281 NORTH HOWLAND CALL KHAQQ BEYOND NORTH DONT HOLD WITH US MUCH LONGER ABOVE WATER SHUT OFF
For the fun of it. Remember, this was sent in poorly keyed code. Add or change as little as possible to make it make sense.
LINE (short for equator) IS 281 NORTH. HAVE or HEARD HOWLAND CALL KHAQQ.
BEYOND NORTH (?)
DONT HOLD WITH US MUCH LONGER (Very hard to construct a short grammatical English sentence containing this phrase. I think DON'T is really WON'T)
CAN'T KEEP RADIO ABOVE WATER MUST SHUT OFF
how deep do you want to delve into this topic?? we could go all the way to the code level??
the received message converted to code is as follows:
..--- ---.. .---- -. --- .-. - .... .... --- .-- .-.. .- -. -.. -.-. .- .-.. .-.. -.- .... .- --.- --.- -... . -.-- --- -. -.. -. --- .-. - .... -.. --- -. - .... --- .-.. -.. .-- .. - .... ..- ... -- ..- -.-. .... .-.. --- -. --. . .-. .- -... --- ...- . .-- .- - . .-. ... .... ..- - --- ..-. ..-.
morse code alphabet is:
check out any similar letters to ones that are in the code and interpret however you like
should make for an interesting diversion.
This has been a very interesting diversion!
I had actually done some exercises with the Morse Code to see if I could shake anything out of the "281" message... The first question I ran into was: Were they using the American or International version of Morse Code? I decided that although the American version was still being widely used in the US at that time, AE and FN would have probably used the International version- which was being used by the US Navy, maritime vessels, and most European countries. Without having seen the actual Morse Code chart available in the plane, we actually have no way of knowing.
However, since their Morse Code message was received and some coherent words were coaxed out of it, I assumed everyone involved was using the same Morse Code version.
The other assumption I made was that SOME of the received words were correct. Words like "Howland and/or KHAQQ". I then ran all the Morse together, without spaces between the 'words', to see what else would come out of it.
I haven't gotten anything really coherent, yet, and I don't want to start switching the 'dashes' and 'dots' around- although I believe some 'dots' and 'dashes' were misinterpreted during the original transmission.
I also Morse coded some words I thought AE and FN might try to send out in code:
. .- .-. .... .- .-. - earhart
-. --- --- -. .- -. noonan
--. .- .-. -.. -. . .-. gardner
-. --- .-. .-- .. -.-. .... / -.-. .. - -.-- norwich city
-. .-. .---- -.... ----- ..--- ----- nr16020
It has been interesting to try to interpret what AE and FN, as amateur Morse Coders, would have been trying to send versus what the professional Morse Coders translated
LTM~ Who's accidentally learned Morse Code,
Stacy