Can't fault your logic Dave - except if she was flying at 10-12k how did she CFIT on ENB - fuel exhaustion is the only thing that occurs to me?
If she was DRing her way back to Rabaul in the dark wouldn't she have been transmitting on HF near constantly, as fuel ran out, thus someone would surely have heard something?
Accept what you say re the old Priest and his sister.
What are your thoughts on the striking resemblance between 'Irene' and Amelia, both physical and aircraft knowledge/personal contacts/languages spoken etc?
Is it just pure BS that 'Irene' existed and looked so much like AE that so many close personal friends wondered?
Those pictures, if not pure fabrication, are pretty compelling too...don't you think?
Wally Shirra has always struck me as a sane, thoughtful individual and he apparently believed she was alive into the 80s?
What about the Marshall Islands commemorative stamps issue in the 70s - Pure BS?
As to Jap soldiers etc remaining schtum post WW2 - I don't find that the least bit surprising.
If she was held/chose to remain in Japan how many lower ranked Japs that may have had contact with her actually survived the war even if they knew who she was?
As to why someone like her would do such a 'strange' thing - well what about Howard Hughes, Lindberg and Neil Armstrong? Great people are sometimes flawed and do things that seem VERY strange to everyone else.
Eamon De Vallera?
