Still from ROV video

[Tim Mellon]

Tim, do a search on the word 'scale' and you should find the appropriate threads.

Chris, thanks for the suggestion. Earlier in the year folks were seeing some of the same things. The wheel, for instance. What has provided scale for me is the juxtaposition of the wheel and engine suggested by John Balderston (see reply #1567 this thread, third attachment).

John also points out the numeral "2" at time 13:43:20 frame 14 in the upper right hand corner of the picture. The known size of the number on the plane's wing is certainly scale that I can believe in (see reply #1598 this thread, third attachment).

Of course, scale is going to depend on distance from camera to object observed. It would be helpful if somehow the ROV could drop foot-long bio-degradable "straws" from place to place, just to give us a shot at scale!

[tom howard]

Tim I think you are exactly correct.
Like you and John, I have seem more in the vi video than in the new hi def one from niku 7.
Is there a hi def version of this niku 6 one that maybe I missed?
Can I just call it the 6 video versus the 7 video or are roman numerals required.

[Tim Mellon]

The 2 Site to John Balderston:

John, do I see another black character just above the circular wire coil (at its 11 o'clock) at 13:43:20, frame 18? Looks like maybe the upper right-hand quarter of the letter "R", which I think is the only character to have a rounded shape on the inside.

[Tim Mellon]

Speaking only for myself, Tom, I have only been seeing these 2010 videos for several weeks now. And I wasn't even aware that TIGHAR existed before May of this year. I think it's the case that new eyes see different things than eyes that have been programmed over time. I know my own eyes benefitted from all the real-time viewing during the VII expedition. The more folks that look, the more we will collectively find. I think the aggregate intelligence thus derived will best inform what the next action steps should be.

Tim I think you are exactly correct.
Like you and John, I have seem more in the vi video than in the new hi def one from niku 7.
Is there a hi def version of this niku 6 one that maybe I missed?
Can I just call it the 6 video versus the 7 video or are roman numerals required. :)

Better ask the Romans all these questions! I'm just a lowly Scot.

[Ric Gillespie]

Is there a hi def version of this niku 6 one that maybe I missed?

The Niku Vi video is hi-def.

[richie conroy]

Hi All

While i enjoy the new optimism in ROV Video new an old,

U have to realize that objects like what u think is a zero in debris field, Is more likely to be  the size of a washer 

Example get your i phone or blackberry go as close to say a car wheel as Rov video is to debris field, an u will see u would only fit 2 wheel studs at most into image,

i know this because i have speculated i see engines wings tanks etc  only to realize i am prob only seeing objects at most, the siize of a football

thanks Richie

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

I reviewed the entire thread, and you are correct, it is about Niku VI video all the way through. However, I did a search of the thread for "andrew mckenna" and the only hit was your very last post.

OK, I found the post I was thinking of.

It's in a different thread.  Here it is in full:

Have you guys ever seen the movie Spinal Tap where the band is playing and the Stonehenge set is being lowered to the stage, only it is ridiculously small compared to their expectations?  The set guy got the scale all wrong.

That is what is going on here, you are the set guy, and your sense of scale is way off.  These photos that the ROV took are taken from from say 1-3 ft away from the objects you are looking at.  Any farther and the light becomes too diffuse to see.  The strut you superimpose, would be maybe 6 inches long instead of the 6 ft you imagine it.  If the object were 6 ft, the camera would have to be a good 20 ft away, and at that distance there simply wouldn't be enough light to light up the bottom.  I don't know what the wattage of the lamp on the ROV is, but it isn't big enough to light up the bottom of the ocean from 20-30 ft away.

Given random pattern, and no scale, we can see all kinds of stuff in these photos, but I really think it is not a productive enterprise.  If there were a real object there, like the rope, we'd recognize it immediately.  Trying to find other stuff that is not obvious may be fun, but is similar to seeing bunnies in the clouds, everyone can see one if they look hard enough. 

We went through this with images in the lagoon that people thought represented the Electra.  We even went to some of the locations just to rule them out, an in every case where someone was sure they could see some sort of object, it wasn't there.

With the upcoming expedition, there will be plenty of images of real stuff to look at - keep in mind the NC wreckage needs to be surveyed to ensure that there isn't an Electra mixed up with that debris, so save your effort for reviewing that footage with a critical eye.

Andrew

" ... the prominent marker provided by the stretched out rope. ..."

I'm pretty sure Ric says they see that stuff all over the place.  I believe he called it "whip coral."

Before any plans are made to launch another expedition, I feel that prudence and intellectual honesty dictate that every effort be made to credit or discredit the assertions presented here.

That doesn't interest me much.  YMMV.

[John Balderston]

Oh Lord!   I've been happily anticipating getting the work week behind me and visiting the forum to see what my fellow TIGHAR enthusiasts have to say . . .until I saw today's thread contents.  Tim, truly, the stuff I've put up warrants no special recognition.  And if by chance my "camel in the clouds" visualizing turns out to be aligned with reality, none of the credit can possibly go in my direction.  I've been looking at a couple minutes of video that TIGHAR shot - after 20+ years of dedicated science to put an ROV on top of wreckage that most of the so-called experts claim would never be found there.  To give me one smidgen of acknowledgement would be like giving credit to a wet-behind-the-ears cabin boy on Columbus' flagship looking out of a porthole at the end of the voyage and noting that there's land on the horizon.  :)

I've gone back and forth with other forum members and our moderator on the merits of the 2010 ROV footage.  I understand that the 2010 video has been closely reviewed and nothing found that puts the "is this AE's Electra?" question to rest.  I do see some things that to me hint at an Electra - all I'm hoping is that somehow this 2010 video can be correlated with the new high-def footage, and these hints confidently dispositioned.

If my opinion means anything, let me say that I see great value in TIGHAR's strategy of seeking to correlate some specific pieces of debris with "the Bevington Object".  The current  research bulletin "Debris Field Analysis" does a good job of concisely articulating the strategy ". . .It is far more efficient to ask whether an unknown object is just like a known object (in this case the landing gear of a Lockheed Electra) than to ask whether it is like any of an almost unlimited variety of possible objects."  Neat and tidy.

So please let's do me a favor - let's NOT in any way associate this armchair layperson with a debris field - any more mention and I will have to crawl under the biggest chunk of coral I can find and quickly decompose.  Ok?  Can I go back to turning coral and sand into radio receivers now?   :)

Humbly (and hopefully much more anonymously) yours, John

(10/22 - corrected some grammatical errors made in the haste of my 10/19 post)

[Chris Johnson]

Thanks Marty,

the Spinal Tap thread, remember it now.

[Tim Mellon]

Have you guys ever seen the movie Spinal Tap where the band is playing and the Stonehenge set is being lowered to the stage, only it is ridiculously small compared to their expectations?  The set guy got the scale all wrong.

That is what is going on here, you are the set guy, and your sense of scale is way off.  These photos that the ROV took are taken from from say 1-3 ft away from the objects you are looking at.  Any farther and the light becomes too diffuse to see.  The strut you superimpose, would be maybe 6 inches long instead of the 6 ft you imagine it.  If the object were 6 ft, the camera would have to be a good 20 ft away, and at that distance there simply wouldn't be enough light to light up the bottom.  I don't know what the wattage of the lamp on the ROV is, but it isn't big enough to light up the bottom of the ocean from 20-30 ft away.

Given random pattern, and no scale, we can see all kinds of stuff in these photos, but I really think it is not a productive enterprise.  If there were a real object there, like the rope, we'd recognize it immediately.  Trying to find other stuff that is not obvious may be fun, but is similar to seeing bunnies in the clouds, everyone can see one if they look hard enough. 

We went through this with images in the lagoon that people thought represented the Electra.  We even went to some of the locations just to rule them out, an in every case where someone was sure they could see some sort of object, it wasn't there.

With the upcoming expedition, there will be plenty of images of real stuff to look at - keep in mind the NC wreckage needs to be surveyed to ensure that there isn't an Electra mixed up with that debris, so save your effort for reviewing that footage with a critical eye.

Andrew

Good Morning, Marty

Thank you for providing Andrew McKenna's thoughts on scale. I cannot say that I can agree with them, in large part based upon my many hours of experience looking at ROV video in real time on the Niku VII expedition. The visual range is certainly sufficient to see the 25-30 feet he warns of, even in the absence of ambient light at depth. For example,

(1) when the ROV was dispatched to rescue the AUV (on two occasions), once the AUV was found, caught in the ledge, the cameras on the ROV were able, as I recall, to encompass the full scene, including the full length of the AUV (about 14 feet). Perhaps Ric could provide you some footage of this part of the incident.

(2) When I directed folks' attention to a wing-like shape on the sidescan sonar returns, the SSI technecian was able to give an approximate length (27 feet, as I recall). Because this matched closely the actual length of the Electra wing, it became a target for ROV examination. When the "wing" was found adjacent to the Norwich City wreckage, it became apparent that it had nothing to do with an airplane, but was rather a portion of a hatch cover or internal bulkhead from the Norwich City. The point being, that the entire length of the object was visible at one time by the ROV.

(3) Small objects found in several locations, such as discarded wine bottles, were never suprisingly huge, as if the camera were only inches away from them.

My point about the Niku VI video is that the various anomolies identified as possible Electra components all give scale to each other, as in the case of the wheel and the engine nacelle. The numerals on the wing are of similar height and width. The rope running down the hill is not out of scale with any of the other objects. The consistency between various components is what leads one to believe that they are all related to one another.

The numeral "2" is so clear to me in its shape, thickness of strokes, angles of strokes, and color that it warrants special attention, in my opinion, by those who have the talents and equipment to examine it in full detail. If someone can provide an alternate explanation of its identity, fine. If you are waiting until we find the actual Airworthiness Certificate before we declare success, then I don't think I have enough years left.

Might I just call this "An Inconvenient 2th".

[Tim Mellon]

Marty, I forgot to comment on the "rope".

The NikuVI video shows a long section of rope (or possibly cable) running down the hill for many yards. This is not whip coral. I cannot believe that whip coral would terminate at a round metal ring.

And the double circle of wire is not whip coral. It is too uniform in thickness, too perfect in its roundness, not the natural shade of greenish brown, and without the imperfections of line seen in growing organisms. Furthermore, it seens to veer of to the right and seems attatched to something metallic.

[Tim Mellon]

Humbly (and hopefully much more anonymously) yours, John

John, your modesty is only exceded by your acute vision.

I'm sure Alexander Fleming felt the same way in 1928.

[Martin X. Moleski, SJ]

Thank you for providing Andrew McKenna's thoughts on scale. I cannot say that I can agree with them, in large part based upon my many hours of experience looking at ROV video in real time on the Niku VII expedition. The visual range is certainly sufficient to see the 25-30 feet he warns of, even in the absence of ambient light at depth. For example,

Different year (2010 vs 2012), different expedition (Niku VI vs. Niku VII), different equipment, different results.

I believe Andrew helped with the ROV used on Niku VI.  He certainly was involved with planning the expedition, has dived extensively at Niku, and seems to me to be "an authority."  That doesn't mean that he's right, but I give a lot of weight to what he says.

The numeral "2" is so clear to me in its shape, thickness of strokes, angles of strokes, and color that it warrants special attention, in my opinion, by those who have the talents and equipment to examine it in full detail. If someone can provide an alternate explanation of its identity, fine. If you are waiting until we find the actual Airworthiness Certificate before we declare success, then I don't think I have enough years left.

Might I just call this "An Inconvenient 2th".

I'm not asking more of TIGHAR than TIGHAR is able to provide.

I presume that Niku VIII will want to do more than just visit the Bevington area to find out what, in fact, is shown in the Niku VII HD video.  If all goes well--a big "if"!--that should only take a few dives, leaving a number of days to improve and extend the search.  The side-scan sonar seems to have been a big disappointment for identifying good targets to look at; just mowing the lawn with a good optical system seems to have borne better fruit.

[Ric Gillespie]

Different year (2010 vs 2012), different expedition (Niku VI vs. Niku VII), different equipment, different results.

To be specific, the 2010 expedition used a SeaBotix LBV the size of a carry-on bag.  The 2012 expedition used an SSI TRV-M the size of a large All Terrain Vehicle.
Both ROVs had four banks of LED lights (indicated by arrows in the photos) but the ones on the TRV-M were much larger and more powerful.

[Ric Gillespie]

The "Wire & Rope" aka the Balderston Debris Field (sorry John) was videoed on June 7, 2010 at a depth of approximately 800 feet somewhere roughly west of Nessie.  We can't be more precise than that because the ROV's position-reporting capability was inoperative due to an earlier accident.  I've plotted the presumed position on the attached maps that show the ROV tracks from the 2012 expedition.  As you can see, we were in the general area but we did not see the objects videoed in 2010 - either because they are no longer there or because we just missed them.  I suspect the latter.

I've sent the various screen captures and opinions about objects in the video to Jeff Glickman and asked for his comments.