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[Brian Heite]

I don't know if this has been broached before, but I stumbled across a video on YTube where a guy is going over a web page about a drastic theory that Amelia died on Saipan. I went to the page and read it and the writer seemed extremely aggressive and negative about TIGHAR which puts me off immediately. There is a lot of "They were heard to say" and it all adds up to a great conspiracy theory that FDR covered up Amelia (of course he was an evil socialist communist too) and our government (not known for it's excellent secret keeping ability) is hanging on to this dark secret for dear life. The sad thing is, it's in a veterans News web site, so scratch that one (I am a 20 year submarine vet) but the disturbing thing was there appears to be a lot of books quoted, and witnesses who saw the Electra destroyed by US serviceman after Saipan was taken. Has this issue every been looked into? I am just curious if any shred of solid evidence (something they accuse TGHAR of doing) is ever presented anywheres in the mound of material? Has anyone ever seen anything to lend any credence to the Saipan thing and the Great Conspiracy?

[Ric Gillespie]

Has anyone ever seen anything to lend any credence to the Saipan thing and the Great Conspiracy?

In a word, no.  Historically, the Earhart mystery has evoked more passion than intellectual rigor. People become invested in a theory that, more often than not, has more to do with their own world-view than with any actual evidence.  Those who don't agree are vilified. The roots of the Saipan theory can be found in the wartime propaganda film Flight For Freedom. Its popularization in the 1960s was the product of residual (and understandable) revulsion for Imperial Japan's many atrocities.  For a scholarly review of the Saipan phenomenon see Amelia Earhart in the Marianas: A Consideration of the Evidence.

A word of caution.  We're not going to get into a discussion of the Saipan theory here unless someone can provide hard evidence (contemporaneous written accounts, datable photographs, or identifiable physical artifacts) to support it.

[Ric Gillespie]

Still nothing new to support -

But was led to some interesting thoughts and writings that I believe make  clear cases of why Saipan does not hold water.

Gary still has problems with "would have" but I find it interesting that he says:
"The commonly accepted level of uncertainty of in-flight dead reckoning is 10% of the distance flown. So even without a navigator on board and with Earhart doing her own dead reckoning navigation, just holding a heading based on correcting for the forecast winds, and with no fixes in flight, no celestial fixes and no visual fixes over an island, she should not have been off course more than 255.6 SM [222 nm] either to the north or to the south of Howland."


As I recently explained on a different thread, the best available evidence now suggests that AE and FN hit the LOP roughly 230 nm south of Howland. 

[Ric Gillespie]

Gary LaPook has not been banned from this Forum despite his participation in Heath Smith's private TIGHAR-haters Forum.  He's not even under moderation.  He's under "watch."  He's welcome to participate in our research as long as he adheres to sound methodology and refrains from troll-ism. 

[john a delsing]

IMHO this forum was a 1000 times better with Gary LaPook than it has become without Gary LaPook.

[Chris Johnson]

Well its GLP's choice not to contribute but I agree John, his posts though mostly going over my head were interesting and fostered intelligent debate.

[Ric Gillespie]

It is my understanding that Gary is active on the private Amelia Earhart Forum.  If you ask nicely and express sufficient displeasure with TIGHAR they may let you in. 

[JNev]

...I find it interesting that he says:
"The commonly accepted level of uncertainty of in-flight dead reckoning is 10% of the distance flown. So even without a navigator on board and with Earhart doing her own dead reckoning navigation, just holding a heading based on correcting for the forecast winds, and with no fixes in flight, no celestial fixes and no visual fixes over an island, she should not have been off course more than 255.6 SM [222 nm] either to the north or to the south of Howland."

Yes - and to me this underscores that something somehow went wrong with more than just the RDF exercise at the end of the flight.  I do not know why or that we can ever know for certain, but it really is as if Earhart found herself in exactly that condition. 

I <have> (edit - J. Neville) admitted personal frustration at Gary's steadfast defense of Noonan's techniques and abilities: had they worked as Gary has long suggested, the wreck ought to be sitting on Howland... (no offense. Gary  )

I don't question that Noonan had those things, but because the flight was lost and did not arrive at Howland despite those things, I believe there remains a more than fair question as to whether they worked or not.  They seem to have failed; it is almost as if Earhart were just dead-reckoning for whatever reason. 

I've speculated before about Noonan and why that might be, much to the chagrin of another moderator (forgive me, father, for I...  ) and will abstain again for the moment. 

That said, with great respect for Gary - I will again personally challenge by noting that despite all odds with regards to Noonan's abilities, state of the art, equipment and the expected possibilties - it did not come down well for a supposedly well-navigated celestial flight.  Gary may have to correct my view, but somehow the best celestial navigation assumptions did fail our intrepid pair - whether landfall at Gardner, or Splash-n-Sank.

As I recently explained on a different thread, the best available evidence now suggests that AE and FN hit the LOP roughly 230 nm south of Howland.

Which I agree with <as an exciting possibility> (edited - J. Neville), despite the flak I may take for it. 
- It fits flying NNW along the LOP for a reasonable time, thence turning back SSE for final shot at landfall - and low and behold, there lieth not dragons but a big blue lagoon surrounded by a coronado strand, as Lambrecht described it. 
- By then Earhart had - oops, may long have, changed over to her daytime frequency, causing Itasca to lose her.
- The rest, whatever it is, is history; and where the navy left off, an intrepid fellow would pick-up some 60ish years later... and the history of a continued search is being written... yes?  May the one who finds her win!

...At least, yes, the case for Saipan fades further into a purple sky - no gas, no cameras, no Japanese entanglements or clandestine socialist plots whereby sitting (no pun intended...) presidents launched aggressive secret efforts to protect democracy so that they could then fleece industry for the sake of a chicken in every pot.   

Gary is no enemy of truth IMO, he simply has a steadfast notion, IMHO, which I yearn to publicly challenge... hey, strong ideas are worth arguing over, eh?    If they are strong, they can always be strongly defended...

I must amend a bit.  I challenged - and got more than I bargained for.  For the first time, I really finally 'get it' as to Gary's navigational points.  See edits above in bold, etc.

It is true that the norm is 10% error on a given 'flight' - which would produce the error you've stated here, Ric.  Problem is, they had known fixes between Lae and the Howland area which greatly diminishes the amout of error that would be expected (see 'visual counterfeit,... etc.').

TIGHAR is the only outfit that has ever produced anything that might relate to the doomed flight.  The trouble we have is 'might relate', but YMMV, of course.  I have long held that those things are 'markers' by which we search; personally I cannot quite cross-over into certainty on that, no matter how much that may seem like I am 'safely hanging back': it doesn't mean no enthusiasm for the search - it merely means rationally I have to recognize alternate possibilities, where they can be appropriately validated.

[Chris Johnson]

There's nothing wrong in looking at other evidence and forming your own opinion, that's what life's about.  At least in TIGHAR and GLP's site we have two differing opinions that are both compulsive.  Its for the individual to make up their own mind

[john a delsing]

   When GLP ( Gary ) was active on this forum, many times he and Ric would disagree on something (s), sometimes Gary would win the point, and other times ( most times ) Ric would 'win', however there never was any losers, as we  members of the forum got to witness two of the best minds ( in the AE disappearance field ) debating ever so many facts, many of which were way over my head.
   IMO the long hours that Ric puts in, not only in this forum but in the many other areas he is committed to, took it's toll. Ric likes to say that Gary can post anytime he wants to. That to me is very misleading. Gary will tell any member who asks him that everything he writes has to be reviewed by Ric and then only the portions Ric agrees with are posted.
 According to Gary, under this system most of his posts, many with lot's of hours of research have just disappeared. It doesn't take very long to just say; what's the use and leave.
   Maybe to someone who owns a forum, this might be called placing someone under ' watch ', to most others I think the word censorship more fitting.

[Dave Potratz]

Well, nobody asked me to weigh-in on this "forum" debate. . . but I will anyway.

I think the key to understanding the TIGHAR administrator's position is that this, as stated, is in fact by design a "Research Forum" in the academic sense.  Not a "public" forum in the social sense.

What I have observed over the past few years of my generally daily visits to this website is that many posters experience frustration born from their own conflating of the term "forum" with "chat room", "Facebook" or "Twitter" conversations.  In those realms, yes, everyone's keyboarding, from well-reasoned, to frivolous, to passionate, to troll-ism carries roughly equal weight, at least as long as it's not explicitly abusive and is tolerated by other posters.

NOT so with this Research Forum, which, as the administrators have repeatedly indicated, needs must adhere to a much higher academic standard . . . or suffer relegation to the aforementioned "chat room" status.

The brass-tacks of this, IMO, is that, unfortunately unhappily for many that I've observed here over these years, each post is NOT equal to the next.  For the simple reason that by the stated intent of the administrators EACH post ideally needs must meet at least a minimum standard of academic relevance,  and likewise be accompanied by a minimum standard of prudent academic discourse.

Otherwise, as I've observed here time and time again, discourse merely degrades into the "he said, she said" mélange of what I assume to be exemplary of the average Twitter conversation.

Sometimes that's mildly entertaining in the TV drama or sitcom sense.   Seemingly oftentimes it IS a waist of time toward the clearly stated goal of this organization.

That's my observed opinion as a TIGHAR member. I support the position of the administrator(s), (though I also acknowledge that they be human, too  ).  YMMV.