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[Monty Fowler]

I know, Irv. 

What I was trying to point out in my usual convoluted way was that MY mental map of images, in my increasingly-tattered brain, saw what it had been the most exposed to. In this case a WWII aircraft. I didn't "see" an Electra because I'm a WWII buff and have a pretty extensive mental image library of WWII aircraft.

Our brain sees what it expects to see. Most of the time. Some of us, like Richie Conroy, are gifted with the ability to see outside the narrow confines of our memory. I am not.

LTM, who tries to keep things real,
Monty Fowler, TIGHAR No. 2189 CER

[Ric Gillespie]

As an argument to support that, I offer up the evidence at the titular "shoe site." When TIGHAR went back the second time to that site, to excavate its possible grave, they found the remains of a leather work glove Ric had left there the year before - and there wasn't much left of it at all. After only one year.

Correction:  I left the glove there in 1991.  We found it when we came back to that site in 1997 - six years later.   The upper surface of the glove was relatively intact.  The under-surface (in contact with the ground) was almost completely eaten away.

[Tim Collins]

Glickman looked vey carefully at both the airplane shaped thingy and the trail.  They are not flaws.
Would a sail survive eight years?  Gallagher found no clothes with the bones after only three years.

Ric -

This has festered with me quite a bit over night - So if Glickman has examined these features and made determinations and suggestions about them, then why did you bait the thread with your "golly gee, what could this be?" in your post of October 3rd? Many of us have since been seriously wracking our brains out over these features thinking that there was the possibility to make a genuine contribution to the effort. But for what? Only to have been spinning our wheels the whole time?  You're the first person to lose patience over wild ruminations and fanciful scenarios so what was the point here? We all get it that you want to write things up for presentation, but baiting and being all secretive and terse and not sharing information about things that become hot topics on the forum is not helpful to the cause and certainly a good way to go in my opinion. You have a very knowledgeable and resourceful (AND very generous I might add) constituency here and it's probably not a great idea to mess with it.

[Tim Collins]

...
1) Red arrow indicates original callout by Ric/Jeff Glickman.
2) Green arrow indicates possible actual location of the "looks like, but not an airplane" object, facing same direction, it seems, as in the other image.
3) Blue arrow indicates possible other location for the object, closer to shore.  This is just me trying to "triangulate," in a sense, based on the other image.

Or it could lie somewhere in between the green and blue arrows. 
...

Regarding the "airplane feature" as viewed from that angle: in my opinion, the tip of the "wing" almost touches the base of your blue arrow. Once you discern that, then look to the left and you can see the engine nacelle. The fuselage is a bit obscured.

[Ric Gillespie]

This has festered with me quite a bit over night - So if Glickman has examined these features and made determinations and suggestions about them, then why did you bait the thread with your "golly gee, what could this be?"

As I have said, the purposes of this forum are as a research tool and an educational tool.  The two purposes are related.  We're all learning.  Struggling with the apparent "airplane-in-the-bushes" was tremendously educational for me.  We agonized over that damn thing for weeks until Jeff was finally able to get a solid scale for it.  I wanted to share just a little bit of that experience with the Forum because I think it's valuable.  I put up the image at 07:35 on October 3 and less than two hours later I explained that it isn't really an airplane.  If that's "messing" with the Forum, I apologize.

[Greg Daspit]

Regarding power of suggestion I didn't see an airplane shape until the picture of the Harney model was put up in the same orientation. It probably seemed like the trail was a skid mark for a while.  What is the latest on the light colored object closer to the shore that was a possible lifeboat at one time?

[Irvine John Donald]

I will admit that Ric also did this exercise with the photo research group. I believe I was the biggest fish he caught. When you look at the hi res photo and digitally zoom in the shape of an aircraft leapt out at me. A few of us asked questions like why the skin was the same colour as the vegetation and Ric played along by providing a photo showing the Electra's polished skin was a very dull and discoloured greenish by the time it left on its last leg. Ric let the exercise go on much longer than the public forum.  I think it was a day or two. Then he let us in on Jeff Glickman's findings.

I felt a bit sheepish and I'm not 100% convinced it's not an aircraft. Ric has said that area has not been well searched. But it showed me that it's as easy to mistake vegetation as easily as coral for aircraft parts. Power of suggestion. I'm certainly not upset by Ric doing this. In fact I found it extremely educational.  My two cents.

[James Champion]

So, is this 'airplane-but-not-actually-an airplane-in-the-bush' feature along with the 'trail'; possibly a camp from the Norwich City survivors; possibly reused as 'camp zero' for AE and FN, - Is this also possibly what created the 'signs of recent habitation'  observation as indicated in Lambrecht's Report?

Apologies for the awkward punctuation.

[richie conroy]

Hi Tim

I understand what you are saying, So imagine what Ric and the Tighar board felt like having all there years of hard work about to blow up in there face, The image seriously had Ric and co questioning there own hypothesis, So why not see forum members responses to the image when they seen it, The forum members only had to wait a couple hours to speculate what the object was, Jeff Glickman showed Ric the anomaly on return flight from New Zealand  and had to wait weeks for Jeff to get back to him with results.

The image only came to light with the study group last week with the "what do you see in this image" question and was days before we were told what the image was meant to show, Now as shocking as it sounds i did not even notice the plane like object instead i found what looks like an A carved into floor and asked Ric if this is what he meant, So imagine what i was thinking when Ric pointed out what he and Jeff thought might be the Electra right there mangled up at the end of what looked like skid marks....

My Thought being "And yous have the cheek to say we see camels in the sky at least we only claim to see airplane parts and NOT a whole crash site and that, if the pilots who took the photo's had missed it, Then they shouldn't be piloting a plane...

For me what happened with this image was a good thing, As we got to share in the up and down moment of it, And proved even Jeff and Ric can get things wrong sometimes

Anyway sorry for waffling on about it, I just found this whole episode an eye opener and hope u Tim C will understand why Ric done it

Thanks Richie   

[Paul Parsons]

Gallagher found no clothes with the bones after only three years.

Do we know the bones were there for only three years?

[richie conroy]

We don't have 100% proof

But logic suggests if the skeleton remains and sextant box found close by belonged to a crew member of Norwich city, Then i doubt there would be a sextant box there to find.

Due to sextant box being in the condition it was found with numbers still visible on outside suggests it hadn't been there 11 years i.e from a Norwich city survivour

That leaves you with who ever it belonged to having seen the skeletal remains said nothing and went were ever without telling anyone of there discovery..

I have been thinking about these bones for awhile now and why Gallagher thought it might of been remains of Amelia Earhart... I was watching a video last night and noticed that Amelia has got a gap in between her 2 front teeth and Gallagher mentions teeth nearly all intact and mentions dental records being able to identify remains ?

These are just my opinions, Good question though Paul

Thanks Richie

[richie conroy]

Our brain sees what it expects to see. Most of the time. Some of us, like Richie Conroy, are gifted with the ability to see outside the narrow confines of our memory. I am not.

LTM, who tries to keep things real,
Monty Fowler, TIGHAR No. 2189 CER
[/quote]

Thank you Monty your comments mean allot 

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

... Gallagher mentions teeth nearly all intact ...

No.  "Bones Found on Nikumaroro":

"The bones included:- (1) a skull with the right zygoma and malar bones broken off: (2) mandible with only four teeth in position; (3) part of the right scapula; (4) the first thoracic vertebra; 5) portion of a rib (? 2nd right rib); (6) left humerus; 7) right radius; ( right innominate bone; (9) right femur; (10) left femur; (11) right tibia; (12) right fibula; and (13) the right scaphoid bone of the foot"


 

[richie conroy]

Hi Marty

My apologies i was going off the following information http://tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Archives/Documents/Bones_Chronology.html

4a. Sept. 23, 1940
Telegram No. 71 from Gallagher to Jack Barley, Resident Commissioner, Ocean Island Transcript:

Some months ago working party on Gardner discovered human skull - this was buried and I only recently heard about it. Thorough search has now produced more bones (including lower jaw) part of a shoe a bottle and a sextant box. It would appear that (a) Skeleton is possibly that of a woman,
(b) Shoe was a womans and probably size 10,
(c) Sextant box has two numbers on it 3500 ( stencilled ) and 1542– sextant being old fashioned and probably painted over with black enamel. Bones look more than four years old to me but there seems to be very slight chance that this may be remains of Amelia Earhardt. If United States authorities find that above evidence fits into general description, perhaps they could supply some dental information as many teeth are intact. Am holding latest finds for present but have not exhumed skull. There is no local indication that this discovery is related to wreck of the "Norwich City".  Gallagher.


"Perhaps they could supply some dental records as many teeth are intact" I was under the impression that some teeth became dislodged in transition between Gardner and Suva.

Thanks Marty for clearing this up       

[richie conroy]

Marty there seems to be something not right here, Gallagher says many teeth are intact, But then says  Am holding latest finds for present but have not exhumed skull ?

Does he mean he has unearthed skull but not removed it from burial site ?

Could there have been more teeth present when skull was unearthed to when skull was actually exhumed ?