Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 09:17:41 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Underwater search Rick, that's indeed a great story but has no relevance to the Electra. They knew roughly where the ship was but we have no clue within 600,000 square miles. The ship traveled at about 35 knots IF it was moving at all. The Electra at 120 MPH. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 09:17:57 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Underwater search Interesting re the capabililties of the successful Sydney underwater search. How deep does TIGHAR believe the Electra is off the reef where the Electra allegedly came down? Maybe bucks should be focused there. Ron Bright ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 10:14:01 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: Underwater search << From Alan Caldwell ...a great story but has no relevance to the Electra. ... we have no clue within 600,000 square miles.>> There is some relevance and the odds are not quite so long. If the theory is correct that the Electra landed more or less intact on the reef, then later washed over the edge, a plausible search area might be only 20 or 25 square miles. If it's not there, either the theory is wrong or the bulk of the wreckage drifted off to who knows where. Debris from the Norwich City would likely complicate an underwater search. There would be several dozen tons of iron and steel from the ship scattered around the bottom. What did the Electra weigh, about one ton? The most useful investigation for the time being would probably be to get more detailed information on the underwater topography. Someone said once that the bottom slopes away from Niku rather steeply then drops to a much greater depth. Does that mean there is a 45 degree slope for three of four miles, then a precipitous drop to 25,000? Is that slope a jumble of rock that might snag and hide any debris or smooth so as to allow a long slide? Tom Doran, # 2796 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 10:56:09 From: Rick Jones Subject: Re: Underwater search A closer reading of the Spokesman article says that the search vessel was leased in Singapore and modified for the search. Another web site indicates the operating limitation of the submersible (cable length?, pressure?) is 3000 meters. Joshua Gillespie posted a web link that shows the Phoenix Island bathymetric depiction, and it will give you an idea of the difficulties involved in searching this area. http://www.phoenixislands.org/islands.html Rick J #2751 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 11:11:12 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: Underwater search Ron Bright wrote: >Interesting re the capabililties of the successful Sydney >underwater search. How deep does TIGHAR believe the Electra is >off the reef where the Electra allegedly came down? Maybe bucks >should be focused there. I have the impression that the TIGHAR theory is that "the Electra" no longer exists. To rephrase your question in the context of the hypothesis, it should read "How deep does TIGHAR believe the pieces of the Electra are off the reef?" I think the proper answer would be, "It depends on which pieces you're interested in and how you imagine them coming off the reef." For me, the interesting pieces are the engines and landing gear. Not being an oceanologist and not having any idea of what the underwater mountainside around Niku looks like, my answer is a resounding "I don't know." (I'm speaking just for myself, not for TIGHAR.) One of our oceanologists, Howard, now sadly deceased, speculated that the engines might have rolled down to what used to be the beach back when the oceans were about 120 meters lower than they are now (roughly 10,000 to 12,000 years ago). If they didn't stop there, they may have rolled all the way to the bottom. Or gotten hung up anywhere in between. I don't think the kind of technology used to find warships is going to have the kind of resolution needed to find an engine or landing gear on the side of an underwater mountain. One feature of the underwater mountain that Howard talked about is the sand river on the lee side. Prevailing winds and the ordinary currents wash around the island from the northeast; the currents meet up on the southwest side and stuff tends to get flushed down the mountainside there. Lots of stuff--inorganic, organic, from the Norwich City and (arguably) from the Electra (if it did, in fact, land on the reef near the NC). I'm sure TIGHAR would gratefully accept and expend the many millions of dollars that would be necessary for an extended high-resolution search of the leeward side of Niku. If some benefactor says that's what they want to do, I imagine TIGHAR will figure out a way to do it. Marty #2359 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 11:41:35 From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: Underwater search Tom Doran wrote: > ... Does that mean there is a 45 degree slope for three of four > miles, then a precipitous drop to 25,000? Somebody sent this link yesterday (maybe to EPAC?): http://www.phoenixislands.org/islands.html It shows the underwater mountains that become islands when they stick their necks above water. When the oceans were lower, Niku's seashore would have been lower than it is now. This guy estimates 70m to 130m for the differences in ocean levels: http://www-das.uwyo.edu/~geerts/cwx/notes/chap15/rain_sea.html That's not that far underwater compared to the ocean bottom, but it's farther than TIGHAR's divers have gone (150', 50 M at most, when Ric wasn't looking?). Is that slope a jumble of rock that might snag and hide any debris or smooth so as to allow a long slide? Seems to me that TIGHAR's divers have reported lots of crevasses. Marty #2359 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2008 12:33:32 From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Underwater search Good response, Tom but here is how I see it. 1. "drifted off to who knows where" is a killer. 2. Although we certainly believe the plane landed at Niku, a smoking gun is necessary before any deep pocket will cough up sufficient money. Plus we are going to have to pin down the most probable search areas and show convincing reasons for our conclusions. I have a long time friend of some 60 years with the capability but I see no smoking gun and no reasonable search area. If the plane did not land at Niku the search area is around 600,000 square miles, more or less. Our basic problem is not knowing the center of the search area since we don't know where the plane was at any time after take off. We have good guesses but nothing specific enough to spend millions on. If the plane DID land at Niku we only have a very good guess where it touched down but no idea where it finally ended up. If it eventually went off the reef we don't know in what condition so it could have floated off an indeterminate distance or sunk pretty quickly. Over time currents could have moved it God only knows where. That makes a pretty sizeable ocean to search in. To complicate matters more some of the currents in the general area go east and some west. To answer your weight question, the Electra weighed a little over 7,000 lbs. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 08:52:36 From: William Webster-Garman Subject: Nutiran, Tatiman passage, off the reef Given the extreme underwater topography around Nikumaroro, if bits of the Electra were washed off the reef into the ocean, it could easily take millions of dollars to find an identifiable shred of the aircraft and it is unlikely anyone would kick in that kind of money unless some kind of leading artifact is identified on the island first. Speaking of which, how thoroughly has Nutiran (NW area across Tatiman passage from the village, site of the Arundel project, 19th century coconut plantings and Norwich City cache) been searched? I've heard the interior's one of the more unpleasant places on the atoll. And speaking of Tatiman passage, I still think the likelihood of finding something in its spill-off area of the lagoon would be higher than searching the kilometres of sheer mountainside, though a survey 100 or 200 metres further off the reef from where the hypothesis speculates the plane may have landed might be worthwhile. LTM, who thinks about stones maybe unturned ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 09:34:32 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Castaway questions To: Ric and others who have been there In re-reading Gallagher's correspondence regarding the bones, he describes the place where the skeleton was found as: Not far from the lagoon shoreline where a Kanawa tree was used to make the "coffin" for the bones. Less than 2 miles from a plot of coconut trees that would have provided the castaway with liquids to drink. We also know that according to the survey in 1938 there were 111 coconut trees remaining from the Arundal era. And; I think we can assume from what Gallagher reported that the castaway stayed pretty much in the same area where he found the skeleton - he reports of fire pits, bird bones, turtle bones, etc. What IS interesting is his comment about the castaway NOT seeing the coconut trees. Why? Because apparently Gallagher did not find anything from the coconuts in the castaway's area - no husks, no shells, no fronds for bedding, no stacks of coconut residue for fire fuel, etc. All this leads me to ask the following questions of those who have been to Niku: How long do coconut shells last out in the open? They would make good drinking cups, eating plates, digging tools, etc. How long does it take for a newly planted coconut tree to produce eatable fruit? If in 1938 there where Arundel coconuts on the island and some newly planted that same year which ones would Gallagher have been referring to in 1940 as a food source? How far away from the seven site is the oldest coconut plot - assuming that Gallagher was talking about this group vis-a-vis the above question? Can you easily walk along the lagoon shore line and ocean side beach from the seven site around the island? As you walk along theses areas can you see the Arundel coconut plots? Remember, Gallagher reported that the castaway was unable to see the plots because of an impenetrable belt of bush. Can coconut husks and shells easily be used for fuel in a fire? Would they be used to start a fire or better suited to sustain a fire? In the seven site what type of trees are in evidence? It is my understanding that basically there are three types of trees on Niku - Buka, Kanawa and Ren. The Ren being the lowest and most scrub like. Why would a castaway choose to sit under one of these to pass on? Do the Buka and Kanawa tree areas offer more open space for living and at the same time offer some shade? Where would you want to pitch camp and call home? Still trying to get my mind around why would someone want to hang out at the seven site! Ted Campbell ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 09:35:37 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Nutiran, Tatiman passage, off the reef William Webster-Garman asks: >Given the extreme underwater topography around Nikumaroro, if bits >of the Electra were washed off the reef into the ocean, it could >easily take millions of dollars to find an identifiable shred of >the aircraft and it is unlikely anyone would kick in that kind of >money unless some kind of leading artifact is identified on the >island first. Agreed. We may have several such artifacts from the last summer's expedition. >Speaking of which, how thoroughly has Nutiran (NW area across Tatiman passage >from the village, site of the Arundel project, 19th century coconut plantings >and Norwich City cache) been searched? Nutiran was the focus of the entire 1999 expedition. I'm comfortable that it was covered thoroughly. >I've heard the interior's one of the more unpleasant places on the atoll. I can vouch for that. >And speaking of Tatiman passage, I still think the likelihood of >finding something in its spill-off area of the lagoon would be >higher than searching the kilometres of sheer mountainside, though >a survey 100 or 200 metres further off the reef from where the >hypothesis speculates the plane may have landed might be worthwhile. Light-weight pieces of wreckage almost certainly passed through Tatiman Passage and probably lie somewhere deep in the vast and growing silt delta that spills out into the lagoon. Searching that environment would probably best be done with low-frequency, sub-bottom profiling sonar, but the real problem would be getting permission to excavate if anything interesting showed up. The island is now part of the Phoenix Islands Protected Area (PIPA), the world's largest marine preserve. Dredging the delta would be a major disruption of the passage morphology. Searching the reef slope offshore, on the other hand, would not alter the environment. With the tidal and reef structure data collected last summer, we now have a much better handle on where the plane could have landed on the morning of July 2, 1937. The possible landing area (smooth enough surface, dry enough surface) is quite constrained. In other words, IF the plane landed on the reef north of Norwich City as we think it did, it HAD to have landed in a particular place that we can now identify. The question then becomes, how much did it subsequently break up and where did the big chunks go? Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 11:18:42 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: Underwater search Marty Moleski wrote: >Somebody sent this link yesterday (maybe to EPAC?): > >http://www.phoenixislands.org/islands.html > >It shows the underwater mountains that become islands >when they stick their necks above water. Thanks for the link. It's a fascinating site with lots of information about the islands. I spent a lot of time looking at the drawing of the islands, trying to figure out why the mountains were so odd looking. They are definitely "spikey-looking." It finally dawned on me that the drawing has an exaggerated vertical scale. The horizontal scale is something like fifty miles per inch. The vertical scale is more like one mile per inch. If the vertical and horizontal scales were the same, the drawing would be telling us that the mountains are fifty miles wide and 150 miles high. I've not heard of any mountains in the solar system shaped like that. This drawing technique is used to illustrate small changes in one direction relative to large numbers in the other. Years ago in college we did this when drawing beams. A steel beam fifty feet long might deflect an inch when loaded. If your horizontal drawing scale is five feet per inch it will fit on the paper. If your vertical scale is the same deflection would be seen as the width of a pencil line. Make the vertical scale one inch per inch and deflection pops out. You can visually locate the maximum deflection point and the curve of deflection, based on the load point(s). Rather than my first impression that the mountains are spikes, what the drawing tells us, approximately, is the ocean bed drops off to 15,000 feet over a distance of maybe twenty five miles. That's about a 12 percent slope, steep but walkable. My guess is that a heavy dense object, like an engine, would have a good chance of getting hung up somewhere on the slope, rather than slide all the way to the bottom. Also on the website referenced above there is more detailed information on the organization of PIPA (The Phoenix Islands Protected Area). It is a joint project of the government of Kiribati, the New England Aquarium, the governments of New Zealand and Australia, and several foundations. A half dozen years ago the Aquarium sent a team of marine biologists to study the biological resources of the islands. They say the eight person team spent hundreds of hours diving around Niku and the other islands. There is a 25 minute video on the website. A couple of things occur to me here. The team may have done some preliminary sketching of the coral reef or even more elaborate maps. If they produced a 25 minute video, they likely have a couple of hundred hours of underwater video that wasn't used. It's at least conceivable that one of the eight divers might say, "Oh yeah, I saw a tire and wheel assembly but I was looking for jellyfish and paid no attention to it." The video footage includes some scenes of the reef outside the surf line in about 30 feet of water. Although the terrain is rocky and typical of coral reef structure it continues like that as far as you can see underwater. If there is a shear drop off it would be some distance further out. Has the New England Aquarium been willing to talk to TIGHAR or share any of their files? What about any of the scientists who participated? One of the partners in this project is National Geographic. Someone once said that NGS was NOT interested in AE searches. Another of the partners is doing "deep water surveys" this year, but I don't know what that means. It could result in information relevant to the AE search, if they would share. The video and still photography, along with the website's commentary, show a unique and stunningly beautiful environment. It seemed, but was not explicitly stated, that the government of Kirbati may be thinking of developing some kind of Eco-Tourism industry. In a dozen years there may be cruise ships conducting dive tours around Niku and the other islands. Would TIGHAR be an appropriate "partner" in the PIPA? It might help establish bona fides for the group. On the other hand partner may simply mean someone who donates a million bucks. Tom Doran, #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 12:20:28 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Underwater search Tom Doran writes: >A half dozen years ago the Aquarium sent a team of marine >biologists to study the biological resources of the islands. They >say the eight person team spent hundreds of hours diving around >Niku and the other islands. There is a 25 minute video on the website. The New England Aquarium learned about the Phoenix Group from the folks who own Nai'a, the ship we use when we go to Nikumaroro. The New England Aquarium people got in touch with us and we've been sharing information ever since. >A couple of things occur to me here. The team may have done some >preliminary sketching of the coral reef or even more elaborate >maps. If they produced a 25 minute video, they likely have a couple >of hundred hours of underwater video that wasn't used. It's at >least conceivable that one of the eight divers might say, "Oh yeah, >I saw a tire and wheel assembly but I was looking for jellyfish and >paid no attention to it." Dr. Greg Stone who led the New England Aquarium expeditions is a friend of mine and he is very much aware of what we're looking for. In fact, during their 2002 trip he did spot what looked to him like an aircraft wheel on the reef. He assumed we knew all about it and had dismissed it. When he later learned otherwise, he and I got together in New Hartford, CT at the new England Air Museum to look at airplane wheels and talk about what he saw. We put together a special small expedition in 2003 to re-locate what we came to call the "wheel of fortune," but when the team got there the wheel was gone, apparently due to heavy storm activity. >The video footage includes some scenes of the reef outside the >surf line in about 30 feet of water. Although the terrain is rocky >and typical of coral reef structure it continues like that as far >as you can see underwater. If there is a shear drop off it would be >some distance further out. Our own divers have spent lots of time in that same area and, yes, there is a steep drop a bit further out. >Has the New England Aquarium been willing to talk to TIGHAR or >share any of their files? What about any of the scientists who >participated? As noted above, there is full cooperation between TIGHAR and NEA. >One of the partners in this project is National Geographic. Someone >once said that NGS was NOT interested in AE searches. Nat'l Geo spent a lot of money putting a film crew aboard the most recent Nauticos search and got nothing for their trouble. It's not that they're not interested in A/E searches. They're just backing the wrong horse. >Another of the partners is doing "deep water surveys" this year, >but I don't know what that means. It could result in information >relevant to the AE search, if they would share. The would share, but there have been many delays in that project. >The video and still photography, along with the website's >commentary, show a unique and stunningly beautiful environment. It >seemed, but was not explicitly stated, that the government of >Kirbati may be thinking of developing some kind of Eco-Tourism >industry. In a dozen years there may be cruise ships conducting >dive tours around Niku and the other islands. > >Would TIGHAR be an appropriate "partner" in the PIPA? It might help >establish bona fides for the group. On the other hand partner may >simply mean someone who donates a million bucks. We work closely with PIPA but we're not a partner because the focus of our work is historical rather than environmental. Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 17:37:25 From: Rick Boardman Subject: Re: Castaway questions Obvious I suppose, but if Gallagher could find no evidence that the castaway had been at any of the coconut trees, couldn't that mean the castaway bones PRE-DATE the coconut planting? LTM, who's got a loverly bunch of....etc Rick Boardman ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 17:37:52 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Castaway questions For Ted Campbell Ric will doubtless want to add to this, but here are some responses to your questions. <> Good question, and one to which we don't have an answer. We found coconut shells in the tank at the Seven Site, but we don't know how long they'd been there. I've found coconut shells in prehistoric sites in Chuuk, but they were buried. I suspect that preservation is highly variable based on very local conditions. <> There weren't any newly planted in '38, except those that might have naturally seeded from the Arundel trees -- unless of course there was someone on the island planting nuts. By sometime in early '39 nuts were being planted, but they certainly weren't bearing any fruit in 1940. Gallagher has to have been talking about the Arundel trees. <> There were Arundel trees on Nutiran and at Ritiati -- the village vicinity. <> Tom Roberts, Mark Smith, and Richie from the Nai'a crew walked clear around the ocean shore of the island in about half a day. The whole "impenetrable bush" business is strange, because while the scaevola is certainly impenetrable, there'd be no reason for the castaway to bash his or her way through it to get anyplace else on the island, and if one walked around the ocean shore and occasionally bopped back into the buka forest, which is relatively easy walking, one would certainly be able to find the Arundel coconuts. Or so it seems from the perspective of 2008, knowing where the Arundel groves were. Perhaps if you didn't know, and were walking around the perimeter of the island in 1938, it would look pretty impenetrable. <> Yes, they burn great. <> Coconut husks are used pretty routinely in fire-starting, in villages I've visited. Likewise the fiber from the butt ends of coconut fronds. <> No, there are more kinds than that -- several other types of island walnut and fruiting trees; I'll defer to Josh Gillespie for botanical information. << The Ren being the lowest and most scrub like.>> Relative to buka and kanawa, yes, but it's not necessarily all that low and scrub like. The main ren tree on the crest of the Seven Site is maybe eight or nine meters high and about the same canopy width, with a trunk maybe 50 cm. across. We sat under it all the time in 2001; this year we lunched under an island walnut of greater size down at the base of the ridge on the lagoon side. <> If I had the choice of passing on under a ren, a kanawa, or a buka, I don't know that I'd actually care which I chose. <> I don't think it would make a lot of difference. Shade-wise I think they're all comparable; what's probably more important is location, location, location -- notably in terms of being open to the breeze from the sea, and perhaps providing a view toward the sea. <> We don't know that the castaway did WANT to hang out there. If it was Amelia, she probably WANTED to be in Kansas. But if you wind up on the SE end of the island for whatever reason -- maybe because that's just as far as you get before your shoe gives out -- the Seven Site is one of the nicer pieces of real estate in the neighborhood. It looks like there was relatively easy passage there between the ocean and the lagoon, nice cool breezes off the sea, lots to eat in the lagoon, on the reef, and in the trees. I'd hang out there. There may have been better places farther along on the SE end, though, that got wiped out by the loran station. LTM (who's very picky about hanging out) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 18:15:12 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: Underwater search/PIPA Ric wrote: >>Has the New England Aquarium been willing to talk to TIGHAR or >>share any of their files? What about any of the scientists who >>participated? > >As noted above, there is full cooperation between TIGHAR and NEA. Has it resulted in information relevant to TIGHAR'S WORK, e.g. terrain maps of the seafloor. That might help track the likely path of any debris, or locate a hole which traps things like engines. A terrain map would also tell us where not to look. It might tell us, "If debris is not within X yards of shore, it's probably thousands of feet down. Is there unpublished NEA video that shows anything of interest? >We work closely with PIPA but we're not a partner because the focus >of our work is historical rather than environmental. A philosophical comment --- the agency I work with, where Tom King lectured a couple of months ago, includes cultural history in our environmental impact studies. It's a federal requirement, actually. For better or worse, humans are part of the environment. TIGHAR has probably done more to document human history on Niku than anyone else. For that reason alone, I'd argue that TIGHAR contributes as much to environmental studies of the region as someone studying barracuda, sooty terns, or scaveola. Tom Doran, # 2796 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 18:15:30 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Castaway questions For Rick Boardman: <> No. It's the old adage: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. The castaway might have climbed and picked nuts from every coco tree on the island (there weren't many) but just not brought any evidence of having done so with him or her to the SE end. Or more likely, of course, he or she could have spent a long time looking longingly at nuts that he or she couldn't reach because he or she couldn't climb the trees, and then wandered down to the SE end without, of course, coconuts in tow. LTM, who's going nuts ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 18:39:59 From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: Castaway questions There is another thing...it is doubtful that they just flew straight in and plopped down on the reef. They must have circled the island at least once, just to see where the best place to land was; it's highly likely they spent enough time looking that they would have noticed a variety of things you can see from the air. Do we know if Earhart or Noonan knew enough about plants to tell what kinds of trees were where on the island? Maybe they would have recognized the coconut trees on sight, and maybe some remnants of the old planting system (old buildings if any, that kind of thing), and landed up north to be near the Norwich City and the trees. They did have some things with them, so maybe they didn't need coconuts for cups and such, or maybe they couldn't collect them. But, they flew around the island at least once, they had to, so they must have had some idea about it before they set down. People who have been there, or the kite experiments and such, can give us an idea of how much information you could collect in a few minutes of looking. Reed ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 2008 20:24:27 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Castaway questions For Reed Riddle, <> If you look at the Aerial Tour of Nikumaroro that TIGHAR produced in 2001, you'll get a good idea of what you can see on a sweep around the island -- bearing in mind that the vegetation today is a good deal different from what it was in '37. I think you're right that they would have recognized coconut trees for what they were, and this may have been one attraction at the NW end of the island. If they circled the island, as certainly seems reasonable to this non-pilot, they also would likely have seen the two ponds at the SE end, which they might well have thought were fresh water (They aren't), giving them a very powerful reason for moving in that direction. LTM (who's going in circles) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 2008 20:19:15 From: Russ Matthews Subject: OT: First Photos of HMAS Sydney Wreck Those of you following this fascinating bit of WWII naval history (which was discussed here on the forum at some length) might like to know that the Finding Sydney Foundation has just posted the first photos of the wreck recently located with sonar -- confirming that it is indeed the Australian light cruiser lost with all hands following a desperate battle with the German commerce raider Kormoran. The ship, while heavily damaged in the fight, appears to be remarkably intact and recognizable. For more info and a look at the photos, click here... http://presspass.findingsydney.com/blogs/search_reports/archive/ 2008/04/04/search-report-3rd-april-2008.aspx ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 2008 20:58:09 From: Russ Matthews Subject: Re: OT: First Photos of HMAS Sydney Wreck I noted that the direct link in my last post was somewhat unwieldy. Here's one for the main Finding Sydney Foundation website... http://www.findingsydney.com/ LTM, Russ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 2008 08:52 From: Andrew McKenna Subject: Re: OT: First photos of HMAS Sydney wreck Very interesting. Looks like they got $4.2 Million in funding from the AUS Government. Now, can we borrow their ship....? Andrew McKenna ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 08:41:11 From: Tom Doran Subject: AE -- trivia PBS Monday had a couple of mentions of AE. Antiques Roadshow evaluated an Autograph from June 1937 at $2000 to $2500. There was also an episode of American Experience. They told her story and described her life. They talked to some of her contemporaries. They seemed pretty catty to me. One may well find things to criticize in her around-the-world trip. To blow her off as a flunky of Putnam and victim of FN's drinking seems shallow. Tom D., #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:28:09 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Wrong Bones? Are we looking for the wrong bones? Apparently the seven site has been determined to be the last resting place of AE basis the clues in Gallagher's correspondence. I have no problem with this hypothesis. However, think it through and you come up with the fact that most of the AE stuff was found by Gallagher in 1940. The stuff we are now finding at the seven site is probably the little bits of material that AE carried there and not found by Gallagher. The things that TIGHAR has found at the seven site are consistent with what you would expect from a castaway that is trying to survive albeit having given up hope of rescue: Possible compact, skin lotion, etc. A shoe, sextant box and bottle are rather insignificant finds if you think about what was available to AE/FN from the aircraft if they indeed landed on Niku. Also at the seven site you have evidence that the site has been "contaminated" by the Coast Guard in the war years and a lot of work has been and is being spent on separating the two sources of stuff found. So I would like to suggest that we take a step back and rethink the landing circumstance. AE/FN put the plane down on the reef flat north of the Norwich City, they find temporary shelter in the Nutiran area but find this area too wet to stay (remember what Gallagher reported in his 9th progress report) so it seems logical they moved south. How far south? Maybe some of the aircraft parts found by TIGHAR in the 1940 village area were taken there by AE/FN; again it seems logical to think that the two castaways would salvage as much stuff from the plane as possible. Plus, the way Ric has described the natural tidal flow from the Norwich City area into the lagoon, the tides may have moved some of the Norwich crew salvage material south as well. This area, near the 1940's village, would be the logical first camp site of our missing fliers. Using up any provisions in the village area AE/FN move on. The next possible stop could have been in the Tekibeia/Aukairame south area. It's here that the final rescue of the Norwich City crew took place. Also, according to the testimony at the inquest, a fairly significant amount of ships stores from the rescuers were carried ashore and left on the beach. It would be expected that some of the left over stores would wash up into the bush and/or possibly into the lagoon via the Bauareke Passage. I realize that some 8 years would have passed between the Norwich City incident and AE?s visit but remember the findings in ?Amelia Earhart?s Shoes.? The shoe parts and other things were found some 50+ years later. Now let's refer to Betty's notebook - FN seems to be in distress from the onset of their ordeal. Could FN have died in this area? If he did I wouldn't think that AE would have had the where-with-all to dig a grave, maybe covering him with palm fronds if that. I would then think that AE, not wanting to hang around a dead person, heads further south and ends up at the seven site. So are FN?s bones somewhere in the Aukairame area? Someone found it appropriate to bury a small child there. Could something found previously suggest to the village residence that this place had already become a resting place for the dead? You know there were at least 3 other bodies from the Norwich City buried somewhere along the Norwich City side of the island. In summary, it seems like a logical suggestion to shift the focus of looking for a few remaining pieces of AE to looking for a complete skeleton of FN. It would be interesting to hear what our digging crew thinks of the idea. Ted Campbell ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 11:47:31 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Wrong bones? <> I take your point, but there are several problems with that approach. Assuming we're right both about where our heroes landed and where AE died, and that Fred died sometime after the first event and before the second, he could have wound up anywhere along the way from Nutiran to the Seven Site. He might be at Aukaraime South, but he might be lots of other places, too. Furthermore, there are quite a few dead and buried bodies on Niku; the village is full of graves. Besides the many colonists who passed away there, there are the missing Norwich City crewmen -- both those buried on the island and those whose bodies were never found. More contributions to the population of dead folk on the island. If we found a grave someplace else (as was the case with the kid's grave at Aukaraime South, and another at Nutiran) there's no guarantee that it's Fred's. We would dig up a lot of dead people before finding (maybe) the right one. We did look for graves at Aukaraime South in 1997, using a couple of different remote sensing techniques, with no success. We could certainly do more, but we could also do more at innumerable other places. As you've noted, if Fred died before Amelia, she probably didn't have much with which to dig a hole and bury him. If he was only lightly covered, the crabs would probably have scattered the remains pretty effectively. Finally, it's not just bones we're looking for at the Seven Site -- it's all kinds of evidence, and we're finding it. So, if I had the money to invest, I'd invest it first in the Seven Site, where we know we have leads to pursue, rather than striking out into the bush chasing suppositions. But I may be too close to the data to see the big picture. It's certainly worth kicking around where else we ought to be looking. LTM (who tries to keep an open mind) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 18:43:49 From: Rick Boardman Subject: Re: Wrong bones? This makes some sense. Further to that, isn't there a possibility that finding and exhuming (either by accident or design), one set of the remains from the Norwich City would give the team a much more accurate baseline as to what happens to a skeleton buried there on the island in the 1930s? Rick Boardman ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 20:27:52 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Wrong bones? For Rick Boardman <> Well, yes, but (a) we don't know where the Norwich City bods were buried and (b) we don't know whether they're still there. On the other hand, from the two baby skeletons we HAVE excavated, we have a pretty good idea of how buried bones survive in the general Niku environment, and I've dug enough burials on other Pacific islands to know that preservation is extremely variable, depending on local microclimatic conditions. My guess is that the skeleton of someone buried at the Seven Site would be pretty well preserved, because it's relatively high and well-drained, and not at all acidic, while someone buried in the village would probably be pretty fragile. The Nutiran shore well inland is probably pretty good for bone preservation; the beach probably isn't. LTM (who knows where the bodies are buried [but isn't telling]) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 20:28:40 From: Norm Daly Subject: USNS Amelia Earhart Ahoy From a Lurker! Check out this link about the christening of the USNS Amelia Earhart, the US Navy's newest Lewis and Clark-class of dry cargo/ammunition ships. http://www.news.navy.mil/search/display.asp?story_id=36309 Love to Mom, who loves what she reads. Sincerely, Norm Daly ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 20:58:25 From: Eric Beheim Subject: Re: Wrong bones? The castaway might have climbed and picked nuts from every coco tree on the island (there weren't many) but just not brought any evidence of having done so with him or her to the SE end. Or more likely, of course, he or she could have spent a long time looking longingly at nuts that he or she couldn't reach because he or she couldn't climb the trees, An interesting point about not being able to climb the trees to get the coconuts. I once saw an old Frank Buck documentary from the 1930s that included a sequence showing a monkey that was trained to climb coconut trees to pick the nuts and throw them down. Without proper equipment, I would imagine that it might be hard to climb a coconut tree without risk of injury, particularly if you never did it before. LTM (who thinks coconuts is a Marx Bros. film) Eric ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 21:26:18 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Wrong bones? For Eric Beheim <> Yes indeed. The locals carve foot-and hand-holds in the trunks, and go up and down pretty readily; a couple our more agile TIGHARs have managed to follow suit, but it's nothing I'd want to try. There might have been handholds and footholds cut in the old Arundel trees, but quite likely there weren't, in which case I'd think they'd be almost impossible for AE or FN to climb. And we don't think they had trained monkeys. LTM (who's fond of monkey business) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 21:35:41 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Re: Wrong bones? To: Tom King Your points are well taken! However, I didn't know that TIGHAR had found numerous other grave sites on the island and digging up dead people in this day and age of DNA identification may not be that unproductive. The scattering of FN's bones by the crabs would, I think, be consistent with the experiments carried out by TIGHAR on the pig carcass. How far from the origin did we find pig bones? Was this an unwieldy radius not knowing the origin? Finally, does the other grave sites on the island give us any insight as to the natives beliefs of the after life or burial practices? We know that in the Gallagher findings the natives believed that only the head was worth burying and the rest of the skeleton was not. If this was a common practice among the natives then I would assume that the island is littered (maybe littered is an exaggeration) with other non-skull bones. Didn't I read that an ultra - violet light reflects nicely off human bones? Ted Campbell ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 2008 21:36:39 From: Ted Campbell Subject: Re: Wrong bones?/coconuts To: Eric What about those that fall naturally from the trees? Ted ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 09:14:57 From: Ron Brigh Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart Group, I was lucky enough to receive an invitation to the Christening of the USNS AMELIA EARHART on 6 April 08. A magnificent ship and a gala christening ceremony. Perhaps 1500 people gathered to hear the Navy officials speak, represenatiave from Congress, and many distinguished guests of honor. The ship will be deployed to WESTPAC with a Merchant Marine Captain to fullfill the role of replenishment at sea. Amy Kleppner struck the champagne bottle, but I don't think it broke. Bad luck again. I had an opportunity to speak with many of the AE historians/ researchers and of course Amy Kleppner. Amy remains pretty well on the sidelines of her famous aunt and speaks little of any disappearance theories. If you would listed to Woody P, a former TIGHAR member, he can tell you exactly where the Electra is now, under some coral at Taroa, placed there in 1943. All he needs is an underground sonar penetrating deal, and bingo!!! Many doubt the claim, however. I didn't see Ric lurking in the crowd, but he may have been there. LTM, Ron Bright ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 09:15:48 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Wrong bones? For Ted Campbell <> Well, if we had unlimited funds and time, and permission from government, perhaps we'd excavate them all and sample their DNA, but we don't have any of those things, and it would be a terribly long shot anyhow; we can be reasonably sure that the folks in the numerous graves are deceased colonists. <> Kar Burns will have to speak to that, but my impression is that most of the bones just disappeared -- i.e. were taken by the crabs to locations where they simply couldn't be found, despite the long flourescent streamers attached to each one. So yes, it's pretty unwieldy. <> There's also a lot of ethnographic and historical data on burial practices, and the colonists were all nominally Christians (some Catholic, some Protestant). There's a strong traditional belief in an afterlife, and in ghosts. One doesn't want improperly buried bodies lying about. << We know that in the Gallagher findings the natives believed that only the head was worth burying and the rest of the skeleton was not.>> Not so. All we know is that they buried the head (cranium) and not the rest (including the lower jaw). We don't know why they didn't bury the rest, but my suspicion is that they didn't find them until Gallagher came along and did a thorough search. << If this was a common practice among the natives then I would assume that the island is littered (maybe littered is an exaggeration) with other non-skull bones. >> That would make sense if it were the practice, but it's not. << Didn't I read that an ultra - violet light reflects nicely off human bones?>> Yes, which is why John Clauss invented a daylight UV scanner that he, Andrew McKenna, and Bill Carter burned their eyes out on scanning most of the slope above the hole where we think the skull may have been buried -- in case the skull had rolled down the hill and shed teeth along the way. No joy. LTM (who invites everyone to the Nikumaroro Easter head-roll) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 09:34:30 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: Wrong bones? <> In my experience there are typically a lot of coconuts around the base of a stand of the trees. Some are green, some are ripe (brown). Also, they begin fruiting when maybe ten feet tall. Extensive climbing is not always necessary. Also, if the body of the first casualty to die were lightly buried so as to be dismembered by crabs, why would it be different for the body of the second person to die? Tom D., #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 10:27:03 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re; USNS Amelia Earhart Ron Bright writes: >I was lucky enough to receive an invitation to the Christening of >the USNS AMELIA EARHART on 6 April 08. A magnificent ship and a >gala christening ceremony. Perhaps 1500 people gathered to hear the >Navy officials speak, represenatiave from Congress, and many >distinguished guests of honor. A delegation of about a dozen TIGHARs, myself included, was in the crowd, not as invited guests but simply as members of the general public. We were in town for our annual Earhart Project Advisory Council (EPAC) conference and had just spent the weekend reviewing the latest research results from the last summer's Niku V expedition. The launching was, indeed, a gala event. Cool, clear night; the enormous ship ablaze in light, decked out in bunting and balloons; the band playing "Anchors Aweigh" and other military service anthems; huge sports arena-style TV screens providing everyone a good view of the speakers who said predictable things about the Navy, Amelia Earhart, and the need to keep building ships in San Diego; the crowd standing practically under the towering hull with the knowledge that this gigantic structure would, incredibly, soon slide backward into the harbor. >Amy Kleppner struck the champagne bottle, but I don't think it >broke. Bad luck again. I was right below the bow where the christening took place. I could see it both on the big-screen TV and with my own eyes. My recollection is that it was Amy's daughter, not Amy, who swung the bottle. Another daughter triggered the actual launch. There was a "striker bar" with pointy steel teeth welded to the bow for the purpose of breaking the bottle. The woman with the champagne bottle gave it at least three good wallops against the bar but the bottle definitely did not break. The ship began to move and, obviously distressed, the woman made a last desperate swing but by then the bow was out of range. The ship's horn/whistle boomed, the band played, the fireworks lit up the sky, and the crowd cheered - but the truth is that USNS Amelia Earhart slid into the harbor unchristened and, according to nautical superstition, jinxed. In the finest Earhart tradition, the next day the San Diego Union reported: "Amy Kleppner, Earhart's niece broke the traditional bottle of champagne over the ship's bow." Love to mother, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 10:44:39 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Wrong bones? For Tom Doran: <> It wouldn't be -- assuming similar populations of crabs in both death spots. The body at the SE end HAD been dismembered -- there were only 13 bones left that Gallagher & Co. could find. If someone died in a part of the island where people didn't happen to go and notice bones, a similar distribution of bones wouldn't be found. And MIGHT still be there, but it's an awfully long shot. Here again, if we had unlimited funds and time, and in this case if we could defoliate the island (and wanted to), we might find some bones, which might or might not be those of another castaway. It's worth noting that Emily Sikuli reported bones being found on or near the Nutiran shore, but her recollections were pretty fuzzy and contradictory. There've been other reports of bones on the NW end of the island, too, but nothing that points to any specific location or suggests that they might still be there. And the area was pretty thoroughly searched in '99 with further work in '01. LTM (who frowns on dismemberment by crabs) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 12:57:07 From: Ron Bright Subject: Other skeletons Re: Islands and Bones While researching possible origins of skeleton(s) on Niku, I ran across an article in "Liberty Digest", Sep 18, 1937. According to the article descrbing the history of Howland, a human skeleton was found in 1862 , along with fragments of a canoe, and a few bits of bamboo. And while constructing an airfield for Earhart in 1937, traces of footpaths and marks of digging were also found "indicating there was some slight evidence of South Sea visitors". Sound familar? Howland was mined intermittently for guano from about 1842 to 1875, then abandoned. There was no evidence that the skeleton was from guano harvesters, hence the article suggested a "castaway" of sorts. So maybe the castaway on Niku was some poor soul who washed up and died there, or maybe an Arundel worker who died on Niku during the Arundel's operation. Many possible origins. LTM Ron Bright Bremerton ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 19:26:06 From: Pat Gaston Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart As one of the 1,000 or so people present at the christening and launch of the USNS Amelia Earhart, I want to urge all of you to say a little prayer tonight for General Dynamics/NASSCO, which is now my favorite defense contractor, hands down. Watching a 13-story, 25,000-ton ship slide down two greased planks into the Pacific Ocean, all to the accompaniment of a brass band and fireworks -- well. Suffice it to say I felt like the old Kansas farmer who once observed, "I been to a county fair and two quiltin' bees, but I ain't never seen nothing like that." Almost as impressive were the two days of pre- and post-launch festivities. To give you some idea, the scotch selection at the (four) NASSCO-sponsored bars was limited to Chivas, Johnny Black, Dewar's and 21-year-old Bushmills Single Malt. Having Ulster blood I concentrated on the latter, leaving the rotgut to those of Caledonian descent. This procedure was repeated three times, at the pre-pre-launch reception, the pre-launch reception and the post-launch "coffee reception." I seem to recall there actually was an urn of coffee present, over in the corner behind the yacht-sized pastry table. All in all a most rigorous ordeal, but well worth the inconvenience; anything for Our Gal, after all. I did have a chance to speak briefly with the president of General Dynamics/NASSCO. I informed him that I don't know much about Carl Brashear, namesake of the T-AKE 7 -- next ship in the series -- but I can become an authority real fast if it means another invite! Only one minor quibble: The official motto of the USNS Earhart is "Esprit Intrepide" -- which is fitting, of course, but for an American ship celebrating an American heroine? Ah, well, one can forgive the occasional incongruities, I suppose. LTM, who really shoulda been there Pat Gaston, presently dieting ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 19:26:46 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: Other skeletons Guano was not mined on Nikumaroro, it is too wet and too vegetated for guano to accumulate. Interestingly enough, Arundel was involved in mining guano on Howland. Arundel's papers are available, but as far as I know, not microfilmed or digitized yet. You should be able to find out if any of the workers died while planting on Nikumaroro. Dan Postellon Tighar#2263 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 19:27:29 From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart I talked to a NSSCO official after the christening and asked if indeed the bottle of champagne was broken. He assured me it was after five or so strikes. But I don't know his source either, so maybe the Ship as well as the Electra was jinxed! Other notables were George Putnam Jr. who looks like he is 90, and Sally Putnam Chapman. Also a delegation from the Atchison Chamber of Commerce, and Lou Foudray, Director of the AE Museum. Elgen Long was there but seems sort of disinterested in the whole disappearance stuff. Gen Dynamics served up a lota booze to help celebrate and Pat Gaston and I saluted Fred Noonan with a glass of VAT 69, which we understand his favorite. If you find an empty bottle of VAT 69 on Niku , it just may be his. LTM, Ron Bright ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2008 19:53:15 From: Tom King Subject: Other skeletons >You should be able >to find out if any of the workers died while planting on Nikumaroro. Ric and Van Hunn went through Arundel's notes in the Kiribati National Archives on Tarawa; no record of anyone dying on Niku. The major guano-producing island in the Phoenix was McKean, though there was mining on a couple of the others as well. It's quite correct that there was no guano mined on Niku. LTM (who's pooped) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 09:48:52 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart " Elgen Long was there but seems sort of disinterested in the whole disappearance stuff." I thought Elgen Long died a couple of years ago... ***************************************** No, but he is pretty much out of the Earhart business I think. Pat ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 09:49:44 From: Pat Gaston Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart Ric, that was indeed Amy Kleppner swinging the bottle. And WHAT a swing! She got it on the fifth whack, I believe. At least the fifth one sounded more like a "smash," whereas the previous four were "bonks." You're right, it was either Beatrice Kleppner (Amy's sister-in-law) or Sophie Kleppner (Amy's niece) who pulled the trigger that set off an explosive charge that knocked out the last chocks that sent the ship down the ways. LTM (still recovering) Pat Gaston ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 09:50:26 From: Barb Norris Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart Wondering if Pat got to meet the elusive Amy Kleppner and if he mentioned TIGHAR to her if he did. It was a spectacular event and I'm pleased to have witnessed such a marvelous feat of engineering and much patriotic enthusiasm. Unforgettable! Blue skies, Barb Norris ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 09:50:57 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earharat << From Pat Gaston I don't know much about Carl Brashear, namesake of the T-AKE 7 -- next ship in the series -- >> He was the US Navy Diver portrayed by Cuba Gooding a few years ago in the movie Men of Honor. Details of his life and career are at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Brashear Tom D., #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 10:18:51 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart Pat Gaston writes: >Ric, that was indeed Amy Kleppner swinging the bottle. And WHAT a swing! You're right. It was Amy. YouTube has several clips. http:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=wghUlNI7hZg shows the whacking from the back and it's clearly Amy doing the whacking. >She got it on the fifth whack, I believe. At least the fifth one sounded >more like a "smash," whereas the previous four were "bonks." As of the fourth whack the bottle was still intact. At just about the moment of the fourth whack the ship begins to move. After the fifth whack, the man on Amy's left takes the bottle from her but all you can see are the ribbons on the neck. The bottle itself is obscured by the man's body and you can't tell whether or not it's intact. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cli8PlNb1FI was taken by someone in the crowd. It doesn't show the whacking but it does have the reactions of a woman watching the whacking, apparently on the big screen TV. After each whack she says, "Didn't break!" After the fifth whack and as the ship slides down the ways her husband (?) with the video camera says, "Did it break?" The woman says, "No!" As the ship's bow appears traveling right to left through the frame, there is no sign of wetness on the bow. >You're right, it was either Beatrice Kleppner (Amy's sister-in-law) or >Sophie Kleppner (Amy's niece) who pulled the trigger that set off an >explosive charge that knocked out the last chocks that sent the >ship down the ways. Actually, according to the announcer who was recorded in the YouTube clip, the trigger honors were done by "Mary Sullivan." It's interesting that several of us were there as eye witnesses and came away with different, and in some cases erroneous, impressions of what happened. And that was Sunday night, not decades ago. Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:06:01 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Naval Air Pilot I have before me, courtesy of TIGHAR members Dan Brown, Dan Postellon, Tom King, Jerry Hamilton, Alan Caldwell, and Robin Acker, an intact copy of "H.O. No. 184, Naval Air Pilot, Pacific Islands, January 1936." It's a hard cover book 6 x 9.25 x 1.5 inches with 677 pages. The book is classified "Confidential." Earhart was reportedly given access to this confidential publication and there has been much speculation about what information it contained. We no longer need to speculate. As described in the book's Preface: "Hydrographic Office Publication No. 184 - Confidential Naval Air Pilot of the Pacific Islands - is designed to furnish information of assistance in the navigation of aircraft in the aforementioned area. Of no less importance, it will provide force, division, and ship commanders with timely data which may have a direct bearing on fleet plans and fleet movements. The publication is divided into three parts and contains information on aircraft facilities and such other specific data as are considered of value. Part I contains general information concerning meteorological conditions. Part II contains detailed information and sketches of of seaplane anchorages, and landing fields, arranged in alphabetical order by island groups. Part III contains photographs of seaplane anchorages, landing fields, landmarks, and other aids to air navigation. The information contained herein has been compiled from the most authentic and reliable sources available." The sketches of islands and coastlines are quite good and include Howland and Baker. There are also aerial photos of both Howland and Baker. Of course, the WPA airport at Howland is not shown because it wasn't built yet. Of the Phoenix Islands, only Canton Island is shown. There is a good overall planform of the atoll and a detailed map of the anchorage just off the main lagoon passage. The other islands of the Phoenix Group are shown only in a large scale map of the entire archipelago. The shapes of the islands are pretty accurate with the exception of "Gardner I (Kemins I) (trees 50 ft.)" which is shown much smaller than it really is and completely the wrong shape. This is consistent with the woefully inaccurate, but then current, British Admiralty map of the island based on an 1872 survey. There are good maps and lots of information regarding the islands of the Japanese Mandate, but in most cases there are notations that the information is "as of 1933." There is no mention of suspicion that the Marshalls are being fortified. For Jaluit, there is a notation that: "It is said that Jaluit is being developed as the central unit of a chain of Japanese Government landing fields in the mandated islands." Mille (Mulgrave) Atoll has no notation about Japanese Government activity. Truk, however, carries the notation, "There is reason to believe that Truk is fortified." I'll be happy to answer any specific questions forum subscribers may have about this publication. Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:24:02 From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Re: Naval Air Pilot Ric, can you give a brief accounting of how TIGHAR members Brown, Postellon, King, Hamilton, Caldwell, and Acker came to obtain this book? Where'd they find this thing? LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:40:21 From: Mark Prange Subject: Re: Naval Air Pilot What coordinates did it give for Howland Island? Mark Prange ******************************* Excellent question. The envelope, please? And our winner is... Lat 0*49' N Long 176*43' W which is what Clarence Williams used for Earhart. Actual coordinates are 0*48?7?N, 176*38?3?W More to follow. Pat ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:45:51 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Naval Air Pilot Randy Jacobson wrote this for the Eighth Edition: For obvious reasons, Earhart's strip map and navigational instructions for the trip to Howland are not available for inspection. However, charts for the same flight, prepared by Clarence Williams on February 9, 1937 but from the opposite direction, are now in the Special Collections archive at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. These show a great circle route representing the shortest distance, 2,556 statute miles (2,223 nm), between the two points, based upon 16 way points. Williams uses the position of 0*49'N, 176*43'W for Howland, the accepted position at the time, corresponding to 2219 nm along a great circle route. CDR W. N. Derby, USCG, commanding officer of the Itasca in 1935, had already sent a letter to the Naval Hydrographic Office detailing the latest, accurate, position for Howland as 0*50'30"N, 176*34'30"W. On Aug. 17, 1936, William Miller reported in his 6th Equatorial Cruise Report, reported that a revised position of Howland was determined to be 0*48'6"N, 176*38'12"W. A copy of this cruise report was retained by Bill Miller for his office files, and he undoubtedly had access to this information when conferring with Earhart prior to her departure. Whether he gave her the latest position information for Howland is unknown. The distance from Lae to this revised, corrected, location for Howland is 2223 nm. The difference in positions for the various Howland locations are on the order of 5 nm, an insignificant amount should one come upon visual range of the island itself. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:54:57 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Naval Air Pilot Alfred Hendrickson asks: >Ric, can you give a brief accounting of how TIGHAR members Brown, Postellon, >King, Hamilton, Caldwell, and Acker came to obtain this book? Where'd they find >this thing? Dan Brown found it for sale on ABE Books, a very good used and rare book website. The actual seller was Recycle Bookstore in la Jolla, CA. Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 20:03:30 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: Naval Air Pilot A similar sort of study from 1955 of Canton Island only can be found online at: http://www.botany.hawaii.edu/faculty/duffy/ARB/041-46/041.pdf It's not entirely clear what the purpose of this study was. It reads sort of like a modern environmental assessment document, with an eye towards development potential, either military or commercial. Tom D., # 2796 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 07:21:50 From: Suzanne Astorino Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart, take 2 Success at last! Not a sign of bad luck in sight! USNS Amelia Earhart Christening, take 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgIGDD1bCIQ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 09:41:14 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart, take 2 Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v753) Suzanne Astorino writes, Success at last! Not a sign of bad luck in sight! USNS Amelia Earhart Christening, take 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgIGDD1bCIQ First of all, it's a superstition. Second, the superstition does not allow for "do overs." Third, the whole episode is too ironic for words. Ric ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 09:47:49 From: Tom King Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart, take 2 Ric writes: >First of all, it's a superstition. >Second, the superstition does not allow for "do overs." >Third, the whole episode is too ironic for words. Ha! Just wait and see how long it is before the USNS AE is piled up on the Nutiran reef next to the Norwich City. LTM (who's crossing her fingers and hoping the ship doesn't sail under any ladders) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 2008 11:06:14 From: Eric Beheim Subject: Similar experiences While reviewing some early World War II radio news broadcasts, I came upon the following incident from the career of the famous World War I flying ace Eddie Rickenbacker: In October 1942, Rickenbacker was sent on a tour of the Pacific theater to review conditions, and to personally deliver a secret message to General Douglas MacArthur. After visiting Hawaii, the B-117D he was flying in went off course by hundreds of miles from its first scheduled stop at Canton island. (The navigation failure was due to an out-of-true octant that had suffered a severe shock in a pre-takeoff incident.) The pilots eventually had to ditch the plane in the Pacific. For 24 days, Rickenbacker (who was then 52) and his companions drifted at sea without food or water aside from an occasional fish and rain. After searching unsuccessfully for them for more than two weeks, the Army was going to give them up for lost. However, Rickenbacker's wife convinced them to extend the search another week. On November 13, 1942, Navy pilots rescued the surviving members of the crew near Samoa. (While adrift, one serviceman had died and been buried at sea.) Rickenbacker completed his assignment and delivered MacArthur's secret message. He later wrote a book about the experience titled "Seven Came Through." Had they been lost without a trace, TIGHAR would have another mystery to clear up. LTM (who remembers Captain Eddie from World War I) Eric ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 2008 10:06:27 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: USNS Amelia Earhart, take 2 << From Suzanne Astorino Success at last! Not a sign of bad luck in sight! USNS Amelia Earhart Christening, take 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgIGDD1bCIQ>> There aee several YouTube videos of the launching/christening. Search on YouTube for USNS Amelia Earhat. There are also several videos on AE. Some are simply tributes, others expound one theory or another on her disappearance. TIGHAR and the Niku theory are not mentioned in any that I saw. It would be a useful project for someone to do a YouTube video on TIGHAR's work, I think. It's cheap publicity that could draw people to the website and maybe help win some new dues-paying members. At the very least the Niku theory would be on the table with the other ideas ---Irene, Saipan, Jarvis, Billings, etc. Tom D., #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 2008 10:08:39 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: Naval Air Pilot This study was probably a preliminary to the British Hydrogen bomb atmospheric testing on Christmas Island (Kirimati). Daniel Postellon TIGHAR#2263 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 2008 18:19:37 From: Tom Doran Subject: Google Earth Looking at Niku in Google Earth this week it seemed that it must be an updated photo. The resolution seemed sharper, Norwich City wreckage is no longer visible, and there are three dark shapes in the water near the lagoon entrance. The dark patches might be seaweed. They are larger than the Norwich City was. Curious about the date I discovered that a new version of Google Earth was released this week, ver 4.3.7191 It includes a new feature, the approximate date of the photography is displayed along the lower right edge of the image. This image was from February 2007. Google says the dates are approximate, plus or minus a couple of weeks. The image may not be put online for several weeks or months after the date of photography. All images worldwide do not yet have dates and probably won't until they are next updated. Tom Doran, # 2796 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 2008 12:37:11 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: Google Earth <> I neglected to mention that to find Nikumaroro in Google Earth you must search for "Gardner Island, Kiribati." All of the Phoenix Islands are listed by their names under British control. Google is not consistent in naming locations, at least in the South Pacific. Places might have the current legal name of the post colonial government, a traditional name from native culture, or the British or American name. When I have trouble finding a place I go to Wikipedia to find out all the names it has been called. Another thought about Google Earth, they have a provision for uploading donated photos, with credit, of locations. TIGHAR probably has more photos of Niku than anyone. A few picures of non-sensitive locations might be useful and would help publicize TIGHAR. For an example search for Canton Island, Kiribati, and click on the blue dots. They have both historic and current photos. Tom Doran #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 2008 13:46:39 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Google Earth >Another thought about Google Earth, they have a provision for >uploading donated photos, with credit, of locations. TIGHAR probably >has more photos of Niku than anyone. A few picures of non-sensitive >locations might be useful and would help publicize TIGHAR. For an >example search for Canton Island, Kiribati, and click on the blue >dots. They have both historic and current photos. Thanks, Tom. Yes, somebody's done quite a job on Canton. We've talked about uploading some photos, and I actually volunteered to do it, wasn't told not to, so probably will one of these days ? just haven't had the time to figure out how it's done. The new satellite imagery is quite impressive; I almost expected to see Nai'a lying off the north cape. LT(photogenic)M ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 2008 12:31:16 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: Google Earth << From Tom King The new satellite imagery is quite impressive; >> Google gets their photography from several sources. There are several satellitte sources of varying resolutions. They also use aerial photgraphy from aircraft. If you scan across an area you'll see the boundaries between source "A" and source "B." Adjoining photos may be at different seasons, one being in leafless winter and the next as green as July. The best resolution, like you'd find in US urban areas, is from aircraft. I'd guess that the new Niku coverage is from an airplane, along with that from the other Phoenix Isslands.Open ocean coverage is pretty low resolution. I've been looking at coverage in Ireland recently. Resolution in most areas is so bad you can barely distinguish between rivers and farmland. Coarse coverage of Dublin tells you which area is rural and what is developed but there is no way to pick out individual buildings. Tom Doran, #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 2008 13:16:47 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Google Earth <> The older Niku coverage was from the ICONOS satellite, image captured with support from TIGHAR and NOAA; I imagine the more recent is satellite-based, too; we know that more images have been made. I suspect the other Phoenix Islands have been shot because of their inclusion in the new Phoenix Islands Protected Area. LTM (who's pretty as a picture) ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 2008 19:31:54 From: John Harsh Subject: Re: Google Earth Is it possible to get previous images? It may be helpful to see older images for comparison. - JMH 0634C ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 2008 20:19:38 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Google Earth For John Harsh I'm sure the 2001 image is on the website somewhere, and doubtless Ric and Pat can supply a copy, but I'd be happy to as well if you'll send me an address. ******************************* http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Bulletins/32_SatPhoto/32_Nikusatphoto.html ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:46:12 From: Lawrence Glazer Subject: New Movie? The latest Avweb Flash contains this item: 'Also this week, Variety reported that Hilary Swank and Richard Gere will star in a movie about Amelia Earhart. Shooting will start later this month in Toronto, Nova Scotia, and South Africa.' Anyone heard anything about this? LTM LMG **************************** Yes, it's been in the works for a while. We are working on putting together a documentary to come out at the same time. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 2008 09:33:20 From: Marcus Lind Subject: Re: New movie? For Lawrence Glazier: Yes... here's a few links about this project: http://comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=44346 http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20193923,00.html http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2275445,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=16 Kind regards - LTM, Marcus Lind ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 2008 13:22:42 From: Daryll Bolinger Subject: PDF document available Since the Forum is slow these days, I thought I would announce the availability of a PDF research document that I wrote to share with anyone sending their email address to me DaryllB25840@MSN.com requesting it. The size of it is about 120 kb and of course you would need the free Adobe reader to open and read it. The PDF document is a good way to share while still preserving the format and font sizes for easy reading. I can promise at least, some insight in to the feelings and beliefs of Amy Earhart, Amelia's mother, as she wrote a very personal letter, during a tumultuous period in American history, to the lady who taught Amelia to fly. The letter was handwritten and transcribed from another source. Daryll Bolinger ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 2008 09:49:24 From: Tom Byers Subject: Re: New movie Earhart is now known more for the the mystery of her disappeance than her accomplishments. Still it should be an interesting movie. Perhaps someday there will be a definitive discovery the remains of her Lockheed similar to the discovery of the wreck of the Titanic. LTM, Tom ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 07:39:05 From: Rick Boardman Subject: Re: New movie Ahhh what will Hollywood do with that one! I can just see a ghostly image of Amelia (arms outstretched and played by Wynslette) in the arms of Noonan (De Caprio), stood in the cockpit, as the Electra (played by a Gooney- bird to fit all the film crew in) flying silently towards their fate.......... Cue the music! LTM (who knows what happened to her one true love....) Rick Boardman ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 07:39:58 From: Marty Joy Subject: Re: New movie >From Tom Byers > >Earhart is now known more for the the mystery of her disappeance than >her accomplishments. Still it should be an interesting movie. > >Perhaps someday there will be a definitive discovery the remains of >her Lockheed similar to the discovery of the wreck of the Titanic. If only that would happen, it would be very cool and historic, looking forward to it! ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 13:12:46 From: Russ Matthews Subject: Re: New movie Actually, the cast we know so far... Hilary Swank as Amelia Richard Gere as George Palmer Putnam Viginia Madsen as Dorothy Binney Putnam A Lockheed 12 (Electra, Jr.) as NR16020 Either a Ford or Stinson Tri-motor as the "Friendship" LTM, Russ ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 18:01:08 From: Colm O?Higgins Subject: Re: New movie In to-day's Toronto Sun newspaper there was a photo of Richard Gere and Hilary Swank, who btw looked lovely and fits the part eminently, during filming in Toronto. They appeared to strolling together on the sidewalk with a period male mannequin in the background. During CHUM FM radio's morning show with 'Roger, Rick, & Marilyn, Marilyn spoke about the photo and Roger asked 'what era was that?' The 'screener' answered after a pause, '1937' ! "She died, right' said Roger. Screamed Marilyn: 'now you've given away the ending' Hilarious at the moment, sad in light of our interest(s). ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 18:32:24 From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: New movie And Johnny Dep as Fred Noonan? ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 10:01:50 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: New movie <> Hillary Swank would be an excellent choice to narrate a documentary on the Nikumaroro theory. Maybe she'd be interested if any tangible evidence turns up, like DNA or serial numbered parts. It could be something like those documentaries in which a celebrity goes to visit the dolphins, tigers, gorillas, etc. Just thinking, has Swank been in a movie in which her character did NOT die at the end? Tom Doran, #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 10:30:51 From: Tom King Subject: Re: New movie >Maybe she'd be interested if any tangible >evidence turns up, like DNA or serial numbered parts. I don't want to pick nits, but I think we ought to be clear about the fact that "tangible evidence" HAS "turned up," by dint of a good deal of TIGHAR effort. If we're going to say that only absolute, hot-and-smoking-gun evidence like DNA and serial numbers constitutes "tangible evidence," we're very likely never to have it. In the harder sciences one can specify with some precision what evidence will confirm or disconfirm an hypothesis; that's a lot harder to do in a soft science like archaeology. Sure, Earhart or Noonan DNA or the right serial number on something would be confirming, but often confirmation comes in little bits and pieces, not in the form of one great discovery. I'd submit that the combination of radio data, historical data, archaeological data, and laboratory analytical data we now have in hand collectively constitutes evidence that is quite "tangible." Whether it's sufficient to constitute some kind of proof is something we can argue about -- just as people can argue about whether evolution has been "proved." But to dismiss our evidence as not "tangible" sets a totally unrealistic and unreasonable standard LTM (a very tangible old mom) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 10:58:37 From: Jim Tierney Subject: Re: New movie Re Hilary Swank dying--- I think she did NOT die in Insomnia--but Al Pacino did... Jim Tierney ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 21:44:03 From: Tom Byers Subject: Re: New movie I wonder how the writers will treat her disappearance? Captured by the Japanese, a castaway or exhausting her fuel supply? Or a Soprano's fade to black ending? (brilliant but frustrating) I think a great title would be: "Courage, the price paid for peace" LTM, Tom ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 13:09:32 From: Pat Gaston Subject: Movies and evidence 1. It's my understanding that the Hilary Swank pic will concentrate on the 1928 Friendship flight, thus playing nicely to the preference of American audiences for happy endings. I've often thought the "real reason" nobody has made a full-fledged Earhart biopic is that, let's face it, the story is a downer. Who wants to spend two hours and 25 bucks getting familiar with AE and FN when you know going in that they'll die at the end? Sheer box office poison. Only the French are good at this sort of thing. I see Sophie Marceau as AE .... 2. Tom Doran is correct; TIGHAR has found no tangible evidence of Earhart's presence on Niku. With all due respect to Dr. King, and acknowledging that archeology is a "soft" science, expanding the term "tangible evidence" to include such things as zipper pulls, glass shards, bottles, a sextant box, clamshells, etc., is to deprive it of all meaning. All of these artifacts are fully consonant with known events on the island, specifically including the wreck of the Norwich City, 25 years of colonization and several years of Coast Guard activity. If these items are probative of Earhart, then I could just as easily say that finding an old arrowhead in my backyard is "tangible evidence" that Sitting Bull once camped there. If the term "tangible evidence" is to have any value, then TIGHAR at a minimum must produce an artifact that is fundamentally inconsistent with the island's known history. To date they have failed to do so. For example, we know that the aircraft skin found in 1991 does not fit anywhere on the Electra, and the mere presence of other airplane parts on Niku -- many of them from a B-24 -- is probative only of the fact that the colonists had access to the Canton scrap pile. This is not holding TIGHAR to a "totally unrealistic and unreasonable standard," but to the same standard applied, in the courts of both science and public opinion, to other historical discoveries. If Bob Ballard claimed he had found the Titanic based upon a few buttons, a deck chair and a teacup, he would have been laughed out of the press conference. Of course, if the teacup had been inscribed "RMS Titanic," it would have been a whole different story. I recognize that Niku's unique history makes the discovery of such an artifact especially difficult. For example, a sextant box found on any other uninhabited island would definitely be an oddity, but on Niku we have the wreck of the Norwich City, which certainly carried a sextant. Further complicating matters are the cultural overlay provided by 25 years of colonization and the apparent use of the "Seven Site" as a Coast Guard picnic ground / target range. But let's not mock the concept of "evidence" by applying it to any item, however mundane, that conceivably >could< have been used in some way by Amelia Earhart. Bearing sleeves? Sure, AE >could< have carried 'em in her pocket .... Pat Gaston ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 13:13:12 From: Tom Ruprecht Subject: Itasca 1/700 kit review For any modelers on the list, a new kit of Itasca's class in 1/700: http://www.steelnavy.com/WEMGorleston.htm Later serving as HMS Gorleston, if one reads the review it will be found that alternative parts for the USCG version are included for Itasca. I have one kit of a WW I subject from WEM and it's a gem, so I can vouch for the company. Tom ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 14:01:43 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Movies and evidence Pat Gaston writes: >Who wants to spend two hours and 25 bucks getting familiar with AE >and FN when you know going in that they'll die at the end? Sheer >box office poison. Yeah, that's why nobody has ever made a movie about the Alamo, or the Little Big Horn, or the Charge of the Light Brigade, or Sir Thomas "Man For All Seasons" More, or Thomas Becket, or William "Braveheart" Wallace. Sheer box office poison. >All of these artifacts are fully consonant with known events on the >island, specifically including the wreck of the Norwich City, 25 >years of colonization and several years of Coast Guard activity. It's easy to be generally dismissive of what at first may seem to be common objects held up as "tangible evidence," but the devil is in the details. The zipper pull turns out to be American of a style never used by the military and manufactured between 1933 and 1936 before the company began exporting zippers to other countries. We also have two fragments from the mirror of a woman's compact that matches the style of mirror (rectangular with beveled edges) used on "Mondaine" compacts in the 1930s. The Earhart compact in the Purdue collection is a Mondaine. The fragments of makeup found with the mirror pieces match the chemical composition of the makeup in a Mondaine compact. I'd be interested to hear your explanation of which of the crew members of the Norwich City, or which of the Gilbertese colonists, or which of the Coast Guardsmen happened to lose an American woman's compact on the site that matches the description of where the bones of a castaway were found in 1940? And there's much more. The results of testing and analysis of the artifacts we collected during last summer's expedition are coming in faster than we can get them written up. >For example, a sextant box found on any other uninhabited island >would definitely be an oddity, but on Niku we have the wreck of the >Norwich City, which certainly carried a sextant. Hold that thought. As you'll recall, the sextant box had a couple of numbers on it. Nobody has ever been able to make sense of those numbers, but that may be about to change. Get ready to calculate the odds of a sextant bearing two four-digit numbers being unrelated to a sextant box bearing those same two four-digit numbers. Life may be about to get a bit more challenging for armchair debunkers. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 14:44:23 From: William Webster-Garman Subject: Re: Movies and evidence Ric wrote: >Yeah, that's why nobody has ever made a movie about the Alamo Don't forget (to cite a very wide range of them) Romeo & Juliet, Doctor Zhivago, Lawrence of Arabia, Mullholland Drive, Pulp Fiction, DOA, 2001 a Space Odyssey... As for tangible evidence, I would say there's plenty. The radio signal documentation rather overwhelmingly points towards Nikumaroro, where physical, documented and anecdotal evidence all long ago flew above the random noise of chance. LTM, who could take a hint, even if it happened to be a coconut falling on her head from one of Arundel's palm trees. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 14:56:13 From: Tom Doran Subject: Re: New movie >From Tom King > >I don't want to pick nits, ............ But to dismiss our evidence as >not "tangible" sets a totally unrealistic and unreasonable standard Perhaps tangible is not the word I need. Whatever the word is, ideally there would be evidence that is irrefutable in the media and the court of public opinion. DNA and serial numbers are two examples, maybe there is something else that would serve. It's inarguable, to me anyway, that TIGHAR hasn't accumulated the preponderance of circumstantial evidence that AE and FN could have landed at Niku. No one has come up with credible arguments against the origin of the zipper pull, compact, etc. Competing theories tend to be either completely goofy or simply lack any evidence at all. "Crashed and sank," might be plausible but only if you dismiss all the radio transmissions. Even if 90 per cent of the transmissions are dismissed as bogus, it seems inescapable that they were on dry land somewhere, hoping for rescue. Niku would be the best if not the only prospect. In Wikipedia there is a good summary of the search for Captain Sir John Franklin's Arctic expedition of 1845. Both ships and all their crew members were lost, "without a trace." Although subsequent expeditions every few years over the next several decades brought back significant numbers of artifacts, some tied to specific men, all explanations were thought inconclusive for almost 150 years. In the 1980's there was finally some scientific consensus of what probably happened to most of the crew, but there still is no slam-dunk conclusive proof that explains everything. Regarding the longevity of Hillary Swank's characters, I should amend the comment to the effect that, "She only wins an Oscar if her character dies." The AE movie should be good for her career, then. Tom D., #2796 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:37:58 From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: New movie Actually, Tom, there was a cairn found in the Canadian Arctic circa 1859 that had a note from the Franklin expedition, explaining how they got caught in the ice. I believe the searching ship was the Fox, and they found identifiable artifacts on land that were left behind the party as they tried to go to the Great Slave Lake. Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin's_lost_expedition) has a decent history (see half-way down the page). ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:39:44 From: Tom King Subject: Re: Movies and evidence For Pat Gaston I don't know where you and Tom Doran went to school, Pat, but where I come from "tangible" means what Merriam-Webster says it means: 1 a: capable of being perceived especially by the sense of touch; palpable. b: substantially real; material. 2: capable of being precisely identified or realized by the mind 3: capable of being appraised at an actual or approximate value synonyms see perceptible By this definition, to say we have no tangible evidence is simply absurd. As for your Custer and the arrowhead analogy, I don't know where you learned your archaeological and historical research methods, either, but where I learned mine there's a great big difference between one out-of-context artifact and a whole suite of artifacts and other data, that collectively support a specific interpretation. A single artifact (even with RMS Titanic on it) isn't likely to prove anything; there are always alternative explanations for how it got into your back yard, or to a specific place on the ocean floor, or wherever. But when you find multiple artifacts -- however "mundane" -- and a bunch of historical and other data suggesting that Sitting Bull or the Titanic were in a particular location, you have to start thinking that it just might be so, and it may be that you don't need a particular "any idiot can recognize it" artifact. LTM (who would like at least to see her children not abuse the language) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:54:08 From: William Webster-Garman Subject: Re: New movie Randy Jacobson wrote: >... there was a cairn found in the Canadian Arctic circa 1859 >that had a note from the Franklin expedition, explaining how they >got caught in the ice ... Yes, actually two notes written two years apart on a standard one page admiralty form made but neither described what happened after Franklin died and the ships were deserted the first time. Scattered artifacts and bodies were also found during the 1850s, however the tale has only been spliced together over the past twenty years or so from both newly acquired forensics and long ignored Inuit accounts of sundry encounters with crew members from the doomed expedition. A few crew members likely survived at least six winters on the ice and rock. One of the lingering mysteries though, is that although the expedition left London with a couple hundred lead message cylinders meant to be stashed in rock cairns at conspicuous navigational landmarks, many cairns were found but only that one admiralty form ever turned up. Folks are still looking. Sadly though, there are now Franklin "buffs" who go up to bleak King Williams Island, looking for artifacts (including bits of bone and skull), plucking them up with no heed for their archaeological context. LTM, who can be coy. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:37:11 From: George Werth Subject: Franklin expedition Nova covered the Franklin Expedition in their series: http://pbs.org/wgbh/nova/arctic/< George R. Werth TIGHAR Member #2630 LTM who loves to watch the NOVA series on PBS ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 23:09:38 From: William Webster-Garman Subject: The hint Ric dropped By the way Ric, I heard the hint you dropped about... could it be true? Having maybe somehow matched up the sextant box numbers with Fred? LTM, ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 23:21:48 From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: The hint Ric dropped William Webster-Garman asked, >By the way Ric, I heard the hint you dropped about... could it be >true? Having maybe somehow matched up the sextant box numbers with >Fred? We're not there yet but we have a promising working hypothesis for what the numbers on the box mean. We're on the scent (running and baying) and we'll see how far the trail takes us. LTM Ric