100 lines
4.0 KiB
Plaintext
100 lines
4.0 KiB
Plaintext
FILE: FLT-19.TXT
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AUTHOR: Associated Press
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DATE: 1990?
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SUBJECT: Theory on the Fate of Missing Flight 19
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THEORY SURFACES ON FINAL FATE OF FLIGHT 19
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MIAMI (AP)--A former air traffic controller is positive he has
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unraveled the secret of Flight 19, five navy torpedo bombers that
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vanished in 1945 and fed the Bermuda Triangle legend, but getting
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proof is going to be expensive.
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Jon Myhre's solution was videotaped for a segment on NBC TV's
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"unsolved Mysteries" last week.
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But doubters include the Navy, Smithsonian Institution, six
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publishers who rejected his book manuscript and People magazine,
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which held Myhre's story after buying exclusive rights to his account.
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"I've given it my best shot. I've done everything i can do," said
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Myhre, of Lantana, who has spent his life savings of more than
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$100,000 to plot and pursue Flight 19's five Grumman TBM Avenger
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torpedo bombers. "I know I'm right. I'm just not in a position to
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prove it."
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Myhre has videotape, shot from a mini-submarine in July, of an
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upside-down Avenger sitting in 390 feet of water about 35 miles off
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Cape Canaveral, but he doesn't have its serial number.
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The plane, just 2.5 miles from where Myhre predicted Flight 19
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went down, was originally spotted during the search for debris
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from the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger, but it was
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ignored then.
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Flight 19's disappearance became part of the legend of the
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Bermuda Triangle, an area where ships and planes supposedly
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disappear under mysterious circumstances involving UFOs,
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magnetic fields and other such phenomena. Flight 19 even figured
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in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," in which first the planes
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and then the men were returned by aliens.
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Myhre's answer to the puzzle came with a flash eight years ago
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when he read the final radio transmissions form the warplanes,
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which tool off from Fort Lauderdale for a training flight over parts
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of the Bahamas on Dec. 5, 1945.
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The squadron leader's reported that both of his compasses were
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out of order.
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At one point, the squadron leader plotted a northeasterly course
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based on the assumption he has somehow reached the Florida
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Keys, on the opposite side of Florida. Myhre thinks that was part of
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the Bahamas' Abacos chain.
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At another point he reported he was over an island an no other
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land was visible.
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Myhre, who has flown the region for years, believes that was
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isolated Walker's Cay.
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By re-plotting the flight form Walker's Cay, using the Navy
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transcriptions of the flight's radio reports, Myhre came up with a
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location where he thought Flight 19, its planes out of fuel, may have
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ended.
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The spot was east of Cape Canaveral. The Avenger he filmed was
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found 2.5 miles away.
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Mayhre learned of the plane spotted during the Challenger
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search from news reports. This summer, with $25,000 raised by
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two partners, he hired a small research submarine and located the
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wreckage.
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He was unable to locate a complete aircraft serial number on the
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upside down wreck.
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Footage of the Avenger shows the last three digits--209-- of a
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five digit Navy service number on the left wingtip. Flight 19's lead
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airplane number was 73209, and Navy records show only two other
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Grumman TBM Avengers with a service number ending in 209, and
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neither was lost at sea.
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"The only thing we didn't get was a positive ID on the plane's
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serial number," Myhre said, but raising the Avenger could cost
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$250,000.
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The plane's landing gear is extended, leading some to suggest
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that plane was lost while trying to land on an aircraft carrier
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instead of the squadron's suspected ditch.
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But Myhre insists he has the right plane and knows where the
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others are.
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"The other planes are further north in much deeper water, I'm
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certain," he said. "This was just the first to ditch. And the tragic
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thing about it is he was only about seven minutes from land. If
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they'd just kept going west..."
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