The Latest from Aviation Week on Science and the Electra pieces found on Mili Atoll

Aviation week weighs in on the evidence from the Paris air show.

http://aviationweek.com/paris-air-show-2015/will-disappearance-amelia-earhart-be-scientifically-explained-long-last

Purdue Archives

"Will Disappearance Of Amelia Earhart Be Scientifically Explained At Long Last?"

Paul Jackson Jun 15, 2015

Parker Aerospace has funded a scientific investigation into one of aviation’s greatest mysteries. Will the disappearance of Amelia Earhart be scientifically explained at long last?

The word “closure” did not have its present meaning when, on July 2, 1937, renowned aviatrix Amelia Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, disappeared over the Pacific while flying a Lockheed 10E Electra on a world circumnavigation attempt. For 78 years, theories ranging from the mundane to the bizarre have surrounded the tragedy but, at last, an answer based on irrefutable science might be about to settle the matter beyond reasonable dispute.

A recent expedition to the Pacific by non-profit Amelia Research, Inc., was sponsored by Parker Hannifin Corporation (Hall 5, C210) and accompanied by Jon Jeffery, its Aerospace division’s director of technology and business development. Jeffery told ShowNews, “Parker is involved with many charitable events to promote engineering and aerospace interest in the world (and) saw this as an opportunity to help resolve a longstanding mystery from an engineering-based approach. Parker has a long history of helping solve difficult problems purely for the benefit of mankind.”

(That expedition included Mike Harris, Les Kinney, Dick Spink and Jim Hayton from these pages.)

Lending dimensions to the enormity of the recent search task, one theory has Earhart and Noonan leaving Lae in Papua New Guinea and then running out of fuel near Gardner Island, 420 miles south of their intended destination of Howland Island. However, the Parker reconnaissance was in Mili Atoll, specifically Endrikin, one of its 92 component islands. This is 850 miles northwest of Howland – a not inconsiderable change of focus.

Why the new target? Explained Jeffery, “There were eyewitness reports from many native Marshallese citizens who observed the landing and were involved in helping the Japanese in moving the aircraft across the island to load it onto a Japanese ship for transportation to Saipan.” (The Marshalls were a Japanese possession between the World Wars, and there is even a claim that Earhart and Noonan survived and were taken to a Japanese hospital on nearby Jaluit Atoll.)

(Specifically, an island elder recalled that the Japanese had ordered the islanders to help them move the plane off the atoll.  As reported here earlier, Andrew Bryce, a WWII Veteran from Denver, reported that during WWII a stevedore he worked on Majuro claimed that he had helped move the place from Mili onto a Japanese barge which took the plane to a Japanese ship docked in Majuro (which was then seen in Jaluit by many eyewitnesses.)  Veteran Andrew Bryce, who was interviewed about his experiences, is the brother of Douglas Bryce, who saw the Electra in a hangar on Saipan during WWII when he was a radio repairman.)

The expedition was prompted by Amelia Research’s discovery in 2014 of metal items which could have been from a Lockheed. The Parker project team arrived in January 2015 to follow-up with more sophisticated searching equipment.

An area 75 x 300 feet has yielded two small aluminum plates, one with some red paint, which was the color of the trim on Earhart’s aircraft, plus other metal items, at least one matching a component of an Electra’s wheel-well. Jeffery’s team of laboratory specialists is now examining the chemical “signature” of the metal and hopes to be able to present its findings later this summer.

Courtesy Dick Spink - piece found on Mili

Jim Hayton demonstrates where this other piece fit on the Electra

For more positive identification, says Jeffery, “the team gathered parts from another Lockheed Electra from the same time period; parts from a Japanese “Zero” fighter and “Betty” bomber; and parts from a 1946 Piper J3 Cub, to compare and show differences.  Also, the team may have access to paint and aluminum samples that is confirmed from Amelia's aircraft”.

The last remark refers to part of the starboard engine nacelle that was removed during an earlier accident repair. The paint’s chemical structure will be a further reality-check, for it must be remembered that U.S.-made aluminum was exported to Japan until an embargo was imposed at the end of 1939.

Parker Aerospace is performing the role of detective, not judge or jury. After its scientists’ findings are disclosed, it will be up to officials of Amelia Research, and others, to weigh the facts and arrive at a decision. “Parker currently doesn't have any plans for further sponsorship beyond supporting verification of the parts came from the Earhart aircraft,” notes Jeffery.

But someone else does. This very month, a different group of historians is on Gardner Island (now known as Nikumaroro) to search for wreckage just offshore, as well as evidence of a castaways’ campsite, hoping to substantiate an alternative theory. Signs are it’s going to be a busy few months for Earhart followers.

The initiative by Parker Hannifin may, or may not, silence the incorrigible conspiracy theorists and achieve public “closure” but, at least, the responsible authorities in Washington, DC, might be able to close their dusty files. At the FAA, for example, the N-number of Earhart’s Electra (16020) is on the “permanently reserved” list in her name, thus unavailable for reissue to another aircraft, as would be usual.

And at the National Air and Space Museum, Tom D. Crouch, senior curator, has declared that the Electra is “on the bottom of the Pacific” 18,000 feet down, tantalizingly close to its destination at Howland. Endrikin or Gardner desert island landings are, therefore, dismissed by a government-funded entity not accustomed to being contradicted.

(Elgen Long also believes her Electra crashed in the ocean. However, he told me point blank that he would be "thrilled" if it turned out that these pieces are from her Electra. Stay tuned.)

If Parker’s public-spirited sponsorship and technical analysis proves the Museum’s unsupported assertion to be 18,005 feet in vertical error, not to mention over 850 miles horizontally askew, it will have been money well spent."

Closure (Photo Purdue Archives)

National Geographic finally weighs in on Dick Spink's discovery

Finally! National Geographic on the right flight path. We spoke with the author of this article extensively back in November of 2014, and then most recently when they had the meeting he's reporting. For all intents and purposes (according to our NTSB expert) Amelia Earhart's Electra has been found... at least where it came down... and now, we'll just have to show everyone where it's buried. 
 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/05/150528-amelia-earhart-spink-marshall-islands-aviation/

Important to note; we are not interested in who or what or why or how these events occurred.  We are not interested in talking about the theories of how she wound up on Mili Atoll.

We are passionate about finding out the truth of what happened to Amelia Earhart to honor her sacrifice for the nation.  And that is, at its core, what happened to her.  

She made an incredible landing on an atoll, not something many pilots could do.  Why was she so far off course? We don't know.  We can guess that it's because she wasn't "over" Howland when she radioed she was - in fact she was 250 miles north west of the Howland.  

But we don't know that for a fact. But we do know that she came down in Mili Atoll.

We do know she was picked up by the Japanese and transported to Saipan. That her plane and Fred Noonan went with her. 

We do know that the plane was put in a hangar on Aslito airfield. That's where it was found in June of 44. We do know that she was incarcerated and died on Saipan.

There are multiple reports about how she died. But how she died doesn't reflect on how she lived.  She lived with courage, and because of who she was - an American pilot flying in the wrong part of the Pacific - she wound up in Japanese hands.

We don't know how much she suffered, or if she suffered. We do know that people in the US knew she was there. We do know that US Marines were asked to look for her. We do know that her briefcase was found, and then her plane.

And the Electra was destroyed by US forces not long after that.  We have multiple eyewitnesses, both islanders and US Marines.  

The results of these tests will be at the end of July, early August. And that will not be the end of the story of what happened to her - it will be the beginning of the end of the story.  She deserves closure, and we are determined to help her achieve it.  Read the article below, from the National Geographic website, written by David Lande:


"One Man’s Dogged Search for Amelia Earhart"

One Man’s Dogged Search for Amelia Earhart
Teacher has spent $50K trying to prove the aviator didn’t crash into the Pacific -- and instead landed on a tiny island.

Picture of Amelia Earhart standing in front of the Lockheed Electra plane

Internationally famous as a trouser-clad, tousle-haired, female flier, Amelia Earhart stands in front of the Lockheed Electra she hoped to fly around the world. With only 7,000 miles to go on the 29,000-mile journey, she and navigator Fred Noonan took off from Lae, New Guinea, on July 2, 1937, and disappeared over a vast stretch of the Pacific Ocean. 
PHOTOGRAPH BY SSPL, GETTY

By David Lande, National Geographic 
PUBLISHED MAY 28, 2015
5
At a gathering of researchers near Seattle, a piece of Amelia Earhart’s plane is reverently passed hand-to-hand around a conference table. The authenticity of the artifact is undisputed—a rarity in the contentious world of Earhart aficionados. It was removed from Earhart’s Lockheed Electra during a repair job in the spring of 1937, and a forward-thinking mechanic rescued it from a trash bin. Just a few months later, Earhart and her Electra would be lost in an attempted round-the-world flight.


What happened to Amelia Earhart? Depends on whom you ask. Some say it’s obvious: She ran out of gas over a vast stretch of the Pacific, splashed into the water, and vanished. Others say she landed and eventually died on an island now called Nikumaroro, some 350 miles (563 kilometers) south of her intended refueling stop on Howland Island.

But a 53-year-old high school science teacher from Washington State named Dick Spink believes a different theory: Her plane set down in the Marshall Islands, far off course, on a tiny atoll named Mili.

Picture of a scrap of metal from the Lockheed Electra plane

After sustaining heavy damage in a failed takeoff attempt from Hawaii, Earhart’s Lockheed was repaired in California in the spring of 1937. A mechanic saved this original section of aluminum skin from the airplane’s horizontal stabilizer. 
(Photo by Richard Martini)

“The world needs to know this,” Spink says. “I heard a consistent story from too many people in the Marshalls to dismiss it. They say, ‘She landed at Mili. Our uncles and aunts, our parents, and our grandparents know she landed here.’ ”

The Marshallese accounts were so convincing that Spink has spent $50,000 of his own money searching for the spot where Earhart landed. He contends that the islanders’ stories will be borne out by scientific proof.

Which is why these eight researchers—including engineers, metallurgists, and aircraft technicians—are gathered around a conference table and joined via teleconference by two scientists from Alcoa, original supplier of the aluminum used in Earhart’s plane.

After examining the authentic piece, the group passes around a half-dozen other parts—jagged, weathered, and corroded aluminum sealed in bags like evidence from a crime scene. Some are still encrusted with sand and bits of coral from the Marshalls, where they were found recently. One still has a hint of reddish paint—perhaps a faded match to the reddish-orange trim of Earhart’s plane.

Picture of Mili Atoll in the Marshall Islands
Some researchers believe crescent-shaped Mili Atoll in the Marshall Islands is where Amelia Earhart landed in desperation after failing to locate her intended fuel stop at Howland Island, some 800 miles to the southeast. 


Putting the pieces together

Dick Spink isn’t the originator of the Marshall Islands theory. It first came to global attention during the 1960s with the publication of Paul Briand’s book Daughter of the Sky, as well as CBS correspondent Fred Goerner’s The Search for Amelia Earhart. (The fascination with Earhart continues; a crew trying to fly a solar-powered plane around the world is planning to embark on what it calls the “Earhart leg” of its trip, across the unforgiving Pacific.)

Goerner’s book—a bible of sorts to many Marshall Islands believers—argues that Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan were taken prisoner by the Japanese after landing in the Marshalls and transported by ship to Saipan, where they died in captivity.

Spink counts himself among Goerner’s disciples, but he didn’t come to faith by reading his book. In fact, he hadn’t read anything about Earhart when he first traveled to the Marshall Islands for a sideline business venture. “I just assumed everyone believed that she disappeared when she sank in the ocean,” he says.

Then, three years ago, Spink was having dinner with Marshallese friends when he asked an innocent question: “Didn’t Amelia Earhart disappear in this part of the world?” A local man answered: “Yes, she landed on our island, and my uncle watched her for two days.”

Dick Spink, Jim Hayton, Rich Martini, Mike Harris

Spink’s first reaction was to laugh, but he stopped abruptly when he realized the man wasn’t joking. After that, wherever he traveled in the Marshalls, he kept hearing the same story. “So many people said the same thing,” he says. “It’s become part of Marshallese history and culture.”

What began as serendipity became a pursuit for Spink. He interviewed dozens of Marshallese natives, pressing for specifics until he pinpointed a stretch of rough coral shore where two fishermen had claimed they saw Earhart land. Her plane, losing parts as it bounced over the coral, was later dragged to a Japanese transport ship.

Spink has never solicited financial help for his pursuits. But through connections with a company called Parker Aerospace, his quest received a major boost. This year Parker funded an expedition that brought sophisticated equipment to bear on the search area in the Marshalls.

Parker manufactured fittings for the fuel systems of nearly all aircraft made in the 1920s and 30s, including Lindbergh’s Spirit of St. Louis and Earhart’s Electra.

Jon Jeffery, a Parker representative who accompanied Spink on the January expedition, says, “When we found that our company had made parts for Earhart’s Electra, that got Parker management excited, and they made the decision to invest in the project.”

Photo: Purdue University

Too Many Miles, Too Little Fuel?
Others haven’t been so supportive. Many Earhart enthusiasts dismiss the Marshalls theory as outlandish. Elgen Long, a retired pilot who spent decades researching Earhart’s disappearance, believes in the splashed-and-sank theory.

“The plane would’ve had to float a long way” to reach the Marshall Islands, quips Long. For him, the answer to the mystery rests under 17,000 feet of ocean.

(BLOG AUTHOR NOTE: Elgen Long told me he'd be "glad if it's true" when I spoke to him just prior to flying up to meet Dick Spink and to examine the piece.  What Elgen Long said, along with the man who owns the original piece of the Electra said, was that the expedition to Nikumaroro to find her plane was "not real." (They both used stronger language, but I'd prefer to let them speak for themselves on the topic. )


Fred Patterson, a World Airways pilot for 25 years who also owned two Electras, shares Long’s opinion. “There’s just no way she made it to the Marshall Islands,” he says. “I’ve done some long-range flying in that airplane myself, and I know exactly what it burns per hour.”

Patterson, Long, and many others in their camp argue that radio transmissions place Earhart near her intended destination of Howland Island when she uttered “gas is running low.” The distance from Howland to Mili Atoll is 800 miles—nearly four and a half hours away at the Electra’s cruising speed.

The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) argues that Earhart landed on Nikumaroro Island, closer to Howland. (For more on this theory, see http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/11/141104-amelia-earhart-forensic-photo-spectral-imaging-analysis/)

Both Alcoa and Parker are analyzing the pieces recovered from the Marshall Islands to determine whether the metal and paint match Earhart’s plane.

For his part, Spink remains confident that he’s on the right path—guided, it seems, by the ill-fated aviatrix herself.


“So many weird things have happened,” he says. “I feel like the key to the Earhart mystery has just been handed to me. It’s kind of creepy, almost as if Amelia is saying, ‘Here, go with this.’ ”

Waiting for the results of the forensic tests...

Just a note to say we're still waiting on the forensic tests being done on the over dozen pieces recovered from Mili Atoll.

Two of the pieces have been examined by a forensic aviation expert, and he believes they are from the Electra.

Recently, members of the team that went to Mili, including a former Federal investigator, a former United Pilot who owns an actual piece of the Electra, Dick Spink who found the pieces, and forensic expert Jim Hayton met with representatives from the company that sponsored the trip to Mili - Parker Aviation, along with a reporter from National Geographic Magazine, and representatives from Alcoa who will be able to determine in their labs the exact amount of aluminum found in the various pieces.  

One of these hangars may have been where they found the plane,
which resembled this burnt out plane on the runway.

I'm told that some pieces from Japanese airplanes were also brought for testing (not recovered at Mili Atoll, as it was not the site of any aerial battles in WWII) and they will be used for comparison.

Amelia being thorough as usual.

To reiterate, Mike Harris went to the Marshalls in the 1980's and interviewed a number of people who claimed to have seen Earhart or hear that she had landed in Mili Atoll.  Harris and crew returned to Mili and this time interviewed a local man who recalled when the Japanese ordered 40 island men to help them "move the Electra" from where it had come down onto a barge.

A Marshallese man who tended to her wounds, interviewed by Harris in 1980.
His business associate is interviewed in the footage below attesting to his honesty.

The tools used to transport the plane at that time have also been recovered.

There is no rail track on Mili, but these rail cars were apparently used to move the plane

In the following clip are first person accounts from a number of sources.  This footage was shot by Richard Martini along with Mike Harris on Saipan in early 2014.  In the footage, a number of new people come forward to speak about their memories of her arrival on Saipan.  It includes an interview with a business associate of Bilimon Amaron, who said that he tended to Ms. Earhart and Mr. Noonan's wounds when their plane was hoisted onto the Kyoshu in dock in Jaluit.

Ms. Blanco saw Amelia and Fred come ashore, and told the same to Fred Goerner, CBS news man in 1964

There's an interview with the woman that Fred Goerner originally spoke to back in 1964 where she spoke of seeing Amelia and Fred Noonan being brought ashore.  Josephine Blanco. She recounts that story in detail in the longer version of this footage.

There are interviews with various people from Saipan - the son of a nurse who tended to her wounds in a hospital on Saipan, as well as others who saw or heard of her presence there.  

The hospital on Saipan where she was tended to by a Saipanese nurse

And finally, interviews with the US Marines who found her briefcase, who found the Electra parked in a hangar at Aslito airfield in 1944.  And with servicemen who saw the plane burned by US forces.

Nabers decoded the messages for commander Louis Wallace. He says he decoded one
that said "We have found AE's plane Aslito field." He was ordered to guard the plane for 24 hours
and let no one in.  Some soldiers tried to get in, and there's an interview with one of the soldiers who overheard
that argument. (Thomas E Devine). Mr. Nabers also decoded the message that announced they would
fly the plane, and finally the message where they said they were going to destroy it.  He claims
he went to the field and watched as it burned. His account is corroborated by others who witnessed
the same event.

Here's the an hour long documentary (from Richard Martini) that includes footage from the US Marines mentioned above:

Mike Harris on Mili with Pix of his team

Here's the same report, but with photographs of Mike and the team, including Les Kinney, federal investigator with 27 years of AE research, Jim Hayton, forensic aviation expert who has testified before Congress and the NTSB, Dick Spink, school teacher extraordinaire who found the original pieces of the Electra, folks from Parker Aerospace, Jared Abrahams survey expert, Jerry Kramer former business partner of the Marshall's native who treated Earhart aboard a Japanese ship after recovering her plane, and Jerry's son...  not in that order...

American group looks for Amelia Earhart clues on remote Marshalls’ atoll

• 
• 

Category: Palau/Pacific News

26 Jan 2015

By Giff Johnson - For Variety

Share on facebookShare on twitterShare on emailShare on printMore Sharing Services2

MAJURO — A group that claims it discovered parts from Amelia Earhart’s plane on a remote atoll in the Marshall Islands last year returned this weekend to search for additional clues they hope will shed light on a mystery that has baffled the world since the famous pilot was lost in 1937.

The whereabouts of Earhart’s twin-engine Lockheed Electra that was lost during a trans-Pacific flight nearly 80 years ago has never been discovered. A group known as Amelia Research, Inc. led visits to Mili Atoll last year that discovered a small aluminum cover plate and a circular metal dust cover from a landing-gear wheel assembly that experts say is from Earhart’s plane.

But The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery or TIGHAR has a competing theory, saying it has found proof that Earhart went down at Nikumaroro Atoll in the central Pacific nation of Kiribati that neighbors the Marshall Islands. TIGHAR leader Ric Gillespie plans to take another team to Nikumaroro — about 400 miles southeast of Howland Island — later this year.

Others also discount the find in the Marshall Islands, saying Earhart’s plane didn’t have enough fuel to get there. But two aircraft experts recently said the plane parts found on Mili Atoll are from Earhart’s plane. Mili was a Japanese military base in the build up to World War II, one of half a dozen throughout the Marshall Islands.

MARSHALL ISLANDS PRESIDENT CHRISTOPHER LOEAK, CENTER, RECEIVING A GIFT FROM AMELIA RESEARCH INC. TEAM LEADER MIKE HARRIS, MET WITH THE SEARCH GROUP THAT IS ON REMOTE MILI ATOLL FOR A WEEK TO SEARCH FOR MORE CLUES ABOUT THE DISAPPEARANCE OF EARHART’S PLANE. MARSHALL ISLANDS PRESIDENT’S OFFICE PHOTO

Marshall Islands President Christopher Loeak also believes Earhart’s plane crash-landed in Mili. “Generations of Marshallese people have known since 1937 that the famous fliers didn’t just disappear in the ocean, as history would want us to believe,” Loeak said in a statement issued after meeting the Earhart search group Friday. Marshall Islanders know that the plane landed “on a small atoll in the Marshall Islands and (Earhart and Noonan) survived.”

Loeak invited the team to visit Mili and has assigned government Historic Preservation Office staff to assist the investigation.

Cleveland, Ohio-based Parker Aerospace is sponsoring the latest Earhart search foray to Mili Atoll. The group left Sunday morning for Mili and expects to be there for about a week.

“We brought more sophisticated equipment to find other parts (of Earhart’s plane),” said Jon Jeffery, director of Technology and Business Development at Parker Aerospace. He hopes they will discover a part with a serial number or others that will offer conclusive evidence it was Earhart’s aircraft that landed in Mili.

MEMBERS OF THE AMELIA EARHART SEARCH TEAM BOARD A SPEED BOAT TO TRANSPORT THEM TO A LARGER VESSEL FOR AN OVERNIGHT VOYAGE FROM MAJURO TO MILI ATOLL IN THE MARSHALL ISLANDS THIS PAST WEEKEND. PHOTO BY HILARY HOSIA

A new wrinkle in the search for Earhart evidence in the Marshall Islands involves nearby Jaluit Atoll, the headquarters for Japan’s administration of the Marshall Islands from World War I to the end of World War II.

“There is an underground hospital built by the Japanese on Jaluit,” Jeffery said. Elder Marshall Islands say they saw Earhart’s plane go down on a small island in Mili Atoll, and others report seeing her in Jaluit. “Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan were in this hospital after they crashed,” he said. “There might be some evidence there.”

Jeffery said his brother James is friends with people in the group searching Mili Atoll for clues to Earhart’s disappearance and last year approached Jeffery about his company sponsoring the latest visit.

“My CEO approved the money to sponsor the visit,” he said.

Expedition to Mili hits the airwaves

The first "official" report.  Note, this is Mike Harris' expedition - he found the sponsor, assembled the team, is shooting the footage.  They're out there during a "King Tide" so hopefully waters have receded to help their search. But if you read the other posts below, you'll find why Mike is on Mili with this team.

Search for Earhart plane on remote Marshalls atoll

15 hours ago

.

View photo

US aviator Amelia Earhart pictured in front of her plane in the 1930s (AFP Photo/)

A search is under way on a remote atoll in the Marshall Islands aimed at solving the mysterious disappearance of aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart.

A group of researchers travelled Sunday to Mili Atoll where a small aluminium cover plate and part of a landing-gear wheel assembly, believed to be from Earhart's plane, were found last year.

"We brought more sophisticated equipment to find other parts," said Jon Jeffery, director of technology and business development at United States-based Parker Aerospace, which is sponsoring the search.

Earhart, the first woman to fly across the Atlantic solo, disappeared in 1937 with navigator Fred Noonan when attempting to circumnavigate the world in a twin-engine Lockheed Electra aircraft.

Marshall Islanders have long claimed Earhart crashed on an atoll and a group known as Amelia Research, Inc. found the aircraft parts last year.

"Generations of Marshallese people have known since 1937 that the famous fliers didn't just disappear in the ocean," Marshall Islands President Christopher Loeak said.

The aircraft landed "on a small atoll in the Marshall Islands and (Earhart and Noonan) survived", he added.

The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery has dismissed the Marshalls theory. It believes Earhart went down at Nikumaroro Atoll in the central Pacific nation of Kiribati near the Marshall Islands.

A new line of investigation in the search for Earhart evidence in the Marshall Islands involves Jaluit Atoll near Mili. It was the headquarters for Japan's administration of the Marshall Islands from World War I to the end of World War II.

"There is an underground hospital built by the Japanese on Jaluit," Jeffery said.

"Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan were in this hospital after they crashed," he said. "There might be some evidence there."

Marshall Islanders have claimed they saw Earhart's plane go down on a small island in Mili Atoll, and others reported seeing her in Jaluit.

New Expedition to Mili Atoll

A new expedition has been launched for an official visit to Mili Atoll.

When the tide is out "a 747 could land here" said one expert.

Sponsored by Parker Hannifin Aerospace Company, which had airplane parts on the original Electra, this expedition will gather new evidence as to whether or not Amelia Earhart's Electra came down on Mili.

Courtesy Purdue University

For those not familiar with the story....

Mike Harris visited the Marshall Islands in the 1980's while investigating the Earhart saga.  While he was there, he gathered accounts from a number of eyewitnesses who claimed to have seen her and Fred Noonan after the Electra came down.

Dick Spink, Jim Hayton, Rich Martini and Mike Harris

Bilimon Amaron said that he treated her wounds aboard a Japanese ship, and that he saw the Electra on the back of that ship.

Amaron being interviewed by Harris in the 1980s. From Harris' footage shot in 1980.

Oscar DeBrum, former recording secretary of the Marshalls said his father told him that an American pilot had been captured and he saw the Electra on the back of this ship as well.

Oscar DeBrum saw the plane on the Japanese ship. From Harris' interview in 1980.

Andrew Bryce, WWII veteran said that he was stationed on Majuro, Marshall Islands during the war and that a stevedore had told him that he had transported the Electra aboard a Japanese barge to a Japanese ship from Mili. (Andrew's brother Douglas saw the Electra on Saipan, but that's another part of the story.)

Andrew Bryce from "Earhart's Electra" spoke to a man who transported the Electra. 

Oliver Knaggs went to the Marshalls in the 1980's with a film crew and filmed islanders, including the Queen of Mili, who claimed they saw Earhart's Electra land at Mili.  Other islanders said they had heard the stories, and knew where the plane came down.

Lotan Jack and others were told to keep quiet about the female pilot/American spy the Japanese captured.
From Mike Harris' 16mm footage shot in the 1980s.

Dick Spink, a school teacher from Seattle, who works frequently in the Marshall Islands, helped organize a trip to the exact spot where the islanders said they saw her plane came down.  And as reported here and in other newspapers, the pieces that he brought back from Mili have been identified - "beyond a reasonable doubt" by NTSB forensic aviation expert Jim Hayton (who has testified before Congress) that they are likely from her Electra.

APU cover with paint that resembles the trim from the Electra. Courtesy Dick Spink.

Specifically, there are two parts. An APU cover that was painted with the same kind of red trim that the Electra was painted with for easy identification (and Hayton has looked at it under a microscope and verified the primer was of that era) and a dust shield that went in the brake assembly of only an Electra 10E.  

That dust shield is listed in the Electra's manual, and is pictured belonging between the brake and the Good Year air wheel.

Jim Hayton demonstrating how the piece fit on his Good Year air wheel, which is identical the the one on the Electra.

Aviation expert Hayton owns one of those air wheels, and has demonstrated that it fits on the same air wheel that was on her plane. In his professional opinion, the dust shield could only have come from her Electra.

So Mike Harris, intrepid explorer, the man who hired Bob Ballard to help him look for the Titanic (and Ballard went back to the location with a new team where they had searched before, and actually found the ship) has mounted a new expedition to Mili Atoll, bringing along a team of experts.

These were used to transport the Electra to the barge, according to locals. They're the same gauge as other Japanese rail cars used for sugar cane transport on Saipan and other islands. Photo courtesy Dick Spink.

Mike is leading the following team:

Jared Abraham does surveys for the US Geological Survey Department using ground penetrating radar. (He was found by pilot Paul Cooper during our Saipan expedition).  Les Kinney is a retired Federal agent who has 27 years of hard evidence that he's gathered about the government's knowledge of her disappearance, and is writing a book about his research,  Jim Hayton is an expert in forensic aviation, called to many crash sites in the Pacific Northwest where he lives, and is friends with Dick Spink, the school teacher who has made four trips to this exact location on this atoll. The team is traveling with Martin Daly, who runs tours from these islands, as well as the son of Jerry Kramer, who was Bilimon Amaron's business partner for 40 years, and has vouched for Bilimon's "unassailable honesty." Also some folks from Parker Hannifin Aerospace Industries are on the trip as well.

Circumstances prevented yours truly from accompanying them on this epic leg of the Earhart saga, but I'm rooting for them from cyberspace.

They're going to be searching for more pieces of the Electra, as there have been eyewitness accounts of more pieces of the plane, as well as eyewitness testimony of people who are related to those who saw her plane come down. 

For those concerned these might be airplane parts from "other Electras" or other airplanes - there were no recorded battles fought over these particular islands during WWII, and no other artifacts have been found from any other planes, despite four expeditions led by Dick Spink. The location of these pieces dovetails with the evidence, both local eyewitnesses and other evidence that will prove beyond a shadow of any doubt that she came down in Mili atoll in 1937.  

The rest of the story will be told soon enough, but for now, where she came down will have to be rewritten by those who care about the historical record.  Theoretical models exist of how and why the Electra should not have been able to make this same island chain where Louis Zamperini washed up ("Unbroken") after 47 days at sea (In Wotje), but theoretical models should not trump physical evidence that is backed up by eyewitness accounts.  

The fact is that it appears now that Amelia flew the Electra all the way to Mili, and landed it on a runway of rough coral. When the tide is low, one eyewitness said "You could land a 747 on this atoll." It would have been low tide when her Electra arrived, when a number of islanders saw her bring the metal plane to the ground.  Her amazing flying feat saved her life and that of her navigator Fred Noonan by making it this far, and the evidence will eventually prove what the rest of their journey was, as difficult as the evidence shows it to be.

So there now exists physical evidence of her amazing feat of skill, and exactly where her plane came down. Knock on wood, these explorers will bring back more.

Lest we forget why we're doing this research. To honor the sacrifice of these two explorers; Fred Noonan and Amelia Earhart. Courtesy Purdue University

Thanks to Parker Hannifin Corporation, Aerospace Industries, who not only had original plane parts in the Electra, but their generous sponsorship for this expedition which may actually locate exactly where the Electra came down and provide more evidence for the solution of the Earhart puzzle.

Stay tuned. 

Exciting News from the front lines of the Search!

Hot off the presses, and about to hit the street:

Just back from Seattle where we interviewed Dick Spink and Jim Hayton.

Dick Spink, Jim Hayton, Rich Martini, Mike Harris

You may not have heard of them before, but you're going to be hearing about them in the future. They're about to become household names.

Here's the news story from the KC star: 

What the story does not include - I have eyewitness reports of every moment from the point that plane came down to when it was found by US Marines in Saipan in June of 1944.

Dick is a school teacher, a well respected member of his community who happens to design boats for countries worldwide, who use his unique designs as river and ferry boats.  He's spent a lot of time in the Marshall islands and considers his friends there family. He was intrigued when they started telling him the stories of seeing Earhart's plane come down on a nearby atoll in 1937.

Jim Hayton is an aviation expert who has testified before Congress and the NTSB about plane crashes.  

Having gone to the University of Chicago, his journey and path led him into aviation where he is one expert they consult when there's an accident in the Pacific Northwest.  He also is a fan of the Electra, and purchased three Goodyear Airwheel that fit the Electra way back when he was a kid.  Over the years, he used two on other planes, but still owns one.  The same airwheel as was on Amelia's Electra.

Dick heard the rumors that Earhart had come down in Mili Atoll, a place that he's been to before, and could lead an expedition to.  He went out with his camera, and investigated what he'd heard and knew about Earhart coming down in Mili.
  

The key difference in Dick's expedition, with respect to Oliver Knagg's trip to Mili in 1983 and Vincent Loomis' trip in 1985 is that Dick went to where the two fishermen actually said they saw her plane come down.

For those familiar with the story - Vincent Loomis book "The Final Story" documents his trip to these islands in 1985 to interview those who saw the plane come down.  And Oliver Knaggs, a journalist from South Africa, went out in 1983 and wrote "Her Last Flight" - both recounting the same stories of locals who claim they saw her plane come down.  They interviewed some of the same people, and footage of their testimony resides in a film vault in Florida.

In "Final Story" Loomis demonstrates how evidence shows she had more fuel on her plane than she actually knew. Evidence shows that on three occassions she "accidentally" flew 200 miles to the north of where she was supposed to go - and her radioman Harry Manning said it was "BECAUSE SHE HAD A TENDENCY TO DRIFT WHILE SHE WAS FLYING THE PLANE."  He mentioned how she had drifted "200 miles" to the north when he flew on the Electra with her. (He was supposed to be on her world flight, but got off after her crash in Hawaii.)  Harry Manning.  If the Electra drifted 200 miles North, she would have enough fuel to make it to the Marshalls.  But the important detail is THAT MANY PEOPLE SAW HER COME DOWN, MANY SAW HER AND THE PLANE AFTER SHE DISAPPEARED.

But Dick followed up on these stories recently, because he knows and loves the people of the Marshalls, and with the help of a local "chief" or "king" of the islands, went out and found a small piece of a plane and brought it back to Seattle to his friend Jim Hayton, the aviation expert.  

And Jim said that it looked like a piece from her plane, could be part of an Electra - but while looking over Dick's footage discovered something that looked more promising.  

The Good Year Airwheel from the Electra

So Dick went back and recovered that piece Jim saw - which Jim identified immediately as being a dust shield that came from between the brake unit and the wheel itself of the Electra.  The size is correct, and as he put it "could only have come from an Electra built identically to her plane." HE RECOGNIZED THE PIECE FROM THE PHOTOGRAPH AND KNEW EXACTLY WHAT IT WAS.

He also explained to me: "The reason it is made of aluminum instead of steel, is that, since it is attached to the magnesium wheel, a steel dust shield would instantly corrode the wheel."

There were no other planes on this island, and no air battles fought overhead or nearby.  So it's the only pieces from an airplane that they could find during their search.

I had the opportunity to access an Electra 10E manual where the piece is clearly identified - as the piece that Jim said that it was. He was correct about the manufacture of the airwheel, and the identity of the piece, both of which are in the manual for the Electra.

Also I got to examine a piece of the actual Electra, that had been retrieved from the plane before it left.  And to my untrained eye, the paint from the original piece Dick found, and the paint from the actual plane looks mighty similar.  Forensic spectrometry could solve that riddle. (The owner of the piece was emphatic in the disbelief she landed in Mili, and is in no way associated with my search for the Electra.  A respected pilot, I won't mention their name with regard to any part of this story, as per their request.)

I'm not posting photos of their find until after they're posted in the media and papers, and I'll leave that to them to license their work in any way they see fit.  Both Dick and Jim are not in the Earhart discovery game, are not treasure hunters, but are experts in their respective fields.  Dick knows a lot about the islands where these parts were found, and Jim knows alot about where on an Electra they would go. 

So.  Where does that leave us?

First, I know there was a "piece of the Electra found" last week - which is reportedly, according to forensic testimony, a piece of a PBY plane that was found on Nikaumaroro and identified 22 years ago by Elgen Long (who spoke with National Geographic and Can Imaging Analysis Solve Mystery of Amelia Earhart's Disappearance?) - that the piece matches a PBY plane exactly.  I'm in awe of those folks' ability to command media attention at every swing of the bat, and wish the same for Dick and Jim, as they've gone a long way and have a great story to tell.)

But this discovery, if verified, will be the linchpin to the story on these pages - that is repeated in the footage to the right of this page, with eyewitness testimony from those who saw her after she came down, saw her incarcerated, saw the plane.

(IT'S 36 MINUTES LONG)

Watch that footage to see that there are eyewitnesses to her coming down in Mili, eyewitnesses to her plane being picked up by a barge and taken to a Japanese ship, eyewitnesses who saw the plane aboard the ship, eyewitnesses who saw her and Fred aboard that ship, eyewitnesses who saw the ship follow a route to Japan.  (Saipan had been part of Japan since 1914, and for purposes of clarity, and common sense, it should be referred to as such, since the Japanese considered it home territory, the way we considered Pearl Harbor home territory. Their Pacific military headquarters were located there as well.)

Her plane was found by US forces on this airfield in June of 1944.  In the foreground is a plane that was burned, but the wings were not destroyted.

At least two eyewitnesses saw Amelia and Fred come ashore in Saipan in 1937, other eyewitnesses saw her on the island from that point forward, and according to the testimony we recently got from eyewitnesses in Saipan, more than one person saw her up until 1944 when the US invaded. 

Fred Noonan's piercing blue eyes were identified by people who saw him aboard a Japanese ship who had never seen the color before.  Amelia and Fred were wounded, they were treated and taken to Japan (Saipan) where the were incarcerated, according to numerous eyewitnesses. (See the footage to the right for some of their accounts).

Eyewitnesses saw the plane in a hangar at the airfield on Saipan before the war, and then during the invasion by the Americans, US Marines reported finding the plane in a hangar in June of 44.  Many people saw it, many we've spoken to and filmed - enough that it doesn't make a lick of sense how or why they would make something like this up.  After all, US Marines aren't prone to making stuff up.  And if they were, we would have heard stories of her on Okinawa, Tawara, or other islands they also fought and died for.

And these US Marines also saw it fly on Saipan in June of 44. 

So that could only mean that her plane had been repaired in the ensuing seven years, and also would account for why the planes that attacked Pearl Harbor had knock off Electra (Pratt & Witney) engines.  And US Marines reported seeing the plane not only at the airfield, but also watched as it was destroyed by US forces for reasons beyond my capacity to understand, or desire to know.

Fred was reportedly executed early on, Amelia was reportedly executed later on.  There were more than one location where islanders claim she was buried - we have a couple of accounts of her death, one who claims she saw her shot, another who claims her father, brother in law of the police chief at that time period, ordered her beheading.  And we have two reports that claim the story of her cremation.  We also have the crematorium on camera.  

Was she buried or cremated?  Again, it's not a piece of the story that's worth pursuing or pinning down.  It's important that Amelia be remembered not for how she died, but for how she lived.  

She died because she was an American. For that alone she deserves to be honored.

So.  These exciting developments have not gone unnoticed by the national media, and from what I understand, will soon, within hours, or days become part of the official revision of this story. 

And we have Dick Spink the school teacher, and Jim Hayton the aviation expert to thank for supplying this amazing, fantastic piece to this overall puzzle.  Thank you!

Stay tuned.