PinecastleAAF wrote:
To my way of thinking it is incredibly simple. As has been mentioned the Pacific is large. NO TRACE of them has ever been found. Honestly there is a 99.9999% chance they crashed at sea and sank.
How many aircrews from the Pacific theatre in WW2 took off for an island destination (ferry flight) and never arrived? While I realize some were shot down since there was a war on I also believe most were lost to mechanical problems, navigation errors leading to fuel exhaustion and/or bad weather.
Again I refer to Occam's Razor. I have to go with the logical, high percentage choice. It is almost certainly correct.
Hi, new here, first post

Something I think about, as a comparison, is Flight 19, those five TBM Avengers that 'disappeared' off the coast of Florida in 1945.
We have a rough idea within where they 'went in' as in 150 miles -/+ 50 of Florida's coast, five planes, with radios and in contact with base. Of course there are theories ranging from poor navigation to unserviceable instruments to the senior officer of the flight being boneheaded he was right, we'll never know, the reason, probably.
That incident happened eight years closer to our time, nearer to mainland civilization, on a much more travelled ocean route, five 'targets' to locate, 14 bodies [iirc] etc yet not a trace has been found.
Compare that to the Earhart Electra, where -if they are honest- no one KNOWS where NR16020 is, cases have been made for a return path as far as ENB, as far south as Nikumaroro, and as far north as what 60 plus miles, triangulate that and you have a HUGE area of water, most of it deeper than where Fight 19 went in.
If we can't find five planes within 200 miles of Florida, in well travelled waters, in nearly 70 years, what are the chances of finding NR16020 in a bigger area and with 8 more years of deterioration?