Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 12:07:58 EDT From: Bob Lee Subject: Fundraising Idea Just charge extra to read any of Bob Brandenburg's postings. They are that good. Bob ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 12:14:16 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply For Hue, Bob B. and radio buffs. Would it be fair to summarize that Bob B. believes it was possible for Betty to hear the Electras radio and Hue does not think it possible. The harmonics, skip, frequencies, drifting and endless analytical radio discussions are mind boggling for the lay person. Ron Bright ****************************************************** From Ric It's a complicated subject and certainly beyond my paygrade, but Hue's challenge was made publicly on the forum and Bob's response deserves the same airing - as do their respective rebuttals. The question of whether Betty could have heard AE is a crucial one. Hue has tried to make the case that it was effectively impossible. My inexpert opinion is that Bob has successfully refuted that allegation. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 12:16:53 EDT From: Roger Kelley Subject: For Cam Warren I agree with Ted Campbell who said, "From time to time I very much appreciate your fencing with Ric on various matters but to be truthful I get a little tired of your picking on the minutiae rather then trying to get your ideas accepted through valid "scientific "arguments and/or physical proof of your "statements of fact." I ask you Cam, are you not a member of the Amelia Earhart Society? Were you not advertised as a major participant in the AMELIA EARHART SYMPOSIUM which was held at the WESTERN AEROSPACE MUSEUM on May 17-19, 2002? Is not the mission of the Amelia Earhart Society and the Symposium which you participated in to encourage the release and conclusive determination of any additional facts surrounding the last flight of Earhart and Noonan, and their disappearance? Key words, "release and conclusive"!!! By the way, you claim the following: 1. You are a combat radio operator USN WW2., 2. You are a professional writer. 3. You are highly knowledgeable regarding radio technology. Are these claims accurate? If so, please bless us with your fully documented military history. A copy of your DD214 would suffice. Please list your publications and professional reviews of same. Please advise this forum what qualifications you have to support your claim that you are, "highly knowledgeable regarding radio technology." Are you an expert in radio technology and if so, by what standards? A list of academic degrees and your qualifications reflecting long term employment by major research institutions or prominent radio manufactures will suffice. I join with Ted and say, "Show me the money !" Roger Kelley ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 12:18:08 EDT From: Christian Duretete Subject: Re: PAA navigation Dan Brown wrote: > The ground stations operate on 3082.5 kc (99 meters), 5165 kc (58 > meters), and 8220 kc (36.5 meters) for communication, and on 1638 kc > (183 meters) for direction finding bearings. The frequencies are Gee: I thought it was a HF DF: in 1936 were they ONLY using 1638, from the aircraft, for DFing? Sounds strange to me... Christian D ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 12:22:38 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Hue Miller's reply II Bob Brandenburg wrote: > Your most recent posting requires comment. > > You refer to an undated Eitel-Mcullough article by John Reinartz as the basis > for some harmonic suppression calculations you have performed. I simply cited the article, with the worst case selectivity, giving figures for the harmonic output with one tuned circuit. > Although the disjoint > nature of your remarks makes it difficult to follow your logic, it appears > that you are once again relying on "factoids" and generalities instead of actual > analysis. Perhaps the following points will be instructive: > > (1). You quote a passage from the Reinartz paper mentioning the difficulty that > amateur transmitters had in meeting the FCC rule circa 1947, in "regard to the > reduction of radiation of harmonic frequencies to not less than 40 db below the > fundamental frequency ...". Apparently, you believe that the Western Electric > 13C transmitter was subject to the 1947 rules. I do not know how you derive "apparently" from my comments. I cited the 40 db FCC ruling, perhaps i should simply not have included that. This was merely by way of explaining the concern of the author about the contemporary 40 db figure. > That transmitter was developed > in the early 1930s, and was in commercial airline service in the United States > by 1936. If it is your position that there was an FCC rule in effect in 1936/ > 1937 specifying required quantitative reductions in harmonic radiation, then > please cite the relevant rule. If you indicate where i maintain this, THEN i will consider citing the relevant rule. > (2) You mention a paper by Labus and Roder, which appeared in the Proceedings > of the Institute of Radio Engineers in 1931, and which Reinartz apparently cited > in his paper. The full title of the the Labus and Roder paper, by the way, is > "The Suppression of Radio-Frequency Harmonics in Transmitters". That paper, > which you evidently have not read, appeared in the June 1931 issue of the > Proceedings and presents a general analysis of some of the factors associated > with suppressing harmonic radiation. One of the factors not treated in the paper > is central to the question of whether Betty could have heard Amelia on a > harmonic. Labus and Roder state ""...it may happen that the frequency of one > of the generated harmonics coincides with one of the natural harmonics of the > antenna. In this case an exceedingly strong radiation for that harmonic will > occur." Clearly, the notion of "coincides with" can be extended, without loss > of rigor, to include "is in the neighborhood of". Uh-oh. Is "in the neighborhood" something like starting with "a reasonable assumption" of harmonic power? > Since the authors use a > Thevenin circuit approach to the problem, the analysis reduces essentially to > finding the ratio of current in the amplifier plate load inductance to the > current in the antenna as a function of frequency and the values of the > impedance components in the output circuit. Yes, current by voltage in the purely resistive radiation resistance. We are talking, ultimately, about the power ratio of the harmonic power in the antenna resistance, compared to the fundamental channel power in the antenna, agreed? The factors, of course, that affect this are the series reactance of the antenna capacity, or inductance, and the parallel impedance of the plate load of the inductor and it's distributed capacitance, plus the plate trimmer capacitor, presented to the tube impedance. > (3) You quote some harmonic suppression results, without stating whether you > calculated those results or just lifted them from the Labus/Roder paper. You > seem to believe that the result depends only upon the Q of the antenna. Wrong. Apparently you read the paper. You know then, that the Q factor examples cited were for the tuned circuit. I did not state otherwise. >If you had read the Labus/Roder paper, you would know that the result depends on > two other factors, one of which is a simple function of the harmonic ordinal. > The other factor is the current ratio mentioned in (2) above. If you examine > the equations in the paper, you will see that the result is critically dependent > upon the unique frequency dependent impedance characteristics of the antenna in > question. Unless the results you cite were computed specifically for the > antenna on NR16020, then they are useless for deciding how much harmonic > suppression occurred in the output circuit of the WE 13C on NR16020. > > Regarding the selectivity of the output circuit, you continue to contend that > the antenna effectively "presents ANOTHER" (emphasis mine) pole of selectivity. > Perhaps I didn't make this point clear enough in my previous response, but the > antenna was the ONLY (emphasis mine) selective element in the output circuit. > You state, correctly, that if the antenna impedance, which varies with > frequency, does not reasonably match the transmitter impedance, actual radiated > power is greatly reduced. But "greatly reduced" is not the same as "eliminated". > You are ignoring the fact that even a small current in the antenna branch could > generate a significant radiated field if the signal frequency was close to a > natural harmonic frequency of the antenna. You also are ignoring the facts that > the antenna gain at harmonic frequencies was higher than at the fundamental > frequencies, and that ionospheric propagation loss was much less than at the > fundamental frequencies. Combining these factors yields a small, but non-zero, > probability that a detectable harmonic signal could have reached Betty's > radio. I agree that only at antenna high-impedance resonance points ( multiple of 1/2 wave) will the antenna radiate to any practical degree harmonics. I do not understand your contention that the antenna is the only selective element. The plate inductor resonates with the plate trimmer capacitor and the antenna capacity. It will do this with or without an antenna connected. > Finally, regarding the matter of whether Betty's radio drifted in frequency, > you rely on "anecdotal submissions" indicating that "old timers" agree with you. > The essence your previous argument on this point was that Betty is not to be > believed, because it was impossible for her receiver not to have drifted. I > don't wish to put too fine a point on this, but unless you have documented > evidence collected by someone who was actually there with Betty, it doesn't > matter what anecdotal evidence you have. Lest you think I m being disrespectful > to "old timers", I happen to be one. I was designing and building my own > shortwave receivers before you were born. That's great. What is your comment on the likelihood of a non-drifting vacuum tube receiver at 18, 24, MHz or higher? How about the "static" at these frequencies? Like a "police scanner" ? I am willing to hear you give some idea of probabilities on these questions. I am not saying "impossible", i AM saying, "consider the likelihood." Here's another idea for you, Bob. Your analysis says even at 0.1 watt radiated power, Betty could have heard this x days out of y. My question is, with thousands of radio hams trying the trans-Pacific route, day in and day out, year after year, Betty was the only one, one blessed week in 1937, to achieve this enviable long-distance reception? I read that hams at Howland, within months of the AE disappearance, where pleased that their AM transmitter, power uncited, but definitely not in the 5 or 10 watt class, were happy to reach inland USA, not East or Gulf Coast USA. This is with numerous tries, good optimized antennas at both ends, skilled technical people. But Betty bested them all? Should they have tried more often? How much harder could they have tried? Should they have used a Zenith home antenna and a 100 foot wire? Okay, so i am in danger of becoming sarcastic here. My point is, if this was achievable in some nonzero x days out of y, WHY not more people? There certainly has not been achieved despite a number of tries. And no, we can not include in long-distance success stories, the modern records made by using SSB equipment, or digital non-voice modes. Or, have you some other examples beside Betty, of such a long distance low power reception of an AM signal? I have been trying to notice any prewar records of long distance reception at low powers in the higher HF frequencies. Purely anecdotal, so far, but what i've come up with is receptions of around 2000-3000 miles at best, with powers down to about 1.5 watts out, this with communications equipment at both ends. You may discount or ignore this, your choice, i am just telling what i have come up with, looking for examples. Overall, my argument is this: consider the probability. This includes probability questions that arise from the content of the reception. One and a half hours and you have cryptic series of numbers, live reporting of a cabin tussle between AE and FN, etc., but WHAT of significance, considering she was (supposedly) trying to summon help? She had to broadcast details of water rising, Fred shouting, them conversing, but nothing a rescuer could use? Or Betty missed the important parts, due to fading and static, where AE said where she (thought) she was, condition, next transmission time, for example? Okay, i grant the probability is nonzero. It is, in my view, however, vanishingly small. That means close enough to zero to eliminate it. Again, i have limited time to give to this very interesting topic. I do plan to take this question, the harmonic issue, elsewhere, for more expert input than mine ( or Mr. Brandenburg's ). We'll see what the larger community thinks. If i'm wrong, you'll see it here. If you're wrong, you'll need to come up with another explanation for what Betty heard. Regards, Hue Miller ************************************************************** From Ric >Okay, i grant the probability is nonzero. It is, in my view, however, >vanishingly small. That means close enough to zero to eliminate it. So after all the hoopla it comes down to "It could have happened but I don't think it did." ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 12:33:55 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: RDF-1 I've been fascinated with the exchange regarding the RDF-1. I've tried to sort this issue out unsuccessfully. I've had a number of off forum exchanges with Cam which were all pleasant until I asked for specific confirmation that the radio was on AE's Electra. He has refused to answer any of my questions and elected to get abusive and insulting as his method of response. I have found no indication there is a living soul who has ever seen this radio if indeed it ever existed. I can find no schematics nor any specs. I've been in contact with former Bendix employees and have come up empty. Cam seems to have strong OPINIONS in this regard but absolutely no proof whatsoever that he is willing to provide. He does not seem to recognize his opinions or those of others are not proof. In addition I can find no significance in regard to the Earhart mystery whether such a radio was or was not installed. I don't see the point of the discussion. An undated photo whose location is not specified found among the deceased's effects is hardly of any significant value particularly since the equipment shown is also not identified. That AE acknowledged receiving on 7500kc does not tell which radio she had. That Vincent Bendix was a friend of the Putnams does not tell me what radio was on the plane. Anecdote that a box marked Navy was delivered to the airplane doesn't tell me what radio was on the plane. I don't know if the statement was made or if it was true or what was in the box or if what was in the box was put in the airplane or if it was a radio and if so what radio it was. I don't know what difference any of this makes. I'm out of the radio thread. Alan ***************************************************************** From Ric This HF/DF radio thread is like Prometheus chained to the rock. An eagle comes and eats out his liver, then his liver grows back and the eagle returns. Every time we go down this road with Cam it ends the same way. He makes claims that he can't substantiate with anything but his own interpretations and opinions. For a while I thought we had a chance to finally make some progress on this question by being able to make a firm identification of the box in the Sias photo, but Hue Miller has - so far - chosen not to back up his assertion that he has an identical box. I think it's time to let our liver start to heal again. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 13:03:57 EDT From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: RA-1 > To which the government would respond, "Vince, you're a real card. What a > swell stunt. You're just the sort of guy to whom we like to award contracts > for classified equipment." Works for me. I agree this scenario doesn't work. But could the scenario have been different. What if the test with Amelia Earhart was carried out with the full approval of US government? The idea from Bendix's point of view was not then to publicise the RA-1/RDF1 but to test it. Amelia, for her part, merely had the use of it but Bendix wanted to sell it to the US government - as he later apparently did, selling 100 sets to the US navy. The project would of course remain classified and this could explain Earhart's assertion that there were matters that she was unable to discuss. We know that Earhart was able to receive on 7500Kcs via the loop antenna. This begs the question as to why, if the loop was working as it should, she did not attempt to use the loop to receive on 3105Kcs with her WE 20B, if she was indeed in close enough proximity to Howland for it to be effective? If however the loop was dedicated to an RA-1 she would not have had the option of using it with her WE 20B and this would explain her continued use of the perhaps useless belly antenna and lack of further reception. Regards Angus. ******************************************************************** From Ric So the government wants to test this new piece of equipment and, instead of conducting tests with knowledgeable radio technicians in Army or Navy aircraft (the XC-35 pressurized Electra, for instance, was being tested by the Air Corps at this time), they give the thing to Amelia Earhart who has just ducked out of taking even a basic radio navigation test???? Maybe they wanted her to write "HF/DF For Dummies". Why didn't she use the loop to receive on 3105? I don't know, but I can guess. AE never figured out that her inability to receive was an antenna problem, not a radio problem. When she asked for a "long-count on 7500" she tuned the WE 20B to 7500 and switched, for the first time, to her loop antenna. She heard not the loung count she asked for but a string of "A"s (dit-dah, dit-dah, dit -dah,....). She rotated her loop but got no change in the signal. She transmitted on 3105 saying, "We received your signals but unable to get a minimum. Please take bearing on us and answer 3105 with voice." In other words, "Forget it. I can't get this thing to work. You take a bearing on me and tell me which way I should go." She then sends long dashes on 3105. Having abandoned the idea of using her own direction finder she tunes the receiver back to 3105 AND switches the antenna back to the missing belly antenna. In her mind the loop is only for DFing and all she had heard when using it was code, which is useless to her for communication. Had she heard a long count in voice over the loop her problems would have been solved because she would have two way voice communication, but Itasca couldn't send voice on 7500. The real tragedy of the Earhart disappearance is that it was so unnecessary. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 13:08:13 EDT From: Dennis McGee Subject: Operation Sepulcher Ok, so this is not about AE and FN, but things are a little slow on the forum this week so I thought I'd pass this along from the November issue of Air Classics. Regardless of what one may think of their editorial efforts, they do have great airplane pix. Nonetheless, here is a piece about a TIGHAR-related effort. "Luftwaffe Aircraft Beneath Schoenefiled Airport?" "New claims promote interest but could be doubtful" "Researchers combing through millions of pages of documents taken from Stasi files -- the dread secret police of [the former] East Germany, indicate they have found proof that tons of WWII munitions along with complete aircraft were buried in bunkers below Schoenefeld Airport -- now a main destination for discount and charter airlines. "An airport spokesperson stated, "We became aware of the bunkers in 1993, four years dafter the fall of the Berlin Wall." The documents claims that the Soviets ordered the clearing of airfields and warehouses and that munitions and aircraft were simply slung into the numerous bunkers and covered over. Excavations will see if there is any credence to the Stasi claims." I know TIGHAR's investigation of similar claims in the early 90s did not turn up any evidence of WWII combat aircraft buried in bunkers on present day US/NATO/West German air bases. But this is another good example of how these rumor (if that is all they are) get started and how they are sustained for long periods. LTM, a former wishful thinker Dennis O. McGee #0149EC *********************************************************************** From Ric Old news. I'm surprised that it has taken Air Comics so long to get around to it. I've never been able to figure why finding rumors in STASI files makes them more credible. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 13:10:58 EDT From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: The Color of Money I just got Bob Lee's note. Is there currently a fundraising thread open? LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ******************************************************** From Ric Surely you jest. The fundraising thread is ALWAYS open. (I know, I know, don't call you Surely.) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 14:56:48 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: For Cam Warren I recognize the frustrations some have with Cam but I don't think getting into a credentials thread will resolve the problem. I will take Cam at his word for whatever his background is. All I really want out of Cam is the answers to the questions folks put to him. Cam believes the radio controversy is a highly significant issue. No one has shown me why that is so but if it is and Cam thinks the RDF-1 was installed on the plane he needs to show his proof or admit it is just his well measured opinion. To battle back and forth like this is getting no where. I don't know whether a RDF-1 was installed on the Electra or not but I have come to the conclusion neither Cam nor anyone else can offer proof that it was. Alan *************************************************************** From Ed Dear Roger, I would say "give me the money", "show me" doesn't put skin in the game. LTM Ed Of Psl #2415 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 15:18:31 EDT From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: RA-1 > So the government wants to test this new piece of equipment and, instead of > conducting tests with knowledgeable radio technicians in Army or Navy aircraft > (the XC-35 pressurized Electra, for instance, was being tested by the Air Corps > at this time), they give the thing to Amelia Earhart who has just ducked out > of taking even a basic radio navigation test???? Maybe they wanted her to > write "HF/DF For Dummies". If it was purely the government doing the testing I'm sure that AE would never have got so much as a whiff of hot paxolin from an RA-1. However we have to remember that Vincent Bendix was a sponsor. Here was an opportunity to do some very basic long distance testing for no cost and also to make a contribution to the Earhart flight that would actually cost the company little, especially if the set was purely on loan, as I would expect. The maximum loss to the company in the event of accident would only be the set itself if the matter were classified. Bendix may have been quite prepared that nothing useful would be learned. On the other hand if the flight were successful Bendix would be able to say to the US navy: "Look - even a woman can use it!" He had nothing to lose. There were also other considerations than operational characteristics that could be tested such as durability under vibration, condensation and corrosion proofing, component reliability etc that did not depend on AE's technical operational skills. Regards Angus. ************************************************************** From Ric If I understand you correctly you're suggesting that Bendix gave Earhart the radio to use with the government's blessing. That's fine as speculation but I know of nothing to support it. If she had such a new and unusual receiver aboard don't you find it just a bit odd that there is no indication that she attempted any DF navigation on the World Flight until the (unsuccessful) test flight at Lae on July 1st? Isn't it a bit strange that nobody who worked on her radios during the World Flight and was later questioned (Sgt. Stan Rose who fixed a blown fuse in Darwin and the Guinea Airways radio technician who checked all her radios and made a report that is included in the Chater letter) never said anything about a second receiver? If it was worth carrying the weight of the thing two-thirds of the way around the world, and if testing it was one of the purposes of the flight, why did Earhart only try to take a bearing on the Itasca as a last ditch effort after she failed in repeated attempts to get them to take a bearing on her? LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 1 Oct 2003 15:19:46 EDT From: Dennis McGee Subject: RA-1 Alan said : "No one has shown me why that is so but if it is and Cam thinks the RDF-1 was installed on the plane he needs to show his proof or admit it is just his well measured opinion." Ric and the Forum have asked Cam that question on several issues over the years and we get the same answer . . .silence. I sincerely appreciate and admire Cam's tenacity and dogged persistence in tracking down his leads -- he probably would have made a great cop -- but he always comes up short on providing proof. Lots of talk, no walk; lots of show, no go; lots of promise, no product; a vaporware specialist. LTM, who remains forever hopeful Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 14:48:38 EDT From: Dennis McGee Subject: RA-1, again Angus said: >There were also other considerations than operational >characteristics that could be tested such as durability under vibration, >condensation and corrosion proofing, component reliability etc that did not >depend on AE's technical operational skills AE may not have planned this trip very well, but I really can't see her voluntarily hauling around the world a piece of relatively heavy equipment that she did not know how to operate just to test its durability etc. Surely all of that testing could be conducted faster, cheaper, and more accurately in Bendix's own labs, I would think. LTM, who is occasionally testy Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ******************************************************************** From Angus Ric asked: > If she had such a new and unusual receiver aboard don't you find it just a > bit odd that there is no indication that she attempted any DF navigation on the > World Flight until the (unsuccessful) test flight at Lae on July 1st? No I don't. I think AE was a bit of a technophobe when it came to radios. Airplanes yes, radios no. The plane was hyped as a flying laboratory and one reason may have been that such a receiver was supposedly on test. There was not a lot else to test. My guess is that perhaps AE was simply not interested in using it unless absolutely necessary. You pointed out that she dodged out of the radio navigation test. The last thing she wanted to do was to try to use some newfangled piece of wizardry that she knew nothing about. Only when things started to look bleak did she fire it up. AE may well have felt obliged to have it along as Bendix was a sponsor, but she wasn't about to use it without a very good reason. >Isn't it a bit strange that nobody who worked on her radios during the World > Flight and was later questioned (Sgt. Stan Rose who fixed a blown fuse in Darwin > and the Guinea Airways radio technician who checked all her radios and made a > report that is included in the Chater letter) never said anything about a > second receiver? If it was classified, they may well have been asked by AE to say nothing about it. Even if it was not classified, it was, according to Taylor, a prototype and one can well imagine Bendix asking AE not to let anyone mess with it and not to publicise its existence for pure commercial reasons. Not only that but Rose and the technician would have been unfamiliar with it anyway and perhaps reluctant to even get involved with it. > If it was worth carrying the weight of the thing two-thirds of the > way around the world, and if testing it was one of the purposes of the flight, > why did Earhart only try to take a bearing on the Itasca as a last ditch effort > after she failed in repeated attempts to get them to take a bearing on her ? For the same reasons given above. If Itasca could give her a bearing without having to use the RA-1, well and good. In the event she had to give it a go and at least managed to receive on it, although not very suprisingly she failed to get a null. She was obviously justified in her misgivings in using it. Regards Angus ************************************************************ From Ric All we know for certain is that Earhart didn't talk about it, Bendix didn't talk about it, the radio technicians who worked on the airplane during the World Flight didn't talk about it, and neither the Coast Guard nor Putnam talked about it afterward, despite all the agonizing about how she failed to find Howland. We can't prove it wasn't there because even if Earhart failed to mention it when giving a comprehensive description of her radios (which she did in Karachi), she could have been lying. Cam says, "I don't believe in conspiracy theories, never have, never will." and yet this is a classic conspiracy theory. All sorts of people are presumed to have engaged in a subterfuge for all sorts of imagined motives and the absence of any real documentation is offered as proof of the coverup. *************************************************************** From Angus Alan wrote: > I have found no indication there is a living soul who has ever seen this > radio if indeed it ever existed. I can find no schematics nor any specs. I've > been in contact with former Bendix employees and have come up empty. It really does exist ( the RA-1 which would have been used with the RDF1 loop). I will send you a photo if you let me have your e-mail address. Regards Angus. ************************************************************* From Ric I know that the RA-1 did exist. I too have seen the photos. But my understanding has been that the RA-1 was the predecessor of the RDF-1 and that the later claim by Taylor was that the prototype for the RA-1 was aboard Earhart's Electra. So, what is an RDF-1 loop? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 14:49:27 EDT From: Russ Matthews Subject: Re: For Cam Warren I agree with Alan that there is no need for a credentials thread and the inevitable "my resume can beat up your resume" back and forth that would be sure to follow. The proof should be able speak for itself, regardless of the presenter's background. LTM, Russ ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 14:58:29 EDT From: Ted Campbell Subject: AE & The Flying Laboratory Do we know who other than David E. Ross contributed funds for the purchase of AE's Lockheed? I believe there were two financial contributors in addition to the various aviation related (e.g., Bendix, Sperry, P&W, etc.) manufacturers which may have contributed hardware. *************************************************** From Ric According to Mary Lovell (The Sound of Wings), David Ross was the original and principal contributor ($50,000) to the Purdue "Amelia Earhart Fund for Aeronautical Research". J.K. Lilly, Vincent Bendix, Western Electric, Goodrich, Goodyear and other manufacturers put up money and equipment totaling another $30,000. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 15:09:52 EDT From: Julie Subject: Dutch roll- last gasp Dutch Roll is a phenomenon of swept wings. I don't believe jets with straight wings suffer from it. Having only flown swept wing jet transports I can't comment on straight wing jets. The auto-pilots of swept wing jets have yaw dampers built into the auto-pilot systems to take care of it. It is interesting to note that the wonderful DC-3 also has a slight Dutch roll as the wing is slightly swept. Obviously way ahead of its time. Cheers. Julie ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 15:11:13 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply II Ric wrote: > So after all the hoopla it comes down to "It could have happened but I don't > think it did." Don't misread me, Ric. I mean close enough to zero, to be zero, for this real world. But as i said, it's time for me to seek other input. Hue ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 15:50:18 EDT From: Rich Young Subject: immaculate reception Since we seem to be in a credential mood these days, I'll throw my limited bona fides up front - I am a no-code Tech Ham licensed radio operator - I have been involved in long-distance AM and SSB radio transmission off and on since the 1970's. I am also an amateur electronics technician - I have scratch-built tube audio amplifiers, and repaired tube and solid state communications equipment. Further, radio communications of both voice and digital data were areas of concern for me in a previous government job. Lastly, I have been an old radio aficionado since I was a small child - living in an apartment, my collection is necessarily modest right now, but includes a Silvertone am receiver, and a Philco am-sw receiver, both pre-war. Submitted for your approval are my highly subjective opinions about Betty's receptions. 1. I do not believe that Betty would deliberately mislead us - I am convinced she is sincere in what she believes she heard. 2. I accept Betty's notebook as a contemporary record of what she believed she heard. 3. The subject matter that she has recorded in her notebook is less consistent with an actual broadcast from an aviator in peril than it is with a hoax, a drama, or dramatic news re-enactment. 4. The behavior of her receiver, (specifically the lack of retuning and apparent signal to noise ratio) is less consistent with multiple thousands of miles skip reception of a sub-watt harmonic at high frequency than it is with a broadcast band signal of robust wattage being received at a moderately long distance from the transmitter, possibly with intervening bad weather. 5. The conditions reported to be existing regarding the aircraft, (landed, rising water, etc.) are, at a minimum, much less than ideal for transmission on the fundamental, much less a fractional-watt harmonic, if indeed any transmission at all is possible, due to dynamotor and battery location. 6. Unless an alleged post-loss reception is reported by more than one listener, agreeing as to content and time of broadcast, the validity of the reception must be seriously questioned. 7. Even an event satisfying number 6 could be deliberate fraud or hoax, or an accidental misunderstanding. 8. Even an event satisfying number 6 should be parsed for expected content - location, aircraft state, health of aircrew, estimated maximum food & water and radio duration, radio frequencies and listening and broadcast times, signal fire or flare descriptions, marker panel descriptions, etc. 9. Any "non-zero" finding of harmonic transmission possibility has to be tempered with real-world experience. After all, there is a "non-zero" chance that I will build a replica Model 10E out of empty beer cans and fly it around the world, but please don't send me your empties. I look forward to the post-loss reception matrix, but I must regretfully conclude that Betty did NOT here Amelia on her dad's radio set. For what it's worth. LTM, (who tunes into Paul Harvey) Rich Young ******************************************************************** From Ric You're entitled to your opinion but in making your case you have presented the best evidence against your own conclusion. You believe Betty is sincere and that the notebook is a genuine contemporary record of what she heard. So far, we agree. Then you say: >The subject matter that she has recorded in her notebook is less >consistent with an actual broadcast from an aviator in peril than it is with >a hoax, a drama, or dramatic news re-enactment. You may have access to sources I have not seen but I know of no other record of a transmission from an aviator in a similar situation. If you do, please share it with us. I would also love to see the script of a radio drama that resembles Betty's transcription. Our examinations, to date, of radio dramas from that era have shown them to be very different from what Betty heard - no station breaks or commercials over a 1.75 hour period, no narrator or announcer, no music, etc.. If it was a drama/hoax that Betty found so convincing it seems odd that no one else seems to have heard the broadcast. That contradiction is reinforced by your opinion that what Betty heard was consistent with "a broadcast band signal of robust wattage being received at a moderately long distance from the transmitter, possibly with intervening bad weather." Many, many people should have heard such a broadcast. The same problem arises with your statement: >Unless an alleged post-loss reception is reported by more than one >listener, agreeing as to content and time of broadcast, the validity of the >reception must be seriously questioned. The same is surely even more true if the signal is not a genuine very low-probability reception but "a broadcast band signal of robust wattage". If Betty is not lying, which we agree she is not, then what she heard was either a genuine distress call or a very elaborate and convincing hoax or drama. Orson Wells' radio dramatization of War of the Worlds was less convincing but caused a national panic. The dramatization that Betty heard must have gotten very poor ratings indeed. You want to dictate what Amelia should have said and, because Betty heard something else, it couldn't have been Amelia. Like Hue Miller, you want to treat "highly unusual" as "impossible", and yet Betty's notebook is ONLY credible if her reception of a distress call from Earhart was one of those freakish, highly-improbable events that happen to somebody, somewhere every day. Betty's chances of hearing a distress call from AE were probably better than any forum subscriber's chances of winning the lottery but people win lotteries every day. And now you know the rest of the story... LTM Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 15:52:48 EDT From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: RA-1, Wild Speculation I've hopefully made my position clear on this -- I don't believe she had the radio on the fateful trip. HOWEVER I am willing to wildly speculate that it COULD have been part of the original flight which was to proceed on a western heading. If the Navy and Bendix were agreeable to let this be used for the Howland leg on that initial flight and then be removed for the remainder of the flight I might be willing to believe that. Once the initial flight had been abandoned and the route changed, the idea of including the radio was dropped. Bob ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 2 Oct 2003 15:56:47 EDT From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: RA-1, again > Surely all > of that testing could be conducted faster, cheaper, and more accurately in > Bendix's own labs, I would think. A lab test NEVER duplicates field conditions. Ric said: > But my > understanding has been that the RA-1 was the predecessor of the RDF-1 and > that the later claim by Taylor was that the prototype for the RA-1 was aboard > Earhart's Electra. > So, what is an RDF-1 loop? The RDF-1 was only part of the system, a loop/tuner/pre-amp or coupler NOT a receiver. The RA-1 was a DF receiver. The two things are as different as chalk and cheese but the RDF-1 could be used in conjunction with the RA-1. Regards Angus. ********************************************************************* From Ric So you're saying that the receiver was the RA-1 and that the RDF-1 was some component (you don't seem sure which) that could be used with the RA-1. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 3 Oct 2003 15:17:13 EDT From: Bob Sherman Subject: WAS THERE A BENDIX? Not as an argument but to point out that Elgen Long mentions a Bendix twice on P. 170. A conversation with Sgt. Rose at Darwin on why she did not respond to their DF procedure. Long says in effect: Sgt. Rose questioned AE on radio procedure and she admited that her recver had not been working properly since she left the United States. Sgt. Rose later advised her that he had replaced a fuse in her Bendix receiver. She went with him to the plane to check the Bendix Receiver. He showed her how to replace a fuse; they put on earphones and he tuned to a local station that came in loud and clear. Long may tell us where he got the Rose details and why he said Bendix when she had a WE recvr. Was her DF test at Lae on some Low Freq. Beacon, or Lae's HF Comm. radio? Point being, is there any record of her having heard anything on whatever HF radio she may have had? ['7500' from the Itasca excepted] As for the LF bands, she could easily have done without them because Tower light signals for taxiing, take-off and landing was more commonly used than radio at airports in those days. RC 941 *************************************************************************** From Ric You will note that from the notes in the book that Long attributes his description of what Rose did to an interview he had with Rose in 1976. Long does not quote Rose directly nor does he provide a transcript of the interview so we don't have any way of knowing whether or not Rose ever referred to a "Bendix receiver". Even if he did, anything he said in 1976 would be a 39 year old recollection. The only contemporaneous source we have for what Rose did is a letter dated August 3, 1937 to the American Consul in Sydney, Australia from the Administrator of the Northern Territory which includes a statement from the Aircraft Inspector and Officer-in-Charge of the airport at Darwin. He says that Earhart blamed her failure to communicate with Darwin while inbound from Timor on the failure of her "D/F receiver" (singular). No mention of whether it was Bendix or Western Electric, but had she had two receivers aboard the airplane she would have had to experience failures in both in order to be unable to hear transmissions from Darwin. He says that Sgt. Rose "discovered that the fuse for the D/F generator was blown". It seems, therefore, to be the case that there was only one receiver aboard the Electra at that time and that it was being used for voice communications but was also capable of D/F. While in Karachi, earlier in the trip, Earhart specifically said that the Western Electric receiver was under the co-pilot's seat. Everything we know about the July 1st test is in the Chater letter which is on the TIGHAR website. "At 6.35 a.m., July 1st, Miss Earhart carried out a 30 minute air test of the machine when two way telephone communication was established between the ground station at Lae and the plane. The Operator was requested to send a long dash while Miss Earhart endeavoured to get a minimum on her direction finder. On landing Miss Earhart informed us that she had been unable to obtain a minimum and that she considered this was because the Lae station was too powerful and too close." I don't know what frequency they were using but it had to a voice frequency. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 3 Oct 2003 15:29:53 EDT From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: RA-1, again Regarding AE's use of a top secret or even prototype receiver. I cannot personally see why they (the manufacturer) would bother to put it in the airplane if they didn't believe it would get a good trial showing its viability for use in everyday flying. IMHO it would seem that they would even want it used as much as possible throughout the trip to show that she could more directly navigate to her destination, taking less time and using less fuel than would be consumed using less accurate methods. Thus, again in IMHO, she had no such device and the device she had was unusable due to her lack of training. Too bad, she could have been the most famous woman aviator for a lot more than having gotten lost. At least Wrong Way Corrigan returned to the world of the living to enjoy his moment in the limelight. LTM, Dave Bush *********************************************************************** From Alan Angus Murray wrote: >The RDF-1 was only part of the system, a loop/tuner/pre-amp or coupler NOT a >receiver. Angus, disregard my off forum request. You are answering my question here. I assume you will amplify your response if you know more about it. What I'm thinking is you might be able to say what the RDF-1 provided AE in addition to the RA-1 if anything or maybe just did it better. If that is clear. Alan ****************************************************************** From Angus Ric wrote: > So you're saying that the receiver was the RA-1 and that the RDF-1 was some > component (you don't seem sure which) that could be used with the RA-1. Not quite. The standard "RDF1" in toto consisted of the loop and "coupler" (tuner) and receiver. (The tuner, independent from the receiver, helped to improve the poor sensitivity of a loop compared to a wire antenna). So the RDF-1 loop was just a part of the RDF-1 system. AE's radio direction finding system as a whole was then comprised (we speculate) of the RDF-1 system loop and coupler and the (non-standard) RA-1 receiver - if we are to believe Taylor et al. (It is of course is by no means certain that this was the arrangement that AE carried). It seems possible that AE was offered the complete system but only took the RDF-1 loop and coupler, having established that she could use it with her WE 20B and save weight. This would explain why a number of people were convinced that the RA-1was carried on the World Flight. It was sent but never used. The news that she had fitted a replacement direction finder was misinterpreted as meaning that the whole system had been fitted. Regards Angus *********************************************************************** From Ric Okay, but I find it odd that there is no mention of the "RDF-1" nomenclature in the August 1937 Aero Digest article headlined "Bendix D-Fs". It describes the various Bendix loops (MN-1, MN-3, MN-5 and MN-7) and it talks about the RA-1 receiver and the fact that Bendix loops can be used with other receivers. I wonder if the RDF-1 terminology came along later. *********************************************************************** From Jon Watson Ric wrote: > So, what is an RDF-1 loop? It's when you discuss this into the ground ... then start over and do it again ... and again ... and - well you get the idea...Sorry Ric, I couldn't help myself ltm jon ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 3 Oct 2003 15:31:57 EDT From: Ron Berry Subject: Re: Dutch roll- last gasp I have been having computer problems so I have missed some days of the forum. What does "Dutch Roll" have to do with A.E.? The last time I looked at the Lockheed Electra has straight wings. As usual I am in the dark, will someone turn on the light? ************************************************************* From Ric Dutch Roll has nothing to do with AE and I'm not posting any more messages about it. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 3 Oct 2003 15:33:22 EDT From: Peter Boor Subject: Re: Wind direction, speed and sea state I have used driftmeters (Type B3) in my days as a navigator in the '50s. The B3 was gyro stabilized, and acted like a downward periscope, with the ability to direct the line-of-sight from 17* before to 87* behind the vertical (ref AF Manual 51-40). To read drift of the aircraft, the device must be boresighted to the aircraft centerline. The operator then views stationary objects on the ground, and rotates the B3 until the objects track the reticle lines of the instrument as the aircraft moves. Drift angle is then read directly. The B3 LOS rotation permitted groundspeed measurements to be taken also, but I doubt that FN's instrument could do that. There was also a B5 Driftmeter at the time - a much simpler device that I never saw, that was likely much closer to FN's instrument, I suspect. In the B-36 and B-47, the K-3A Bombing System had a periscope that allowed the operator to measure drift in the proper mode, just as with the B3 Driftmeter. We were taught that over water, whitecaps could be considered as stationary objects, and that is how I measured drift on long overwater trips. No whitecaps, no drift readings. It took many readings to get a good handle on drift, and I would guess that we were able to be within a couple of degrees. I never used smoke - the point source of the smoke might be considered a stationary ground object to use, and at any cruising altitude, the wind is likely to be quite different than the wind on the ground blowing the smoke. This is navigational information only - not likely to move the mystery ball forward. And if anyone is interested in more Dutch Roll discussions, I have some things to share on that subject. Like where the name comes from (ah, trivia). Peter Boor #856C ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 3 Oct 2003 15:56:33 EDT From: Rich Young Subject: immaculate reception II "You may have access to sources I have not seen but I know of no other record of a transmission from an aviator in a similar situation." Submitted for your approval the story of "My Gal Sal", an B-17E and her crew who went down on the glacial icepack of Greenland after running out of fuel trying to locate their landing field as part of "Operation Bolero", along with two other B-17s, on June 27th, 1942, at latitude 65.21'N longitude 45.53'W. The crew , using a hacksaw, shortened the propellor blades of one of the engines equipped with a generator so it could be run in order to transmit over the radio. Aircraft down, crew in peril in a hostile environment - this is as close as I can come up with off of the top of my head. The crew transmitted their location and status, and after air drops of food, water, and survival gear, were rescued via PBY from a nearby temporary lake formed by melting snow. "If it was a drama/hoax that Betty found so convincing it seems odd that no one else seems to have heard the broadcast....Many, many people should have heard such a broadcast." We don't KNOW nobody else heard the broadcast - perhaps many people did, but were not fooled into thinking they were actual Earhart transmissions, and so, did not record or report them. What WOULD be odd, if it's a true A.E. distress call, is that Betty and ONLY Betty heard and logged the transmission. "Betty's notebook is ONLY credible if her reception of a distress call from Earhart was one of those freakish, highly-improbable events that happen to somebody, somewhere every day." - or she is mistaken. We have two competing explanations for an event - one requires a feat of electronic communication that hasn't been approached, much less achieved, by experts using high quality equipment designed for such work, directional antennae, and pre-arranged transmission schedules being accomplished by accident on a harmonic by a teenager on a home shortwave set, (and ONLY her...) OR...a teenager made a mistake. Which one would Occum's razor lean toward? LTM (who uses Neat) Rich Young ************************************************************************ From Ric Occam's Razor says we should test the easiest to test hypothesis first - which is what we have done. Did Betty hear the March of Time broadcast (the only known radio dramatization relating to the Earhart disappearance)? No, she did not. What she heard was nothing like the March of Time broadcast. Next hypothesis. Because Betty listened for an hour and three-quarters and heard no station identification breaks required of commercial broadcasts by FCC regulations, did she hear a privately perpetrated hoax? Such an elaborate hoax should have been heard and believed by many people (it has fooled many of us here on the forum) but there is no indication that anyone but Betty heard it. Other people at other times (Nina Paxton, Thelma Lovelace, and Mabel Duncklee) reported hearing transmissions from Earhart that describe hearing messages from Earhart describing very similar situations, but none of these overlap in time. Do we then have at least four hoax transmissions at different times that heard by only one person? You suggest that it is more likely that Betty (and presumably the other women) were mistaken. By all means, let us have your correction of their mistake. What did they hear? LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:10:48 EDT From: Dennis McGee Subject: Betty's logs Ric said: "Other people at other times (Nina Paxton, Thelma Lovelace, and Mabel Duncklee) reported hearing transmissions from Earhart that describe hearing messages from Earhart describing very similar situations, but none of these overlap in time [with Betty's]." Yes, and Betty's is the only "documented" event that was transcribed in real-time and reported almost immediately. Do we know if Paxton, Lovelace and Duncklee wrote anything down when their "events" occurred? And when did they report them? My point is, Betty wrote hers immediately, the others may have not mentioned anything for years after their events. In the case of Paxton, et. el, the lapse of time between the event and when it was recorded could've forced them to rely on imperfect and fading memories. LTM, who misses The Man in Black Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ********************************************************************** From Ric Paxton claimed to have heard Earhart on July 3rd but for some reason did not contact her local paper until July 9. Her statements, as quoted in the resulting article "Ashland Lady Hears Earhart", are the closest thing we have to a contemporaneous account of what she heard. When Mrs. Paxton next came forward it was 1943 and both the world and her story had changed. Thelma Lovelace made a note of the lat/long position she heard Earhart give and saved it for many years, but it was eventually lost after the family moved several times. Like Betty, she initially went to the authorities with her story but was laughed at. Like John Hathaway did on Betty's behalf, Thelma made an attempt during the Japanese -capture hysteria in the 1960s to get someone to pay attention to her story, but got nowhere. She contacted TIGHAR in 1991 after seeing me on "Unsolved Mysteries". Mabel Duncklee also made notes of what she heard Earhart say but these too were lost over the years. She said that her family decided not to discuss the matter with anyone in accordance with a request they were under the impression President Roosevelt had made. Mabel contacted TIGHAR in 1990 after seeing press coverage of our work. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:11:57 EDT From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: RA-1, again Ric said: > I wonder if the RDF-1 terminology came along later. This seems very possible. RDF-1 derives pretty obviously from Radio Direction Finder number one. Obviously Bendix had to create the various components of the system before he could give it a name. The Aero Digest article may well have been written several months before publication and it seems possible that at that time, the components were very new and had not as yet been given a name when assembled as a system. The MN-5 loop may in fact be one and the same as the loop used in the RDF-1 system. Regards Angus. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:16:49 EDT From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply II For Hue Miller > I simply cited the article, with the worst case selectivity, giving figures > for the harmonic output with one tuned circuit. But you neglected to mention whether the results are based on your own calculations of the output circuit parameters for the transmitter on board NR16020, or whether you lifted them from the Reinartz paper without consideration of whether they were applicable to the transmitter on board NR16020. > I do not know how you derive "apparently" from my comments. I cited the 40 db > FCC ruling, perhaps i should simply not have included that. This was merely by > way of explaining the concern of the author about the contemporary 40 db figure. It was a straightforward deduction. In your original comments about my analysis, you argued that the transmitter on board NR16020 "would never have been allowed on the air" if it could generate any of the hypothetical harmonic power levels I used in the analysis. Your argument implied the existence in 1937 of a rule quantifying the allowable harmonic output of the transmitter. Given that context, your mention of a 1947 rule suggested that you believed the transmitter was subject to that rule. Now you have an opportunity to resolve any ambiguity. If there was a rule in 1937 quantifying the allowable harmonic output of the transmitter on board NR16020, then cite the rule. > Uh-oh. Is "in the neighborhood" something like starting with "a reasonable > assumption" of harmonic power? I think the meaning is clear to the average reader, but I will try to clarify it for you. The logic of the Thevenin circuit analysis approach used by Labus and Roder is not restricted to the case where a natural resonant frequency of the antenna exactly corresponds to a harmonic of the transmitter fundamental frequency. The logic also applies when the antenna resonant frequency is close enough to ("in the neighborhood of") a harmonic of the fundamental frequency, so that harmonic current flowing in the antenna generates an electromagnetic field detectable at long distances. > Yes, current by voltage in the purely resistive radiation resistance. We are > talking, ultimately, about the power ratio of the harmonic power in the antenna > resistance, compared to the fundamental channel power in the antenna, agreed? We are talking about the division of power amplifier plate current between the two branches of the output circuit at a harmonic frequency, relative to the division at the fundamental frequency. It is not necessary for the antenna branch to be purely resistive in order for significant current to flow in the antenna branch. > The factors, of course, that affect this are the series reactance of the antenna > capacity, or inductance, and the parallel impedance of the plate load of the > inductor and it's distrbuted capacitance, plus the plate trimmer capacitor, > presented to the tube impedance. You speak of a plate trimmer capacitor, but there was no such capacitor in the output circuit. You speak of the parallel impedance of the plate load inductor and its distributed capacitance, but if you had done the calculation you would know that the self-resonant frequency of the plate inductor in the WE 13C was far above the transmitter's fundamental frequencies. The antenna impedance is another crucial element of the analysis involved here, but you apparently haven't done that calculation either. > Apparently you read the paper. You know then, that the Q factor examples cited > were for the tuned circuit. I did not state otherwise. I have read the Labus/Roder paper. Your statement that the "Q factor examples cited were for the tuned circuit" begs the question of which transmitter you are talking about. If the results you cited are based on your analysis of "the tuned circuit" in the WE 13C transmitter on board NR16020, then say so. If the results you cited are taken from Reinharz's paper, then say so and specify the transmitter to which his results apply. > I do not understand your contention that the antenna is the only selective > element. The plate inductor resonates with the plate trimmer capacitor and the > antenna capacity. There is no plate trimmer capacitor in the WE 13C output circuit. Furthermore, the plate inductor and the antenna are parts of a SINGLE tuned circuit, which constitutes a SINGLE selective element. > What is your comment on the likelihood of a non-drifting vacuum tube receiver at > 18, 24, MHz or higher? Comment: the likelihood is non-zero. > How about the "static" at these frequencies? Like a "police scanner" ? I addressed this in my previous response. Go back and read what I said. > I am willing to hear you give some idea of probabilities on these questions. I already did that. See my report on the TIGHAR web site. > I am not saying "impossible", i AM saying, "consider the likelihood." So now you agree that it was possible for Betty to have heard Amelia on a harmonic. Good. That's progress. As for considering the likelihood, I have already done that. See my report on the TIGHAR web site. > Here's another idea for you, Bob. Your analysis says even at 0.1 watt radiated > power, Betty could have heard this x days out of y. My question is, with > thousands of radio hams trying the trans-Pacific route, day in and day out, year > after year, Betty was the only one, one blessed week in 1937, to achieve this > enviable long-distance reception? Try to focus on the fact that we are talking about propagation conditions over a specific path during a specific time period on one of several specific days in July 1937. In order to answer your question within that frame of reference, it would be necessary to have a list of hams, with their locations and equipment details, who were listening on harmonics of Amelia's frequencies at the same time Betty was listening. If you have such a list, post it. > Okay, i grant the probability is nonzero. It is, in my view, however, > vanishingly small. That means close enough to zero to eliminate it. Which is it? Zero or non-zero? You can't have it both ways. LTM, who knows that time spent in clear thinking is wisely invested. Bob #2286 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:22:11 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: RA-1, again I cannot see any reason for the Bendix RA-1 radio receiver to be "Classified". The main thing unique about it was that is compact for what it does, considering its year. It is, i'd guesstimate, maybe 1/2 the size of the usual table top ham type radio (not home radio), and had a wider tuning range than any competitive product i am aware of. There was also the feature that it could be either remote controlled via cables or operated right at the set (like where you'd have a fulltime operator at a desk.) It also incorporated a fuller range of long distance shortwave communication frequencies plus the lower frequencies useful for (conventional) direction finding. But there is nothing in it circuit-wise that is radically new & original, so no way could the RA-1 be secret. It's compact package might have presented a threat to competitor companies, but it wouldn't, i think, be a big trade secret also, compared to some new car coming out, using for example some totally different fuel. The Bendix RA-1 is also not what you'd call "rare" either, just "seldom seen", like most anything from 1937. BTW also, Bendix went mostly into the avionics-navigation market, and never produced another general tuning shortwave receiver like the RA-1. The RDF-1 unit could be called a small electronic directional antenna. Instead of being a broadbanded unit that just attaches to your radio, it required retuning to every channel the radio tuned to, plus the other control twiddling usual to the old-time manual DF procedure. ( Unlike the later plug & play ADF radios.) There's nothing in the RDF-1 that i can see would cause it to be considered secret either. Maybe the results of the Navy's experiences with HF-DF would have been classified as secret, as they wouldn't want to share with potential enemies some technique they had learned to exploit. But there's nothing in the RDF-1 that could be patented or needed to be hidden, it seems. The "two handed tuning" when changing channels could be a hassle and maybe that was part of AE's problem or reluctance to get really familiar with the unit. The dial was marked with arbitrary numbers, not kHz or MHz so you'd have to have a lookup table or a good memory to be able to rapidly retune the thing. I don't think that was for secrecy, the front panel is just too small for a better detailed display, altho the 0 to 100 marking did not reveal any clue that the unit tuned much higher than the usual DF unit. I also don't think this unit would have had much, if any, appeal to the commercial aviation industry user. Why pay more for capabilities that were experimental, with a reputation for unreliability, when the usual longwave and broadcast band loop unit did just fine, within the accepted distance limitations? Back 2-3 years when we were discussing the unit, there was posted here a URL where another fellow had put up a Navy text on theory and usage of the RDF and also line drawings and schematic wiring diagrams. ( This i'm sure is no longer up, as he's gone on to post other photos. This fellow, Mike Hanz, BTW, recently spent many, many hours reinstalling the communications and counter-measures electronics on the Smithsonian's "Enola Gay" B-29. If i know him, it ALL works, too. -Hue Miller ************************************************************ From Ric Do you think there was an RA-1 aboard NR16020 when it disappeared, and if so, why? ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:23:14 EDT From: Ron Berry Subject: Re: immaculate reception II Don't be so quick to condemn Betty's notebook, she could have been the only person in the area to be listening when AE made her pleas for help. Just because there were radios that were able to hear her harmonics, that doesn't mean that many people did. Stop and think, how many people would sit down and listen to all of that static? Which is mostly what you heard on those radios you really had to be dedicated to sit and decipher words from all of that noise. On rare occasions reception was clear for a few minutes. I have often when I was a child listened to the very same waves that she listened to. To make my self perfectly clear, I could not hear AE since my parents had not met yet in 37. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:26:51 EDT From: Ross Devitt Subject: Bigass Latro - again The following passage is from events related some time between 1770 and 1790. All I know of the time frame is that the American War of Independence had begun some time earlier and was still being fought. The passage is taken from a narrative of events on the island of St Kitts. I checked on Birgus Latro, and it appears that he is indeed the land crab referred to. "I could now see the land-crabs running through the graves of two or three whom I had left stout and full of health. In the West Indies the grave is dug no deeper than just to hold the body, the earth covering it only a few inches, and all is soon consumed by the land-crabs. The black fellows eat them. When I asked them why they eat these loathsome creatures their answer was, 'Why, they eat me.' >From the Life And Adventures Of John Nicol - Mariner. Might sort of make one think twice about sleeping under the stars on Niku? And definitely suggests that our old friend Birgus may have made a meal of the castaway. Unfortunately, the passage makes no mention of bones being carried off. Th' WOMBAT ******************************************************************* From Ric There is really no question that a dead, or merely incapacitated, body on Niku (human or otherwise) is quickly assaulted and consumed by crabs. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:34:11 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: immaculate reception II Rich Young wrote: > You may have access to sources I have not seen but I know of no other > record of a transmission from an aviator in a similar situation. ( Just for our mental filing cabinets, under "Interesting Factoids".) I read about a Navy JRF (seaplane) which had to land at sea off Venezuela pre-war. The engines were inoperable and the plane just drifted. The crew were able to reach distant base ( Panama? or FL ? i don't recall. ) and a rescue ship was dispatched. This story was published in something "Old Timers Bulletin" and was written by a crew member. Also i read that the Japanese pilot who landed on Nihau, Hawaii after the Pearl Harbor raid tried for a day or two to reach his fleet via the radio ( witnessed by local Hawaiins), which still operated. However, that effort was doomed, useless, because #1 The radio was low power lower- shortwave range ( same tuning range as AE's, but about 10 watts) #2 pilot only tried during daylight hours #3 aircraft's antenna in such a situation was short, low to ground, and very inefficient for long distance work, #4 pilot was only equiped and apparently) trained to use voice radio, not the longer range telegraphy, and #5, why did the pilot even suppose that any vessel of the fleet would tarry, and risk itself, to try to rescue a single pilot? The three incidents we have so far, all involved military aircraft. ( There may well be more such incidents i have encountered, but that's all that comes to mind at the moment...) We can maybe safely assume that the military pilot has more self-discipline and training, at least regards survival procedures, than a civilian pilot. From last-minutes accounts i have read from civil aviation accidents, however, i've never read of any account of panic, tears, breakdown etc. being purposefully transmitted. -Hue Miller ************************************************************** From Ric Any FAA Flight Service station operator can tell you stories of panic, tears and breakdown by pilots who get lost and call for help. I've heard the tapes. It ain't that pretty at all. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:37:30 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: WAS THERE A BENDIX? > Everything we know about the July 1st test is in the Chater letter which is > on the TIGHAR website. > > "At 6.35 a.m., July 1st, Miss Earhart carried out a 30 minute air test of the > machine when two way telephone communication was established between the > ground station at Lae and the plane. The Operator was requested to send a long > dash while Miss Earhart endeavoured to get a minimum on her direction finder. On > landing Miss Earhart informed us that she had been unable to obtain a minimum > and that she considered this was because the Lae station was too powerful and > too close." I wonder if this 06:30 time was close enuff to local sunrise timeframe that unsettled ionospheric conditions gave a strong and constantly shifting skywave to scramble the direct signal f rom the airfield, meaning "no null", or at least, "no null" for an impatient or unskilled user. I dunno how she did the experiment, of course, but i'm thinking for 30 minutes, i'd allow ~10 mins out, ~10 mins try, and ~10 mins back. That travel time should allow about 20 miles out, maybe somewhat less. That i would think would certainly be far enuff to cut down the strong signal overload situation, IF that really was the problem. She seems sorta "amateurish". -Hue Miller ************************************************************* From Ric I'm aware of no recorded occasion when Earhart herself successfully used a loop antenna. "Amateurish" is charitable. "Clueless" is more like it. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 10:41:08 EDT From: Arthur Rypinski Subject: Anecdotal Evidence A few days ago Ric wrote: >Their is no hierarchy of credibility in anecdotal >recollections. A story is a story until its corroborated with hard >evidence, no matter who is telling it. I agree with you that "a story is a story until its corroborated...", but I don't agree that "there is no hierarchy of credibility in anecdotal recollections." I suspect that, on reflection, you wouldn't agree with you either. We humans hear lots of stories, on diverse subjects, every day, and we are constantly evaluating them for credibility. Some of the many tests of credibility of anecdotal evidence: 1) Is the story first hand or hearsay? We all know how screwed up stories can get after they have been retold a few times. 2) Does the story contain some "occult" or largely unknown counterintuitive detail? People who have never seen real airplane wrecks, frinstance, tend to imagine that the wreckage looks something like an airplane. The first airplane wreck I ever saw I described as "years ago, somebody must have dumped a barrel of aluminum scrap in a ravine." 3) Does the respondent have something to gain or lose via the story? 4) Does the story stay straight under questioning, or does it mutate or improve? I credible respondent remembers what he remembers, and doesn't remember what he doesn't remember. Other outcomes are evidence of the imagination at work (usually subconsciously). 5) Is the behavior of people in the story consistent with their character and role? 6) Do objects in the story observe the laws of physics? I could go on, but you get the drift. However, even a highly credible story will still often have pieces that are wrong. In memory, events get compressed, telescoped, moved around in time and place, have one person substituted for another. Sometimes, somebody else' story gets invisibly grafted onto our own memory. We need to be able to decide which anecdotes are worth trying to corroborate. LTM, Arthur Rypinski *************************************************************** From Ric I'll go along with that. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 13:58:15 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: RA-1, again Ric wrote: > Do you think there was an RA-1 aboard NR16020 when it disappeared, and if so, > why? Sorry, i have no opinion on that, having no information to convince me one way or the other. The recent postings here would seem to come down pretty strongly on the side of "one receiver". I was wondering if Bendix had given her one, would she have replaced the W. E. co. receiver, since the RA-1 would seem better. But after pondering that for a while, i am not convinced that unless Bendix forced it on her as a condition for some other support, like financial, that she would have changed out the WE receiver anyway. After all, the W.E. worked, the greater tuning spectrum of the RA-1 wouldn't be of any use to her, and the transmit/ receive wiring complexities were already worked out for the system she had in place. The only advantage to the 2-receiver setup, that i can see, is that she could leave the 2nd one on the channel to be DF'd, not have to crank back and forth when she wanted to use the radio on a voice channel to talk to someone. The cranking back and forth would seem like a pretty big hassle to me, but i can't judge that for her by her criteria. Hue Miller ****************************************************************** From Ric That may be why Earhart said, prior to leaving Miami, that she did not plan to do much talking on the radio because she planned to use her receiver (singular) for direction finding. ***************************************************************** From Alan Hue wrote: >There was also the feature that it could be either remote controlled via >cables or operated right at the set ... That indicates the gear could have been located essentially out of sight and thus not appearing in any photo. One posting on this subject indicated the Navy bought 100 RDF-1 radios. For which aircraft were they to be installed? Alan ******************************************************************* From Ric There would have to be a remote in the cockpit which should be visible in photos. That's what Elgen Long claims the Sias photo shows. The Navy RDF-1s were for PBYs according to the posting . ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 13:59:59 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply II To Bob and Hue. I have read your exchanges very carefully and I want to thank you both for clearing this issue up for me. Seriously I'm awed at the exchanges. It is appearing that the possibility Betty heard what she claims cannot be eliminated. Maybe not a common and frequent occurrence but still possible. I am not a big fan of probability although I recognize the usefulness of the theory. For one single event the probability must necessarily be zero or 100%. Either it happened or it didn't. I'm wondering if there are other examples of a similar occurrence? If so that should answer the question. If not more work is needed. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2003 14:05:22 EDT From: Tom King Subject: Re: Bigass Latro - again For th' Wombat Fascinating quote. Can you give me a full source citation? The idea that the crabs would dig into graves sort of belies the results of my little experiment with burying bones in 2001, which suggested that burial was a pretty absolute deterrent to crabridation. But mine was a pretty crude experiment, and a whole decaying body underground may a whole lot more detectable by a crab than just a bone or two. *********************************************** From Ric Just suppose ol' Fred kicked the bucket and AE buried him someplace near the Seven Site. She probably couldn't bury him very deep. Did the crabs dig him up, eat him up and scatter the bones? Or are his bones still there? Maybe we need two pigs. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 13:58:18 EDT From: Tom King Subject: Re: Bigass Latro - again Well, there IS the large flat coral slab on the Seven Site that I jocularly referred to as Fred's tombstone..... The Seven Site would be a pretty hard place to dig a hole, though, even if one had the tools to do it. As we know from experience. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 13:57:35 EDT From: Carl Peltzer Subject: Re: radios again r+r here are some more to ponder: probably make it worse but oh well! today, if i remove anything permanent on my aircraft [of course not experimental] I have to go thru the process of paper work, ie: log entries and weight and balance computations to keep it legal. now I realize that it was experimental and also not knowing what the caa regs would've been back then but there still should have been some paper trail even though out of conus. just a thought. those radios were very heavy and if removed from the wrong place would have changed things around, also! OK, experimental being the catchword, when you remove radios you also change the magnetic properties of the airplane ask anyone who has to reset the compass after removing and or replacing any radio, which makes another hat to hang upon with them getting lost even with landmarks during the flight, not much, but something to consider. know I make it harder but give some credence to these musings, if you all will. *************************************************************************** From Ric NR16020 was registered in the Restricted, not the Experimental category - but, yes, replacement or installation of radios would require weight and balance paperwork submitted to the Bureau of Air Commerce (not yet the CAA). The last government paperwork we have on the airplane is the inspection carried out on May 19 at the completion of the repairs that followed the Luke Field accident. By the way Carl, the keys on your keyboard that say "shift" are for starting sentences. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 14:12:54 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: RA-1, again Alan wrote: > One posting on this subject indicated the Navy bought 100 RDF-1 radios. For > which aircraft were they to be installed? "Squadron Signal" publisher has a photo book called, i think, just "TBD Devastator" in its military aircraft series. One photo is from the factory, it is a view from the rearseat gunner position, before equipment was mounted in the plane. One marked-off area has the designation painted right on it, "RDF-1". Before i knew what the RDF-1 was, i was puzzled by this marking, as it doesn't correspond to the Navy nomenclature system i am familiar with. As it turned out, it is NOT standard Navy nomenclature, it was carried right over from the manufacturer's designation - as maybe most of the Navy's equipment bought from Bendix - examples RA-1, TA-12, MN-26, all were used by the Navy without changing the nomenclature, the Navy used the Bendix nomenclature. No one seems to know why, possibly the fact that Bendix was a minority supplier to the input stream helped? The RDF-1 was an exception to this in that around the start of WW2, the Navy renomenclatured it for their purposes as the DU. ( In the Navy 2-to-4 letter nomenclature system, R as first letter meant receiver, AR meant aircraft receiver, and D meant direction finding equipment. So "RDF-1" would be a legitimate nomenclature, but would indicate "radio receiver type RDF, revision 1", which would not match what the Bendix actually was. The Navy apparently decided even before WW2 that HF-DF for aircraft was too flakey and not practical to use - you have to have a practical, repeatable, reliable procedure which will work for every aircrew with a certain standard level of training - not "might work if you're really careful and clever". The great mass of numbers of aircraft DF "adaptors" that the Navy bought from then on were named DU-1 and deleted the shortwave coverage. The RDF-1 used on large patrol planes was, i'm sure, often the configuration where the circular loop unit was remoted from the operator, and hydraulically controlled. The version i have, has the circular loop mounted right on top of the box - this is the version used in the 2 and 3 place scout-bomber class aircraft, where the operator/ gunner just reached over, tuned the thing, and manually rotated the loop. The whole thing was inside the cockpit glass. Another solution to placing the loop used the control adaptor box with a long neck, about 4 foot long, extending from the top of the adaptor box, with a circular loop at the top end. This was used apparently in early PBM, for example, where the long shaft extended up from the operator's equipment rack, thru the top surface of the compartment, and the loop was outside. This answer is a long way (sorry) of saying, "TBD also". Hue Miller ************************************************************************ From Ric The photo I have of the radioman/gunner compartment of the TBD (in Aero Series publication 23 "Douglas TBD-1 Devastator") sounds like the same one you describe, but what it says is "TYPE RDF-1A Direction Finder". The photo is credited to "Douglas" but is not dated. The Devastator entered service in November 1937 but the earliest photo I can find that shows a loop antenna installed is dated May 1938. It would seem, therefore, that the units (whatever they were comprised of) installed in TBD-1s were a later version of the RDF-1. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 14:51:35 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: More Florida It would be so simple for Bob Brandenburg to for once and ever to convince the skeptics. All he would have to do, is to do some searching in archives, surely as easy as operating the computer propagation analysis. Then, he could post something like this: "Not only does my analysis show that the trans-Pacific route to inland USA was possible using double-sideband AM and power levels down to 1 or even 0.1 watt radiated, this has been in fact verified through experiences other than the four women's in 1937. "For example, during war years of 1941-1945 and 1950-1953 and to a lessor extent, 1961-1974, when there were numerous transmitters fitting these parameters operating in the Pacific area, there were not infrequent examples of shortwave listeners in the USA hearing low power combat operational radios radios from throughout the Pacific. For example, see Radio News magazine, August 1945. Also, during the "dx" heyday years of the late 1940s and mid 1950s, ham publications were periodically posting results of hams making the cross-Pacific trip with tiny AM transmitters on the higher HF bands. Power levels down to 1 or 0.1 watt, with simple AM transmitters were not unheard of, for diligent operators, even across both the Pacific and inland North America path, altho this was clearly exceptional and required many attempts..." See how easy it would be to fortify the Propagation Analysis? Much easier than for Hue Miller to list many thousands of failed attempts, right? Have at it! -Hue Miller ****************************************************************** From Ric You might follow your own advice and offer a plausible alternative explanation for what Betty and the others heard. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 14:49:12 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply III Bob Brandenburg wrote: > But you neglected to mention whether the results are based on your own > calculations of the output circuit parameters for the transmitter on board > NR16020, or whether you lifted them from the Reinartz paper without > consideration > of whether they were applicable to the transmitter on board NR16020. I used the Q selectivity factor examples in the text, with the "worst case" selectivity, best for the "harmonic theory". > Your argument implied the existence in 1937 of a rule > quantifying the allowable harmonic output of the transmitter. Given that > context, your mention of a 1947 rule suggested that you believed the > transmitter was subject to that rule Clearly the 40 db rule did not exist in 1937. This point is nonmaterial to the argument, anyway, unless it's important to you to show i'm a fool. > We are talking about the division of power amplifier plate current between > the two branches of the output circuit at a harmonic frequency, relative to the > division at the fundamental frequency. It is not necessary for the antenna > branch to be purely resistive in order for significant current to flow in the > antenna branch. True, but the only power radiated is in the actual radiation resistance. Anyway, moving on.... >> The factors, of course, that affect this are the series reactance of the >> antenna capacity, or inductance, and the parallel impedance of the plate load >> of the inductor and its distributed capacitance, plus the plate trimmer >> capacitor, presented to the tube impedance. > > You speak of a plate trimmer capacitor, but there was no such capacitor in the > output circuit. You speak of the parallel impedance of the plate load inductor > and its distributed capacitance, but if you had done the calculation you would > know that the self-resonant frequency of the plate inductor in the WE 13C was > far above the transmitter's fundamental frequencies. The antenna impedance is > another crucial element of the analysis involved here, but you apparently > haven't done that calculation either. Bob, i don't know that i need to "do the calculations" to describe the transmitter, do you? Is it necessary to calculate resonance, when from the text and schematic it's clear how resonance is achieved? What's your point here? One of the texts i have mentions the plate trimmer. I know there may be a discrepancy in a (or all ) published schematic. One text (or more) absolutely does discuss the "plate circuit trimmer." I can understand your missing this, because as i recall, it might not have appeared in the schematic. ( I believe the schematic for the "interstage bandpass transformer" also is not literally correct, but simplified from they way the texts describe it. ) The fact is, the transmitter was not tuned only by coil adjustment, the trimmer capacitor was used for careful adjustment. I am somewhat limited in discussing this as i have packed away all the texts. I think there were 3 texts that described the W E transmitter. >> I do not understand your contention that the antenna is the only selective >> element. The plate inductor resonates with the plate trimmer capacitor and the >> antenna capacity. > > There is no plate trimmer capacitor in the WE 13C output circuit. Furthermore, > the plate inductor and the antenna are parts of a SINGLE tuned circuit, which > constitutes a SINGLE selective element. > >> What is your comment on the likelihood of a non-drifting vacuum tube receiver >> at 18, 24, MHz or higher? > > Comment: the likelihood is non-zero. > >> How about the "static" at these frequencies? Like a "police scanner" ? > > I addressed this in my previous response. Go back and read what I said. > >> I am willing to hear you give some idea of probabilities on these questions. > > I already did that. See my report on the TIGHAR web site. > >> I am not saying "impossible", i AM saying, "consider the likelihood." > > So now you agree that it was possible for Betty to have heard Amelia on a > harmonic. Good. That's progress. As for considering the likelihood, I have > already done that. See my report on the TIGHAR web site. Sure Bob, if she could read telegraphy, or use a digital mode, and tried maybe a couple hundred nights, i'm sure she could have heard AE. >> Here's another idea for you, Bob. Your analysis says even at 0.1 watt radiated >> power, Betty could have heard this x days out of y. My question is, with >> thousands of radio hams trying the trans-Pacific route, day in and day out, >> year after year, Betty was the only one, one blessed week in 1937, to achieve >> this enviable long-distance reception? > > Try to focus on the fact that we are talking about propagation conditions over a > specific path during a specific time period on one of several specific days in > July 1937. In order to answer your question within that frame of reference, it > would be necessary to have a list of hams, with their locations and equipment > details, who were listening on harmonics of Amelia's frequencies at the same > time Betty was listening. If you have such a list, post it. Ah, here's the crux: NO ONE achieved this before or after. Just Betty, and her three female fellow listeners. But, it's MY JOB to list the people who have tried to achieve an equivalent long-distance low-power recored through the years! It's MY JOB to disprove it "could have happened" - not someone else's job to prove it did happen - in the real world, outside some happy "mathematical analysis". One would think that if this power and path worked for a few blessed days in 1937, it should have been repeated somewhere in the history of long distance radio 1930-2003. You want ME to list the attempts, is that right? The onus is really on me? Bunk! >> Okay, i grant the probability is nonzero. It is, in my view, however, >> vanishingly small. That means close enough to zero to eliminate it. > > Which is it? Zero or non-zero? You can't have it both ways. "That means close enough to zero to eliminate it". > LTM, who knows that time spent in clear thinking is wisely invested. > Bob Even Betty and AE lived in the real world. Okay, let's go on to some more analysis, which even us non math wizards should get. We have an hour and more broadcast, but hardly any useful distress-call details. Instead we have a practically complete story, not a Shakespeare drama, but with some editing could make a reasonable "Twilight Zone" episode. It opens apparently, shortly after the forced landing. ( We later learned AE and the injured FN next day returned to the plane for this scene.) AE and FN struggle for control of the radio, meanwhile broadcasting their comments about the situation in general. They talk about using the radio, while using the radio. They listen for what? on the radio, altho it's daylight there and no long distance reception is coming in, and besides, the regular receive antenna is gone. Even when they're not actually trying to make a distress call, we hear them speaking, arguing, fighting. ( Did they both have microphones, and try to prevent each other from pushing the "talk" button? ) In addition to this conflict, AE with FN, we have a looming crisis: water is rising and the plane is starting to slip. ( Note: having the "Betty Interview Tape" is necessary to understanding of the whole story as i describe it.) As she realizes the hopelessness, AE is finally experiences remorse. ( Note, is AE's "guilt" or "culpability" a modern concept? Would she feel "guilt"? I don't know, i am just putting this question out there.) Finally, with the water rising, and the plane starting to slip off the rocks or whatever it's grounded on, AE and FN have to climb out of the plane again. Exit scene, to narrator Rod Serling in the foreground, talking about pride and humbling of pride. ( This last line is my embellishment. ) But, no practical details on location, status, etc. Just arguments, recriminations, tears. Maybe AE was also 14 years old then. We do have the mention that one of the women listeners actually had for some years the latitude and longitude written down. Great! I think we really need to be grateful to our four women listeners: thousands of hams and shortwave listeners monitoring the airwaves in those days, in a hobby very predominantly a male hobby, yet only four women had the courage to come forward. Faith, a miracle in 1937, and a doctor to testify. Hue Miller ***************************************************************** From Ric I'll leave the technical debate to those who speak the language but I must comment on the strange logic that holds that four women who all heard what they believed was Earhart telling basically the same story (she is very upset, on an unknown reef or island, concerned about the surrounding water, and her navigator is injured) cannot have been hearing genuine distress calls because - because - because why? Because four is not enough? How many would be enough? We have 184 alleged post-loss receptions of various kinds. I don't know what radios were used during WWII or whether they had significant harmonic output or whether shortwave listeners sometimes heard them, but I do know that those questions have no bearing on whether these women may have heard Earhart. I also know that reports of highly unusual, even amazing, radio receptions are not at all uncommon. We've heard many right here on this forum. Your description of the situation described by Betty's transcript is as inaccurate as it is unfair and I won't dignify it by correcting it. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 14:52:31 EDT From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Bigass Latro - again > Fascinating quote. Can you give me a full source citation? Tom, The paragraph was quoted verbatim from "Life and Adventures 1776-1801 John Nicol, Mariner" (as edited by Tim Flannery.) This book was originally published in 1822, edited by one John Howell, who took down John Nicol's reminiscences. The copy I quoted from is in a book called "Two Classic Tales of Australian Exploration" edited and introduced by Tim Flannery and published by Text Publishing, Melbourne, Australia in 2000. ISBN 1 876485 61 2 Life and Adventures was also published alone by Text Publishing in 1997, so there's a good chance it may be available through your library system. The quote was in Chapter 2 on page 6 of what is an eight and a half page chapter in my (borrowed) copy. It is the only mention of our coconutty friend that I have seen in the book so far, and it was so totally unexpected that I had to do a google search to confirm that Birgas Latro was in fact the crab referred to. Regards, RossD. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 15:41:07 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Case of Brandenburg vs Miller Rather than continue to bore readers with circuit minutiae, maybe we can pare down these proceedings. Mr. Brandenburg maintains Betty could have heard AE, x days out of July 1937, because with the receiver setup and the aircraft antenna, a radiated harmonic power of 1 watt or even down to 0.1 watt would provide a usable, listenable signal in Florida. Myself and possibly some others do not believe this. Rather than be awed by the results of the software propagation analysis, i say, something is wrong there. Either it is too simplified, or inputs incorrect, and rather than an inscribed stone from the mount, it is a theory. If it's a theory, and it is correct, it should be verified by other examples in the real world, not just young Betty's 1937 achievement. ( The other 3 women, we don't have the specifics of their receiving setup, so for the purposes of the AE radio analysis, it's just Betty.) Now if Mr. Brandenburg was designing radios before some of us readers were born, it should be a simple task for him to cite some other examples of very long distance, low power ( at these modeled levels ), double sideband ( "AM" ) communication, using this vintage equipment, and with the link maintained up to almost 2 hours. There are about 30 years of shortwave radio history to draw from, let's say for this kind of technology, say from roughly 1930-1960. This includes a number of sunspot cycles. No further need to debate circuit elements, antenna impedance, etc. until later in the debate, when we revisit the power issue. I say it's incumbent on the proponents of the Harmonic Theory to establish its veracity. I don't feel it's in the skeptic's job description to refute every detail of every theory that comes down the road. But somehow, the skeptics here come up bearing the onus: "Prove it didn't happen!" I don't think the effort to compartmentalize the "radio analysis" from the "content analysis" can fly, either, as if they were independent elements in proving the theory. When i used the term "logic problems" earlier, i did not mean electronics theory. TIGHAR TRACKS for 9/ 2003 describes the Florida reception as "what is believed to be a genuine distress call from Amelia Earhart in the days following her disappearance". I ask, is this now official TIGHAR canon? Does Mr. Brandenburg also believe this? If you believe it, i ask, have you explained yet, what AE was listening to on the shortwave radio at 10:00 local time? And using the loop antenna, which was less sensitive than the torn-off wire receive antenna? And using a receiver tuning only up to 8000 kcs. - missing the daylight long distance bands? How she could listen and broadcast at the same time? Why days after landing, she dragged FN with her when she went back to the plane, and with him irrational and violent, and it not easy to climb back in the plane? How did the communications handheld microphones pick up the sounds of the cabin conversation and wrasslin'? Did they each have their own microphone, as was suggested here? If so, what were they fighting to control? To keep each other's thumb off the microphone button? And so on.... It seems to me, it's in the believer's job description, not mine, to answer these, if the story is really truth. Or, do you get to choose what parts of the story to tout? Hue Miller ******************************************************** From Ric Allow me to correct your misconceptions and answer your questions. No one is asking you to prove it didn't happen. Bob Brandenburg has demonstrated that it could happen. You have already agreed that it could happen but you maintain that it was so unlikely that it would happen that it couldn't have happened. Apparently that logic makes sense to you. Yes, it is "official TIGHAR canon" that we believe that Betty heard a genuine distress call from Amelia Earhart in the days following her disappearance. We do not claim that the authenticity of the reception has been proven. We're only asserting our opinion. And that's all you're doing. You ask a number of questions. >what AE was listening to on the shortwave >radio at 10:00 local time? Not shortwave. HF. I think she heard Itasca's logged morse code transmission at 10:00 local time on July 5: "CALLED EARHART//3105 KEY" >And using the loop antenna, which was less sensitive than the >torn-off wire receive antenna? That right. >And using a receiver tuning only up to 8000 kcs. - missing >the daylight long distance bands? No. The WE 20B tuned to 3105. >How she could listen and broadcast at the same time? No necessity that she did. She can certainly hear something and then depress the push-to-talk and say "Here put your ear to it." >Why days after landing, she dragged FN with >her when she went back to the plane, and >with him irrational and violent, and it not >easy to climb back in the plane? We don't know that either of them left the plane during that time nor do we know that Noonan was irrational and violent for the entire time. >How did the communications handheld microphones pick >up the sounds of the cabin conversation and wrasslin'? You've answered your own question. If two people are close enough to be "wrasslin'" the mic is going to pick up both. >Did they each have their own micro phone, as was suggested here? If so, what >were they fighting to control? To keep each other's thumb off the microphone >button? I don't know. Do you? The things you find so incredible HAD to have happened whether what Betty heard was a genuine transmission from NR16020 or a man and a woman perpetrating a hoax. Or are you saying that this was a hoax cooked up by Betty and her family and there really was no transmission at all? LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 15:43:14 EDT From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply II Alan wrote: > To Bob and Hue. I have read your exchanges very carefully and I want to thank > you both for clearing this issue up for me. > > Seriously I'm awed at the exchanges. From my perspective, this has consumed far more time and effort than warranted. But if it helped to clarify the issue for you, then it was worthwhile. >It is appearing that the possibility Betty heard what she claims cannot be > eliminated. Maybe not a common and frequent occurrence but still possible. Precisely so, Alan. That was the case when my report was posted on the TIGHAR web site over two years ago, and nothing has happened since then to change that conclusion. > I am not a big fan of probability although I recognize the usefulness of > the theory. For one single event the probability must necessarily be zero or > 100%. Either it happened or it didn't. Probability is a valuable tool if used correctly. It is obvious that you understand the concept of probability with respect to events in the past. > I'm wondering if there are other examples of a similar occurrence? If so > that should answer the question. If not more work is needed. Let me counsel caution here, Alan. There is a crucial difference between "similar" and "identical". The question of whether Betty could have heard Amelia depends on a particular combination of highly specific factors. If we allow deviations from those specifics, then the question will be changed and the answers obtained will not necessarily be applicable to Betty's case. As for more work, it has already been established that it was possible for Betty to have heard Amelia. That result is not contingent upon corroboration by other cases. LTM, Bob ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 15:48:24 EDT From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: RA-1, again Hue wrote: > "RDF-1" would be a legitimate nomenclature, but would indicate > "radio receiver type RDF, revision 1", Actually this is not so. The -1 means not "revision 1" in Navy-talk but issue 2. The first issue would be RDF, the second RDF-1 etc. It is the suffix letter that denotes a revision, so the RA-1b would be RA-1 second revision. However in this particular case the nomenclature is Bendix so that is not necessarily, although probably still, the case. Ric wrote: > It would seem, therefore, that the units (whatever they were comprised of) > installed in TBD-1s were a later version of the RDF-1. That is probably the case as the RDF-1A in Navy-talk is a revision of the RDF-1. However that interpretation assumes that the navy tacked on their own revision suffix to a Bendix nomenclature. Regards Angus. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 6 Oct 2003 15:46:34 EDT From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: Bigass Latro - again I was doing a little 'internet' research on how much damage the Cyclones of the Pacific do to some of the smaller islands and atolls and came upon a number of references to the fact that the islanders, in preparing for the storm, would bury their food. Struck me a little strange at the time, but perhaps is another indication that buried items, at a reasonable depth, can be made somewhat safe from critters. Are there materials to build a 'cairn like above ground structure' or would burying the body be the natural thing to do on Niku? Bob ************************************************************* From Ric You could build a cairn out of coral slabs but finding and transporting the slabs would be a lot more work than digging a hole. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2003 12:50:42 EDT From: Dan Postellon Subject: Re: Case of Brandenburg vs Miller Hue Miller wrote; >There are about 30 years of shortwave radio >history to draw from, let's say for this kind of technology, say from roughly >1930-1960. Didn't the Kon-Tiki expedition send short wave to Norway on a low power (10 watt or less) transmitter? Dan Postellon TIGHAR #2263 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2003 13:30:07 EDT From: Ed Croft Subject: Re: More Florida Ric wrote: >You might follow your own advice and offer a plausible alternative >explanation for what Betty and the others heard. I don't have any opinion on whether the post-loss messages referred to are real, but I do think there are other plausible explanations. Assuming that there was the belief at that time that Amelia was transmitting messages and other people were hearing them, I would not be surprised that honest, well-intending people believed that they heard Amelia. Asking Hue to offer a plausible alternative is like asking someone to explain what people really saw when they thought that they saw ufos, were abducted, etc. UFO sitings have begotten other UFO sitings numerous times. The question that I have is, if the real point of the discussion is to prove that Amelia was transmitting messages 'post loss', why is the discussion not centered on the Pam Am station receptions ? There you have receptions that seem to me to be extremely hard to explain as something other than transmissions by Amelia. ltm, who never saw a cow mutilation, Ed #2523 **************************************************** From Ric The question of whether there were any post-loss transmissions from Earhart is a big one and it can't be covered in a forum posting. We originally thought it could be covered in a large special edition of TIGHAR Tracks but it now looks like it will take a book to really address all the various aspects of the question. The Pan Am receptions will have their own chapter. The topic under discussion on the forum is a very narrow one - is it reasonable to believe that Betty heard Earhart? ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2003 13:31:57 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply II Bob Brandenburg wrote: >Let me counsel caution here, Alan. There is a crucial difference >between "similar" and "identical". The question of whether Betty >could have heard Amelia depends on a particular combination of highly >specific factors. If we allow deviations from those specifics, then >the question will be changed and the answers obtained will not >necessarily be applicable to Betty's case.>> Thanks, Bob. Yes, I understand the absence of other such events has no real significance as it only needed to happen once. As to other factors I think I read somewhere this was a period in which there was minimum interference from sun activity. I am wondering if the aurora could have had any effect even though they were not in that vicinity. I can well see that a "combination of highly specific factors" could create an event that is not easily repeated if at all. I think we can all list scores of such events requiring such a specific mix. The missing of Howland Island is somewhat the same. If any one of a myriad of factors were changed none of us would be here. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2003 13:38:45 EDT From: Andrew McKenna Subject: Big-ass latro? Wombat said: >The following passage is from events related some time between 1770 and >1790. All I know of the time frame is that the American War of >Independence had begun some time earlier and was still being fought. I seriously doubt we are talking about Birgus Latro in the Caribbean, unless it never reaches the large adult stage we see on Niku. Having lived in the Caribbean I can tell you that there are lots of crabs down there, hermit crabs and land crabs, I don't know the species, but they are hardly ever larger than one's hand. I never in 6 years saw anything that got even close to the adult coco crabs of Niku. Now that I've said that, I will admit that I never hung out at the cemetery to see if they were digging up the graves. These days folks down there generally seem to prefer to build a little mausoleum above ground out of masonry. May be a good reason for this practice. Andrew McKenna #1045 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2003 13:37:29 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply III Although I may not understand all the technical aspects you two are discussing I am having more difficulty understanding how the petty junior high school sniping makes or emphasizes a point. It also appears we are not certain what radios were in the plane in the first place as that seems to also be a contentious thread. Am I to assume it makes no difference to this thread what radios we are discussing? Alan **************************************************** From Ric There seems to be no disagreement about what transmitter was in the airplane or that Earhart should have been able to use her loop antenna to receive, regardless of what receiver she was using, and either of the debated receivers should have been capable of receiving on the frequencies in questions - so the Great Bendix Debate would seem to have no bearing on this thread. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2003 13:40:37 EDT From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: Case of Brandenburg vs Miller Dan Postellon wrote: > Didn't the Kon-Tiki expedition send short wave to Norway on a low power (10 > watt or less) transmitter? A few months ago Angus and I had a couple of short postings about that very issue. Angus came up with the details. Never really went much further so I assumed that the Radio experts discounted any importance to those broadcasts and the AE/FN situation with post loss signals. Bob Lee ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2003 14:09:08 EDT From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: More Florida Ed Croft wrote: >Asking Hue to offer a plausible alternative is like asking someone to >explain what people really saw when they thought that they saw ufos, were >abducted, etc. UFO sitings have begotten other UFO sitings numerous times. You're contradicting yourself. You say that you can dismiss a hypothesis without offering a more plausible alternative explanation and then you offer a more plausible explanation. If someone dismisses a hypothetical explanation for an observed phenomenon it is incumbent upon the dismisser to offer a plausible alternative hypothesis. Many plausible alternative explanations have been offered to explain UFO sightings and many have been proven correct. There are any number of other examples. It was shown that crop circles could be created by hoaxers even before the hoaxers themselves came forward. You can't just say, "I don't buy it." And expect to be taken seriously unless you can produce a different explanation that is more plausible. The complex and varied individual pieces of evidence that TIGHAR feels are best explained by Earhart's arrival and demise at Gardner Island are another example. You can say that you don't agree with TIGHAR's explanation but you're just spouting meaningless opinion unless you can come up with a better interpretation of the hard evidence that has been uncovered. Hue has admitted that it was theoretically possible for Betty to have heard Earhart but he just doesn't buy it that she actually did. If he wants to be taken seriously he has to either provide a more plausible explanation for the hard evidence represented by the notebook. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 09:25:33 EDT From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Case of Brandenburg vs Miller Dan, There were three simple transmitters--with the 40/20, 10 and 6-meter rigs made up entirely of 2E30 tubes and also an SSTR-1 10w input, 6w output. Kon-tiki also had two National receivers, HRO-7 and NC173. August 5, Haugland worked Amundsen in Oslo, Norway ( about 10,000 miles). I quote: Their primary transmitter for 7 and 14 Mhz was constructed by the National staff from a design published in QST in July 1941 from the article "A Versatile Portable-Emergency Transmitter." There were also rigs for 28 and 50mHz utilizing a design by ARRL staffer Ed Tilton, W1HDQ. AM and CW capabilities were included and a 10 watt tube, the 2E30, was the heart of these designs. Pi-network tuning was included and the antenna chosen for all operation was an end-fed wire supported by the raft's 40-foot mast. The transmitters were housed in watertight aluminum boxes fitted with rubber gaskets. Meters were not used in the transmitting equipment because of their presumed susceptibility to the harsh sea environment. All tuning was done by neon bulbs and lamp loops. The other radios were aboard to access maritime frequencies, but ham radio carried the main radio traffic. Power was the challenge. In this era before transistors, the tube-type equipment was power hungry, especially the filaments. Dry cell batteries were used, as lead-acid batteries were thought to be too dangerous. After all, an acid spill might burn through the hemp ropes holding their humble craft together. Their dry cells also proved problematic in the moist ocean air. Many stateside amateurs assisted in relaying traffic and there was direct communication with Norwegian station LA7Y, at the magnificent distance of 10,000 miles. In fact RST of 559 was exchanged both ways during one of these contacts later in the voyage. Given the problems the crew was having with their dry cell batteries (heater voltages dropped to about 4 volts after two months) the Kon-Tiki was probably frequently transmitting at 5 watts output or less. In spite of this, they had an advantage over AE regarding long distance as they could transmit on substantially higher frequencies. They had assigned operating frequencies of 27.98 and 14.142 MCs. Regards Angus. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 09:27:40 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Case of Brandenburg vs Miller All of us who are critical from time to time and that includes myself, need to keep in mind this flight was a one time event. This was not one of many that we could use averages and probability with. We cannot use averages with the evidence. The size of an average woman's shoe, or the usual way coconuts are opened, or the general radio propagation parameters are, the average weather in the Pacific is, and so on. This was one flight that occurred on July 2, 1937, one specific set of radios were used, specific winds and weather conditions existed, specific radio propagation factors existed, etc. ALL of that would have to be duplicated exactly and that cannot be done. No time machine just yet. All we can do is approximate and make our best estimate. Long and company tried to recreate the radios and of course that is merely an approximation of the original. Even if we had the same radio models built at the time we could not be certain they would function exactly the same. I cannot see how it can be proven beyond a doubt that it was impossible for Betty to have heard AE. If that is so it needs to be accepted at face value. I see no reason not to nor have I heard anyone articulate a reason not to other than "I don't believe it." I also accept the opinions of anyone who doesn't buy Betty's story as just that - opinion. I cannot deal with probabilities in this case. If there is one chance in a million then there is one chance. That's all that is needed. If we can also SUPPORT Betty's notebook with other data so much the better. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 09:28:52 EDT From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Big-ass latro? Andrew McKenna wrote: > I seriously doubt we are talking about Birgus Latro in the Caribbean, unless > it never reaches the large adult stage we see on Niku. Andrew is right, I am still trying to find the reference that said Birgus Latro lived in the Caribbean, but I've forgotten which search turned it up. The most likely candidate for the old mariner's reminiscences otherwise appears to be Coenobita. However there was a specific reference to Birgus. The problem with the web is that it is so hard to find the scientific among all the hobby pages. Th' WOMBAT ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 09:31:23 EDT From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply III For Hue Miller > Clearly the 40 db rule did not exist in 1937. This point is nonmaterial to the > argument, anyway, unless it's important to you to show i'm a fool. I have no interest in showing you to be a fool. The point is material to your original declaration that the WE 13C "would never have been allowed on the air". I invited you to cite a 1937 rule supporting your declaration. The fact that you haven't done so shows that your declaration was made without a demonstrable basis in fact. I now consider the matter to be closed. > Bob, i don't know that i need to "do the calculations" to describe the > transmitter, do you? Is it necessary to calculate resonance, when from the > text and schematic it's clear how resonance is achieved? What's your point > here? Description of the transmitter is not the issue. My suggestions were in the nature of hints that you were making assertions without benefit of the requisite knowledge. > One of the texts i have mentions the plate trimmer. I know there may be a > discrepancy in a (or all ) published schematic. One text (or more) absolutely > does discuss the "plate circuit trimmer." I can understand your missing > this, because as i recall, it might not have appeared in the schematic. (I > believe the schematic for the "interstage bandpass transformer" also is not > literally correct, but simplified from they way the texts describe it. ) The > fact is, the transmitter was not tuned only by coil adjustment, the trimmer > capacitor was used for careful adjustment. I think the text to which you refer may be "Aircraft Radio and Electrical Equipment" (Morgan, 1941). He uses the term "antenna tuning trimmer" in his description of the WE 13C transmitter, but he is not referring to, nor does he mention, a "trimmer capacitor". The "trimmer" cited by Morgan was a small inductance wound on the inside of the antenna tuning coil form at the low potential end of the coil, and was screwdriver adjustable through the front panel of the transmitter. The fixed capacitor in series with the movable tap on each tuning coil not only isolated the antenna from the high direct current voltage in the transmitter output plate circuit, but also combined with the antenna impedance to present a net capacitive reactance to the transmitter output tuning circuit. It was designed that way so the antenna could be tuned by adjusting the inductance of the autotransformer in the transmitter output circuit. The facts are that the transmitter WAS tuned only by coil adjustment, and there was NO trimmer capacitor. I emphasize, this is a matter of FACT, not opinion. > You want ME to list the attempts, is that right? The onus is really on me? > Bunk! It was your idea. My analysis stands on its own feet. If you think that additional cases should be examined, then it seems only fair that you should provide the list. LTM, Bob #2286 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 09:32:42 EDT From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: Hue Miller's reply II Alan, > As to other factors I think I read somewhere this was a period in which there > was minimum interference from sun activity. I am wondering if the aurora > could have had any effect even though they were not in that vicinity. Two very interesting points. Your recollection about solar activity is correct. The average daily sunspot number (SSN) for July 1937 was 145.1, but the daily SSNs for the period 1 July through 5 July were 69, 91, 74, 65, and 91, respectively. The SSN climbed sharply from 6 July, reaching a peak of 223 on 12 July. So it happens that the sun was relatively quiet on the day (5 July) that we think is the most likely day that Betty heard the signals she logged in her notebook. I doubt that the aurora -- actually the auroral oval which extends from the North pole and follows the sun -- had a significant effect. The oval affects high latitude propagation paths. But the great circle path from Gardner Island to St. Petersburg didn't pass near the typical domain of the oval. LTM, Bob ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 10:00:08 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: More Florida I'd like to know why you call the Notebook "hard evidence". Do you know the date of writing? Have any witnesses to the supposed date of creation? Any witness testimony to the Notebook from the time? Visibility of the path of provenance? Are there substantial elements that appear in the Notebook, that were not frontpage news in the Florida newspapers that weekend in 1937? As i've maintained before, i believe it's impossible to understand the story without seeing the Betty interview tape. If i am correct in this, then this totality of Notebook + interview is not called "hard evidence", it's called "anecdote". Hue ********************************************************************** From Ric If you wish to review the exhaustive process by which this forum determined that the other entries in the notebook are entirely consistent with the spring and summer of 1937 I invite you to do so via the forum archives. The provenance of the notebook is very simple and entirely credible. Betty had it in her possession from 1937 until she donated it to TIGHAR. Her children, other family members and friends all attest to that. As a historical document, Betty's notebook has exactly the same credibility of provenance as does the original Itasca radio log and the Chater letter. Each was retained in the possession of a single custodian until turned over to an historical archive - in the case of the Itasca radio log, the National Archives; in the case of the Chater letter and Betty's notebook, TIGHAR. Betty's notebook is hard evidence. Her recollected explanations and elaborations are anecdote. Had Betty's notebook been found among her personal effects after her death it would still be a remarkable document and, as has been discussed on this forum, there are many aspects of what Betty wrote that made no sense to Betty but, further research has shown, lend the document credibility. There is no "totality" of notebook + interview any more than there is a "totality" of the Itasca log and Long's 1973 interview with Bellarts. In each case there is a historical document and a later anecdotal commentary. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 10:51:06 EDT From: Ed Croft Subject: Re: More Florida Ric wrote: >Hue has admitted that it was theoretically possible for Betty to have heard >Earhart but he just doesn't buy it that she actually did. If he wants to be >taken seriously he has to either provide a more plausible explanation for the >hard evidence represented by the notebook. Another plausible explanation is simply 1. Betty heard someone else, or perhaps several other people transmitting 2. After first hearing the words 'Amelia Earhart' and then while trying to decipher what was being said, she interpreted the unclear transmissions using the presumption that Amelia Earhart was speaking, thus influencing her in what her mind actually heard. For example, Betty's notebook has a recording of 'W40K Howland port or W O J Howland port'. Now, in the TIGHAR archives it states that 'in 1937, W40K was the call sign assigned to Francis G. Carroll of Fort Worth, Florida'. Now, either Amelia either heard Francis Carroll transmitting and then repeated his call sign, or Betty heard Mr. Carroll transmitting. I have no idea of the likelihood of Amelia hearing his Mr. Carroll's call sign. If he heard Amelia on a harmonic, what frequency would he be transmitting on, and would Amelia be listening on the same frequency ? Is that even theoretically possible that the conditions supporting the reception by Betty of Amelia, would also support the reception by Amelia of Mr. Carroll ? Isn't it more likely that Betty heard Mr. Carroll ? In normal conversation, I myself have 'heard' something different than what the other person was speaking. The brain interprets speech in the context of what is spoken and one does not always hear what is spoken. It is one of the reasons for the difficulty of computer interpreted speech. Betty stated 'The signal faded in and out, sometimes stopped altogether for several minutes and at other times was quite distorted, but Betty tried her best to get down at least some of what was being said. If she wasn't sure about a word she would just write down what it sounded like to her.'. Simply stated, we have no way of knowing the accuracy of the recording of the transmission. Now, as far as I can see, there are 3 'occult' items in the broadcast which could be viewed to support the theory that this is Amelia transmitting. 1. 'Knee deep water'. 2. S 309' 165'E 3. Suitcase in the closet. If the tidal research is consistent with the 'knee deep water' at the time of the transmission, then that would be a factor in supporting Betty hearing Amelia. As far as the 'S 309' 165'E' phrase is concerned, it is curious as it appears to be on the flight path, but then again can this be used as an argument that Amelia is transmitting ? The 'suitcase in the closet' can only be used as support if there is some evidence that a suitcase as of July 37 would be of concern of Amelia. I understand the argument that Amelia at one point had letters in a valise (?) that she did not want people to see. But we don't know if 1) the letters still existed by July 37, 2) they were in a suitcase, or 3) they were in california. Let me state, I have no opinion on whether Betty heard or did not hear Amelia. Personally, it does make me wonder and I hope that she did. My only point is another plausible explanation exists. Betty heard someone else, someone with a much stronger signal than Amelia's. Perhaps all the conditions were conducive to hearing a transmission from the Pacific, but that instead of hearing Amelia, Betty heard someone else in the Pacific, someone involved in the search for Amelia. Ric, this will close out my 2 cents, as I don't want to waste any more of your time. ltm, Ed ********************************************************************* From Ric The coincidence of the letters W40K being the call sign of a ham in Florida who was on the same great circle propagation path from Gardner Island as Betty and who is reported to have once said that he "talked to" Amelia has been discussed at length on this forum. No one has been able to offer a plausible explanation of how Betty could have heard him on her shortwave, much less have mistaken him for Amelia Earhart. Your understanding of the "occult" references in the notebook is incomplete. I don't consider "knee deep" to be an occult reference. In order to have an occult reference we have to match something in the notebook to information that we know was available to Earhart but was not available to the general public. I do consider 'S 309' 165'E' to be an occult reference, not because 3* 9'S/165*E was a point on the route from Lae to Howland (there were thousands of points on the route from Lae to Howland) but because it was a specific point - USS Ontario's assigned position - that was not publicized but which was, of course, known to Earhart and Noonan and logically may have been noted on a chart aboard the plane. I consider "George, get the suitcase in my closet (in) California" to be an occult reference for the reasons you have stated. I also consider the apparent struggle with Earhart preventing Noonan's exit from the airplane to be an occult reference because it fits so well with the physical set-up of the Electra's cockpit and hatch. You almost have to sit in an Electra cockpit and read the transcript (as I have done) to understand how well it all works. There are, of course, other possible occult references that depend upon interpretation to a greater degree. Is "NY, NY" shorthand for "New York City", a misunderstood reference to "Norwich City"? Is "Marie, Marie" really "Mary Bea, Mary Bea" (Noonan's wife)? None of these are absolute proof of anything, but they argue for the authenticity of the transmission. If you want to argue that the words and phrases Betty wrote in her notebook were her own fanciful interpretations and bear no resemblance to whatever she actually heard you have to also argue that all of the apparent occult references are just coincidences. If Betty's notebook even vaguely resembles what she actually heard then you have to posit a commercial broadcast or private hoax involving passionate performances by a woman and a man that fooled no one but Betty (and her mother and father, if you believe Betty's anecdotal account of the event). Betty's notebook is a remarkable document. So far, the least outrageous explanation for it is that Betty heard exactly what she thought she heard. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 14:09:31 EDT From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: Big-ass latro? The WOMBAT wrote: > Andrew is right, I am still trying to find the reference that said > Birgus Latro lived in the Caribbean, but I've forgotten which search > turned it up. > The most likely candidate for the old mariner's reminiscences otherwise > appears to be Coenobita. However there was a specific reference to > Birgus. The problem withthe web is that it is so hard to find the > scientific among all the hobby pages. A cousin lives in the Caribbean: "The name Coenobita Clypeatus (usually pronounced seen-oh-bit-a cly-pe-ait-us) may be translated as "shield-bearing monk or cloister brother," which conjures up a truer image of this often gregarious and variously cloistered resident of tropical East American shores than does "hermit crab." But, like most common names, "hermit crab" or "soldier crab" in native parlance, will certainly endure. The animal so called belongs to a small family of terrestrial decapod crustaceans quite distinct from the marine hermit crabs. The family Coenobitidas is composed of two genera: Birgus and Coenobita. Birgus is represented by a single species, Birgus latro(Linnaeus, 1767), the Robber Crab or Coconut Crab of Indo-Pacific islands. Birgus has discarded the protection of an appropriated shelter except for a brief juvenile period. Coenobita contains seven species that inhabit tropical regions throughout the world and that live in discarded snail shells for their entire adult lives, changing to larger shells as they grow." http://www.fmrpets.com/promotions.ivnu So the Pacific and Caribbean crabs are close relatives. LTM & the boys. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 14:17:31 EDT From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: More Florida I'm curious about getting in and out of the Electra cockpit. Under normal circumstances, is it easier for the co-pilot to get out first because there is no yoke on the right hand side? It seems that it would have been extremely difficult for AE to exit her seat if FN had, in fact, been injured. Just curious. Kudos again to Pat & you on the recent TIGHAR Tracks publication. Well done. LTM, Mike Haddock #2438 *************************************************************************** From Ric Actually, the opposite is true. The hatch is directly over the pilot. To use it you have to stand on the pilot's seat. If the pilot is sitting in that seat you'd have to literally step on the pilot in order to use the hatch. Of course, you can always crawl over the tanks and into the aft cabin to exit through the regular cabin door unless the left main gear is collapsed in which case the cabin door cannot be opened but the right-hand engine is still operable to recharge the battery. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 14:24:07 EDT From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: More Florida > I do consider 'S 309' 165'E' to be an occult reference, not because 3* > 9'S/165*E was a point on the route from Lae to Howland (there were > thousands of points on the route from Lae to Howland) but because it > was a specific point - USS Ontario's assigned position - that was not > publicized but which was, of course, known to Earhart and Noonan and > logically may have been noted on a chart aboard the plane. > > There are, of course, other possible occult references that depend > upon interpretation to a greater degree. Is "NY, NY" shorthand for > "New York City", a misunderstood reference to "Norwich City"? Is > "Marie, Marie" really "Mary Bea, Mary Bea" (Noonan's wife)? > > None of these are absolute proof of anything, but they argue for the > authenticity of the transmission. Things brings up an interesting issue. On one hand we have a possible indication of a very exact position being given -- perhaps referenced off one of the charts. Yet when it comes to where they are, it doesn't appear to have been specifically referenced. This is puzzling. Of course, they may have given very specific coordinates and Betty either didn't hear them or didn't write them down -- or they really weren't certain of where they were and simply decided to broadcast a very obvious landmark within their eyesight -- the Norwich City. I believe that the NC played a key role in some of the more significant events that followed: 1. Possible aircraft debris assumed to be part of the NC debris field. 2. NC Wreck blocking the view to the area of suspected aircraft wreckage to visitors of the island. 3. The NC wreckage a potential distraction for aerial searches and finally the potential that the "NY, NY" reference in Betty's notebook is actually Norwich City. Bob ****************************************************************** From Ric When trying to make sense of the entries in Betty's notebook we have to take them in context, and the context is a very distraught Earhart and a worse-than-useless Noonan. Earhart may have no idea where they are and be simply reading numbers off Noonan's notes in the hope that they will make sense to somebody. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 16:06:16 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: More Florida >because there is no >yoke on the right hand side? How did we establish this as a fact? I recall there is a picture showing a yoke beside the plane but that doesn't tell me there was no yoke in the copilot's position. What have I missed? Alan ********************************************************* From Ric We did not establish it as a fact nor did we claim to. Just speculation. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 12:15:17 EDT From: Adam Subject: Betty's Notebook and why not 6210? I've been lurking for many months because I am not as yet a member of TIGHAR (due to sketchy employment in the past year), and until I can swing that I did not feel I should take up any of Ric's time with my posts. Also I didn't have much useful to add. But, two things: (1) Re "occult" references in Betty's Notebook. More than any of the items listed, I would submit that the appearance of coordinates only 1 degree removed from their last stated line of position rates as an occult reference. [the first number is 158, the second is 58 338...given we're dealing with fragments a very small extrapolation to 158/338. Phoentic proximities to 158/338 appear throughout the message] If nothing else, it's an extraordinary coincidence. (2) I don't know if anyone else has thought of this (I don't remember reading it), but a logical explanation (other than antenna, frequency problems or Elgen Long's sudden crash theory) struck me as to why no one heard Amelia Earhart repeat her message on 6210 on her last logged message to the Itasca. It's TIGHAR's contention that based on a close reading of the unsmoothed logs neither of the radio operators heard the final message; that other crewmen listening to the message heard it over the loudspeakers and relayed them to the radiomen. If that's the case, then it's logical to assume that by the time the message was relayed, logged, and the radiomen changed frequencies from 3105 to 6210, that Amelia had already repeated the message on 6210 so they missed it. And if she kept to her half-hour schedule, by the time the next message rolled around, she may have been out of range on that frequency. That's all...Ric I hope to be able to throw in my small contribution soon. I enjoy this forum a lot and I also appreciate the methodical and logical approach to research. Adam ******************************************************* From Ric Thanks Adam. Those are both good points. The problem with looking for occult information in Betty's notebook is that it is very much like looking for occult information in a "psychic reading". People professing psychic ability provide generalities that the willing listener can interpret to fit known occult information. The listener then makes slight changes or fills in the blanks and the reading suddenly becomes breathtakingly accurate. The less we have to change or interpret the actual entry in the notebook, the more credible it is as genuine occult information. On the question of switching to 6210 - it's only the second part of the 08:43 message ("We are running on line north and south.") that we think was missed. The first part (We are on the line 157 337. We will repeat this message. We will repeat this on 6210.") seems to have been recorded just like all the other transmissions. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 12:23:20 EDT From: Jackie Tharpe Subject: Re: More Florida In response to Hue's latest questions, I just read all of the information concerning the post-loss radio messages, and Betty's notebook files. I have also seen Betty's interview. 1. How can you question the validity of Betty's notebook when it contains the same messages reported by numerous other's all around the world as reported in the Hooven report? It seems ridiculous to me that soooo many people heard A/E stating things like "KHAQQ" (which civilians like Betty would know nothing about) and other callsigns that were associated with the final flight, and yet still consider these post-loss messages as "hoaxes" or mininterpretations, etc. 2. Betty's father also heard A/E when he came home, and then went next door to see if the neighbor was also hearing them, and reported it to the Coast Guard. 3. I can't wait to see TIGHAR's report on these messages. I find this area to be the most interesting and intriguing part of our quest to discover what happened after the end of the flight. Its just a shame the Navy didn't take these messages more seriously, because although she was unable to find Howland, I feel that there's no excuse for the Navy's failure to find them on Gardner, and no excuse for not searching the island further after the Colorado was relieved of duty. ****************************************************************** From Ric While it is true that most people probably would not be aware of Earhart's radio call sign prior to the disappearance, once the first alleged post-loss receptions (by Walter McMenamy who did have that information) were reported in the press, the information was accessible to anyone who read the newspapers. That said, there are many other problems in ascribing most of the alleged post-loss receptions to hoaxes or misunderstandings. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 12:24:33 EDT From: Eric Subject: Betty's notebook Ric wrote: > Betty's notebook is a remarkable document. So far, the least outrageous > explanation for it is that Betty heard exactly what she thought she heard. After reading over a year's worth of postings, both pro and con, on the notebook, I've come to the conclusion that Betty probably heard AE. This is based entirely on a gut instinct influenced by the fact that truth is often stranger than fiction. Due to some fluke of nature, it might just have been possible that a young girl in Florida picked up transmissions that escaped the professionals who were listening with 1937 state of the art equipment. LTM Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, Ca. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 9 Oct 2003 16:08:09 EDT From: John Luttrell Subject: Re: More Florida Ric, two questions; Where did you deduce the "S309 and 165E" from Betty's notebook?? Where on the forum can I read the statements of the two women Lovelace and Duck?////////?? Thanks LTM (Who still thinks Denmark's a prison) John **************************************************************** From Ric Look on page three of the notebook pages on the TIGHAR website at http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Documents/Notebook/notebook.html The names of the other women are Thelma Lovelace and Mabel Duncklee. We've discussed them briefly on the forum but I don't recall exact dates. You can probably Google it. There correspondence with TIGHAR will be reproduced and their stories discussed in depth in the Post-Loss Radio Study. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 10 Oct 2003 11:08:32 EDT From: Bob Bennett Subject: Re: More Florida I am a former US Army Intel Officer and I would like to know your opinion of the Fred Goerner and Randall Brink books of 1966 and 1994 respectively? Goerner believes that Earhart died of dysentery while being held in Garapan prison on Saipan sometime before the war started and that Noonan was executed as a spy also before the war started. Brink has an Army Air Corps aerial photo of Taroa Island that shows Earhats plane with the wing broken on the left side, and parked on a revetment. Goerner thinks the plane was destroyed during operations on Saipan, but Brink thinks it still might be buried in an underground bunker on Taroa Island where a Jap Admiral hid it along with his personal customized Zero. What do you guys think? **************************************************************************** From Ric Hi Bob. Welcome to the forum. Fred Goerner was a sincere journalist and avid Earhart researcher who mistook U.S. government attempts to keep him from exposing a CIA training camp on Saipan for attempts to cover up complicity in the Earhart disappearance. In the end, all Goerner or any of the other Japanese-Capture/Conspiracy theorists have ever been able to come up with are unsupported and often conflicting tales of the South Pacific. No documents. No photographs. No artifacts. Just stories. While Goerner's book was a well-written, if misguided, best seller; Brink's book is an amateurish bad joke. It is so shot through with half-truths and outright falsehoods that it should be listed as fiction. The Taroa photo you mention shows what is probably a Kawasaki Type LO (Allied name "Thelma") - a widely-used contract-built version of the Lockheed 14. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 10 Oct 2003 11:22:33 EDT From: Ed Croft Subject: Fred Noonan and Norwich From Ed Croft, Reading through the TIGHAR archives under 'The Real Fred Noonan' : "A birth certificate uncovered by Jackie Ferrari of Fifeshire, Scotland now leads us to suspect that Earhart's navigator is the Frederick Joseph Noonan born July 14, 1891 in Norwich, England, to Joseph and Clara Greenfield Noonan." I also saw where Fred himself stated that he was born on April 4, 1893 in Cook County, Illinois. My understanding is that no birth certificates were found supporting that, but that would not be too surprising. If he were born in Norwich, I would see why that would have rattled him and he would have said 'Norwich' over and over, and that was captured in Betty's notebook. It's also interesting that the 'N.Y.' is tied together with the 'Marie', which could be as Ric informed, a capturing of Fred saying his wife's name of 'Mary Bea'. Probably was born in Cook County, but according to frednoonan.com, "he shipped out in 1910 on a British sailing bark, although there appears to have been a ship before that which he served on. In 1910, Fred gave his age as 18, when he more than likely was still 17." If the ship was the Crompton, per TIGHAR, it shipped out on June 22nd, which would be a vote in favor of the '91 date. Of course, he could have lied for many reasons. strange stuff, Ed ********************************************************************** From Ric We need to update that part of the website. Jerry Hamilton has established that Fred Noonan - like Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown - was born on the south side of Chicago. His date of birth was April 4, 1893 and he was baptized on April 23rd at St. Rose of Lima Catholic church. He was 17 when he shipped on the bark Crompton, but that was not his first ship. He had previously sailed as ordinary seaman aboard the bark Hecla but we don't have the year. Jerry's excellent biography of Noonan is included as Chapter 1, Section B of the Earhart Project Book, Eighth Edition. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 10 Oct 2003 11:49:46 EDT From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Dados I have read "Dados Galore". In a world w/o Murphy, these things would have markings right on them that point to the 10E. That, or the 11 rolls of microfilmed drawings would show the dados. At least once. (Izzat asking too much? Once, for crying out loud!?) Markings or not, I am so convinced that the dados are from the 10E, that I'm seriously losing my objectivity. Help me out here: If we pretend that the dados did NOT come from the 10E, where else could they have come from? One other thing: If the dados come in lengths with the end returns on them like the Tracks picture shows, how are the end splices handled? Do these things butt together, sort of like drywall joints on a stud, at each of the structural frames of the aircraft? Or are they lapped? LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ************************************************************************ From Ric For those who are not yet TIGHAR members and have not received the latest issue of TIGHAR Tracks, the "Dados Galore" article Alfred refers to is now up on the TIGHAR website. Just click on Research Bulletins on the main Earhart Project page http://www.tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/AEdescr.html You'll see both the new "Dados Galore" report and also "The Dado - Part I" which is a reproduction of an earlier analysis of the original dado by TIGHAR member Frank Lombardo in 1994. Please note that Frank's report expressed several opinions and theories about the dado with which we do not necessarily agree, but it was a useful and informative report and we've reproduced it as he wrote it. To Alfred's question, "If we pretend that the dados did NOT come from the 10E, where else could they have come from?" I can only say, "Beats the hell out of me." LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 10 Oct 2003 16:05:02 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Post Loss Msg after 5 July Let's assume for the moment that Betty actually heard AE and that her transcription of Amelia's plight was pretty accurate and ended as she indicated at about 6:00pm, Monday, 5 July 37 or 11:30am Gardner Island time. (if my time zone is correct). Because you have probably the best catalogue of post loss msgs collected to date, are there any alleged signals after 5 July 11:30 am Gardner time that in your opinion seem credible? For instance similarity in content or duration. Newspapers report some fragmentary signals, but I don't have the times,content or exact dates. LTM, Ron Bright ******************************************************************* From Ric Thelma Lovelace said she heard Earhart at what would be 1 a.m. local time in the Central Pacific on July 7th. She tells the same basic story as Mabel Duncklee (on the 2nd), Nina Paxton (on the 3rd), and Betty Klenck (on the 5th?). There were several other receptions heard after the the 5th and some of them have characteristics that may suggest some measure of credibility. For example, later on the 7th several HAMs in Hawaii and California reported hearing a "rippling carrier" on 3015 that sounded "like a motor-driven generator rather than DC". ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 10 Oct 2003 16:34:00 EDT From: Tom King Subject: Re: Dados In response to Alfred's question about where the dados might have come from, and Ric's response: "I can only say, "Beats the hell out of me."", isnt' the obvious answer that they came out of some other aircraft that operated in the area (notably on or through Canton) that had dados and a wood floor? LTM (who likes to keep her feet on one) Tom ******************************************************************* From Ric Yes, and that's what beats the hell out of me. Lots of airplanes had wooden floors but we know of no military airplanes that had dados (they're a "furnishing" in a finished cabin) and our dados don't have part numbers - a further indication that they did not come from a military airplane. There were, of course, civilian planes that came through Canton both before (Pan Am flying boats) and after (Pan Am and British airliners) the war. None were wrecked except an FAA Connie that crashed and burned at Canton about the same time the colony on Niku was being abandoned. Damage that we see, and don't see, on our dados (as explained in the bulletin) suggests that our dados were salvaged from wreckage rather than simply "uninstalled". Here's another interesting tidbit. A TIGHAR member who worked on the restoration of the pre-war Boeing 307 Stratoliner now in the NASM collection reports that the cabin furnishings featured dados made from non-clad aluminum (as are ours). However, Boeing dados were spot-welded and riveted. Ours are only riveted. If I recall correctly (PAA experts please check me on this) the Pan Am boats that serviced Canton were Boeing 314 Clippers and most of the post-war service was by Boeing 377 Stratocruisers. The point being that the known alternative dado-bearing aircraft were Boeings and our dados are unlike known Boeing dados. In short, so far I have been unable to come up with an informed alternative hypothesis. We have recently seen photographic evidence that at least some Lockheed 10s had dados that match the general dimensions of the ones we found on Niku. What we don't yet know is whether they matched the particular construction and features of ours. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 11 Oct 2003 09:04:39 EDT From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Dados For Tom King: It certainly looks like the most probable source for the dados is a certain Electra 10E Special that we may all be familiar with. There is no other ready explanation for how they come to be on that island. (See? I told you my objectivity was gone!) Ric, please update us on the dado studies as info becomes available. Thanks and LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 11 Oct 2003 09:32:58 EDT From: Bill Leary Subject: Re: More Florida > If someone dismisses a hypothetical explanation for an observed > phenomenon it is incumbent upon the dismisser to offer a plausible > alternative hypothesis. You seem to be saying that we can only dismiss a hypothesis when we have an another to offer. Are you asserting that "I don't know the answer, but I don't think that's it." isn't an acceptable position? - Bill #2229 **************************************************************************** From Ric Everyone is entitled to their own opinion but if you expect anyone else to share your opinion you had better be able to come up with something better than "I don't think so." There's a classic Monty Python skit called "Argument Clinic" that illustrates the point beautifully. (I'm paraphrasing.) "This isn't an argument." "Yes it is." "An argument is not just the gainsaying of a premise. You have to offer an alternative position." "No I don't" ...and so on. I can say that I don't find the evidence offered by those who believe that AE was captured by the Japanese to be convincing - and I'm just stating my opinion. But if I want to persuade others to share my opinion I have to offer a more plausible explanation for the evidence. In short, peer review must consist of something more than "mmmm...Nah." LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 10:45:53 EDT From: Bill Leary Subject: Re: More Florida BL> Are you asserting that "I don't know the answer, but I don't think that's BL> it." isn't an acceptable position? RG> Everyone is entitled to their own opinion but if you expect anyone else to RG> share your opinion you had better be able to come up with something RG> better than "I don't think so." In the above, the purpose wasn't to convince anyone, just express the opinion that the answer offered wasn't the correct one. If you further want to sway someone to that opinion then, yes, you do have to do better than that. To be sure I understand this, the "better than that" could be an alternate explanation or expressing why the existing hypothesis is, in your opinion, impossible or, probably best, both. So, it would be possible to say "I don't know the answer, but I don't that that's it BECAUSE ." Yes? Sorry to belabor this, but the thread got me to doubting that I was sure how the opinions were being processed. - Bill #2229 ********************************************************************** From Ric I'm much less interested in opinions than I am in rational explanations for observed phenomena. I encourage those who disagree with our conclusions to offer better explanations because I really do want to know the truth much more than I want to prove any given hypothesis. Lord knows, TIGHAR's own research has disproved and rejected more of our own hypotheses than have nay of our critics. The story told by Betty's notebook is powerful and dramatic. I don't want to be fooled anymore than the next person. If there is a better explanation for what Betty heard I want to know about it. So far nobody has been able to come up with one. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 10:52:47 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Post Loss after 5 Jul 37 Deep in my files is a report from "Palmer Bevis", who I have never heard of and don't know his credibility, etc., Harry Poole sent the report to me a couple of years ago. Bevis reports one of the only translated code msgs I can find received after the 5th of July. He writes that on 6 July 37 a Los Angeles operator Louis Messier reported he heard a weak code signal at midnight Howland time. It was logged as: 17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec will sou nant now sou (sic) I have no idea who Messier is nor what the above might mean to a Ham, etc. Poole wrote that in Feb 1940 Palmer Bevis , hired by the Amelia Earhart Foundation, sent the report, including other post loss signals, to Eleanor Roosevelt to "inspire" a new expedition to the Pacific. Reportedly the report is from the Roosevelt Library and found by Angelo Campella , 6 Jun 99. Maybe this code and time lines up with one of your cataloged msgs. LTM, Ron Bright ************************************************************************* From Ric The Bevis Report is the only source we've been able to find for the Messier message. Neither the content nor the time matches any other reported message. Itasca heard an unreadably weak voice signal on 3105 twenty-five minutes later. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 13 Oct 2003 11:03:42 EDT From: Paige Miller Subject: Betty and Dados Bill Leary writes: "You seem to be saying that we can only dismiss a hypothesis when we have an another to offer." Not necessarily. A theory can be dismissed by proving it could not happen, even though no credible alternative hypothesis is put forth at the same time. For example (I have mentioned this before), there was quite a lot of debate over the claim that Christopher Columbus first landed in the New World at Watlings Island. Recently, the debate over whether his log referred to leagues or miles was resolved in such a way that the Watlings Island theory was now impossible. This is a valid dismissal of a hypothesis, even if no alternative is put forth. Bill Leary then asks: "Are you asserting that 'I don't know the answer, but I don't think that's it.' isn't an acceptable position?" I'd have to agree with others, you're entitled to disagree, for whatever reasons you want, but that's not an acceptable position to hold if you want to participate in a discussion, such as this forum. Otherwise, we turn into a voting discussion group, the position with the most votes wins ... I'd prefer to think we are an evidence based discussion group. Let's hear the evidence and logical arguments that lead you to dismiss an hypothesis, or the evidence and logical arguments in favor of an alternative. -- Paige Miller, #2565 LTM (who never argued logically) ******************************************************************** From Ric This is interesting. I presume that the theory that Chris landed at Watlings Island was based upon some kind of historical evidence - perhaps a physical description in his log that seemed to describe the island. If that was the case, and if research showed that the distance disqualified Watlings, it seems like you'd have to come up with some other island that did fit both the distance and the description in order to supplant the Watlings hypothesis. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 15:46:21 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: More Florida >If you further want to sway someone to that opinion then, yes, you do have >to do better than that. Perhaps I am misunderstanding so if I got what you wrote wrong please correct me. I think I'm understanding that just giving an opinion without any reason is OK but if the opiner further wants to sway someone he ought to give reasons. If that is what you mean I agree. Where I would have a problem is what value is an unsupported opinion? What would one do with that information? I already know some people have alternate opinions so I don't have an interest in hearing about them - unless that opinion is accompanied by some rationale. Only then does it have value. Without support the opiner is wasting their time and mine. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 15:48:16 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Betty and Dados >Recently, the debate over whether his log referred to leagues or miles was >resolved in such a way that the Watlings Island theory was now impossible. I'm certainly not suggesting this thread should survive one more note nor am I much interested but to comment anyone would first have to know and be convinced that your above premise is correct that the league Vs miles issue was in fact resolved correctly and absolutely. Secondly, if Watlings is out it is irresponsible not to suggest what the new probability is. Without that I would have trouble eliminating Watlings out of hand. To bring that home suppose our facts prove AE made it to land and she did not have fuel to go anywhere but Niku yet the villagers on Niku (who didn't really exist) say no airplane came to Niku that day. One could similarly say the Niku theory was now impossible. If we then find there was REALLY no other land she could have gone to and there could NOT be an alternate theory then we would have to revisit the villagers' statements. In the case of Columbus there would have to be an alternate theory advanced or I would have to reexamine the league Vs miles question. And I feel I have just wasted my time. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 15:44:40 EDT From: Neil Barnett Subject: Re: Post Loss after 5 Jul 37 Ron Bright wrote: >Bevis reports one of the only translated code msgs I can find received after >the 5th of July. He writes that on 6 July 37 a Los Angeles operator Louis >Messier reported he heard a weak code signal at midnight Howland time. It was >logged as: > > 17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou >sec will sou nant now sou (sic) > >I have no idea who Messier is nor what the above might mean to a Ham, etc. Speaking as a ham who can send and receive Morse by hand at 15-20 wpm, I have to say that with the exception of "ja", none of the text is ham "lingo". The abbreviation "ja" has long been used to refer to Japan or a Japanese operator, as "JA" is one of the prefixes used in Japanese callsigns in the same way that "ZL" is used in my callsign to indicate "New Zealand". However, in 1936 the prefix for Japan was not "JA" but was "J" (refer "The Radio Amateur's Handbook", 1936 Edition, page 355, published by ARRL, the American Radio Relay League, and yes, I have a copy in my possession). Whether "JA" became a prefix in 1937, or when it did, I do not know. The letters "nx" are possibly part of "tnx", a common ham abbreviation for "thanks" in Morse code. I do not know whether this abbreviation was used by the Navy or other services, or by maritime shipping. I see nothing in the *reported* text to indicate ham radio "lingo" usage, and I am no more able than other forumites to decipher what appear to be fragments of words and, by implication, fragments of digit groups. Neil Barnett ZL1ANM Auckland, New Zealand. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 15:52:11 EDT From: Paige Miller Subject: Off topic- Columbus Ric says: >This is interesting. I presume that the theory that Chris landed at Watlings >Island was based upon some kind of historical evidence - perhaps a physical >description in his log that seemed to describe the island. If that was the >case, and if research showed that the distance disqualified Watlings, it seems >like you'd have to come up with some other island that did fit both the distance >and the description in order to supplant the Watlings hypothesis. There are approximately 15 islands put forth by historians as potential first landfall sites. Watlings was one of the favorites for many years. When Watlings was disqualified, that left (approx) 14 other islands to debate. The evidence in Columbus's log supports some islands more than others, but no island came out a clear winner, and the debate continues. Read all about it here: http://www1.minn.net/~keithp/cclandfl.htm http://www1.minn.net/~keithp/watlings.htm http://www1.minn.net/~keithp/leagues.htm -- Paige Miller, #2565 LTM ************************************************************************ From Ric Wow. It's reassuring to see that there are other groups as obsessed with pointless argument as we are. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 11:34:20 EDT From: Ted Campbell Subject: Post Loss Messages Have you had a linguist look at the post loss messages to see if he/she can make anything out of them? To my untrained eye this last one from Louis Messier via Bevis seems to be pleading for all to look south of Howland not north. I am not sure if AE could pick up any radio traffic on her receiver but if she could I would think she would have heard a lot of radio messages that would have included references to looking north of Howland for her. I would also think that as time went on 3,4,5 days she would have finally come to the conclusion that the search area was not in her general direction of south of Howland and she started to focus on getting everyone turned around. Just some thoughts. *************************************************************************** From Ric I don't know what sort of linguist would be able to help. Do you know of people who specialize in completing and interpreting fragmentary messages? Seems like there should be such people, probably in the "intelligence community". If so, their track record is less than illustrious. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 11:38:00 EDT From: Kerry Tiller Subject: Re: Off topic- Columbus Ric wrote: > Wow. It's reassuring to see that there are other groups as obsessed with > pointless argument as we are. It is such obsessions that separate humans from other life forms. (Well, that, and opposable thumbs.) **************************************************** From Ric If you think that pointless argument is a uniquely human trait you don't own a cat. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 11:40:01 EDT From: Bill Leary Subject: Re: More Florida > If you further want to sway someone to that opinion then, yes, you do have > to do better than that.>> > > Perhaps I am misunderstanding so if I got what you wrote wrong please correct > me. I think I'm understanding that just giving an opinion without any reason > is OK but if the opiner further wants to sway someone he ought to give > reasons. If that is what you mean I agree. Yes. > Where I would have a problem is what value is an unsupported opinion? I was asking a VERY general question. I should have been more specific about what I was asking or, perhaps, limited the form of my question to what was applicable to the forum. Conversationally, say on the phone or face to face, the "I don't think so." comment would be fine. Might even promote further discussion because, since I'm apparently unsure why I disagree (it's a "gut" feeling perhaps) further discussion might bring interesting things out or might help resolve what my subconscious was thinking when decided against the hypothesis. On this forum (or any other non- or low-interactive format) the value is probably zero, or even less. > What would one do with that information? I already know some people > have alternate opinions so I don't have an interest in hearing about them > - unless that opinion is accompanied by some rationale. Only then does it > have value. Without support the opiner is wasting their time and mine. On this media, I quite agree. As may be, the answers cleared up things nicely for me. Thanks everyone. - Bill #2229 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 11:49:34 EDT From: Troy Carmichael Subject: Tinian burial? My money is on Ric on this one. Maybe that's where the Brits buried her bones (lest anyone takes me serious--I'm joking): http://www.guampdn.com/news/stories/20031013/localnews/442241.html --now back to lurking....... Daniel Troy Carmichael ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 14:33:47 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: The Messier message We are looking at it but so far to no avail. We are now postulating our "expert" morse code sender made a number of errors such as using a wrong dot dash combination and a timing error in that a character series was not broken at the proper place. My gut feeling is it is an exercise of futility. Alan ********************************************* From Ric Nothing could be messier. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 14:36:00 EDT From: Marty Moleski Subject: The Messier message From Marty Moleski Ric wrote: > I don't know what sort of linguist would be able to help. Do you know of > people who specialize in completing and interpreting fragmentary messages? Yes. It happens all the time in Biblical studies, archeology and classical studies that there are fragmentary texts. Cf. the Dead Sea Scrolls or the Archimedes Palimpsest http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/archimedes/palimpsest.html In Bible circles, it's known as text (or lower) criticism. Paleographers date manuscripts by tracing the development of handwriting. Archeologists speak of it as epigraphy: "Epigraphy is the study of inscriptions or words and text that often survive on stone. Epigraphy would also include the study of graffiti and written texts on pottery and even text found on coins and other artifacts." http://www.website1.com/odyssey/week4/digthis.html BUT--and it's a big but--these scholars are generally working to fill blanks in within boundaries and have a lot of material to guide their guesses. They can sometimes tell how many characters are missing because of the size of the fragment they're working with. Nothing in the purported message has that kind of boundary or context to help decode it. If we could interview the person who took down the mishmash, they might be able to say whether there were "blanks" between the letters--or, in other words, give a clue about how many letters or words might be missing. LTM. Marty #2359 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 14:38:37 EDT From: Jim Preston Subject: Re: Tinian burial? It was Saipan not Tinian! ********************************** From Ric Naw, that's the OTHER Earhart grave. THIS one is supposedly on Tinian. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 14:42:11 EDT From: Bill Leary Subject: Re: Post Loss Messages > I don't know what sort of linguist would be able to help. Do you know of > people who specialize in completing and interpreting fragmentary messages? As it happens, I do. > Seems like there should be such people, probably in the "intelligence > community". Yes. > If so, their track record is less than illustrious. Well, there's that... Still, I'll be seeing him next month. If you think it might be helpful, I can ask. - Bill #2229 ************************************************************ From Ric Can't hurt. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 15 Oct 2003 14:58:51 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Possible Origin of W40K Here is a summary of my interviews with Nancy Carroll, daughter of Francis G. Carroll. These interviews follow TIGHAR's initial contact with her in 2000. POSSIBLE ORIGIN OF THE W40K ENTRY We are all aware that the letters "W40K Howland port" or "WOJ Howland port" appear at the beginning of Betty's handwrittten entries in her notebook. They are located in the upper right corner in the margin, separated from the main text. The letters seemed to be a ham call sign. Betty's friend , John Hathaway believed that and in 1970 found that W40K belonged to a Francis G. Carroll in Georgia, and W40J belonged to Weldon W. Shows of Atlanta , Ga. WOJ could not be identified as a call sign. In Nov 2,2000, TIGHAR learned through the efforts of Janet Whitney that W40K was the call sign to Carroll, but in 1937 he was living at West Palm Beach/Ft Worth area of Florida. Betty had never heard of Carroll, nor had any relationship with ham operators, when TIGHAR interviewed her in Nov 00. So was this a legitimate call sign and if so , how did it get into Betty's notebook. Betty believes that she heard the woman who identified herself as Amelia Earhart voice those letters. Could she be mistaken? TIGHAR's investigation in Nov 00 disclosed that West Palm Beach was on the great circle route from ST Petersburg; Bob Brandenburg speculated that if Betty could hear AE's signals, then so could Carroll, and since Carroll was a ham, unlike Betty , he could have made some attempt to contact AE. TIGHAR subsequently learned that Francis Carroll and his wife, Leona, recently died, but that his daughter Nancy Carroll, a retired Marine Corp major, lived in Ft. Pierce. Terry Linley, Ric Gillespie's second cousin, talked with Nancy Carroll in Nov 00, and learned that indeed Francis was an avid ham and had worked for a local radio station in the late 30's. Nancy said at that time that she couldn't recall her father mentioning Amelia Earhart, but her companion, "Smitty" recalled that sometime between 1987 and 1992 , while watching an Earhart television special, Francis had remarked , "I talked to her ; I wondered what happened". Smitty dismissed it as "an old man's ramblings". [ he was born in 1912] Nancy at that time could not confirm that interchange. Nancy promised to look for logs as this seemed a promising answer to the appearance of the W40K in Betty's notebook. Could it be that she in fact heard Carroll in 1937? The investigation stalled and nothing further was heard from Nancy, or the search for the logs. On 8 Feb 03 and 14 Oct 03, I interviewed Nancy Carroll by telephone at her Ft. Pierce residence to catch up on a later developments. Nancy , now 68, recalled that she grew up in the West Palm Beach and Lake Worth area (adjoining cities) where her dad Francis worked. He attended a communication technical school and eventually becoming amateur Ham about 1929 when his call sign was assigned. (His license will be forwarded to me). She believed that in 1937 , Francis was employed y radio station WJNO (WOJ?) at close by Ft Lauderdale, Fl. His ham equipment, she recalled and she is a ham herself, was "pretty routine" equipment as far as power, with a standard transmitter, receiver and antenna. Nancy then related the incident in which Francis reported the enigmatic comment about "talking to her". Nancy said she and her companion , Smitty, were sitting in Francis living room at his Vero Beach residence along with her mom. Her recollection is that while watching the television documentary of Amelia Earhart and her radio problems, Francis spontaneously spoke up saying something like "I talked with her". He went on to say that he while listening on his shortwave in 1937 all of a sudden he heard "Amelia Earhart", perhaps repeated. He , Carroll said, clearly interpreted it that it was of a SOS or emergency situation. He heard nothing further. She is not sure if he heard or repeated Amelia's call sign. According to Nancy, he went on to say he tried to contact her thinking that if he could hear her , his signal could be heard by Amelia on that same frequency. Nancy recalled that he said he was unsuccessful in his attempts. (Nancy asked Smitty who was in the background if this was accurate, and Smitty agreed. I intend to interview Smitty later). Neither Nancy or Smitty made much of an attempt in 1992 to clarify that alleged intercept. Nancy said the only other comment he made during the program was something to the effect of "I often wondered what happened" . Was Francis lucid, competent? Yes said Nancy, he was mentally sharp at age 80, although her mother was not. When questioned about any earlier reports, Nancy said this was the first time he had mentioned any contact with Amelia, and doubted he told any co-workers, friends, etc., since he was unsuccessful in making a contact. Nancy said that he rigorously followed ham procedure and would have used his call sign W40K; the phrase "Howland port" was to her inexplicable. According to Nancy, Francis' nickname was "Frank" and never heard anyone call him "Bud". (She did mention that an infant child of Francis who died within weeks was named "Buddie" or "Bud", but she will verify this. He died circa 1933). I related the relevant words , phrases, numbers in the notebook, such as "Bob", Uncle, Marie, etc to determine if any may have been related to Francis' work, friends, other hams, or his travels. None rang a bell. She knew of no connections that Francis had in the St Pete area. Nancy opined that as a 25 year old ham, Francis may have well read about hams picking up signals in the US and specifically tuned to her frequency. The answer would lay in his log, but she believes it was discarded years ago when moving to a retirement home. And Francis sister, Iva Hamilton, was questioned by Nancy and could not recall anything about an Earhart contact. My speculation. We must rely on the contemporaneous written entry of W40K (or WOJ) as an probable accurate representation of what Betty heard. In view of the proximity of West Palm Beach on the same great circle route (about 170miles), Francis's long time ham W40K operation, his anecdotal recollection and remark some 55 years later as interpreted by his daughter and Smitty, it is possible and likely that both Betty and Francis Carroll heard the same signal in early July 37. The remaining question is was that signal from Earhart . It may well confirm that more than one person heard that signal. Reportedly, Carroll didn't relate he thought it was a hoax signal when he mentioned it as he was pretty adamant about "talking to her". Nancy's impression was he thought it was a genuine signal. So now we have two people, arguably, that heard "Amelia Earhart". Further work here is necessary. Did Betty hear Carroll' s futile attempt to contact Amelia? What was his voice like? Could the voice be interpreted as a female with static etc? Did Betty simply infer that it was a female voice? These are worth rehashing with Betty, for if she is absolutely positive (and who could be now) that it was a female voice, then we have to look elsewhere for the answer to the W40K entry. If I can answer further questions, let me know. I have a good rapport with Nancy who is quite thrilled to be involved in Earhart research as I indicated I was affiliated with the TIGHAR group who initiated the first contact with her. LTM, Ron Bright *********************************************************************** From Ric Thanks Ron. Good follow-up. I should have mentioned to you that Terry did send me copies of Carroll's ham license. The elaborations on his claim of having "talked to her" are interesting if perhaps a bit suspect now that Nancy knows as much as she does about why we're interested in the story. Still, it is more than a little bizarre that Carroll's call sign turns up in Betty's notebook and they're both on the same great circle to Gardner and he claimed to have "talked to her". ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 11:30:50 EDT From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Possible Origin of W40K Regarding the Florida Ham and his number being used by Betty. Is it possible that Betty did not hear Mr. Carroll, but that AE heard him and tried calling him using his call sign? Thus Betty would have heard AE and written down the call sign. Also, if she did hear Mr. Carroll, is it possible that she heard only his call sign as he was signing off or over to AE and waiting for her reply? I see that Mr. Carroll might have heard AE, and thus returned or tried to return her call and at the same time his call sign was transmitted to Betty. To summarize: 1. AE sends distress call which is received by Mr. Carroll and he returns the call with his call sign - Betty does NOT hear him send his call sign, but hears AE's reply. 2. AE replies to Mr. Carroll using his call sign and Betty hears AE use the call sign, does not know what the call sign is or means but writes it down as having some importance. 3. Betty hears Mr. Carroll, but tunes in just as he is signing off the radio and thus only picks up his call sign. Then AE begins to send her info to Mr. Carroll (if AE heard him at all). AE may not have heard him, but was transmitting during the same time and thus Betty heard the stronger signal first, then began receiving AE's broadcast. 4. AE hears Mr. Carroll and tries to reach him, using his call sign, but is unsuccessful, however, Betty hears AE and writes down the call sign she is transmitting. FWIW - IMHO LTM, Dave Bush ******************************************************************** From Pete As I remember, WOJ was found to be part of a group of stations operating in Hialeah, Florida, along with WNC and WNC2. The group was supposed to be fixed stations, operating point-to-point, and thought of as a group of IT&T serving telephone service to the Carib. I contacted FCC directly over a year ago about WOJ, and the Agency themselves told me there was no record of the station. Forumites may remember when I reported this to Ric, as I believe I cut and pasted the FCC response to the Forum. I've actually been recently looking over websites dealing with "OTR" (Old Time Radio) and have not yet seen any mention of neither WOJ nor WNC. I have seen WOK, but at this time I remember dismissing the station as being located in the Northeastern United States circa 1937. I admit to distraction at this time Forumites, and beg your collective leave as I attempt to bring my faulty memory forth. My Best to All! Pete #2419 A trip through the Forum archives could better clarify this, I hope. *************************************************************************** From Hue Miller I would just like to point out that W4OK could, we can say with a very high degree of probability, only transmit on less than 500 kHz segments near 2, 4, 7, 14 and 28 Mhz in the under-30 MHz range. Ham radio equipment in recent years frequently either covers the whole range or can be modified to cover more; but in 1937 there would have been no reason whatsoever for his transmitter to involve more complexity just to reach unlicensed-for, disallowed frequencies. Almost every ham receiver, on the other hand, COULD receive all frequencies from 1.5 - 30 MHz. My point in belaboring this is just to point out that it would seem to cast doubt on the idea he would/ could answer the [real] AE on the same frequency as he heard the call. Transmit equipment that covered channels far off the ham bands didn't really appear in ham shacks til maybe the post-WW2 military surplus electronics equipment wave hit the market. Nor could AE have received him, that time of day, on ANY ham frequency. 2, 4, 7 MHz were out, due to the daylight path in both locations; and the higher bands could not be tuned in by AE's receiver. ( Unless you rule in "Cam's RA-1", which tuned to 15 or 20 MHz....but we better leave that alone.) So, one wonders, on what frequency did Carroll W4OJ hear her? Even IF he knew that she had some kind of arrangement with hams along the way, with his experience of 8 years or so, he would know that only 14 or 28 MHz offered any prayer of reaching her. I think this would seem to rule out the "same frequency" part of Carroll's statement, at least. Hue Miller *********************************************************************** From Ric Let's bear in mind that we don't have a statement from Carroll. We have an anecdotal recollection by his daughter's friend that was later elaborated upon by the daughter after she had much more information about our interest in the incident. Such elaborations, in my experience, are highly suspect. What we have are a handful of facts: - Carroll's callsign appears in Betty's notebook - Betty didn't know Carroll - Carroll was on the same great circle from Gardner as Betty The original anecdote about Carroll making the "I talked to her once. I always wondered what happened." comment during the TV documentary seems pretty reliable - but there's no way to know for sure that he really said that. Nancy's recent embellishment seems far less reliable. As Dave Bush points out, the simplest explanation for Betty hearing AE say "W40K" is that, at some time and on some frequency, AE had heard Carroll calling and was trying to reply. The question then becomes whether there was any reasonable way that Earhart could have heard a transmission sent by Carroll. Her Western Electric receiver certainly had the ability to receive on frequencies Carroll could legally use but then we have to ask why she would be listening on any of those frequencies. ************************************************************************** From Neil Barnett Ron Bright wrote: >We are all aware that the letters "W40K Howland port" or "WOJ Howland >port" appear at the beginning of Betty's handwrittten entries in her >notebook. W40K: This is not a valid ham callsign. You seem to be using "0" instead of "O" throughout the post. At the time of the Earhart flight, US callsigns consisted of "W" (continental United States), followed by a digit (1 thru 9), followed by either two or three letters, resulting in a callsign unique to a particular individual. If this is indeed a ham callsign, it should be written W4OK (sic). Incidentally, on some keyboards the unambiguous 0 (zero) can be typed by holding down the Alt key and typing 0216 on the digit keypad at RHS of keyboard. Then release Alt key. "Howland port": "port" implies the word "portable", indicating that the operator's current location is not his/her normal operating site as given in the license documentation, but is instead a temporary site. WOJ: I'd suggest you check out W2OJ. When spoken quickly, "dubbya-two-Oh-Jay" sounds a little like "double-U-Oh-Jay". Find out whether W2OJ served in the Pacific. He may have been one of the civilian (ham) operators at Howland. Neil Barnett ZL1ANM Auckland, New Zealand. ************************************************************************** From Ric There's no point in getting all excited about whether we've been typing "W4OK" or "W40K". What counts is what Betty wrote in her notebook and there is no way to tell whether that handwritten circle is supposed to represent a cipher or a letter. What Betty apparently heard was the sound "oh", which can mean either. Is your interpretation of "port" as short for "portable" a known convention or your own speculation? There was a portable Coast Guard transmitter on Howland but the radio logs do not include any mention of the word "port". The callsign of that transmitter was "NRUI2". LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 11:32:37 EDT From: Ted Campbell Subject: Re: Post Loss Messages I have noted that you have received some feed back from others on the forum regarding how/who to contact a linguist. My only suggestion would be to contact the language department of your local university, explain the situation and seek their advice of whether or not this angle is worth following through. To me many of the phrases, sentence snippets and words sound familiar when read phonically. Someone trained in phonology might be helpful in looking for overlapping communication records of the time. The number(s) sequences are another problem as I see it; we don't know how the listener heard the number read out e.g. 22, was it twenty-two or was it two-two, this would be hard to pin down at this late date. However, in Messier's recording the word "southwest" doesn't seem to be a far stretch to get to southwest! Just one more suggestions on how to spend your idle days - I bet you get a lot of help in this area! Ted Trying to move the ball forward a little at a time. ************************************************************************** From Ric You're forgetting that Messier received code, not voice. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 11:34:54 EDT From: Jim Preston Subject: Re: Tinian burial? Hey Ric, ever been on Tinian? I have when I flew for Air Mic. It was a very interesting place in 1978/79. The concrete runways double and triple side by side 11,000 ' long didn't have any grass growing thru the cracks. NO CRACKS, our Seabees did a fabulous job in 1944. CAL people on the island were the major land owners and had been there for centuries. They never mentioned anything. Couple of weeks before my first trip to the island. One of the family had been chasing a steer and the steer disappeared into a hole in the ground. When they went to investigate, they found a complete Japanese Hospital that had been mothballed and the entrance sealed. There were drug, medicines, bandages and sheets & blankets folded on the beds. Went to the Japanese Commanders command post and surrounding buildings they had holes in the walls you could walk thru. Only on Saipan did we hear the mysterious tales of the paranormal Earhart and Noonan saga. Jim Preston ******************************************************************** From Ric Never been on Tinian. I have, however, fallen into a number of holes. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 11:39:24 EDT From: Kerry Tiller Subject: Cat ownership >> Wow. It's reassuring to see that there are other groups as obsessed with >> pointless argument as we are. > > It is such obsessions that separate humans from other life forms. (Well, > that, and opposable thumbs.) > **************************************************** > From Ric > > If you think that pointless argument is a uniquely human trait you don't own > a cat. Heck, I don't even have a wife. ************************************************************* From Ric I think I know why. ************************************************************ From Mike Everette Ric, I know you are not so naive as to think that anyone "owns" a cat. You may let one live in your house... but you will NEVER EVER, NOT EVER own the cat. Shall this thread continue? In the words of Edgar Allan Poe: 'Nevermore." But that statement did beg a reply. LTM (whose family fortune was made in the manufacture of tennis racquets) and 73 Mike E. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 11:52:03 EDT From: Ric Gillespie Subject: The Messier message Alan Caldwell and some associates who wish to remain nameless have come up with some interesting observations about the Messier message. To refresh everyone's memory, here's the sum total of what we know about the incident: A Los Angeles operator, Louis Messier, reported he heard a weak code signal at 3:30 am (Howland midnight). It was sent very slowly and Messier logged it as: "17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec will sou nant now sou". ************************************************************** From Alan Ric, in re the morse code message reported by Messier on the 6th of July we've come up with some interesting possibilities. Initial observations include the following: 1. The "SOU" repeats may well be SOS. The letter U is dot dot dash so if the sender tried to send S but held the key a shade too long on the third dot it will come out U. 2. "SOUTHWES" is illogical. Anyone trying to send SOUTHWEST would have sent SW. We are trying to break that one down with one possibility being that the first three are actually SOS but have not got to the rest of it yet. 3. The numbers are also a problem. Consider the first part of the message which may not have been the actual start of the transmission. "17 NA" may not have been numbers. "1" is dot dash dash dot which could have been AN. "7" is dash dash dot dot and could have been TNE. We would now have ANTNENA (Antenna?). 4. The analysis is considering: a. This may not be the entire message. There may be a part preceding and a part following. b. The sender may well have been in poor condition. c. The sender may not have been well versed in code. d. The preceding two would fit AE four days after landing at Niku. e. If the code was sent by an inexperienced sender it might well contain incorrect characters, incorrect spacing of the dots and dashes and the key held down too long or too short. (Was there a key on board or I suppose we don't really know for certain) Alan ********************************************* From Ric It seems to be well-established that there was not a key aboard the aircraft. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 13:26:07 EDT From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: The Messier message Ric wrote: > It seems to be well-established that there was not a key aboard the > aircraft. Is it possible to send 'quasi code' using the push to talk button of a microphone or some other means in an emergency? Bob ******************************************************************* From Ric Sure. You can use the push-to-talk to send dots and dashes but it's going to be slow and sloppy. Also, as I understand it, what is heard on the other end will sound different than if it was sent with a key. Instead of a clean "tone" it will be a more ragged sound, sometimes referred to as a "rough note". Several of the reported post-loss code receptions were described as having a "rough note". ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 13:28:11 EDT From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: The Messier message From Gary LaPook Which Morse code is this? You apparently looked at a table showing the "American Morse Code" which was only used on American telegraph lines and not on radio. The "International Morse Code is used for radio communications. In the International Morse Code the code for "1" is dot-dash-dash-dash-dash (one dot followed by four dashes.) Dot-dash-dash-dot is the letter "P" not the numeral "1". Dash-dash-dot-dot is the letter "Z" not the number "7". Check out : http://www.chss.montclair.edu/~pererat/percode.html ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 14:30:51 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Possible Origin of W40K The forum seems to come up with some interesting analyses that are helpful. Yes , I think the original hypothesis about "W40K "( or however you write it) is that Earhart received it somehow on her receiver, and repeated it for some reason. This is based on Betty's recollection that it was a WOMAN'S voice. Perhaps Betty could revisit this recollection. Back in Dec 02, Hue Miller wrote that WOJ was an ATT high frequency communication station located in Florida (place not identified) in 1937. He cited the ITU Berne list. This station did voice traffic like ship to shore. Is this correct Hue? Can someone check the call sign for a Mr. Louis H. Hendler, (now deceased), a long time licensed radio operator since 1934 who was "involved in the search" for Earhart after she disappeared in July 37. No further clairification of "involve". It may be unrelated to his Ham activities, and he lived in New Jersey until 1934. LTM, Ron Bright ********************************************************************** From Ric <> In my initial interview with Betty, as shown in the videotape, I addressed this point very specifically. At first Betty said she couldn't remember whether it was the man or the woman who said "W40K" but after thinking for a while she thought it was Amelia who said that. Asking her to revisit the recollection might or might not get us a different answer but it wouldn't get us any new information. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 11:33:47 EDT From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Possible Origin of W40K Ric wrote: >Her Western Electric receiver certainly had the ability to receive on >frequencies Carrol could legally use but then we have to ask why she >would be listening on any of those frequencies. IMHO - if I was stuck on a remote island and hadn't successfully communicated to anyone on the frequencies I was using, I would try every frequency available to me in hopes of reaching SOMEONE, ANYONE! So I really don't think it is a far stretch to believe that AE would have been attempting to communicate on other frequencies that she had available. After all, she hadn't been successful with the other frequencies. LTM, Dave Bush ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 11:35:46 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Possible Origin of W40K So her first recollection that it could have been a man or woman, then a "woman", leaves the door open . It could have been a man's voice, and faulty memory as well as the influence of AE's later transmissions ,certainly come into play. Thanks, I shall go back to the interview again. Ron Bright ******************************************************************* From Ric The door is open on any anecdotal recollection. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 11:38:48 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Possible Origin of W40K Ron Bright wrote: > Back in Dec 02, Hue Miller wrote that WOJ was an ATT high frequency > communication station located in Florida (place not identified) in 1937. He > cited the > ITU Berne list. This station did voice traffic like ship to shore. Is this > correct Hue? The WOJ item turned out to be an intriguing dead end. I have packed up my Berne List books, and i don't for now have access to those posts. But as i recall, i found in the 'List of Call Signs' a listing for a WOJ and i think, i really think it was for Hialeah FL. There was very skimpy information in the 1-line listings, i think all it revealed that it was a point to point traffic type station. Those stations belonged to ATT and were located near coastal areas for actual telephone over radio type traffic to ships or the more remote or isolated overseas land points. However, the rub in the WOJ story, altho the callsign was listed, my checking of the actual reported-by-listeners listings in numerous issues of several different radio magazines of the 1930s showed NO listings for any WOJ station, altho other stations of ATT's chain were regularly reported by the listeners. Of course, i will scrutinize any more mags i get, but i would think if it was going to show up, it already would, because the station's operation would be a regular daily thing, not one time thing which might be missed. If i recall, it seemed from the listings that the callsigns were for one specific fixed frequency, at one site, of course. So, my assumption is: ATT reserved this call- sign for some particular frequency for one particular radio transmitter site, but for some unknown reason never activated the frequency. There would be no difficulty in receiving such stations thruout the whole USA and in their regions the signals would be very stable and strong. The transmitters were of thousands of watts to tens of thousands of watts power, and altho highly directional antennas focused on the target area were used, there was enough transmission even in the disfavored direction to provide good reception in the USA. This would be something like in the USA listening to Voice of America broadcasts intended for overseas reception, but still well heard in the USA. One point tho, is that the transmitter only carried one side of the transmission; so the listener at home would most often hear only one side of the conversation, or the other party would be of much lower volume from the more distant station. Myself, i think i'd have to dismiss the "WOJ" connection and pursue the "W4..." connection. -Hue Miller ******************************************************************** From Ric For once, I agree with Hue. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 11:44:13 EDT From: Bob Lee Subject: Silly Experiment on the Messier Message As a specialist in wasting time -- I've cooked up the following idea and backed it up with a little energy and have created something that *might* be worthwhile in trying to help understand this message. I got the idea a little bit from the folks that broke the Enigma code in WWII. For the purpose of this experiment, I made the assumption that the number of pulses for each letter are accurate, but whether they indicate a dot or a dash maybe more difficult to decypher. So I made a spreadsheet that lists the transcription of the original message with one letter in each column, and then simply under those columns listed all other possible letters or numbers that match the transcribed characters pulses. Now cut these strips into vertical bands (one for each column) and start playing puzzle. If you want a copy of the spreadsheet, just email me at bob@sunstarip.com. Enhancements to this rather crude experiment would be to rank the possible characters in relation to their frequency of use in the English language. I did use the International Morse Code Chart and ignored accented characters (tilde, umlaut, etc...). I am neither a morse code expert nor a cryptologist -- so my apologies to any who are.... Bob *************************************************************** From Ric This is a perfectly valid form of code-breaking first laid out by Edgar Allen Poe in "The Gold Bug". ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 11:52:24 EDT From: Mike Holt Subject: Re: Tinian burial? Troy Carmichael wrote: >My money is on Ric on this one. Maybe that's where the Brits buried >her bones (lest anyone takes me serious--I'm joking): >http://www.guampdn.com/news/stories/20031013/localnews/442241.html The one thing that keeps screaming at me about this sort of thing is that EVERYONE is quite willing to accept without a hint of hesitation that the Japanese would murder two well-known Americans and then hide the deaths forever. Just to avoid maintaining an international reputation as psychotics, one might expect the Japanese government today to be very happy to help show the truth behind the tales. Michael Holt ******************************************************** From Ric The Japanese Capture theories have always been more about left-over hatred from WWII than about Amelia Earhart. The very use of the word "capture" is a dead giveaway (pun intended). Earhart and Noonan disappeared in peacetime. In peacetime people are "kidnapped" or "abducted". They are not "captured". ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 11:53:55 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The Messier message >Dot-dash-dash-dot is the letter "P" not the numeral "1". You are correct, Gary, but think outside of the box. Dot, dash........dash, dot is A N. I have no idea which system the sender used or whether, being so unfamiliar with morse, the sender mixed the two. Given that the sender transmitted laboriously there is no guarantee where the dots and dashes should correctly be broken. All possibilities must be tried. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 12:49:40 EDT From: Neil Barnett Subject: Howland port Ric wrote: >Is your interpretation of "port" as short for "portable" a known convention >or your own speculation? There was a portable Coast Guard transmitter on >Howland but the radio logs do not include any mention of the word "port". The >callsign of that transmitter was "NRUI2". Here are the words of my previous post: "Howland port": "port" implies the word "portable".... In that sentence, I don't believe I asserted that the shortening of "portable" to "port" by the transmitting operator was the only possibility under consideration. Actually, a more likely deduction is that the operator gave (on voice) a callsign followed by "Howland, portable", and Betty heard only the first syllable of "portable" due to static or signal fade. Or, she was jotting down the text as fast as she could, and chose to abbreviate the word herself. Or, did 15-year-old Betty even have the word "portable" in her vocabulary? Of course, the transmission could have been from a vessel or plane which was reporting passing Howland (on the) port (side). Neil Barnett :) Auckland, New Zealand. ******************************************************** From Ric Thanks. I think I understand what you're saying and I think you're on to something. Things that occur to me: - Howland was not a "port" in any conventional sense and it's not customary to refer to a seaport as "such-and-such port" (Norfolk port, Sydney port, San Francisco port) anyway. So "Howland port" is probably a fragment of a longer phrase or the word heard as "port" may have been some other word. - Possible words of which only the "port" part may have been heard include "portable", "important", "airport", what else? In the Howland Island radio log, Frank Cipriani repeatedly refers to the portable Coast Guard transmitter as "P" or the "portable". For example, the log entry for 02:04 on July 5 is "Calling Itasca with P" and the entry for 05:01 the same day is "Calling NRUI on portable". It seems entirely possible that what Cipriani actually said, if he was sending voice, was "Itasca this is Howland portable". - From the way it's written in the notebook it appears that "W40K Howland port" (or WOJ Howland port) was spoken as a single phrase very much like a radio station identifies itself (WHYY Philadelphia). Earhart knew that Itasca's call sign was NRUI but, as far as I can tell, she did not know that the portable Coast Guard transmitter on Howland was NRUI2 or that the ham operators on Howland were K6GNW (Yau Fai Lum) and K6ODC (Ah Kim Leong). Hypothesis: Earhart has heard Cipriani calling Itasca and identifying himself as "Howland portable". Earhart later hears Carroll indentifying himself as "W4OK" and (quite naturally) assumes that she's hearing Howland again so she trys to call "W4OK Howland portable" which Betty records as "W4OK Howland port". LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 12:53:59 EDT From: David Katz (Masochistic Red Sox Fan) Subject: Re: Possible Origin of W40K Is there any way you could arrange with the government of Kiribati to have Grady Little and Dusty Baker exiled to Nikumaroro? Red Sox and Cub fans would be grateful. LTB (Love to Bambino) David Katz ********************************************************** From Ric I'll ask, but I think the place has already been reserved for Dick Cheney and Karl Rove. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 17 Oct 2003 14:21:17 EDT From: Dan Postellon Subject: Camp Niku >>Is there any way you could arrange with the government of Kiribati to have >>Grady Little and Dusty Baker exiled to Nikumaroro? > >I'll ask, but I think the place has already been reserved for Dick Cheney >and Karl Rove. I thought that Saddam Hussein and Osama were there first! Dan *********************************************************** From Ric I just hope we can finish our work there before any of those guys arrive. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 14:37:13 EDT From: Marty Fowler Subject: Here a grave, there a grave, everywhere Amelia's grave ... "Amelia Earhart's Gravesite Found? It is one of the most enduring mysteries of the past century: What happened to Amelia Earhart, the daring young aviator who disappeared with her navigator, Fred Noonan, on July 2, 1937 as they attempted to fly around the world? They last radioed that they were about 100 miles from Howland Island, which is a tiny atoll southwest of Hawaii. Many expeditions to find the bodies, the plane, or even the slightest clues have proven fruitless." -------------Finding even the SLIGHTEST CLUES HAS PROVED FRUITLESS?!?!?!?!?! *goes away muttering under his breath* LTM, Monty Fowler, #2189 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 14:55:15 EDT From: Eric Subject: Peace time vs. War time Ric wrote: > The Japanese Capture theories have always been more about left-over hatred > from WWII than about Amelia Earhart. The very use of the word "capture" is a > dead giveaway (pun intended). Earhart and Noonan disappeared in peacetime. In > peacetime people are "kidnapped" or "abducted". They are not "captured". A little over 5 months after AE and FN disappeared, Japanese dive bombers bombed and strafed the USS PANAY, sinking her with the loss of two crewmen and one civilian passenger, plus many wounded. Since this happened in "peacetime" would this be considered "combat" or a "show of force." And is "taken into custody" more acceptable than "captured?" LTM Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, CA. ************************************************************************ From Ric There have been many peacetime incidents similar to the sinking of the Panay - the North Korean taking of the USS Pueblo; the Soviet shooting down of the Korean Airlines 747; the American shooting down of an Iranian Airbus; etc. They were acts of war -some intentional, some not - but they did not precipitate wars. The Japanese said that the Panay incident was a case of mistaken identity. It probably was. Until late 1941 the United States and Japan were at peace. The point remains that the use of the word "capture" to describe Earhart's purported abduction reveals the contextual error that is at the root of the allegations. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 10:25:12 EDT From: Don Iwanski Subject: Re: Peace time vs. War time Ric wrote: >Until late 1941 the United States and Japan were at >peace. How about the 1938 hijacking of the Hawaii Clipper out of Guam where a couple of japanese stowed aboard the aircraft and killed everyone just so Japan could get a better understanding of their engines? Don. I **************************************************************** From Ric And then there was that ugly incident in 1939 where Dorothy was captured by the Wicked Witch of the West. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 10:37:22 EDT From: HH Subject: Re: Peace time vs. War time Seeing that the Japanese are a very proud race and were humiliated with their defeat in the S.Pacific and angry following Hiroshima and Nagasaki surely they would have shouted from the rooftops if they had ,"captured" and executed AE and FN....HH ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 10:46:20 EDT From: Wally Subject: Re: Off topic- Columbus I read the arguments about distances and found them all wrong... The proof is completely faked, because to make it work the arthur used 4 n.m. per league to make a fit when there only 3 n.m. to a league... Why didm't the so called scientists call his hand when this junk was presented... WALLY ***************************************************************** From Ric It's my understanding that the "league" as a unit of distance measurement varied widely according to place and time. In England in the 18th century it was a mile and a furlong. I have no idea what it was in Spain and Italy in the 15th century. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 11:52:08 EDT From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: The Messier message Two points Alan, If the sender (presumably AE or Noonan) were un familiar with morse it seems very unlikely that they would know both systems, especially since "American Morse" was only used by telegraphers so it would not be likely that the sender could "mix the two." As to shifting the dots and dashes around to try out all possibilities all you then end up with is Jell-O since you can then create every possible message. Morse only works at all because of the differences in the lengths of the dots and dashes and of the spaces between each of these characters and the of the space between letters in the message. The length of the "dot" is the basic building block of the code. A "dash" is three dots long. The spacing between each dot and dash in a letter is one dot long. The space between each letter is three dots long, the same length as a dash. (The spacing between letters may actually be longer but wont be less.) So: the letter "A" is . - "N" is - . "AN" is . - - . . - - . is "P" they do not sound at all alike. Radio operators spent many hours learning to transcribe the incoming code characters and had to be able to distinguish between the code letters. "You are correct, Gary, but think outside of the box. Dot, dash........dash, dot is A N." No, dot, dash is an "A" but then a pause followd by a dash indicates the letter "T" which is a single dash in Morse not an "N". Sending slowly(laborously) makes it easier to correctly interpret the letters, not more difficult. gl ******************************************************************** From Ric I've been thinking about this and I have to agree with Gary. I think the only way to approach a fragmentary message, whether received in voice or code, is to assume that the words and phrases were correctly copied unless there is some specific and independent reason to believe otherwise. For example, the "281" message includes the phrase "don't hold with us much longer". It's next to impossible to use that phrase in a grammatically correct English sentence that makes any sense. It seems entirely justified to presume that the "d" was actually a "w". In other cases the person receiving the message may have, at the time, expressed doubt about the accuracy of the transcription (the last part of Earhart's 08:43 "running on line" message and Betty's "N.Y., N.Y" are examples). The first question that occurs to me is; what was it about this reception that made Messier believe that it may have come from Earhart? He's a ham operator. He is accustomed to hearing code transmissions. This one is unusual because it's both weak and sent very slowly, but there are is no "KHAQQ" or "Earhart" in: 17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec will sou nant now sou. The English words that are either complete or strongly suggested are: southwes(t) owl so not call will now All are very common words that might be expected to occur in many radio transmissions - with the exception of "owl". If it's a partial word it might be "bowl", "cowl", "fowl", "howl", or "jowl" - none of which seem any more likely than "owl". But, of course, that unusual confluence of letters is present in the word "Howland" which has special significance in the context of a call from Earhart. The Messier message, as with all alleged post-loss radio events, was either a misunderstanding, a hoax, or a genuine call from the Electra. Was it a misunderstanding? The message was reportedly heard at 11:30Z on July 6th. At that moment, Frank Cipriani on Howland Island was attempting to make scheduled contact with Itasca but was unsuccessful. His log does not say specifically, but the transmission should have been a code signal, "NRUI2 DE NRUI" and it should have been sent at normal speed. There appears to be no reason to think that Messier heard Cipriani. If Messier misunderstood a message it was not sent by any of the searchers. Was it a hoax? Possibly, but one would expect a hoax to be less cryptic. A hoaxer wants his message to be understood and believed. There's just not enough here to suggest a hoax. By process of elimination we're left with an increased possibility that the message was genuine. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 12:12:20 EDT From: Betty Brown Subject: W40K Howland port The call sign was Amelia's voice and she was trying to get back to someone with that call sign ...She was so excited I couldn't get everything down... I think the call sign is by one of my pictures. I heard it first then turned to the regular page to finish .. The Howland port is a line where several words were just the words that came in strong but had space in between like I told you when we first talked ....some came through as a regular sentence, some were a sentence with only the words that were better to hear but still on one line ....I never heard anyone but those two voices AE and His .... I never forgot the sound ..Love Betty ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 12:43:37 EDT From: J. Thomas Subject: Re: Peace time vs. War time Ric wrote: > The Japanese Capture theories have always been more about left-over hatred > from WWII than about Amelia Earhart. The very use of the word "capture" > is a dead giveaway (pun intended). Earhart and Noonan disappeared in > peacetime. > > In peacetime people are "kidnapped" or "abducted". They are not > "captured". The U.S. Navy apparently considers the Pueblo and her crew to have been "captured," though we were not at war with North Korea at the time. On this official Navy website: http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-usn/usnsh-p/ager2-l.htm Quote: "USS Pueblo (AGER-2) and her crew had been captured off Wonsan on 23 January 1968." I'm not trying to lend any credence to the Japanese Capture theories -- I just wanted to point out that general use of the word "captured" may not always be strictly limited to circumstances of war. -J. Thomas ************************************************************ From Ric This is interesting. The Pueblo was carrying out electronic spying and was "captured". Similarly, when Francis Gary Powers was shot down while on a spy mission over the USSR he was "captured". On the the other hand, Aldrich Ames (the CIA agent who was working for the Soviets) was "caught". The way the language works seems to be that if you catch my people spying on you, I say that they have been "captured" (the same word I use to describe soldiers in wartime). If I catch your people spying on me I say they have been "caught" (the same word I use to describe criminals). Conspiracy theorists maintain that Earhart was "captured" by the Japanese. The Japanese would have said they "caught" her spying. Ain't language fascinating? ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 12:47:03 EDT From: Ron Berry Subject: Re: Peace time vs. War time I have just slipped my wrists out of the bonds the keep them tied to the arms of my chair and I have to respond to this statement. If the Japanese had "captured" our heroes in 1937 they would have been yelling at the top of their lungs that they caught them over their Mandate and wanted an apology from the US. much like the Russians did with the U2 in which Gary Powers was "Captured. In 1937 the US and Japan were having a cold war of their own. The US was upset because of Japans China moves. So one little chance to make us look bad would have been jumped on with big flat feet. The second thing I would like to remark about is the burning of the Electra on Siapan during the war. If the US troops would have come upon AE's Electra they would have been yelling at the top of their lungs about [what those dirty Japs had done with AE]. The base where the burning was suppose to be secret and very heard to get to. I did not say get into, I said it was hard to get to on the ground there was a very small road that was the only access to the volcano caldron where this aircraft was suppose to be. All of the people that I have ever heard said that they were out walking in the jungle and stumbled on this secret airstrip. You don't stumble up a volcano. I don't think any of those things happened and those are my reasons. thanks ****************************************************** From Ric >If the Japanese had "captured" our heroes in 1937 they would have been >yelling at the top of their lungs that they caught them over their Mandate. You "capture" my spies. I "catch" yours. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 13:06:21 EDT From: Rich Young Subject: Panay sinking Ric said >The Japanese said that the Panay incident was a case of mistaken >identity. Certainly that assertion was made publicly, but even Japan's own inquiry concluded the attack was deliberate, per a diplomatic attache intelligence report held by the U.S. Naval War College archives, and cited by William Manchester in his book, "The Glory and The Dream". The Panay was not only flying the American flag, but had oversize flags painted on the top surface of her deck awnings. The American court of inquiry also concluded the attack was deliberate. Lastly, we have the testimony of one of the commanders of a naval air unit that participated in the attack that states that the Japanese Army commander had ordered the attack, claiming that the ships contained Chinese combatants. This same commander had attempted to engage the refugee flotilla with shore artillery earlier, in an apparent attempt to precipitate war with the U.S., apparently as a move in a larger struggle between civilian Japanese Authority, and the various branches of the military - something about forcing the completion of the "Showa" restoration, according to: "History of United States Naval Operations in World War II" Volume 3: "The Rising Sun in the Pacific" (pages 16-18) by Samuel Eliot Morison ********************************************* From Ric Thanks. I didn't know that. So the attack seems to have been prompted by internal power struggles within the Japanese government. People often think of Imperial Japan in the years leading up to 1941 as a monolithic force set on conquest but, in fact, it was a government wracked with turmoil until the militarists eventually succeeded in consolidating power. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 14:26:48 EDT From: Daryll Subject: Peace time vs. War time Ric wrote; >The Japanese said that the Panay incident was a case of mistaken >identity. It probably was. Yeah right,...probably the only boat on the river with a smoke stack. The Paney was a radio intelligence boat, a smaller version with the technology of the day as the Pueblo was many years later. The Japanese knew that and what it was doing. The Paney was listening to actual combat radio operations by the Japanese. Code stuff, order of battle, the things the US Navy intercepted when the Japanese held their Grand Maneuvers except this was combat operations against the Chinese. The Japanese offered to recover bodies or other stuff in a salvage operation BUT the US declined because the Navy didn't want them to look for and find the safe with the secret radio stuff. I don't agree with the word "capture" that is used to describe AE & FN's situation in the Marshalls. It is a hold over concept from WWII. When Eric de Bisschop and Tati sailed into Jaluit in '35' they were detained and questioned everyday of the 15 days they were held. They weren't locked up and they slept on the boat. Upon leaving Jaluit the Japanese gave them a basket of fruit. When the fruit showed strange spots on it, it was thrown overboard because it was feared the fruit was poisoned. The Japanese had searched their Chinese Junk for an "electric" sounding device (depth finder). That search allowed water to get into their food stuffs/stores which spoiled in a couple of weeks after departing Jaluit. They were near death from starvation when they were found floating off Molokai. The difference with AE & FN in Jaluit was that their transportation was slung off the back of the Koshu, they couldn't leave. Are they captured or stranded? By July 13th the Japanese had watched the US Navy sail around a big chunk of the ocean and they knew the US Navy had no idea of where AE & FN were. Was there an international law that said the Japanese had to let AE use their radio to call home? Were the Japanese obligated to sail them to Honolulu? Were the Japanese obligated to let the US Navy sail into the Marshalls to pick them up? How would the newspapers react knowing of the potential for a great story in the Marshall islands about the stranding and rescue of Amelia Earhart? The attention that would be focused on the Japanese in the Marshalls would be exactly what they were trying to avoid. The events that would sink the Paney in December had started on July 7th at the Marco Polo bridge. When the Japanese Governor dealt with Eric de Bisschop as a possible spy in '35' he was in contact with Tokyo regarding him. Eric knew this because the Japanese had recovered some of his stuff that he thought he had lost when his first Chinese Junk sunk off the China coast in a Typhoon years earlier. There is no reason to think that AE would not be treated in the same way. The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. The Governor, acting under the direction of Tokyo, would simply keep AE & FN incommunicado because of bureaucratic indecision. Is that considered a state of being "captured"? The Japanese were at war with China by now. How much flak would they get for not letting the US know they had rescued Earhart or let AE use their radio. Even taking Earhart to Saipan could diplomatically be described as a rescue in progress by pointing out that Pan Am had a stop at Guam only about 100 miles away. With the Japanese leadership in Tokyo confronting the stress of the Chinese war, each day that went by could change a decision on AE that was made only the day before. When anyone else uses the word "capture" in connection with AE it is meant to prejudice or slant the discussion depending on where the sympathies lay. Daryll ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 14:29:06 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: W40K Howland port I see that Betty is now pretty positive it was a woman (AE's) voice she heard with the call sign of W40K. This seems to eliminate Carroll sending a signal to AE and intercepted by Betty. If we accept Betty's recollection, are we faced with a similar problem of transmission capability of a ham shortwave set; namely, could Carroll's shortwave transmissions reach Amelia , Howland, and/or Itasca. I suppose if we believe that AE's signal could reach St Pete, we can believe that Carroll's transmission reached the south pacific area. We have speculated that Carroll may have initiated on his own, without hearing AE, an attempt to contact AE as the papers were full of amateurs hearing signals. According to Long, Cipriani was transmitting on the T-22, portable unit [? watts] , on Howland probably for 12 days or so, on 2670 kcs. Is this a band that Carroll could possibly receive? It is also conceivable that Cipriani, who was daily reporting back any signals or bearings to the Itasca, may well at times have shortened his call sign to "Howland Portable" when sending to Itasca. We have no record of Cipriani, the Itasca, nor any other ship hearing Carrolls call sign. IF Betty heard a man's voice, it was most likely Carroll attempting to contact AE because we believe "Smitty's" recollection that he talked to her once, his call sign appears in the notebook, he was an avid Ham, and he was on the great circle route about 165 miles from St. Pete. Just some possible scenarios. Ron Bright ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 14:31:50 EDT From: Marjorie in Montana Subject: Re: the secret Saipan airstrip Ron Berry writes his doubts about an airstrip in a secret (Japanese) base in a "volcano caldron" on Saipan where Amelia's plane was supposedly destroyed on orders from Washington, DC (see "With Our Own Eyes" or whatever that dreadful book is called). I have my strong doubts about that story, too, but I have problems wiith Ron's description of the location of the supposed airstrip. I lived in the Mariana Islands for seven years in the 1960s, three of those years in Saipan. I traveled (by jeep, Datsun, and on foot) from one end of the island to the other and every nook and cranny we could find (believe me, there is not much to do on an island that size besides going "boonie stomping" in search of the perfect beach or sad souvenirs of the Japanese killed in the caves at the northern end of the island.) During this period we had to get special permission to enter the northern third of the island -- it was closed off because of the hazards of unexploded ordinance and we had to get a pass from the guy in charge of the team that was step-by-arduous-step cleaning the stuff up. I saw some gorgeous scenery but I never anywhere on the island saw anything resembling a "volcano caldron." I really think we would have noticed one. I visited three of the island's airfields (one was in use at the time, one was later upgraded and is the current international airport, and the one out on the Kagman peninsula -- site of the notorious CIA training camp of the 1950s -- was a gravel strip gradually being reclaimed by the tangan tangan (I don't think the vegetation on Saipan qualiifies as jungle in most people's understanding of the word). There was a fourth airstrip -- used only during "Japanese times" -- in the northern sector of the island which we only viewed from the top of Suicide Cliff. It would have taken a machete to get through the tangan tangan to reach it, but it was certainly not in a volcano caldron. Let me also say that in my three years living there, in the main village of Chalan Kanoa, with many Saipanese friends, I never heard any Saipanese talk about Amelia Earhart except in the context of Fred Goerner's search for her body in the local cemetery (which the people I talked to seemed to view as amusingly Quixotic). We American expats, however, often made weekend hikes beating through the undergrowth to the old Japanese jail or the old hospital in the (then) nearly obliterated site of Garapan Village and fantasizing about Amelia's possible presence. In fact, I've written a novel using those fantasies of the 1960s and once it's published I'll repeat the traditional caveat that it is entirely fiction and has nothing to do with the scientific research of the good people of TIGHAR. -- Marjorie Smith ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 14:33:21 EDT From: Kerry Tiller Subject: Re: Peace time vs. War time J. Thomas wrote: > The U.S. Navy apparently considers the Pueblo and her crew to have been > "captured," though we were not at war with North Korea at the time. On > this official Navy website: Just a minor point here; a peace treaty was never signed at the end of the Korean "Conflict". The two Koreas are generally considered to be still at war. [A major bone of contention on the part of the ROK is the North's refusal to admit defeat.] It could be argued that the U.S. is also still at war with The Peoples Democratic Republic of Korea as well, though it was officially referred to as a "conflict" by us because we never officially declared war. We just fought one. My point being, the Pueblo incident could certainly be considered in a wartime atmosphere. As for the Gary Francis Powers U2 incident, our government and the military took the "Cold" war very seriously and considered any momentary heating up of the war to be a war situation. But, Ric, you are right. In any situation, our spies are "captured" and the other guy's spies are "caught". It's part of the rules of propaganda. Kerry Tiller ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 16:46:09 EDT From: Ray Brown Subject: W40K It's been a while since I have posted anything here but I have been doing a lot of lurking lately. You wrote recently : "Earhart later hears Carroll identifying himself as "W40K" and ( quite naturally) assumes she's hearing Howland again.." I doubt that AE could have heard Mr Carroll who was as I understand it an amateur radio operator , aka "ham." Amelia had only two frequencies on which she could transmit / receive. As 3105 kc and 6210 kc were dedicated aeronautical frequencies,surely Mr Carroll (or any other ham ) would not have been permitted to transmit on them. Betty could well have heard W40K transmitting, but I doubt if it would have been on 3105 or 6210 kcs. Regards and LTM , Ray Brown. ********************************************************* From Ric The frequencies that Earhart could transmit on are not relevant to the question of whether she could have heard Mr. Carroll. Her receiver could be tuned to a wide range of frequencies. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 16:53:43 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The Messier message Ric wrote: >I think the only way to approach a fragmentary message, whether received in >voice or code, is to assume that the words and phrases were correctly >copied. That certainly makes sense but it cannot apply here as that assumption leads nowhere. Gary, you are correct that .--. is P and .- -. would be A N. Tell me which pattern was sent. I certainly believe Messier copied what he heard and I also believe he may not have heard the entire message and therefore we cannot, out of hand, say neither "Earhart" nor "KHAQQ" appears in the message. All we can say is neither were heard or copied. The procedure is NOT to rearrange or substitute dots and dashes on a wholesale basis but to check to see if a break was incorrect and/or a particular dot or dash might have been sent in error. To simply assume all that was correctly sent and received ends the analysis as it makes no sense. Alan **************************************************************** From Ric As I said earlier: >...voice or code, is to assume that the words and phrases were correctly copied >unless there is some specific and independent reason to believe otherwise. If you're going to argue for misplaced breaks or mistakenly sent dots or dashes you better have something that really fits and makes sense with minimal alteration. Otherwise you're just making stuff up. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 20:00:33 EDT From: Ron Berry Subject: Re: the secret Saipan airstrip Marjorie, Thank you for your description of Saipan I have never been there, my only experience with describing the island is the description that Fred Goerner gave in his book and I may have gotten that wrong. the politics of the situation are still the same. If the Japanese would have "captured" them on any spit of land or chunk of coral they would have been screaming at the top of their lungs. On the other hand if we would have found anything of our heroes the military would have been doing the same thing, it would have been [Remember Amelia Earhart] right along with remember Pearl Harbor. Perhaps I didn't make myself clear enough, I DO NOT BELIEVE THAT ANY OF THIS HAPPENED. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 12:35:35 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: The Messier message I have searched the LA times dated 6 -7 July, but no report of Messier. Sometimes the paper just referred to "amateurs" receiving signals. I guess we can wait until we get the complete Bevis report of 1940 to see how Mr. Messier surfaced and to whom he reported it. Do we have any forum members in LA that could check out a City Directory for 1937 and see if he appears; and/or check public records. Ron **************************************************************** From Ric Back on June 6, 1999 forum subscriber Angelo Campenella posted the full quote concerning Messier form the Bevis Report: >The next morning - 6 JUL37 - a Los Angeles operator, Louis Messier, >reported he heard a weak code signal at 3:30 am (Howland midnight). >It was sent very slowly and Messier logged it as: "17 na u 61 4 southwes >1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec will sou nant now >sou". That's all there is. We could probably find out if Messier had a ham license. LTM, Ric *************************************************************** From Hue Miller I agree, it would be pointless for a hoaxer to send a cryptic broken message; no glory in it; nor would a hoaxer be likely to use telegraphy, voice would make a bigger splash; and a hoaxer would probably stick to a short telegraphy SOS type message. I think we can judge it a legit message fragment, but from what source? I was thinking also, poorly formed characters can come from how the transmitter is "keyed". Microphone buttons "work" for sending telegraphy but it's a game of skill and the limitations of the button's mechanics, the springyness, the speed it acts and returns to "off position"; also how fast the transmitter relays can follow short pulses - the "dits" or "dots" in the message. This adds another level of uncertainty to the message as recorded, i think. Anyone have an idle Cray supercomputer? -Hue Miller ****************************************************************** From Ric I wonder if the response time of the transmitter relays might account for the many apparently missed characters. It's interesting that we have two cases - the 281 message and the Messier message - of poorly sent code resulting in fragmentary messages. The 281 message was received in Hawaii on 3105 during a one hour period between 11:30 and 12:30Z on July 5. The Messier message was reportedly heard at 11:30Z on July 6 - exactly 24 hours later. It may be worth looking for commonality between the two reported texts. The 281 message was: 281 NORTH HOWLAND CALL KHAQQ BEYOND NORTH DONT HOLD WITH US MUCH LONGER ABOVE WATER SHUT OFF The Messier messge was: 17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec will sou nant now sou I count 92 characters, including breaks, in the 281 message and 95 characters, including breaks, in the Messier message - so the two transcriptions are of very similar length. The 281 message includes the phrase "281 north Howland". The Messier message includes what may be the word "Howland" (owl) preceded by what may be a cardinal compass direction (south), preceded by a number beginning with "2". Both messages contain the word "call". The transcribed word "dont" in the 281 message is almost certainly "won't". The Messier message contains the positive form of the same word (will). That's all I can come up with, but there do seem to be some interesting coincidences. ********************************************************************** From Alan I think it is rather obvious on its face that the message could not possibly have been sent OR copied correctly. One or the other or even both. I agree with you it is more likely the message was from AE rather than a hoax for the very reason you gave. A hoax would not have been so cryptic. The fact that it was sent slowly points toward someone not all that familiar with code. Given that, I would think the person would have written out the message before trying to send it although logic doesn't seem to be the word of the day in this mystery. Although, earlier I indicated the process would be to lay our the entire code and check for possibilities the bottom line would be minimum substitutions and I would expect a repeating error. For example the "sou" which appears four times might actually be "sos" with the same error each time. I am NOT suggesting "sou" really should be "sos." Could be but it doesn't fit well. We have to also consider the person sending may not have been as coherent as we would like to believe. We may be looking at exactly what was sent. The signal was weak and we don't know how long the spaces were. It is possible words or parts thereof were missed. I started this post because I wanted folks to think along these lines - that whatever errors there were they were minor but that there may have been characters before and/or after those that were written down. Thinking that way may allow something to pop up that makes more sense that what we see. No, I wouldn't just make something up. One of you might catch on. Alan ************************************************************* From Ric Despite the grief I've been giving you, I'm glad you started this thread. The Messier message is clearly not random and there does appear to be something going on here. Let's keep banging away at it. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 12:55:01 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: W40K Ric wrote: > The frequencies that Earhart could transmit on are not relevant to the > question of whether she could have heard Mr. Carroll. Her receiver >could be tuned to a wide range of frequencies. What range of frequencies? Be careful! I understand the presence of seemingly unrelated call letters, in the Betty log, presents a challenge to explanation - particularly to believers. Hue Miller *********************************************************** From Ric Okay, let's talk about this. Let's start with the assumption that Earhart had the receiver that all the paperwork says she had - the Western Electric 20B. That receiver had four "bands" of frequencies: 200 -400 Kcs 550-1500 Kcs 1500-4000 Kcs 4000- 10,000 Kcs It is my understanding that amateurs (hams) transmitted on frequencies within the 1500-4000 Kcs band. Of course, 3105 is also in that band. The receiver itself was under the copilot's seat and Earhart operated it via a Western Electric 27A remote mounted in the "shelf" at the base of the aircraft's instrument panel. To tune in a frequency, she selected the desired band using a four-position switch and then turned a knob to move the needle to the proper part of the dial and searched around until she picked up the signal. It's interesting that if she was twiddling around looking for a signal on 3105 she was doing it in the same band that contained transmissions by hams. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 12:57:21 EDT From: Mike Everette Subject: Re: Peace time vs. War time >Seeing that the Japanese are a very proud race and were humiliated with >their defeat in the S.Pacific and angry following Hiroshima and Nagasaki >surely they would have shouted from the rooftops if they had ,"captured" >and executed AE and FN....HH Oh come ON now... surely you forget that Japan was in no position, for almost a decade after WW2, at least, to "protest" anything. Japan was defeated. Japan was occupied. Generaal Douglas MacArthur 'ruled" Japan like an emperor, until the Korean War and MacArthur's falling-out with Harry Truman. LTM (who made sure her children did their history homework first) and 73 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 13:01:28 EDT From: Neil Barnett Subject: Re: W40K Howland port Here is what Betty wrote: "W4OK Howland port", or, "W0J Howland port". Let us assume that the transmitting person actually said "portable", and was misheard or misunderstood by Betty so that she wrote only the first syllable of "portable". The phrase "W4OK Howland portable" is a standard identification format. It indicates that W4OK is operating from a temporary site at a landmark or geographical feature known as "Howland". The person speaking the phrase is either: (a) W4OK himself, identifying himself temporarily located at Howland, (b) someone calling W4OK, using the location description previously given by W4OK when identifying himself. No-one has suggested that W4OK (Carroll?) ever actually operated from Howland Island, so at least six things are possible: 1. W4OK was the speaker and was perpetrating a hoax by pretending to be on the island. 2. The speaker was an unknown person who was perpetrating a hoax by pretending to be on the island and had misappropriated W4OK's (and/or WOJ's) callsign(s) for this purpose. 3. The speaker was calling W4OK who was a hoaxer under the circumstances of 1. and 2., and he/she was also a hoaxer. 4. The speaker was a hoaxer who had heard or had invented the callsign(s) W4OK/WOJ, and was having fun by associating them with Howland Is. 5. The speaker was AE, and was calling the hoaxer(s) in vain. 6. The speaker was AE, and she had heard Carroll transmitting and wrongly associated his callsign with the operators at Howland, who were using some other callsign, such as "NRUI2 Howland portable". Betty now says that AE was the speaker, so although 5. or 6. appear to be validated, the odds are 4 to 2 that this was a hoax. Incidentally, by itself, "Howland portable" is not a callsign, and its use is not acceptable practice. Neil Barnett ZL1ANM New Zealand ****************************************************************** ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 13:11:19 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The Messier message >Despite the grief I've been giving you, I'm glad you started this thread. >The Messier message is clearly not random and there does appear to be >something going on here. Let's keep banging away at it. No, that was a good comment for all of us as it would take little to get carried away changing all the dots and dashes. Hue, recognized immediately that the mechanics of keying a mike to produce dots and dashes creates its own problem. I would like to think that somewhere in those two keyed messages lies the direction to or location of the Electra. Alan **************************************** From Ric Unfortunately, a lot depends upon how much AE knew about where she was. The fact that nowhere in any of the messages is there any apparent attempt to name an island (other than the one we know she wasn't on) is a pretty good indication that she didn't know any more than that she was on some uninhabited island on or near the LOP south of Howland. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 14:00:19 EDT From: Julie Subject: Re: W40K Regarding the comment: "Amelia had only two frequencies on which she could transmit / receive. As 3105 kc and 6210 kc were dedicated aeronautical frequencies , surely Mr. Carroll (or any other ham) would not have been permitted to transmit on them." That is not quite correct. If it is perceived as an "emergency" a ham operator can transmit or relay information on those frequencies in a life threatening situation. Cheers. Julie Coronado, CA ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 14:34:17 EDT From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: W40K Howland Port For Neil Barnett ZL1ANM >although 5. or 6. appear to be validated, the odds are 4 to 2 that this >was a hoax. Respectfully: I don't think this is correct, Neil. IF the six possible events you list are the only six possibilities, AND if each of the six events have identical probabilities of occurring, THEN your statement is true. We do not know, however, nor can we establish, what the individual probabilities of each of the six events are, so we cannot accurately arrive at your conclusion. Anyone else with some probability & statistics background, please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. LTM, who liked Prob & Stats, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 14:35:51 EDT From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: The Messier message Every time I read the fragmented message Mr. Messier recorded, the question comes to mind could he possibly have transcribed the message in French? His sirname seems to be French. Please don't break into hyterical laughter but the thought just keeps bugging me. LTM, Mike Haddock #2438 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 11:42:22 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: W40K Howland Port Alfred writes: >Anyone else with some probability & statistics background, please feel free >to correct me if I'm wrong. Alfred, I think I may have mentioned this once or many times before. This is not a subject on which we can successfully use averages, probabilities, statistics or percentages. For example it doesn't make any difference what the odds are that AE could transmit in Morse Code. All she had to do is do it once or in this case perhaps twice. Her percentage chances of making a successful landing on Niku is of no importance. All she had to do is do it once. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 12:29:51 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The Messier message Ric writes: >Unfortunately, a lot depends upon how much AE knew about where she was. Too true. But maybe they weren't as oblivious of their location as we tend to think. One thought I keep bouncing around in the empty space behind my eyes is this. Let's say for the sake of argument that the sky WAS overcast and they were above some sort of weather after passing the mid point. They must now DR the rest of the way to Howland with no land marks. Folks have certainly suggested this many times. Just to make this more fun I'll put YOU in the pilot's seat. You've just DR'd all the way from Noonan's last fix somewhere around the Ontario/Myrtlebank or Ocean Island. You clearly don't know the winds but you have an ETA. It is 7:42 am. At 7:42 what are you going to announce to Itasca and the world? Are you going to say Noonan's nine hour DR has taken you exactly to a point over Howland at exactly the predicted time? ("We must be on you.") Not me. I would say we ought to be pretty close, maybe within 50 miles or so or something like that. But they indicated they were dead sure they were over Howland. Why? Well, of course I don't know but to my way of thinking Noonan had to have had good reason to think that at 7:42 he was over Howland. I think he must have had what he thought were pretty good fixes not all that far out. I don't think they were sun shots so that would put his fix back close to the dawn. The point of this is that once again I think their "We must be on you..." is evidence Noonan had sufficient navigation confidence that puts them fairly close to Howland, say a little over 20 miles or so. That will be his reference point for their brief search and for where they went next. I considered the possibility they believed they were looking down at Ontario but were actually seeing the Myrtlebank then DRing from there on that erroneous belief but they couldn't DR that far and express such an exact belief they were on top of Howland. So even if that mistake was made it would have been corrected later. Now the significance of this nonsense is that if my analysis is roughly accurate they should have had a pretty good idea which piece of land they put down on. So why did they not say? I think Noonan would have known but was incapacitated to a significant extent and AE DIDN'T know. I say this because Noonan doesn't appear to be the one sending Morse Code and he would have been far better at it having used it aboard ship. Or so I think I remember. Noonan would have navigated them to where he thought he could accurately get them and to where he thought they could safely land and to the closest land that met that criteria. SE was the easiest choice as he had course lines and the closest land. I have to believe he knew something of the PanAm survey of the Phoenix Islands. If so Gardner appears to be the most obvious choice, possibly Canton or Enderbury. The message of a ship on the reef could refer to Gardner OR Enderbury and maybe a few other places as reefs were ship magnets. I know only of those two, however. To play my own Devil's advocate I would wonder why AE didn't know where Noonan was guiding them? Does that mean they only chanced upon land and even Noonan didn't know what it was? I find that hard to buy unless the land wasn't one of the Phoenix Islands. Uncharted reef? OR someplace else entirely? Comments? Alan *********************************************************** From Ric There was no Pan Am survey of the Phoenix islands for Noonan to know about and none of Noonan's nautical paperwork mentions anything about being able to send code. A major factor in trying to assess what Earhart could'a/should'a/would'a known about where she was during and after the flight is the degree of communication that can be presumed to have taken place between Mr. Noonan and Ms. Earhart. Noonan is the person aboard the airplane who can logically be thought to have had the best handle on where they were at any give time. However, his ability to convey that knowledge to Earhart was limited by the very high decibel level in the cockpit and its effect on hearing after nearly a full day aloft. If their experience was anything like that of Merrill and Lambie who spent the same amount of time aboard essentially the same aircraft, by the time Earhart and Noonan were approaching Howland they were both effectively deaf. Communication between AE and FN while airborne during the world flight seems to have carried out by means of small handwritten notes. The navigator told the pilot what to do, not why. It is therefore a mistake to assume that what Earhart was heard to say over the radio was an accurate reflection of what Noonan knew - it is, instead, Earhart's impression of what Noonan meant. Anything she says has to be seen through that filter. Her use of the phrase "we must be on you" indicates a certainty that Noonan may not have shared. He may have given her a note that said something like, "heading 68* ETA Howland at 1900" - the time he knew they would reach the advanced LOP. Noonan knows they may be too far north or south but all AE knows is what the note says. When Howland does not appear as advertised the situation in the cockpit becomes more complex. Noonan needs for Earhart to follow certain procedures (turn northwest for some amount of time, then turn around and fly southeast) and, meanwhile, Earhart tries unsuccessfully to use her loop antenna - but they can't discuss their plight. All they can do is jot notes back and forth. Earhart's cryptic "running on line north and south" may be an example of "I'm just doing what Fred says to do". If Noonan is injured during the landing, Earhart's knowledge of where they are and how they got there is limited to her own experience, the notes Noonan gave her, and what she can glean from notations on his charts. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 12:43:14 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: The Messier message > 17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec > will sou nant now sou. > > The English words that are either complete or strongly suggested are: > southwes(t) > owl > so > not > call > will > now > > All are very common words that might be expected to occur in many radio > transmissions - with the exception of "owl". If it's a partial word it might be > "bowl", "cowl", "fowl", "howl", or "jowl" - none of which seem any more likely > than "owl".... -I deleted all the previous posts with Messier in title, mistakenly thinking they would not be of interest to me. May i assume the sentence length transcription above is the message? "equen" is obviously a fragment of the word "frequency", or "frequently". So, with this logical fragment, we could have: 1. "calling frequency", as a noun. An example of such usage: "All units, calling frequency will be 2670 kilocycles". 2. "call frequency", as verb and object. As in, "Please call on frequency" (please reply on same frequency ) or as in "please call on frequency 6210". 3. "call frequently", as in "Please send recognition/ call-up/ invitation to respond, frequently" 4. another possibility: call as short for "callsign". This is a frequent abbreviation. Example, "a call frequently heard was NRIU". However, i also note: the use of the word "frequency" would NEVER be used in any professional message sent via telegraphy. It would always be shortened to "freq" or just omitted, if there is a number associated. Examples, in telegraphese: "PSE QSY 525 KC" ( Please change frequency to 525 kcs. ) or "ALL UNITS MUST R MUST WATCH DAY/ NIGHT FREQS 24 HRS CONTINUOUS" ( all units must, repeat, must monitor day and night frequencies continuously). If the word carried in the Messier message was "frequency", that would be the sign of someone unfamiliar with radio protocol. If the word is frequently, i dunno. -Hue Miller ********************************************************** From Ric Yes, the complete reported Messier transcription is: 17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec will sou nant now sou I had wondered about "equen" but had stupidly not recognized it as the middle of frequent/frequently/frequency. Let's speculatively fill in some blanks and see where we are. 17 na u 61 4 southwest 1 23 south Howland 23 ja so not nx call frequency 170 south sec will south nant now south Still doesn't make much sense. I do note that the numeral sets "17" and "23" each appear twice. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 12:44:34 EDT From: Edgard Engelman Subject: Re: The Messier message French is my first language, and let me assure that the message sounds as cryptic in French as in English, and probably even more. The groups of letter OWL, WILL, NOW are virtually unknown in French words and would certainly not been found together in the same phrase, or so closely together, unless it would have been written in Frenglish. Edgard ********************************************* From Ric Merci ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 12:46:42 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: W40K >If it is perceived as an "emergency" a ham > operator can transmit or relay information on those frequencies in a life > threatening situation. First, you do not address the improbability of Mr. Carroll being equiped to transmit on aircraft frequencies. Why not ask a ham radio old-timer, some are still around from the 1930s: "Say, ever set up a transmitter so you could talk to aircraft?" Second, i believe this so-called exemption is myth. I recall a recent article in QST (ham radio magazine) in the last few months, that addressed this issue. It seems the FCC was going after someone who excersized this option ( out of band operation more feasible nowadays with wideband computer controlled radios. The Feds also reiterated that there is no legal exemption. Okay, i will have to assign this as my project #4001-B, to find that article. Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 13:03:05 EDT From: Eric Subject: The Nauru island radio intercept On page 318 of his book, Goerner describes his examination of the Navy's classified Earhart file. In this file, he noted a Navy message with no heading which stated that, at 1030 on the morning of the disappearance, a radio station on Nauru (one of the British-controlled Gilbert Islands) had picked up AE broadcasting on 6210 kcs saying "Land in sight ahead." 1030 is about the time they would have reached Gardner Island. Although this message might have been discussed extensively before I joined the forum, I'd be interested to know what if any significance TIGHAR gives to it. LTM Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, Ca. ***************************************************************** From Ric Fred and I corresponded about this at length. I'd love to believe it but the documentation just isn't there. It only exists in notes that he took while he was permitted to examine, but not photocopy, Navy files that were then still classified. When he finally got his hands on photocopies of the files years later, there was no such message. Goerner postulated that someone, during the de-classification process, removed it believing the message to be a mis-transcription of "ship in sight ahead". However, altering documents like that is unheard of and Nauru certainly reported no such reception when they reported their other receptions of signals from Earhart. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 13:03:54 EDT From: Tom Riggs Subject: Re: Tinian burial In previous forum posting, Troy wrote: >My money is on Ric on this one. Maybe that's where the Brits buried her >bones (lest anyone takes me serious--I'm joking): http://www.guampdn.com/news/stories/20031013/localnews/442241.html This story reports burial of two flyers "in their flight suits". Numerous photographs taken of AE and FN boarding the Electra in Lae, NG for their last flight clearly shows both AE and FN in casual shirts and pants. As best I know, there is no documentation of "flight suits" carried on the last flight. Tom Riggs #2427 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 14:27:11 EDT From: Cam Warren Subject: Re: RA-1 Ric says: >If she had such a new and unusual receiver aboard don't you find it just a >bit odd that there is no indication that she attempted any DF navigation on the >World Flight until the (unsuccessful) test flight at Lae on July 1st? Well, it comes to mind that the US Navy wasn't involved anywhere else in the World Flight but the mid Pacific. And, the Bendix RA-1 was NOT so "new and unusual" at the time. Just a very good - and much better - receiver than the WE. Your perennial fall-back position to sidestep any new information that doesn't fit YOUR scenario is to demand "evidence". I have, as you well know, documented to a considerable extent why I strongly suspect the presence of a Bendix RDF-1 system (which included an RA-1 receiver) aboard the Electra. If I had a complete set of photographs (rather than Navy schematics) of the installation, you could - and undoubtedly would - say; "WELL, how do we know those are REAL photos?" Or some such vapid remark. Many of your contentions could be similarly disarmed. As to my background and credentials, and for further documentation, I refer you to the just published hard cover edition of Flight Into Yesterday, which contains a full chapter - written by me - on the HF/DF installation. It contains the best available, contemporary photo of the DF control unit. Perhaps your photo analysis people can come up with a model number, etc. Of course, you can challenge the authenticity of the photo and its source, but that strikes me as counter-productive. Quite possibly many Forum followers are tired of this thread, just like a lot may be tired of navigation, fuel consumption, floatability of the aircraft, and dozens of other angles. As far as I am concerned, they are perfectly free to skip the postings. Most SUV buyers never go off the pavement either. It's still a free country. Cam Warren ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 14:28:20 EDT From: Cam Warren Subject: Re: WAS THERE A BENDIX? >I don't know what frequency [Lae was] using but it had to be a voice frequency. > >LTM, >Ric > It was a high frequency - 6540 kc, to be exact. Cam Warren ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 14:30:58 EDT From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: More Prob & Stats Thanks Alan; I was not making the point that it would be useful or productive to assign probabilities. I was simply pointing out that drawing an accurate "odds are" conclusion from a series of events with unknown probabilities is just not possible. If we consider an ordinary, fair, six-sided die, and we ask ourselves, "What is the probability that I will roll a number greater than 4", the answer is 1/3, since there are two ways to do it, of six possible outcomes. 2/6 = 1/3. But, if we begin with a loaded die, that unfairly favors, say, the numbers 3, 4, and 5 to varying degrees, the problem is more complicated. We must know the individual probabilities to answer the question. Neil listed six events, 4 of which pointed to a hoaxer, and 2 of which pointed to AE. He concludes that the odds therefore favor the former. Irrespective of whether the exercise is useful, his conclusion cannot accurately be drawn, because the individual probabilities of the events are unknown. I am not an expert in the radio communications field, Alan. I do know a thing or two about mathematics. And I find it believable that AE was transmitting and, further, that she was heard. I do not agree with you on this one; "Her percentage chances of making a successful landing on Niku is of no importance." I think it is important. Here are some extreme examples to demonstrate why: If it could be convincingly shown that she had a zero percent chance of landing on Niku, no one would be looking there today. That is important. Put another way, I think it can be convincingly shown that the probability that AE made landfall at Juneau, Alaska, is zero. Notice that no one is looking for her there? (Watch someone jump in now and say that they are, indeed, doing just that. :-| ) In some measure anyway, the probability of an event does influence what we do, and is therefore important in that context. LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 14:35:16 EDT From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: The Messier message Ric states: >However, his ability to convey that knowledge to Earhart was limited by the >very high decibel level in the cockpit and its effect on hearing after nearly >a full day aloft. If their experience was anything like that of Merrill and >Lambie who spent the same amount of time aboard essentially the same aircraft, >by the time Earhart and Noonan were approaching Howland they were both >effectively deaf. > >Communication between AE and FN while airborne during the world flight seems >to have carried out by means of small handwritten notes. If AE and FN were "effectively deaf" could that be why they couldn't hear the Itasca or get a "minimum"? They were essentially deaf to the signals that they were receiving. LTM, Dave Bush ************************************************************* From Ric Clearly Earhart was able to hear the "A"s sent by Itasca but reduced aural acuity could have been a factor in her inability to distinguish subtle changes and "get a minimum". ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 14:54:37 EDT From: Ron Bright Subject: Beneficial Suggestion Perhaps you have this, but I would like to see an index, at least a content index, of the TIGHAR Tracks from the first issue. Not a subject index but an index that one could run down and find the subject. It is a valuable resource but hard to find the subject without going through them all. Example: TIGHAR Tracks, Vol 14, No 2 Dec 1998 AE's bones and shoes The Floyd Kilts story The Nikumaroro Shoe The Tarawa papers The Hoodless analysis Re-anlysis of Hoodless (Burns and Jantz) Kanawa Point The Wreck Photo B-24 Crash at Sydney Is Perhaps this is already on computer and can be sent out annually . A subject index would require an enormous amount of time to compile but this could be quickly reviewed for the appropriate subject. LTM, Ron B. ********************************************************** From Ric A subject index would be nice to have but it's the same old problem of time and money. We're pursuing an investigation and reporting our progress as we go. We just don't have the resources to devote to indexing. If a TIGHAR member would care to volunteer to build and maintain a TIGHAR Tracks/Research Bulletin/Documents index by subject we would gladly put it on the website. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 13:34:52 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The Nauru island radio intercept >Goerner postulated that someone, during the de-classification process, >removed it believing the message to be a mis-transcription of "ship in sight >ahead". Is it possible that was the 1030 GMT message of a ship in sight instead of a 1030 am local time? Alan ******************************************* From Ric It seems most likely that Goerner just mis-transcribed the 10:30 "ship in sight ahead" message in his notes. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 13:36:10 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: More Prob & Stats >If it could be convincingly shown that she had a zero percent chance of >landing on Niku, no one would be looking there today. Alfred, you made my point exactly. The practical odds were zero or 100%. You picked zero for your example. Anything else is just a math exercise. The odds are of no importance. By that I mean anything other than zero or 100%. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 13:38:02 EDT From: Tom Strang Subject: Re: The Messier message Speaking of frequencies - What was the radio frequency Messier received his assumed message from Amelia Earhart on? Respectfully: Tom Strang ********************************************************* From Ric We don't know. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 13:44:07 EDT From: Ed Croft Subject: Re: The Messier message Ric wrote: >I had wondered about "equen" but had stupidly not recognized it as the >middle >of frequent/frequently/frequency. Let's speculatively fill in some blanks >and see where we are. 2 quick notes for what they are worth (probably nothing) 1. the difference between the 'en' in equen and 'at' in equat is en = . -. at = .- - 2. 170 is one off for all the numbers from 281 I know, I know, you have to be wary of changing things, but this is all I got. ltm, Ed *************************************************** From Ric I too had thought that "equen" might actaully be "equat" and be equator, but if something makes sense without changing it ("equen" for frequency) ya gotta go with it. 170 is one number each off 281 but I can't make that mean anything unless somebody is using some kind of simple code - and that makes no sense. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 13:51:05 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: The Messier message >17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec >will sou nant now sou " Some more ruminations on the message. IF "equen" is part of "frequent(ly), frequency", as i said, no regular telegraphist/ trained telegraphy operator would spell the word "frequency", as applies to radio. If the word was like "frequency of rainfall", then i think so, and maybe I can say probably, the sender would spell out the whole word. If i was stranded on an island, with limited transmit duration, "i" would choose to not use the word "frequently". Why not just substitute, "often"? Also, i think it *very* strange that "southwes" is spelled out. Why spell it out? Again, in official communications, wasn't this just abreviated "SW"? I think the only reason was to be absolutely certain, static crashes, etc. didn't change the message by damaging the letter "S". I am now trying very hard to remember some of the morse code weather broadcasts i used to copy from Vancouver B.C. radio VKN way, way back in the 1980s. ( Now gone forever.) I *think* they spelled out "SOUTH" and such words. ( But also they were moving along at a pretty good clip - not "slow cw". ) I will have to ask elsewhere on this point. BTW, morse sent by microphone button, it seems to me, would be noted as not just "slow", but also with adjectives like "insane, broken, very poor", etc. Even a trained sender, i think, is going to screw up a certain number of the characters, due to the uncomfortable and unusual response of the button ( and maybe also the transmitter internal power switching circuits.) Also, you have the factor of "no feedback" to the sender; i mean the sender cannot tell what exactly he is sending. ( called "sidetone"; the best transmitters provide an audio tone when the key is depressed; this helps the sender to judge if he (she?) is forming his characters correctly. I think i recall that when using an unexpected implement (instead of a telegraph key) to send morse, you end up exaggerating the "dahs" versus the "dits" - this turns out to be the only way to send and have characters turn out distinguishable. So the sending is distinct, unique, to say the least; not just "slow". ( I welcome anyone else's informed input on my contentions above.) Right now, i am leaning toward suspecting this message fragment is from a morse code weather broadcast. Of course, at this point it's nothing more concrete than a suspicion. Hue Miller ************************************************ From Ric Apparently the sender of the 281 message spelled out the word "north" twice. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 13:52:23 EDT From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: W40K Howland port Betty wrote: > The call sign was Ameilas voice and she was trying to get back to someone > with that call sign ...She was so excited I couldn't get everything down... I > think the call sign is by one of my pictures. I heard it first then turned to > the regular page to finish .. > ....I never heard anyone but those two >voices AE and His .... I never forgot the sound ..Love Betty If i'm not mistaken, Betty heard AE at around 16:00-18:00 local, and this was around 10:00 + on Niku. Amelia was trying to get back to someone with that callsign, W4OK. I assume because she used his callsign, and was excited sounding, she had just heard him. Am I safe in this? W4OK turns out to be ham Carroll, W4OK, in Florida. I am wondering what ham frequency band AE may have heard Mr. Carroll on. Can someone with radio or propagation expertise address this question? Thanks- Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 14:07:45 EDT From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Re: Beneficial Suggestion I've had a couple of responses from members who might be interested in volunteering to do an index of TIGHAR-published Earhart material by content - in other words, some convenient way to find out everything that has been published about, for example, the Floyd Kilts story. Because I am a person of slow intellect who should listen more carefully to what his wife has been trying to tell him for some time now, I failed to point out that we already have such a system. Pat specifically structures all of the information on the TIGHAR website so that it can be searched using Google. Just type "Floyd Kilts" into Google and you'll get dozens of hits where Floyd Kilts is referenced in documents, research bulletins, TIGHAR Tracks articles, and forum postings. You'll also be able to find the best prices on Scottish kilts - but what the heck. A hint on using Google; for a specific subject, enclose the word or words in quotation marks. Also, you'll sometimes see a line that says "In order to show you the most relevant results, we have omitted some entries very similar to those already displayed. If you like you can repeat the search with the omitted results included." If you go ahead and choose that option you'll get everything. Of course, Google can only find what is already on the web and not all TIGHAR Tracks articles pertaining to the Earhart Project have been digitized and put up on the website (it's rather a time consuming job). However, there are tables of contents for every issue of TIGHAR Tracks on the website and hard copy of most issues can be ordered. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 14:10:33 EDT From: Dave in Fremont Subject: Re: RA-1 After reading Cam's latest missive, I must have missed something along the line... "I have, as you well know, documented to a considerable extent why I strongly suspect the presence of a Bendix RDF-1 system (which included an RA-1 receiver) aboard the Electra. If I had a complete set of photographs (rather than Navy schematics) of the installation, you could - and undoubtedly would - say; "WELL, how do we know those are REAL photos?" Or some such vapid remark." When has Cam presented here, to the forum, any substantiation of his claims? In every posting, Cam claims to have "documented to a considerable extent" the installation of a Bendix RDF-1 system. Okay, Cam, once and for all, please post your "documentation" or provide of links to the "Navy schematics" and put this information up for critical review. Unless it can't or won't stand up to scrutiny, of course. In any event, your "documentation" only leads you to "strongly suspect the presence of a Bendix RDF-1 system... aboard the Electra." That, in itself, constitutes nothing more than rank speculation. You need to do better than that to convince most of us. To use the vernacular, put up or shut up, Sport. LTM, Dave (#2585)=20 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 14:21:46 EDT From: Daryll Bollinger Subject: Re: The Messier message "17 na u 61 4 southwes 1 23 sou owl 23 ja so not nx call equen 170 sou sec will sou nant now sou" [Messier message] There does seem to be enough repetition in the numbers and letters that were received to suggest that the transmitter was transmitting in the "blind" some coordinates. "17" could be part of "170". "1" (2 times), "23" (2 times). "sou" (4 times) counting "so" maybe 5 times. Hue pointed out.... >complete words ; "so" "not" "call" "will" "now" "owl". It doesn't seem >like the word "owl" can be a logical complete word to be included in a >transmission. almost a complete word "southwes"(t). Is there a radio convention to transmit coordinates with Lat. first then Long. or vise versa? Longitude numbers can go to 180. Latitude numbers can go to 90. If Noonan was coherent he could have gotten star fixes the first night for Lat. & Long. They should now know where they are. All things being equal the accuracy was only limited by the accuracy of his chronometers if they were still working. Would they try and transmit coordinates or the name of the island on their charts? I will be the first to point out that "ja" is the first two letters in "japan" or "japanese". If Messier heard this on the same frequency that Waliupe heard the "281 message" 24 (?) hrs earlier, it would seem that the Navy should be keenly listen at that same time the next day. It's too bad we don't have a better feel for the spaces, gaps or pauses in the transmission. The decreasing battery voltage, dynamotor spinning up, static or skip could explain the fragmentary nature of the "281 message" and what Messier reported. >....Noonan needs for Earhart to follow certain procedures (turn >northwest for some amount of time, then turn around and fly southeast) >and, meanwhile, The "offset" or "Deliberate error" technic makes backtracking over the northwest or southeast leg unnecessary when compensating for error. >There was no Pan Am survey of the Phoenix islands for Noonan to >know about When Musick flew the New Zealand survey in March it was suggested on the Pan Am website story that they had some time to look around between Kingman Reef and Pago Pago. Daryll ******************************************************** From Ric If Musick took a 300 mile sidetrip enroute from Kingman Reef to Pago Pago in order to look at islands in the Phoenix Group you'd think there would be some mention of it someplace. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 14:30:17 EDT From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The Messier message >1. the difference between the 'en' in equen and 'at' in equat is > en = . -. > at = .- - Changing 170 to 281 is too much in my estimation but equator is a word I would have expected before seeing frequency. As someone pointed out it is usual that someone would refer to 3105 but unlikely they would also note that as being a frequency. It is sort of a given. In any case, Ed, that is good thinking and a good approach to solving the message. Alan ********************************************* From Ric There is this: From the Honlulu Star Bulletin of July 3rd: "George Palmer Putnam, husband of Amelia Earhart, today sent a wireless message to station KGU in Honolulu asking a nightlong hourly broadcast to his missing aviatrix wife and her navigator, Fred Noonan. The broadcast would ask her to radio single words, 'land' is she is on land, 'water' if she is on water, 'north' if she is north of the equator, and 'south' if she is south of the line. The Coast Guard said it would order the cutter Itasca to keep its radio silent during such broadcasts." The many occurrences of "sou" may be relevant and it also argues in favor of "equen" being "equat(or)". LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 15:00:46 EDT From: Gary LaPook Subject: Running north and south Ric wrote: >Clearly Earhart was able to hear the "A"s sent by Itasca but reduced aural >acuity could have been a factor in her inability to distinguish subtle changes >and "get a minimum". You can try this at home and see just how this works. Just take a portable am radio and tune to a weak station. Hold it to your ear and rotate your head and body around the compass. You will find two places in the circle where the signal strength drops to a "minimum" maybe so low that you can't hear it anymore. The two spots are 180 degrees apart which is the "180 degree ambiguity" inherent with a loop antenna. You will find that these two spots are very distinct and that the strength drops off sharply and then increases sharply after you move past the spot. At the "minimum" the edge of your radio will be aimed at the transmitting antenna since the antenna inside your radio is also aligned with the edge of your radio. Modern (can I say "modern") ADFs (Automatic Direction Finders) use an additional "sense" antenna and the signal from it is combined with the signal from the loop antenna and then produces a pattern with only one "minimum" to resolve the 180 degree ambiguity.( Did AE's RDF have a "sense" antenna?) Without a sense antenna you resolve the ambiguity by taking a bearing and then flying straight for a few minutes then take another bearing. The correct bearing will move towards the tail. For example, lets say you are flying straight north and you take a bearing by getting a minimum when the antenna points at right angles to your nose which means the station is straight out on your right wing tip or your left wing tip straight east or west of you and you can't tell which. Continue flying north straight north for a few minutes and take another bearing. Now the antenna points behind the right wing tip and ahead of the left wing tip. You now know that the station is off to your right near the direction of your right wing tip. You can now turn to the right until you get a minimum with the antenna aligned with the nose of the plane and you will know that the station is directly ahead. gl ****************************************** From Ric Some have argued that the belly wire antenna that was lost on takeoff was a sense antenna for the RDF, but it was awfully long for that purpose. I wonder if there's any chance that Earhart's "we are running on north and south line" or we are running on line north and south" (the log entry can be interpreted either way) at 08:43 is not a reference to the northwest/southeast advanced line of position she just said she was "on" moments earlier, but an attempt to resolve a 180 ambiguity on a "minimum" she had been able to get after the failed attempt 45 minutes earlier. Itasca has been transmitting "constantly" on 7500 since then. That "north and south" bit has always bothered me. 157/337 is not north and south, it's southeast and northwest. Is she talking about two different "lines"? But if she is flying on a north/south line to resolve a 180 degree ambiguity it means that the ambiguity was east or west - yes? So she's on the 157/337 line that is supposed to pass through Howland. We don't know what she's been doing since 08:00 when she said she heard the signal but couldn't get a minimum, but I know what I'd be doing - trying and trying to get a minimum as long as the signal was there to work on. Maybe she does finally get at least what she thinks might be a minimum and it indicates that the Itasca is either to the east (we're not there yet) or to the west (we went too far), so she starts running on a north/south line hoping to resolve the ambiguity. Just a thought. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 15:02:40 EDT From: Paige Miller Subject: More Prob and Stats Alfred Hendrickson writes: "Neil listed six events, 4 of which pointed to a hoaxer, and 2 of which pointed to AE. He concludes that the odds therefore favor the former. Irrespective of whether the exercise is useful, his conclusion cannot accurately be drawn, because the individual probabilities of the events are unknown." I'll go one step further, Alfred. Probability does not apply to past historical events. (Or, in a trivial sense, you could say the probability is either 0 or 1 that the message was from AE.) Probability refers to random events. Thus, if AE chose at a certain time to fly a random course through the Pacific, changing to a new random we could then compute a probability that she made it to Gardner. This of course is ridiculous. Thus, I have to disagree with you, Alfred, when you disagree with Alan and say "I do not agree with you on this one; 'Her percentage chances of making a successful landing on Niku is of no importance.' " I say there is no such probability, or in a trivial sense the probability is either 0 or 1, and TIGHAR is trying to show it is one and not 0; TIGHAR has a belief that it could be 1. As far as someone not searching for AE in Anchorage, Alaska, that may be because everyone who is interested in AE believes she could not have flown that far; that the probability she made it to Anchorage is zero. -- Paige Miller #2565 LTM ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 15:05:04 EDT From: Paige Miller Subject: Did AE know what island she was on? A lot has been written in the last few days about whether or not AE knew what island she was on, about sun shots that could have helped the identification of land, and cockpit communication. The way I look at it, let's assume AE is on an island and FN is not coherent. AE knew where on the map she should have been at 0743Z. She also knew what direction she flew in after that time, and how long she was in the air after that time. This has to narrow down the potential list of islands on her map somewhat; starting from say Howland plus or minus X miles, and then add on her next leg. If we assume she flew southeast, then what are the choices? If we assumes he flew west, what are the choices. In any scenario, AE could have narrowed her list down by simple reasoning and looking at her map, even with an incoherent FN. In any scenario, there is no single island that she could identify based upon this logic. However, AE could have reasonably known she was in the Phoenix Islands if she flew SE. She could have reasonably known she was in the Gilberts if she flew West. And so on. And that is the information I would expect to hear in AE's transmissions, not necessarily the name of a specific island. -- Paige Miller #2565 LTM ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 25 Oct 2003 15:08:44 EDT From: Bill Moffet Subject: Re: The Messier message In the belief that Morse could only be sent from NR16020 by 'keying the mic' and whether the operator was Fred or Amelia, neither was proficient with Morse. Frank Jones, "The Radio Handbook", 1938 Ed., in Ch. 4, Learning the Code, says, "dash is equal to three dots; spacing between letters equal to one dash, spacing between words equal to five dots". It seems likely to me that our heroes had a 'pony', a hardcopy of Morse. (By the way, the telegrapher's Morse went click-clack over the wires while the radio Morse went dit-daw. Unless one worked on a railroad, Western Union or a stockbroker, he/she would not be familiar with the click-clack code which differed from the radio code. I think we can rule it out.) It seems to me we have several problems here: 1. If the sender is NR 16020, the mic is being keyed. It's inherently sloppy. Also lots has been written about the dynamotor starting and stopping as the mike is depressed and released and the effect this has on the radiated signal. In addition it's my understanding that a modulated continuous wave (for voice transmission) is sent - not a continuous wave broken by keying as for Morse. 2. For a signal from the Central Pacific to be heard several thousand miles away in the U.S., 'skip' , signals bouncing between the ionosphere and the surface, must be involved, and often parts of the transmission are lost. I believe this is Bob Brandenburg's field. He might care to comment. 3. To my knowledge we don't know much about Mr, Messier and what he had to say about what he heard, particularly about gaps between letters and such words as he copied. It would be useful to know where he found spacing that would perhaps have made more sense than what was reported. 4. As I think you know, numbers start out with a dot and four dashes for 1, then another dot is added and only three dashes for 2, and so on to 5 which is five dots. Six reverses the dits and daws: daw, dit, dit, dit, dit, and progresses with two daws and three dits for 7, etc., until you get to five daws for zero. Spacing in Morse is critical: With 1 as an example, it can be read as A O or W M. Oh, Jones shows four daws as CH and in my long but limited experience I don't recall hearing it so used, but if it were 1 might also be read as E CH. You get the idea: 2 could be I O or U M, 3 as I W or S M, etc. I've played with this 'til I'm getting groggy and so far haven't found anything that seems to make more sense of Messier's text. Mike Everette might also like to kick this around, hopefully making more out of it than I have. By the way, the two Ham ops on Howland in '37 and the RDF put ashore there to my recollection were addressed and responded with call letters and not as "Howland Portable". The Earhart Project Research Library (CD), Vol 1, will verify this. LTM Bill Moffet in Wayne, PA #2156CE ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:34:02 EST From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: RA-1 Dave in Fremont wrote to Cam warren: >To use the vernacular, put up or shut up, Sport. I think perhaps when Dave contributes some original research of his own, he may have more justification in criticising other people. Should that ever happen, I still see no need for him to be rude in doing so. Personally, I welcome anyone's research and ideas whether or not they can back them up with hard evidence. If you don't like them you don't have to take them on board. Anecdotal evidence is often useful in pointing one in the right direction even if it cannot in itself be initially corroborated. Cam may not have the documented evidence he would like. That certainly doesn't mean that the anecdotal evidence and any deductions made from such should be ignored. The photograph of the interior of an electra in Goerner's book, showing what appears to be a piece of Bendix equipment mounted just below the roof of the cockpit, is substantially more than anecdote. It needs to be explained by the anti-RA-1 theorists just as much as the dados need to be explained by the crashed and sankers. What appears to be the window which shows the frequency, is an extremely similar shape to that on a production RA-1. There also appear to be three lines of writing which exactly mirror those on the box held by Remmelein in the photo of AE with the loop. The similar three lines of writing indicate the time-frame is similar. I think the argument that this photo may not be AE's electra is very weak. In what other electra might such a piece of equipment have been fitted and why? Since it is not a readily recognisable item of radio gear, it certainly infers it may be a prototype. The lack of an identifiable frequency tuning control also indicates that it could be fixed frequency. Whilst there is not yet any hard evidence that a Bendix receiver was fitted to AE's electra, there is no hard evidence that it was not fitted and until evidence to settle the matter either way appears, Dave should be a good deal more circumspect in belittling the contributions made by people who have done a good deal more research than he has. Regards Angus. ******************************************************* From Cam Dave asks the question: >When has Cam presented here, to the forum, any substantiation of his claims? And you can answer it affirmatively, if you are the gentleman I believe you to be. Cam Warren ****************************************************************** From Ric Cam has made his case on this forum for the presence of an RA-1 aboard NR16020 on several occasions. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:39:44 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The Messier message Daryll wrote: >I will be the first to point out >that "ja" is the first two letters in "japan" or "japanese". Daryll, that was ably pointed out last week. However, you are correct that "ja" is the first two letters of "Japan" and its various forms but it is also the first two letters of nearly 7 columns of words in Webster's including "jackass," "jam," "jar" and "jaw." Alan ************************************* From Ric I think Daryll was the first to point that out to the forum. But like "owl" and "Howland", "ja" and "japan" have a better possible connection to the Earhart disappearance than "jackass," "jam," "jar" and "jaw." ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:41:19 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Did AE know what island she was on? Paige Miller wrote: >AE could have reasonably known she was in the Phoenix Islands >if she flew SE. She could have reasonably known she was in the Gilberts >if she flew West. And so on. And that is the information I would expect >to hear in AE's transmissions, not necessarily the name of a specific >island. I would agree, Paige, and the lack of an island name in a message appears to support that idea and also the idea that Noonan is not at his best to say the least. Ric's note about the hourly request to AE to transmit single words may have an important bearing on what is in the two messages we are working on although "southwes(t)" is very troubling. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:45:33 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: The Messier message Daryll and radio gurus. Would the fact that AE had no key but had to use the mic push button cause any of those spaces, etc Ron B ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:44:47 EST From: Reed Riddle Subject: Re: Did AE know what island she was on? Noonan should have kept up with the navigation, up to the point where they began final preparations for landing. So, after landing, Earhart would have had a map to look at, with lines drawn on in that plotted the flight path. There was obviously some error on the map, but Gardner is far enough away from other islands that it's reasonable to think it would have been the closest land to the final position plotted on the map (otherwise, they were just lucky to find it!). If Earhart doesn't have a map, then it must have been destroyed in the landing in some way. If the plane makes it down in one piece (necessary for the post-loss transmissions), then the map must have survived. How else might it have been destroyed at landing? I can't think of a way offhand. If Earhart then has a map, and a good idea of where she is on it (even without Noonan doing measurements after they land), then why isn't she yelling "I'm on Gardner!!!"? Was Gardner named on the map? If there is no name, she can't call it out over the radio...so we hear positions relative to Howland instead of an island name. This might explain why we never hear Gardner named, and why the post-loss messages sound a bit more complicated than expected. We really need that summary of the messages to piece together the rest of the puzzle. Reed ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:47:02 EST From: Mike Allen Subject: Re: Beneficial Suggestion > Google. Just type "Floyd Kilts" into Google and you'll get dozens of hits You can restrict your Google search to only the TIGHAR website if you enter your search request as follows: "Floyd Kilts" site:www.tighar.org or for example "betty's notebook" site:www.tighar.org etc. Try it and you will see that except for paid links you will only get results from the specific website you want to search. Mike Allen ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:48:26 EST From: Ted Campbell Subject: AE & Coded Messages I think we all are fairly sure that AE removed her coding key from the aircraft while in Miami and therefore any subsequent attempt to send code was most likely done by the "press to talk switch" i.e. mike button. Furthermore, in reading many recent posts on the forum regarding coded messages there seems to be a concern on how the radio equipment (dynamotor(sp?), etc., responded to the frequent pressing of the mike button and how this action may have altered the message sent out or how the recorder heard the message. My question is, was there a particular transmitter tied into the coding key and was it removed otherwise why wouldn't the mike button pressing have the same "desired" crispness as the coding key? It seems to me the machine wouldn't know if its command to start/stop came from a key or the mike. Ted Campbell ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:50:10 EST From: Tom Riggs Subject: Re: The Messier Message Ric wrote: >Unfortunately, a lot depends upon how much AE knew about where she was. The >fact that nowhere in any of the messages is there any apparent attempt to >name an island (other than the one we know she wasn't on) is a pretty good >indication that she didn't know any more than that she was on some uninhabited >island on or near the LOP south of Howland. I agree. No apparent attempt to name an island could have resulted because she had no clue what island she had landed upon. Perhaps she wisely knew if she guessed the island name, and got it wrong, her radio transmission could have sent the rescue party completely in the wrong direction. Therefore, she may have elected to not give a name, but rather a direction to where she thought she was relative to Howland island. For example "281 NORTH HOWLAND". But the same rationale applies to her guessing a direction. If she guessed a direction, and got it wrong, her radio transmission could have sent the rescue party completely in the wrong direction as well. Tom Riggs #2427 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:55:16 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Florida message heard on ? frequency When Betty and relatives went to the Coast Guard, did anyone convey to the Coast Guard what radio frequency Betty heard AE on? This seems like something you would want to tell them, or note in the notebook, don't you think? I understand she had her back resting on the radio, or something like that, and didn't look at the dial, but before they left, it would seem like she maybe would have thought to note it down. If not, i can see why the USCG gents sent them right back home. "Girl hear says she heard Amelia Earhart. No, she doesn't know the radio frequency. Says it WAS on the radio, though". "Okay, thank them and tell them we already have the situation in hand." -Hue Miller **************************************************************** From Ric Betty did not go with her father and the neighbor to inform the Coast Guard. That she did not note the frequency in the notebook means only that she was thinking like a 15 year old girl, not a radio operator. Whether her father noted the frequency and told the Coast Guard ... we have no way of knowing. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 12:42:52 EST From: Mike Z. Subject: Re: Beneficial Suggestion (Googling TIGHAR) Ric said: >Just type 'Floyd Kilts' into Google and you'll get dozens of hits where >Floyd Kilts is referenced in documents, research bulletins, TIGHAR Tracks >articles, and forum postings. You'll also be able to find the best prices on >Scottish kilts - but what the heck. You can also limit Google to search only the TIGHAR site by prefixing the following (separated by a space) to your search text in Google's text box: site:www.tighar.org So typing "site:www.tighar.org Norwich City" gives you 17 pages of pure TIGHAR search results, as opposed to a whole lot of links about somewhere far far from Niku. Not that I have anything against kilts. --Mike Z. from Massachusetts ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 13:03:39 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Betty wrote: > The call sign was Ameilas voice and she was trying to get back to someone > with that call sign ...She was so excited I couldn't get everything down. Ric wrote: >As Dave Bush points out, the simplest explanation for Betty hearing AE say >"W40K" is that, at some time and on some frequency, AE had heard Carroll >calling and was trying to reply. The question then becomes whether there was any >reasonable way that Earhart could have heard a transmission sent by Carrol. Her >Western Electric receiver certainly had the ability to receive on frequencies >Carrol could legally use but then we have to ask why she would be listening on >any of those frequencies and >It is my understanding that amateurs (hams) transmitted on frequencies within >the 1500-4000 Kcs band. Of course, 3105 is also in that band.....It's >interesting that if she was twiddling around looking for a signal on 3105 she >was doing it in the same band that contained transmissions by hams. From the 'ARRL Handbook 2000', article 'Propagation Summary, by Band', pg. 214 : ] "3.5 - 4.0 MHz 80m ) ....Daytime communication range is typically limited to 400 km ( 250 mi) by ground-wave and skywave propagation. At night, signals are often propagated halfway around the world. As at 1.8 MHz, atmospheric noise is a nuisance, making winter the most attractive season for the 80-m DXer. "7.0 - 7.3 MHz (40m) The popular 40-m band has a clearly defined skip zone during the day.....During the day, a typical station can cover a radius of approximately 800 km (500 mi). At night, reliable worldwide communication via F2 [propagation] is common on the 40-m band. Atmospheric noise is less troublesome than on 160 and 80 [meter bands], and 40-m DX signals are often of sufficient strength to override even high-level summer static. For these reasons, 40-m is the lowest frequency amateur [ham] band considered reliable for DX communication in all seasons...." Ham lingo: 80m = 80 meter wavelength band. DX means "long distance". 3105 kHz = about 100 meter wavelength, and 6210 = about 48 meter wavelength. Now, i ask this again: What radio frequency did AE hear Mr. Carroll, W4OK, on July 5, 1937, 10:00 A.M. Niku, and 4:00 P.M. at Betty's and Carroll's homes? Anyone? -Hue Miller ************************************************************** From Ric Everything you've quoted above is qualified with "typically" "reliable", etc. Just as with Betty's reception, we - by definition - are talking about a highly unusual occurrence. If we were talking about typical, reliable radio traffic we would have dozens of Bettys and Carrols. Let me throw the question back at you. Is it not possible that Earhart heard some part of a transmission by Carrol? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 14:46:01 EST From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: The Messier message Bill, It is true that parts of a transmission can be lost during ionospheric propagation, usually as a result of random variations in signal absorption along the path, or in the background noise field, or both. The result can be similar to what Messier reported. The problem, for purposes of reconstructing the original transmission, is that we don't know the lengths of the gaps between fragments. The gaps could vary from a fraction of a second to tens of seconds. Absent knowledge of the gap lengths, the process of reconstruction is reduced to a guessing game. Bob #2286 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 14:20:19 EST From: Ed Croft Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? >Is it not possible that Earhart heard some part of a transmission >by Carrol? What I would like to know from Bob is that if the conditions were right for Betty to hear Amelia, does that mean those same conditions made it possible for Amelia to hear Carroll ? Or are the conditions totally separate ? In other words, if Betty heard Amelia, would it mean that, assuming Amelia was listening to the correct frequency, Amelia would normally hear Carroll? Or only 1 out of 1000 times when the conditions were right for Betty to hear Amelia, would Amelia be able to hear Carroll. When you start stringing together low probability conditions, the possibility of it happening quickly vanishes. Ed ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 14:51:59 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: The 281 message This has always bothered me. That direction is NOT north of Howland but rather west. Only eleven degrees off. It doesn't make sense to me. As a distance it also makes little sense as I don't know of any place 281 miles from Howland in any direction. Anyone with an idea? Alan ******************************************************** From Ric Remember, the message was fragmentary and we really don't know what words go together or where there are words missing. 281 NORTH HOWALND CALL KHAQQ BEYOND NORTH DONT HOLD WITH US MUCH LONGER ABOVE WATER SHUT OFF It could have been something like this: line 281 NORTH HOWLAND CALL KHAQQ we are BEYOND shipwreck NORTH end of island plane WON'T HOLD WITH US MUCH LONGER barely ABOVE WATER must SHUT OFF ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 14:54:09 EST From: Tom Strang Subject: Re: Florida message heard on ? frequency Is Betty's father and neighbor Rodes contact with the St. Petersberg Coast Guard Station still considered anecdotal evidence? Respectfully: Tom Strang ************************************************* From Ric Of course it is. It's not documented in a contemporaneous source. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 14:55:35 EST From: Rick Subject: Re: The Messier message A Lancastrian was recently discovered in the Andes, after it vanished with all on board many years ago. I recall the mysterious last Morse signal from it had been "STENDEC". Didn't somebody figure out that simply moving the pauses between dots and dashes gave the actual name of the airliner? Anybody out there remember this one? What was the solution, and if you do that sort of thing to the Messier message, does anything emerge? ******************************** From Ric I think that's right. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 14:56:52 EST From: Neil Barnett Subject: Re: The Messier message > The problem, for purposes of reconstructing the original transmission, > is that we don't know the lengths of the gaps between fragments. The > gaps could vary from a fraction of a second to tens of seconds. > Absent knowledge of the gap lengths, the process of reconstruction is > reduced to a guessing game. Absolutely correct. There is no provision in the transcribing of Morse text for indicating the length of gaps. Even if Messier had left a notation, "one second gap here", it cannot necessarily be presumed that text was actually transmitted during the gap. Also, we could not deduce how many characters were missed, because characters are not of uniform length. "E" is dit. Four units length (one for the dit, three for the space before the next letter begins). "0" (zero) is dah-dah-dah-dah-dah. Twenty-two units length! To sum up, the gaps could have been of considerable duration, and it is even conceivable that some station (which Messier could not hear) was replying to the sender during those gaps. Neil Barnett Auckland, N.Z. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 15:01:06 EST From: Don Iwanski Subject: Radio Communciation have a couple of questions. (1) What is the estimated range of communciation on 3105 kcs (2) What is the estimated range of communication on 6210 kcs (3) What is the estimated range of communication on 7500 kcs The only time she heard anything from the Itasca was on 7500 kcs at 8:00 am. This information comes from page 340 of The Sound of Wings - 19:30/8:00 am "Earhart: KHAQQ calling Itasca We received your signals but unable to get a minimum. Please take bearing on us and answer 3105 with voice" All the way up until 8:00 am she does not receive a signal from the Itasca, then bingo, at 8 am they are communcating on 7500 kcs. It seems as though this would be an indication she was further out than she thought she was. But instead of continueing on her heading, she turns? And the next time Itasca hears from her is 44 minutes later on 3105 kcs when she reports she is on the line of position 157-337 running north and south. What kind of signals were being transmitted on 7500? Could they two way voice communicate on 7500? Thx Don I. ***************************************************** From Ric There is no set range for any of those frequencies. Her ability to hear the morse code "A"s sent by Itasca on 7500 is probably due to switching to the loop antenna. Itasca had no voice capability on 7500. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 15:03:12 EST From: Claude Stokes Subject: Re: AE & Coded Messages Ted Campbell wrote: > My question is, was there a particular transmitter tied into the coding key > and was it removed otherwise why wouldn't the mike button pressing have the > same "desired" crispness as the coding key? It seems to me the machine > wouldn't know if its command to start/stop came from a key or the mike. My recollection of old radios in old airplanes, (vht2 superhomer in cessna 140) when you press the mic you get a sound, and also,, when you release the mic you get a sound. Could this have happen with AE and her bendix set up thus causing a high degree of garbled signals if trying to send morse code with the mic, resulting in the weird message like the one we've been trying to decode? For anyone who has ever used the old tube radios with variable tuning and maybe 3 or 4 transmitting crystals does this kind of ring a bell? I'm thinking the old vht2 superhomer was not very far removed from the kind of radio AE was using. In my book that was a very difficult radio to use, with many flaws, and you had to be real careful how you tuned the receiver and how you used the mic compared to the clear crystal sets we are using today. Claude Stokes ltm ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 15:08:29 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: AE & Coded Messages Ted Campbell wrote: > My question is, was there a particular transmitter tied into the coding key > and was it removed otherwise why wouldn't the mike button pressing have the > same "desired" crispness as the coding key? It seems to me the machine > wouldn't know if its command to start/stop came from a key or the mike. Ted, not wanting to give a flip reply, but i would like to say, "why don't you try it?" All this requires is a push-to-talk comm microphone and a knowledge of what good sending sounds like. You will find that only with great attention and extremely slow speed, can you make anything come accross that doesn't sound sick. Then, add in the runup of the transmitter dynamotor to full speed, the timing of the high voltage and antenna relays, and you are guaranteed to lose or mangle characters. Did Messier report "very slow and poor morse sending, rife with errors" ? "Slow sending" is not the same as "troubled, extremely slow sending". Hue Miller ************************************************************** From Ric Hue, we don't know how Messier described it. We only know how Bevis related what Messier said. You seem to want to dictate what people should have said. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 15:15:53 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Ric wrote: > Everything you've quoted above is qualified with "typically" "reliable", etc. > Just as with Betty's reception, we - by definition - are talking about a > highly unusual occurrence. If we were talking about typical, reliable radio > traffic we would have dozens of Bettys and Carrols. Let me throw the question > back at you. Is it not possible that Earhart heard some part of a transmission > by Carrol? I will accept the challenge of this question turned to me and reply: 1. I thought the reason we went to the "Harmonic Theory" in the first place, was because the idea of hearing a distress call: At home in Florida From Niku in the So. Pacific On AE's regular low HF channels ( 3105 & 6210 ) During daylight hours. was untenable, an unworkable, impossible combination. Not just unlikely or rare: impossible. 2. If there's some difference in propagation between these 2 paths, on same frequencies and time of day, i don't see it: Niku to Florida vs. Florida to Niku 3. But, i agree, you should not take my word for it. Will you refer this to Bob Brandenburg for analysis? Bob? I suggest as parameters: 10:00 Niku 16:00 Florida, USA Frequencies ( centered in 2 possible ham bands ) 3800 and 7200 kHz. Mode, double sideband AM. For Carroll's ham antenna, how about a dipole, broadside to the path to Niku (optimized for Niku ) For Carroll's ham transmitter power, i suggest using 200 watts. (His daughter - also a radio ham - says his gear was nothing out of the ordinary. In 1937, max legal power (about 700 watts out) required a rack about 22 inches wide and 4 to 6 feet tall. I feel confident that if Carroll had this, which few hams had, his daughter would have so commented.) However, for the sake of the analysis, we could also try the analysis with a power of 700 watts. AE's receiver, let's simply say, same practical sensitivity as Betty's. AE's antenna, is somewhat diminished from a fullsize wire antenna, because remember, she is receiving only on the loop antenna, diameter approximately 1 foot. 4. Once Bob determines the number of days that this path, under these conditions, would be possible, we can then address this question: Why was it so important for Earhart to reply only to W4OK in Florida, when there were stronger ham signals nearby from the many hams on the air from California, Mexico, Hawaii, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia ( Netherlands colony ), Japan? Maybe even, in morse code only, from Howland Island ? So AE tries to contact only one of the weaker stateside signals, instead of one of many hams running high power from another coastal area? Did she have some preference for Florida people? Betty was able to hear AE for 2 hours, but hears AE only call one Florida ham. -Hue Miller ********************************************************* From Ric Bob's an innocent victim in this. He never proposed that AE could have heard Carroll. I asked the question of whether it was possible, but maybe he can help us evaluate the possibility. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2003 15:18:47 EST From: Daryll Bollinger Subject: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF Ron Bright wrote: >Daryll and radio gurus. >Would the fact that AE had no key but had to use the mic push button >cause any of those spaces, etc Yeah, I think that is a possibility. As I understand some of the exchanges that Mike E. has contributed to the forum, when you push the button, the dynamotor starts to spin up to supply the peak transmit voltage. With the button NOT pressed down, plate voltage (?) (idle voltage?) comes from the normal 12/24 (?) volt AC electrical system. Using a mic button to form dots and dashes and coupled with the spin up AND spin down lag times means that peak transmit voltage might not coincide with some dots and dashes. AE not having a key is pretty well circulated in AE lore. Why? Probably because some of the post loss messages were in "key" code and there were discussions about real vs hoax messages being received in code. Not having a key reinforced the crash & sank theory. Just because they left Miami without one (key) doesn't mean they couldn't have picked one up in Batavia. Noonan wrote Pallet that the radio was just in a fix or worthless while crossing the Atlantic in the rain, they were on instruments most of the time. The airplane didn't have static wicks for one thing. Maybe Noonan put on his list of "things to do" is get a key at the Batavia stop, theorizing that code might get through better than voice. We have the Itasca logging dashes from the Electra at 08:00 I think. If the Mic button was used to form those dashes I would think the Itasca would have heard cockpit engine noise in those dashes and ID'd it that way. A couple of hours earlier that morning AE said on the radio she would whistle into the Mic for the Itasca to DF on them. So now we have "whistling" and "dashes" coming from the Electra. Instead of logging "whistling" at 08:00 the Itasca logs "dashes". It seems contemporaneous records don't agree with contemporaneous documents concerning the Electra's MEL (minimum equipment list). Cam argues for the presence of an undocumented Bendix HFDF in the Electra. Cmdr. Safford's research circa 1960's indicated that the HFDF on Howland came out of a Navy Patrol Plane at Pearl AND was the same as AE had in her plane. AE couldn't get a minimum at Lae during her test because she thought she was too close to the station, what freq. was Balfour using for the test? Typical NDB freqs were low frequency that would allow an airplane to navigate directly to AND fly directly over the beacon. If a pilot couldn't find a bearing to the beacon by obtaining a minimum with the loop then that's a squawk and should not to be passed off as a function of distance. AE must have had other expectations regarding her radio capabilities. Balfour noted that his reception quality had no bearing on when AE changed frequencies. The Itasca by pre-arrangment was sending weather on 7500 and 3105 during the night. AE could have attempted to DF on those weather broadcasts at great distances as a test for the Bendix RA-1 with records kept and logged onboard the Electra. AE seemed to confirm that she could DF on those frequencies when she asked the Itasca for signals to DF on 7500 kcs and stated she couldn't get a minimum. Was that radio transmission the "disobeyed all orders" that Morgenthau referred to in May '38'? "Orders" not to publicise that she had the Bendix radio on board? I can't think of anything else that happened that morning that could be construed as "disobeying orders".......except ending up in the Mandates when she was told to stay away from there. Aviation and radio experts seem to agree (TODAY) that HFDF radios couldn't be used to navigate accurately. Well somebody didn't tell the Japanese that back in '37'. ****************************************************** Source: OP-20-G Station Baker (Guam) documents 28 June to 18 July 1937, II OPERATIONS, classified secret in '37'. pg. 3 During the period 29 June to 5 July inclusive, the Kamoi, Okinoshima, Asanagi, Yunagi and Yokohama Air Station were active with aircraft maneuvers, terminating in a flight from the Kamoi to the Yokohama Air Station by a Kamoi plane, on 5 July. On 2 July, the Kamoi was heard repeating his call sign, alternately on 7275 Kcs (E) and 6150 Kcs, for periods of 5 to 8 minutes, presumably to permit planes to take bearings. pg. 53 NEKA5 (Kamoi) heard on 7275 Kcs sending his call over and over. Alternated with 6100 Kcs at intervals of about 20 minutes. Believe this to enable planes to take bearings on him. This frequency probably an aircraft DF circuit. ***************************************************** It would appear from the Navy's own intelligence sources that the Japanese Navy (IJN) were testing or using HFDF airborne radio direction finders during the "World Flight". KAMOI's frequencies were "7275 Kcs (E) and 6150 Kcs" and "6100 Kcs". ITASCA's frequencies were 3105, 6210, 7500 Kcs. When AE asked for signals on 7500 to DF on and then stating she couldn't get a minimum, to a Japanese intercept station in the Marshalls, the situation would then paralleled the intelligence on the Kamoi's that the US Navy had collected classified as SECRET on Guam. It seems logical to me if the two great opposing Navies in the Pacific were toying with airborne HFDF and AE had one, then not documenting it in the Electra seems reasonable to me. Daryll ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 11:38:32 EST From: Ted Campbell Subject: Re: AE & Coded Messages Hue Miller, thanks for your response to my question. You stated "Then add the runup of the transmitter...guaranteed to lose or mangle characters." Wouldn't all this additional "interference" be there even if you used a coding key? I am trying to get it clear in my mind what if any "machine noise" we have to take into account when we try to decipher the Messier message. For example: lay out the Morse code for na u 61 4 then lay out the code for 17?a(the A may be machine noise or an inadvertent press of the ptt switch) 61(the 1 may be the same as the A above)4 and you get something that looks like 17?6 4 which is awful close to the longitude of Howland Island on the Clarence S Williams navigation log for Howland to Lae. The point being, MAYBE AE was trying to guess her location relative to a "known location" of Howland Island. Ted Campbell ********************************************************************** From Ric I think we all need to get a good handle on what happens when you send code using a key versus what happens if you try to send code using the push-to-talk button on a microphone. I'm not sure I have it straight in my own head so I'm going to describe what I think happens and ask that our radio gurus correct me. The first thing to understand is that the transmitter has to, for want of a better term, "spool up" before it can actually transmit. Unlike today's radios, you can't just pick up the mic, mash the push-to-talk, and start speaking. You have to wait a second or two after you push the button while the dynamotor spins up and provides the transmitter with sufficient voltage to operate. If you have a code-sending key there is a switch on the key assembly labeled "CW-Phone". By flipping that switch to the "CW" position the dynamotor is turned on so that the transmitter is sending a "continuous wave" (that's what CW stands for). You then use the key to interupt the continuous wave in a pattern of dots and dashes - i.e. code. What you're sending out is a constant "shhhhhhhh" sound (a "carrier wave") broken by little clicks and moments of silence - short for dots and longer for dashes. If the receiving station has a device called a Beat Frequency Oscillator (BFO), those moments of silence are converted into "beeps" so that the operators hears " de de deee de ..." etc. instead of breaks in the carrier wave - much easier to read. Without a code-sending key the situation is very different. With no way to make the dyamotor run continuously, it has to spin up every time you depress the mic button. You're basically sending code by repeatedly starting and stopping the dynamotor. It's not only ponderous and sloppy, but it's really rough on the dynamotor. The sound you're putting out is also very different from that put out by a key. The dynamotor spinning up puts out a characteristic "yoop" sound, followed by the "shhhh" of the carrier wave. Code sent with the push-to-talk would be heard as "yoopshh yoopshh yoopshhhhh yoopshh". Have I got that right? (Radio gurus, bear in mind that Earhart did not have MCW capability.) LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 11:46:40 EST From: Angus Murray Subject: STENDEC There's a whole website devoted to STENDEC and a wide variety of fairly convincing explanations, one of which I seem to remember is: ST (Stardust - name of airliner) END (end of transmission) AR (out). (EC and AR are identical in morse apart from the letter break). The message was repeated three times so it seems unlikely that there was any error in it of actual dots and dashes. The problem with the Messier message is that we don't know the period of time between letter groups. Could be seconds - or many minutes. You can make anything of it you like with a little imagination. STENDEC has umpteen interpretations and that is a single word, without gaps, sent by an experienced operator and was repeated three times - so we can be pretty sure that was what was actually sent. Trying to make sense of the Messier message by considering it continuous and then reinterpreting the spaces between letters is an utter waste of time. Regards Angus. ********************************************************************* From Marty > Didn't somebody figure out that simply moving the pauses > between dots and dashes gave the actual name of the airliner? That seems to be one of several theories of what it might means. It's not a knockdown argument: LTM. Marty #2359 ************************************************************** From Ron Berry STENDEC Severe Turbulence Encountered Now Descending Emergency Crash-landing. In October of 1972 an airliner sent this signal just before it became missing. It was thought that everyone on board was killed but only 13 were killed in the crash on a mountain top in the Andes. The survivors were stranded for 72 days on the mountain in the snow and ice. This is off the subject and not very detailed. Ron Berry **************************************************************** From Herman De Wulf (#2406) The aircraft Rick refers to was an Avro Lancastrian of British South American Airways (BSAA), registered G-AGWH. It was named "Stardust". On the last leg of its flight to Chile, while en route from Buenos Aires to Santiago, Lancastrian "Stardust" slammed into Mount Topungato at 5,000 ft. on 2 August 1947, killing all 11 on board: the crew of 5 and 6 passengers. The wreck was discovered only in 2000. Where do you get the information the aircraft's call sign would have been "STENDEC" ? By the way, the Lancastrian was a crude conversion of the British wartime Lancaster bomber. It had all military equipment removed, including nose, top and tail gun turrets which were faired over, giving the aircraft a beautifully streamlined appearance. The bomb bay offered seating for up to 14 passengers very much in the way the B-24 Liberator was made into the wartime VIP transport C-87. Bomb doors had been removed and the belly was also faired. Flying in a Lancastrian in the post war years was an experience as noisy as flying in a Lockheed Electra... LTM *********************************************************************** From Phil Tanner I watched a TV documentary on this last week - a repeat, but I believe made within the last couple of years. At the point it was made, the message remained a puzzle. Maybe publicity brought about by the original broadcast produced the answer. LTM Phil Tanner 2276 ***************************************************************** From Karen Hoy This is way off-topic, but I couldn't resist. From what I've read about radio transmissions aboard airplanes, the radio operator always uses the aircraft's call sign when transmitting. Therefore, Stendec probably wouldn't stand for the plane's "public" name, Stardust. The Nova documentary suggested Stendec was the normal Morse sign-off, badly garbled. Karen Hoy TIGHAR#2610 ************************************************** From John The plane was named STARDUST and crashed in the Andes Mountains in 1947. I think that a fair amount of interpretation was probably used to get to that. I'm no good at Morse so I really can't say. I found a NOVA website about it but lost the address. John ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 11:48:44 EST From: Rich Young Subject: Morse sending Ted Campbell asks: >My question is, was there a particular transmitter tied >into the coding key >and was it removed otherwise why wouldn't the mike button pressing have the >same "desired" crispness as the coding key? It seems to me the machine >wouldn't know if its command to start/stop came from a key or the mike. Wireless telegraphy, AKA sending morse code by radio, involves a continuous unmodulated (no sound information) carrier wave, which is modulated with a clearly audible tone when the key or "bug" is pressed. The length of the tone determines whether it is a dot or a dash, and the length of the pause between letters determines the beginning and ending of the words. Since the carrier wave is continuously transmitted, a unit powered by a dynamotor would keep the dynamotor spun up until the end of the transmission. When attempting to send morse by keying the mike, the dynamotor would be continuously trying to spin up and shut off, possibly causing loss of parts of the message and definitely drastically shortening the battery life. Further, the mike switch and the transmitter relays add another variable to the equation, making it very easy to turn a dot into a dash, or two dots into a dash, etc. Lastly, rather than an audible tone, you would just be sending bursts of static as the carrier "broke squelch" on whomever attempted to receive it. Basically, attempt to key morse with a mike switch overs no advantages over simply transmitting voice, and many disadvantages, esp, with the type of equipment AE was thought to be equipped with, and running off of the battery. 73's & 88's to mother Rich Young ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 11:57:10 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: The 281 message The 281 msg was received on 5 July at Wailupe radio at 1130 GMT. How would this fit into the alleged July 5th interception of AE's signal by Betty around 4:30pm EST in terms of time and content? Cdr Thompson later regarded this as a hoax "originating in the Hawaiian Islands." Did he ever serve up some evidence of this conclusion. Ron Bright ************************************************************************** From Ric In terms of local time in the Central Pacific, the 281 message was heard between midnight and 1 a.m. on July 5th. We speculate that Betty's reception may have been heard later that morning from 10 a.m. to 11:45 a.m. In terms of similarity of content you could say that both attempt to convey some sort of position and both convey concern about rising water. For what it's worth, both messages are heard during what we calculate to be periods of rising tide at Gardner island. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 12:03:15 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF Many ideas very interesting to me, were in Daryll's post: > Yeah, I think that is a possibility. As I understand some of the > exchanges that Mike E. has contributed to the forum, when you push the > button, the dynamotor starts to spin up to supply the peak transmit > voltage. With the button NOT pressed down, plate voltage (?) (idle > voltage?) comes from the normal 12/24 (?) volt AC electrical system. > Using a mic button to form dots and dashes and coupled with the spin up > AND spin down lag times means that peak transmit voltage might not > coincide with some dots and dashes. Another complication is that you have 2 sequenced relays ( "high voltage" and "antenna relays" ) which "may" ( i dunno for sure ) interfere with the formation of short morse code elements ( the "dits" or "dots" ) > Just because they left Miami without one (key) doesn't mean they > couldn't have picked one up in Batavia. Noonan wrote Pallet that the > radio was just in a fix or worthless while crossing the Atlantic in the > rain, they were on instruments most of the time. The airplane didn't > have static wicks for one thing. Maybe Noonan put on his list of "things > to do" is get a key at the Batavia stop, theorizing that code might get > through better than voice. But was FN comfortable enuff with the code AND telegraphy radio procedure, that just picking up a key would have set him up for using it on the next flight legs? > We have the Itasca logging dashes from the > Electra at 08:00 I think. Dashes are easy to make just using the mic button. It's when you have to turn the transmitter on and off rapidly that you get difficulty. > If the Mic button was used to form those > dashes I would think the Itasca would have heard cockpit engine noise in > those dashes and ID'd it that way. That's a pretty good point! > Cmdr. Safford's research circa 1960's indicated that the HFDF > on Howland came out of a Navy Patrol Plane at Pearl AND was the same as > AE had in her plane. Another thing i didn't know. So the Howland HFDF was the same thing as in AE's plane, a type "RDF-1" loop unit? Very interesting! ( But not particularly effective, compared to the usual large, ground-based Adcock antenna unit. > Balfour noted that his reception quality had no bearing on when AE > changed frequencies. I don't understand what you're saying here. You mean, his reception of AE was the same on either channel? > Aviation and radio experts seem to agree (TODAY) that HFDF radios > couldn't be used to navigate accurately. Well somebody didn't tell the > Japanese that back in '37'. The keyword might be "accurately". I might add, reliably. Nobody told the Japanese back in '37, but they caught on by 1941. From WW2 histories ( "Combined Fleet Decoded", for example ) we can see that Japan had much success with ground and ship-based direction finding on shortwaves. However, the equipment used was not small aircraft receiving loops, rather, large, fixed place equipment and antenna arrays. ( Same as the other powers. ) In fact, from what i can tell, Japan had both more various types of aircraft radios, but used less actual aircraft avionics than other wartime belligerents, including *much* less use of beacon homing stations. I base my statement on 3 WW2 U.S. classified listings of Japanese equipment which i have examined, plus some magazine articles on the technology. For example, an Office of Naval Intelligence publication on Japanese aircraft equipment illustrates and lists about 30 aircraft radios - only ONE is a (LF/MF) navigation type receiver, and it is a copy of the Fairchild USA pre-war model. And from what i have seen in existence, this unit is extremely rare, compared to other models of Japanese communications gear. This unbalance in comm to navigation type equipment is not seen in the equipment stocklist, or surviving examples, of USA, UK, or German or Italian equipment, as far as i can tell. A good many Japanese fighter planes did not even carry radios - in this case maybe only the flight leader's plane did. I read one account by a Japanese fighter pilot, who said pilots removed radios, because they operated so poorly. ( Try that in the USAAF or USN ! ) Also, i recall that when Saburo Sakai made his hours long straggling return flight to his base, in his damaged Zero fighter, wounded, eyes clouded with blood, he did it without any kind of electronic or radio navigation equipment. ******************************** > Source: OP-20-G Station Baker (Guam) documents 28 June to 18 July 1937, > II OPERATIONS, classified secret in '37'. pg. 3 > > During the period 29 June to 5 July inclusive, the Kamoi, Okinoshima, > Asanagi, Yunagi and Yokohama Air Station were active with aircraft > maneuvers, terminating in a flight from the Kamoi to the Yokohama Air > Station by a Kamoi plane, on 5 July. On 2 July, the Kamoi was heard > repeating his call sign, alternately on 7275 Kcs (E) and 6150 Kcs, for > periods of 5 to 8 minutes, presumably to permit planes to take bearings.... Where is this very interesting intercept material published? I would only add - of course i wasn't there- but you don't take bearings on call letters, on dots and dashes, at least with "manual" antenna rotating and seeking equipment. ( The allied antisubmarine HFDF was automatic and fast enuff to deal with DFing on very short telegraphy messages. ) You take bearings on long dashes or continuous carrier. (The only reason for long "dashes" instead of a solid uninterrupted carrier is to keep the transmitter from overheating, if it's operating close to its limits.) Sometimes call letters were sent by machine, so they could be endlessly repeated. This was to provide a marker, as to the correct frequency to answer back on. Maybe the intercepts quoted above actually implied that uninterupted periods for bearing-taking were *also* sent, i don't know. Permit me a few more sentences of more digressive stuff. I recently bought the book "Flyboys", and for WW2 aviation enthusiasts i really recommend it. Deals with WW2 USN air war, George Bush, real wartime emotions of these really young flyers, strafing parachutes, fire bombing, Japanese radio communications station Chichi Jima, war criminals, and much more of interest. Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 12:18:17 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Ric wrote: > Bob's an innocent victim in this. He never proposed that AE coud have heard > Carroll. I asked the question of whether it was possible, but maybe he can > help us evaluate the possibility. We don't need to reinvent the wheel. I visited TIGHAR's excellent website and copied this: "A previous analysis, performed when Betty's report was received, addressed the question of whether Betty could have heard Amelia on 3105 kHz (Amelia's night frequency) or 6210 kHz (her day frequency). The results showed that such reception was impossible. The entire propagation path from Gardner Island to St. Petersburg was in daylight, and the path loss was too high for reception on either frequency. But Betty's notebook was too credible to be dismissed out of hand, so it was decided to consider alternative explanations. During that process, Mike Everette and the author concurrently, and independently, recognized the possibility that Betty heard Amelia on a harmonic of 3105 kHz or 6210 kHz. " Unless someone strongly objects, i suggest the same truth stated in the second sentence above applies to the same path, but signal sent in opposite direction: from ham Carroll's Florida home, to AE at Niku island. So, i ask again: how did AE hear W4OK, Mr. Carroll? The conclusion you must arrive at is: the Amelia Earhart at Niku island, did not, COULD not hear W4OK. Then, you may want to ask, what is this callsign doing in the Betty's log of AE's message? Betty recently verified it IS IN FACT a callsign, NOT just words that "sound like call letters", as associated by propagation highs or omissions, as was at one point maintained here on the Forum. Furthermore, AE was excited about hearing someone and trying to get back to them. You want to talk about "occult facts"? ( I prefer to use the term, "esoteric knowledge", but no big deal. ) How about "W4OK" ? Did the REAL Amelia Earhart have any reason to know a Florida ham's call letters? Who in this story, COULD know a Florida ham's call letters? Note, i am not necessarily pointing my finger at any single person, i am saying: let's look at all the players, and think about who COULD have known a Florida ham's call letters. Hue Miller ***************************************************************** From Ric I can't fault your logic. It does seem effectively impossible that Earhart heard a transmission from Carroll - so where did the call letters come from? Who may have known those call letters? Well....one possible answer is Amelia Earhart. We don't have many details about it, but there was apparently a network of amateur operators set up prior to the first World Flight attempt intended to assist the flight. I don't recall right now where it was referenced - maybe in one of the newspaper articles that preceded the first attempt - but one of the "books" inventoried after the Luke Field crash was a "List of stations performing special services". Carroll's location in south Florida would seem to make him a candidate to assist that part of the flight. Maybe his callsign was one of many that Earhart had on her list and she was just trying them all at different times. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 12:21:14 EST From: Daryll Bollinger Subject: the Lancastrian Rick wrote: >A Lancastrian was recently discovered in the Andes, after it vanished >with all on board many years ago. I recall the mysterious last Morse >signal from it had been "STENDEC". Rick, the Lancastrian story was a fascinating conclusion to a 50+ year old aviation mystery. The Lancastrian was asked to re-transmit the last message and STENDEC was confirmed as the content of the coded message the radio operator sent. When the PBS program first aired a year or so ago, viewers were asked to email in their thoughts regarding what STENDEC meant. I suggested "STARTING ENROUTE DESCENT" since this was before radar, transponders and enroute air traffic control. Aircraft had to radio the phase of flight they were in. Since no one at the arrival airport or anyone involved in the airline in South America knew what it meant I guessed the creative Lancastrian radio operator would have cleared it up had they arrived safely. Asked what he meant he could have responded, "...I didn't want to tap out the complete string of letters. From now on I will just send STENDEC when we start letting down...." Had Noonan been around for the search critique of the "world flight" and asked if he sent the "281 Message" he could have responded; "...yeah I sent it. We departed the LOP on a 281 degree heading trying to get back to the string of islands in the Gilberts. I didn't know we had been NORTH of HOWLAND until we ended up in the Marshalls. You received ABOVE WATER, didn't that suggest to you that we were on land above the water line somewhere on the 5th? Really...., I thought the Navy had charts of the Pacific that would have indicated that there WASN'T any land 281 miles north of Howland and you guys should have figured out that 281 was degrees on a compass rose....%^$@#"...." Daryll ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 09:53:17 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Betty and Francis/ W40K Previous inquiries with Nancy Carroll, daughter of Francis Carroll (W40K in 1937), disclosed that according to her roommate, "Smitty", Francis remarked during an Amelia Earhart television special circa 1990 that "I once talked to her... and wondered whatever happened" or words to that effect. The comment that he once "talked" to Amelia spurred our efforts to determine just how his call sign of W40K got into one of the first entries of Betty's notebook. We speculated that AE may have somehow heard his transmission and repeated his call sign and Betty recorded it. A second possibility was that Betty heard Francis's attempt to contact AE on his shortwave radio and recorded the call sign. Francis, an avid ham, was just 170 miles away at West Palm Beach on the same great circle route from St Petersburg. Betty was "pretty sure" it was a woman's voice but it could have been a man. [ In view of the initial excitement, static, fading in and out, I think we can not rule out that it could have been Francis Carroll] Thus today I interviewed by telephone Vea J. Smith, aka "Smitty", a roommate of Nancy Carroll's, at Ft Pierce, Florida about her recollections of Francis' comments. Yes she recalled the circumstances and has discussed the events with Nancy. She remembers she, Nancy, Francis and his wife were in the living room at Carroll's Vero Beach residence watching a television special on AE, such as History or National Geographic. She could not recall which one nor any of the content. She placed the date sometime in late 80' or early 1990s. Sometime during the program, Francis remarked that he " had HEARD her once and tried to get back to her but couldn't". [my emphasis]. I reminded "Smitty" that we first heard from Nancy, who was quoting you, that he had "talked" to her, not "heard" her. Smitty spent some time thinking about this and is quite sure now that he said he "heard" her, not "talked" with her. He was fully cognizant of his faculties, she said and trusted that comment. Note: All of Smitty's recollections are hearsay and of course anecdotal. I think this might make a huge difference in our research. Francis, who died in 2000, is stating that he only HEARD AE, and that he couldn't reach AE to talk with her. It is entirely possible that Betty and Carroll heard the same woman's voice, maybe AE's, and that when Carroll attempted to transmit back, Betty noted the W40K. (There is no report of a KHAQQ calling in connection with Carrolls call sign, nor any apparent attempt by AE to clarify his location, etc.) I again talked with Nancy Carroll specifically about her father's shortwave equipment. Since she just a child,she had no specific recollection of the 1937 equipment, but as she grew up in the households, she remembered he owned general equipment, not expensive because they couldn't afford it. He was into emergency help and assistance as many hams were, and it was a hobby. She thought, and it was only a guess, that he used a single dipole antenna (whatever that is) at their W. Palm Beach House. She is looking up photos of the house now. LTM, Ron Bright ****************************************************************** From Ric Thanks Ron. Very interesting. So let's say that Carroll hears AE on the same harmonic frequency that Betty hears her on just prior to when Betty tunes in. If Betty heard AE on a harmonic it was probably between 18 and 25 mHz. If Carroll heard AE and tried to reply he would probably call on the same he heard her on - so the question becomes, could an "average" ham like Carroll transmit on 15525, 18630, 21735, 24840 kHz? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 09:56:48 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: AE & Coded Messages Ric and all the other radio experts, was there not a switch on the radio whichever one was installed for CW? I know you said there was one on the key. Alan ********************************************************************** From Ric In a forum posting on Feb. 8 of this year Mike Everette wrote: >The switch in question was located on the telegraph key assembly. >If the key was left behind, there was no way to place the radio in the >"correct" CW mode. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 10:03:11 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Morse sending From the descriptions I'm read from you guys about what is produced by using a mike to send Morse rather than using a key is so radically different that I'm puzzled no one mentioned that fact when receiving the coded message. All I recall in the way of comment was it was sent slowly. I see four possibilities. 1. It WAS mentioned and I am the only one who missed it. 2. No one thought to mention it. 3. The mike keying didn't come out as we are thinking but more like regular code with a key. 4. They really DID have a key. What am I missing? Alan ************************************************************************ From Ric What we're all missing in the case of the two fragmentary code messages reportedly received (the 281 message and the Messier message) is any first-party description of what was heard. In the case of the 281 message we have only what the Coast Guard operator in Hawaii (COMHAWSEC) said he was told by Navy Radio Wailupe, probably in a phone call as there is no written message. In the case of the Messier message we have only what Bevis put in his report three years later. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 10:10:41 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF > Just because they left Miami without one (key) doesn't mean they > couldn't have picked one up in Batavia. I haven't read anything that convinces me there was a key on board or not. I am also not convinced about the degree of proficiency in Morse our heroes had or didn't have. As I recall the comment was made by someone at Lae regarding their lack of Morse Code ability. That's not enough. I also recognize the contrary has not been shown. Alan ************************************************************************** From Ric It's more than a comment by someone at Lae. Earhart herself repeatedly specified that the Coast Guard should send only voice, and Chater is very specific on this point. "On enquiry Miss Earhart and Captain Noonan advised that they entirely depended on radio telephone reception as neither of them were able to read morse at any speed but could recognise an individual letter sent several times. This point was again mentioned by both of them later when two different sets at Lae were used for listening in for time signals." What would convince you? There are a lot of open questions about the Earhart disappearance but this ain't one of them. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 10:14:59 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: The 281 message Ron said: >Cdr Thompson later regarded this as a hoax "originating in the Hawaiian >Islands." Did he ever serve up some evidence of this conclusion? Am I correct that Thompson simply voiced that opinion unsupported or we are not privy to his reasoning? Alan ********************************************************************* From Ric Thompson did not explain his reasoning and there is no record of any investigation that revealed the 281 message to be a hoax. Thompson categorically dismissed all of the alleged post-loss messages after it became known that the airplane could not transmit if afloat. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 10:28:00 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF > Cmdr. Safford's research circa 1960's indicated that the HFDF > on Howland came out of a Navy Patrol Plane at Pearl AND was the same as > AE had in her plane. >Another thing i didn't know. So the Howland HFDF was the same thing as >in AE's plane, a type "RDF-1" loop unit? Is this something we can take to the bank or is it undocumented? Alan ********************************************************************* From Ric I am aware of no documentation to support such allegations. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:10:33 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF Hue wrote: >Dashes are easy to make just using the mic button. It's when you have to >turn the transmitter on and off rapidly that you get difficulty. I'm getting more confused than normal. Hue, are you saying that with the transmitter on and just keying dots and dashes with the mike button you don't have dynamotors spinning up or anything else happening other interruptions to the carrier wave? By that I mean as the receiver I hear nothing, the mike is keyed and I hear carrier wave, the mike button is released and I'm back to hearing nothing again. Thus the dots and dashes would be "sssss" "ss" and so on. Alan, not a radio man is he ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:11:58 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? >Carroll's location in south Florida would seem to make him a candidate to >assist that part of the flight. Maybe his callsign was one of many that >Earhart had on her list and she was just trying them all at different times. I'm not seeing the problem with the call sign. AE took off from Florida on this flight and Carroll could have cranked up and bid her a good flight or she could have known before hand and in desperation may have called Carroll and Lord knows who else. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:16:21 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Ric wrote: > Who may have known those call letters? Well....one possible answer is Amelia > Earhart. I have to credit you with that interesting possible answer, which seems to me the most farfetched of all the candidates. > We don't have many details about it, but there was apparently a > network of amateur operators set up prior to the first World Flight attempt > intended to assist the flight. I don't recall right now where it was > referenced - maybe in one of the newspaper articles that preceded the > first attempt - I saw a list in RADIO magazine, some issue in months before or after the loss. W4OK was not in the list. I will try find and maybe copy for you the short article. > but one > of the "books" inventoried after the Luke Field crash was a "List of stations > performing special services". You can eliminate this book from your considerations. This is part of the Berne List series. It means, commercial and government stations giving time, weather, and DF services. I have at least one of these, from the 1930s. Other volumes were different compilations, such as broadcast-only stations, call letters of all stations, aeronautical services stations, things like that. Berne Lists, as far as i know, never had any compilation of ham stations. > Carroll's location in south Florida would seem to make him a candidate to > assist that part of the flight. Maybe his callsign was one of many that Earhart > had on her list and she was just trying them all at different times. The RADIO article, if i recall, has hams listed in California and Hawaii. If Earhart had him on her to-do list, she must have favored his callsign above others, for some reason, because Betty didn't hear AE call any other station in 2 hours. Why was AE all excited about calling W4OK, in Florida? -Hue Miller ******************************************************************* From Ric I'm just trying to think of possibilities. Yes, I'd very much like to see the list. It may tie in with other alleged post-loss receptions. For example, I'd love to know if Walter McMenamy, Karl Pierson, or Bob Rybinski were on the list. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:19:36 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Morse sending Rich Young wrote: > Basically, attempt to key morse with a mike switch overs no > advantages over simply transmitting voice, and many disadvantages, esp, with > the type of equipment AE was thought to be equipped with, and running off of > the battery. I want to correct this information, at least the first part of the above statement. At the receiving end, for anyone with a communication-type receiver capable of cw reception, once you notice the on-and-off rushing or pulsing noise that marks a cw ( morse telegrapy) signal, you simply flip a switch on the receiver that gives a tone of around 700-1000 Hertz instead of the former noise. The tone of around 1000 Hz is pleasing to listen to, is around the maximum sensitivity frequency of the ear, and punches through noise much better than the complex medium of the human voice. As i mentioned earlier here, the old "rule of thumb" in the US Navy was that morse was 10x as effective as AM-voice. That means, roughly, 1/10 the power was required for the same distance. ( If you have a receiver with variable bandwidth that can be set for very narrow selectivity - the theoretical advantage of radiotelegraph over DSB-AM voice is up to 17 db. That's around 40 times as effective as voice. ) In a distress situation, sending telegraph any way you can, makes powerful sense, whether you do it by touching bare wires together, anything, as long as you can interrupt the transmitter output, to form dots and dashes. Now that second part: i agree wholeheartedly. This kind of morse sent with dynamotor being on and offed and large, sequenced relays kicking in and out, would sound like hell at the receiving end, would sound like the rankest beginner, would be rife with errors (from misformed dot / dash characters. ) ( Maybe it would be kinda fun to recreate the Messier message using this way of sending, and convert it to a WAV file? ) Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:27:54 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Betty and Francis/ W40K Ric wrote: > Thanks Ron. Very interesting. So let's say that Carroll hears AE on the > same harmonic frequency that Betty hears her on just prior to when Betty tunes > in. If Betty heard AE on a harmonic it was probably between 18 and 25 mHz. If > Carroll heard AE and tried to reply he would probably call on the same he heard > her on - so the question becomes, could an "average" ham like Carroll > transmit on 15525, 18630, 21735, 24840 kHz? Yes, Ron does do very good work. Thanks, Ron, indeed for your legwork on the research. Why would Carroll think the aircraft would have a general coverage radio, I mean one tuning extra bands beyond those required for communication? Especially above 20000? Even the Bendix didn't tune that high, let alone the WE aircraft set! Where on earth would Carroll get crystals for these odd frequencies in 1937???? And why????? How quickly could Carroll modify his transmitter for these frequencies? 2 days? Modify his antenna? -Hue Miller ********************************************************************** From Ric I don't know what assumptions Carroll may have made about what Earhart's receiving capabilities were and neither do you. If you're saying that it's not reasonable to think that Carroll would have the capability to transmit on any of those frequencies, even if it was legal for him to do so, that's something else. Do the other radio gurus agree? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:33:54 EST From: Mike Juliano Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF " ... neither of them were able to read morse at any speed but could recognise an individual letter sent several times. This point was again mentioned by both of them later when two different sets at Lae were used for listening in for time signals." That's odd. I was under the impression that all PAA officers worked their way the ladder to left seat and that they had to be proficent in ALL areas of the operation of the flying boats and radio? LTM Mike J. (.-...) ************************************************************************* From Ric We looked into that some time back. As I recall the company went to that policy shortly after Noonan resigned. Prior to that there were dedicated navigators and radio operators who were not slated for advancement to piloting positions. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:45:48 EST From: Daryll Subject: Hue's comments For Hue; >But was FN comfortable enuff with the code AND telegraphy radio >procedure, that just picking up a key would have set him up for using it >on the next flight legs? We have statements from ex Pan Am people that state that Noonan would spell the regular radio operator on Clipper Flights. I can't imagine Noonan just sitting there at the radio AND then running to get or wake up the regular radio operator when the radio started clicking. As I understood in a previous post on the forum, the SOP for the Clippers, they would send something over the radio every 20-30 mins. for the Pan Am ground stations to take a bearing. When I read that I noted how closely it paralleled AE's routine. >>Howland came out of a Navy Patrol Plane at Pearl AND was the same as AE >>had in her plane. > >Another thing i didn't know. So the Howland HFDF was the same thing as >in AE's plane, a type "RDF-1" loop unit? Very interesting! ( But not >particularly effective, compared to the usual large, ground-based Adcock >antenna unit. Cam W. has restored Cmdr. Safford's manuscript to hard cover, which I regret not having a copy. A few years ago Randy J. was good enough to copy the lose pages that he had and send them to me. Parts were extremely hard to read from the copying process. Safford stated that he became interested in the Earhart mystery when he read Goerner's book and noted the experimental HFDF on Howland. HFDF was part of Safford's business when commanded the Navy's OP-20-G before and during the war. He started tracking the source of the experimental HFDF that was on Howland. It seemed that when he said it was "the same as AE had in her plane" it was said as a passing comment like he just knew it. I don't recall him explaining that comment or his knowledge of Earhart's radio in any more detail. >>Balfour noted that his reception quality had no bearing on when AE >>changed frequencies. > >I don't understand what you're saying here. You mean, his reception of >AE was the same on either channel? I was just trying to say that AE had a radio schedule for frequencies and transmission times that she followed, independent of how well Balfour could hear her. The Ontario was the only official listening station between Lae and Itasca. >From WW2 histories ( "Combined Fleet Decoded", for example ) we can >see that Japan had much success with ground and ship-based direction finding on >shortwaves. However, the equipment used was not small aircraft receiving >loops, rather, large, fixed place equipment and antenna arrays. You might check me on this if you have Prado's book "Combined Fleet Decoded" handy. I thought one of the points that Prado was making was the LACK of development on the Japanese part for developing shipboard HFDF. He attributed a major sea battle victory to the US Navy because they had a good shipboard HFDF when the Japanese didn't. >Where is this very interesting intercept material published? You are referring to the Station Baker documents. I only have 3 pages of what appears to be a larger report. They were not published that I know of. What I have was sent to me by a researcher who monitors this Forum. They might be found in the list of NSA documents that have been declassified at NARA. The copies I have have SECRET crossed out (w/highlighter) and a CONFIDENTIAL stamp to replace the secret classification. I don't see a declassification stamp on them which makes the provenance suspect. By suspect I mean Safford could have accessed them for his research on his manuscript before they were officially declassified. Daryll ***************************************************************** From Ric Daryll, did you or did you not post to this forum the following as a statement of fact? >Cmdr. Safford's research circa 1960's indicated that the HFDF on >Howland came out of a Navy Patrol Plane at Pearl AND was the same as AE >had in her plane. Now you say: >It seemed that when he said it was "the same as AE had in her >plane" it was said as a passing comment like he just knew it. I don't >recall him explaining that comment or his knowledge of Earhart's radio >in any more detail. So which is it? Did Safford ever say anything about the Howland HFDF coming out of a Navy patrol plane or did you just make that up? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 19:49:41 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Fact and fiction I've questioned a number of posting comments lately for the simple reason they have been suspect to me as NOT being documented facts. I'm not talking about opinions. I'm referring to things like Howland having the same radio AE had and Thompson's declarations regarding the 281 message. It is quite easy to accept things as fact when they are not and thus change the course of our thinking and investigation to some degree however significant. Alan ************************************************************* From Ric The rules of this investigation are very clear. If you state something as fact you had better be ready to back it up with documentation. We have seen repeatedly that a number of folks who fancy themselves as "Earhart researchers" don't understand this most basic of principles. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 20:01:25 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF >as neither of them were able to read morse at any speed I don't have a problem with their lack of ability to READ or RECEIVE Morse Code. I would agree that is not all that open to question but receiving is not the issue. Sending Morse is. If the two messages we have been discussing were sent by AE or FN then that demonstrates the ability, albeit a poor one, to know and send a message in Morse Code. That tells us they either had a "cheat" sheet of Morse or they actually knew the Morse equivalent. I think most would pick the former. I would. Although I would like to think that LOGICALLY they would have kept a key just in case it seems obvious that logic and reason were not their long suits. And before you or someone else points it out I also recognize most any of us could have sent those messages without ANY knowledge of Morse other than having the Code in front of us and preparing the message ahead of time. As to the latter comment it would seem to me the sender must have prepared the message before sending unless they DID know Morse Code. However, since the messages come to us second hand we can't be certain what "sent slowly" means. So it would appear they dumped the key but kept the code book. Odd. Alan ************************************************************* From Ric Having a copy of the alphabet and numerals in morse code does not require having a "code book". Heck, when I was learning to fly it seemed like every plotter and E6B computer (sort of a circular slide-rule for aviation use) had a copy printed right on it. Earhart needed some way to decipher the station identifiers if she hoped to use her RDF at all. I have no trouble at all seeing her leave the key behind but having a copy of the morse code aboard. If she did send any messages in code it seems like she would have to sit down beforehand and laboriously write out the dots and dashes she intended to send. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 20:08:18 EST From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Ric wrote: > Bob's an innocent victim in this. He never proposed that AE could have heard > Carroll. I asked the question of whether it was possible, but maybe he can > help us evaluate the possibility. Some have suggested that Amelia should have been able to hear Carroll at the same time as Betty heard Amelia because the conditions on the path between Carroll and Niku were the same as on the path between Niku and Betty. Since time and frequency are among the factors determining propagation conditions on a given path, this implicitly assumes that Carroll called Amelia on the same (harmonic) frequency as that on which Betty heard Amelia, and during the period when Betty heard Amelia. In order to hear Carroll on a harmonic of her transmitter frequency, it would be necessary for Amelia to be listening on that frequency, and for Carroll to transmit on a frequency outside the authorized ham bands. It does not seem plausible that radio-ignorant Amelia would be listening to a harmonic of her transmitter frequency, even if her receiver allowed her to do so. Nor does it seem plausible that Carroll would transmit outside his authorized frequency limits and risk losing his ham license. Furthermore, we have no evidence that Carroll called Amelia while Betty was hearing Amelia, or that the only time she mentioned "W4OK" was during that period. Carroll could have called Amelia at some earlier time, perhaps even on an earlier day, and she could have mentioned his call sign during each of her transmissions after hearing him. So we are left with the question of how Amelia could know Carroll's call sign. We know that Carroll said he tried to contact Amelia, and we know that she had a radio receiver capable of receiving frequencies up to 10 MHz. It has been suggested that Carroll could have tried to contact Amelia on either of two ham bands within the frequency range of Amelia's receiver. Two specific frequencies, 3800 kHz and 7200 kHz have been suggested as possibilities. It has also been suggested that ham transmitters of the day were restricted to a maximum legal power output of about 700 watts. To cover all possible date/time combinations between Amelia's arrival at Niku on July 2nd and Betty's reception of Amelia's signals (on what we believe to have been July 5th), I calculated the probability of reception at Niku for transmissions from Carroll, at 2-hour intervals throughout all 4 days. I assumed an isotropic (non-directional) antenna at the transmitting and receiving ends of the path, to get signal-to-noise ratio results that depended only on the transmitted power and the propagation conditions over the path. The highest probabilities of reception occurred during the interval from just before sunset at Niku (0538Z, 0038 local time at W4OK) to sunrise at W4OK (1031Z, 0531 local). At 3800 kHz, the probability was about 40 chances per million (odds of 25,000 to 1) at 0400Z, and about 2 chances per million (odds of 500,000 to 1) at 0600Z. At all other times, the probability was less than 1 chance per hundred million (odds of more than 100 million to 1). At 7200 kHz, the probability was about one chance per million (odds of 1 million to 1) at 0200Z, about 6 chances per 100,000 (odds of about 17,000 to 1) at 0400Z, about 4 chances per hundred (odds of 25 to 1) at 0600Z, about 57 chances per 10,000 (odds of 175 to 1) at 0800Z, and about 170 chances per million (odds of about 5900 to 1) at 1000Z. At all other times, the probability was less than 1 chance per hundred million. Although 7200 kHz looks like the best frequency for Amelia to have heard Carroll, a 1936 ham frequency allocation chart shows that 7200 kHz was in the 40 meter ham band which covered 7000 kHz to 7300 kHz, but the entire band was restricted to CW transmissions only. The chart also shows that 3800 kHz was in the 80 meter ham band, which covered 3500 to 4000 kHz, with 3900 to 4000 Khz authorized for voice transmissions. So, of the two suggested frequencies for the analysis, 3800 kHz seems to be the only feasible frequency for reception of voice signals from Carroll. The bottom line is that it was possible for Amelia to have heard Carroll on a frequency in the 80 meter ham band if she was transmitting on 3105 kHz and was tuning in the neighborhood of 3000 to 4000 kHz listening for a response. Of course, this begs the question of why radio-ignorant Amelia would assume that someone hearing her on 3105 kHz would respond on some other frequency. Perhaps she was tuning around hoping to find signals indicating that help was on the way. It's an area ripe for speculation, but the propagation analysis results show that she could have heard Carroll calling her (although at a low probability) and thus learned his call sign. LTM, Bob #2286 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 12:52:33 EST From: Cam Warren Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF >As I recall the comment was made by someone at Lae regarding >their lack of Morse Code ability. Well, here we go again. One of the best contemporary sources was C. B. Allen, aviation editor for the NY Herald Tribune (1934-38), and good friend of Amelia. Lovell (Ch. 19) says " Going over a checklist with her Allen noticed that the 'Morse key was missing'. 'Oh, she told him, that was left off when Manning had to drop out of the flight'". And (from my Allen file), Amelia continued, saying "Both Fred Noonan and I know Morse code, but we're rank amateurs and probably never would be able to send and receive more than 10 words a minute, and the professionals can't be bothered with 'ham' operators who can't match their own speed." (The Allen papers are in the NASM Library, Paul Garber Collection.) Allen was much more than one of those flaky journalists Ric dismisses with a wave. After he left the newspaper FDR appointed him to the Air Safety Board of the CAA. He learned to fly while in the Army in WW1, held a captain's position in the Air Corps Reserve, and a commercial pilot's certificate. He was one of five newspaper men to make the first trans-Pacific flight in the China Clipper, and was at Lakehurst when the Hindenburg burned. In 1938 the magazine National Aeronautics hailed him as "the dean of aviation reporters". And his wife was Margaret Platt, presumably of Pratt & Whitney fame, so he commanded some respect in the industry.. As for the Morse key(s): W. A. Titus, of Western Electric, says Amelia sent him back one key from Miami; Joe Gurr claimed to have the other one. So; to answer the question(s) yet again; Both AE and Noonan DID know Morse code, and there were no telegraph keys aboard the Electra. Cam Warren *************************************************************************** From Ric Yes...here we go again. >Lovell (Ch. 19) says " Going over a checklist with her >Allen noticed that the 'Morse key was missing'. 'Oh, she told him, that >was left off when Manning had to drop out of the flight'". I can find no such quote in my copy of Lovell's book. Allen is mentioned on page 260 in Chapter 19 and the decision to get rid of the trailing wire antenna and leave the morse-sending keys behind is discussed on the next page, but the quote you say is there is not there. Please explain. >And (from my Allen file), Amelia continued, saying "Both Fred Noonan and I >know Morse code, but we're rank amateurs and probably never would be able to >send and receive more than 10 words a minute, and the professionals >can't be bothered with 'ham' operators who can't match their own speed." >(The Allen papers are in the NASM Library, Paul Garber Collection.)>> I don't have the Allen papers. When did Allen offer this recollection, in 1937 or years later? Let's assume for the moment that Allen wrote that within days of when he talked to Amelia. Which version of her morse capabilities should we believe? "Both Fred Noonan and I know Morse code, but we're rank amateurs and probably never would be able to send and receive more than 10 words a minute,..." told to a newspaper reporter in late May or; "Miss Earhart and Captain Noonan advised that they entirely depended on radio telephone reception as neither of them were able to read morse at any speed but could recognise an individual letter sent several times. This point was again mentioned by both of them later when two different sets at Lae were used for listening in for time signals." told to an aviation professional on the eve of a flight where their lives were at stake. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 12:58:39 EST From: Cam Warren Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF >>So the Howland HFDF was the same thing as >>in AE's plane, a type "RDF-1" loop unit? << > >Is this something we can take to the bank or is it undocumented? > >Alan And previously Alan said: >I haven't read anything that convinces me there was a key on board or not. One wonders if Alan a) isn't convinced of anything save the Niku theory, or b) has done much - if any - reading about Earhart. To be helpful, I'd suggest - at a minimum - read Lovell and/or Osborne. (I'd suggest Flight Into Yesterday [Safford, Payne & Warren], but that would be construed as self-serving.) And to answer Alan's question; Safford was apparently incorrect that it was from a PBY. Chief Electrician Henry Anthony said the equipment on Howland was a portable unit - don't have the model designation in front of me - borrowed from the Navy Radio Intercept Station at Hei'ea, Hawaii). Cam Warren ************************************************************************* From Ric Why do you believe an undocumented allegation by Anthony over an undocumented allegation by Safford? Is it your contention that if one reads enough about AE it is possible to know which undocumented allegations to believe? Do you develop some kind of "feel" for the truth? ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:00:03 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Hue writes: >The RADIO article, if i recall, has hams listed in California and Hawaii. That's hardly surprising as she was planning to fly west. When the decision to fly east was made it is hardly likely publications had time to gin out a new list. I think you are making too much of this. There are a myriad of possibilities AE knew Florida radio stations and could have known those and countless others from years of flying. You seem to want to believe she had to just suddenly become aware of a ham radio station solely for the purpose of this flight. Actually you want us to believe she was NEVER aware of any ham radios. This is nonsense. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:01:11 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF Ric wrote: >Having a copy of the alphabet and numerals in morse code does not require >having a "code book". Sorry to confuse you. That's what I meant by code book. As I recall when I flew T-6s there was a little Morse code chart about pocket size in the plane. That's all I meant. Alan, who still calls ships boats ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:03:01 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Bob Brandenburg writes: >So we are left with the question of how Amelia could know Carroll's >call sign. Good analysis, Bob. I am still at a loss why it is curious to anyone how AE knew Carroll's call sign. You are all supposing AE did not at any time in her flying career know or hear any ham radios. In the 30s we ALL listened to ham radios almost daily. Those two may well have had with them a list of a whole lot of ham radios around the world and the fact Betty only heard one means nothing. AE could have called a number of hams. We could speculate why she called that particular one but again that would be assuming it was the only one called and we don't know that. There is NO reason to assume the call was made ONLY because she heard Carroll from the Pacific. What folks are doing is creating a scenario based solely on insupportable assumptions and then arguing about it. Talk about tilting at windmills.... Alan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:04:58 EST From: Garry Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF According to the article in Naval History Magazine Aug 2000 by John P Riley,............... "Unknown to many researchers, Noonan held a Second Class Commercial Radiotelegraph License, which he obtained two years before his death, and he often stood by for the Clipper's radio operators when needed. They worked in CW exclusively". I wonder if there is a record of his license ?? Regards, Garry ( 2141) ******************************************************************* From Ric If he had one there should be a record of it. I have seen no such record. Riley says a lot of things he can't support. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:07:53 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Fact and fiction For Alan, I am not sure I understand your complaint about non documented facts being posted such as Thompson's statement that the 281 msg was a hoax . He stated that, but as Ric pointed out he never provided any evidence (that I can see) that supported that opinion. But that is what he stated. Ron B. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:06:57 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Mic buttons vs Keys and HFDF Alan wrote: > Hue wrote: > >> Dashes are easy to make just using the mic button. It's when you have to >> turn the transmitter on and off rapidly that you get difficulty >> by that I mean as the receiver I hear nothing, the mike is keyed >> and I hear carrier wave, the mike button is released and I'm back to hearing >> nothing again. Thus the dots and dashes would be "sssss" "ss" and so on. > > Alan, not a radio man is he Alan, not sure i understand the question, but- Non-entertainment radio receiver will have a certain switch on it, flip the switch and the "sssss" shhhh or hissing sound is converted to a very audible, easy to work with, audio tone, beeeep beep. So, for rescue purposes, you can use the radio microphone for sending even without it sending any voice, whistling, etc. Hue ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:14:17 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Carroll hears & calls AE I am going to go with the theory that Mr. Carroll suffered from some psychological maladjustment, suffered from delusions. Perhaps his daughter could be diplomatically asked if he suffered problems in this area. Consider this. He hears AE, and quickly notes that the frequency is a multiple of one of the 2 aircraft channels. But he doesn't go to the Coast Guard or Navy, because they would get the glory instead. He doesn't rush to phone or contact his ham buddies, to tell them "Hey gang, tune up to xyz frequency real quick, I can Amelia Earhart calling SOS there!". No- this Mission is his alone. He doesn't take this extremely newsworthy item to the radio station he works at, because then it would be picked up by other media and splashed all over. People would want to come ask him questions, bother him and distract him. No- he gets on his radio and calls Amelia. He knows that for a normal human being, the odds of his getting thru all those miles to her are minscule, but for him the odds are different: don't apply. He gets on 3800 kHz, knowing telepathically, that AE will be tuning around there, listen- ing for him. He ignores the stateside hams who call him on the air, "Hey W4OK what's up???" He doesn't try to relay a message on to hams in Hawaii or California or Philippines or other places - he doesn't need their power and location advantage. This Mission is his. But it fails. Something goes wrong. His enemies sabotage his Mission. Years later, the memory of his defeat still burn. All he will admit about it is, "Yeah, I heard her once." On the other hand, I'm considering another theory, but it seems less likely. That is, that when Mr. Carroll "heard Amelia Earhart once", he meant he heard her while she was on some flight over the Gulf states or the Eastern USA, and he heard her on the regular aircraft channels, same as any other shortwave listener with decent equipment could. That when he got on the ham radio those July nights in 1937, he would talk with his ham buddies about who they'd talked to, the new antenna they we putting up, the improvements they were making to their equipment. If someone had suggested he call Amelia Earhart on the 3,800 kHz ham band, he would have laughed. Hue Miller ************************************************************** From Ric I think that's about as close to an admission of defeat from Hue as we're going to get. He has reached the same point as he did with Betty's reception. Yes, it could have happened, but he doesn't think it did. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:15:04 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Betty and Francis/ W40K I agree, that we have to take at face value what evidence we do have. Carroll tried to contact AE or whomever he heard, as that is what he told Smitty. He may not have known what his range was, cared etc., because other amateurs were attempting to do the same from newspaper accounts. Whatever he did, his call letters ended up in Betty's notebook. Ron B. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:18:27 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Amelia Hears W4OK. Okay, how? Thanks for the technical explanations Bob, but I strongly disagree that we don't have any evidence when Betty heard Carrolls call sign. Look again at the notebook and her the interview, Betty said she heard the call sign early in the transmissions. There it is in her notebook right at the top. No indication whatsoever that this was a later addition, or earlier notation. Those entries were made chronologically as she heard them. It fits well into the structure of the notebook. Betty heard that call sign during the 4:30 to 6:00 time frame, on whatever date the transmissions came in. Ron Bright ********************************************************** From Ric I think you misunderstood what Bob meant. AE could have heard Carroll at any time previous to the transmission Betty heard and Betty could have heard AE say his callsign in an attempt to contact him. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:20:09 EST From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: the Lancastrian Except the purpose of radio is to communicate which can't be accomplished if everyone makes up his own code and esoteric abbreviations as he goes along. Codes only work if both parties know the meanings of the code groups. It takes a long time to tap out morse code messages so abbreviations are very common but they are pretty well standardized you just don't make them up on the spot. In addition to abbreviations, a standard code was developed which allowed one to transmit common statements using only three letter groups. This is usually called the "Q Code" since each three letter group starts with he letter "Q." Q was selected since it rarely is used in normal words so when you hear - - . - you know it is the beginning of a code group. There is a whole list of such codes for use in aircraft. The lancastrian's radio operator only had to tap out "QHQ" to inform the tower that they were on the approach. Or, "QRE 1015" would mean "my estimated time of arrival is 1015." And very commonly used, "QNH ?" would mean "what should I set on the sub-scale of my altimeter so that the instrument would indicate my elevation if I were on the ground at your station?" You can see that Q signals saved a lot of dits and dashes. So what does STENDEC mean, I have no idea. gl *********************************************************************** From Ric Thus endeth the off-topic STENDEC thread ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:27:01 EST From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: Morse sending Morse code is normally sent by switching the "continuous wave (CW) " on and off by use of the key. This is usually done in the amplification stage of the transmitter. In order to hear normal CW morse the receiver must have the capability to insert a local produced signal to "beat" with the incoming signal to produce a "beat note" in the audio range that can be heard. It is similar to using a tuning fork or pitch pipe to tune a musical instrument. If AE were transmitting CW morse at 3105 kc the receiver's local oscillator (called a BFO for beat frequency oscillator) would be set to 3106 kc which differs from the income signal by 1 kc which is 1000 hertz which is the tone you would then hear though the speaker. (I simplified this description by leaving out IFs to make the explanation easier to understand for non radio people.) Another way to send morse is called MCW, or "modulated continuous wave." In this type of transmitter an AM signal is sent just like a voice signal but instead of a voice being impressed on the carrier an audible tone is turned on and off and this tone is added to the carrier. Think of it as a person humming dits and dahs into the microphone. This mode allows for the reception of the signal with a receiver that does not have a BFO but it does not have anywhere near the range of a normal CW morse code transmission and only has the same range as a voice transmission. So, which of these two methods did AE's transmitter use? Does anybody on the forum know the answer? If it was designed to do MCW then it would have made much more sense for AE to speak into the mic and use real words rather than attempting to use morse. If the radio was capable of CW with the longer available range would radio novitiate AE have known about it so that she would have attempted to send morse using the mic button? That doesn't seem likely. What if the mic didn't work? Wouldn't it then make sense to try to send morse with the mic button? But how would AE know that it wasn't working. Was her radio set up so that she could hear what was being sent out? Maybe someone on the forum knows. One other thought. Were the morse signals received CW or MCW? The person listening can tell the difference because of the effect of the BFO. Were the received signals of the same type (either CW or MCW) that AE's transmitter would transmit? If they weren't then they were coming from some other transmitter. gl ************************************************************************** From Ric As I said in my first posting on this subject, AE's transmitter did not have MCW capability. In Coast Guard parlance, "A1" is straight CW, "A2" is MCW, and "A3" is voice. None of the suspected post-loss transmissions are logged as A2. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:42:50 EST From: Daryll Subject: Ric's question Ric wrote: >Daryll, did you or did you not post to this forum the following as a >statement of fact? >>Cmdr. Safford's research circa 1960's indicated that the HFDF on >>Howland came out of a Navy Patrol Plane at Pearl AND was the same as AE >>had in her plane. >Now you say: >>It seemed that when he said it was "the same as AE had in her plane" >>it was said as a passing comment like he just knew it. I don't recall >>him explaining that comment or his knowledge of Earhart's radio in any >>more detail. >So which is it? Did Safford ever say anything about the Howland HFDF >coming out of a Navy patrol plane or did you just make that up? Yes I did post that. The "passing comment" was my interpretation of how Safford worded "same as" Earhart's radio in his manuscript. >So which is it? Did Safford ever say anything about the Howland >HFDF coming out of a Navy patrol plane or did you just make that >up? I posted that because I remember reading it in the manuscript. It has been a few years since I read it. I have posted the exact same wording on this forum before. The manuscript that Randy sent was about an inch thick of loose pages. I will have to sort through it to try and find the exact page with the quotes. As I understand the provenance of the manuscript that Randy sent, it is a copy of the same manuscript that passed through your hands way back when it was circulated around. By your questions I can only presume that you have never looked at it throughly. Before I was the internet, I had tried to find the manuscript for over 10 years because I knew who Safford was and I felt what he had to say would be significant. Daryll *********************************************************************** From Ric Cam Warren seems to agree with your original statement that Safford thought the Howland HFDF came from a PBY. I've tried to find some reference to that in Cam's edited and expanded republication of Safford's book but it's so rambly and poorly indexed that i can't find anything. Anyway, Cam has apparently decided that Safford was wrong and he now wants to believe somebody else. You guys both wander in the same wilderness. In the absence of documentation you choose whose recollections you want to believe and that becomes the truth. That's fine until you try to lay that trip on the rest of us. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2003 13:46:34 EST From: Daryll Subject: For Alan & Ric Alan wrote: >From the descriptions I'm read from you guys about what is produced by >using a mike to send Morse rather than using a key is so radically >different that I'm puzzled no one mentioned that fact when receiving the >coded message. All I recall in the way of comment was it was sent >slowly. From the "281 message"; "...POOR KEYING BEHIND THE CARRIER...". What does that mean to you? This was a comment on the reception by the operators at Waliupe who received it. I have asked all the radio guys what this meant and haven't gotten a good answer. Some are of the opinion that this could be heard during the reception of the clicks, I'm not sure. I do know that an oscilloscope would show the carrier in the form of a sine wave on a CRT. I could imagine that the signal imprinted on the carrier could be seen as a blip on either one side of the wave peak or the other. This is regarding todays technology. I do recall Mike E. saying that oscilloscopes were around in that time period but were very expensive, I presume because of the CRT (TV tube). I also know I have seen references to finger printing transmitters by the OP-20-G people back then. It seems to me that they would have to have an oscilloscope to do that and they would have had the money to buy oscilloscopes. >As I recall the comment was made by someone at Lae regarding their lack of >Morse Code ability. That's not enough. I also recognize the contrary has not >been shown. Ric wrote: >It's more than a comment by someone at Lae. Earhart herself repeatedly >specified that the Coast Guard should send only voice, and Chater is >very specific on this point: >"On enquiry Miss Earhart and Captain Noonan advised that they entirely >depended on radio telephone reception as neither of them were able to >read morse at any speed but could recognise an individual letter sent >several times. This point was again mentioned by both of them later when >two different sets at Lae were used for listening in for time signals." >What would convince you? There are a lot of open questions about the >Earhart disappearance but this ain't one of them. The CG sent both voice & code in the weather transmissions. Question: Who was making the quote, who's mouth was moving, is my question? Was AE speaking the words and Noonan was standing next to her shaking his head in the affirmative? Unless you can produce a reliable non-hearsay quote by Noonan about his lack of Morse capabilities then it is still pretty much up in the air and just a PR comment of the moment. Noonan's background and experience (head of navigation?) with PAA was pretty well separated from the PR of the "world flight". What AE said can be believable from her standpoint but becomes a little harder to believe from Noonan's standpoint when there is conflicting evidence. Daryll **************************************************************************** From Ric That's okay Daryll. You go ahead and believe whatever fits your needs.