Might the "Loop Antenna and Base" still be attached to the Electra??
That would make it pretty difficult to raise it without breaking it.
I find it amusing that nothing is said about the expense of expeditions looking for bones and freckle cream jars and shoe soles, etc. Maybe the stills from the ROV video ahould be brought to the attention of sonmeone like James Cameron of the TITANIC effort. He might be interested in the movie rights to produce a movie entitled EARHART. It would prolly out gross his other movie. Just a random thought,
I happen to have said alot about the scarcity of resources, Harry - consider the context.
It is recognized that the cost of ANY AND ALL operations TIGHAR does on Niku is high.
Point is, what do you go BACK for? It takes a compelling case to muster major resources like Dr. Tom King and his crew on land, Seabotics, multiple vessels for ROV work, more crew to support all, etc. -
So if you have a week or two at a time to be on station and limited resources, WHERE DO you focus your precious resources?
The land effort is no different -
read Dr. King's comments on that. They found enough 'fruit' to want to go back and comb some more area, etc. Also in re-evaluating the big picture, the Aukermaine site may beckon again.
I'm not poo-pooing those who are 'seeing things' here, really, just believing it takes a great deal of analysis to have enough confidence in what may be found in an area to direct resources back there on Niku. Do you recover ground already looked at last year, or do you move to the next sector? Or, do you try to make the case to a backer to cover BOTH?
Ric and the board have got big shoes to fill when it comes to convincing the major supporters to back these things, and I'm sure he and TIGHAR are watching all developments with interest. I think what you all are excited about is great; I also think it takes many hours of hard analysis to really 'see' what 'may' be there - none of us are magically endowed with seeing through silt, etc. to see what gives 'shape' to what may be nothing more than rock.
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As an aside, I believe I recall that no ship wreckage was found - and I don't know that much real time was spent surveying that far to the south. But, if we could get a view or two of ANYTHING from the ship down that slope (maybe none there - maybe all at bottom) maybe we could get a better idea of how the sediment settles and obscures things. From that the baseline for searching might be enhanced - knowing better 'what to look for', so to speak.
LTM -