TIGHAR
Amelia Earhart Search Forum => Celestial choir => Topic started by: Robert J Schafish on September 30, 2010, 10:15:57 PM
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Is there a kml file of possible flight paths for the flight from Lae? It would be interesting to see a display on Google Earth. I also have seen flight simulations that have been created using Google Earth ..for example the splashdown of US Air Flight 1549 into the Hudson. Has anyone done a simulation for the flight from Lae? I noted a lot of discussion on the Celestial Choir forum regarding where the aircraft could have been at sunrise. Would a simulation help with this issue?
Cheers, BobS
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Is there a kml file of possible flight paths for the flight from Lae? It would be interesting to see a display on Google Earth. I also have seen flight simulations that have been created using Google Earth ..for example the splashdown of US Air Flight 1549 into the Hudson. Has anyone done a simulation for the flight from Lae? I noted a lot of discussion on the Celestial Choir forum regarding where the aircraft could have been at sunrise. Would a simulation help with this issue?
I fooled around a bit with Google Earth and some other flight-planning software to trace the great-circle route from Lae. The results I got didn't answer the questions I was asking and I gave up on it for now.
I don't know enough about simulations to answer your question. Offhand, it doesn't seem that it would help a great deal. The issue, such as it is, is that from the position reports and the fact that they were flying the line 337-157 during their last transmission, we can't tell exactly where they made their sun-sighting. Did they start descending before dawn? At dawn? Some time afterward? What was their groundspeed from their dawn until they turned on the line drawn through Howland? It seems to me that there are lots of imponderables and not enough data to choose among them.
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Moleski. Probably the routing was Lae - Gagan - Nukumanu - In.Pt.Nauru - Nikunau - Sunrise Fix - one line approach - Howland , totaling 2,628 st.mls loxo. This assumption is in itself a speculation (although proof exists that the great circle was not flown) , but it is remarkable that for this navigation model all time versus coordinates versus speed groups exactly follow the radio communications records.
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Moleski. Probably the routing was Lae - Gagan - Nukumanu - In.Pt.Nauru - Nikunau - Sunrise Fix - one line approach - Howland , totaling 2,628 st.mls loxo. This assumption is in itself a speculation (although proof exists that the great circle was not flown) , but it is remarkable that for this navigation model all time versus coordinates versus speed groups exactly follow the radio communications records.
Additional remark : the loxo (rhumb line) Lae-Howland distance was 2,559 miles as computed bij DOL algorithm , this being only 3 miles longer than the great circle sum of chords (2,556) and 12 mls longer than the great circle´s theoretical length. Rhumb line flying could have been safer (one single true course to be reduced to magnetic) than following the great circle (variable true courses).
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Moleski. Probably the routing was Lae - Gagan - Nukumanu - In.Pt.Nauru - Nikunau - Sunrise Fix - one line approach - Howland , totaling 2,628 st.mls loxo. This assumption is in itself a speculation (although proof exists that the great circle was not flown) , but it is remarkable that for this navigation model all time versus coordinates versus speed groups exactly follow the radio communications records.
Additional remark : the loxo (rhumb line) Lae-Howland distance was 2,559 miles as computed bij DOL algorithm , this being only 3 miles longer than the great circle sum of chords (2,556) and 12 mls longer than the great circle´s theoretical length. Rhumb line flying could have been safer (one single true course to be reduced to magnetic) than following the great circle (variable true courses).
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Take a look at the Google earth images at these sites, it may give you what you are looking for:
https://sites.google.com/site/fredienoonan/discussions/flight-planning-aspects-relating-to-a-possible-earhart-s-spy-flight
and
https://sites.google.com/site/fredienoonan/discussions/was-earhart-a-spy
Gary LaPook
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Is there a kml file of possible flight paths for the flight from Lae? It would be interesting to see a display on Google Earth. I also have seen flight simulations that have been created using Google Earth ..for example the splashdown of US Air Flight 1549 into the Hudson. Has anyone done a simulation for the flight from Lae? I noted a lot of discussion on the Celestial Choir forum regarding where the aircraft could have been at sunrise. Would a simulation help with this issue?
Cheers, BobS
Since the sunrise time-position group could be precomputed directly from the sunset fix near Nukumanu , it is probable that the sunrise computed position was @ 178-47-W ; 00-09-N for 175453 GMT @ 150 mls off. Because of the 44 min delay @ Nukumanu , the computation had to be adapted since , without the delay , the sunrise position would have been @ the turn-off initial point of the offset landfall operation .