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Author Topic: Helping to understand  (Read 16302 times)

Michael HALL

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Helping to understand
« on: June 21, 2010, 06:06:38 AM »

Hi

Well first post here and in at the deep end ;)

Honestly until the film I knew nothng of Amelia, my wife and i sat down on the sofa having no clue of her fate and it was quite a shock when we did not get the typical hollywood ending, (yes we knew it was based on a tue story, we just did not know the story).

So from the moment I got up from that Sofa feeling somewhat cheated by my own lack of knowledge I started doing some research and this is where i got hooked on all things AE and Tighar's research to find "The answer"

Now before I go on, I am indeed in the "she landed" camp, but I have my own questions that I am finding hard to put to one side. And this is what i ask for help on.

1. The Norfolk crew were known to have "camped out" on the island for 5 days prior to rescue - Could the fires at the 7 site be from them and NOT AE?
2. The ladies compact - shaving mirror from one of the crew or a momento from a sailors wife or love?
3. Bones - it is reported that dead crew members were buried on the island I think?
4. Lanolin cream - sailors have to protect their hands and face from the harshness of being at sea, OK OK I admit you have got to have quite a hardend of a sailor to admit he carries the stuff but not implausable?
5. Post lost messages, are there any that have been varified that the voice of AE was actually heard or is it all static?

Many questions I have floating around in my head but I will stop there and hope these at least for now could have some light thrown on them

Regards
Michael
« Last Edit: June 21, 2010, 06:09:35 AM by Michael HALL »
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Helping to understand
« Reply #1 on: June 21, 2010, 07:21:51 AM »

Good questions.

1. The Norfolk crew were known to have "camped out" on the island for 5 days prior to rescue - Could the fires at the 7 site be from them and NOT AE?
Yes, but "could" covers a lot of territory.  According to their own written accounts, the Norwich City survivors had two camps - one near the wreck site at the western end of the island and the other on the southern shore from which they were ultimately rescued. It would appear that they never came within a mile of the Seven Site. Also, the Seven Site fire features contained the bones of birds, turtle, and small fish.  There is no record of the Norwich City survivors catching and cooking local wildlife.

2. The ladies compact - shaving mirror from one of the crew or a momento from a sailors wife or love?

The glass shards we've found match the size, shape and features of the mirror in a particular 1930s vintage compact.  It is, of course, possible that the same type of mirror was also used as a man's shaving mirror.  The presence of pieces of cosmetic nearby, however, would seem to argue for a compact as the source.  Yes, a sailor from the Norwich City or a WWII Coastie can carry around a woman's compact as a memento but the compact is only one of many indications of the presence of a woman at the site.  Gallagher found what he was sure were parts of a woman's shoe and a modern analysis of the bone measurements Dr. Hoodless made suggest that the partial skeleton found was that of a female. A small broken glass jar we found during the recent work at the site has a distinctly feminine look and may turn out to be another gender-specific artifact.

 
3. Bones - it is reported that dead crew members were buried on the island I think?

That's right, but the burials were near the shipwreck on the opposite end of the atoll from the Seven Site.


4. Lanolin cream - sailors have to protect their hands and face from the harshness of being at sea, OK OK I admit you have got to have quite a hardend of a sailor to admit he carries the stuff but not implausable?

It's hard to explain a bottle made in 1933 being aboard a ship that was wrecked in 1929 but a WWII Coastie can have a small bottle of hair tonic or hand lotion in a ten year-old bottle.  Any artifact, taken by itself, can be explained away if you postulate an unusual undocumented event (i.e. a compact carried as a memento), but when you find yourself having to do that over and over when there is a single hypothetical event (i.e. an American female castway) into which everything fits, the maintenance of skepticism begins to appear more and more desperate.


5. Post lost messages, are there any that have been varified that the voice of AE was actually heard or is it all static?

There are numerous reports of voice transmissions - some intelligible, some not. On the night of July 2nd, the radio operator at Nauru heard the same voice he had heard from the plane in flight the night before "except without the hum of the plane in the background" but he couldn't make out the words. The next night the U.S. government radio operator on Baker Island heard a "good, strong" transmission from the plane trying to contact Itasca. On July 4th Dana Randolph in Rock Springs, WY heard Earhart calling for help, as did Betty Klenck in St. Petersburg, FL the next day.  
For a more complete discussion of the post-loss messages I recommend Finding Amelia - The true story of the Earhart disappearance (Naval Institute Press, 2006) by some guy in Delaware.

Ric
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