldn't care less. Perhaps someone writing a book might be interested in the little fill ins Angus might provide but we are looking for the airplane not colorful tidbits about the flight. Your expertise would certainly be welcome in evaluating the celestial aspect of the last few hours of their flight. I have suggested Noonan had tools at hand to do a pretty good job of navigating to Howland. The clinker in all of that is we don't know the weather. At the time Noonan had the sun, moon, Venus, Jupiter and various stars as navigational aids as well as drift readings. The question is whether the cloud cover permitted him access to any of that. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:24:33 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Reed, I much appreciate your offer and I must say that the objectivity of a fellow scientist would be a great asset as far as the credibility of an opinion is concerned but some might see a slight problem in that you are not altogether a disinterested party. It would also be almost impossible for you to explain your reasons for accepting the validity without giving anything away. In order to do that you would have to confine your observation to "Yes I think its valid" or "No I don't think it valid". How much further would anyone then be ahead? They'd have your opinion and mine (for what its worth) but of course Nauticos, for instance, can get half a dozen well qualified people together to support their ideas. It doesn't mean they're right to look where they're looking and unless they divulge the details no-one else can reach an independent opinion. Also, the whole reason for the exercise was to give a potential collaborator confidence that he was not getting a pig in a poke. Since that - as far as Tighar is concerned - is not presently on the cards, the exercise would be mainly to satisfy your curiosity and my desire to see the skeptics thrown into confusion. I think both those points are not of overwhelming importance at present. All that being said, I am very tempted. I will say one thing however. When the time comes to release the information, I will certainly first send it to you for your evaluation and I look forward to hearing what you have to say about it. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:27:30 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: 20 GPH Ric said, > I have the Army report and I can find nothing in it about 1600 rpm, or > re-leaning, or noticing a beat. Elgen's misattributed speculation only > reinforces my opinion of his scholarship. Whilst there is not the slightest doubt that Elgen has many things wrong in terms of the conclusions he draws, it would seem a little surprising if this is based altogether on speculation. He generally has some sort of evidence for what he says - whether it is good or unreliable evidence. But then again maybe you're right. Can anyone clarify the matter with him? > I don't see any analogy to the Lae/Howland flight anyway unless you're > suggesting that, having arrived at where they thought Howland should be > and not seeing an island, they backed way off the power and loitered > there to see if maybe the island would show up. I think the point is important merely in understanding the fuel consumption of the 10E. That they were running at 1700rpm, in absence of Elgen's assertion, is a highly credible reason why the fuel consumption was slightly higher than expected in spite of reducing power by running at low manifold pressure.. If on the other hand we accept what Elgen says, then the corollary is that KJs figures were slightly optimistic rather than pessimistic as is often assumed. This does of course have consequences for deciding the amount of fuel burned on the Lae-Howland flight. Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:28:03 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: 20 GPH Carl said: > Come on guys, I can't get my lycoming 0-320 to run on less than 8-9 > gph now take R-985's times two and ask them to run on 20 gph! I daresay > impossible to do today and even then never!!!! 985x2 = 1970 cubic inch > displacement it simply will not work even today. You're missing the point. It has long been settled that AE was talking about 20 gph per engine. What is interesting is that once one assumes this to be true one has to explain why she was getting only about 39.5 gph ("under 20gph") instead of KJ's 38 gph. - ie was KJ optimistic or were they running at 1700 rpm instead of the 1600 rpm which KJ had specified? Regards Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:30:05 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Ric wrote: > C/S can never be truly tested. To test it at all requires stacks upon > stacks of assumptions in order to constrain the search area to a > manageable size. That said, millions of dollars have been spent > searching many square miles of sea floor without success. Yes, that's what I was getting at. > The post-loss surface search covered 262,281 square miles. If that's > not exhaustive I don't know what is. It was literally hundreds of > thousands of square miles greater than even the most optimistic bottom > search and was made during a time when it was entirely reasonable to > expect that some kind of floating debris might remain. Whoops - my fault. Insufficient attention to pre-posting homework. > And since when is Long's area the only C/S hypothesis? Timmer (the > Howland Landing group) insists that his area is different. The C/S > search area possibilities are, for all practical purposes, limitless. Sure. I was just figuring that Long's map is a reasonable example of the proposed C/S search area. I don't know if anyone has proposed it, but it seems to me that a "hybrid" hypothesis would also be possible -- that AE took the LOP southward, as Tighar proposes, but C/S en route to Niku (or some other alternate landing site). That would expand the C/S search area vastly. [reg. the air search immediately following disappearance] > Yes, and things were there that shouldn't have been there. If I remember, there were signs of human habitation (or similar wording). But those -should- have been there due to the shipwreck. There seems to be no doubt that someone was at the "Seven" site. But whether it was an artifact of the Norwich City, AE, some other unfortunate traveler, or the various other known (and unknown?) times people have visited the island still is an open question. > Wrong on both counts. Aside from Gallagher's successful search for the > bones in 1940, the island was never searched for signs of Earhart until > we got there in 1989. OK. But Gallagher or the colonists certainly would have found a Lockheed Electra if it had been there. (as before, I understand the hypothetical explanation for its conspicuous absence). Exploration of the island made during the colonial period should be considered a partial test of the Niku explanation. By many peoples' standards, the fact that the plane wasn't there would be enough to discard the hypothesis (i.e., falsify it). I'm not trying to argue that point. But I think it's only fair to consider those explorations when summing up "tests" of the competing explanations. The anecdotal reports that there had been a plane wreck are sufficient to generate "conjectures," but (by themselves) are no better than similar anecdotes about any number of other AE plane sightings. > [Reg. "unambiguous physical artifacts"] That's a bit like saying that > - a hundred years ago - a detective who > visited a suspected crime scene and found blood stains and shell > casings had found contrary evidence. Was he investigating a shooting? If so, that would be a good start on unambiguous evidence. Unless he was searching around inside a hunting shack. If he was investigating accounting fraud, then it might be hard to connect this evidence to the crime. The physical evidence from Niku is a lot less convincing than the bloodstains and shell casings might be. It does show that someone was at the site. But it doesn't distinguish between AE, the known inhabitants, and some other hypothetical castaway. Here's another way to look at this: given the island's known history of habitation, I suspect it would be a surprise if there weren't at least a few things lying around that could give the impression of AE artifacts. What if archaeologists were to investigate a camp site in the Mojave desert where people had stayed intermittently since at least the 1930s? There could easily be a shoe fragment, a piece of auto wreckage consistent with the car AE drove, and a few other things. There's a phrase you probably know, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." I'm not a complete adherant to this view. To me, if qualified people look long and hard for evidence [solid, unambiguous evidence] and don't find it, then their negative results become evidence (but not proof) of absence. That (in combination with my desert campsite scenario) is why I referred to the results so far as "contrary." [multitude of bone explanations] > Such as.......? It is my understanding that the island had been inhabited prior to the Norwich City and post-Earhart colonization. But I have to admit, that's less than a multitude. I was thinking that the bones had turned up well after the colonization attempt. Bzzt. > What sort of evidence would you consider "close" but not yet "there"? Well, even if an artifact could be clearly tied to an L-10 or to AE herself, it wouldn't be proof that AE had landed at Niku. After all, there are a bunch of artifacts from a B-24 (?), and nobody claims that a B-24 ever landed on the island. So, a small L-10 artifact would suggest that either the plane landed at Niku, or else landed or washed ashore somewhere else where people had access to it. That would be close. > As you yourself said, > < experimental design, "testable" means "falsifiable.">> > By that standard, C/S is not even a useful hypothesis. I think that's about right. In logical terms, it's perfectly testable. But in practical terms, it's not. Various smaller portions of it may be testable (and have been tested, without result). But the big picture c/s hypothesis can't be (anywhere close to) fully tested unless technology provides some new much more cost-efficient way to search large areas of ocean bottom. One much-different test has already been mentioned here many times: If they crashed and sank, then they could not have used the radio, and there would be no authentic post-loss radio messages. We'll all get to nitpick that soon enough. Meanwhile maybe Ric (or someone) could add a little bit on AE's equipment. I understand that the battery was charged by running one of the engines, and it's presumed that -if- they used the radio, -then- they must have been on land where they could operate the engine. But if the plane was floating in the ocean, wouldn't the battery have at least some charge left in it? And, if so, wouldn't they be able to operate the radio until the battery either went dead or the plane sank? Anyone know how long the battery might have lasted in this scenario? Or was it low enough in the plane that it would have been submerged even if the plane was floating? Best, -SW (paid up now) And thanks for putting up with my skepticism. It's in my nature, you know. There's a great Richard Feynman quote, something like this: "In science, you have to make sure you aren't fooling yourself. And you are the easiest one to fool." ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:30:50 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Taroa For Ron Reuther: Here's the report citation: Adams, William, H., Ross, Richard, E., Krause, Elisabeth, L. and Spennemann, Dirk H.R. (eds), Micronesian Resources Study, Marshall Islands Archaeology. The Japanese Airbase on Taroa Island, Republic of the Marshall Islands, 1937-1945: an evaluation of World War II Remains., San Francisco, Calif. : Micronesian Endowment for Historic Preservation, US National Park Service. It's dated 1997, but I believe there's an earlier report. Anyhow, the source would be the Western Regional Office of NPS, Cultural Resources Program. I doubt if there's much if any land surface on Taroa over 20 feet above sea level. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:31:08 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Taroa For Ron Reuther The sources you cite look like chapters in the source I cited. I haven't had my hands on a copy of the report in some time, though I think I have one tucked away someplace. My wife oversaw the whole NPS Micronesian Resources Study that funded (among other projects) the Taroa survey, and I reviewed the report in draft, but it may have gone through several transmogrifications after I saw it. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:31:43 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: 20 GPH Carl Peltzer doubts that Amelia Earhart's Pratt & Whitney R-985s would run on 20 gallons per hour. Without the benefit of having Kelly Johnson's fuel consumption figures at hand I'd like to remind the old aviation rule of thumb. That rule of thumb says piston engine fuel consumption can be estimated by dividing the engine's horsepower by 10, then multiply the figure by 2. This will give you fuel consumption in litres. As the R-985 produces 550 horsepower, it will burn 110 litres per hour. Since a Lockheed 10 has two of them the airplane will burn 220 litres which, my computer says, converts into 26.4 US gallons. Reducing power for cruise to 75 % would bring fuel consumption down to 26.4 gph :100 x 75 = 19.8 gallons per hour. That is pretty close to the 20 gallons mentioned. This is not a scientific method. It's only a rule of thumb. LTM ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:31:59 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: Remote viewing If remote viewing had any value, Osama Bin Laden would have been found long ago.... LTM ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 09:43:15 From: Danny Brown Subject: Re: Mystery message Has anyone checked to see if Kirkby could be a ship's name? LTM (who knew who and what she was - a lady) Danny Brown #2426 ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:00:56 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Mystery message Danny Brown asked: > Has anyone checked to see if Kirkby could be a ship's name Good thought, and I love it when somebody asks a question I can actually answer and be reasonably sure I'm right. The 1937 Berne List - which supposedly lists all radio-equipped ships in the world - has no ship named Kirkby. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:01:33 From: Colm O'Higgins Subject: Re: maybe later Angus ..."when the time comes..." One question: WHY WAIT ? Colm ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:02:29 From: Oscar Boswell Subject: Re: 20 GPH > From Herman De Wulf (# 2406) > >> the airplane will burn 220 litres which, my computer >> says, converts into 26.4 US gallons. Since a gallon is 3.785 liters, 220 liters is actually more than 58 gallons, and even without this mistake, your rule of thumb is flawed. The actual fuel consumption of the engines at 75% was about 71-72 gph (specific fuel consumption 0.52 lb/hp/hour). At full power, the fuel consumption would be near 100gph. ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:02:58 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Alan, Woody and Mike believe the Japanese picked the Electra up, along with AE,by one of the ships, and was transported to Jaluit. As I recall, Amran said the ship departed 19 July for Saipan. Enroute, or possibly another ship, the ship stopped at Taroa where it was unloaded. Brink claims he interviewed one of the Heine brothers who was working the docks there and he confirmed such an offload.Hence the Electra was hidden on Taroa. Could that have happened? One set of researchers certainly believes it may well have happened that way. Ron ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:20:17 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Gallagher and his clues One thing that has bothered me in this whole "bones" affair is the lack of any information from Gallagher about an airplane being seen on the island by the early settlers. Gallagher finds the bones and later the skull (it was buried and subsequently dug up), the shoe parts, the bottle, the sextant box, the brass chain and corks, etc. In his communication of Sept. 13, 1940 he describes what he has found (the forgoing material) and ends the note saying "no local indication" that this stuff is related to the Norwich City; I think this implies he at least asked others where these things may have come from. It seems odd to me that the one thing that would have reinforced Gallagher's speculation that all the remains he found was that of AE would have been the mention of the settler's tale of seeing the airplane or at least his observations of the settlers using aluminum from some source. On the other hand if the L10 E was gone by the time the settlers got there and didn't reappear until after Gallagher's death this could explain his not saying anything about it. However, I recall some of your conversations with the early settler's saying they saw the aircraft prior to Gallagher's arrival. What and when did things really happen? Strange indeed! Another thing that has bothered me in light of the post loss messages is, if AE did send them for the period covered (I believe 3-4 days after her failure to arrive at Howland) why wouldn't Gallagher have found other stuff from the aircraft. It seems to me if you have 3-4 days where the plane could be used for transmitting messages you would also have taken this time to off load some survival gear from the airplane to be found later by Gallagher. Such hardware things as canteens, tools, signal pistol, etc.-see the Luke Field Inventory. I doubt that crabs have much of an appitiet for these somewhat heavy items. In summary: If AE had time to send all post loss messages why weren't other hardware items from the aircraft off loaded to be found later? If the plane washed off the beach before anything (the sextant box, shoes, bottle, chains and corks, etc.) more could be removed from the airplane who made the post loss messages? Did the timing of the sightings of the plane by the settler's and the use of aluminum for combs, etc., take place after Gallagher's death and thus explain why he didn't say anything about it? How does this fit with the interviews of the earler settlers? Ted Campbell ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:20:44 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Scott and I are finding less and less to disagree on. Let me see if I can continue to chip away at the list. > If I remember, there were signs of human habitation (or similar > wording). But those -should- have been there due to the shipwreck. This is old ground but I'm willing to plow it again. Lambrecht's cryptic description went like this: "Here (meaning at Gardner) signs of recent habitation were clearly visible but repeated circling and zooming failed to elicit any answering wave from possible inhabitants and it was finally taken for granted that none were there." The most interesting word, for us, is "recent". What constitutes a sign of "recent" habitation as opposed to just a sign of habitation? We find ourselves asking how Lambrecht used language to describe what he saw and the best indication we have is other descriptions within the same report. At McKean he saw the remains of the buildings that once housed the 19th century guano diggers (I've seen them myself). He described these as: "Signs of previous habitation remained and the walls of several old buildings apparently or some sort of adobe construction, were still standing." Okay, so old ruined buildings are "signs of previous habitation". At Sydney Island: "There were signs of recent habitation and small shacks could be seen among the groves of coconut palms, but repeated zooms failed to arouse any answering wave and the planes headed northeast for Phoenix Island." This is almost identical to the language he uses to describe what he saw at Gardner except for the mention of "small shacks" in addition to the "signs of recent habitation". Clearly, the signs of recent habitation were something other than small shacks. What could they be? A press report filed by the Associated Press reporter aboard the Colorado claims that the flyers saw "letters scooped in Sidney (sic) beach spelling dozens Polynesian words including kele fassau molei seen from air but pilots said life unsighted discounting possibility were messages relating lost plane." We've researched the words with Pacific language scholars but the results are not very helpful. "Kele" is a Tokelauan root word meaning earth or soil. "Fassau" doesn't seem to mean anything. "Molei" is a Tokelauan word meaning "nothing left". We know that there were Tokelau laborers living on the island harvesting copra under contract to Burns Philp until shortly before the Earhart disappearance so there's no mystery about whose shacks Lambrecht saw or who made the words in the sand. There appears to be a strong possibility that Lambrecht's "signs of recent habitation" at Sydney were marks in the sand. That makes sense. Marks in the sand will last only until the next big storm puts surf up on the beach. If Lambrecht used the same term to describe marks in the sand at Gardner it means that somebody had been there since the last big storm. The last recorded visit to Gardner prior to the Earhart disappearance was a very brief call by HMS Leith on February 15, 1937 - about five months before Lambrecht's overflight - for the purpose of erecting a flagpole, Union Jack and placard asserting His Majesty's ownership of the island. Lambrecht mentions no pole, flag, or placard. Late February and March is storm season in the Phoenix Group (ask me how I know). If Lambrecht saw marks in the sand in July I doubt that they were left by Leith's shore party in February. Fred Goerner once asked John Lambrecht what he saw on Gardner and Lambrecht remembered "markers of some kind". Bottom line: We can't be sure what Lambrecht saw but it seems reasonable to speculate that he saw some kind of marks in the sand. If so, it is very difficult to explain them if they were not made by AE and FN. > There seems to be > no doubt that someone was at the "Seven" site. But whether it was an > artifact of the Norwich City, AE, some other unfortunate traveler, or the > various other known (and unknown?) times people have visited the island > still is an open question. Open yes, but not very far. There is a temptation to say, "It could have been anybody", but it couldn't. Whoever it was had to meet certain criteria. Norwich City is a real stretch. For the castaway to be an NC survivor you have to say that: A. There was a Norwich City survivor somehow left behind by the rescuers. B. He had a woman's shoe with him. C. The sextant box he somehow saved or found washed up from the wreck survived eight years in the Niku environment intact and with the numbers still legible. There is every indication that the castaway was a Westerner (sextant box, shoes, etc.). If he/she was not an NC survivor, where's the report of a missing yacht or ship? Where's the wrecked yacht, ship or at least lifeboat or raft? Why is there part of a woman's shoe and part of man's shoe? How did these people get there - fall out of the sky? Maybe. > Gallagher or the colonists certainly would have found a Lockheed > Electra if it had been there. Agreed, but the assumption that if the colonists found a wrecked airplane in the bush or in shallow water just off the reef, they would think it was a big deal is a culturally biased perception. > Exploration of the island made > during the colonial period should be considered a partial test of the > Niku explanation. Only if the exploration was made by someone who would care anything about an airplane or wreckage other than as a source of useful objects. >> [Reg. "unambiguous physical artifacts"] That's a bit like saying that >> - a hundred years ago - a detective who >> visited a suspected crime scene and found blood stains and shell >> casings had found contrary evidence. > > Was he investigating a shooting? If so, that would be a good start on > unambiguous evidence. Unless he was searching around inside a hunting shack. > If he was investigating accounting fraud, then it might be hard to connect > this evidence to the crime. The physical evidence from Niku is a lot less > convincing than the bloodstains and shell casings might be. It does show > that someone was at the site. But it doesn't distinguish between AE, the > known inhabitants, and some other hypothetical castaway. I think that what Gallagher found and what we have found at the site does make some important distinctions about who the castaway(s) can be. They are certainly not the known inhabitants; they are probably Westerners; they are probably a man and a woman; they haven't been on the island all that long - a few years at best. They somehow got there without leaving evidence of their means of arrival. It's either AE and FN, who are known to have disappeared in the area within that time frame, or it's somebody else whose disappearance was apparently unnoticed and who just happened to have a sexant box a lot like the one Noonan is known to have had (etc.). > Here's another way to look at this: given the island's known history of > habitation, I suspect it would be a surprise if there weren't at least a few > things lying around that could give the impression of AE artifacts. Perhaps, but the more we find, the harder it is to make that argument. > There's a phrase you probably know, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of > absence." I'm not a complete adherant to this view. To me, if qualified > people look long and hard for evidence [solid, unambiguous evidence] and > don't find it, then their negative results become evidence (but not proof) > of absence. Me too. I'm an adherent to the principle that nothing vanishes without a trace. "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." has always seemed to me to be a fairly meaningless aphorism that is just a short step away from its corollary "Absence of evidence is proof of a cover up." > Meanwhile maybe Ric (or someone) could add a little bit on AE's equipment. I > understand that the battery was charged by running one of the engines, and > it's presumed that -if- they used the radio, -then- they must have been on > land where they could operate the engine. But if the plane was floating in > the ocean, wouldn't the battery have at least some charge left in it? And, > if so, wouldn't they be able to operate the radio until the battery either > went dead or the plane sank? Anyone know how long the battery might have > lasted in this scenario? Or was it low enough in the plane that it would > have been submerged even if the plane was floating? Electrical current to power the transmitter had to flow from the batteries (one located in the belly just forward of the main spar and an aux. battery on the cabin floor opposite the door) through a dynamotor which boosted the voltage. The dynamotor was located under the pilot's seat. Because the Electra, like all airplanes, is heavier in the front than in the back, it is going to float in a nose-down attitude with most of the cockpit underwater. In a water landing the dynamotor is going to be instantly submerged and rendered inoperable. This is what Lockheed explained to the searchers in 1937. The airplane absolutely cannot transmit if afloat on the ocean. > And thanks for putting up with my skepticism. It's in my nature, you know. > There's a great Richard Feynman quote, something like this: "In science, you > have to make sure you aren't fooling yourself. And you are the easiest one > to fool." Your postings are excellent and welcome. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:52:31 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: fuel usage Almost no pilot operates an engine at 75%, more usually 65 and in this case probably a lot less that that and you are right, 52 gallons per hour or worse yet 58 is a lot more that 38gph and really lowers their endurance by a considerable amount. I forgot the cubic inches for a minute: 1340 is of course correct. If i remember correctly she had a form of exhaust gas analyzer to help get the best mileage. If you work 1000 gallons by 52 do the math comes out to less than 20 total hours of flight time if they figured on 20% reserve then the numbers do not work out and they could get down near 38. The first few minutes during takeoff and climb you might use close to 100 gph and that is already figured into the program I'm going to have to get into Pratt and Whitney radial engine research more than I wanted to do -I'm having enough trouble with my own engine right now. ======================================================================= Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 12:52:53 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel and weather Ron Bright says: >Woody and Mike believe the Japanese picked the Electra up, along >with AE, by one of the ships, and was transported to Jaluit. ....Could >that have happened? The question, of course, is what ship and how could they do it? It's easy to say that they "picked the Electra up" but I've never heard an explanation of how a ship - even a ship with a clear aft deck and a crane - can recover an airplane from a reef or shore. All of those islands are protected by surrounding reefs and you can't just back a ship up to a reef as if it was a wharf. The ship has to stay well clear or be pounded to pieces. How ya gonna get a 7,000 pound airplane to where the crane can grab it? You gonna wait for a calm day and raft it out to the ship? I'd pay admission to watch somebody try to load a Lockheed 10 from a reef-edge onto a raft. Let's say you just push the sucker off the edge and figure it will float long enough to get it close to the ship. You can only do that if the plane is on its gear so that you can roll it around. That means a safe landing which, in turn, means finding a reef that has a smooth enough stretch that dries at low tide. Niku has that, but it's very unusual. Let's say the plane is on its belly on the reef. You can put a line on it, attach the other end to the ship and drag the plane off the reef. On our first Niku expedition the ship's crew used that method to get an aluminum skiff (maybe 500 pounds) out of the lagoon. They dragged that puppy across the reef but by the time it got to the ocean it was so torn up that it darn near sank before they could hoist it aboard. I can't imagine dragging an Electra across a reef on its belly and ending up with anything but a Lockheed aluminum anchor. But let's say that, by some miracle, you manage to get a still-floating Electra alongside your ship. Float planes are designed to be hoisted. Electras aren't. There is no place to grab onto them. The plane is going to be bobbing around in the ocean with its tail sticking up in the air. To have any hope of lifting it without pulling it apart you'd need to construct some kind of special harness of straps, installed by divers, that would go around the centersection. And finally, why the heck would you go to all that trouble to recover a wrecked Electra when your government already has one that they bought from Lockheed a couple years ago? The whole thing is too dumb to talk about. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 14:26:36 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: 20 GPH Herman, A 205 litre fuel drum holds 50 US Gallons of fuel.. Th' WOMBAT ======================================================================== Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2004 14:27:02 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues Ted Campbell says: > One thing that has bothered me in this whole "bones" affair is the lack of > any information from Gallagher about an airplane being seen on the island by > the early settlers. You're bothered because you have a perception of the relationship between Gallagher and the early settlers that does not fit the possibility that he was not told about an airplane being seen on the island. In fact, we have very limited information about that relationship and most of it comes from Gallagher himself. For the settlers to tell Gallagher about an airplane they would have to: A. Know that what they saw was an airplane. B. Think that it might be something of interest to Gallagher. C. Be confident and assertive enough to approach him. D. Be able to communicate with him in either English or Gilbertese. Gallagher was new to the island and was its first resident European administrator. We have it, anecdotally, from at least one person who was there at the time - Bauro Tikana, Gallagher's clerk/interpreter - that the settlers were afraid to talk to him. We have it from the official records that Gallagher had some trouble learning to speak and understand Gilbertese and very few of the laborers had any English. >It seems odd to me that the one thing that would have reinforced Gallagher's >speculation that all the remains he found was that of AE would have been the >mention of the settler's tale of seeing the airplane or at least his >observations of the settlers using aluminum from some source. The earliest accounts we have of the settlers using aluminum are from 1944. >However, I recall some of your conversations with >the early settler's saying they saw the aircraft prior to Gallagher's >arrival. The first work party arrived in December 1938. Gallagher took up residence on the island in September 1940 and left in June 1941. He died within days of his return in September 1941. There is a tradition, mentioned in several anecdotes, that there was an aircraft somewhere at Nikumaroro, when the first settlers arrived. Again, the communication of that information to Gallagher would depend upon the conditions listed above. >Another thing that has bothered me in light of the post loss messages is, if >AE did send them for the period covered (I believe 3-4 days after her failure >to arrive at Howland) why wouldn't Gallagher have found other stuff from the >aircraft. Once again, you're bothered because you have a perception of the situation that does not fit the possibility that little or no material was salvaged from the aircraft by AE and FN. None of us were there. The only clue we have to the question of how they were coping with the situation is the content of the post-loss radio messages. If those accounts, and particularly the fragments transcribed in Betty's notebook, are true then the answer is, "not well." LTm, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:19:47 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: 20 GPH > From Oscar Boswell > Since a gallon is 3.785 liters, 220 liters is actually more than 58 > gallons, and even without this mistake, your rule of thumb is flawed. Actually, that figure ties in nicely with the Kelly Johnson figures, which show a maximum fuel consumption at 1800 RPM and 28" of boost at 4000ft of 58 GPH. A rule of thumb such as Herman is remembering, would not be much good if it only gave you the best or worst figures. To be of use to the masses, it should give you a fair average consumption. Johnson stated his figures were "tests" not calculations. He also stated that the results were "for airplane" not "per engine". This means the figure of 18 GPH per engine was achieved, at 1700 RPM, 22" manifold pressure. The figures also suggest that at the worst likely settings, Earhart had around 22 hours of fuel at 1100 Gallons, and more likely 25 hours. Th' WOMBAT -- We don't use Windows - so You get fewer Viruses. Mepis Linux, Mozilla and OpenOffice.org. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:20:17 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: 20 GPH I should have added "approximately" because the drum is known as a 44 gallon drum in British regions, a 200 litre drum in Europe and a 50 gallon drum in the USA, but it seems to hold none of those quantities! On the subject of fuel, I remember putting together a couple of pages on fuel consumption based on Earhart's receipts from when she fuelled up on the earlier parts of her trip. I can't recall the exact result, but it did seem to point to figures in the Kelly Johnson range. Th' WOMBAT > From Ross Devitt Herman, > A 205 litre fuel drum holds 50 US Gallons of fuel.. > Th' WOMBAT ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:21:04 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues IMHO - If you are on a reef with a plane in sound condition and are expecting help to arrive within a day or two, you probably are going to stay with the plane and keep everything there in hopes that you will be able to fuel up and take-off. Thus you don't want to spend time unloading and reloading. Once you realize that you aren't going to get help before the surf destroys your plane, you don't have time to unload. Maybe the tide came in at night or rough surf developed suddenly. Anyway, we are trying to figure it out sitting in a nice comfortable easy chair, not on the ground with more than 24 hours in the air (plus how many awake prior to takeoff?). Add in the emotional mix of having missed your most important refueling site and all the other emotions that go with it and you have the potential for some poor decision making. Especially if she is saddled with a Noonan who has a head injury and may not be coherent much of the time. LTM, Dave Bush Houston, Texas ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:21:33 From: Jim Preston Subject: Re: Taroa Ron. I spent some time on Kwajalin in the sixty's. People who lived there said the Japanese used dynamite to make a huge cistern under the surface of the island. It had to be more than 20 feet deep as it was still in use in the 60's&70's for fresh water. It could be down 20 feet or less. Jim Preston ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:22:11 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: 20 GPH What airspeed could you expect the Electra to have with a setting of 1600 rpm vs 1700 rpm. Then what would that equate to in regards to time in flight to Howland vicinity? That should give you a better picture of which setting she most likely used. LTM, Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:22:54 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: 20 GPH > This does of course have consequences for deciding the amount of fuel > burned on the Lae-Howland flight. Apparently I missed one of AE's radio calls where she said what her power settings were for the entire Lae to Howland leg. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:23:21 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: 20 GPH > specific fuel consumption 0.52 lb/hp/hour Thanks Oscar. I keep trying to make that point but few listen. Reduction of power equals reduction of speed for a given weight. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:24:00 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Taroa Ron Bright wrote: > Woody and Mike believe the Japanese picked the Electra up, along with > AE,by one of the ships, and was transported to Jaluit. Thanks, Ron. I can't remember but weren't all the Japanese seaplane tenders accounted for? Were there other Japanese ships that had a clear deck and hoist? Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:24:28 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: 20 GPH Hi Wombat! Thanks for replying. According to my Airtour CRP-1 computer I used for nearly 20 years, 50 US gallons translate into 190 litres. 205 litres turn out to be 54.5 gallons or 45 Imperial gallons. Herman ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:24:52 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: 20 GPH I stand corrected. Should have put my spectacles on... On the CRP-1 scale 220 litres appears to be about 58 gallons. Herman ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:25:15 From: Herman De Wulf Subject: Re: fuel usage For Carl Peltzer With 1,100 gallons at take off a fuel consumption of 58 gallons would provide an endurance of just under 19 hours. At 52 gph it would be just over 21 hours. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:25:59 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Conjecture, Hypothesis, Theory Alan Caldwell wrote: > I like the way some spin the facts. What Scott says is so but the reader > comes away with a false impression. "days immediately following" is actually a > week later. Lambrecht flew over Gardner on the ninth of July. I wasn't trying to spin anything, Alan. Sorry if it seemed like it. Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:52:00 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Reed, you seem to have established a better rapport with Angus than anyone else. I don't count as Angus is antagonistic toward me because I needle him so much. I'll quit doing that as it makes him think I want to know his secrets or at least that I'm curious. I don't and I am not. Angus, as you can see has a problem. He has figured out something he wants to sell but he is in a couple of catch 22 positions. He can't figure out how to tell anyone the significance of his secret so as to get them to buy it. He can't get anyone to validate his theory because he can't trust anyone. He pointed out you were not a disinterested person which of course is true but only someone who has an intimate knowledge of the Earhart mystery would have the ability to say whether his information had value. Catch 22. I know he believes he can offer confirmation, albeit not 100%, that Earhart landed on Gardner. Angus is too close to his own project and can't see we already have enough circumstantial evidence to show Gardner was the place they ended up. Angus' information would just be redundant, regardless of its validity or quality. Angus can't see that. Our problem is not proving the plane landed on Niku. Our problem is figuring out how to search vast expanses of ocean bottom at some realistic cost. Nothing Angus can come up with can narrow that search. Nothing we can come up with can do that either, at least so far. We know it is not just over the reef edge but beyond that it could be almost anywhere. IF the plane was washed off the reef reasonably intact there is no way to tell how long it floated or how far or in what direction. That makes for a very large ocean to search. This is the same reason the crashed and sankers are at a dead end. Their ocean is too big. My suggestion is that you and Angus chat off forum. The more he writes the more chance he has of saying something he will regret. I don't want to be responsible for messing up Angus' potential for reward. I don't think any of us on the Forum are significantly curious but none of us would want to cause him the loss of what he thinks he has at stake. I'm off Angus's back and I hope everyone follows suit. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:52:54 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: 20 GPH Ross Devitt wrote: > The figures also suggest that at the worst likely settings, Earhart had > around 22 hours of fuel at 1100 Gallons, and more likely 25 hours. Good point, Ross. I've mentioned before that all the wrangling over how AE managed her fuel is hardly an issue. The airplane manages the fuel and it is hard to vary the fuel flow from the engine's design characteristics. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:53:16 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: fuel usage Herman, the fuel consumption decreases as does gross weight. Generally you can figure 58gpm at start ending at 38gpm near the end. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 10:53:52 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Scott wrote: > I wasn't trying to spin anything, Alan. Sorry if it seemed like it. I know that Scott. I must have been in a tacky mood. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:20:24 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Reed Reed, one last thought regarding helping Angus. He is rightly concerned his information could be compromised but he has an easy solution which he is well aware of. Any of the attorneys in Forum could solve his problem. Any except me as I would not wish to be involved. All he has to do is secure a client agreement with one of our guys to review and evaluate his information. Attorney client privilege will safeguard his project. If I did it I would charge a token dollar and I would assume the other guys might do the same. We could not risk suspension or loss of our license by revealing anything Angus told us. Angus is well aware of this solution but has not taken advantage of it. If I have any curiosity it is not about Angus' information but rather why he refuses to have his project evaluated when he could do so safely and without cost. I have to say that raises a specter of suspicion. I would not participate because Angus would not accept my opinion one way or another. That would be wise of him as he well knows that I think more information regarding Gardner doesn't help find the plane or create new funding. Angus disagrees. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:20:46 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Alan says: > We know it is not just over the reef > edge but beyond that it could be almost anywhere. IF the plane was washed off > the reef reasonably intact there is no way to tell how long it floated or how > far or in what direction. That makes for a very large ocean to search. I would define the problem somewhat differently. If the plane washed off the reef, drifted for a time and sank in very deep water well offshore prior to Lambrecht's overflight on July 9, then we must reject all of the anecdotal, photographic and physical clues that suggest that the later settlers knew about an airplane wreck and, at least for a time, had access to it or to pieces of it. I don't think we have a very large ocean to search. I think we have a rather specific section of the reef slope to search but the depths involved are greater than can be accessed by divers. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:21:22 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Thanks Alan for this little piece of inspiration. OK, Had an idea; Let's go in another direction with this thread: Suppose the airplane somehow got out past the reef then how about the drifting possible by a floating object from the island? Can that can be charted or approximated and if so we have a possible course outbound? Yes, I know we have no way of it's condition or how long it might float but this might be a start. ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:22:01 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Vaporware Alan Caldwell said: "My only problem with Angus is that he doesn't say what he has to offer in terms that are meaningful. Consequently it can't be determined whether his information has value to us or not." Alan, I think he is peddling "vaporware." You know, the software that is suppose to do everything but does nothing. Back in the mid-1800s, scam artists did a similar thing with old gold mines. They'd concoct some cock-and-bull story about having to sell the mine and offer it for sale to some unsuspecting rube at a fairly low price. A prospective buyer would visit it and find a few small nuggets of real gold at the opening the mine, which the scammer had placed ("salted") there immediately before the visit. The victim would see it and, with riches glowing in his eyes, would pay the owner his asking price thinking he'd really put one over on this guy. Of course the mine was worthless, but the victim didn't know that until after paying his money and putting in a lot of sweat equity. Vaporware, salted gold mines, treasure maps, perpetual motion machines, cold fusion, and now the key to the Earhart mystery, it's all the same. All show, no go. LTM, who avoids vaporware Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:22:30 From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory From: Mike Haddock I've always assumed that Lambrecht's use of the term "recent" habitation referred to well-worn paths or trails to and from the "7" site. Am I just having a senior moment? Keep up the good work, Ric. LTM, Mike Haddock, #2438 ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:33:07 From: Dennis O. McGee Subject: Re: Reed's offer Reed Riddle said: "I offer my services to Angus in order to evaluate his evidence. I will not divulge the evidence to the forum . . . I will share my evaluation of its validity with the forum, and explain my reasoning as best I can without divulging the details. That won't be easy, but an outside examination can only help the interpretation. Angus, if you are willing to allow your evidence to undergo an unbiased examination by an outside observer, please let me know and we can make arrangements accordingly." Awwwww-RIGHT!!!!! I've just forward to my bookie for his evaluation the last 30 days of forum comments on the Angus Issue. He's offering odds of 10-1 that Angus DOES NOT accept Reed's proposal, and odds of 200-1 that the info will be judged as having no value. I don't know he arrived at those figures, but I think remote viewing had something to do ith it. LTM, who's in for $20 Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:33:31 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues Dave/Ric, I doubt very much that refueling and takeoff from Gardner was a real possibility. Just getting on the island must have been one heck of a feat. If AE had time to take the sextant box, a bottle, shoes, chains and corks, etc., why not the flashlight, ax, signal pistol, etc., (see the Luke Inventory for other possible items that could be of assistance on the island). Something just doesn't fit here. If the post loss messages are indeed from AE over a 3-4 day period and none of them exhibit a specific distress call e.g. "we are located at XXX, come and help us FN is injured, etc." but rather ramblings of a person who seems to have given up hope and is suffering mental anguish it seems to me that being stranded on the island has already become a reality for AE and FN. If they feel stuck there why not make the best of it by using other hardware from the plane. The only explanation that comes to mind is that they filled the sextant box with goodies and while floating it to shore it dumped its contents and only the box was left. If this happened then that puts the post loss messages in doubt because it would imply the aircraft was in water deep enough to cause them to wade/swim to shore and therefor render the engines inop. In summary the post loss messages have to fit into series of events from the time they landed to the time the plane either sank or floated away. I find it hard to believe that self survival instincts didn't become priority number one! ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 12:42:08 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather > From Alan Caldwell > > Reed, you seem to have established a better rapport with Angus than anyone > else. I don't count as Angus is antagonistic toward me because I needle him so > much. You "don't count" because you make your mind up before you have the evidence, make categoric statements on subjects you know nothing about and have little in the way of good manners. You also have little conception of rational thinking unclouded by emotion. Reed, on the other hand, knows how to be polite, has evidently reserved judgement until he sees something and generally behaves the way one might expect any scientist to behave. > I'm off Angus's back I'll believe it when I see it. You've said several times you want to see an end to the thread but you still keep posting. >and I hope everyone follows suit. In case you haven't noticed Alan, - you're the only one. Regards Angus ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 14:59:48 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues Ted Campbell says: > I doubt very much that refueling and takeoff from Gardner was a real > possibility. You're doing it again. You've set all kinds of conditions based upon your own perception of the situation and then you use those conditions to make decisions about what must have and could not have happened. How can you possibly know AE's opinion of the likelihood that she could land, resolve her radio problems, call for help, get refueled by Itasca, and take off again? >Just getting on the island must have been one heck of a feat. Really? Have you ever been on that reef? What information are you drawing on to decide that landing there would be one heck of a feat? > If AE had time to take the sextant box, a bottle, shoes, chains and corks, > etc., why not the flashlight, ax, signal pistol, etc., (see the Luke Inventory > for other possible items that could be of assistance on the island). I could easily offer scenarios to explain all of that but the point is that neither of us knows what the situation was. > Something just doesn't fit here. If the post loss messages are indeed from > AE over a 3-4 day period and none of them exhibit a specific distress call > e.g. "we are located at XXX, come and help us FN is injured, etc." but rather > ramblings of a person who seems to have given up hope and is suffering mental > anguish it seems to me that being stranded on the island has already become a > reality for AE and FN. If they feel stuck there why not make the best of it > by using other hardware from the plane. I respectfully suggest that you wait until you know what the post-loss messages say before you decide what they don't say. > The only explanation that comes to mind is that they filled the sextant box > with goodies and while floating it to shore it dumped its contents and only > the box was left. If this happened then that puts the post loss messages in > doubt because it would imply the aircraft was in water deep enough to cause > them to wade/swim to shore and therefor render the engines inop. A hundred things could have happened - things we can imagine and things we can't. One of the biggest mistakes we can make is to think that we know more than we do. > In summary the post loss messages have to fit into series of events from the > time they landed to the time the plane either sank or floated away. I find > it hard to believe that self survival instincts didn't become priority number > one! Well...it's all about we each of us finds easy or difficult to believe, isn't it? LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 15:00:10 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Reed's offer All of you guys are missing the point. There is no way in hell that TIGHAR is going to pay Angus or anyone else a bleedin' farthing for information, no matter how conclusive it is alleged to be. It's a matter of principle. If somebody else wants to pay him and then make the information public (or try to use it to raise money for their own treasure hunt) that's up to them. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2004 15:00:35 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Mike Haddock says: > I've always assumed that Lambrecht's use of the term "recent" habitation > referred to well-worn paths or trails to and from the "7" site. Am I > just having a senior moment? The apparent trails show up in a Dec. 1, 1938 photo taken in junction with the Kiwi survey. By coincidence, the one phot we have of Gardner that was taken during the Lambrecht overflight also shows the Seven Site (albeit in much poorer resolution). No trails are apparent in that photo but neither should there be if the trails were made by AE and FN. The Lambrecht photo was taken on July 9, 1937 - just a week after the disappearance. AE and FN had not had time to decide they were probably not going to be rescued anytime soon, explore the island, decide on the Seven site as the best spot to hang out, and develop a system of trails in that location. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:42:23 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE's fuel, weather Carl, as you can see by Ric's post there are more than one possibility. Ric points out that "wreckage" may have been seen on the reef later on. The idea I presented requires the Electra to be washed off the reef around the 8th or ninth just before Lambrecht made his over flight, washed back up for it to be seen by the folks who came to the island later and then washed away for good. The problem with my theory that it could have been relatively intact and floated away is the probable damage the reef would have incurred. It may have not been capable of floating. If that is the case then it should be found in deep water off the reef edge. The obvious difficulty with that is whether the plane was significantly damaged to the point it couldn't float. I don;t think we have a good handle on that. As to which way it would go I can;t answer. The currents just to the North change from east to west at different times of the year. Exactly what they were on the 9th of July 1937 I don't know. As to Ric's theory I think his is the most likely but I wouldn't put too much hard earned money on it until we have a better way to make the search. There is also the possibility no aircraft wreckage was ever spotted on the beach. Language communication and misunderstandings could be factors in the anecdote. Ric suggested without time travel we may never know much more about what happened. I mused that it would have been nice to go back to 1937 and track the plane with GPS. Sadly there were no satellites up and running so the whole idea falls flat. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:43:39 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Vaporware Dennis McGee wrote: > Alan, I think he is peddling "vaporware." You know, the software that > is suppose to do everything but does nothing. Dennis I have had long off forum email exchanges with Angus. I give him a terrible time but I believe he is on the level. He strikes me as a very honest man. I don't know whether he has been misled or is deluding himself but my basic assessment is that he truly has some information that adds to what we already have that indicates the Electra made it to Gardner. Not 100% certain but of some significance. Angus thinks his information is so good that it will cause potential funds to materialize for an ocean search. This is where Angus and I disagree. It is my belief that even a video of the Electra landing there would not help. Most of TIGHAR already believes the plane landed there. I think we have enough circumstantial evidence to "prove" that. When Ric posts the post loss data I think the major road block to potential funding will be removed. At this time there is a large segment thinking they ended up in the Marshall's and another large segment thinking the plane crashed and sank. There are surprisingly few who subscribe to the Gardner theory. We are too close to that idea and that makes it seem like the foremost theory to us. It is not. All the publicity emphasis has been on Long's ideas and the Marshall/Japanese theory. The post loss radio data will convincingly show the plane landed thus eliminating the crashed and sankers. It will also show they never flew to the Marshall's. Common sense tells you the Japanese never sailed a thousand miles down into British waters to salvage a wrecked Electra. Bottom line is I have little doubt Angus is legitimate albeit somewhat misguided. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:44:03 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues Ted, there is no way to know how AE and FN reacted to the situation they were in. Almost any possibility could have occurred. We had a B-52 crew bail out over the far north. All survived except for the navigator who was found frozen to death sitting on his unopened survival kit. Some very bright people are just not survivors. I know folks who could never get a can open in such a situation. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:45:15 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Reed's offer Ric wrote: > All of you guys are missing the point. What guys? Angus says I am the only one. There seems to be different realities at work here. None of us think TIGHAR or anyone else is going to pay Angus for his information. Only Angus believes that. I'm just in disbelief that anyone has the gall to believe someone would pay money and not know what he was paying for. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:45:38 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory I have always felt that Lambrecht's signs of "recent" habitation were highly significant but that he was thrown off when no one responded to his "low" flying and "zooming" and so discounted the recent signs. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:47:58 From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Reed's offer Dennis said: > Awwwww-RIGHT!!!!! I've just forwarded to my bookie for his evaluation the > last 30 days of forum comments on the Angus Issue. He's offering odds > of 10-1 that Angus DOES NOT accept Reed's proposal, and odds of 200-1 > that the info will be judged as having no value. Dennis - let me know his address! At 200:1 I will make a million on a £5000 bet and once he's taken the bet I can reveal all to Reed and the forum. I'll get £50,000 just for revealing the story to Reed. Problem solved! Reagrds Angus. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:48:17 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Taroa For Jim Preston Are you mixing up the atolls. Some believe the Electra was unloaded in July 37 at Taroa, not Kwajalein. On the other hand, I have an update on a post I made about a year ago. This was the report by a Kwajalein Security or Police Officer, De Los Reyes, who said she was assigned to picu\k up a partial female skeleton discovered on Roi Namur, and return them to Kwajalein proper. Along with the bones, she said, was a 1930s watch. All of which made the Kwaj officials suspect the bones were Amelias. The bones, she continued, were sent off circa June 1985 to Hawaii for a forensic identification. Tom King is trying to locate someone at the Army Lab to confirm the report. It was supposed to be rather "hush hush". Although female skeletons may be rare, I am sure there are plenty of other possibilities. So last week I talked again to Kathy De Los Reyes and she couldn't really add any other significant details and added that she "lost" her documentations, or dairy of the event when she returned to the US. LTM, Ron Bright ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:49:10 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues > From Ric > Ted Campbell says: > >> The only explanation that comes to mind is that they filled the sextant box >> with goodies and while floating it to shore it dumped its contents and only >> the box was left. If this happened then that puts the post loss messages in >> doubt because it would imply the aircraft was in water deep enough to cause >> them to wade/swim to shore and therefor render the engines inop. Actually, this has been implied by Ric and others who have seen the site. The reef flat is tidal. At times it is dry, and at times they would indeed have to wade ashore, even if the water was not deep enough to render the engines (permanently) inoperable. Th' WOMBAT. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:49:38 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Taroa For Alan and Ric, I think it was either Donahue or Carrington that had the fact sheet on the Koshu, a large, over a 120 ft converted German freighter. It had booms forward and on the stern. Some experts in this crowd could probably give an educated guess on how, or if a heavy plane such as the Electra could be hoisted to the stern. LTM, R0n Bright ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:51:06 From: Tom Hickcox Subject: Re: 20 GPH > From Ross Devitt > > I should have added "approximately" because the drum is known as a 44 > gallon drum in British regions, a 200 litre drum in Europe and a 50 > gallon drum in the USA, but it seems to hold none of those quantities! > > On the subject of fuel, I remember putting together a couple of pages > on fuel consumption based on Earhart's receipts from when she fuelled > up on the earlier parts of her trip. > > I can't recall the exact result, but it did seem to point to figures > in the Kelly Johnson range. Are you using the term drum and barrel interchangeably? A barrel of hydrocarbon is by definition 42 U.S. gallons, or about 159 liters. >> From Ross Devitt Herman, >> A 205 litre fuel drum holds 50 US Gallons of fuel.. >> Th' WOMBAT By my calculations using an immaculate conversion factor <>, 205 liters is 54.2 U.S. gallons. Perhaps that's the difference in litres and liters. Fortunately, when I took my chemistry degree we only had to worry about earth, air, fire, and water. Tom Hickcox ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:52:08 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Ric wrote: > . . . The Lambrecht photo was taken on July 9, 1937 - just a week > after the disappearance. AE and FN had not had time to decide they > were probably not going to be rescued anytime soon, explore the island, > decide on the Seven site as the best spot to hang out, and develop a > system of trails in that location. I've read somewhere on the Tighar site that there was no surface water available on Niku Isl. Anybody know about how much drinking water would have been aboard the plane? Or if there were other water sources? E.g., would it have rained enough over those few days to provide a meaningful amount, collected in anything that might hold it? Was there training or widely known pilot lore on how to capture rainwater or even condensation and funnel it into a vessel for drinking? If the only water available was whatever they brought along for the flight, I would not expect them to last 7 days. Has anyone here researched how long people can last before they succumb to dehydration in such circumstances? Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:53:26 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Replying to Ric > Scott and I are finding less and less to disagree on. Let me see if I > can continue to chip away at the list. I'm in no position to disagree on facts, and I appreciate your setting me straight where I screw them up. I might weigh them differently, but I do this from my armchair, and not from the front row seat in the investigation where Ric sits. And I tend to open my big mouth before I figure out what I'm talking about . . . > There appears to be a strong possibility that Lambrecht's "signs of > recent habitation" at Sydney were marks in the sand. That's one possibility. I think it's also possible that he may have seen something else, less permanent than structures but more permanent than footprints. Maybe rock or wood windbreaks, or a fire ring. But if he'd seen rocks or heavy mollusc shells arranged into SOS or AMELIA HERE or something, he'd have gone to a lot more effort to figure out the source. I tend to think that if he'd seen evidence of habitation within the past few days (smoking campfire, footprints, words in English . . . ) he'd have made a bigger deal out of it in his reporting. Are there chunks of coral on the island the right size to pile into a windbreak, or arrange into letters on the beach? > Whoever it was [at the seven site] had to meet > certain criteria. Norwich City is a real stretch. For the castaway to > be an NC survivor you have to say that: > A. There was a Norwich City survivor somehow left behind by the > rescuers. > B. He had a woman's shoe with him. > C. The sextant box he somehow saved or found washed up from the wreck > survived eight years in the Niku environment intact and with the > numbers still legible. Couldn't one or a few Norwich City crew members have occupied the site briefly while waiting for rescuers? What about preliminary visitors evaluating the island pre-settlement? Isn't it still at least somewhat uncertain whether the sole is from a woman's or man's shoe? [or maybe sailors aboard the Norwich City had something in common with the famous lumberjacks of the Monty Python song!] Does the sole float? Could it have washed up onto the island? I guess I'll need to read more about the sextant box, but it seems (offhand) that several prior visitors would have had good reason to take a sextant ashore to fix their positions, and may have accidentally left the box behind. Also, is it clear that the box couldn't have originated with the B-24? BTW - I see that the revised edition of Tom's book will be out soon, and I promise, I'll get it and read it. So don't spend too long on this if you don't have time. > There is every indication that the castaway was a Westerner (sextant > box, shoes, etc.). If he/she was not an NC survivor, where's the > report of a missing yacht or ship? Is it clear that these artifacts originated from a single source? Is it unreasonable that someone at the site may have scavenged them from around the island and carried them to the site, thinking they might come in handy? > Where's the wrecked yacht, ship or at least lifeboat or raft? That one is easy -- same place Tighar hypothesizes that the Electra went. :-) > . . . the assumption that if the colonists found a wrecked > airplane in the bush or in shallow water just off the reef, they would > think it was a big deal is a culturally biased perception. Much more on this in your current exchange with Ted Campbell. I still tend to think that, if the plane had been there, then Gallagher would have learned about it. Or, at the very least, enough of it would have been salvaged by colonists to leave behind some less-ambiguous artifacts. It's downright weird that all the clearly identifiable plane parts trace back to a plane that never was on the island. > "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." has always > seemed to me to be a fairly meaningless aphorism that is just a short > step away from its corollary "Absence of evidence is proof of a cover > up." I love this one, Ric, and I plan to steal it. Thanks for the explanation on the battery and dynamotor locations. Just for the sake of running down this path to its bitter end . . . I presume someone has given some thought to the possibility that AE and FN, if stranded in a floating plane, might have salvaged those components by moving them higher up in the plane? Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:53:51 From: Scott White Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues > Ted Campbell says: >> I doubt very much that refueling and takeoff from Gardner was a real >> possibility. > Ric replies: > You're doing it again. You've set all kinds of conditions based upon > your own perception of the situation and then you use those conditions > to make decisions about what must have and could not have happened. . What is it about this list that makes such a wet blanket out of me?? As I understand it, the Tighar hypothesis is that the plane landed on the reef, below the high tide line, and later was washed off the reef. Now, I admit, I haven't seen the reef. But I've walked around knee deep in the rocky intertidal zone quite a bit (I once thought I was going to be a marine biologist, but openings for crew members on Jacques Cousteau's Calypso don't come up very often). It seems very unlikely to me that prospects for flying off of the reef were ever realistic. And even if AE & FN did think they could take off from the reef, they'd have known that it would be at minimum a few days before the Itasca could find them, inspect the plane, and refuel it. But Ric, Pat (and others here?) have been on the reef. Presuming that's where the plane was, would it have been at all realistic to imagine taking off again? They had to stay in the plane to use the radio. Good reasons to leave the plane were to look for food and water. If the plane was vulnerable to wave action, they would have learned that when the tide came in the first day. Safety would become another good reason to leave the plane, or at least prepare to leave it. Like Ted, I wasn't there and I don't know what really went on. But it seems very likely that they would have taken any basic survival gear available onto dry land, even if they spent most of their time in the plane trying to use the radio. That doesn't mean the survival gear wouldn't have disappeared in the next storm . . . Dave Bush wrote: "If you are on a reef with a plane in sound condition and are expecting help to arrive within a day or two, you probably are going to stay with the plane and keep everything there in hopes that you will be able to fuel up and take-off. Thus you don't want to spend time unloading and reloading. Once you realize that you aren't going to get help before the surf destroys your plane, you don't have time to unload." Maybe so, Dave, but this sounds like an ad hoc argument to me. It leaves no window for taking stuff off the plane, and thus helps explain the inconvenient fact that few (if any) artifacts have been found on the island. Ric's criticisms of Ted's views would apply equally well to this scenario. Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:54:16 From: Scott White Subject: Re: AE's fuel and weather Ric wrote: > How ya gonna get a 7,000 pound airplane > to where the crane can grab it? You gonna wait for a calm day and raft > it out to the ship? I'd pay admission to watch somebody try to load a > Lockheed 10 from a reef-edge onto a raft. If I was going to try it, I would strap a bunch of inflatable pontoons onto the plane at low tide, and then try to move it off the reef or beach at high tide. Then use one or more small boats to pull it out to deeper water. I'm not claiming this would work, and I'm certainly not claiming that it happened. Best, -SW ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:55:08 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: Reed's offer Hi Angus, I can understand why you're reluctant...I'm sure we have all dreamed, just a little, what would happen if we figured out the key to the mystery. If you really have, everyone will be excited, and maybe a little jealous. :) One thing I want you to consider though...having a second set of eyes look at something always improves the view. There have been many times that I have looked over someone's shoulder, or they have looked over mine, and together we have figured out something that neither of us could see independently. A second perspective will usually (but not always) bring up new questions that can clarify the meaning of the data. Sometimes, that means that the data is shown not to mean what we think, but that's all a part of science (and an unappreciated one). If you're still interested, I would be glad to look at the evidence without telling the forum about it. I'll still press you to tell everyone what you have found, but I wouldn't say anything until you allowed me. And, having a second person look at it will either give you confidence in your interpretation, or save you from spending more energy on something that isn't as great as you think. Either way, you will some extra confirmation of what you have...and I think we all hope it does help solve the mystery. Reed ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:55:38 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: Reed's offer Ric wrote: > All of you guys are missing the point. I'm not...if Angus has a key to the mystery, then having someone confirm that for him will help to bring it out quicker. If it's not a key, but a minor bit, then he'll be more likely to contribute it without looking for funding. If it's meaningless, then we all save (and maybe the forum will quit picking on him). This is different from the science I do...none of us look at the profit in our work in astronomy, because there is none. :) But, the Earhart story can make money for someone, even people who are making things up (not talking about Angus here). If Angus can turn his information into a profit, more power to him. I'm a scientist, and will do whatever I can to promote the free flow of information. If no one will pay, and it's good data, then maybe discussing the data with Angus will convince him to release it for the common good. All the sniping here isn't going to convince him to share though. Reed ======================================================================= Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 10:56:15 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Ric, Develop a system of trails with what? You've been there did you and the others develop a system of trails? Did you have to use any tools or was just walking around the underbrush enough? ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 11:08:21 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Re: Reed's offer Angus said: "Dennis - let me know his [my bookie] address! At 200:1 I will make a million on a £5000 bet and once he's taken the bet I can reveal all to Reed and the forum. I'll get £50,000 just for revealing the story to Reed. Problem solved!" Here's a deal: I'll give you the address if you give me your information. That way you can get rich and TIGHAR can find Earhart. Win-win, problems solved!!! :-) LTM, who's led a rich life Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 11:16:23 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory You are making reference to a photo taken of Gardner Is on 9 July by Lt Lambrecht. I haven't heard of this before. Is it included in his report? Do we have his specific photo? Is it the one shown in Donahues book that doesn't look like Gardner? LTM, Ron Bright **************************************** http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Documents/Lambrecht_Photo.html ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 11:51:30 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory re: Lambrecht photo,dated 9 July 37 Ric, Thanks for refreshing my mind. Presumably there is no debate over the date on the reverse. Odd that the photography of those islands were not mentioned in his report. Would there be any significance if the only Island that was photographed was Gardner? [ Was that a young lady waving in the bottom left corner of the photo?] LTM, Ron Bright ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 11:51:51 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Taroa Ron Bright says: > I think it was either Donahue or Carrington that had the fact sheet > on the Koshu, a large, over a 120 ft converted German freighter. It > had booms forward and on the stern. Koshu was, supposedly, a "survey ship". Loomis/Ethel say that it was "capable of retrieving small floatplanes" but they don't say how they know that. U.S. "survey ships" such as USS Bushnell did not have that capability. The Japanese seaplane tender Kamui (usually misspelled Kamoi) that is sometimes alleged to have participated in the Japanese search was never anywhere near the area. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 12:22:21 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory > If the only water available was whatever they brought along for the flight, > I would not expect them to last 7 days. Has anyone here researched how long > people can last before they succumb to dehydration in such circumstances? Nobody knows how much water they had aboard the plane. Reasonable parameters might range from a minimum of a few quarts to maybe a couple gallons. Nobody knows whether it rained at Niku during the week between the disappearance and the Lambrecht overflight. Based upon our own experiences at Niku during similar times of year it would be unusual if there were not occasional rain showers. Whether they figured out how to collect rain water if it did rain is anybody's guess, but we do know that there were probably means both aboard the airplane (tarps) and ashore (corrugated iron sheeting) that could be used as part of a catchment system. We also have reason to believe that there was a cache of supplies, including drinking water, left on the island in the area where we think they came ashore , by the rescuers of the Norwich City survivors. We also know that SOME castaway - whether it was AE and FN or somebody else - managed to survive for a considerable time on the island. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 12:23:11 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Ted Campbell asks: > Develop a system of trails with what? You've been there did you and the > others develop a system of trails? Did you have to use any tools or was just > walking around the underbrush enough? Excellent question. Yes. Trails-R-Us. Take a look at the research bulletin at: http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Bulletins/21_RecentHab/21_RecentHab.html Just walking on the coral rubble along the same route for a couple of days is enough to make visible path because the sun darkens the upper surface of the rubble. Walking disturbs the surface and uncovers the underlying, lighter-colored rubble. Of course, if you're under the trees then the trail would not be visible from the air but, fortunately for us, the 1938 photo was taken at the height of a devastating period of drought that stripped the trees of their foliage. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 13:24:28 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Ron Bright asks: > Odd that the photography of those islands were not mentioned in his > report. Would there be any significance if the only Island that was > photographed was Gardner? Remember the Lambrecht's "report" wasn't a report at all. It was an article written for a Navy newsletter. We really have no idea who took the photo we call the "Lambrecht photo" except that it had to have been taken by one of the six men in the three planes that flew over the island that day. It's a lousy photograph and clearly an amateur effort. The Colorado's Corsairs were not set up to be photography platforms. Somebody probably just snapped a photo with a personal camera. Knowing how the cockpits of the 03U-3 are set up, the absence of aircraft structure (struts and wires) in the photo suggests to me that it was taken by one of the observers in the rear cockpits. We don't know that other photos of other islands weren't taken. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 13:27:22 From: Eric Beheim Subject: GP and "Flight for Freedom" It can be argued that the Amelia-was-a-spy theory came about largely as a result of the commercial success of the 1943 RKO film FLIGHT FOR FREEDOM. According to the Internet Movie Data Base, the film's original story was credited to Horace McCoy (1897-1955)who specialized in writing scripts for B pictures during the 1930s, '40s, and '50s. At around this same time, George Putnam was also employed in Hollywood. From what I have read, he worked for Paramount Pictures as a story editor, reviewing scripts to determine which ones should be produced as feature films. In this capacity, he undoubtedly knew many Hollywood writers and would also have been familiar with the various scripts that were being developed and marketed around town. Therefore, it is unlikely that he was unaware that a fictionalized script about AE was being prepared and that it implied that she was lost while on a special mission for the U.S. Government. From what I've read about GP, he was a master promoter who never missed an opportunity to keep Amelia in the public eye. Did this include working behind the scenes to help perpetuate a myth about her being involved in a Government spy mission? According to AMELIA EARHART'S SHOES, RKO paid him a fee, reportedly to forestall a lawsuit. But perhaps it was actually for his cooperation in helping to develop the script for FLIGHT FOR FREEDOM (or at least give it his blessing.) The fact that the film was a commercial success was certainly a win-win for GB. Not only did it add to the Earhart legend, but it also left the impression that the failure of the world flight was somehow connected with a noble sacrifice made in the national interest. Hmmmm. LTM (who also likes old films) Eric, Naval Station San Diego ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 14:34:31 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: 20 GPH > From Tom Hickcox >> From Ross Devitt >> >> I should have added "approximately" because the drum is known as a 44 >> gallon drum in British regions, a 200 litre drum in Europe and a 50 >> gallon drum in the USA, but it seems to hold none of those >> quantities! > Are you using the term drum and barrel interchangeably? A barrel of > hydrocarbon is by definition 42 U.S. gallons, or about 159 liters. I did not recall mentioning "barrel" at all. Sorry if I did, it is unusual for me because barrel is not a term we ever use for fuel. I have no idea why I said that, nor can I find the post. In any case, I meant drum. >>> From Ross Devitt Herman, >>> A 205 litre fuel drum holds 50 US Gallons of fuel.. >>> Th' WOMBAT > By my calculations using an immaculate conversion factor <>, 205 > liters is 54.2 U.S. gallons. > Perhaps The same drum is referred to as 200 litres and 205 litres, and as a 44 gallon (imp) and 50 gallon (US). As I pointed out, I don't think it "actually" holds any of those amounts, but I would be interested to know. I do know that when we changed our system of measurement the actual drum seemed to stay the same. Th' WOMBAT -- We don't use Windows - so You get fewer Viruses. Mepis Linux, Mozilla and OpenOffice.org. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 14:35:11 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Scott White says: > But if (Lambrecht) had seen > rocks or heavy mollusc shells arranged into SOS or AMELIA HERE or > something, he'd have gone to a lot more effort to figure out the source. A safe assumption. > I tend to think that if he'd seen evidence of habitation within the > past few days (smoking campfire, footprints, words in English . . . ) > he'd have made a bigger deal out of it in his reporting. You seem to be saying that "recent" means something different than "recent". Lambrecht clearly saw something that made him think that someone was there not just in past few weeks or the last few days, but right then. That's why he circled and zoomed to try to "elicit an answering wave." > Are there chunks of coral on the island the right size to pile into a > windbreak, or arrange into letters on the beach? Sure, but a wall/windbreak made of coral slabs is pretty substantial. There are structures like that in the village that have been there for at least 40 years. You could probably spell out letters on the beach but the only reason to do that would be if you expected an aerial search. For Earhart to have expected an aerial search she would have had to be listening to news reports about the search on KGMB - and there is evidence in the post-loss receptions to indicate that she was. However, as you say, if Lambrecht had seen English words or the letters AE or SOS spelled out on the beach he certainly would not have reacted as he did. >> Whoever it was [at the seven site] had to meet >> certain criteria. Norwich City is a real stretch. For the castaway >> to >> be an NC survivor you have to say that: >> A. There was a Norwich City survivor somehow left behind by the >> rescuers. >> B. He had a woman's shoe with him. >> C. The sextant box he somehow saved or found washed up from the wreck >> survived eight years in the Niku environment intact and with the >> numbers still legible. > > Couldn't one or a few Norwich City crew members have occupied the site > briefly while waiting for rescuers? No. We have good descriptions of their activities and they were never anywhere near there. > What about preliminary visitors evaluating the island pre-settlement? Nope. There was only one such visit - Maude and Bevington in October 1937 - and we have detailed information about where they went and what they did. See Bevington's diary at http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Documents/Documents_index.html#11 Besides which, any explanation for the Seven Site has to involve somebody dying there. > Isn't it still at least somewhat > uncertain whether the sole is from a woman's or man's shoe? [or maybe > sailors aboard the Norwich City had something in common with the famous > lumberjacks of the Monty Python song!] Gallagher was unequivocal about it. That's all we can say. > Does the sole float? That's a question for Father Moleski. (sorry, couldn't resist.) > Could it have > washed up onto the island? Not where Gallagher found it. He specifically says that all the stuff he found was well above the normal wash-up line and to say that it was deposited there by a storm is to say that storm happened to deposit an entire scene (a partial skeleton under a tree, remains of a fire and birds and turtle, shoe parts, sextant box etc.) that coincidentally just happened to look like a castaway's camp. > I guess I'll need to read more about the sextant > box, but it seems (offhand) that several prior visitors would have had good > reason to take a sextant ashore to fix their positions, and may have > accidentally left the box behind. I'll be interested to hear about these careless prior visitors. > Also, is it clear that the box couldn't have originated with the B-24? Very clear. You're not thinking Scott. Gallagher found the box in September 1940. There were no B-24s anywhere in the Pacific until about two years later. > Is it clear that these artifacts originated from a single source? Is it > unreasonable that someone at the site may have scavenged them from around > the island and carried them to the site, thinking they might come in > handy? That is almost certainly what happened with at least some of the objects we found at the site. There were, for example, several glass fragments, all from different glass objects and all usable as cutting tools, found together in one spot (and no sign of the rest of the objects they came from). The sexant box could have been similarly beachcombed but it seems less likely given its apparently good condition. >> Where's the wrecked yacht, ship or at least lifeboat or raft? > > That one is easy -- same place Tighar hypothesizes that the Electra went. > :-) Maybe not so easy. Yachts and lifeboats tend to float better than airplanes. The Norwich City lifeboat washed ashore and was found (and photographed) in the bushes by the New Zealand survey team. >> . . . the assumption that if the colonists found a wrecked >> airplane in the bush or in shallow water just off the reef, they would >> think it was a big deal is a culturally biased perception. > > Much more on this in your current exchange with Ted Campbell. I still tend > to think that, if the plane had been there, then Gallagher would have > learned about it. Or, at the very least, enough of it would have been > salvaged by colonists to leave behind some less-ambiguous artifacts. My comments to Ted apply here. > It's downright weird that all the clearly identifiable plane parts > trace back to a plane that never was on the island. Why so weird? There was never a B-24 on the island and yet there were b-24 parts there. All that is required is that someone who lives on Niku has access to an airplane or airplane wreck for some period of time. > I presume someone > has given some thought to the possibility that AE and FN, if stranded in a > floating plane, might have salvaged those components by moving them higher > up in the plane? No way. All of those components (batteries, dynamotor, transmitter, antenna leads, remotes, etc.) are linked with cables and wires that run all through the airplane. You can't just take it all apart and assemble it someplace else, especially while bobbing around on a half-submerged airplane. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 15:14:32 From: Dennis McGee Subject: Re: Lambrecht photo Ric said: "Knowing how the cockpits of the 03U-3 are set up, the absence of aircraft structure (struts and wires) in the photo suggests to me that it was taken by one of the observers in the rear cockpits." If it was, it would have to be taken as the photographer looked back as the airplane traveled away from the island. If the photo was taken looking forward it is difficult to see how the photographers could avoid including portions of the wings. Here are a couple of photos of the O3U-3, both real and models for the forum to see what I'm talking about. http://www.vought.com/heritage/products/html/o3u-3.html and http://www.internetmodeler.com/2000/september/aviation/vought.htm Obviously trying to shoot forward would cause considerable problems, and shooting towards the rear as the plane departed could allow the shooter to include parts of the horizontal stabilizer and the vertical fin. Even shooting at 90 degrees to the subject, which this photo apparently was, the camera would record parts of the upper and lower wings, wouldn't it? But if the camera had a telephoto lens . . . Assuming (Dennis, I've told you NOT to use that word in front of Ric!) this is a full-negative print, (i.e. the processor used the whole negative and did not crop off anything) and that the camera was held in a vertical rather than horizontal position (which it appears to be) maybe the shooter could have pulled it off. But a couple of things seem to be in conflict here. 1. Photo quality: Tighar suggests it may be an amateur's effort using a hand-held personal camera. Yes, that would explain the poor quality, but those personal cameras had a relatively wide angle lens in an effort to mimic the angle of sight of humans, which is around 50-55 degrees. That size lens, combined with the dimensions and shape of the Corsair, I think would make it difficult for the shooter to avoid including parts of the aircraft structure - regardless if it was horizontal or vertical shot. 2. Photo size/shape. Personal cameras of that era produced rough square photos from their "110" format; 35mm was available but only in the higher end Leicas, Nikons, etc The dimensions of the photo suggest it is not an uncropped 110 or 35mm format. Therefore, if it is a cropped photo then it could also be from a standard USN reconn camera, but that would leave unexplained the poor quality of the image. I don't know how to resolve these conflicts other than to suggest that the photo was taken with a telephoto lens (to avoid the aircraft structure and which would partially account for the poor quality of the print), or it was cropped by the processor to take out the aircraft structure. Maybe somebody with more knowledge of 1930-era cameras could offer some educated guess as to what we may have. LTM, a recovering shootist Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 15:15:17 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues Scott White says: > As I understand it, the Tighar hypothesis is that the plane landed on the > reef, below the high tide line, and later was washed off the reef. > Now, I admit, I haven't seen the reef. But I've walked around knee deep in the > rocky intertidal zone quite a bit (I once thought I was going to be a marine > biologist, but openings for crew members on Jacques Cousteau's Calypso don't > come up very often). It seems very unlikely to me that prospects for flying > off of the reef were ever realistic. I suspect that if you saw the reef you'd feel differently. > And even if AE & FN did think they > could take off from the reef, they'd have known that it would be at minimum > a few days before the Itasca could find them, inspect the plane, and refuel > it. But Ric, Pat (and others here?) have been on the reef. Presuming that's > where the plane was, would it have been at all realistic to imagine taking > off again? Yes. > They had to stay in the plane to use the radio. Good reasons to leave the > plane were to look for food and water. If the plane was vulnerable to wave > action, they would have learned that when the tide came in the first day. > Safety would become another good reason to leave the plane, or at least > prepare to leave it. Our hindcasting of the tidal situation suggests that high tide was not a particular threat to the aircraft for the first few days but each day's high tide got a little higher until, about the time that most of the post-loss messages stop, it was high enough to become a real problem. > Like Ted, I wasn't there and I don't know what really went on. But it seems > very likely that they would have taken any basic survival gear available > onto dry land, even if they spent most of their time in the plane trying to > use the radio. That doesn't mean the survival gear wouldn't have disappeared > in the next storm . . . You're assuming that they saw the land as being a safer environment than the plane, but we don't know that that is the case. What sort of dangers lurked in that jungle? Were there wild animals, poisonous snakes, disease-bearing insects, maybe even (gasp) cannibals? The briefest visit ashore would reveal the presence of rats and crabs that look like something out of King Kong. I don't know that they thought any of those things but neither can it be automatically assumed that they didn't. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 15:15:49 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: AE's fuel and weather Where are you going to get the inflatable pontoons? You have to use the materials that are available to the ship, or that can be taken from the island (ie - raft made from bamboo or trees, etc.). I greatly doubt that the ship would have inflatable pontoons - why would they have them? And as Ric pointed out in an earlier note - once you get the electra out to the ship, how are you going to lift it? Unlike float planes it doesn't come with a lifting ring. LTM, Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 15:25:18 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Lambrecht photo One way that the other portions of the airplane might not have been in the photograph would be if the picture were taken during a steep turn with the subject more or less "overhead" to the photographer. LTM, Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 15:25:42 From: Jack Thomas Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory > From Ric > > You seem to be saying that "recent" means something different than > "recent". Lambrecht clearly saw something that made him think that > someone was there not just in past few weeks or the last few days, but > right then. That's why he circled and zoomed to try to "elicit an > answering wave." But surely the Navy and therefore Lambrecht were interested in finding Earhart alive OR dead, if possible. Doesn't TIGHAR's theory require that these "recent" signs be indicative of AE and FN's presence on the island, but simultaneously and contrarily require that Lambrecht then regard them as essentially unimportant? Why should we, with only a meager description of what he saw, give them more significance than he did when he was actively searching for such signs and disregarded them after a flyover? -Jack Thomas ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 20:52:33 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues All of our "theories" are ad hoc. The point of it is to try to explain, as best we can, the evidence that we do have or to put forth theories that can be tested in order to advance our understanding of evidence. I don't know of any evidence that shows that AE was trained to live off the land or fend for herself in a jungle environment. Anything that I say about her, her motives or objectives are merely conjecture on my part, unless I can find contemporaneous evidence to the contrary. I do not know of any writings that show she ever had any such training. Most of the records show that she was part of the "in crowd" and liked her leisure when she wasn't setting records. That doesn't mean she wasn't a hardy soul who would be able to handle the rigors on the island. And even if she was able to handle them, does not mean she would abandon the airplane or plan for its eventual loss. IMHO I believe she would have held fast to the belief that help would arrive quickly and she would be able to continue her journey. But I can't prove it - I can only rely on the available evidence. The scarcity of items does not mean that she didn't take more ashore. But if she had taken more ashore, it should have been with the items that were found - but it wasn't. The island was occupied for a number of years, but we can't be sure if more items were found or not, since we cannot be sure that all the stuff would have been reported, kept for posterity or even moved vs left in situ. LTM, Dave Bush ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 20:52:58 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Lifting ring <> Now, wait just a cotton-pickin' minute here, guys; All the pictures of AE's plane I've seen have a large, conveniently-located lifting ring sittin' right there over the cockpit. LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 20:53:42 From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Lambrecht was searching for AE - an airplane, signs that would point to AE. He might very well have overlooked other signs or taken them for a native population (such as found on the other islands) and was only trying to see if there were people he could land and talk to (as was done on other islands). If someone was there, he could ask them if they had seen AE or an airplane. Absent the airplane or signs of it, he would only make mention that there were "signs" of recent habitation. This happens a lot in search operations. The searchers are looking for an intact airplane or at least wreckage that is recognisable as an airplane and totally overlook other signs because they don't fit their preconceived notion of what they are looking for. These airmen weren't trained for this type of search - in fact - that type of training wasn't around at the time. Only over time has the training been developed and it is still difficult for the best trained searcher to sometimes recognize items from the air. Try it sometime. Fly at 1,000 feet (the recommended altitude for searches), at speeds of 90-100 knots, over heavily wooded terrain, or rolling terrain with heavy underbrush. It is quite difficult to spot. In the Civil Air Patrol we often use existing wreckage that we know the exact location of and fly new trainees over it. Even for those of us who know where it is, it sometimes is difficult to spot and nearly impossible for the new trainees. It takes training and discipline and a certain level of luck to spot it. "Signs" of recent habitation could mean anything. And what is "recent"? Last week, last month, last year. Its all relative without a context. LTM, Dave Bush Houston, Texas > From Jack Thomas > >> From Ric >> >> You seem to be saying that "recent" means something different than >> "recent". Lambrecht clearly saw something that made him think that >> someone was there not just in past few weeks or the last few days, but >> right then. That's why he circled and zoomed to try to "elicit an >> answering wave." > > But surely the Navy and therefore Lambrecht were interested in finding > Earhart alive OR dead, if possible. Doesn't TIGHAR's theory require that > these "recent" signs be indicative of AE and FN's presence on the island, > but simultaneously and contrarily require that Lambrecht then regard them > as essentially unimportant? Why should we, with only a meager description > of what he saw, give them more significance than he did when he was > actively searching for such signs and disregarded them after a flyover? > > -Jack Thomas ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 20:56:55 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: The reef idea I can't go with a reef landing, that is get to land in shallow water with the gear down and not have it flip upsidedown, Which is the usual situation and If that scenerio happened then the post loss messages have no reason to exist. What is much more likely to have occurred is a beach landing and runout, then taxi it as far up off the shore as is possible. Now You have few tools and a heavy weight to secure; little training in survival and the male of the party is injured. The sand is going to slowly wash away under the gear and finally take it out to sea: either that or the plane ran up under the brush and couldn't be seen in the week following. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 20:59:26 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Lambrecht photo >Maybe somebody with more knowledge of 1930-era cameras could offer some >educated guess as to what we may have. One very good possibility is the Brownie Box Camera. These were built in large numbers from 1933 or so, right through the 1950's. The camera I am holding has a physical size of 4" wide x 3" high x 4-1/2" front to back and weighs mere ounces. The controls can be operated by someone wearing sheepskin lined leather gauntlets (I tried it with motorcycle gauntlets), and the film advance knob is quite easy to turn, if a little awkward. The shutter on the other hand, is dead easy. The controls of the expanding "bellows" type personal cameras of the era whould be a bit harder to operate by aircrew than the brownie. The one I have one here would produce a picture similar to that in the Lambrecht photo, as well as being the type of "personal" camera small enough and simple enough to be carried by an aircrew for snapshots. The camera exposes a negative of 2-1/4" x 3-1/4", which made them great for quick contact prints. Quite a few of the elderly (say 50ish +) members of the forum will remember this as their first camera. The image quality from the SIX-20's fairly large negative is similar to that of the Lambrecht photo, but the proportions are a little wrong. I'm curious about the photo as it appears on the website. Are the width and height proportions identical to those of the original photo? or has it been squeezed a little on the page? It looks quite natural resized to the same proportions, and even the N marker looks right. Anyway, I suggest this might be one possible source of the Lambrecht photo. I have been told quite a lot of service photos originated with these cameras, as they sold for around $1.00 at the time, were very robust and fitted easily into kit. I have had this one since 1961, and it still works, despite being dropped, soaked and left in numerous places when I was a child. In fact not too long ago I was still taking photos with it to see if it worked. Th' WOMBAT ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 20:59:50 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Lambrecht photo > From Dave Bush > One way that the other portions of the airplane might not have been in > the photograph would be if the picture were taken during a steep turn > with the subject more or less "overhead" to the photographer. Actually, another feature of the Brownie box camera I mentioned is that it has two viewfinders, one on top of the camera, which takes a portrait picture, and one on the side that takes a landscape picture. I did some experiments and found that it is not at all difficult to exclude items the size of the main wing and the tail assembly over quite a reasonable angle. If we really need to know, I can take the thing down to the airport and try from the cockpit of a Tiger Moth or something I suppose, but I'm pretty certain from the things I tried here. Also, some of the Kodak Brownie series had sights rather than the viewfinder. You can get quite a reasonable shot of something by just aiming the box at your subject without using the viewfinder. If you check this page, you can see the brownie "box" and another brownie. If you scroll down near the bottom, you can see a picture of a woman with almost the same proportions as the Lambrecht photo. The picture, that is. The woman's proportions are quite different.... http://members.aol.com/Chuck02178/brownie.htm Th' WOMBAT ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 21:00:12 From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues > From Ric > The briefest visit ashore would reveal the presence of rats and crabs > that look like something out of King Kong. I think I'll sleep in the plane tonight honey. You toddle off to that seven site if you want to..... Th' WOMBAT -- We don't use Windows - so You get fewer Viruses. Mepis Linux, Mozilla and OpenOffice.org. ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 21:00:50 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: AE's fuel and weather That's about what I would do as well. There are inflatable airbags that you can stuff under an object, then inflate to lift it, that can also be used as rollers to move the object. I supect that the difference between high and low tide isn't much (someone should know this), so you would need one hell of a big airbag to float an Electra. Anyone have the weight of the Electra and the height of the tides? Dan Postellon TIGHAR#2263 > From Scott White > > Ric wrote: > >> How ya gonna get a 7,000 pound airplane >> to where the crane can grab it? You gonna wait for a calm day and raft >> it out to the ship? I'd pay admission to watch somebody try to load a >> Lockheed 10 from a reef-edge onto a raft. > > --- If I was going to try it, I would strap a bunch of inflatable pontoons > onto the plane at low tide, and then try to move it off the reef or beach > at high tide. Then use one or more small boats to pull it out to deeper water. > I'm not claiming this would work, and I'm certainly not claiming that it > happened. > Best, > -SW ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 21:01:07 From: Jim Preston Subject: Re: Taroa No Ron I wasn't mixing the atolls. I read that post and it made some sense. 3 times I spent 4 or 5 days in a row on Kwaj in the 60's,( multiple engine failures), and heard some strange tales from the locals. Then I didn't give them much thought. For instance the question has arisen how do the Japanese get the plane on the deck of a ship.I remember talking to some locals about some Aussie treasure hunters finding some Japanes Planes still in the crates on one of the Marshall Atolls and recovering them to a small freighter and leaving for Australia. This happened in the 60's. I have read "Eyewitness" and the follow up book and they seem to jibe with some other things so I am just watching and reading. Jimbo ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 21:01:34 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: Lambrecht photo I concur that the photo was taken while returning from the island to the Colorado, perhaps after the short visit to the Corondelet Reef. I base this on: Reconstruction of the flight paths, based upon where the Colorado launched and recovered the planes Reconstruction of the flight path based upon the various reports of the order of visitation of the islands (McKean, then Garnder, then Carondelet Reef) The estimate of the altitude (higher than the 500' [or 1000'? I forget] reported of the island overflight itself) The direction of the plane relative to the island and concurrence with the direction to the Colorado. From this, I can estimate the time of when the photo was taken. Now, if only we knew precisely the tides during that time.... ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 21:03:14 From: Tom Hickcox Subject: Re: 20 GPH Ross Devitt wrote: > The same drum is referred to as 200 litres and 205 litres, and as a 44 > gallon (imp) and 50 gallon (US). As I pointed out, I don't think it > "actually" holds any of those amounts, but I would be interested to > know. > > I do know that when we changed our system of measurement the actual > drum seemed to stay the same. Ross, I think we were on the same page but perhaps not the same line. 44 gal is close to the standard 42gal U.S. barrel that refineries use as a measurement, i.e. the local whatever Exxon is now refinery has a capacity of 500,000 barrels per day and I believe the oil reserves are expressed in barrels. The "standard" all-purpose drum for industries here on the Gulf Coast is 55gal but I bet few of them hold exactly that. Tom Hickcox ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 21:03:54 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory Jack Thomas asks: > Why should we, with only a meager description > of what he (Lambrecht) saw, give them more significance than he did > when he was > actively searching for such signs and disregarded them after a flyover? Because we have far more information that he had. - We know that there should have been no signs of recent habitation on Gardner. Lambrecht didn't know that. - We know that he was not going to find the plane on any of the other islands he still had to search. Lambrecht didn't know that. - We know that the Lexington Group was not going to find the plane or a life raft floating in the ocean. Lambrecht didn't know that. - We know that there was a castaway on Gardner island whose partial skeleton would be found three years later. Lambrecht didn't know that. - We know that later inhabitants of the island would tell stories about an airplane being there. Lambrecht didn't know that. I could go on, but you get the point. LTM, Ric ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 21:11:04 From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: lifting ring [tongue firmly embedded in cheek] That's not a lifting ring but the df sensor for the radio, Al By the way if you could pick it up that way it would come up vertically and would look very silly! ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 22:54:03 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: AE's fuel and weather > From Dave Bush > > Where are you going to get the inflatable pontoons? You have to use the > materials that are available to the ship, or that can be taken from the > island (ie - raft made from bamboo or trees, etc.). You can make them from inner tubes, or even use inner tubes. Dan Postellon ******************************** I wonder how many inner tubes it would take to float a 7000 pound aircraft...? Pat ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 22:55:28 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues > Thus you don't want to spend time > unloading and reloading. I'm not sure what you think was going to be off loaded and reloaded. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 22:55:54 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Ae's fuel and weather Why would anyone want to go through any kind of drill to get a wrecked airplane off of a reef? Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 22:56:37 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Reed's offer > if Angus has a key to the mystery, The only problem I have, Reed, is that we don't know what Angus thinks is the mystery. Thus we have no way of knowing what he has an answer to. Makes a big difference. I agree with you that you could provide a valuable service to Angus and if he can get someone to give him money I think that is great. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 22:57:03 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Gallagher and his clues > What sort of > dangers lurked in that jungle? There is also a rumor that there was quicksand on Niku. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 22:57:23 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Lambrecht photo Dennis, didn't they use 120 and 620 film back then? I did. Alan ======================================================================== Date: Tue, 30 Nov 2004 22:57:58 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Conjecture, hypothesis, theory >> Does the sole float? > > That's a question for Father Moleski. (sorry, couldn't resist.) Ric, you need time off. You've been working too hard. Alan