“One of the authors, Wright, developed an alternative forensic craniometric software application CRANID (Wright, 2008 and Wright, 2012) with a larger sample base and a broader worldwide spread than the cranium samples used in FORDISC."
I don't blame Dr. Wright for wanting to demonstrate that his software is better than the competition but I find his paper short on historical accuracy and long on bias.
"In the case of the Nikumaroro bones, the skeletal evidence was lost during World War II. Subsequent attempts to trace the bones indicate that they were moved to Australia, probably Sydney, but no further evidence has been found."
Not true. No one knows what happened to the bones. McPherson recommended that they be sent to Australia but Sir Harry Luke nixed the idea.
“Upon receipt of the Hoodless report, Macpherson concluded that the remains were not those of Amelia Earhart and the case was closed without further action.”
Not true. McPherson made no such judgement. It was Secretary Vaskess (who was not a medical man) who suggested that further inquiry was pointless. The case was not closed. Investigation into the sextant box and other artifacts continued.
Hair? Last week I saw Boobies carrying all manner of stuff up into the Buka trees to build their nests.
Rate of deterioration of remains? No mention of the taphonomy experiments done on Nikumaroro by Kar Burns.
"The sextant case was identified in 1941 as English or French make, “of some age” and used as a receptacle."
Not true. The sextant box was not identified in 1941. TIGHAR research has shown that the numbers documented to have been on the sextant box clearly indicate it was a Brandis U.S. Navy surveying sextant, the same kind used by Noonan as a "preventer" (back-up) instrument.
and so on....
We should probably put Dr. Wright's paper up on the TIGHAR website along with a detailed rebuttal but meanwhile I'm not going to lose any sleep about whose bones Gallagher found.