{"id":2045,"date":"2017-07-11T06:00:12","date_gmt":"2017-07-11T11:00:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/doctoraviation.com\/?p=2045"},"modified":"2017-07-16T17:21:44","modified_gmt":"2017-07-16T22:21:44","slug":"amelia-earhart-lost-evidence-pilots-question","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/doctoraviation.com\/amelia-earhart-lost-evidence-pilots-question\/","title":{"rendered":"Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence – A Pilot’s Question"},"content":{"rendered":"

These are my thoughts, as a pilot, regarding the Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence documentary shown on the History Channel July 10, 2017.\u00a0 I shared my thoughts on the new photo in my previous blog:\u00a0 https:\/\/doctoraviation.com\/amelia-earhart-photo-a-critique\/<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

As a pilot I was most interested in how Earhart could possibly have gotten to the Marshall Islands, 800 miles from her intended destination.\u00a0 Earhart and Noonan\u2019s original landing site was intended to be Howland Island.\u00a0 The Marshall Islands lie to the west and north of Howland Island.\u00a0 As documented in the film, the Marshall Islands were under Imperial Japanese control at the time.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

Howland Island on a clear day<\/p>\n

The documentary gave scant attention to the specifics of Earhart\u2019s final flight.\u00a0 As I thoroughly cover in Session 4 of Doctor Aviation, this leg was the longest (by far) of any of the flights to this point in her round the world venture.\u00a0 It was planned to be 2,556 miles.\u00a0 The United States had a Coast Guard Cutter, the Itasca<\/em>, in place at Howland Island in the midst of the Depression to assist in her arrival.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

The Itasca<\/em><\/p>\n

As the navigator, Noonan would rely on dead reckoning and celestial navigation to guide the Electra from Lae, Papua New Guinea (the point of takeoff) to Howland Island.\u00a0 The last known island landmark to check his navigational accuracy were the Nukumanu Islands about 800 miles into the flight.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

Scattered clouds and shadows dominated the morning she was to arrive at Howland.\u00a0 Earhart and Noonan were having difficulty finding their destination.\u00a0 The Itasca<\/em> began to emit black smoke in order to try to provide a visual location.\u00a0 They also transmitted frequently over the radio in an effort to guide the wayward craft.\u00a0 Some errors by Earhart hampered radio communications.\u00a0 For example, Earhart\u2019s radio receiver and antenna were on different wavelengths and there is visual evidence from earlier in the around the world venture that Earhart had trimmed her long wire antennae (presumably to cut weight).<\/p>\n

At 7:42\u00a0am Earhart radioed “We must be on you, but cannot see you\u2014but gas is running low. Have been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying at 1,000 feet.”\u00a0\u00a0 In her last known transmission at 8:43\u00a0am Earhart broadcast “We are on the line 157 337. We will repeat this message. We will repeat this on 6210 kilocycles. Wait.” However, a few moments later she was back on the same frequency (3105\u00a0kHz) with a transmission which was logged as a “questionable”: “We are running on line north and south.”<\/p>\n

What happened next was the most helpful hypothesis offered by the documentary.\u00a0 Colonel Dan Hampton, a former Air Force fighter pilot, proposed the following theory.\u00a0 He asserted that Amelia Earhart had a backup plan should she not be able to find Howland Island.\u00a0 The backup plan was to fly west (heading 270) to the Gilbert Islands, a long string of islands she said she could not miss.\u00a0 This is the first time I have heard of this back up plan.<\/p>\n

However, more importantly, winds on that day were forecasted to be light and from the northeast.\u00a0 Colonel states that instead they were actually from the southeast blowing at 23 knots (25 mph) that strength of wind will cause an aircraft to drift off course, if not accounted for.\u00a0 Over several hours, if the Electra did not correct for drift, they would have been blown west and north of Howland Island by a considerable distance.\u00a0 If they then turned west (heading 270) they would have been heading for the Marshall Islands, which lie north of the Gilbert Islands (their purported back up location).<\/p>\n

Hampton\u2019s statement of the cloud cover was also different that I had researched in the past.\u00a0 However, with cloud cover and no visible landmarks it is plausible that the Electra was north and west of Howland Island and did not know it.\u00a0 If they headed west and came upon the Marshall Islands (a series of atolls), this would provide a decent emergency landing option. Mili Atoll, shown on the documentary and stated by two eye witnesses to be the scene of the emergency landing would have provided a beach landing strip consistent with those found in a jungle environment.\u00a0 I highlight such a beach in Session 8 of Doctor Aviation, when I chronicle Nate Saint\u2019s landing on Palm Beach in Ecuador.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

My biggest question as a pilot, \u201cIf Earhart was really running low on fuel near Howland Island, how did she make it 800 miles to Mili Atoll in the Marshall Islands\u201d?\u00a0 I have read the same question from others, to include a man who has flown Lockheed Electra\u2019s.\u00a0 The documentary provided at least a plausible explanation.<\/p>\n

In flying there is a concept known as \u201cBingo Fuel\u201d.\u00a0 This is a fuel level which causes the pilot to make a decision.\u00a0 For example, when doing work on a flying range, when the fuel level hits \u201cBingo\u201d (let\u2019s say that is 800 lbs of fuel) the pilot knows that it is time to return to base so that they return with ample fuel to land safely.\u00a0 Hampton proposed that when Earhart stated she was low on fuel, she was referring to a bingo fuel.\u00a0 The amount of fuel remaining that would require her to either land at Howland Island, if it could be found, or else head to the Gilbert Islands. \u00a0Hampton shows some fuel calculations indicating that Earhart could have made it to the Marshall Islands.\u00a0 I have not checked the accuracy of those calculations.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

My Final Thoughts (for now).\u00a0\u00a0 I have long held that the most plausible explanation for the Earhart \/ Noonan disappearance was the crash and sink theory.\u00a0 That she ran out of fuel crashed into the ocean and sank.\u00a0 I had at least allowed for the possibility that she may have crash landed at Gardner (now Nikumaroro) Island, but this seemed less likely.\u00a0 At this point, I would add that the Marshall Island crash and capture by the Japanese is a valid hypothesis.\u00a0 It also holds much more credibility than that Gardner Island hypothesis.<\/p>\n

To view clips of the documentary, see: http:\/\/www.history.com\/specials\/amelia-earhart-the-lost-evidence<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

These are my thoughts, as a pilot, regarding the Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence documentary shown on the History Channel July 10, 2017.\u00a0 I shared my thoughts on the new photo in my previous blog:\u00a0 https:\/\/doctoraviation.com\/amelia-earhart-photo-a-critique\/ As a pilot I was most interested in how Earhart could possibly have gotten to the Marshall Islands, 800 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":338,"featured_media":2043,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[24],"tags":[339,342,343,329,333,341],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAmelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence - A Pilot's Question - Doctor Aviation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"These are my thoughts, as a pilot, regarding the Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence documentary shown on the History Channel July 10, 2017. 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