This needs to be straightened out.
Gary LaPook has been on something of a campaign to discredit TIGHAR's hypothesis that Earhart and Noonan ran down the 157 337 line and landed at Gardner/Nikumaroro.
On his website at https://sites.google.com/site/fredienoonan/discussions/why-it-was-not-possible-to-follow-lop-to-nikumaroro he writes:
"Contrary to TIGHAR's premise, there was no way to navigate along the "157º-337º LOP" to Nikumaroro (I have written countless posts about this, the navigation is quite simple even though to non navigators it might sound complicated. To a navigator it is no more complex than getting in your car and driving to the supermarket to get a gallon of milk) so they did _not_ end up on that island."
Unfortunately, Gary has a gross misunderstanding of TIGHAR's hypothesis. We are not suggesting that Earhart or Noonan navigated down the line using celestial navigation to stay on course. As Gary points out, again and again, there is no way to do that. It is TIGHAR's hypothesis that, upon reaching the LOP calculated to fall through Howland Island, and not seeing Howland Island, AE and FN turned and flew first northwestward, then southeastward along the line by means of the the only navigation method available to to them at that time - dead reckoning. As Lindbergh once said, "The only thing wrong with dead reckoning is the name." He used it to cross 1,700 miles of trackless ocean from St. John's Newfoundland and hit Dingle Bay, Ireland on the button. To suggest that a navigator of Noonan's caliber could not dead reckon a few hundred miles - perhaps as few as 150 miles - with decent accuracy is, frankly, nonsense.
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Ric, you will have to forgive me if I didn’t understand that you were not claiming that they had a
method by which they could determine that they were staying on the LOP and using this method
to fly along the LOP to Niku. My misunderstanding started when I read an article written by you
and published in the April 1992 issue of "Life.Magazine" On page 70 of that issue you wrote:
"Using celestial tables, Gannon pointed out that on the morning of July 2, 1937, the rising sun
would have provided the precise line of position Earhart said she was running. By flying
southeast
along that line, Noonan could be sure that, even if he missed Howland, he would reach
an island in the Phoenix group in about two hours."
I noticed that you did not say Noonan would just fly that heading but that he would fly "
along
that line" which I read as clearly intimating that Noonan had some way to stay on the LOP.
Then on February 26, 2002 you responded to my post:
“Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 12:23:34 EST
From: Gary LaPook
Subject: Re: Celestial navigation and post-loss messages.
But, since they were following their plan to go to the Phoenix islands, they
didn't need to fix their position after they arrived, all they had to say is "we
on one of the Phoenix islands, probably Gardner, come and get us."
gl
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From Ric
Their plan was not to go to the Phoenix Islands. Their plan was to
run
southeastward on the LOP in hopes of hitting one of the islands known to be
on that line - namely - Howland, Baker, Gardner, and as we've only recently
realized, Atafu (Duke of York).
So here you are,
running down the LOP, watching and hoping for an island, and
it's taking FOREVER, and you're wondering, "
I recently watched the show, "The Real Amelia Earhart" (2006) on the National Geographic
Channel and at 21 minutes into the show they show a chart with the LOP through Howland and
Nikumaroro
Narrator:
"Gillespie thinks it makes prefect navigational sense for Earhart and Noonan to aim for Gardner
Island, now known as Nikumaroro, located in the Phoenix Island chain."
Gillespie:
"If Earhart is lost, the only piece of information she has is that she is on a navigational line that
falls through Howland Island. She also knows there are other islands on that line so if she flies
southeastward on that line she is guaranteed of hitting land."
And in your recent movie, “Finding Amelia,” about eight minutes into the show you say that
navigators came to you and told you about Noonan's technique. Then a map was put up showing
the LOP through Howland and Gardner.
The Narrator says:
"If Amelia and Fred couldn't find Howland they could have
followed this line south and
reached another island, Gardner, now called Nikumaroro."
Then you say:
"And my first reaction is, first of all, these guys know what they are talking about, these are real
navigators..."
You didn’t take this opportunity to point out that the narrator was wrong, that they could not
have
followed this line south.
To make sure I got it right I decided to look up the definition of the word “along” to make sure
that I had the proper understanding of that word. There are a number of dictionaries available
online at:
http://www.onelook.com where I input “along” and got many definitions, all similar to
these:
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1. moving on or beside a line
a.
moving forward on a line, road, path, etc. toward one end of it
Mrs. Klein was hurrying along the path toward us.
b.
moving from one place to another while staying near the side or edge of something
They were sailing along the southern coast of Australia.
2. used for showing where someone or something is
a.
continuing in a line on or beside a road, river, wall, etc.
The stores along 5th Avenue were brightly lit for Christmas.
a line of trees along the river bank
b.
at a place on or beside a road, river, etc.
The sound of gunfire was coming from somewhere along the road.
From a different dictionary:
PREPOSITION:
1. Over the length of: walked along the path.
2. On a line or course parallel and close to; continuously beside: rowed along the shore; the
trees along the avenue.
http://www.onelook.com/?w=along&ls=a------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I also looked up “followed” and a typical definitions is:
Travel along a certain course
“Follow the road”
“Follow the trail”
Synonyms: travel along
Based on all of these statements, you can understand why I thought you still believed that they
had some way to follow along the LOP to Niku and that they were not just dead reckoning. You
can also see how an average viewer of these TV shows could also conclude that your point
was that they would have been able to easily determine that they were staying on the LOP and
tracking it to Niku.
Anyway, it is good that we are finally in agreement that there was no way for Noonan to
determine that they were staying on the original LOP and following along that LOP all the way to
Niku so if they ended up on Niku it was only by dead reckoning those 350 nautical miles.
gl