TIGHAR: Earhart Mystery could be zipped up

[Richard Woods]

...I still wish them well...
http://www.BrewsterCorsair.com

TIGHAR or NHC?

Whichever. I figure they both have about the same chance of finding her...

[Tailspin]

We had the author of "AE's Shoes", Thomas King, give us a power Point brief of TIGHAR's efforts on Nikumaroro (Garder Island) at Wings over the Rockies about a week ago. He is a PHD in Archaeology who has been on several of their trips. He presents a pretty good case, but I am still not convinced they were not spying and that the Japanese didn't pick them up. One of the alum strips they found definitely came from a Lockheed airplane, but the rivet pattern isn't consistant with the L 10-E.
Hope someday soon, someone will find a piece of the plane or engine that can be positively ID'd.
Regards,
Hugh

[T J Johansen]

Oh come on. We all know that the Electra is situated in the same hangar as the Chinese Stirling, and that Earhart herself made it big as a vaudeville artist in Guilin. Noonan did petty jobs, and later became a munk in a monestary near Wutong.

T J

[PinecastleAAF]

What I find amusing and why I don't give any credence to a zipper is that at least twice before they have announced to the national news media that
they have solved the mystery. First a shoe sole, then a piece of aluminum...or vice versa....and now a zipper. As if any of those pieces
by themselves OR together prove anything.

Sound investigation methods aside I think they have long ago shot their credibility on this one.

Besides, she is on the moon with the B-32. I thought everyone knew that.

[Django]

No, no, Captain Janeway found her in stasis on that planet in the Delta Quadrant. Duh.

[ZRX61]

It has always surprised me with this claim, that there is not anything more substantial of the aircraft found to support the claim, either in the way of corroded debris locatred in the sea, while aluminium may be well gone there should be remains of steel from engine cores / undercarriage/prop hubs etc or parts washed up into the beach, as the wreck broke up, and preserved from fully corroding?

Mark Pilkington

I'm not sure how a 1200(?)lb engine would be bouyant enough to surface on a beach if she went down someplace like the Marianas Trench?

[Tailspin]

FWIW,
TIGHAR claims they haven't found an engine because there was a shipwreck very close to where AE C/L the Lockheed on a reef. Tidal flow would have taken the plane off the reef down a shallow incline to a shelf about 30 meters deep (I think he said). They can't use metal detectors because of the scattered ship part nearby. They claim the shoe sole was from a shoe called a "Blucher" which they have a pic of AE wearing....but it was a very popular ladies shoe at the time. They found a wooden sextant case with a serial number that is very close to the one in the Pensacola NAM which is pretty well agreed to be one of Noonan's sextants. The zipper is actually just a zipper pull made by the Talon company. They have established that it did come from ladies slacks of that era. (Zippers weren't commonly used in men's clothing until near to WWII.) They do have a lot of circumstantial and factual evidence that is open to interpretation, but no "smoking gun". If you get a chance to hear one of the lectures, it is well worth your time. It is very interesting, but as I said previously, I'm not entirely convinced of their theory. Everyone has their own idea of what happened to them. I think one of the most interesting aspects is the complete screw up as to what radio equipment and frequencies AE had available after she took off from Lae. Evidently, the Itasca and AE were literally not on the same frequency. Anyway, it was an interesting lecture.
Regards,
Hugh

[PinecastleAAF]

They found a wooden sextant case with a serial number that is very close to the one in the Pensacola NAM which is pretty well agreed to be one of Noonan's sextants.

You have my attention now! Like to hear more about this.

[Tailspin]

PAAF,
All I can tell you is what the archaeologist, King, said. "The sextant box has two numbers on it 3500 (stenciled) and 1542-sextant being old fashioned and probably painted over with black enamel". He later stated that one of the numbers (I don't remember which) was quite close to numbers on a very similarly constructed sextant box in the museum at Pensacola. Most authorities agree that it once belonged to Fred Noonan.
H

[Russ Matthews]

They found a wooden sextant case with a serial number that is very close to the one in the Pensacola NAM which is pretty well agreed to be one of Noonan's sextants.

You have my attention now! Like to hear more about this.

Check out this link...

http://tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Bulletins/12_Sextantbox/12_Sextantbox.html

[PinecastleAAF]

Thanks for the link, I've been checking their website tonight. It is very interesting all the small items and information they have found.
I hope they can solve the mystery someday. There certainly seems to be a decent chance they were on the island. Hopefully some trace of the a/c will turn up that can be positively id'd.

[The Inspector]

Did Mr. Aiken say that TIGHAR had also found the missing Henry Ford crystal punchbowl too? HUZZAH!!! I also undrstand that they are trying to resserect EDSEL under the now available OLDSMOBILE banner name-do you suppose, that given enough time they could find out why my 401(k) is disappearing??

[Bill Greenwood]

Re the shoe sole they claim to have found. I recall it is about a size 8 whereas Amelia had small feet, about size 5 AS EVIDENCED by her shoes that are on display in the museum to her in her home town. I haven't seen these shoes, this was told me by longtime warbird member Jeff Ethel who also wrote a book about the mystery. One fascinating fact he found was the Japanese claimed to have searched their island areas for Amelia, and according to Jeff he found logs or records that a couple of ships the Japanese claim to have been searching never left Japanese home port.. A logical conclusion could be that the Japanese did not need to search it they had already captured her and Noonan. There is native testimony of this in Jeff's book, but he told me it is a strong theory, but her plane may also have just gone down at sea and not been captured at all. I think she might well be doing some recon also, if she was asked.In all the years Tighar has been around, I think their main output has been interesting theories, not airplanes found.

[JohnH]

I loved watching the lying body language of Gillespie on that Natl Geographic show about Earhart that has aired several times, (including just a couple of months ago), he swears on camera that there's "no question" about what happened to her while he closes his eyes and shakes his head. What a con artist fool he is and always has been.

John

[JohnH]

dup