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The Spectacle Blog
This morning I watched a ceremony on the State Department’s website featuring Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announce the support of the federal government in renewing the search for Amelia Earhart this summer. The search will coincide with the 75th anniversary of her disappearance as Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan attempted to circumnavigate the globe aboard the Lockheed Electra.
I have long been fascinated by Earhart. In July 2008, I wrote an article about her in July 2008 and put out a poetry chapbook titled Woman in the Sky in October 2009.
As you can imagine, it was quite the Hillary lovefest. LaHood compared Hillary to Earhart calling her “a hero and a trailblazer.” I guess in the eyes of the Obama Administration being a parachute candidate in the New York Senate race is equivalent to flying solo across both the Atlantic and the Pacific.
Also on hand was Ric Gillespie of The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) which has spent nearly a quarter century searching for Earhart, Noonan and the wreckage of the Lockheed Electra. They believe the Lockheed Electra crash landed on Gardner Island (now known as Nikumaroro Island) and that Earhart and Noonan set up camp there before perishing. Several years ago, TIGHAR found glass and makeup on Nikumaroro which they had tested for DNA but the sample was contaminated and the results were inconclusive. I remember this because the DNA lab that did the testing is located in my hometown of Thunder Bay, Ontario. Last year, a DNA lab in Oklahoma tested bone fragments found on Nikumaroro but those tests were also inconclusive as researchers could not determine if the bones belonged to a human or to a sea turtle.
However, the reason the State Department has become involved is because their officials analyzed a photo of Gardner Island taken three months after Earhart and Noonan’s disappearance. These officials believe that part of the wheel from the Lockheed Electra is protruding from the water just off the island. Gillespie said his group will set sail for Nikumaroro on July 2nd (the 75th anniversary of her disappearance) and will arrive on the island eight days later. TIGHAR plans to spend about ten days trying to find the wreckage of the Electra Lockheed.
I am more inclined to believe the crash and sink theory advanced by pilot Elgen Long. The Lockheed Electra was supposed to refuel at Howland Island before flying onto Honululu. But Howland Island is a tiny dot in the Pacific Ocean with low elevation. Earhart’s last radio communication indicated she was on top of Howland Island but could not see it and was running out of fuel. Unless Earhart and Noonan were way off course it is difficult to imagine they could have flown another 350 nautical miles to Gardner Island with their limited fuel supply. The Lockheed Electra was also not a sea plane and could not have lasted long on water. The depth of the water in that part of the Pacific is more than 16,000 feet. Chances are that Earhart, Noonan and the Lockheed Electra are at the bottom of the Pacific.
Here’s a piece written earlier this year by skeptic Brian Dunning. He does not think Noonan could have made such a dramatic navigational error and is also critical of TIGHAR’s position that no one other than Earhart and Noonan could have possibly been on Gardner Island. Dunning argues that Gardner was regularly visited by pearl boats going back to the 1800s.
Now while the TIGHAR expedition itself is privately funded one must wonder how much the State Department is spending to provide logistical support. Of course, if TIGHAR does find Earhart’s plane it is yet another thing for which the Obama Administration will take credit. On the other hand, if this is yet another failed expedition it will be just be one more investment on borrowed money with no return.
Well, at least the crash and sink theorists and the folks at TIGHAR can agree on one thing. Earhart and Noonan were not spying on the Japanese despite the claims advanced by the late CBS newsman Fred Goerner. I will say though that Plainsong’s’ “The True Story of Amelia Earhart” (written by Iain Matthews and based on Goerner’s research) is probably the best song about a conspiracy theory ever recorded.
View all comments (16) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by Aaron Goldstein
http://spectator.org/blog/2012/03/20/the-search-for-amelia-earhart
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pespada| 3.20.12 @ 1:48PM
Mr. Goldstein:
It's "Lockheed Electra"--You got the name of the airplane (Electra) with its manufacturer (Lockheed) in the wrong order.
Mike 3/505| 3.20.12 @ 2:23PM
As opposed to the Electra 225, Buick's competitor to Cadillac in the "boat" class of cars. :-)
Aaron Goldstein| 3.20.12 @ 3:21PM
Thank you. All fixed up.
PCC| 3.21.12 @ 9:03AM
Another stupid and wasteful use of taxpayers' money.
Why not? It's free money, right?
Cpm| 3.20.12 @ 2:00PM
It would be nice if the Obama Administration could manage to eke out one positive accomplishment before it is over.
albert constantine jr.| 3.20.12 @ 2:23PM
Somehow, though, it will be GW Bush's fault that she crashed.
solidground| 3.20.12 @ 3:00PM
I dunno. I watched a program on the Nat Geo Channel yesterday that made a pretty good case for the two aviators being captured by the Japanese (and not necessarily suspected of being espionage agents) and eventually dying in captivity (whether by execution or disease, unknown) on Saipan. I'm trying to imagine how a grainy photograph taken 75 years ago could distinctly show a wheel sticking out of the water. I'm guessing this photo is worth just about as much credibility as any of Nellie poking her long neck out of Loch Ness.
BruceTi| 3.20.12 @ 4:04PM
I've always enjoyed reading and hearing about this story, since childhood back in the 1970s.
therealguyfaux| 3.20.12 @ 4:31PM
While the Nikumaroro explanation has a certain plausibility and is as good an explanation as we are ever liable to get, the sad fact is that we may never know for sure. And the American spirit is not one that takes kindly to such explanations; Earhart and Noonan land on a deserted island, damaging their plane thereby, and, having no operable radio, they slowly, over a period of days, die of thirst, sunburn, and blood loss from multiple sand crab bites? This is too human an ending for Amelia Earhart; heroines deserve to go out in a "Blaze Of Glory," not helpless in a hell hole. We don't want our heroes dying, if not ignoble deaths, deaths that seem somehow less than poetic, for want of a better term. Of course, this ending would humanize Earhart and Noonan, but is that something we really want to do? Forget whether we SHOULD do, and thereby turn her into a tragic figure like polar explorer Capt. Scott, a much more accessible and relatable figure; can we have no heroes?
John Ford said it right: "Print the legend."
ncatty| 3.20.12 @ 5:27PM
Sir Hillary Clinton was first on Mt. Everest, right?
albert constantine jr.| 3.20.12 @ 5:45PM
A somewhat contemporaneous disappearance in the Pacific of Lt. Col. E.H. "Pete" Ellis, USMC was also reported. Some believe he stumbled upon secret Japanese fortifications, as well, as was killed to prevent him from revealing this.
I have always allowed, though, that perhaps he was with Ms. Earhart, living on a Pacific Island paradise in the manner of Professor Hinkley and Mary Ann Summers.
RayH| 3.20.12 @ 6:38PM
People, please. Everyone knows that Earhart was abducted by aliens and found in cryo-stasis in the Delta Quadrant by USS Voyager in the early 2370s. The whole story is fully explained in the documentary titled "The 37's."
RJ| 3.21.12 @ 12:22AM
Given that some, presumably educated, adults "learn" history through the movies, I suspect that more and more people believe it. Beam me up, Scotty.
David | 3.20.12 @ 9:20PM
Considering all the interest, we learn so much from established facts. And we never leave our own behind. She is one of ours. And her influence continues greatly today, in fashion, in science, in aviation, in women's studies and in adventure. A simple small town girl became one of the greatest American heroes. That is what America does! So, one horrifying fact, is that there were many reports of post-loss radio messages, indications of survival. There has been much analysis of those messages. But no on-site test. Here is an up-start group of American fellows who would go and do, with a little help. Check out Project AERO. http://www.wc5c.org
David
DAVID MENARD| 3.21.12 @ 6:46AM
Please go to this website via google : electranewbritain.com This will upset the
apple cart big time!
Randall Brink | 6.10.12 @ 8:24PM
The latest publicity exploit by "TIGHAR" is merely another in a long, LONG series of prevarications and presentation of bogus "evidence," all of which has been thoroughly discredited.
Recent statements regarding radio transmissions from the Earhart aircraft are a flagrant attempt to take credit for the work of other who have gone long before "TOGHAR."