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[Monty Fowler]

We'll be here and there's always plenty to do on a farm.  Dress is casual of course. 

I knew it! He's going to have us mucking out the horse stalls 

LTM, who tries not to mix and match his mucks much,
Monty Fowler, TIGHAR No. 2189 ECSP

[Ric Gillespie]

Excellent article in today's online Philadephia Enquirer
The story will run in the printed newspaper tomorrow.

[John Wallace]

Nice article.

Since Philly is pretty close, has any consideration been given to more of an open house type scenario for the Labor Day weekend?  "Come see how we are trying to find Amelia."  Open invitation with donations accepted/encouraged.  Could have a set time for Glickman to give a little talk. Bring your own picnic if weather nice. Might be able to draw in interested/non-members into the fold. I suspect level of advanced work and specifics of costs, might be able to get some current and future donations. I saw only room for 12 somewhere but isn't there a lawn and a big barn?

 Also, there is a pretty active little general aviation airfield up the road with actitivies several preceding weekends which would be additional opportunity to publicize/tie-in/garner interest. May be nice excuse for GA pilot to get out that saturday.
http://www.newgardenflyingfield.com/

If others are traveling that weekend, they might be able to arrange slight detour/drop in.

Just some thoughts.

[Jeff Lange]

I am trying to work out the logistics to being able to attend and see most of the 2-2-v-1 Commission members again, plus see the TIGHAR digs. Let you all know in a week or so if I can make it.

[Ric Gillespie]

Since Philly is pretty close, has any consideration been given to more of an open house type scenario for the Labor Day weekend?

We'll call it a Research Conference and Open House.  We'll put out an invitation to the TIGHAR membership via TIGHARNews and see what kind of response we get.  If we decide to cast the net wider we can put the invitation on the TIGHAR Facebook page. 

I saw only room for 12 somewhere but isn't there a lawn and a big barn?

We can expand to meet demand. We have acres of lawn so, if need be, we could put up a tent like an old time religious camp meeting.  The barn is plenty big but it's not ready for prime time.

Also, there is a pretty active little general aviation airfield up the road with actitivies several preceding weekends which would be additional opportunity to publicize/tie-in/garner interest. May be nice excuse for GA pilot to get out that saturday.

New Garden is a great little GA airport.  I'm a member of the EAA chapter there.  I'm also a member of the Pennsylvania Aero Club based at Wings Field near Philadephia.  We'll extend invitations to both groups.  Again, I have no idea what kind of response we'll get.  We'll need to set a cut-off date for registrations so that we know how many to plan for.

[Randy Conrad]

Hey Guys! In correlation to Jay Burkett's post to 'hard' landing. Which I feel is pretty much a definate picture of what might have happened to Amelia and Fred. I have a question on something in response to the hard landing idea. Okay, let's say for example that they are close to Gardner Island. They can actually see it, and then as they are approaching the engines stall. When this happens...can you still lower the landing gear or landing gears by hand or does the engine have to be running to do this? Not familiar with this!!!

[Ric Gillespie]

...can you still lower the landing gear or landing gears by hand or does the engine have to be running to do this?

The landing gear system on a Lockheed 10 is electric.  There is no manual retraction or extension system.

[Ted G Campbell]

Ric,

Do us a favor.  Ask the local EAA/FBO what they can do on discounted fuel prices, cost of a shuttle between the A/P and your place.  If the price of the shuttle is not crazy I’ll cover the initial cost after all I sent folks way south to get pictures that I would like to get copies of  - hint, hint.  My plan is to fly up there in my C 172, refuel, spend the night in a local hotel, spend the next day looking at objects recovered from Niku, etc.  I’ll be coming up from Atlanta.

Ted Campbell

[Ric Gillespie]

Do us a favor.  Ask the local EAA/FBO what they can do on discounted fuel prices, cost of a shuttle between the A/P and your place.

I'll talk to the FBO.  No guarantees, but I'll ask. We'll shuttle anyone flying in to New Garden.  Glad you can make it.

[JNev]

...can you still lower the landing gear or landing gears by hand or does the engine have to be running to do this?

The landing gear system on a Lockheed 10 is electric.  There is no manual retraction or extension system.

Thought there was an emergency hand-crank for extending the gear.

There should be no reason to use it if the engines quit, so long as the battery was in good shape - the electrical extension system ought to work fine.

As to the scenario of losing both engines, then a landing necessarily being harder than normal - maybe, but the only reason would be dealing with a compressed workload.  If there's time to get the wheels down, there's time to settle the bird normally.  So I don't see a hard landing as a 'necessarily so' outcome in such an event.

Also, had the engines flamed out prior to landing, presuming fuel exhaustion, then we'd not have certain other things that logically go with a landing on Niku - subsequent radio transmissions for several days, etc.  Plus some of us remain with the belief that there was enough fuel to get to Niku and broadcast for a time.

Not sayin' a dead-stick couldn't have been the case, just sayin' it would be a hell of a coinkydink.

[John Ousterhout]

To Jeffrey's point, I think it might be a bad assumption that fuel starvation would only occur if all on-board fuel was exhausted.  It depends on which tank was selected, as well as how much "unusable" fuel remained.  The Lockheed had a complicated fuel system, with lots of places for fuel to hide.
Even if Amelia's protocol was to run each tank "dry" before switching to the next one, there might still be a considerable quantity left in the dry tank.  We don't have enough detail information about the ferry tank construction to estimate how much fuel might remain, but someone with knowledge of the Lockheed wing tanks (Ric?) might be able to give an estimate.

[Ric Gillespie]

Thought there was an emergency hand-crank for extending the gear.

You're right.  My mistake.
"..by pulling a T handle from the floor, the pilot can throw a clutch to the hand operating position and operate the gear with a hand crank at the right of his seat."

Oddly, there's no mention of that procedure in the Operating Manual.  Failure of the gear to extend is not even among among the emergencies listed.

[JNev]

To Jeffrey's point, I think it might be a bad assumption that fuel starvation would only occur if all on-board fuel was exhausted.  It depends on which tank was selected, as well as how much "unusable" fuel remained.  The Lockheed had a complicated fuel system, with lots of places for fuel to hide.
Even if Amelia's protocol was to run each tank "dry" before switching to the next one, there might still be a considerable quantity left in the dry tank.  We don't have enough detail information about the ferry tank construction to estimate how much fuel might remain, but someone with knowledge of the Lockheed wing tanks (Ric?) might be able to give an estimate.

It's only one obvious assumption that outright fuel starvation could have happened - you are right, there are other opportunities to misfeed the bird.

But how far to you want that dog to go in the field?  Like so many things, it's speculation - and still tells us nothing about how the ship might have landed (gently, despite dead-stick is quite possible). 

Just MHO, but more obvious reasons for a potentially hard landing exist: despite the survivable (also IMO) terrain, the bird could still get knocked around on an uneven surface - and might have certainly found a groove to drop a wheel in.  We know the Croydon Monospar lost a tailwheel on a reef in more or less that way (I believe it dropped through the 'crust' in that case).

[JNev]

Thought there was an emergency hand-crank for extending the gear.

You're right.  My mistake.
"..by pulling a T handle from the floor, the pilot can throw a clutch to the hand operating position and operate the gear with a hand crank at the right of his seat."

Oddly, there's no mention of that procedure in the Operating Manual.  Failure of the gear to extend is not even among among the emergencies listed.

That is interesting.

I'd bet that took about 80 turns on that handle... ouch.

[Dan Swift]

My plan is to fly up there in my C 172, refuel, spend the night in a local hotel, spend the next day looking at objects recovered from Niku, etc.  I’ll be coming up from Atlanta.

Ted Campbell

Let me know if you have an empty seat in the 172.  If so, I could help with some gas $$.