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Author Topic: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly  (Read 72075 times)

Greg Daspit

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #15 on: March 12, 2015, 03:55:59 PM »

An anomaly the size of a small plane. An isolated cluster of manmade objects above it. A shallow area above this “debris field”, that is near where the Bevington object was photographed and where Emily Sikuli saw plane wreckage. The search area for Niku VIII seems very small relatively speaking.

If you were to produce a map that included all of the areas where people have suggested the plane could be, and then delineate the focused search areas for Niku VIII, it would be hard to illustrate.  It would be like trying to illustrate something the size of the head of a pin on a map the size of a shopping mall. Even relative to the size of Nikumaroro, these are small areas to search. These are also obviously extremely difficult areas to search, or even get to. As painful as Niku VII may have been, it seems clear  to me that the sonar and video images, obtained from that expedition have provided good reason to search a more focused area.

I am enjoying the Preponderance of Evidence series on Facebook. It is a good reminder of the process used to look for the plane, and to try to determine what happened to Earhart and Noonan.  If what is left of the plane is found, I hope people remember the effort and method it took to determine to focus in on those small areas.
3971R
 
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Jeff Scott

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #16 on: March 12, 2015, 09:25:58 PM »

I've debated how to bring this up, but this thread appears to be a good opportunity. As background, I attended the 2012 conference in DC and happened to sit with the representative of one of the sonar companies who spoke on the last day. I believe he was from the company that ran the autonomous side scan sonar vehicle. Our chat was maybe 10 minutes, but it became apparent that there had been very little coordination in how the sonar search would be conducted and whether the vehicle would even work in the environment off Nikumaroro. I thought, "surely they'll figure this out and make it work by the time the expedition actually starts," so I didn't ask anything about it during the presentation. After the many trials and tribulations that came to light during Niku VII, I wish I had said something and maybe better planning could have resulted.

This leads to the current Niku VIII. I've seen very little description of exactly how the ROV search is to be done, but it sounds like the plan is to look at the anomaly and the debris field. My question is whether that is all you plan to do? It sounds very "success oriented" to me--we'll go look at the prime target, prove it's Earhart's Electra, and celebrate victory. But what if the anomaly turns out to be nothing related to Amelia Earhart? Is there a backup plan to do anything else with this ROV equipment in case the primary target is a bust?  Is the equipment and the mother ship capable of searching elsewhere along the reef slope--deeper or in rougher waters--and avoiding the problems encountered previously operating an ROV from the Nai’a?

I don't mean to be pessimistic, but I work in a part of the aerospace industry where we routinely get into trouble by assuming everything is going to work perfectly and vastly underestimating the cost and complexity. Trying to think through all the things that could go wrong and having contingency plans accordingly (risk management, in other words) is often what saves a program from cancellation when the "success oriented" assumptions don't pan out.
It's not too late to be great.
 
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Ted G Campbell

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #17 on: March 13, 2015, 01:22:56 AM »

Jeff Scott is right on!  Plan it out before you leave.
Ted Campbell
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #18 on: March 13, 2015, 01:19:12 PM »

The plan for the underwater investigations during the upcoming expedition are are not "success oriented."  They're "reality oriented."
We're dealing with a number of limitations:

• Money.  The best way to search the reef slope is with manned submersibles.  Last year we tried to raise the money to do that.  Couldn't do it. So we have to accept that that option is not available to us.
•  For all the trials and tribulations of the 2012 trip, we did come away with a side-scan sonar survey of the western reef slope. While we were there we checked out a number of "targets" pointed out to us by the contractor.  None was of interest.  The anomaly that was later spotted is the only sonar target that seems worth investigating. 
• The "debris field" Jeff Glickman spotted in the ROV video is the only thing that seems worth chasing in all the underwater video shot in 2010 and 2012.
• Money.  The ship we hope to be able to afford is Nai'a.  She's a great ship for supporting land ops and divers but she's a poor platform for "live boating" an ROV - so we're not going to be able to do a "mow-the-lawn" ROV search of the reef slope.
• We hope to be able to find the two targets worth investigating - the "anomaly" and the "debris field" (aka the "fender"). Our ability to do much more than that with the ROV will be very limited.
• The plan for stabilizing Nai'a over the targets is shown in the attached illustrations.  We can't actually moor the ship.  The reef slope is too steep.  The best we can do is tie off to the shipwreck and an anchor set in the reef-edge and rely on the prevailing wind to hold us in place.  We've used this technique many times to position the ship near the island.
•  In addition to the ROV operations we'll have a SCUBA team covering the shallower areas off the Bevington Object location looking for smaller debris that may have been left behind or washed back up.

   

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Bill Mangus

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #19 on: March 13, 2015, 01:33:28 PM »

Great pictures Ric; who was the intrepid sole who climbed the mast to take the last picture? :o
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #20 on: March 13, 2015, 01:37:47 PM »

Great pictures Ric; who was the intrepid sole who climbed the mast to take the last picture? :o

I get to do stuff like that.  I'm the only expendable soul on the team.
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Monty Fowler

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #21 on: March 13, 2015, 02:18:51 PM »

That one is toooooo easy. So I will resist the temptation.  ;D

LTM, who remembers the movie They Were Expendable,
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Michael Calvin Powell

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #22 on: March 13, 2015, 03:31:31 PM »

Ric, out of curiosity, have you thought about taking a small drone?  I thought the video you captured from the copter trip was very informative - especially when thinking about why Lambrecht didn't spot anything.  Given how cheap drones are, it might make a nice piece of footage and help members see things in perspective.
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #23 on: March 13, 2015, 03:53:21 PM »

Ric, out of curiosity, have you thought about taking a small drone?

The plan is for our cameraman, Mark Smith, to deploy two drones during the expedition.  He'a already running test flights. An amphibious drone will be used to capture shots of the ship and the dive team at work - as well as any sea life (dolphins, sharks, turtles, manta rays, white whales, sea serpents, etc.) that may happen by on or near the surface.  Another drone will work with the land team doing aerial searching for objects that need to be checked out. We're not sure how the birds will react to the drones.  We could have some trouble with the frigates if they see the drones as prey.

The drone footage is sure to be featured in the documentary we'll make of the expedition.  No deal with Discovery Channel or other media this trip.  The possibility for truly historic footage is too great to sell the rights for what we could get. This time we'll produce our own film. Everyone who contributes at least $49 to the "Put My Name Up In Lights" campaign will be listed in the credits of the documentary.  Where else can you get immortality for $49?
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Michael Calvin Powell

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #24 on: March 13, 2015, 06:41:32 PM »

Thanks Ric.  I've already signed up to get my name in the credits (and hope to have lots of company).
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Bob Smith

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #25 on: March 21, 2015, 04:12:20 PM »

Is the Niku VIII going to be more viewing and surmising only, or are you planning on actually hauling something up topside if its really interesting? Maybe this isn't posible, but if the wreck we re looking for is found, or you are reasonably sure that it is visible under the other debris, will you be equipped to lift or even move things out of the way for a better look? A winch and basket, for instance, or as a last resort a dragline of some kind?
Bob S.
 
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Bob Smith

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #26 on: March 21, 2015, 04:48:29 PM »

The reason I am asking is I believe as others probably do, that the Debris Field is a pile of WWII Seabees  heavy equipment used for clearing and construction for development of the village, and was discarded before they left. They may or may not have known what was there before, but it could have covered and flattened anything, such as an aluminum airplane. There are many objects of seemingly man made  origin, such as wheel rims, perhaps idlers and guide rollers and tracks, etc. from tracked vehicles, as well as possible aircraft parts. But the aircraft parts, to me anyway, seem to be mostly underneath or buried by the different debris on top. Since we aren't especially interested in bulldozers and halftracks, to  better find the airplane it may be necessary to excavate or shove things around to get at what is important to this search. I don't have the locations in the video for specific parts, but there is a suspicious "thing" which may be a wing or tail that may or may not have numbers on it, partially covered by sand and junk. More info on the specific video location is shown in the comments of the "Debris Field" video.
Bob S.
 
« Last Edit: March 21, 2015, 04:52:16 PM by Bob Smith »
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #27 on: March 21, 2015, 05:35:30 PM »

Is the Niku VIII going to be more viewing and surmising only, or are you planning on actually hauling something up topside if its really interesting?

Excuse me if I sound a bit testy about this but we are doing aviation archaeology, not salvage. We're following accepted protocols that you are not familiar with.  We're not going to "haul something up topside" just to get a better look at it.  If we encounter an object of interest we'll examine and photograph it as thoroughly as possible without disturbing it. Then, if we decide that it may be from the Electra and it is small enough to be recovered and conserved, we'll consider raising it.
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #28 on: March 21, 2015, 05:52:12 PM »

The reason I am asking is I believe as others probably do, that the Debris Field is a pile of WWII Seabees  heavy equipment used for clearing and construction for development of the village, and was discarded before they left.

The Seabees were never there.  There was heavy equipment used by the Coast Guard for building the Loran station at the southeast tip of the island but the U.S. had nothing to do with the development of the village.  That was entirely a British operation and was done entirely by Pacific Islanders using hand tools long before the Americans arrived.
Please do us all a favor and familiarize yourself with the facts of the case before expounding on your opinions. 
And please don't tell us about the parts of the plane you think you see in the video. There are no obvious airplane parts in the video. Jeff Glickman spotted some coral shapes that he thinks MAY be parts of the landing gear.  We'll try to check them out.
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Bob Smith

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Re: Bevington Object / Sonar anomaly
« Reply #29 on: March 21, 2015, 07:24:42 PM »

Sorry, I didn't mean I knew anything more than anyone else. Just my opinion. That's what you wanted, I presume.
Bob S.
 
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