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Author Topic: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?  (Read 92861 times)

Stephen Hinkle

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #15 on: March 12, 2011, 11:20:19 PM »

Ric mentioned, "The closest was a coconut operation on Hull Island 114 nautical miles to the east, but there's no way Noonan could have known about it."

I am curious here.   Where was the closest place that Fred Noonan did likely know about that was habitated from Gardner Island / Nikumoro?
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #16 on: March 13, 2011, 04:53:32 AM »

Probably Samoa.
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Walter Runck

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #17 on: March 13, 2011, 10:14:29 AM »

If they couldn't get a sight overnight, then all they would have had is the advanced sunrise LOP and whatever sun or moon sights FN could have made between dawn and their ETA at the Howland LOP.  Which would bring us right back to your thoughts about the assumed starting position for the run to Gardner.

  We'll never know exactly what happened, but the scenario that fits what we do know has Noonan unable to keep the flight on course during the night due the inability to take celestial observations.

Change "the scenario" to "one scenario" and I'm all on board.  We're talking possibilities, not probabilities.
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #18 on: March 13, 2011, 04:51:09 PM »

Change "the scenario" to "one scenario" and I'm all on board.  We're talking possibilities, not probabilities.

If we speak only of possibilities without regard to probability then all possibilities are created equal.  In the case of the Earhart disappearance, abduction by space aliens is a possibility but I don't think that recognizing it as such helps us much. Japanese capture is another possible scenario but a realistic assessment of its probability shows it to be only marginally better than alien abduction.
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Walter Runck

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #19 on: March 13, 2011, 07:27:23 PM »

Change "the scenario" to "one scenario" and I'm all on board.  We're talking possibilities, not probabilities.

If we speak only of possibilities without regard to probability then all possibilities are created equal.  In the case of the Earhart disappearance, abduction by space aliens is a possibility but I don't think that recognizing it as such helps us much. Japanese capture is another possible scenario but a realistic assessment of its probability shows it to be only marginally better than alien abduction.


Agreed.  All possibilities are created equal.  They're just possible.  It's only by applying probabilities to their components that they start to take on relative likelihood and we can differentiate them on the basis of merit.  The scenario I offered doesn't require Japanese or Martians.  Just a little bit of good weather during the night and a bunch of bad luck during the day.  I may be being too pedantic on this point, so I'll skip the semantics and offer this angle.

One theory requires that they couldn't see something above them.  The other requires that they couldn't see something below.  The first had to be true all night and perhaps into the next day (I need to do some more work before I can comment on latitude by sun or moon after dawn).  The second only has to be true for whatever length of time they were within visual range of Howland.

I'm not claiming equal likelihoods here, but either of these ideas is orders of magnitude more likely than the kook stuff.
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Bill Lloyd

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #20 on: March 17, 2011, 09:39:50 PM »

One theory requires that they couldn't see something above them.  The other requires that they couldn't see something below.  The first had to be true all night and perhaps into the next day (I need to do some more work before I can comment on latitude by sun or moon after dawn).  The second only has to be true for whatever length of time they were within visual range of Howland.

I'm not claiming equal likelihoods here, but either of these ideas is orders of magnitude more likely than the kook stuff.
I am not sure that those are two distinct theories. If the sky was indeed obscured and Fred could not see a star then their only course of action was to hold track and continue flying toward their destination of Howland.

During darkness, Fred would have been unable to get an accurate fix on what the wind was doing to them and not until he clocked the sunrise, did he  know how far he was from Howland. At that time the stars had become invisible, therefore the course of action would be to continue the track towards Howland while Fred was attempting to determine latitude.

When he estimated that they had traveled the 200 hundred or so miles and arrived at or near the LOP that runs through Howland, he might have figured that the wind had pushed them south, but he still did not know how far and advised Earhart to fly up or down the LOP and try to see the Island or the Itasca.  When they could not see anything, Earhart transmitted, “we must be on you but cannot see…..”.   That whole scenario seems like just one theory to me.

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John Ousterhout

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #21 on: November 18, 2011, 07:14:49 PM »

"...During darkness, Fred would have been unable to get an accurate fix on what the wind was doing to them and not until he clocked the sunrise, did he  know how far he was from Howland."
Although I have very little Celestial Navigation training, I cannot imaging FN not knowing their position, or at least their N/S drift,  from the available stars at that time.  That's 'almost' trivial navigation (you're welcome to quote me later).  It seem likely that Fred would have been able to calculate the N/S drift from wind upon reaching the sunrise LOP, and given AE reasonably accurate directions which way to turn, following the LOP, to raise Howland.
Whatever happened, they did not follow my assumptions.
Cheers,
JohnO
 
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Gary LaPook

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #22 on: November 19, 2011, 01:10:37 AM »

Even if she couldn't take or reduce a sight, she knew enough DR to keep or at least understand a track and knew that they had flown x many hours at y knots on a course of z degrees from Howland ("we must be on you").   She certainly knew they were on an island southeast of Howland and probably had a pretty good idea how far on what bearing.

Dana Randolph heard her say, "Ship on reef southeast of Howland."  That seems to be the best she could do.

For me, her "we must be on you" comment is evidence that she didn't understand what Fred was doing.  Without an RDF bearing, the most Fred could know was that they had reached the LOP that ran through Howland.  If they were bang on course, Howland should appear but otherwise there would be only empty ocean.  I suspect that at some time after sunrise, while AE was trying to get Itasca to take a bearing on her, Fred passed her a note saying something like "ETA 1900" meaning that at 1900 Greenwich they would reach the LOP that ran through Howland. Amelia apparently took it to be an ETA for Howland.  I don't think Fred would say "we must be on you." Without a three-star celestial fix there was no way for him to navigate to a specific point.
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You only need two LOPs to determine a position. A third LOP only acts like RAIM on a GPS approach in that the third LOP acts as a check to catch gross errors in the two LOP fix. The Moon was available to provide the second LOP during all the relevant times.

gl
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #23 on: November 19, 2011, 06:44:03 AM »

You only need two LOPs to determine a position. A third LOP only acts like RAIM on a GPS approach in that the third LOP acts as a check to catch gross errors in the two LOP fix. The Moon was available to provide the second LOP during all the relevant times.

So they really did reach Howland after all.
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Gary LaPook

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #24 on: November 19, 2011, 11:15:48 AM »

You only need two LOPs to determine a position. A third LOP only acts like RAIM on a GPS approach in that the third LOP acts as a check to catch gross errors in the two LOP fix. The Moon was available to provide the second LOP during all the relevant times.

So they really did reach Howland after all.
Yep, and they pushed her plane into the ocean and then hid her aboard the Itasca so that they had an excuse to search the Mandated Islands. Unfortunately, during that terrible storm on the way back to Hawaii, Earhart and Noonan were lost overboard so they had to cover everything up to avoid the public outcry if people had found out that the Coast Guard allowed her to be lost overboard.

gl
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Ric Gillespie

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #25 on: November 19, 2011, 11:24:01 AM »

Case closed.
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Harry Howe, Jr.

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #26 on: November 19, 2011, 01:00:13 PM »


And their( AE&FN) bodies  were found by the aliens and returned to Roswell, NM, where the military confiscated them and took them to Wright-Patterson Air Base to study their brains and the advanced technology they learned while living with the Aliens.   LOL
No Worries Mates
LTM   Harry (TIGHAR #3244R)
 
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Irvine John Donald

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #27 on: November 19, 2011, 07:22:03 PM »

Gee guys. That's just a little too simple. What about the theory that AE and FN were on the Zapruder film at the grassy knoll asking for directions? How did they get there?  And the conspiracy theory that Nixon was talking to them from the white house and those are the missing minutes from the Watergate tapes? 
Respectfully Submitted;

Irv
 
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Dan Swift

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #28 on: November 21, 2011, 11:28:15 AM »

Actually, Amelia Earhart is alive and well....and in a holding pattern over LAX.   
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Rich Ramsey

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Re: What was the fate of Fred Noonan, site of camp?
« Reply #29 on: November 21, 2011, 01:19:28 PM »

On a serious note! Does anyone think it is plausible that Fred went down with the plane? Betty did report that she heard them fighting and that he was not "feeling" well (sorry to over simplify that). Is is at all possible that he passed out, passed away or was somehow not able to get himself out of the plane. AE not having the strength to get him out had to leave him there when it washed over the side? I know how much Ric likes the "would have's" and such but I just think this is the easiest explanation to his vanishing (or lack of skeleton). I think when we find the plane we will find Fred in the seat waiting for that rescue.
"Hang Tough"
Rich
 
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