Why It Took 23 Yrs to Link Amelia Earhart’s Disappearance to This Scrap of Metal | Hacker News Reader

Why It Took 23 Yrs to Link Amelia Earhart’s Disappearance to This Scrap of Metal

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58 pointsmocy15 comments

It is funny that he is pretending to have only realized what this patch "is" as there were claims from TIGHAR several years ago that this piece of metal could be that patch. As I commented on another article, yesterday, I am highly skeptical of any of their claims as they seem to draw highly fanciful conclusions from very little evidence.

We only have to wait to see if they do discover anything next year. There are only so many times you can cry wolf.

I agree there is a high amount of speculation in this article, and he's not the first person to suggest that this item is the patch from her aircraft. (http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/06/27/photos-could-prove...)

Either way, I'm curious if they will find anything with an ROV. Coral reefs in the middle of the ocean don't provide the necessary protection to preserve an artifact like her aircraft. Which would explain why a single piece was found washed up on an island.

My first thought in seeing this headline was to think "no these guys again." They do this every few years. They trot out some new piece of "evidence" in an attempt to drum up money for yet another expedition to the Nikumaroro island. Never mind that they've already been there 10 times and have failed to come up with anything credible.

It is also worth noting that the island in question has been periodically inhabited for much of the century prior to TIGHAR beginning its investigation, so the discovery of numerous artifacts is unsurprising, but it hasn't stopped them from trying to link everything they find to Earhart. What's more, the records of radio communication with the aircraft don't support the notion that they would have landed so far off course.

The thing that's changed recently is the theory about which part of the airplane the patch might have been applied to.

From http://tighar.org/wiki/2-2-V-1 (http://tighar.org/aw/mediawiki/index.php?title=2-2-V-1&oldid... if the wiki page gets edited):

> "All aspects of the artifact, including the rivet pattern, fit closely with a section of the belly on the right hand side of the aircraft between stations 269 5/8ths and 293 5/8ths..."

My recollection is that they ultimately decided that the patch did not match the section of the belly described in the quote. It's only been in the last couple of months that they started thinking that the patch might have been one that covered the window.

(Qualifier: I know very little about planes or the background of this case)

If the part found was a last minute patch, I'd guess that the patch wasn't properly attached, so came off in flight; then the plane crashed as a result of losing the patch. Otherwise, what are the chances of that being the only piece found...

That's the first thought that springs to mind, but not necessarily the case.

Aircraft from that era were quite solid and they did not have a pressurized hull. The Lockheed Electra and other similar aircraft from the same era flew in wartime operations and regularly came back full of holes.

A single window broken cover should not bring an otherwise sound 1930s era aircraft down.

Exactly correct. There is no way a missing window would bring down the plane, especially the back window, unless by some freak accident the patch damaged a control surface on the tail by breaking free. One can think of an almost limitless list of more likely hypotheses.

To be completely fair, a list such as insulating foam peeling off and striking the wing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Columbia#Final_mi...) or a random bird striking a plane and causing a failure (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird_strike#Incidents)? I'm not saying it happened, or even that it's likely, I'm saying stranger things have happened.

Planes could take a lot of beating and still fly. Grandfather flew a bomber in World War 2 and planes would come back with hundreds of holes. Losing a patch should not have brought down the plane. A modern airline, yes, it could have a much bigger effect. Pressurized hulls, electronic flight systems etc are more fragile.

reminds of a HN favorite story, about how the study of bombers links up with work done today

http://www.fastcodesign.com/1671172/how-a-story-from-world-w...

Regarding this being the only piece found... if they needed to get parts off the plane for use as tools, this patch would be a good target piece of metal to go for prying free. I still feel the odds are pretty slim but they make an interesting (if sketchy) case. Hopefully something more concrete will come up in future.

https://hn.algolia.com/?q=amelia+earhart+metal#!/story/sort_...

Is there even a legit/documented chain of custody on the metal patch?

Clearly after becoming a castaway Earhart learned to fight and became a ninja. She managed to get of the Island, and when she returned she became a bad-ass vigilante. She didn't tell anyone she came back because that would have made it more likely that her secret identity would be discovered.

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