Earhart In The News

[JohnB]

Marine Air...
I think you are being a bit too harsh about Mantz.
He was the celebrity "go to" pilot of the day, so it is easy to see how he got involved (or dragged into) the flight.
He had confidence in her abilities, though they were probably shaken after the Hawaii incident. He had his own successful operation and he wasn't in it for notoriety or money. He certainly wasn't a rockstar-like "hanger on" helping his boss to an untimely end.

Mantz was certainly her senior in age, experience and reputation, I have never read anything where he (or her other aviation friends) felt she wasn't qualified for the flight.
She was no Lindbergh or Doolittle, but then, few pilots are.

After all, she had a state of the art aircraft and a experienced navigator (remember most, if not all, early Pan Am and Navy navigators started their careers in ships) so "what could go wrong"?

Scott Thompson is our resident Mantz expert, perhaps he can give us insight on the topic.

As for this new image...
It looks to be in one piece, so probably not a stall-spin.

Anyone know how well Lockheeds did in water landings?
Any histories of civil 10-12-14-18 ditchings?
How about military Hudsons or PVs?
Certainly some of them ended up in the water.

[warbirdfinder]

From Wikipedia:
Following a distinguished 22-year career at sea, which included sailing around Cape Horn seven times (three times under sail),[4] Noonan contemplated a new career direction. After learning to fly in the late 1920s,[4] he received a "limited commercial pilot's license" in 1930, on which he listed his occupation as "aviator." In the following year, he was awarded marine license #121190, "Class Master, any ocean,"[3] the qualifications of a merchant ship's captain.[5] During the early 1930s, he worked for Pan American World Airways as a navigation instructor in Miami and an airport manager in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, eventually assuming the duties of inspector for all of the company's airports.

In March 1935, Noonan was the navigator on the first Pan Am Sikorsky S-42 clipper at San Francisco Bay. In April he navigated the historic round-trip China Clipper flight between San Francisco and Honolulu, piloted by Ed Musick (who was featured on the cover of Time magazine that year). Noonan was subsequently responsible for mapping Pan Am's clipper routes across the Pacific Ocean, participating in many flights to Midway Island, Wake Island, Guam, the Philippines, and Hong Kong. In addition to more modern navigational tools, Noonan as a licensed sea captain was known for carrying a ship's sextant on these flights.[citation needed]

1937 was a year of transition for Fred Noonan, whose reputation as an expert navigator, along with his role in the development of commercial airline navigation, had already earned him a place in aviation history.

[Dan Jones]

I have to read it again but in Mantz’s biography (I think that’s where I read it) it says that he had a hard time checking her out in the Lockheed because she kept trying to manage it’s swings on takeoff with power, not rudder. I got the impression that she thought more of her abilities than he did, but I’m sure he did his best to prepare her. Maybe after wrecking it on takeoff in Hawaii she decided to listen to him.

I watched a video last night (https://youtu.be/UyfTi2-VQDY?si=KLlP8WVDdzYyK0eY) interviewing Ballard and there’s some video (at about 6:44) of an Electra taking off. I had to watch it a couple of times because the Electra breaks ground, the gear begins to retract, the airplane settles back towards the runway, starts climbing again, and the gear completes it’s retraction. It didn’t give me much confidence in whoever was driving, but I assume it’s footage of her.

The Pacific is VAST. I ferried a C-130 from California to Australia two months ago and it took three days (and at 300 knots). The prospect of doing the same thing with a Lockheed 10 would be somewhere between terrifying and a bad idea… By reputation though, Noonan was the guy to do it, but whatever he was being paid wasn’t enough.

I think they might have found it. Supposedly this target is pretty much on course and about a hundred miles short of Howland. I suspect they might have ended up in the water early due to fuel starvation (as opposed to fuel exhaustion) and were probably too low to get it sorted out before they got wet. She was broadcasting that their eta was up and that “we should be on you but cannot see you” and the radio operator on the Itasca said she was LOUD and clear, so we know they were close. If it is the Electra it’ll be interesting to calculate the error and compare that to how accurate he could have been given his technology. How Noonan was figuring his ground speed I haven’t a clue but 100 miles doesn’t seem like much of a 1937 error after crossing that much water.

[p51buff]

[quote=marineair]
Fred Noonan was a WW I ship navigator and had survived ships being torpedoed and sunk during the war. Was he the best choice for this aeronautical stunt?
[/quote]

Yes. (Although I wasn't there. )

There's been a lot of trash talk like this about Noonan over the years, people forget/don't know that Fred Noonan was a Navigation Instructor for Pan Am, among other career highlights he was the Nav for Captain Edwin Musick on the inaugural SFO-HNL-SFO China Clipper flight. Captain Musick did not suffer fools or allow anyone who was not the very best to fly for him.

Attachments

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[marine air]

Interesting clip of the Lockheed 10 and possibly Earhart flying it. To me it looks like she took off and immediately reached for the gear handle and pulled it up. About that time she said "Shucks. I forgot to reset the trim from the last landing." The trim wheel is typically much farther aft on landing than for takeoff in most airplanes. So, she shoves the yoke forward and probably also trimming the airplane. Darn near makes contact with the ground.
I like the posted theory that they were on course and simply exhausted their fuel. This would exonerate Noonan as he had them on course and possibly exonerate Earhart as she was doing her job up until that point.
Lots of possible theories; winds were different than forecast, carburetors out of tune and burning richly, aircraft didn't get a good "top off", fuel wasn't the proper grade of avgas, engines were running hot so she couldn't lean properly or she forgot to lean properly. The video, if that's here, suggest "improper use of checklist" .
Many years ago three of us flew a PBY Super Catalina (the late Charlie Clements) from Miami to north of Jacksonville, Florida sometimes as low as 100' ASL. Never had any radio problems whatsoever but we did have magnetic anomalies while in the proximity of a storm. I guess we can chalk it up to the Bermuda Triangle. Did Earhart's route have any weather or magnetic anomalies?"
Last , more recently a couple of times I have flown a Lake LA-4 seaplane from south Florida up the entire coast of western Florida. There is an area north of Crystal River where the aircraft loses communications below 2,000' ASL. I found this out by going down on the deck off shore and the radios went quiet. I picked up comms. again at 2,000'. We couldn't hear anything but they (JAX Center) could hear us and had tried to give us a freq change while on VFR flight following) . With Earhart there were a few ships trying to communicate with her and she couldn't seem to hear anything. Would this be an antenna failure on the aircraft or she was not on course but several degrees and miles left or right of course? Because no one along the route had luck communicating with her. Does the weak scratchiness of her transmissions support that theory?

[ffuries]

Guess Rick/TIGHAR added their two cents to this story.

"Another claim, supported by a 2018 forensic analysis of bones found on the remote Pacific island of Nikumaroro, suggests Earhart could have died there.

The bones were discovered in 1940 and initially thought to be male. But a reinspection six years ago pointed to their measurements being female and similar to Earhart’s body shape.

The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery has previously suggested Earhart died of starvation as a castaway on Nikumaroro, which lies to the east of the sonar image.

The US-based group has raised doubts about Mr Romeo’s supposed discovery."

"For the wings of an Electra to fold rearward as shown in the sonar image, the entire centre section would have to fail at the wing/fuselage junctions,” it said. “That’s just not possible.”

https://news.yahoo.com/amelia-earhart-p ... 51803.html

[JohnB]

As related in countless previous posts here and just about everywhere else, many feel TIGHAR group lacks credibility.

Here is a commentary by a former group member (who donated $50,000+).
https://myplace.frontier.com/~monty.fow ... alysis.htm

After years of claiming a piece of aluminum found on the island was from the Lockheed, despite markings on the back that suggesting WWII era manufacturing, the group finally admitted the piece was from a C-47, as critics suggested all along.

The bones found on the island were found, lost and found again....to cut a long story short, recent DNA tests did not match AE.

For years the group tried to tie everything on the island to AE....bones, feces, part of a shoe, a "freckle cream" jar.

What was rarely mentioned was the island was occupied by almost 60 civillians by 1938-39 and in WWII by the USCG and after the war by a group of civilians.
So it was hardly a pristine area where any objects found had to have come from AE.

After years of searching and despite claims they had solved the mystery, the group never proved she was there.

Conjecture, sure, but no hard evidence that would hold up in court.

The wiki article on the island quotes the NASM which says the same thing.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikumaroro

So, does it come as a surprise that the group is disdainful of other group's efforts?

Last edited by JohnB on Tue Jan 30, 2024 11:42 pm, edited 5 times in total.

[Dan Jones]

Interesting clip of the Lockheed 10 and possibly Earhart flying it. To me it looks like she took off and immediately reached for the gear handle and pulled it up. About that time she said "Shucks. I forgot to reset the trim from the last landing." The trim wheel is typically much farther aft on landing than for takeoff in most airplanes. So, she shoves the yoke forward and probably also trimming the airplane. Darn near makes contact with the ground.
I like the posted theory that they were on course and simply exhausted their fuel. This would exonerate Noonan as he had them on course and possibly exonerate Earhart as she was doing her job up until that point.
Lots of possible theories; winds were different than forecast, carburetors out of tune and burning richly, aircraft didn't get a good "top off", fuel wasn't the proper grade of avgas, engines were running hot so she couldn't lean properly or she forgot to lean properly. The video, if that's here, suggest "improper use of checklist" .
Many years ago three of us flew a PBY Super Catalina (the late Charlie Clements) from Miami to north of Jacksonville, Florida sometimes as low as 100' ASL. Never had any radio problems whatsoever but we did have magnetic anomalies while in the proximity of a storm. I guess we can chalk it up to the Bermuda Triangle. Did Earhart's route have any weather or magnetic anomalies?"
Last , more recently a couple of times I have flown a Lake LA-4 seaplane from south Florida up the entire coast of western Florida. There is an area north of Crystal River where the aircraft loses communications below 2,000' ASL. I found this out by going down on the deck off shore and the radios went quiet. I picked up comms. again at 2,000'. We couldn't hear anything but they (JAX Center) could hear us and had tried to give us a freq change while on VFR flight following) . With Earhart there were a few ships trying to communicate with her and she couldn't seem to hear anything. Would this be an antenna failure on the aircraft or she was not on course but several degrees and miles left or right of course? Because no one along the route had luck communicating with her. Does the weak scratchiness of her transmissions support that theory?

My understanding is that she really didn’t understand the radios in the airplane very well and in an effort to lighten the aircraft in Lae she removed her receiver. Remember, in those days they had individual receivers and transmitters, not transceivers like we have now. Where that particular fact comes from I don’t remember but I don’t believe she had her receiver on board the aircraft on this leg. I’d have rather left ten gallons of gas behind than the radio. If that story is true there’s a record of it somewhere, but I seem to recall that it was found along with some of their other things when their stuff got shipped back to the ‘states afterwards.

I think she was on course, just late on her eta, and apart from being a boozer I’ve never heard anything bad said about Noonan over the years, certainly not in regards to his skill. If they ran out of gas early either she was running rich for much of the journey, developed a leak, or she blew a tank, and whether that cost her one engine or both, she ended up in the water before she could either sort it out and switch tanks or get a message off.

[Dan Jones]

As related in countless previous posts here and just about everywhere else, many feel TIGHAR group lacks credibility.

Here is a commentary by a former group member (who donated $50,000+).
https://myplace.frontier.com/~monty.fow ... alysis.htm

After years of claiming a piece of aluminum found on the island was from the Lockheed, despite markings on the back that suggesting WWII era manufacturing, the group finally admitted the piece was from a C-47, as critics suggested all along.

The bones found on the island were found, lost and found again....to cut a long story short, recent DNA tests did not match AE.

For years the group tried to tie everything on the island to AE....bones, feces, part of a shoe, a "freckle cream" jar.

What was rarely mentioned was the island was occupied by almost 60 civillians by 1938-39 and in WWII by the USCG and after the war by a group of civilians.
So it was hardly a pristine area where any objects found had to have come from AE.

After years of searching and despite claims they had solved the mystery, the group never proved she was there.

Conjecture, sure, but no hard evidence that would hold up in court.

The wiki article on the island quotes the NASM which says the same thing.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikumaroro

So, does it come as a surprise that the group is disdainful of other group's efforts?

That commentary warmed my heart! I must read it again, before bed, with a glass of good whiskey in front of me! Lol

[quemerford]

As related in countless previous posts here and just about everywhere else, many feel TIGHAR group lacks credibility.

...which is akin to saying, "Some folks feel that Jeffrey Dahmer is an unreliable babysitter".

However I do admire your restraint.

[Dan Jones]

As related in countless previous posts here and just about everywhere else, many feel TIGHAR group lacks credibility.

...which is akin to saying, "Some folks feel that Jeffrey Dahmer is an unreliable babysitter".

However I do admire your restraint.

[Ken]

The Pacific is VAST. I ferried a C-130 from California to Australia two months ago and it took three days (and at 300 knots). The prospect of doing the same thing with a Lockheed 10 would be somewhere between terrifying and a bad idea.

So glad you made this comment. As a fellow (former) Herk guy, I find it hard to describe the sheer vastness of our Earth to someone who hasn't experienced it themselves. Even being out over the "easy" Atlantic or vast stretches of jungle in remote Colombia drove home to me that we, even in our modern, climate-controlled, GPS-guided machines, are but a grain of sand to the rest of the world. I have thought on many occasions, if we go down "out here", I can easily see how we might be swallowed up, never to be seen again - I don't say that with any intended drama - it's a simple truth. My hat is off to those who choose/chose to dare greatly.

Ken

[Hooligan2]

The only time the Earth ever seems small to me is when I see the ISS following its orbit across Australia on Heavens Above, then 45 minutes later it's passing over my head...

[p51buff]

I think she was on course, just late on her eta, and apart from being a boozer I’ve never heard anything bad said about Noonan over the years, certainly not in regards to his skill.

Different time. Could you imagine trying to remake The Thin Man movies now without the boozing and smoking?

[JohnB]

Over the years, Earhart fans (but apparently not TIGHAR*) tried to pin the disappearance on him, citing his drinking.

Of course with no actual proof that he'd been drinking during the flight (after all his life depended on it, too) or whether AE would let him work while impaired.

Apparently they didn't want to tarnish AE's feminist icon hagiography, so the disappearance could not have been her fault.

* https://tighar.org/Projects/Earhart/Arc ... noonan.htm