TIGHAR
Amelia Earhart Search Forum => General discussion => Topic started by: Ric Gillespie on September 15, 2020, 12:53:45 PM
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I was recently contacted by Michael Ashmore who spotted something interesting on Google Maps. About once a week, somebody finds the Earhart Electra on Google Earth or Google Maps. I always look at what they found. It's usually the Norwich City wreck or some imagined airplane shape in the bush or water, but this is a real thing and it's kind of interesting. I'd like some opinions. It will take several postings to lay out, so bear with me.
The point of interest is a spit of sand that sticks out into the lagoon from Taraia, the peninsula on the north side of the lagoon opposite the main passage (image below).
Although not a TIGHAR member, Mike Ashmore has read the TIGHAr website carefully and is familiar with our research. Back in May or June, he was looking at the shore of the lagoon on Google Maps and noticed a linear shape in the water near the Taraia sand spit (image below). He wondered if it might be airplane wreckage.
Recall that in 1997, while we were in Funafuti, former Niku schoolteacher Pulekai Songivalu told us of seeing airplane wreckage on the lagoon shore opposite the main passage (where floating wreckage washed through the passage might have ended up). This was in the 1950s and he assumed it was wreckage from WWII.
In 2007 we searched that whole shoreline with metal detectors and found nothing.
When Mike Ashmore looked at the area again July, the object was gone. (image below) Had it washed away or was it buried in sand/silt? That's when he decided to contact me and send me the screen captures he had made. My first impression was that it is probably a log, but I was curious to see if anything was visible in that location in the satellite imagery we have. We don't have imagery from 2019 but we do have June of 2018 and there appears to be something there (image below).
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The object also appears in imagery from 2017 and 2016 (images below). We don't have imagery from 2015 and nothing is visible in the 2014 imagery but there's a lot of sunlight reflection in that image (image below). There's definitely nothing there in earlier satellite imagery going back to 2001.
When we were there in 2015 we saw clear evidence of a major storm that had hit the west end of island within the past year or so. The most logical explanation for the object is that it is a log that washed up as a result of that storm, stayed there for five years and was washed away between May and July of this year. The fact that the location corresponds with Pulekai's anecdotal is coincidence. Anything that washes through the passage can end up over there.
But nothing is ever that simple.
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The 1938 New Zealand aerial photos do not include a good overhead view of Taraia. The best we have is an oblique view looking south and no object is apparent (image below).
However, just to make life interesting, the 1939 U.S. Navy mapping montage shows a dark something in just about exactly the right location (image below).
Thoughts?
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I wonder if anyone from either of the two expeditions in 2015 took any pictures of that area?
Perhaps reach out to everyone who went?
Don't know the distances between trees, etc there, that seems to be an awfully big log.
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I am not used to making posts on the Forum but on our 2017 Niku visit one of our group Rick Pettigrew flew his drone in the lagoon area, he has views of the area of interest from different angles. He didn't fly directly over the spit but has oblique views from different locations at 500ft altitude in 4K. I have given him details of the object of interest and he will check to see if he can obtain views that may assist. I will try to attach a example drone image showing the area but may need advice to do this.
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I have zoomed in on the drone image previously posted as Rick Pettigrew does not think he has another suitable image. This is the largest I can do before losing definition - however it does appear to show an object of interest in similar location, also some detail of the spit as in 2017. I have also enhanced the satellite image of the item of interest that was posted - it does seem to show a target that is not natural. We did note some large items from the wreck in the channel and on-shore when carrying out survey of the channel area - perhaps the object is from the wreck?
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Any idea of scale? I did a quick Google Earth ruler and swagged it as about 24' for the long piece, and maybe 17' for the shorter bit over the top.
What does an underwater log in an emerald lagoon look like? There should be others to examine.
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I wonder if anyone from either of the two expeditions in 2015 took any pictures of that area?
I don't think the Betchart people went over there and I'm quite sure none of our people were there in 2015.
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Any idea of scale? I did a quick Google Earth ruler and swagged it as about 24' for the long piece, and maybe 17' for the shorter bit over the top.
Yeah, I get something similar for the long piece. I don't see a shorter bit over the top. The left end appears to be out of the water and there seems to be something extending at a right angle from the shoreside edge. If it's a log with a branch sticking out, it's not a coconut palm log.
What does an underwater log in an emerald lagoon look like? There should be others to examine.
That's a problem for the log hypothesis. I don't recall ever seeing a log washed up on the lagoon shore. Andrew?
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This is frame 23:43 from the 2001 Aerial Tour of Nikumaroro (https://youtu.be/DL9FGsvB3E8).
Worth watching. We made a very close pass. No object visible but there's a small log on the beach in the foreground - too small to be the object in question.
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Here's the problem with the object being Electra wreckage. The object appears to be cylindrical. The only part of the airplane that is cylindrical is the fuselage. A 24-foot section would be a majority of the fuselage. We're looking at a whole new hypothesis. The airplane broke up on the reef edge and most of the fuselage washed into the lagoon. That's why nobody has found anything in the ocean.
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Here's the problem with the object being Electra wreckage. The object appears to be cylindrical. The only part of the airplane that is cylindrical is the fuselage. A 24-foot section would be a majority of the fuselage. We're looking at a whole new hypothesis. The airplane broke up on the reef edge and most of the fuselage washed into the lagoon. That's why nobody has found anything in the ocean.
Even if the pipe is from the Norwich City, it may show where some debris accumulates and gets buried in the sand or mud.
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That thing is only a few feet from shore, so probably only a few feet deep. The intact Electra fuselage would not be fully submerged at that depth. It would be 50-60% above water. I think it is too long and too narrow to be an airplane. I think we would also see the forward half of the fuselage with somewhat intact wing spars before we would see an intact 24 foot length of fuselage with no wing spars. Would it look like a piece of a plastic model, or would it look like an airplane wreck with weaker parts broken off?
Not to mention the lack of any reflection from any exposed aluminum.
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That thing is only a few feet from shore, so probably only a few feet deep.
Lagoon silt deep enough to hide an Electra is rare. There's one are over by Kanawa Point that's really deep but along most of the lagoon shoreline the silt depth is less than a foot. I don't recall being in that exact spot but when we were metal detecting in that general area in 2001 the silt was not deep.
The intact Electra fuselage would not be fully submerged at that depth. It would be 50-60% above water. I think it is too long and too narrow to be an airplane. I think we would also see the forward half of the fuselage with somewhat intact wing spars before we would see an intact 24 foot length of fuselage with no wing spars.
The Model 10 did not have wing spars. The wing was built around a "main beam" that ran from engine to engine, including right through the cabin. Passengers in the forward seats had to climb over it.
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If the horizontal thing sticking out is the main beam it looks like it is in the wrong place. If the thing sticking out is the exposed back part of the wing and the rest is buried then it seems like it needs quite a bit of sand/ silt depth to hide it.
(FYI You guys are answering my questions about before I finish typing my replies.)
The black tip seems like it could be a root ball but the light color does not seem natural.
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The black tip seems like it could be a root ball but the light color does not seem natural.
Coconut palm trunks are light colored and have big, dark root balls.
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I'm not sure any section of relatively fragile structure such as fuselage could survive that intact after being washed through the passage into the lagoon and then being subject to 80 years of tides + regular storms. The condition of Artifact 2-2-V-1 would surely tend to bear this out?
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I still see an object present in the July 2020 image. It just looks like high tide vs low tide in the others.
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I'm not sure any section of relatively fragile structure such as fuselage could survive that intact after being washed through the passage into the lagoon and then being subject to 80 years of tides + regular storms. The condition of Artifact 2-2-V-1 would surely tend to bear this out?
Let's play this out. Let's imagine a large section of the Electra fuselage washed across the reef flat, through the passage, across the lagoon, and fetched up where we see the object. Obviously, the section of fuselage would have to be buoyant. The only way it could be buoyant is if at least some of the empty fuel tanks remained intact in the cabin. If the fuselage section is buoyant, the journey from reef to Taraia has to happen at the time the plane breaks up in 1937. That would be consistent with the dark spot in the 1939 aerial mapping montage. Once wreckage is there, it will not be subject to extreme forces.
We think 2-2-V-1 is so beat up because it made a punishing journey down the reef flat before being washed up in 1990, where we found it the next year.
The big problems are the shallow depth of the silt and the proportions of the object. There's apparently enough silt there to mostly obscure the object in 2017 for example, but the Electra fuselage is a good five and a half feet from keel to top and i have a hard time thinking there's ever that much silt in the area.
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It just looks like high tide vs low tide in the others.
High tide vs low tide. Duh. Thank you.
Tidal depth fluctuation is not as great in the lagoon as it is out on the reef but it could be, I dunno, maybe two feet.
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Yeah, not exactly the Bay of Fundy, but probably a few feet, like you said. That and the silt could do a good job of obscuring an object.
I hate to say it, but the Bing maps view is better, and more recent, than Google. Maybe we can see it in Flight Sim 2020.
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The big problems are the shallow depth of the silt and the proportions of the object. There's apparently enough silt there to mostly obscure the object in 2017 for example, but the Electra fuselage is a good five and a half feet from keel to top and i have a hard time thinking there's ever that much silt in the area.
What if due to material erosion and/or weathering it's not the entire fuselage that we might be seeing but only a portion, say, from the fuel ports up? Think of the shape of a stalk of celery or better yet, a sculling shell. Or maybe the wing root down, just the belly pan and keel? From my limited A&P experience, I would venture that it's possible the semi-oval shape of the fuselage - the portion with the greatest internal shape or form support (the vertex of the ellipse) - might have a tendency to stay together compared to the larger, "flatter" sidewall sections which could be eroded away or "blown out". This might also explain why the "now we see it, now we don't" variables in the photos, depending on environmental conditions or tidal levels at the time the photo was taken and the angle. I agree, to "hide" an object of the entire diameter of the fuselage would be difficult in shallow waters/silt...but if it was only the top 12"-18" of the fuselage....???
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What if the water depth was greater in the Taraia spit area in 1937 as the plane floated in ? Slowly taking on water and settled in at this location. Becoming totally submerged, tides would have surely covered it up over time with silt/sand making it only visible occasionally. So what we look at being shallow water now, was in fact much deeper than we thought then.
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Any explanation for what happened to the Electra must take into account:
• The Navy flyover on July 9, 1937 did not see an airplane.
• The Maude/Bevington expedition in October 1937 did not see an airplane.
• The New Zealand survey of the island in Jan./Feb. 1939 did not see an airplane.
• The U.S. Navy Bushnell survey of the island in November 1939 did not see an airplane.
• Gallagher was in residence on the island from September 1940 to June 1941 and did not see an airplane.
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This is frame 23:43 from the 2001 Aerial Tour of Nikumaroro (https://youtu.be/DL9FGsvB3E8).
Worth watching. We made a very close pass. No object visible but there's a small log on the beach in the foreground - too small to be the object in question.
It doesn't help that the pilot took that turn like he was dodging a VC machine gun. Probably an old Cav guy. It looks like he was having fun.
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As noted in my earlier post on the 2017 Niku visit I did note large sections from the wreck in the channel area. The curved section in the attached image attracted my attention however on further investigation it was found to be of iron composition. It was close to the channel exit into the lagoon, no doubt, as seen by earlier expeditions, large sections from the wreck have been over time carried into the lagoon. The Taraia object could be similar to the attached image.
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Well, if I had to guess, I'd say it is probably a log that washed into that position. Black is the root ball, light is the trunk covered by a thin layer of sediment. Top has been broken off in the wind storm that uprooted the tree. Floated there and got caught up on the shoreline.
Based upon the anecdote of airplane parts being spotted out on the far lagoon shoreline (I can't recall the specifics at the moment), we did survey this area extensively in 2001 using metal detectors. We also surveyed this area underwater by skiff towed scuba guinea pigs (Walt and myself) in 2001, and I believe using the small AUV sidescan unit in 2010? Taraia point is one place where the sediment does accumulate, that is why it is there, and it does change shape a bit over time as it builds and erodes. Just off the tip, on the side where the log is, it is very loose fine grained stuff and easy to sink into, and very stinky, i.e. much like quicksand made from bird guano. As you move farther up the shore, it firms up.
My opinion, anything other than a log is an extreme long shot, but.....
Fun to speculate though.
Andrew
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What if the Taraia object is exactly where it crashed and not brought in by tidal movement over any period of time. Maybe Amelia & Fred decided on this approach instead, due to the coral reefs and all the hazards involved. With their focus more on personal preservation than the aircraft itself. Picking the spit area to be the most beneficial to have a survivable landing. Coming to that decision after multiple flybys or unless it was a spur of the moment as they ran out of fuel. Most likely bringing the Electra through Tatiman Passage to make a belly water landing ( ditching ) with intentions of reaching the spit. If this were to be, the majority of the plane would be within the Taraia Spit and cove search area. This is my hypothesis on the last moments of her flight.
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It’s probably a Japanese mini sub that sank on a mission to resupply the Imperial Japanese Army Commandos who loaded the Electra on the barge for the journey to Jaluit.
Or a log.
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Here we have a blowup of the 1938 photo of Taraia area. I have
circled what I believe to be the same object as seen in the other
photos. If so, this could corroborate the float in or the fly in theory.
Have a look and draw your own conclusions. What do you think?
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It doesn't help that the pilot took that turn like he was dodging a VC machine gun. Probably an old Cav guy. It looks like he was having fun.
He was definitely having fun and the old Cav guy in the back of the Hughes 500 (no seats, no belts, nothing to hold on to) was grabbing anything he could find trying to stay aboard.
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What if the Taraia object is exactly where it crashed and not brought in by tidal movement over any period of time.
Any hypothesis that has the Electra landing in the lagoon has to dismiss all of the post-loss radio signals and the Bevington Object plus assume the Navy fliers missed an airplane wreck sitting right there in plane sight.
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Here we have a blowup of the 1938 photo of Taraia area.
This is the area of interest in 1938 photo. Using Photoshop, I have discarded the color, rendering the image in black & white.
I don't think there's anything there.
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It doesn't help that the pilot took that turn like he was dodging a VC machine gun. Probably an old Cav guy. It looks like he was having fun.
He was definitely having fun and the old Cav guy in the back of the Hughes 500 (no seats, no belts, nothing to hold on to) was grabbing anything he could find trying to stay aboard.
Hopefully they had a harness for you. It looks like the cameraman was in the pilot's seat.
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Hopefully they had a harness for you. It looks like the cameraman was in the pilot's seat.
No harness. No nuthin'. Mark Smith was shooting from the right seat up front.
The helicopter had no provision for passengers in back so the original plan was for me to show the pilot where I wanted him to take Mark, then we would come back, I would get out, Mark would take my place in the right seat, and I would wait on the ground while they went out and filmed. But when we got Mark strapped in, I couldn't stand the thought watching them fly off without me so I went around to the pilot's side and hollered, "Is it okay I ride along in the back?" He looked at me like I had lost my mind. "There's nothing back there!" I said, "Not a problem. I rode in slicks all the time in the Cav." He said, "Suit yourself, it's your ass." And off we went. Life is cheap on Niku. You routinely do things you wouldn't dream of doing in the real world.
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five and a half feet from keel to top
Ric, can you comment on the Electra 10 "keel"?
Dan Brown, #2408
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Ric, can you comment on the Electra 10 "keel"?
The keel was a heavy aluminum extrusion that ran from the main beam aft and anchored all of the circumferential bulkheads.
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Hello everyone,
I`m in agreement with Ric, I didn`t take in account all of the evidence thus far. I know
my theory is off the beaten path and is total speculation. So if this proves to be her plane
wreckage and taking in all of the other evidence, the float in theory would be the most
plausible.
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It's seemed to me from the beginning of this thread that there are three possibilities. It may be late to write this now -- I intended to post it when the discussion began -- but here goes.
1) It's an object that is periodically uncovered and covered, like the Maid of Harlech. This could be part of the Electra. The evidence against this is that metal detectors -- and visual search -- in that area did not detect it.
2) The area where it is seen occasionally captures elongated objects (perhaps logs) for a time, but does not retain them. The question is whether there is a source of such objects to land in the water and be moved into that place and then elsewhere by natural forces. It seems that People Who Have Been There have been answering that question.
3) It's an optical illusion, which Ric thought it was initially, and which seems the likeliest explanation, given that nearly all such sightings are exactly that. The evidence against is that occasionally some have been determined have a high probability to be real, not illusory objects. An example is the Bevington Object, now considered to have a high probability of being a landing gear assembly from the Electra. There are others also considered to have a probability to be other than illusory.
Don
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1) It's an object that is periodically uncovered and covered, like the Maid of Harlech. This could be part of the Electra. The evidence against this is that metal detectors -- and visual search -- in that area did not detect it.
If it's a part of the Electra, it's a big part of the Electra that must have floated in. The only part of the Electra that looks remotely like the object is the fuselage. The fuselage, or any portion of the fuselage, is not buoyant unless some of the fuel tanks are still in place and intact. It is hard to imagine that a piece of wreckage like that could go undetected for all these years. In size, color, and proportions, it looks like a coconut palm log with a root ball on one end.
2) The area where it is seen occasionally captures elongated objects (perhaps logs) for a time, but does not retain them. The question is whether there is a source of such objects to land in the water and be moved into that place and then elsewhere by natural forces. It seems that People Who Have Been There have been answering that question.
When storms hit the island from the west, tidal surges erode the banks of the main passage and under-wash coconut palms growing along the edge of the passage, exposing the root ball and killing the tree. (photo below from 2007) Some are washed into the lagoon. Taraia is a logical place for one to wash up.
3) It's an optical illusion, which Ric thought it was initially, and which seems the likeliest explanation, given that nearly all such sightings are exactly that. The evidence against is that occasionally some have been determined have a high probability to be real, not illusory objects. An example is the Bevington Object, now considered to have a high probability of being a landing gear assembly from the Electra. There are others also considered to have a probability to be other than illusory.
There's definitely something there in some of the photos but interpretations of what it is are prone to pareidolia.
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That picture sure provides the scale of things on Niku.
Nice!
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Well, make a note to look in this spot next trip. If it is a 23' piece of fuselage, you will probably still find bits of aluminum even if it moved. If it is a 23' coconut palm trunk with a root ball, it should still be in the vicinity.
I would take some of those tongs the oystermen use in the Chesapeake Bay.
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If it is ~23’ long then by my rough scaling it is ~18” to ~36” in width (depending upon whether the dark lines are part of the object, or are shadows). So it is highly unlikely to be the fuselage.
Is 18” - 36” diameter the scale of local-origin palm trees that might wash up there?
Jon
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3’ was my thought as well. Much more treelike than airplane-ish.
There are many thousands of coconut palm trees on the island. There has been, at best, one Lockheed Electra.
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18 to 36 inch diameter sounds about right for Niku cocos. Most are inland and not susceptible to being washed into the lagoon, except the cocos along the Old Village edge of Tatiman Passage.
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When I saw Ric's reply to my three options, I thought, it's coconut palms, and that seems to be the growing consensus.
It appears that a tree gets washed in, captured for a while, then washes out again. Thus some photos show an object and others don't. There is only a tree there sometimes (Schrodinger's tree?).
But why only one? Is there some reason that only one tree would be captured there, or does it just happen there has only been one on those occasions?
Where do the trees go after that? Is there a place where they accumulate, or are they washed back out to sea?
Are there stray coconut logs around the lagoon shores?
Don
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It appears that a tree gets washed in, captured for a while, then washes out again. Thus some photos show an object and others don't. There is only a tree there sometimes (Schrodinger's tree?).
There's an object there for a few years. Sometimes it's more visible than others. High versus low tide seems to be the best explanation.
But why only one?
Because for the most part, cocos are not prone to being washed into the lagoon. Most are inland. The southern shore of the main passage is the only place where cocos grow near the water in a spot that gets clobbered by storms.
Is there some reason that only one tree would be captured there, or does it just happen there has only been one on those occasions?
It's a logical place for a log to wash up but it's a rare event.
Where do the trees go after that? Is there a place where they accumulate, or are they washed back out to sea?
Stuff does appear, and then disappear, from the lagoon shore. For several years there was a big rusty tank on the lagoon shore over by Kanawa Point. Then it went away. I don't know where stuff goes but I don't think anything in the lagoon gets washed back out to sea. There's plenty of force to wash things into the lagoon but very little force going the other way.
Are there stray coconut logs around the lagoon shores?
If there's a coconut log graveyard, I've never seen it. I suspect what few logs wash the lagoon eventually get waterlogged enough to sink to the bottom and get covered with silt..
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Is there some reason that only one tree would be captured there, or does it just happen there has only been one on those occasions?
It's a logical place for a log to wash up but it's a rare event.
I don't have any first-hand experience with the tides there, but it looks like at least some of the ocean water flowing in from Tatiman creates a clockwise current around the Northern part of the lagoon. That's probably what caused that sandbar to build up at Taraia. That same action would cause the log to get hung up on the sandbar. It also makes sense that airplane parts that were originally on the reef North of the passage would wash up in that area rather than in the main body of the lagoon.
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It also makes sense that airplane parts that were originally on the reef North of the passage would wash up in that area rather than in the main body of the lagoon.
And that is where a former Niku resident told us he saw airplane wreckage sometime in the 1950s, but if
it was there then it seems to be gone now, either from being salvaged by locals or washed away - or both.
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Or once again being covered by silt/sand while being forgotten,
until Niku resident recalls wreckage years later.
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If we were there we'd go check it out, but it certainly doesn't warrant a dedicated expedition. At the moment, there is nothing that justifies the immense expense of another trip to the island. The last expedition that produced positive evidence was Niku VI in 2010. The 5 expeditions since then (TIGHAR in 2012, TIGHAR in 2015, Betchart in 2015, Betchart in 2017, and Nat Geo in 2019) have found zip. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.
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Sorry if I am beating a tired drum, but if a part of the Electra had had sufficient buoyancy to end up on Taraia, it certainly had sufficient buoyancy to drift just about anywhere else around Niku, and much more likely to have. I think the Electra may indeed have sunk at sea as many surmise, however not near Howland but near Niku. Those spending millions scanning the sea bottom elsewhere would do well to turn their sights onto a few square miles near Niku, focusing on the deep areas that haven’t yet been searched.
Unfortunately, the last five expeditions were proven to be under-resourced for the kind of deep search (literal and figurative) now required, after the “easy” successes of TIGHAR’s early days. Let’s hope that in the future searches becomes much more affordable and effective due to inevitable advances in artificial intelligence, robotics and remote sensing.
Earhart searchers of the future may well look back on TIGHAR’s efforts the way contemporary explorers admire Shackleton from the relative comfort and safety of McMurdo Station. Those who participated in TIGHAR’s expeditions were and are heroes in my book.
Jon
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Although a separate trip to Niku is not cost effective. An in-depth search of the lagoon would be more likely to have results than the extensive cost of deep exploration surrounding the island.
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What if the Taraia object is exactly where it crashed and not brought in by tidal movement over any period of time.
Any hypothesis that has the Electra landing in the lagoon has to dismiss all of the post-loss radio signals and the Bevington Object plus assume the Navy fliers missed an airplane wreck sitting right there in plane sight.
The hypothesis that the Electra landed on the reef is the only thing that has stopped me asking (in the last 20 or so years) why on earth Amelia would have landed out on the reef flat.
As an relatively inexperienced, but adequate, pilot, if I was approaching an island with wide sandy beaches, ore coral rubble beaches, I would have tried lining up on the coral. I'm pretty sure Amelia and Fred were low enough on fuel to know they would be relying on the Electra for accommodation and supplies of whatever they had, like tools etc.
I'm also fairly sure they would realise that the Electra would never be flown off again if they landed on the reef, even if the crevasses in the coral didn;t tear the gear off.
Better to risk landing those lovely big balloon tyres that were more or less made for landing on sand, on loose coral rubble or soft sand, and coming to a sudden halt, even if they hit a small boulder or two or tore off a wing tip, or even a whole wing.
There appear to be lots of, admittedly sloping, coral ruble or sand beaches around most of Niku.
Had they done that, and had they avoided a fire on landing, they would have had shelter, food, water and survival stores. They would have had no chance to fly off, but they would have been visible to a search and perhaps alive.
Assuming they chose to land on the reef, they still immediately gave up any chance of flying off, but added the complication of their shelter being subject to destruction on the first high tide.
I know a pilot's first though is to save the plane, which is the cause of so many crashes when someone tries to turn back when an engine fails. But logically, you put the thing down somewhere survivable. Stuff the plane - save the people.
Th' Wombat
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That she landed on the reef is pretty much beyond question. Why she chose the reef will always be a matter of speculation. Having walked the reef myself, I don't agree that deciding to land there meant accepting the loss of the airplane. It's better than some runways I've landed on. And having walked the very soft and often steeply sloped beaches, I'd go for the reef. Her entire career was tied up in that airplane. Land safely, figure out what's wrong with the radio, and call Itasca. Have them bring enough fuel to fly to Howland. Refuel and complete the world flight.
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And, AE probably was aware of a similar sized aircraft that had successfully landed on a fringing reef just 9 months before her flight.
https://tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Archives/Research/Bulletins/64_ReefLanding/64_ReefLanding.htm
amck
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After months of reviewing the original image, Here's what I have. This is an image of the left wing of Amelia’s Electra. The size, shape and shadowing have all the earmarks of this. Even down to the aileron partially broken off. And unlike the fuselage, the wing could be hiding in shallow water due to its height. This seriously needs to be looked at.
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I hate to bring this up again, mostly because it’s been beaten to death very recently, but I just rewatched the aerial tour video, and there IS something under water in the exact spot, reflecting light. It’s at 23:44 and appears for about 2 seconds. In my image it is at 8 o’clock, near the left edge of the picture. The reflection appears and disappears before going out of frame.
If you watch the video for 30 seconds or so around that time, you will see plenty of sunlight reflecting off the surface of the water. This image shows a reflection from something underneath the surface. Maybe a bare spot of sand-worn coral reflecting some sunlight? It’s certainly not an entire airplane....
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I was looking at this photo this evening and turned it from side to side. I believe there maybe something to this photo. It appears to me to be part of motor housing. The round cylinder profile shown almost indicates that it forced its way into the ground. Just my thought but it is very interesting.
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How big do you think it is?
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Okay maybe my depth perception is a tad off but would you agree that something is there?
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Looks like a pile of seaweed.
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Okay maybe my depth perception is a tad off but would you agree that something is there?
Yes. It's about 15 feet across. I think it's a bush.