========================================================================= Date: Sat, 1 Feb 2003 11:20:22 EST From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Hurray! Ric: Does Bill Shea's posting mean we get to discuss the wreck photo again? Alfred #2583 ********************************************************************* From Ric I'm happy to discuss anything that is on topic, provided the discussers have something substantive to add to the discussion. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 1 Feb 2003 11:23:39 EST From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: Forum admin matters I don't know how Ric sees my raw postings, but they are done on a Unix system and I generally work only in plain text. This note is being written in Mozilla's mail app (Netscape). Most of the problems with text from different platforms and apps is in how they relay end of line information. Macintosh needs only a Carraige Return (CR), while Unix needs only a Line Feed (LF) While DOS/Windows needs both a CR and a LF. That's the cause of the double spacing most likely. Other issues can result from setting the text width beyond 80 characters. If you guys are Mac people, take a look at BBEdit which I haven't used in years, but had the capability to remedy the situation. For a more detailed explanation and maybe more or better asnswers do a search for a program called CleanTxt -- it's a in/DOS app, but has a pretty good details about cross platform problems. Hope this helps. Bob ************************************************************************* From Ric Thanks Bob. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 1 Feb 2003 11:28:28 EST From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: Phoenix Rising Just out of curiosity, how long will Marty be in Fiji & will he need any assistance? LTM, Mike Haddock #2438 ********************************************************************** From Ric About six weeks. We can always use help, especially from people who are famiilar with doing historical/archival research but they'd need to be self-funded. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 1 Feb 2003 17:29:48 EST From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Forum at half-mast Today's forum (Sat., Jan. 31, 2003) is abbreviated due to the news of the Columbia disaster and out of respect for the brave flyers we lost today. The forum will resume on Monday ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 08:39:47 EST From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: Clips Ric wrote: > ... Whatever these things are, they do not appear to be a standard part of > anything. They could be home-made replacements for standard parts that > wore out or were broken, or they could be unique unto themselves. ... When thinking about the doohickeys, it's important to remember that a lot of non-AE/FN debris is in the same area: the Tarawa Police water tank, screening material, sheet metal, broken Coast Guard plates, spent shells, glass shards, some wooden posts, an oil can cap, etc. I'm gonna place my bet on something made by a native from the colony rather than AE or FN. If the Seven Site is where the bones were found, then native workers were there first doing some logging and clearing; and probably Gallagher had some more come with him at least from time to time when conducting the "more thorough" search. Just a hunch. I won't kill or die for this opinion. The reason the cap was so much more exciting was that the patent numbers ultimately led to its positive identification. Kudos to the people who collected it, to Jeff Glickman, to the folks who searched the patent lists, and to the man who found the matching specimen now pictured on the web site. It was GREAT detective work, even if seems to have been a gun oil cap rather than the smoking gun. LTM. Marty #2359 *************************************************************************** From Ric The work we've done in the village has given us a good feel for the manufacturing and metal-working capabilities of the colonists and we never seen anything known to have been made on the island that even approaches theses things in complexity. The most sophisticated locally-made metal devices we've found have been a few hair combs fashioned from aircraft aluminum, and they're pretty crude. Whoever made the "clips" had the capability to cut serations and drill holes and had American screws. From what we've been able to learn, even the Coasties would probably have to have something like this made for them in a shop on Canton. Among those who might have brought these objects to the Seven Site, I think the colonists are way down on the list. Given the fact that the castaway is known to have had a wooden box in his/her possession, and that the screws are wood screws, and that one of the plates is bent (suggesting forcible removal), and that the sextant box was thought to have been used most recently as a general-purpose container (how would you know that unless internal fitting had been removed to make more space?) - and given all the other reasons we have to suspect that the castaway was an American (specifically Amelia Earhart) - I personally think that, of all the artifacts recovered from the Seven Site - the "clips" are among the most likely to be associated with Earhart. Ric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 08:47:27 EST From: Bill Subject: Re: Refraction variability Can anyone clarify what info we have on Noonan's chart - that Howland Island might be charted in the wrong position? This has been suggested many times. If Howland was charted in the wrong position on the chart that Noonan used, does that also mean that Baker and Gardner might also have been charted wrong? If it was just Howland that was charted wrong would Noonan have still used the 157/337 Line since they all wern't in a line. Also, if all three were chartered wrongly and Noonan didn't see Howland, how could he have flown 157 to Gardner? Hmmmmmm Cheers from Bill **************************************************************************** From Ric No one knows whether AE/FN had the correct coordinates for Howland. All the speculation about them having the wrong coordinates are based on the fact that Clarence Williams, the retired Navy captain who hand-made strip maps for Earhart's first World Flight attempt, had the wrong coordinates for the island. However, we also know that the correct coordinates were known to the flight's main contact and advisor at the Bureau of Air Commerce, Bill Miller. It's hard to imagine that he didn't fill them in, but nobody knows for sure. In any event, the discrepancy was only about 5 miles. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:05:26 EST From: Christian D. Subject: Re: Breaking News speculation Ric, what I don't understand is why, while you keep the >>location<< of the item confidential, you can't tell what it is... Knowing what it is won't help anybody to go steal it! OR: is it possible to think of something very specific, which, by its own nature, MUST be in a very specific location on Niku??? Hard to fathom... What >>AE-related<< item would have to be in a certain place only??? I suppose for ex, that teeth would be somewhat likely to be in the famous skull hole? But what else? Christian D ************************************************************************ From Ric As I said before, we've satisfied ourselves that it needs looking at. Any discussion of what it might be would not change the fact that we need to go check it out. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:07:53 EST From: Tom Riggs Subject: Navigating The Pacific Circa 1937 Ric....if you think this article is too large for the Forum, please delete article text cut/pasted below and replace with this link for interested readers: http://www.ion.org/newsletter/v8n2.html Thanks. TR ********************************************************* From Ric This is the paper by Bill Polhemus that many of us are familar with. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:12:44 EST From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Paradise Now The Paradise Now raffle is up and running on the TIGHAR website. Go to the home page at www.tighar.org and you'll get a pop-up screen that provides a direct link. This is too good to miss. You can order your chances right on the secure website. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:20:06 EST From: Marty Moleski Subject: Why the Long Flight from Lae to Howland? Please forgive me if this has been asked and answered in the history of the Forum. My buddy is reading Shoes and asked me why AE & FN didn't stop in the Gilberts to gas up. If they'd taken a full load of fuel on there, they might have had enough gas to fly east, miss Howland, and fly back. LTM. Marty #2359 ************************************************************************* From Ric There was no airstrip and no avgas in the Gilberts or anywhere else in the Central Pacific in 1937. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:31:36 EST From: Mike Everette Subject: Re: Radio matters Ric asks: >To somebody listening for a transmission might this make a sound >"something >like a generator starting up and stopping"? It's possible. It would be nice to know, however (and we obviously can't know for sure), exactly what the person meant by those words. If one is listening for a CW signal, and hears a transmitter key up asn the dynamotor is spooling up, there is a definite "yoop" to the CW "note." until the dyno reaches speed. Is it deja vu...? I think we have been in this area before, a long time ago. 73 Mike E. *************************************************************************** From Ric Maybe...but it's of particular interest right now as we're looking more closely than ever before at the post-loss receptions. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 09:42:23 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: KGMB via shortwaves Now here's an interesting tidbit (at least i think so, momentarily): RADIO NEWS magazine, December 1936 pg 366 KIO Kahuku...11680 kc/s....relaying KGMB....Gallagher [ not THE Gallagher ] reports them on 1110 heard testing Aug. 24 8:30 PM [ 1936 ] EST..... KKP Kahuku 16030 Relays KGMB Tuesdays.... KKH Kahuku 7520 used again for regular Monday evening programs to the CBS... Didn't that Wyoming fellow report AE reception around 16000 kc/s ? -Hue Miller ************************************************************************ From Ric That Wyoming fellow heard what he heard on or about 16000 kcs on Sunday, not Tuesday. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 10:36:37 EST From: Rich Young Subject: Re: Can't transmit and receive at the same time. From Betty's notebook: "Help me" "This is Amelia Putnam" "SOS" "Speak" "Help, help us quick" , etc. If genuine transmissions, Amelia is trying to initiate TWO-WAY radio traffic. In that case, unless directed otherwise, response is expected to be on the same frequency as the initial transmission! Although it's possible to pre-arrange a radio net to transmit on one frequency, and listen for a reply on a different frequency, this has to be agreed to ahead of time, and is usually only done if a "repeater" is being used to extend range. Further, not all transmitter/receiver sets are capable of such operation, many have the tuning features of the transmitter and receiver sections either shared or mechanically linked to MAKE SURE that listening and transmitting occur on the same frequency. In the absence of transmitted directions - "I will listen for reply on 6210 cycles", for example, - anyone who wants to respond is going to respond on the same frequency they hear the transmission on. Since no such requests are logged, (bear in mind how many times "Marie" and "New York" appear, and then think that reply instructions SHOULD have been part of every transmission if indeed she was listening on a different frequency), she was expecting a reply on the same frequency. This is supported by the "Oh, if they could hear me" comment - IF she was listening on a different frequency than she was transmitting on, and whoever she was hearing didn't know it, there would be no possibility of them hearing her! So obviously, she's transmitting on the same frequency as she is listening to, going by the notes. Nothing else makes sense. So even if she COULD listen to a completely different frequency, if she hopes to establish communication, as indicated by the notes, she would be listening to the SAME frequency she is calling on - which means if the transmitter is keyed, (and she should know this, there is probably a light that comes on when transmitting, the dynamotor under her seat will be spinning like a heavy-duty twist drill, her battery amperage and voltage will be falling like Enron stock, and, at worst, the static in her headphones is suddenly gone - either muted, or replaced with a REAL LOUD copy of what she is transmitting. Therefor there is no need to "listen, put your ear to it" IF she is transmitting, but she MUST be transmitting, or else BETTY couldn't have heard it. In fact, in ANY of her radio traffic, when it was pre-arranged and POSSIBLE to transmit and receive on different frequencies, did she EVER use that technique? WHY would she start now, in the absence of any expectation that such a thing would result in a conversation? Were her transmitter and receiver wired to DIFFERENT "coffegrinders" for frequency tuning, or were they both slaved to one remote unit, which would require "re-tuning" after every transmission in such a mode? To put this in perspective, for Amelia to be transmitting on e one freq. and listening on another would be akin to asking for help on CB channel 9, but switching to channel 19 to listen for a reply - WITHOUT telling anyone. Logical? You make the call... LTM (who sends threes and eights to everyone) Rich Young *************************************************************************** From Ric Transmitting and receiving on different frequencies was not at all unusual. ************************************************************************* From Mike Everette >one of the books on aircraft communications >shows the control wiring peripheral to the this specific >equipment. I don't think it's the Sandretto book, it may >be the Morgan book, or possibly even Nilsun & Hornung. >I definitely did see it. What you may have seen is in Morgan. I have a copy of it in front of me. When this was made, i blew it up on the copier and lost the page number but the illustration is "Figure 89." This shows the wiring for a bench test setup for the transmitter. I have not seen anything showing how it interconnected with the receiver. As for transmitting and receiving at the same time: On the same frequency it would be impossible. I do not believe it would be possible to transmit and receive simultaneously with this system, regardless of frequency, if it is interconnected according to the standard practices of the day which include receiver muting when the transmitter is keyed. This of course means that the receiver is disabled while transmitting, either by breaking the audio output to avoid potential feedback, or by opening the high voltage supply to the receiver, or by removing the screen-grid voltages from the RF and IF amplifier tubes. Given the information in the receiver schematic, I'd say it is an excellent bet that the receiver's high voltage supply was disconnected on transmit -- using an external relay. The one thing I have wondered about, is whether there was some provision for "whistle thru" or any other means to zero the receiver to the transmitter frequency. I can't see that on any diagrams I have available. LTM (who doesn't believe in whistling in the dark) and 73 Mike E. ************************************************************************** From Mike Everette Ric writes: >Mike Everette seems to think that, if you and I are right about the belly >antenna, simultaneous transmission/reception WAS possible. The fact that the >quality of the reception would be greatly reduced doesn't seem to be a good >reason to discount AE's apparent attempt to convince FN to "here, put your >ear to it." If you re-read my last few posts, especially the one this reply references, you'll see that I put a qualifier on this. It would definitely NOT!!! be possible to receive and transmit (duplex operation, a la the familiar telephone) at the same time, ON THE SAME FREQUENCY, under ANY circumstance. No way. If the receiver used a separate antenna -- not in any way connected through the antenna change-over relay in the transmitter -- it MIGHT (read, MIGHT!!!) be possible for an incoming signal to be heard through the receiver, depending upon: (1) how much the receiver was desensitized on account of being "swamped" by the RF field from the transmitter -- which will be a great amount, if the frequencies are close together, and TOTALLY if one happens to be listening to 6210 while transmitting on 3105; and a lesser amount (but still occurring to some degree) on more widely separated frequencies, i.e. 3105 and 7500. (2) whether the system was configured to "mute" the receiver, when the transmitter was keyed up -- if it was so wired, there is no way simultaneous reception/transmission could occur; (3) and even if the receiver was not muted on transmit (which, frankly, I can't really imagine, knowing how these systems are usually configured), simultaneous reception would be impossible if the receiver shared a common antenna with the transmitter, because the change-over relay GROUNDED the receiver input during transmission, through an extra set of contacts. Now, read this carefully. The RF output from a "50-watt" transmitter is NOT going to "burn out" a tube-type receiver, unless the transmitted power is connected directly to the receiver's antenna input. Ham radio operators have, for many, many years, used separate receive and transmit antennas when they couldn't obtain a proper antenna change-over relay, or wanted to operate "break-in CW" which requires an antenna relay capable of following a Morse key... not an easy thing to find. I've done it myself, so I know this first hand. A low power transmitter will not pose a threat to the receiver. (And if you are truly worried about it, put a neon bulb between the receiver antenna terminal and ground.) Now back to the WE system, and the issue of "high RF voltages at the transmitter antenna post": There is no danger posed to the receiver, in any circumstance, if the receiver input was coupled through the transmitter's change-over relay, because the relay had an extra set of contacts which GROUNDED the receiver input, on transmit. Now, on to the cockpit audio system: Regardless of whether an interphone system was present, it is perfectly reasonable to assume that there were separate "jack boxes" provided in the cockpit for the headsets/mics for the left and right seats. 73 Mike E. ************************************************************************ From Ric So simultaneous transmission and reception is impossible on the same frequency, but may be possible on dissimilar frequencies. But if AE is hearing code from Itasca on 7500 and is transmitting on 3105 or 6210, that is the case. Try this: AE transmits on 3105 or 6210 saying something that Betty writes down as "W40K or WOJ Howland port". She says something about "waters high". She does (or doesn't) stop transmitting and suddenly hears code on 7500. She begins transmitting again, trying to reply and also tells Noonan "Here put your ear to it." after which she stops transmitting and passes the headset to Noonan who hears the code. He then puts on the second headset and picks up the other mic as AE is sending "This is Amelia...etc." Noonan starts injecting his own words into the transmission and Earhart tells him to stop. Both Earhart and Noonan were almost certainly severely hearing impaired after nearly 24 hours sitting between those engines and, rather than shout at each other, they may have used the radio (in the absence of an intercom) to talk to each other - each wearing a headset and using a microphone. That's why Betty hears not only intended transmissions but also some of the interpersonal exchanges. **************************************************************************** From Hue Miller Ric wrote: > 1. There was no "transmitter/receiver system". Actually, there was. The PTT switch does not simply turn the transmitter on/off. Your radio expert can verify this. It also handles the muting of the receiver. We can ask your radio expert about this. If i show you the wiring diagram for the WE transmitter receiver SYSTEM, would you agree that this would seem to be the system on this particular plane, or is there some reason AE would elect to go with a pointless, technically retrograde setup? >The loop > antenna over the cockpit was, I maintain, operated via a "coupling unit" to > the receiver under the copilot's seat. A switch alowed the pilot to select > which receiving antenna the receiver would use - belly wire or loop. And, just to ensure we each have the same understanding on this, the switch is on the loop unit, yes? Because the loop unit needs a 'sense antenna', and when 'looping' ( DFing ), it used the same wire receiver antenna as its 'sense antenna'. > I can > see no evidence in the available photos that the transmitting system in the > tail of the airplane (operated via a remote in the cockpit) and the receiving > system in the nose were in any way connected. The evidence shows up in the SYSTEM schematic, not in a photo. If you can see the interconnect wires and connections, then you truly hold some exceptional photos. The system schematic is discussed in one of those 3 texts i mentioned in a previous post- not available to me at present, but i can eventually lay my hands on these again. Perhaps Mike has these and can verify the setup. > 3. We still need to figure out why it might be that the PTT seems to have > been locked down - but you're not helping. Actually, the exceptional claim is that the "PTT seems to have been locked down". This would be for the proponents to explain. The PTT apparatus is quite robust. Even throwing it at a brick wall would break off the button but not jam the switch. As for relays jamming, etc. etc. or such a conjecture, such a hard landing would damage vacuum tubes first. Hue Miller ************************************************************************** From Ric This whole line of argument is bogus. There is no requirement stated or implied in the notebook that the PTT be locked down or that transmission and reception is occurring at the same time. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 12:16:55 EST From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Forum issues For today's forum (Monday Feb. 3) I've posted and replied to roughly a third of the postings. Pat will post the others later today as time permits. I'm spending as much time as I can trying to get the Post-Loss Radio report finished while also trying to keep the fundraising going. These are tough times for all nonprofit organizations (and for-profit businesses, for that matter). Many have fallen, and many more will fall victim, to the shrunken and stagnant economy and to the uncertain and unpromising future. But "this too, shall pass" and the survivors will be the ones who manage their assets wisely and who continue to earn and receive the trust and support of their members/customers. We'll do our part, but you'll need to do yours - as most of you do. We don't, and we won't, make it a requirement, but everyone on this forum who has been a subscriber for more than a month should be a TIGHAR member. If you're not, you're riding the bus without paying the fare. It's an honor system. Everyone on the forum should take advantage of the Paradise Now raffle. It has never been easier to support the work you care about and do something for yourself and your family at the same time. This forum is an important part of TIGHAR's total effort to conclusively solve the Earhart mystery and we encourage you to participate with your questions, comments, and opinions - but please remember that every time you submit a posting either Pat or I has to open it, read it, possibly respond to it, copy/paste it into a separate document, and send it on for distribution. Once it goes out, over 800 people have to, at a minimum, look at it and decide whether or not to open it and read it or delete it. So please do us all the courtesy of familiarizing yourself with the exhaustive (and admittedly exhausting) information on the website, and let's try to hold the witty one-liners to a minimum. As we've said a hundred times or more, the purpose of the Earhart Project is to develop and demonstrate sound techniques and methodologies in historical investigation - in short, learning and showing how to discover truth. That mission has never been more important than it is now. Thank you for your help, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:13:22 EST From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: drift information Marty wrote: > Bob wrote: > > > > I don't mean to be contentious but do we know that there was a drift > > meter on board? > > Evidence that there MIGHT have been equipment like > that on board comes from the inventory of the contents > of the plane after the crash in Hawaii: Thanks, Marty. I have a copy of the Luke Field inventory. My question for Alan was rhetorical. The intent was to prompt reexamination of the apparent assumption that FN had access to an installed drift sight of the type that essentially is a telescope mounted in a vertical tube through the bottom of the fuselage, equipped with a rotatable grid sight for finding drift angle. Inventory item 107, "type D-270 speed and drift indicator", might be a circular slide rule of the type that evolved into the modern E-6B, used for solving time/speed/distance and drift calculations. Or, it might be a drift sight intended to be mounted externally on the two brackets installed on the outside of the fuselage at the aft edge of the cabin door frame. If so, mounting and using the device would have been interesting, to say the least. First, FN would have to open the cabin door several inches, against the pressure of the slip stream, and latch the door open in that position. Then he would have to reach through the door opening and attach the sight to the brackets, being careful not to drop it or let the slip stream rip it from his grasp. After mounting the sight, he then would have to position his head in or very close to the door opening to take readings. Item 122, "Mk II B pelorus drift sight", was very crude compared to the modern grid-type drift sight. There is a photo and description of this sight in Dutton, "Navigation and Nautical Astronomy", published by the U.S. Naval Institute, 1948. Dutton's description states, in pertinent parts: "It consists of a sighting tube about eight inches long mounted by a pivot joint on a post free to turn in a base. The sighting tube contains no lenses: there is a peep hole at one end and cross wires at the other". "The post can be adjusted in height by releasing a thumb screw and sliding the post up or down in the index arm". "When a drift observation is to be made with the Mark 2B drift sight, the aircraft is flown over some prominent stationary object on the ground at constant heading and speed and as the object draws aft, the cross wires are kept centered on it. When the object is left some distance behind and the line of sight through the tube has steadied, after perhaps half a minute or a minute, the angle between the the track (reciprocal of the line of sight) and the heading (longitudinal axis of the plane) is read on the drift scale at the base opposite the index line on the index arm. This is the drift angle." The Mark 2B installation in NR16020, with the pivot mounts at the cabin windows, restricted its field of view such that the sea surface was not visible forward of the wing trailing edge, or more than 30 degrees aft of the beam, or more than 50 degrees below the horizontal. The Mark 2B could have been useful for taking bearings on mountains and islands in the early hours of the flight from Lae, but there were no "prominent stationary" objects on the sea surface for FN to use in finding drift in the vicinity of the 157/337 LOP. So, if it is assumed that FN was able to get drift information, how did he do it? LTM, Bob #2286 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:14:02 EST From: Dennis McGee Subject: Speculation I am skeptical that this marine biologist saw anything on the island "that might be an identifiable component of a Lockheed Electra." You say the biologist was familiar with TIGHAR's work, yet he neither photographs the find nor recovers it because he assumed we already knew of it. If he is aware of TIGHAR's work then he would also be aware of what we know and don't know, and obviously we knew nothing of this artifact or else something would have been on the website about it. And even if we did know of it, it did not dawn on him at that time to take a quick photo or two just to document its present condition. By chance, did the biologist mark the site in any way -- a pile of stones or debris, a GPS coordinate, a rough map, a yellow ribbon around the old Kanawa tree -- so it could be quickly relocated? Anything? I'll bet not, because he assumed we already knew of it so there was no need to document it, and because it was a "brief visit" (10 minutes? 12 hours? 2 days?) and he didn't have time to waste on something he thought we already knew. I think the guy is pulling our leg, but we still have to check it out. LTM, who suffers from pulled-leg syndrome Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:14:38 EST From: Dennis McGee Subject: One more? Ric said: "I'll take your suggestion and leave it up to the forum to decide whether I need to spend my time and theirs responding to your efforts to keep me honest." Sactodave, Janet Whitney, Cam Warren . . . Hue Miller! LTM, who does not suffer in silence Dennis O. McGee #0149EC ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:15:40 EST From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: Refraction variability > Marty we may be having a misunderstanding. I am 100% certain that the > 157-337 LOP was derived from one (and probably a lot more than one) sun > line observation with Noonan's sextant. My point is that it would not be > a "dawn sight" taken only at the time that the sun peeked up over the > horizon. My apologies, Gary. I misunderstood you and misrepresented your position (intellectual, not line of). :-O If Fred could have gotten a good LOP drawn on his chart during the hour after sunrise, it would give him a good starting point for dead reckoning to a parallel line through Howland & the Phoenix Islands. I know that the preceding sentence begins with "if" and continues with "would." All I'm presenting is a conjecture. I did not invent the conjecture. It dates to 1937 and resurfaced in the 1980s, I believe. All I've ever said or meant to say is that this scientific WAG makes sense to me. ;o) LTM. Marty #2359 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:18:49 EST From: Tom Strang Subject: Re: 31.05 revisited I vote to keep keep Mr. Hue Miller around - May be just to find out why he is still riding around with a burr under his saddle over Miss Betty and her "note book" - A person is never so blind as one who chooses not to see. Respectfully: Tom Strang Ric wrote: >Because they're the ones who have to read all this stuff (or delete it), I'll >take your suggestion and leave it up to the forum to decide whether I need to >spend my time and their's responding to your efforts to keep me honest. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:19:48 EST From: Mark Prange Subject: Refraction variability >Let's.....say that Fred uses a >different line derived by a ...........significantly >post-dawn sun shot, which he advances through Howland. >He then flies until he reaches the advanced line but, ooops, no Howland. >He can't then just start flying the 157 337 line because he has no way of >knowing where he is in relation to the 157 337 that passes through >Howland........ Post dawn sun observations would indeed give him information as to whether he was on the line through Howland. Mark ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:21:21 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Refraction variability > My argument for the 157 337 line being a sunshot LOP advanced through > Howland is that it's the only way he can get to the advanced line, > not see Howland, and then start running on the line and have any > confidence that that it will eventually bring him to an island. I'll talk to you Monday about this but I'm being technical about what I say. I totally agree with you that is probably what occurred. I'm only pointing out that "it ain't necessarily so." Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:22:15 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: MARCH OF TIME TAPE Ron, thanks very much for taking the time to post that piece from MOT. I agree that there is no similarity. But we didn't expect it would be did we? I am certainly with you that the notebook leans more to the 2nd of July, six days before the MOT was broadcast just for starters. I cannot conceive that the notebook is anything but genuine and I'm one of the most cynical sceptics of all. Some here will not believe that from my posts but Ric knows. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:23:32 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Drift information Marty Moleski wrote: > Duties and Responsibilities of > THE NAVIGATOR > Excerpt from the Pilot Training Manual of the B-17 Flying Fortress > > "When flying over water, desert, or barren land, where no reliable pilotage > points are available, accurate DR navigation still can be performed. By > means of the drift meter the navigator is able to determine drift, Now you see why I would not discuss the drift meter. Two reasons. Everyone could find this same URL just as easily as Marty. Two, it did not explain the technique for obtaining drift over open ocean and I really didn't want to start that thread. Since the issue has been opened let me touch on it briefly and leave everyone to their own research to answer whatever questions this brings up. I'm not trying to be difficult or mysterious but my time is not totally free any more than that of everyone else. Obvious stuff: Find some object floating and use it for the drift target. Drop a flare or other object and use it. If AE knew how to do the drift problem she could have tossed Fred out after he failed to find Howland. Finally there is a technique using waves to run the drift problem. Ah Ha! Who knew that? Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:24:28 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Refraction variability Gary LaPook writes > The speculation that this LOP was based on an observation of the moon or a > planet does not hold water. The only time on July 2, 1937 that an > observation of the moon while in the Vicinity of Howland was 1620 through > 1626 Z way before NR16020 would have been close to Howland. Venus would > produce the same azimuth only during the period 1752-1801 Z which is after > sun rise when it would be very difficult or impossible to observe Venus. Gary, I know of no speculation that a planet was used to obtain an LOP. The moon most certainly could although I am not saying that was the source of the LOP. I am saying it could have been. It doesn't make any difference what time the moon shot was available. While you are checking all this out I would suggest you look at how little time Noonan had to do sun shots from the time he could see the sun and the time he reached the vicinity of Howland. I think there is an erroneous view that Noonan had considerable time to shoot and move sun lines. That is not so. You DID make a good point that I've made in less clear terms that I suspect few are understanding and that is that the azimuth of the sun changed so slightly that Noonan had a good opportunity, weather permitting, to refine his LOP position AFTER 7:42 L. THAT point is far more significant, in my view, than many understand. Every little clue like that makes me more convinced that either Noonan was a far less qualified navigator than is supposed or he had Howland's coordinates wrong. I'll opt for the latter. Why? Because he had an hour to redo his work and Howland STILL was not where he plotted it to be. Could he have been that bad? OK, the weather could have prevented subsequent celestial but the weather reports do not support that probability (nor do they refute it). Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:25:45 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: MOT > Numerous places I've researched MOT indicates they were broadcast > by NBC, not CBS. For example, I cut/pasted the following information > from the Library of Congress SONIC database for one of their many MOT > recordings: No, they were broadcast by CBS. NBC took over that Fall, unfortunately AFTER the July broadcasts. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:26:36 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Drift information Gary LaPook wrote: > Over land you sight on fixed objects but over water it is a little trickier. > If there are whitecaps you can sight on them if they persist for a while. > Each whitecap stays in one place. Rats! Gary, you told. Now they don't have to look it up. Good explanation. I hope everyone can start to see that Noonan was far from limited in what tools and techniques he had at his beck and call. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:28:06 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Texas Ric wrote: > Sure looks "central" to me but I'm sure Texans have their own definitions > for such things. I'm in Austin which is central Texas. Ft. hood is 70 miles from me. I go there shopping so I know. Texans use odd descriptions of their areas. I'm in the "Hill country" which is flat. My lady friend used to live in Cisco which is called "West Texas." Cisco is east of me and north of course. It's far closer to Dallas than El Paso or even Lubbock. Then there's the valley. That's Kingsville which is not in a valley. There is an Austin County but Austin is not in it. I could go on and on but you get the idea. Ric is correct. Ft. hood is central Texas. Keep in mind this is a big place. Don Meridith, former Cowboy quarterback, used to say that if you tip Texas up to the North Brownsville would be about 65 miles from the Canadian border. If you tip it to the South Texarkana would be several hundred miles south of Acapulco into the Pacific. If you tip it to the West Orange would be several hundred miles out in the Pacific and if you tip it to the East El Paso would be several hundred miles out in the Atlantic. For Chris, Gary, and hue, please don't bother checking your maps. This was a joke and not absolutely, perfectly accurate. Just the best I can remember Meridith's story. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:30:19 EST From: Mark Prange Subject: Re: Astronomy >One note: the 157/337 line is the perpendicular line to the horizon >sunrise point on that day. In order for Noonan to find that line >accurately, he absolutely must have taken a shot of the Sun when it >rose. But Noonan did not have to find the azimuth accurately. The 067 azimuth is what would have been gotten out of "Navigation Tables for Mariners and Aviators." The azimuth angle is seldom measured in celestial navigation. >Noonan likely predicted where he expected to be when the Sun rose, and >knew that the LOP would be at that angle, but it's a meaningless line >*unless* he measured it when the Sun rose. Not really. For an assumed position, a navigator computes or looks up the azimuth. That azimuth is helpful sometimes to predict which direction to find the body, and definitely to find the alignment of the LOP through that assumed position. >It makes no sense to use it >as a reference without a measurement that morning, as they wouldn't >know where the line really was without an accurate measurement of the >sunrise azimuth. It is conventional to use the predicted azimuth, rather than the measured azimuth, because the azimuth applies strictly to observatioins from the assumed position, not the observer's position. The azimuth/LOP alighnment is not as critical as is the height of the body. The 067 azimuth of the sun would have obtained over a broad swath of latitude and LHA; (a look at some sight reduction tables shows it to be about from N 10 degrees to S 9 degrees, if I remember correctly, and a considerable span east and west, too). >That's why I'm so sure that they had to know their >course angle, within the errors of their instruments, at sunrise; >Earhart would not have been flying that LOP unless Noonan knew, with >certainty, what the angle was. If he was using "Navigation Tables for Mariners and Aviators" then he knew the angle with more precision (tenth of a degree) than he could measure it. To navigation along the LOP it is useful to have an idea of its alignment, but repeated Sun height observations are what tell how closely an LOP is being flown. >Measuring azimuthal angles against a compass is easy. For that reason known azimuth angles are useful in determining accuracy of the compass, because navigational compass accuracy doesn't have to be within small fractions of a degree. Normally the azimuth angle is not measurable with enough accuracy to be useful in posiion finding. >......we found our >position, using a sextant and transit...... Azimuth instruments, when available to the navigator, are used more for determining heading or bearing, or determining compass error/corrections. But for position finding the navigator normally uses a height instrument--a sextant--without relying too much on azimuth instruments. >...I don't know how being in a plane would >affect the accuracy, though. Plus or minus 6 NM is doing really fine. >You also really need three measurements to >find your position; two will get you by, but it's not nearly as >accurate. There is much to be said for having three bodies, especially if the intercepts are either all TO, or all FROM. With daylight, Noonan would have been down to just one body, the Sun for some of the time. The moon's azimuth didn't differ enough from that of the Sun until later in the morning. >I don't >understand how navigators were trained to do their job, but I'll work >on that. A few were trained first in surveying. Many began as mariners. In the 1930s more and more were aeronautical navigators from the start. When surveyors use celestial observations it is not usually so much for position finding as it is for determining bearing along a line. The azimuth observation has not so much primacy with navigators. Celestial navigators focus more on a body's predicted and measured angular height. In marine navigation, traditionally the various corrections are made to the sight. In aerial navigation, the preference is to make the corrections beforehand to the (pre)computed height, so that a position line can be plotted more promptly after an observation. Mark Prange ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:32:35 EST From: Christian Duretete Subject: Re: Query Ric wrote: > What you're missing are the umpteen previous postings that have explained > that the nature of the reef surface prohibits any taxiing to the shore. > Only the first couple hundred feet of reef near the ocean is smooth enough to > land or taxi on. Move any closer to shore and the reef becomes deeply pitted > and jagged. Details, details... Myself, while I remember the smoothest area was at the edge, for landing, I hadn't understood that taxiing to shore was out of the question. Thanks for this detail. CD ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:34:23 EST From: Harvey Schor Subject: Re: Drift information my sincere thanks to all who answered my questions regarding drift measurements harvey Schor #2387 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:35:34 EST From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: Breaking news I had kinda promised myself I'd stay out of this .... A "brief visit" by a marine biologist suggests to me that the scientist was going somewhere else, and Niku was on the way to someplace else. He (identified as "he" in Ric's initial announcement) landed on the island mostly to be able to say to his friends back home that he'd been to the island ... unless there is something of special interest to such as he. Is there something on Gardner that would attract marine biologists? I suspect the chap went to some place on the island that TIGHAR may not have gone, but which is familiar in some way to marine biologists. The biologist may not have had a clear idea what parts of the island had been explored by TIGHAR. He just went somewhere that looked like some places he knew well. What's his area of research? We on the Forum don't know yet whether the artifact was on the land or in the water, nor do we know if -- were it in the water -- whether it was detected visually or remotely. Since it appears that the island has been at very least surveyed completely from the air, my first guess is that the artifact is submerged, or has been covered in brush or sand which for some reason has been cleared away. Have there been any storms there recently which would have changed the shape of the beach or the extent of the brush? Given that he new about TIGHAR, it may be assumed that he's at very least an aviation enthusiast. But that may be in error: it may be equally likely that Niku fits a profile in which he is interested professionally, or that Niku is on the way or near to someplace of particular interest to marine biologists. What he knows about aviation leads to the possible identity of the artifact. If he knows, for example, what I know, the artifact is going to have to be identifiable obviously as an airplane part from the right era. If he's a pilot of some experience and of different airplanes, that broadens the possibilities. Is he a pilot, or does he simply pick up a copy of "Air Classics" on his way home? Given what I recall about the rates of destruction of metals on that island, whatever it is has to be fairly substantial. I vote, therefore, for either an engine or landing gear, buried in sand underwater. LTM Mike H. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:37:54 EST From: Bob Brandenburg Subject: Re: Closest Point of Approach (CPA) Ron Bright wrote: > Safford says in "Flight into Yesterday", chpt 11, "The Electra had no chance > of hearing the ITASCA's 7500 KC signals at night, nor of taking a bearing on > them by day until within about 40 miles of the ship." A bit confusing, but > it seems to confirm that 7500 kc signals could be heard by AE if within 40 > miles. Ron: This illustrates, yet again, the folly of accepting anecdote as fact. I don't know how Safford derived his conclusions, but it appears that he was not in possession of the relevant facts. It's worth noting that the Itasca's signal you cite was sent in daylight, about 2 hours after sunrise, using the 500-watt T-16 transmitter. I ran this case in the ICEPAC model, and the signal was receivable "loud and clear" within a radius of about 600 nautical miles. Safford's claim that "The Electra had no chance of hearing the ITASCA's 7500 KC signals at night, . . ." is not credible on its face, but I ran a night case out of curiosity and the signal was "loud and clear" within a radius of about 1000 nautical miles. As for not getting a bearing on the Itasca's signal until within 40 miles, Safford may have been referring to the ground wave reception limit. But if so, he was ignoring the fact that the Itasca's signal had a strong skywave component at any distance, which would make it virtually impossible to get a minimum (null) with the loop antenna on NR16020. LTM, Bob #2286 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:38:41 EST From: Mike Everette Subject: Re: Can't transmit and receive at the same time. Dave Bush writes: >Also, I remember reading in one of Stephen Coonts' books about a WWII >fighter pilot who was in a shootout with a ME-109 who went thru the whole >fight with his mike "open". I think what you remember is not from Stephen Coonts (unless he "borrowed" it), but from "Thunderbolt!" by Robert S. Johnson. The German a/c was a Focke-Wulf 190. 73 Mike E. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:39:08 EST From: Tom Riggs Subject: Re: Query In response to Pat Gaston's question about taxiing the Electra across the reef flat to the Niku beach shoreline, Ric wrote: "What you're missing are the umpteen previous postings that have explained that the nature of the reef surface prohibits any taxiing to the shore...." Not only would the nature of the reef surface prohibit taxiing to shore, but also: 1- taxiing the Electra to shoreline would discount Tighar's theory that tide and wave action floated the Electra over the reef edge. 2- improbable that only seven days later on July 9, 1937 Lt. Lambrecht didn't happen to notice a huge 7000lb. shiny aluminum airplane sitting on the edge of Niku shoreline. Tom Riggs #2427 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:40:35 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: antenna musing One thing that struck me as i pawed through the Navy type DU manual (equivalent to AE's Bendix-commercial unit), that i hadn't really notice before, i don't think, is that the unit uses the 1 wire antenna, the communications antenna, for both the communications ( operating coupler in "through" mode ) and as loop sense antenna, in "direction finding" mode. ( In this mode, it turns down the signal from the wire antenna to compensate for its stronger signal, compared to the loop.) The coupler then has one wire to the receiver, this wire carries the signal from either the loop or wire. This is saying that ONLY ONE antenna served for sense and receive. So, it was not the case where the ventral was sense and dorsal V, receive/ transmit. The belly antenna served all receive purposes, OR the V topside antenna served all receive + transmit purposes. In the latter case, the belly antenna would be unused. I am thinking, with AE's concern for weight and streamlined flying, she would not keep a useless apendage on the plane. Does this help at all clarify the way the setup may (?) have been, or muddy the water more? Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:41:01 EST From: Ed Subject: Re: Clips When we think of the village and the hand-made items (combs, box inlays, etc.) that were fabricated from aircraft aluminum, the remnants of that craftmanship may prove to be of value. Likewise other salvaged items may still lie within the village perimeter. Any thoughts of spending more search time there looking for the smoking gun? LTM Ed of PSL #2415 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:41:40 EST From: Eric Subject: Betty's Radio (Update) Here is a response I received from ORZ at the Old Radio Zone web site (http://www.oldradiozone.com/). I pass it along without comment for what it's worth: It would be impossible to track down all 1000Z owners. I seriously doubt she [Betty] listened on a 1000Z. Were Betty's parents extremely wealthy? The 1000Z was $750, which was a fortune back then. I live in Florida and I have never heard of a 1000Z coming from Florida. How old is Betty today? How tall was Betty in 1937. The 1000Z is a very tall model at about 4 feet tall. There are also wooden sliding doors on this model. ORZ www.oldradiozone.com Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, CA ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:43:41 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: KGMB via shortwaves > Didn't that Wyoming fellow report AE reception around 16000 kc/s ? > -Hue Miller > >***************************************************** > From Ric > > That Wyoming fellow heard what he heard on or about 16000 kcs on Sunday, not > Tuesday. However, this Tuesday thing is not all that decisive. This listing is for Dec 12, 1936, allowing plenty of time for schedule changes. The rest of the text, maybe i should have quoted more, states in a couple places "testing". The point is, the precedent:: KGMB reached USA via shortwave in 1936, in 16000 band. I think an impartial judge would say based on this, it would not be unexpected for Kuhuku to be broadcasting KGMB to the USA in mid-1937. Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:45:08 EST From: Jon Watson Subject: Re: Can't transmit and receive at the same time. Out of curiosity, the other day I logged into the Library of Congress to see what AE related pictures they may have. The one photo I found most interesting is virtually identical to the one taken from the overhead hatch, where AE is sitting in the co-pilot's seat. It has to have been take about the same time, because in the photo with AE, there is clearly something missing from the panel "table", and there is what looks like a block of wood inserted in the hole. In the LOC photo, the picture is taken from the same vantage point, and the block of wood is clearly there. What's not there is AE. The photo clearly shows the cockpit sidewall next to the co-pilot's seat. Although the thumbnail of the photo is small, there is clearly a set of earphones hanging next to the co-pilot's seat. While we obviously don't know for sure that the headphones made it aboard for the second flight, it is reasonable, I think, to presume they did. > From Ric > She does (or doesn't) stop transmitting and suddenly hears code on 7500. She > begins transmitting again, trying to reply and also tells Noonan "Here put > your ear to it." after which she stops transmitting and passes the headset to > Noonan who hears the code. He then puts on the second headset and picks up > the other mic as AE is sending "This is Amelia...etc." Noonan starts If in fact the second earphone set was present, she wouldn't even need to hand hers to Fred, just tell him to put his " ear to it". (Ric, I'll send you a copy of the thumbnail of the photo in another email) ltm Jon 2266 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 3 Feb 2003 15:48:24 EST From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: Breaking news This was not my post. I'm not nearly this articulate! There is a fellow forumite who signs his postings Mike H.--ain't me buddy. It would simplify matters if he wouldn't use initials. LTM Mike Haddock #2438 >From Mike Haddock > >I had kinda promised myself I'd stay out of this .... *************************************** Yes, it would make our lives easier if *everyone* would sign first and last names to their posts, please! Also, include attribution (So-and-so wrote:) when quoting as we don't necessarily remember who wrote what by the next day. Thanks! Pat ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 09:52:51 EST From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Clips I have 2 questions related to the clips; When I look at the photos, I do not conclude, or even think, that they are home-made. (Perhaps there is something about them that is more apparent when you hold them in your hand.) What specifically is it about them that makes you conclude home-made? Do you and Angus need any help on any research related to these things? - Alfred ************************************************************************** From Ric If you held them in your hand you'd know what I mean. The plates are well made but very imprecisely made. The rounded one is a bit lopsided and the corners of the rectangular one are not quite square. The serrations on both are not symmetrical. Angus had them for several weeks and has done what he could in terms of physical analysis. We've explored a number of possibilities and find that the closest similarity is to fasteners on the internal fittings found in sextant boxes - but no exact match. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 10:08:36 EST From: Mike Holt Subject: Re: Breaking news >From Mike Haddock > >I had kinda promised myself I'd stay out of this .... Wrong Mike H! Mr. Haddock, you didn't write that one; I'll take the flak myself. I'll add my complete last name next time! ******************************************************************** From Ric With 800-plus subscribers we're bound to have some duplication in names and intials. It's a good idea to include your first and last name in your posting, or some other distinguishing handle like "Ed in PSL" or "Dave in Houston". While we're on the subject, it saves me a lot of time if you begin your posting with "From (whoever)" so I don't have to do it. Thanks. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 10:11:36 EST From: Dave Carmack Subject: Re: One more? I dont know if I am allowed a vote or not since I am not a member, only a lurker, I must red-facedly admit. But I would vote to keep Hue around. I think the problem is not with his skepticism about certain things but more with certain parts of his dialogue, as when he gets perhaps a little too personal sometimes. However, I would say in his defense that given the obvious bias a lot of the members here have towards any TIGHAR theory, that the way THEY respond to someone with skepticism can provoke some of these personal affronts. If all the innuendos and cynical remarks could be deleted from the posts it would alleviate this a lot . Of course it would not be as entertaining but personal attacks I dont consider all that entertaining. Im sure if the positions regarding this particular matter---Bettys notebook--were reversed, that almost all the Tighar members would be finding ways to support it and not the other side. Sometimes the views on this are like listening to the OJ Simpson trial-- a lot of lawyers throwing out so much information in the hopes it will confuse everyone and that some of it may stick. In short, I think it is good to have someone like Hue around trying to present a different point of view. Hue, I would say--stick by your beliefs only try to keep from any kind of personal remarks.....and the same to everyone else. Of course no one will admit to being the one who started it, but cant someone be big enough to say -'I will be the first to quit' Arguments are good for progress, but with personal things thrown in they can deteriorate into just plain mud-fights. We can see that on Jerry Springer. Sincerely, David C ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 10:38:15 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Can't transmit and receive at the same time. > From Ric > > Transmitting and receiving on different frequencies was not at all unusual. In which communications realm, in 1937? > From Mike E. > > For Hue Miller > What you may have seen is in Morgan. > > I have a copy of it in front of me. When this was made, i blew it up on the > copier and lost the page number but the illustration is "Figure 89." > > This shows the wiring for a bench test setup for the transmitter. > > I have not seen anything showing how it interconnected with the receiver. The other book is "Aeronautic Radio" by Eddy, 1940? Has a 2 page expanded schematic of transmitter, with comments. This one is good for explaining the transmit relay timing sequence, things that weren't immediately obvious to me. I think we need to look at the "Transmitter Bench Testing Setup" diagram, and the receiver diagram (with a magnifying glass and ruler!!) and tease out the wiring. I am thinking the receiver highvoltage relay is in the receiver dynamoter box. > The one thing I have wondered about, is whether there was some provision for > "whistle thru" or any other means to zero the receiver to the transmitter > frequency. I can't see that on any diagrams I have available. Yes- me too. They either had to search for the call of the correspondent station on the dial, "around where expected", or was this receiver the modification shown in the book, with crystal controlled receiver channels? Ric wrote: > This whole line of argument is bogus. There is no requirement stated or > implied in the notebook that the PTT be locked down or that transmission and > reception is occurring at the same time. Ric, is this fiat, or based on fact, or even probability? Mike does have a point about receiver silencing, even when receiving on a different band. Howsoever, the bridge you must cross, to validate any possibility of your simultaneous 3105 transmit, 7500 receive scene, is how her duplex mode acted when on same frequency. In other words, your proposed radio switchover setup, how does it act when normally used? When AE was communicating on 3105, for example, with no auto muting of her receiver - unlike every other aircraft radio station we are familiar with, and unlike any portrayed in the Morgan or Eddy books, or any aircraft radio manual i have seen. ( Mike? ) Now, as Sandretto's radio engineering text explains, the receiver is muted because: (excluding the damage reason, excluded per above.) 1. Transmitter signal in receiver is so strong it requires volume manually turned down immediately before transmit, or operator's hearing is threatened. Then turned back up when done speaking. Every time! Don't forget, or you'll be tearing off off your headphone! ( This aggravation is why PTT and relays were used!) 2. Audio feedback from transmitter>receiver>transmitter can set reciever to howling or screeching in headphone, when transmitter is on. 3. Receiver is desensitized or blocked for a period of some seconds after transmitter is turned off ( as AGC discharges ). "Okay, Amelia, before you give it back to Itasca, be sure to tell them to count to 20 before transmitting.") I can quote Sandretto for you if you think i concocted this. So, you are saying AE lived with this disadvantage, so she could enjoy the dubious advantage of hampered reception while transmitting? I also note your scene envisions 2 microphones. Before you see the schematic, Ric, are you really sure you want to go with this supposition? -Hue Miller *************************************************************************** From Ric I said: >There is no requirement stated or > implied in the notebook that the PTT be locked down or that transmission and > reception is occurring at the same time. You asked: > Is this fiat, or based on fact, or even probability? It's based on the notebook. We have no way of knowing how much time elapsed between entries. You asked: >So, you are saying AE lived with this disadvantage, so she could enjoy the dubious >advantage of hampered reception while transmitting? I'm saying that the whole discussion about simultaneous transmission/reception is based upon the assumption that Earhart did not release the PTT after asking Noonan to put his ear to (presumably) the headphones. You ask: >I also note your scene envisions 2 microphones. Before you see the >schematic, Ric, are you really sure you want to go with this supposition? The Luke Field inventory shows two microphones aboard and they had the same transmitter then as they did in July, so if you have a schematic that doesn't permit 2 microphones then you apparently don't have a schematic for that particular transmitter. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 11:05:08 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: 31.05 revisited Tom Strang wrote: > I vote to keep keep Mr. Hue Miller around - May be just to find out why he > is still riding around with a burr under his saddle over Miss Betty and her > "note book" - A person is never so blind as one who chooses not to see. I vote to have a vote. Does discussion of the probability of a simultaneous receive-transmit situation ( for example), or shortwave propagation and station calls, fit this forum, assuming it is a forum, or is the Betty story beyond criticism? If the latter, i will certainly yield, and with a new understanding of how the forum works. Hue ************************************************************************ From Ric This forum and this investigation are about the process of arriving at the truth. No item of evidence is beyond criticism, but for criticism to carry any weight it has to survive the crucible of peer review. In my opinion, your attempts to discredit the Betty story are useful, if a bit tedious. You force us to consider issues that we may not otherwise have dealt with. Your technical expertise in radio matters is considerable (certainly far greater than mine) but you make the same mistake that so many others make in fastening upon an assumption (the simultaneous transmit/receive question for example) and then treating it as a fact that can be used to prove or disprove a premise. That's exactly what the crashed-and-sankers do. You can't seem to be able to separate anecdote from contemporaneous written documentation and you take your own interpretations of ambiguous material as gospel - which is just what the Japanese capture crowd does. You see our acceptance of Betty's notebook as blind faith and wishful thinking. So far, your attempts to discredit it look to me to be based upon unsupportable assumptions. Time and again, the validity of attempts to solve the Earhart mystery turn upon questions of methodology. LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 11:06:20 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Radio minutiae XCIX I don't have any desire to force forum readers to have to read about radio minutiae. Nor do i want to hide behind the internet. Any forum reader who wishes to chastise me, correct me, debate me, submit facts, anything, without clogging this forum, here i am at: kargo_cult@msn.com Thanks- Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:23:54 EST From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: refraction variability > You DID make a good point that I've made in less clear terms that I suspect > few are understanding and that is that the azimuth of the sun changed so > slightly that Noonan had a good opportunity, weather permitting, to refine > his LOP position AFTER 7:42 L. THAT point is far more significant, in my > view, than many understand By 19.12 GMT Zn was already a degree different at 65.9 degrees at Howland. By 20.12 Zn was 62.9 degrees. This does not seem a negligible change. Are you suggesting by "refining his LOP position" that he would be redefining his position as on some new LOP at a different angle later in the day? Or are you saying that he could better define the position of the 157/337 line he was running on (since arriving at the 157/337 line through Howland depended on perfect dead reckoning from the last sight to choose the correct time to turn)? Perhaps you can explain exactly how he would have done this? Regards Angus ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:25:26 EST From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: refraction variability Mark Prange wrote: > Post dawn sun observations would indeed give him information as > to whether he was on the line through Howland. These lines that we're talking about are slanting lines running NNE (357) and SSE (157). If Fred got the observations he needed to place one of these lines on his chart--a line that represents his position at the time of the observation--it would not be a "line through Howland." A line drawn slanting from 357 to 157 through Howland would be parallel to the line of position Fred had drawn on the chart. The distance between the two parallel lines would show AE & FN how much further they had to fly before turning left or right on the "line through Howland." There is a magnificent page on TIGHAR's web site showing the two parallel lines: LTM. Marty #2359 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:27:37 EST From: Tom King Subject: Re: Clips and village archeology For Ed -- Maybe I can lighten Ric's load and respond to your query about more search in the village, since working there has been one of my schticks. The village certainly may contain a smoking gun or two. No question that the villagers were "quarrying" aircraft aluminum for use in making stuff, and if they were quarrying some of it from the Electra they may well have brought in a diagnostic part or two (like the dado but better). But the village is a big place, and searching it with proper archeological control is time consuming. It's heavily forested, heavily covered with palm fronds and nuts, and there's so much metal of all kinds that a metal detector search is pretty frustrating. Doing a job on it involves clearing selected chunks of ground, gridding it off, and doing both metal detector and visual search -- crawling around on the ground with a trowel turning things over and digging them up, plotting them, deciding what to take and what not, and so on. Can't do much there in a single episode of fieldwork. We've kicked around whether there might be some particular place where folks tossed stuff they didn't need -- like complicated airplane parts that weren't much good for combs because they were all messed up with ID numbers and such. There's noplace that's obvious either archeologically or historically, but the best bet seems to be the near-shore water in the lagoon and on the ocean side. The ocean side is where we figure that wreckage would have washed up anyway, if the plane went down where we think it would, so working along this shore could give us a double whammy -- stuff that's washed up, and stuff that's been thrown in. So, that's high priority for 2004. Meanwhile, some of us are trying to intrest academic archeological institutions with access to foundation grants to take on the "non-Earhart" archaeology of the village, doing studies that would necessarily involve clearing housesites and would turn up airplane parts along with all the other interesting stuff the sites contain. There's interest at a couple of institutions in Canada and the U.K., and Gary Quigg and I will be doing a presentation at this year's Society for American Archaeology meeting in Milwaukee that may attract some US institutional interest. Of course, academic institutions face the same problems we do with work on Niku; they just have access to different funding streams. Hope that helps answer your question. In a nutshell, you're right, and we're working on it, but it ain't easy. LTM Tom ============== Thomas F. King, PhD Consultation, Training, Dispute Resolution in Cultural Resource Management PO Box 14515 Silver Spring MD 20911 tfking106@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:28:36 EST From: Dave Bush Subject: Re: Can't transmit and receive at the same time. Ric: Amelia using the last name Putnam might not be such a stretch. Let's say she has been calling and calling hoping to get an answer. She hears other operators on her radio, but her calls go unanswered. Then she realizes (or thinks) that maybe people are hearing her (because she hears their outgoing messages), but they aren't replying to her calls (and she doesn't realize that she could be hearing them but they might not be hearing her). So she thinks that they might not be replying because it could be a hoax, so by using a different name, she hopes that they will reply to that distress signal. Thus she stops using Earhart and starts using Putnam. Just a thought. LTM, Dave Bush ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:30:29 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Speculation Dennis writes: > If he is aware of TIGHAR's work then he would also be aware of what we > know and don't know... Even most forum members aren't aware of what we know and don't know. Alan ****************************************** Oh, OUCH!!! Alan, can we say "some" instead of "most"? Pat ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:31:32 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: Closest Point of Approach (CPA) For Bob Brandenburg, Thanks. But don't infer that I am accepting Saffords stuff as the gospel. He has some radio expertise and credentials, of course. But my point was that CDR Thompson is the one cited in the May 1938 newspaper article indicating that the Electra must have been no further than 30-35 milers away for her to receive the 7500 coded msg. So who is giving Thompson that information or "fact", Leo Bellarts? I doubt if Thompson would have an independent knowledge of the 7500kc range. It may be based some facts we are not aware of, or someone's erroneous conclusion. Thanks, Ron Bright ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:32:34 EST From: Ron Bright Subject: Re: KGMB via shortwaves The Wyoming fellow (Randolf) heard on Sunday, 4 July at 8:am, Rock Springs, Wyoming Time (MST) a faint voice saying "Amelia Earhart calling...ship on reef south of equator." Nothing else. That is 4:30 am Sunday, 4 July Honolulu time , and 3:30 am Gardner Island time. [Honolulu Star Bulletin, Mon, 5 July 37, from an AP release at Rock Springs, Wy. No byline.] I figure it was 10:00am Sunday, St Petes time.EST (?) From what I have seen in the MOT broadcast, there was no mention of "reef" or "equator" , so I still doubt Betty heard a MOT signal, AM or shortwave. Ron Bright ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:35:13 EST From: Rich Young Subject: OK so no stuck switch - then why...? Ric wrote: >Transmitting and receiving on different frequencies was not at all >unusual." In ANY leg of the RTW flight, did Amelia ever use the technique of transmitting on one frequency and recieving on another? According to what we know about Lae and Itasca's logs, she was expecting to recieve and transmit voice on the same frequency. Could she even tune the reciever to another frequnecy, or are the tuning circuits of the Westrn Electric 20 series slaved to the same coffee grinder as the transmitter? Is there any record of the PTT circuit in her airplane being modified to disable the reciever muting, and why? >This whole line of argument is bogus. There is no requirement stated or >implied in the notebook that the PTT be locked down or that transmission >and reception is occurring at the same time. I thought YOU posited transmitting and recieving at the same time to explain transmitting "here, put your ear to it" and that YOU hypothesized a stuck mike to explain all the background noise and conversation being transmitted, in the absence of situations reports, locations, yadda, yadda, yadda, but... Okay, we'll play it YOUR way...so Amelia deliberately pushed the PTT switch and cried into the mike so that...? Fred could hear her cry? Itasca could hear her boo-hoo? This doesn't strike you as the least bit melodramatic/out of character/FAKE? LTM, (who doesn't cry for me, OR Argentina, either) Rich Young ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2003 12:38:28 EST From: Daryll Bollinger Subject: "Yoop" Mike E. wrote and Ric responded: >Ric asks: >>To somebody listening for a transmission might this make a sound >>something like a generator starting up and stopping? > >It's possible. It would be nice to know, however (and we obviously can't >know for sure), exactly what the person meant by those words. >If one is listening for a CW signal, and hears a transmitter key up asn >the dynamotor is spooling up, there is a definite "yoop" to the CW >"note." until the dyno reaches speed. >Is it deja vu...? I think we have been in this area before, a long time >ago. >73 >Mike E. >********************************************** >From Ric >Maybe...but it's of particular interest right now as we're looking more >closely than ever before at the post-loss receptions. I have asked Mike this question before, maybe he has had more time to think about. The "281 message" has a statement from the operators who heard it, "KEYED TRANSMISSION EXTREMELY POOR KEYING BEHIND THE CARRIER" The question that I had and still have is how the operators could have made that statement? How could they give their opinion regarding the operation of the key compared to the carrier wave being generated? It is a matter of record that experienced radio operators could identify the "fist" of the operator sending the Morse Code. That is one reason that Yamamoto left the original radio personnel behind in the home islands when the Pearl Harbor attack force sailed, but the "fist" is a human element separate from the equipment being used. Would this "yoop" be the reason for the statement in the "281 message"? Would you expect to hear this "yoop" from a hoaxer using a commercial power source that was NOT dependant on a dynamotor for power? The "281" sender used the KHAQQ call sign in the message and the transmitter might have exhibited indications that it was being powered by a dynamotor 3 days after the airplane would have ran out of gas. Daryll ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:28:34 EST From: Randy Jacobson Subject: Re: OK so no stuck switch - then why...? On the trip from Oakland to Honolulu, AE set up a radio procedure that she would broadcast on 3105/6210 and listen to PAA station on 29XX kHz for bearing information determined by them. My understanding is that this was pretty much standard procedure: listen on a different frequency than broadcasting. Not too many people had capabilities of crystal-controlled 3105 and 6210 kHz transmitters. The receiver was broadband, and could be tuned to any number of particular frequencies. Randy Jacobson ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:29:50 EST From: Andrew McKenna Subject: Re: Breaking news Mike Haddock writes: >Is there something on Gardner that would attract marine biologists? Niku is so far off the beaten path that, with the exception of about 20 years, it is essentially untouched by man. The biodiversity there is excellent, and the reefs are perfectly natural. No overfishing, no poisoning from salt water aquarium collectors, very few anchors crushing the coral, no crude oil spills, etc. Niku is so pristine that it is considered a baseline upon which to study the degredation of other coral atolls. Niku is the kind of place marine biologists are attracted to so they can observe what it was like before man arrived and screwed up the ecosystem. LTM (who prefers the pristine) Andrew McKenna ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:31:23 EST From: Bob Lee Subject: Re: OK so no stuck switch - then why...? Rich Young wrote: > I thought YOU posited transmitting and recieving at the same time to explain > transmitting "here, put your ear to it" and that YOU hypothesized a stuck > mike to explain all the background noise and conversation being transmitted, > in the absence of situations reports, locations, yadda, yadda, yadda, but... > Okay, we'll play it YOUR way...so Amelia deliberately pushed the PTT switch > and cried into the mike so that...? Fred could hear her cry? Itasca could > hear her boo-hoo? This doesn't strike you as the least bit melodramatic/out > of character/FAKE? Perhaps I've missed this conversation in the archives, but... I don't see how we can assume that after hours of frustration trying to establish two-way communication in a confusing and stressful environment that we can assume that snippets of this conversation *shouldn't* contain some melodrama. The microphone as well as the radio could be experiencing technical malfunctions -- that could explain the open mic. Asking Fred to listen says to me that whatever she was or *wasn't* hearing took her a bit by surprise and wanted someone else to hear it. I think the human element needs to be considered on these post loss messages. Bob Lee ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:33:42 EST From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: OK so no stuck switch - then why...? Rich Young wrote: > Okay, we'll play it YOUR way...so Amelia deliberately pushed the > PTT switch and cried into the mike so that...? Fred could hear > her cry? Itasca could hear her boo-hoo? This doesn't strike > you as the least bit melodramatic/out of character/FAKE? No - you've got it all wrong. (CRYING NOW) "AE back on the radio now" - see note in Betty's notebook. Why is she back on the radio? Well actually she isn't because Fred still has the mike and its HIM who still has the button depressed. He's probably thinking - "perhaps if they can hear her blubbing they'll really believe this isn't a hoax". He's standing right next to her because only a few minutes earlier she said "here - put your ear to it" and the crying is overheard but it sounds like she's back on the radio to Betty. Can you really not figure that out? Regards Angus ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:36:09 EST From: Mark Prange Subject: Re: Refraction variability I wrote: >> Post dawn sun observations would indeed give him information as >> to whether he was on the line through Howland. Marty Moleski wrote: >These lines that we're talking about are slanting lines running NNE (357) >and SSE (157). I am only talking about the precomputed 157/337 line through Howland. >If Fred got the observations he needed to place one of these >lines on his chart--a line that represents his position at the time of the >observation--it would not be a "line through Howland." Fred's getting the observations would give an idea--even without placing each line representing his position on his chart--of how far he was from that precomputed line through Howland. Mark Prange ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:37:34 EST From: Alfred Hendrickson Subject: Re: Clips Ric wrote: "The plates are well made but very imprecisely made." I see. One thing I had noted was that the bend in the one is not uniform. It does not appear to be a smooth, constant radius. To me, this suggests that it might have been bent sometime after it was made. It certainly does not look like a mandrel-formed bend, which I would expect from a manufactured item. Alone, the lopsidedness of the flat one does not convince me of it not being a manufactured item. Same with the asymmetrical serrations. I have seen some pretty oddball, low-tech-looking things that were mass-produced. Even today, this can be seen in items produced in developing countries. LTM, Alfred Hendrickson #2583 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:55:14 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Speculation > Oh, OUCH!!! Alan, can we say "some" instead of "most"? I suppose that caught me in one of my rare cynical moments. I'll go one better and stand corrected. I'll say a FEW forumites are less than knowledgeable of what is known or what is on the web site. Is that better? Alan, humbling away in Austin. PS. I have not heard this announced publicly yet but from a "knowledgeable" source who shall remain anonymous, shuttle parts have been found now in Sugarland, Texas. For those not familiar with the geography down here that is hundreds of miles further south from the Columbia's track than the main debis field. Initially it was thought as a 30 mile wide swath then a 50 mile wide swath. CBS will carry that info. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:56:05 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: refraction variability Marty wrote > These lines that we're talking about are slanting lines > running NNE (357) and SSE (157). Good concise explanation, Marty, and I know you meant 337 degrees. You might also reiterate what I posted earlier that Noonan did not have very much time to do that between sunrise and when he was to his turning point. Even less if he waited to get a more accurate reading when the sun was higher in the sky. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:00:17 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Breaking news Ric wrote: > With 800-plus subscribers we're bound to have some > duplication in names and intials. This is true. Occasionally I see posts that have errors in them from someone claiming to also be Alan Caldwell. The emails with errors in them are from the fake Alan Caldwell not me. The real Alan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:02:49 EST From: Ed Hamilton Subject: Re: Clips and village archeology Tom, Thanks for your response. I'm convinced that the gun lies on Niku somewhere. Betty's experience points out that they landed somewhere with Niku the best bet. Did you ever find out any more regarding the use of the sea lions to do the underwater archeology? You know, maybe the networks could be approached to some sort of reality series based on Niku with the competition being a supervised dig, underwater search, etc. You never know what they may find attractive or different, e.g., "Search for Lost American Heroes". I read the book last year, excellent work, very tantalizing! LTM Ed of PSL #2415 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:03:47 EST From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: AE's 'open' MIC Maybe you guys have already covered this but was 1937 too early for noise cancelling mics? If this mic was that type then it wouldn't pick up Noonan unless his lips were up against it. gl ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:04:17 EST From: Gary LaPook Subject: W40K I think I asked this before, W40K, Is it "whiskey- four-zero-kilo" or "whiskey-four-oscar-kilo"? Gary LaPook ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:08:56 EST From: Christian Duretete Subject: Re: Clips and village archeology Tom King wrote: > The village certainly may contain a smoking gun or two. No question > that the villagers were "quarrying" aircraft aluminum for use in making > stuff, and if they were quarrying some of it from the Electra they > may well have brought in a diagnostic part or two (like the dado but better). > We've kicked around whether there might be some particular place where > folks tossed stuff they didn't need -- like complicated airplane parts that > weren't much good for combs because they were all messed up with ID > numbers and such. There's noplace that's obvious either archeologically > or historically, but the best bet seems to be the near-shore water in the > lagoon and on the ocean side. The ocean side is where we figure that > wreckage would have washed up anyway, if the plane went down where we > think it would, so working along this shore could give us a double whammy -- > stuff that's washed up, and stuff that's been thrown in. So, that's high > priority for 2004. Isn't there a fair chance that a medium sized piece of the airplane washed up somewhere, was too big/heavy to drag to the village "workshops", and so it was butchered in-situ. Nowadays, there could be a collapsed skeleton of aluminum framing under the brush somewhere in back of the beach, too small to be found by someone looking for a "plane", but still fairly big, like a half wing skeleton, with all the skin removed? Is this considered as an avenue of search? > Meanwhile, some of us are trying to interest academic archeological > institutions with access to foundation grants to take on the "non-Earhart" > archaeology of the village, doing studies that would necessarily involve Tom: what would be interesting on Niku for them? Regards. Christian D ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:09:49 EST From: Christian Duretete Subject: Re: Can't transmit and receive at the same time. Ric wrote: > transmitter then as they did in July, so if you have a schematic that doesn't > permit 2 microphones then you apparently don't have a schematic for that > particular transmitter. Why are we concerned about how many mikes there was? There is no indications anywhere that I remember, that there was an >>intercom<< -which would have necessitated several mikes... But there is a good reason to carry a spare mike, as it is not unusual for the mike cord to go bad, or the carbon capsule to go weak. FWIW Christian D ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:14:18 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: Back to the microphone issue Those who have used carbon microphones on vintage radio equipment may still be puzzled how the microphone in the cabin of AE's plane was able to pick up ambient sounds so well. For example, how do you cry into a carbon communications microphone, unless you are really trying? How are sounds of "wrasslin'" and "lashing out" and shouting, and yes, conversation (per Betty interview tape) - EVEN IF they both have their own microphones to broadcast into? How much wrasslin' and lashing out can you do, with a non-coil cord microphone? I don't know. Okay, for non-vintage-microphone people, we are not dealing with a telephone microphone here. Communications designers do not consider it a side-benefit if an industrial grade, comm microphone picks up engine sounds, track sounds, wind, crowds, gunfire, room noise, background conversations, etc. Think about using a walkie-talkie. That's why these are known as "close-talking" microphones. Did AE have her mic sensitivity turned up? Itasca reported her signal as "R5", excellent, but did not report any engine noise. Nor apparently did previous ground stations, for example Lae, when testing in the days before. So why this apparent change in microphone specifications? This aircraft microphone had a sensitivity internal adjustment ( required soldering to change it the setting ). Was it set to "high sensitivity"? "For use in quiet locations (ground stations, boats, etc.) the large section can be short-circuited to increase sensitivity if desired". [ Aeronautic Radio, Myron Eddy, 1939 ] That still doesn't mean you get broadcast studio action, you just don't have to raise your voice as much. "Then he started wantin' to get on the radio" [ How'd Betty know? ] "Like she thought she heard somebody....said here put your ear to it" "Like neighbors fighting" "She finally got back on the radio" [ after cabin noises had been continually broadcast? ] "Where are you going" [ why broadcast this? ] "Are you so scared?" [ AE was so overwrought she held the microphone button down even while asking these questions? ] and there's more. These quotes are from Betty, in the interview tape. I do think we still need to work out an explanation of how and why such seemingly odd material came to be broadcast. Remember, in your damaged microphone scenarios, that a hard landing that bad would most likely have damaged the glass radio amplifier tubes. If there are gaps in the heard reception, are these all due to propagation, or AE pressing the button inadvertently? Why all this button pressing? -Hue Miller ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:16:49 EST From: Benjamin Allen Subject: Open Conjecture Dennis writes > If he is aware of TIGHARS work then he would also be aware of what we > know and don't know. I have been aware of a group searching the Phoenix Islands for Amelia Earhart since the time I was in fourth grade. I knew the founder of the group was one, Richard Gillespie. However, until recently, I did not know the name of the organization, or what they may or may not have found. I always figured when they found NR16020, CNN would kindly inform me. My point is this: Let us assume that a year ago, I was on an Island in the south Pacific. I notice what appears to be an aircraft part. I would have tracked down this man called Gillespie and informed him of what I had seen. I would have found him, and told him, without knowing the name of his organization, or any progress they may have made. Breaking News States : >TIGHAR has learned that last year a marine biologist... >assuming we had already seen it... Just how, I wonder, did TIGHAR come to "learn" this information? Said MB was operating under the assumption, that "we had already seen it". Surely, that can only mean, YOU CANNOT MISS IT. Was he traveling with someone who attempted to change his assumption? Was the evidence he saw, so compelling, he became later convinced we could not possibly have seen it yet? I suspect, our mysterious Marine Biologist told TIGHAR himself what he saw. b. A. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 12:18:10 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: LOP/Navigation thread Without pointing fingers and in spite of the Electra's poor outcome, I think AE was fortunate NOT to have some of our posters as her navigator. I spent more than twenty years with this in SAC, TAC, USAFE, and PACAF and the subject comes easy to me but it is not a simple process and I can see why few seem to not ever understand the concepts. Part of the problem, of course, is the difficulty of communicating through emails and part is an inability to get past a preconceived idea or agenda. If anyone is interested in clearing up some of these thoughts you may email me at acaldwell@aol.com rather than to continue to bore and befuddle our compatriots. This offer is for those who have misunderstandings not for those who want to argue theories. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 13:21:14 EST From: Hue Miller Subject: Re: "Yoop" > >From Ric > >Maybe...but it's of particular interest right now as we're looking more > >closely than ever before at the post-loss receptions. > > I have asked Mike this question before, maybe he has had more time to think > about. > > The "281 message" has a statement from the operators who heard it, "KEYED > TRANSMISSION EXTREMELY POOR KEYING BEHIND THE CARRIER" > > The question that I had and still have is how the operators could have made > that statement? The dot and dash pulse lengths should aspire to the accepted ratio of one to the other. Then there is the spacing between groups of dots/dashes forming individual characters, this should show a definite separation, with its own lenth, and so on. SO the extremely poor keying can come from operator sloppiness, or a makeshiftt telegraph key that's hard to use. (Yes, this would include a microphone push to talk button.) >How could they give their opinion regarding the operation of > the key compared to the carrier wave being generated? I agree with Mike, i think we trod these sands one time. But with no conclusions, it doesn't hurt to try again... When i first read this, i thought, "A2 mode???" ( Pure telegraphy (CW) just turns the bare carrier wave on/off. No audio, no nuthin' else, and in your ordinary radio you just hear SOS like SH' SH' SH' SHHHHH SHHHH SHHHH SH' SH' SH', no tone.) A2 is the old military term for "tone telegraphy". The carrier is switched on and stays on. Then an audio tone is added and this tone is keyed. This would be just like whistling SOS in your microphone while holding down the TALK button. In fact, if you could whistle a perfectly steady tone, there would be no difference between "real" tone telegraphy and your whistle message. I think Mike also mentioned tone telegraphy in those posts a while back, in this connection, because of the cryptic "Behind the carrier" remark. > Would you expect to hear this "yoop" from a hoaxer using a commercial power > source that was NOT dependant on a dynamotor for power? If a hoaxer was using a non-crystal controlled transmitter, it could sound worse than the dynamotor & relay keyed AE transmitter. [There used to be some networks in the Pacific area til the mid-1980s, with Morse keying so bad it was laffable. Rumor had it that these were Chinese fishing boats, using surplus BC-375 US military aircraft transmitters. Don't laff - after WW2 even some US companies modified aircraft gear for fishing fleets. While the Chinese used them as is, the US companies were forced by FCC rules to modify them for crystal control.] Only reservations i have about keying by the microphone button, is i wonder how long the transmitter fuse would hold up under that kind of surging amperes abuse. BTW, i would be quite surprised if the Lockheed, which i believe was a single- control plane, had two microphones up front. Carbon-type microphones are vulnerable to carbon "packing" from heat and moisture, you might think they would keep one packed up as spare. In addition there was no electrical intercom. Hue Miller ************************************************************************* From Ric The Model 10 definitely featured "dual-controls" - that is, there were duplicate flight controls and instruments for pilot and copilot. In fact, photos of the cockpit of NR16020 show that the radio controls were on the copilot's side ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 13:34:04 EST From: Ric Gillespie Subject: Background noise Hue wrote: >Itasca reported her signal as >"R5", excellent, but did not report any engine noise. Only once, during the final 08:43 reception, did the Itasca radio operator make a notation in the log about the strength of the signal received. All of the other information about the strength of previous signals comes from later recollections. The 08:34 transmission was logged as S5 (maximum strength). No description of its "readability" (R) was offered. >Nor apparently did >previous ground stations, for example Lae, when testing in the days before. >So why this apparent change in microphone specifications? Not true. When Nauru reported hearing post-loss transmissions later that night they described the voice as similar to that heard from the plane in flight the night before but "without the hum of the plane in the background." LTM, Ric ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 13:44:50 EST From: Eric Subject: Re: Zenith Stratosphere 1000Z ORZ at the Old Radio Zone web site e-mailed me one additional comment about the possibility of Betty's family owning a Zenith Stratosphere 1000Z: "There is NO way a working class family has a Zenith Stratosphere model 1000Z in 1937. I think we can rule that out now." ORZ www.oldradiozone.com However, there are still three other possible Zenith radios which might be the one in question: Zenith Stratosphere 16-A-61: sold for $375.00 Zenith Stratosphere 16-A-63: sold for $295.00 Zenith 12-U-159: sold for $175.00 (this was the model for those who couldn't afford a Stratosphere but who still wanted a "top of the line" radio. I have one of these and it is really a nice set. The big black round dial is about the same size as the 1000Z's.) All three of these radios can be viewed at www.oldradiozone.com. The two Strats in particular might well have been able to pick up a weak distress call, particularly if they were connected to a good outdoor antenna, which Betty's father apparently had. LTM (who only listened to a Philco "Cathedral" model radio) Eric, NAS NORTH ISLAND, San Diego, CA. *************************************************************************** From Ric Let's remember that Betty has never claimed that her family's radio was a Strat 1000Z. She says only that it was a very nice Zenith with a black dial and "cave"- like cabinet such as the ones shown on the website mentioned above. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 11:20:32 EST From: Marty Moleski Subject: Re: refraction variability Alan Caldwell wrote: > Marty wrote >> These lines that we're talking about are slanting lines >> running NNE (357) and SSE (157). > > Good concise explanation, Marty, and I know you meant 337 degrees. DOH! Right. Typos happen. :o( > You > might also reiterate what I posted earlier that Noonan did not have very > much time to do that between sunrise and when he was to his turning > point. Even less if he waited to get a more accurate reading when the sun > was higher in the sky. I'm not too clear on when AE & FN may have hit the terminator marking the end of night and the beginning of day. That would be their "dawn" in the airplane. I found some data for Niku that day (see below). I set the time for GMT (Zulu, UT, UTC) because AE & FN took off at 0000 hours GMT. The last transmission from them was heard at 0843 LOCAL TIME on Howland (-11.5 GMT), so that would make the time of the last radio reception 1913 GMT. "Dawn" in the plane as it flew west of Howland and Niku would be later than on the two islands, but then again, if AE and FN were at 8,000 to 10,000 feet, they would see the sun before the terminator was directly underneath them, so ... nice round numbers ... Fred might have had something like 90 minutes from observing the sun until having to make the turn to 337 or 157 to search for Howland along the line. U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department Sun and Moon Data for One Day The following information is provided for Nikumaroro (longitude W174.0, latitude S4.0): Saturday 3 July 1937 Universal Time SUN Begin civil twilight 17:21 Sunrise 17:44 Sun transit 23:41 Sunset 05:37 on following day End civil twilight 06:00 on following day MOON Moonrise 12:18 on preceding day Moonset 00:35 Moonrise 13:13 Moon transit 19:22 Moonset 01:30 on following day Marty #2359 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 11:20:46 EST From: Angus Murray Subject: Re: Clips Before Ric first sent the clips to me, he commented that they looked homemade and from the pics on the website I was not immediately convinced. When I was able to examine them it rapidly became apparent that there was no doubt that they were homemade and were very low tech. The underside flats had been roughly filed with a fine file, the aluminium quality varied between the two, the pitch of the teeth varied on each clip and was different between the two and the holes for the screws had been drilled undersize and the screw forced through. The oval clip was assymmetric in ovality and appeared to have been made from bent, straightened and then filed aluminium. The edges did not exhibit the typical shear striations and upper-rounded / lower-sharp edges of punched out sheet metal but showed signs of filing. There is simply no doubt that they were not manufactured items. They had been hand made with some degree of care but probably with limited tools and material. The wood screws are of American origin. If the clips were made by islanders for what purpose were the clips made? They would have probably have been made post Loran in order to source American woodscrews as the colony was British. The Coasties, according to evidence collected by Ric, had little patience for making anything. If the clips were hand made for a sextant box by Pan Am's workshops one would expect uniform aluminium sheet, not straightened and filed scrap and the holes would likely be the right size for the screws. However, if they were made by Fred Noonan to modify a Pan Am box to suit his own sextant, they might well have been made from whatever scrap he could find. The Pensacola sextant box once owned by Noonan does show evidence of previous crude modification by chiselling away the wood to suit a different sextant or instrument and is probably a Pan Am box rather than a Ludolph one. I am fairly confident that these artefacts were indeed securing clips of some sort and if I had to hazard a guess as to their use, I could not think of anything more likely than the above explanation. My guess is that the two numbers were Pan Am inventory numbers. Regards Angus. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 11:22:08 EST From: Tom King Subject: Re: Clips and village archeology For Christian -- Re. structure with aluminum cut off it -- Sure, that's a possibility; we just haven't seen it. A very likely place for such a thing, if our hypothesis about the landing site and our flow models are correct, is the area we plan to search in 2004, along the ocean side adjacent to the village. Such a structure could be buried in the sand overwash there. Re. what would interest academic archeologists: There's a "school" of archeological practice called "household archaeology," that tries to learn things about social structure from the organizations of households. They're always interested in sites with good documentation about household organization, population size and structure, and so on, that can be studied to try to derive generalizations that can be applied to prehistoric sites where the same kind of documentary data don't exist. A site like the village, with tons of demographic and historical data and very well-preserved house sites, would be an ideal place to do household arch. studies. LTM (whose household was far too clean to interest an archeologist) Tom ================ Thomas F. King, PhD Consultation, Training, Dispute Resolution in Cultural Resource Management PO Box 14515 Silver Spring MD 20911 tfking106@aol.com For a chance to help in the archeological search for Amelia Earhart, and to win a prize, go to www.tighar.org and click on "breaking news". ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 11:29:08 EST From: Pete Gray Subject: Re: Zenith Stratosphere 1000Z Hello Ric! Forgive me, but was it not our own Forum that decided that Betty's radio was a Stratosphere? I recall searching for a Sears Silvertone for quite awhile before her recollections lead us to the Strat by appearance. As for not affording the Strat, did not Betty's father work for the Power Company, and thus was able to afford top of the line? Love to Mother Pete Gray #2419 *************************************************************************** From Ric We decided that the Betty must have had one of the Zenith Stratosphere models because she remembered that it was a Zenith, had the black Zenith dial and that the cabinet design had a "cave" in the front. We did not, as I recall, conclude that it was necessarily the top-of-the-line Strat 1000Z. I don't know how we'd be able to be that specific. Yes, Betty's father got a break on the price because he worked for the power company. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 11:33:40 EST From: JDubb Subject: Re: Open Conjecture Are we taking bets yet on who the biologist was who found the mysterious object? If so my money is on someone who was in the Phoenix Rising 2002 Primal Ocean Project. Jdubb ************************************************************************* From Ric We can do raffles but parimutuel wagering is beyond our scope. By the way, it won't do you any good to figure who the marine biologist was because he ain't talking. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 11:49:55 EST From: Dave Porter Subject: breaking news speculation My guess, based on the information that (1)the item was found by a marine biologist, and (2)the folks you plan to send are all divers, is that the item is underwater, and in an area that hasn't been searched by TIGHAR previously. BTW, there was some discussion after the last expedition regarding the bright red algae (or was it coral) that comprised the anomalous pixels in the satellite image. Was there ever a satisfactory answer as to whether or not the "red spot" might have gotten that way by growing atop some rusting metal? If not, maybe you could get a knowledgable answer from the friendly marine biologist fellow. LTM, who fondly remembers the "Seinfeld" episode where George claimed to be a Marine Biologist. Dave Porter, 2288 PS: I wrote this posting single spaced, double spacing between paragraphs, in my email program (hotmail) which seems to allow about 70 characters per line. I receive the forum digest, and the only problems I've ever had are lines of more than 70 characters being made into two lines, and some posts being filled with numerical gibberish. (and I'm NOT referring to the LOP and fuel consumption related posts ) I think that you got some from me that way once, and we figured out that "rich text" had been enabled in my program, and that deleting it solved the problem. Hope this helps *********************************************************************** From Ric We had divers down on the red algae and that's all it is - red algae. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 11:59:58 EST From: Rich Young Subject: radio, still... Randy Jacobson replied to me: >On the trip from Oakland to Honolulu, AE set up a radio procedure that she >would broadcast on 3105/6210 and listen to PAA station on 29XX kHz for >bearing information determined by them. Exactly! Transmitting and receiving on seperate frequencies HAS to be pre-arranged! WHen you are down on a reef, broadcasting a distress call to anyone available, it's not POSSIBLE to pre-arrange a multi-frequency net, At least until 2-way traffic was firmly established, any one who DID hear her would respond on the same frequency upon which the distress call was sent. Anything else would require the responding party to "read her mind" to determine the respone frequency: please note the conspicuous absence in Betty's notebook of any transmission similar to "...AM LISTENING ON 6210 CYLES" or "...REPLY ON 6210". LTM (who doesn't beleive in Mistress Cleo) Richard Young *************************************************************************** From Ric You're making the common mistake of assuming that things back then were the way things are now. Context, context, context.... Here's an explanation from one of our airline veterans who wrote to me privately on this subject: It was -Not -usual for pilots [airlines excepted] to use a single freq. for comm. The 'single channel' did not come about until well after the war. Many on the forum just do not understand the '30's use of aero radio; which was used only by the 'well to do private' [and airline] pilot. and differently than today. Her use of 3105 for both xmit & recv. was an anomaly related solely to the Itasca, for the specific flight. She had the world at her finger tips if she wanted to listen to other stations from 200kc to at least 10 mc but she would not hear anyone on 3105 except the Itasca. Pilots did not hear other pilots calls to the ground because they had only LF recvrs. For 1937 AE was in rare company with an 'all-band' recvr. Almost assuredly AE used 3105 xmit & 200-400 to recv. while in the US at least. Although she expected to hear the Itasca on 3105, that would have been her only listening on 3105 because it was an air to ground freq. and not the reverse. All during the period thru WW-II, light signals were used for T.O. , landing, and taxiing at airports, and I suspect that AE did the same especially when her recvr. was inop. Red-Green lights .. and the cost was the reason a radio xmtr. did not become mandatory until years afterward. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 12:03:12 EST From: Mike Haddock Subject: Re: Zenith Stratosphere 1000Z Yesterday I was discussing my interest in AE with a new employee and she told me that she has an autographed book by AE "The Fun of It". She brought it in and it's in great condition. Inside the back cover is a small record titled "Amelia Earhart's International Broadcast" in London, May 22, 1932 as picked up in New York by Silvertone. I have to confess when I saw AE's autograph I was very touched--oh well. My friend is interested in donating the book to a worthy organization or foundation. Any suggestions? LTM (who is easily excited) Mike Haddock #2438 ************************************************************************** From Ric We have a copy of "The Fun Of It" with the little record in the back, but it's not autographed. That would be nice to have. If she wanted, we'd be happy to do a swap so that she'd still have a copy of the book. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:33:48 EST From: Tom King Subject: Re: Clips and village archeology For Ed Hamilton Thanks for reminding me about the sea lions. I actually tried to look into it, but got nowhere; people kept telling me I'd never teach them to use trowels. ================ Thomas F. King, PhD Consultation, Training, Dispute Resolution in Cultural Resource Management PO Box 14515 Silver Spring MD 20911 tfking106@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:36:19 EST From: Edgard Engelman Subject: Re: W4OK whiskey-four-oscar-kilo : if it is the HAM call-sign. In 1937 HAM call-signs had only 1 number (4 in this case). So the O is Oscar not Zero There has been a very complete explanation by Mike Everett a few days ago about this. Edgard ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:36:57 EST From: Ross Devitt Subject: Re: Breaking news > Niku is so far off the beaten path that, with the exception of about 20 > years, it is essentially untouched by man. Of course, we're all hoping it was essentially touched by a certain woman..... Th' WOMBAT ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:38:14 EST From: Alan Caldwell Subject: Re: Zenith Stratosphere 1000Z Eric writes > There is NO way a working class family has a Zenith Stratosphere model > 1000Z in 1937. I think we can rule that out now. My grandfather was a retired RR brakeman and there was no SS. He even bought a brand new Studebaker sedan in the late 30s - early 40s. Your source is not credible. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:38:39 EST From: Tom Riggs Subject: Re: The Wyoming reception Ron Bright wrote: >The Wyoming fellow (Randolf) heard on Sunday, 4 July at 8:am, Rock Springs, >Wyoming Time (MST) a faint voice saying "Amelia Earhart calling...ship on >reef south of equator. I think it was discussed on the Forum before that the word "ship" may not have been in reference to the Electra, but could possibly have been AE's attempt to draw attention to the Norwich City? Tom Riggs #2427 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:40:21 EST From: Tom Riggs Subject: Purdue University Collection FYI....The entire collection of Amelia Earhart archival material donated to Purdue University (by the Putnam family?) is now available on-line at: http://gemini.lib.purdue.edu/Earhart/EarhartDisplay I entered a keyword search for the word "cockpit" which resulted in lots of photos of the Electra showing engine cowlings, radios, etc. Here is the link to the photos: http://gemini.lib.purdue.edu/Earhart/EarhartDisplay/search.cfm?criteria=cockpit&type=search&kind=full Click on any thumbnail image and it will put the image into an editor that allows you to zoom-in on anything in the picture. For example, you can zoom in on a particular instrument in the Electra's instrument panel. Tom Riggs #2427 *********************************** This is indeed a fine collection, and well worth browsing. Thanks for reminding everyone, Tom. Pat ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:41:06 EST From: Tom Riggs Subject: More From Purdue Collection You would not believe the dozens and dozens of high-quality photos of AE, FN, and the Electra stored in the Purdue collection!!! A small portion of these photos you have seen published many times, but the large majority I have never seen before. For example, a picture of the Lae to Howland navigation calculations signed by Clarence Williams. If you are an AE/FN buff, I guarantee you will not be disappointed viewing these photos. Sit back and enjoy. Here is the link: http://gemini.lib.purdue.edu/Earhart/EarhartDisplay/list.cfm?type=subject&Criteria=1937 Tom Riggs #2427 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:42:42 EST From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: OK so no stuck switch - then why...? Up through the '60s all towers in the US monitored just a few frequencies for aircraft that only had a few crystal controlled transmit frequencies. They also had low frequency channels that they monitored. If you ever used a six channel "Super Homer" vhf aircraft radio with 6 transmit channels and a tunable receiver you will know what I am talking about. gl Randy Jacobson wrote: > On the trip from Oakland to Honolulu, AE set up a radio procedure that she > would broadcast on 3105/6210 and listen to PAA station on 29XX kHz for > bearing information determined by them. My understanding is that this was > pretty much standard procedure: listen on a different frequency than > broadcasting. Not too many people had capabilities of crystal-controlled > 3105 and 6210 kHz transmitters. The receiver was broadband, and could be > tuned to any number of particular frequencies. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:43:53 EST From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: Refraction variability > I have now obtained the altitude correction tables found in the 1937 edition > of the Nautical Almanac. (The librarian at the US Naval Observatory was kind > enough to fax me these pages.) This gives proof as to why Noonan would not > use a "dawn sight." > It turns out that the 1937 Nautical Almanac only provided refraction > corrections for the sun down to a minimim sextant altitude (Hs) of 6 degrees > and 30 minutes (6.5 degrees.) The modern Nautical Almanac gives the > corections all the way down to zero. Because of this Noonan could not have > used sun sights at a lower altitude than 6.5 degrees since he couldn't look > up the necessary corection to use. This also rules out the "dawn sight" since > at dawn (sunrise) the sun is well below 6.5 degrees, in fact it is actually > more than 1.5 degrees below zero, ( minus 1 Degree and 37') when observed > from 10,000 feet which is 8 degrees lower than the corection table allows > for. > > The correction becomes very non-linear at low altitudes. Noonan's table gave a > correction of 7.4' for an Hs of 7.0 degrees and 7.9' at the minimum altitude > covered of 6.5 degrees which is rate of change of 1 minute per degree. A > linear extrapolation would give a correction of 14.4' at Hs of zero and 15.9' > for a sunrise Hs of about 1.5 Degrees below zero > > However, the modern Nautical Almanac continues down with 8.5' for 5 Degrees, > 11.8' for 4 D, 14.4' for 3 D, 18.3' for 2 D, 24.3' for 1 D and 34.5 ' for > zero degrees which is very non linear. The modern Air Almanac continues down > into negative territory with a correction of 50' for the sunrise altitude of > 1.5 Degrees below zero. If Noonan used the lowest availabe corection value > from his table of 7.9' for a sunrise sight his correction would be 42.1' in > error ( 50 - 7.9 = 42.1) which would result in an error of his position LOP > of 42.1 Nautical Miles (NM) since one minute of Hs equals one NM. Even if he > extrapolated to 15.9' he would still be in error by 34.1 NM. It does not seem likely that Noonan would use a sight that has an unknown error since his correction table did not cover such a low altitude sight, especially since his life depended upon it. The sun's altitude would be above the necessary 6.5 degrees after 1818 Z (0648 Itasca time) in the vicinity of Howland Island on July 2, 1937. This is approximately the same time that AE reported "100 miles out." This means that they had about 100 miles and between 40 and 45 minutes to take multiple shots of the sun to derive the most accurate interception of the 157-337 sun line LOP through Howland. There would be no reason to take a "dawn sight" with an unknown refraction correction and then advance it by dead reckoning (and introducing an additional approximately 15 NM error) to find Howland since much more reliable higher altitude sun sights would be available as the plane approached the 157/337 LOP. gl ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:45:46 EST From: Gary LaPook Subject: Re: refraction variability Angus Murray wrote: > By 19.12 GMT Z was already a degree different at 65.9 degrees at Howland. By > 20.12 Zn was 62.9 degrees. This does not seem a negligible change. Are you > suggesting by "refining his LOP position" that he would be redefining his > position as on some new LOP at a different angle later in the day? Or are you > saying that he could better define the position of the 157/337 line he was > running on (since arriving at the 157/337 line through Howland depended on > perfect dead reckoning from the last sight to choose the correct time to > turn)? Perhaps you can explain exactly how he would have done this? Well, yes, that is a negligible change for flying a landfall procedure. The landfall is plotted slightly differently than what is normally used to find a fix. The destination is used for the assumed position (AP) and the LOP is drawn through the AP on the azimuth of the LOP. You might plot several different LOPs on different azimuths corresponding to different arrival times. Then the sight is taken and compared to the precomputed altitude curve so that you know instantly the distance between your position and the LOP. You do NOT plot the LOP for where you actually are as that is not important because using the destination as the AP means that the difference between the precomputed altitude at the destination and the altitude measured with your sextant is the distance you are away perpendicularly from the LOP that runs through the destination. As the day goes on and the azimuth of the sun changes the LOP plotted through the destination will rotate as though on a pivot stuck on the destination. So a one degree change in the azimuth of the sun to 066 at 1846 Z (which lasted until 1923 Z including the time of the "must be on you" message) results in a 156-336 LOP and would result in only a one nautical mile (NM) error in you position only if you were at least 60 NM out from the destination on the LOP. ( The sin of one degree is approximately 1/60th. so a one degree change results in a one mile change for each 60 miles flown. It is actually one part in 57.3 but navigators use the approximation of one part in 60.) A one mile error falls well within the margin of error of the sextant shot. The azimuth of the sun stays at 066 until 1923 Z; 065 until 1945 Z; 064 until 2003 Z and was 063 at 2012 Z when they reported being on the LOP which result in only a 4 degree difference. So even at 2012 Z it would only produce a 4 NM error at 60 NM from Howland on the LOP and only 2 NM if 30 NM from the island. You would expect that this period would have allowed enough time for them to find Howland. Eventually the azimuth does change enough so that you have to plot the new azimuth and plan your heading to track that new course. At this point you recalculate your landfall again. By 2230 Z, a time when they could have been approaching Gardner, the azimuth would be 040 and so they would have had to compute a new landfall and plan on following a 130-310 LOP since the 157-337 LOP no longer existed. This is why they couldn't have just followed the 157-337 LOP to Gardner. You can check the textbooks at: http://www.geocities.com/fredienoonan/landfall.html for how this procedure is plotted and computed. Look particularly at Weems, page 396; TM 1-206, pages 110-112 and 174-175; and AFM 51-40, 1951 edition, pages 306, 309, and 311. gl ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:47:41 EST From: Bill Shea Subject: Re: refraction variability Marty wrote; > "Dawn" in the plane as it flew west of Howland and Niku would be later than > on the two islands, but then again, if AE and FN were at 8,000 to 10,000 > feet, they would see the sun before the terminator was directly underneath > them, so ... nice round numbers ... Fred might have had something like 90 > minutes from observing the sun until having to make the turn to 337 or 157 > to search for Howland along the line. Marty, how do you know that they wern't already somewhere on the 157/337 line when dawn broke over Howland? Cheers from Bill ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 6 Feb 2003 13:47:00 EST From: Eri