Are we over thinking the whole thing? He had his orders and he had his protocol to follow regards laying down the smoke. Doesn’t make him a bad commander, just one who isn’t prepared to think outside the box.
I doubt whether there was ever a protocol for the situation he was in. My first thought if I were in his position would have been that Amelia's plane is lost and flying at 150 knots and therefore isn't likely to be inthe neighborhood very long. Making smoke not only takes time to get it going, but takes a considerably time to get any into the air, assuming that there is no breeze and it will actually rise to some visible altitude. The situation requires speedy decisions and action, which Thompson failed to do. I might add that officers are not graded highly if they merely "follow standard procedures (which for this situation I'm not even sure what they would be, or even if a relevant protocol exist). The most important factor in rating an officer for promotion is that he demonstrate personal initiative and show skill in using whatever he has at hand to get the job done. The military services are not looking to promote officers who simply do the minimum (which Thompson clearly was doing, i.e. Ric's description of how Thompson basically was most concerned that he wouldn't get blamed for what was happening). There are many things Thompson could have done beforehand in anticipation of problems with radio contact. I'll leave it to you to think of some of those things that could have, but weren't, done.
My main effort this past week has been to ascertain the visible range of a rocket parachute flare. While I don't know precisely the characteristics of a pre WWII flare, descriptions of same lead me to believe that not much has changed since then. Rocket flare guns today cost less than$30 and fire flares that generally rise to 500 - 650 feet and stay suspended in flare mode for quite a few seconds. Their luminosity ranges from 16,000 to 30,000 candles.
Unfortunately, I was unable to obtain any data concerning visible range of lights/flares during daytime, except to note from my own observations of the Atlantic Ocean out my window that you can see lights during overcast days from quite a distance - beyond what I can see at the horizon, which at my condo's altitude, is 13 miles away. I was able to obtain data on visibility during good viewing conditions for lights at night. Of course, the curvature of the Earth means that your horizon will, at some point, interfere with your line of sight. For example, at Amelia's presumed altitude of 1000 feet, the horizon is 37 nautical miles away. The horizon for a flare at 500 feet is 27 nautical miles, which means that Amelia would have unobstructed line of sight to a flare suspended by parachute at 500 feet from 27 plus 37 or 64 nautical miles away - over 70 statute miles. But could she see the flare during overcast? I don't know, but here is what she could have seen in near darkness - a 100 watt incandescent light bulb which produces 1850 lumens can be seen by the unaided eye at a distance of 118 kilometers, or over 60 miles. I would estimate the flare to be several times brighter than a 100 watt lightbulb, leading me to guess that it could be seen from more than 100 miles away, if the line of sight were unobstructed. So if Amelia had arrived in the vicinity of Howland ( which she clearly did, based on the strength of her radio signal) in early twilight, unless both she and Noonan were looking directly away from the island, it would have been, in my view, impossible for them to have missed seeing a flare shot from the ship or from the island. And, of course, you don't just fire a couple of flares.
A Coast Guard vessel I would guess has hundreds, perhaps thousands of flares on board, and quite a few flare guns as well. But again, I wonder how far a flare in overcast or cloudy conditions can be seen. Certainly further than a during a bright sunny clear day. My experience looking out my window tells me that much. The way to find out is, of course to fire some flares on a cloudy day in the morning as occurred during Amelia's approach and make observations at various distances. Haven't tried that yet. Probably won't. I have convinced myself, however, that Amelia would have easily seen flares while she was in the vicinity of the island and most likely from quite a distance as well. It's just too bad that Amelia didn't request the Itsca to fire flares during one of her broadcasts. I'm also surprised that Noonan didn't suggest doing the same.