Niku IIII (2001)

Fieldwork 2001

Fieldwork in 2001 had several objectives, explore the 7 site for evidence of the castaway, exploration of the colonial village, scuba survey the shallow water of the reef face along the NW end of the island from the landing channel to the NW tip, and scuba survey the northern end of the lagoon for evidence of any wreckage.

Leading up to the 2001 expedition, TIGHAR was able to obtain a high resolution satellite photo of Nikumaroro that proved to be an excellent research tool for locating specific areas of the island, particularly the 7 site. Upon examination of the area North of the wreck of the Norwich City, a particularly unusual rusty colored area revealed itself, and became a focus of attention and excitement leading up to the expedition.

lots to fill in here, I think Ric probably has some good text

The Fiji Bones Search

The section below should be deleted as it was part of the 1999 work

The Fiji Museum kindly provided us with office space, telephones, and computers, as well as access to its extensive collections and research library. The Museum also handled coordination with government offices, and three Museum volunteers -- Faiz Ali, Elaitia Vakarau, and Steven Brown assisted in the work. By the time the last member of the team -- Kristin Tague -- returned to the U.S. on July 26th, we had accomplished the following work :

• Inspected the Museum's skeletal collections; • Inspected the osteological collections of the Anatomy Department at the Fiji School of Medicine, the successor to the Central Medical School; • Inspected a cranium and two femora in a box held by the Suva Masonic Lodge; • Searched the attic of the old Central Medical School building, now the Dental Clinic at the Colonial War Memorial Hospital; • Searched the attic, underfloor, and garage of Dr. Hoodless' former residence, now a student housing office; • Searched tunnels under the hospital complex at Tamavua, to which the Medical School relocated in the 1950s; • Searched the offices of the Fiji Intelligence Service, formerly used by visiting WPHC officers; • With the kind permission of His Excellency President Ratu Mara, searched the basement of Government House and the nearby bomb shelter tunnels; • Consulted with government, Hospital, and Medical School officials and building maintenance personnel both about knowledge of the bones and to encourage them to be alert to the possibility of their turning up in the future; • Conducted archival research at the Museum and the National Archives; • Consulted with Sir Leonard Usher about Fiji during World War II and the operations of the WPHC; • Consulted with Mr. Foua Tofinga, who had been employed in Sir Harry Luke's office in 1940, about the WPHC, bones, sextant box, Gallagher, Vaskess, and other areas of interest (Mr. Tofinga was of particular assistance, and continues to work with us); • Through the good offices of Mr. Tofinga, interviewed Mrs. Emily Sikuli, daughter of the Nikumaroro village carpenter in 1940, who reported that she had observed aircraft wreckage on the Nutiran reef north of the Norwich City; and. • Through Mrs. Sikuli, interviewed Mrs. Otira O'Brian, another former resident, who had recollections pertaining to bones and aircraft wreckage.

Nikumaroro Reconnaissance

The section below should be deleted as it was part of the 1999 work

On Nikumaroro, work was hampered by heavy rain, but the following work was accomplished (See Fig. N-41):

• Intensive search of ___(RIC, HOW MANY?) twenty-meter squares plotted over the area identified by airphotos as including the site of the large structure and the possible wreckage; • Search of the dense mao along the shore north of the Norwich City, employing thrity- to forty-meter long transects cut at twenty-five meter intervals; • Excavation of a grave found on the Nutiran shore near the Norwich City; • Visual inspection of the Taraia shoreline; • Visual inspection of the Nutiran reef flat in and well beyond the area identified by Emily Sikuli as the site where she had been shown wreckage; • Visual inspection of Kanawa Point, including evaluation by Dr. Burns; and • Similar inspection of Aukaraime South.

Unfortunately, time did not allow a visit to the third candidate "bones site" on the southeast windward shore.

Results

The section below should be deleted as it was part of the 1999 work

The search in Fiji did not produce the bones, but it provided us with a much clearer understanding of what may have happened to them. They were not to be found in any of the "obvious" locations (Fig. N-42) -- the attic of the old Central Medical School, Dr. Hoodless' residence, the Anatomy Department's collections, the Museum's collections. There are many other old government buildings in Suva, but without any idea which of them might be more likely to contain the bones than any other, it was not practical to continue searching. Instead, a reward was posted for information leading to the bones' recovery, and a special request was made to Government maintenance personnel to be on the lookout for them. One of the most likely-seeming possibilities is that the bones went into one of Suva's many bomb-shelter tunnels during World War II and never came out. Most of these tunnels have been sealed in recent years for safety reasons, and many have doubtless collapsed. It remains possible, however, that the bones are recoverable somewhere in Fiji, or that they were sent to Tarawa, Funafuti, Honiara in the Solomon Islands, or England when the WPHC closed its doors. These and other possibilities are being investigated.

The Fiji search also put us in touch with a number of people whose information may be invaluable to the project, notably Foua Tofinga, who has first-hand knowledge of the operations of Sir Harry Luke's office during the time the bones were sent in, and who visited Nikumaroro shortly after Gallagher's death. It also introduced us to Emily Sikuli and Otira O'Brian, whose stories have added to our corpus of anecdotal accounts pertinent to the study. Mrs. Sikuli's information, especially, adds to the evidence that the wreck of the Electra may have once been on the Nutiran reef.

Finally, the Fiji search gave us an opportunity to inspect a number of archival sources, which led to additional sources of data elsewhere, including contacts with Sir Ian Thomson, Sir Harry Luke's Aide-de-Camp, and Sir Harry's own family.

The Nikumaroro reconnaissance was also superficially disappointing. At the site where something that might have been aircraft wreckage appeared on the 1980s air photos, nothing was found but an oarlock, suggesting that the "thing" imaged in the photos may have been a Norwich City lifeboat. Only one small piece of aircraft aluminum was found, and it was painted with zinc chromate, indicating military origin. Nothing was found on the reef at the point identified by Emily Sikuli. The grave excavated, like the one at Aukaraime, turned out to be that of an infant, and was carefully refilled.

The reconnaissance achieved its objectives, however, by clarifying the situation both on western Nutiran and at two of the three candidate bones sites. It appears that there is no obvious airplane wreckage either on shore or on the reef flat at Nutiran, but the hydrodynamics of the area are such that any wreckage there would most likely have been swept over the reef edge long ago. The same physical factors would very likely have caused wreckage to move along a ledge that runs about twelve meters below the water surface down toward the mouth of Tatiman Passage, where storm events would sweep it into the lagoon to be deposited on the Taraia shore or in the sandbar that runs across the passage's inner mouth.

At the two candidate bones sites, Dr. Burns was able to get a first-hand idea of the challenges to be encountered in physically searching for residual bones and artifacts. This information will be factored into planning for future work, hopefully after further research has narrowed the choice of possible sites somewhat.

It is also notable that the reconnaissance of the Nutiran reef flat revealed that there is a long, wide, smooth area immediately north of the Norwich City, which at low tide would have made an attractive and usable landing place for an aircraft.

Links

http://tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/NikuIIIIsumm.html http://tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Bulletins/38_SecretsKnob/knob1.html