stendec mystery solved

Improperly loaded, it crashed on landing, killing 80 of the people on board -- at the time, the worst air disaster in world history. Neither men were taken to the jail. STENDEC is the same Morse as SCTI AR if you don't consider any spacing between characters. A quality comment reply on reddit my mind truly is blown. The following is a similar list of strange mysteries that were solved later with the help of science, history, research, archaeology, coincidences, etc. [12], A report by an amateur radio operator who claimed to have received a faint SOS signal from Star Dust initially raised hopes that there might have been survivors,[11] but all subsequent attempts over the years to find the vanished aircraft failed. The Army unit also discovered that the wheels on the plane were in an upward position, so the crew had not attempted an emergency landing. Full video here breaking down the story -, A subreddit dedicated to the unresolved mysteries of the world. Some things can be said with some degree of certainty. This was the case in 1947 when an airliner crashed in the Andes, killing everyone aboard. The theory about it being a code for the airport makes a lot more sense. [17] One of the pilots recalled that "we had all been warned not to enter cloud over the mountains as the turbulence and icing posed too great a threat. STENDEC Solved (Mystery message from 1947 Andes plane crash) Lancasters had four Rolls Royce Merlin engines, the front-line combat engine that powered the latest Spitfire and Mustang fighters. The unit had to finish quickly. use SOS, the internationally accepted distress signal? STENDEC Solved (Mystery message from 1947 Andes plane crash) By Shiplord Kirel: Fan of Big Bird, Bert, and Ernie Weird December 2010 Views: 31,881 Tweet ntskeptics.org The "STENDEC mystery," referring to the cryptic message sent by a Lancastrian airliner before it vanished in the Andes, is a staple of the UFO culture. - /. full message sent at 17.41 hrs was as follows: Using the Thanks SK. was that a small rearrangement of the dots and dashes (for example . The North Texas Skeptic It was underpowered, unstable in yaw on the ground (pilots of the Tudor got used to feeding in power at different levels from each engine on takeoff to prevent the beast from departing uncontrollably off the side of the runway), unpleasant to handle in the air, prone to leaks of all kinds, and an ergonomic and maintenance nightmare. In Morse code, determining accurate spacing between characters is vital to properly interpret the message; "STENDEC" uses exactly the same dot/dash sequence as "SCTI AR" (the four-letter code for Los Cerrillos Airport in Santiago, "over"). But would they repeat AR too, not just the airport code, for clarity? One of the two main landing wheels was still fully inflated after a half century! Whilst many accepted that the fate of Stardust and its crew had been settled, the absence of a wreckage, along with the mysterious circumstances surrounding its final message, lead to widespread speculation, with theories spanning from sabotage to extraterrestrial in nature. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa_EU5_gWrA, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1947_BSAA_Avro_Lancastrian_Star_Dust_accident#cite_note-SAR_Technology_-_Aviation_Cold_Case_Response-22, https://www.planeandpilotmag.com/article/a-pilots-last-words-stendec/, https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/vanished/stendec.html, https://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2000/vanished.shtml, https://www.thevintagenews.com/2018/02/05/stendec-mystery/, https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2002/sep/06/owenbowcott1v, https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/jul/08/2, http://www.sartechnology.ca/sartechnology/ST_STENDEC_ColdCase.htm, http://www.ntskeptics.org/2010/2010december/december2010.pdf, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosigns_for_Morse_code, https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2002/sep/06/owenbowcott1. (STENDEC) With the plane supposedly minutes away from the airport, the final word from the Lancastrian became shrouded in mystery when the plane, along with everyone on board, vanished into thin air. You can post your own LGF Pages simply by registering a free account with us. STENDEC" That wasthe last message received from Star Dust, sent by Radio Officer Dennis Harmer at 17:41 on 2nd August 1947. In 2000 the Argentine Army detachment found the debris scattered over one square kilometer, a relatively small area, so the bomb theory was discarded. The experienced crew of the "Stardust" apparently realized the plane was off course in a northerly direction (it was found eighty kilometers off its flight path), or they purposely departed from the charted route to avoid bad weather. You can post your own LGF Pages simply by registering a free account with us. This would mean the message he was trying to send Los Cerrillos was instead: When you look at the beginning of the words, you can notice some similarities, which shows how easy it can sometimes be to mistranslate morse code. That is the official ruling of an Oklahoma court. How police solved the mystery of a VHS tape depicting sexual assault The Disappearance of Flight CS-59. The "STENDEC" Mystery As the compressed snow turned to ice, the wreckage would have been incorporated into the body of the glacier, with fragments emerging many years later and much further down the mountain. method of signalling a late arrival amongst RAF radio operators.. / - / .- / .-.. / .- / - / . Not understanding the word "STENDEC" he queried it STENDEC - The World's Most Mysterious Morse Code - Reddit It's possible that the desire to descend as soon as possible to a level at which the passengers could breathe normally may have factored into Star Dust's premature departure from a safe crossing altitude. Though it had as its General Manager a pilot of exceptional distinction -- Air Vice Marshal D.C.T. . STENDEC. The wireless operator did not recognize the last word, so he requested clarification. The first letter has to be V, and the rest just fall into place-ALP-a perfect match in Morse. NOVA Online | Vanished! | Theories (Jan. 31, 2001) - PBS Even parts of the plane had been frozen in time, with one of its wheels still fully inflated after spending half a century lost on the glacier. Another expose from ProPublica propublica.org Bonnie Martin kept the bleeding secret for as long as she could. Both in London and in Buenos Aires, the pilot, Reginald Cook, had been briefed not to take this option if bad weather prevailed, but despite this advice, Cook had chosen to fly Stardust along this central route. It is thought that the plane may have caused an avalanche upon impact, resulting in the snowy burial of the aircraft, concealing it from searchers whilst at the same time preserving it for its eventual discovery years later. Plane and Pilot expands upon the vast base of knowledge and experience from aviations most reputable influencers to inspire, educate, entertain and inform. . To use it, drag this button to your browser's bookmark bar, and title it 'LGF Pages' (or whatever you like). Blast From the Past: The North Texas Skeptic, May 1999, Republican Senator Claims 'The Left' Will Start a Civil War Unless Federal Highway System Abolished, A Christian Health Nonprofit Saddled Thousands With Debt as It Built a Family Empire Including a Pot Farm, a Bank and an Airline, Popular Instagram Photographer Revealed as AI Fraud, Cutting IRS Funding Is a Gift to Americas Wealthiest Tax Evaders, Record 6,542 Guns Intercepted at US Airport Security in 22, Interview With Oklahoma State Sen. Nathan Dahm, US: Russia Has Committed Crimes Against Humanity in Ukraine, Joel Cummins Umphreys McGee Keyboard Rig - January 2023 [VIDEO], Oklahoma Judge Transfers Lesbian Moms Parental Rights to Her Sons Sperm Donor. Some politicians have irresponsibly suggested that every new IRS employee will be a gun-toting enforcement agent. Mistakenly believing they had already cleared the mountain tops, they started their descent when they were in fact still behind cloud-covered peaks. It was delivered to BSAA on 12 January 1946, was registered on 16 January as G-AGWH and given the individual aircraft name "Star Dust". Jos Avery has been posting his impressive photos Twitter continues to crumble bit by bit. . Part of the problem was that BSAA was operating types of aircraft that were at the extreme limits of their capabilities. Imaginative souls speculated that aliens had snatched the large Lancastrian along with its passengers and crew. This would have explained the suddenness of its disappearance, and the fact that large pieces of wreckage had not been spotted during a wide air and land search. However, while the aircraft was unpressurized, its crew had been supplied with oxygen. The message was repeated-STENDEC, then transmitted a third time. The Mystery of STENDEC - Skeptoid (STENDEC) My god, I'm still just sort of dumbfounded by how good and informative this post is. The theory BBC2 9:00pm Thursday 2nd November 2000, Although science has solved But before that, to help understand the [3][pageneeded], Star Dust carried six passengers and a crew of five on its final flight. (0), By Shiplord Kirel: Fan of Big Bird, Bert, and Ernie. 10 'Unsolved' Mysteries That Have Been Solved | HowStuffWorks Each letter in morse code consists of a number of unique dots and dashes, so to scramble a word like descent in such a way is highly unlikely, especially three times in succession. The investigators concluded that the aircraft had not stalled. STENDEC." That was the last communication sent in Morse code on August 2, 1947, by an Avro 691 Lancastrian aircraft flying for British South American Airways from Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Santiago, Chile. Furthermore, whilst it is relatively easy / . A Spanish magazine about UFOs appropriated STENDEK as its title, and at least one U.S. comic book illustrated the disappearance of the Stardust, pondering the meaning of STENDEC for its fascinated readers. The STENDEC Puzzle | Science 2.0 For regular taxpayers, the consequence is slow customer service and processing delays. . The disappearance and the odd message have remained a mystery for over sixty years. BSAA ran out of money and passengers' confidence in 1949, with the result that it was forcibly incorporated into the state-owned British Overseas Airways Corporation, a component of today's British Airways. . On August 2, 1947, the Stardust, a Lancastrian III passenger plane with eleven people on board, was almost four hours into its flight from Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Santiago, Chile. An extensive search operation failed to locate the wreckage, despite covering the area of the crash site. [10] However, Star Dust never arrived, no more radio transmissions were received by the airport, and intensive efforts by both Chilean and Argentine search teams, as well as by other BSAA pilots, failed to uncover any trace of the aircraft or of the people on board. enigmatic radio message was meant to mean. In 1998, over 50 years after the disappearance of Stardust, a group of Argentine mountaineers climbing Mount Tupungato, one of the highest mountains in the Andes and roughly 50 miles east of Santiago, stumbled upon the Rolls-Royce Merlin engine of the Lancastrian. Anagram Theory If spacing between letters is hard to distinguish, its clear to see how some characters can be accidentally mistaken for others, leading to incorrect words or phrases. Could it be that Stardust were informing Los Cerrillos that they were on course for Rodelillo Airfield near Valparaiso instead, diverging from their original route? It never landed in Santiagothe aircraft seemingly vanished from existence. On this ill-fated day, a British South American Airways airliner called Star Dust carrying six passengers and five crew members crashed during its journey from Buenos Aires to Santiago. 1 "The Bloop" is an underwater mystery that took nearly 10 years to solve. DNA clues reveal 55-year-old secrets behind crash of the Star Dust Its meaning, however, is astonishingly simple. Several people have pointed out that normal for the Radio Operator to start the message by transmitting the name Weird December 2010 Views: 31,751. _.. . Cook had been awarded the Distinguished Service Order (DSO) and the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC). three times.STENDEC/Stardust There's still no explanation for the loss of Star Ariel, but so many things went wrong with Tudors on such a regular basis that its disappearance is hardly to be wondered at. More interestingly, the morse code for STENDEC is only one character off from instead spelling VALP, which is almost the call sign for the closest airport to Valparaiso, 110km northwest of Santiago. destroyer escort during the 70's.We were morse code trained. attention, and another signing off. The letter was not C. Nor were the first two letters of this strange message ST: / . The last word in Star Dust's final Morse code transmission to Santiago airport, "STENDEC", was received by the airport control tower four minutes before its planned landing and repeated twice; it has never been satisfactorily explained. Explaining the unexplained: 10 famous mysteries solved Dear NOVA, I am a radio amateur who actively uses the Morse Code. In either case, they attempted to contact what they thought was the nearest airport, Valparaiso, not Santiago. the ETA. [10], In 1998, two Argentine mountaineers climbing Mount Tupungatoabout 60mi (100km) west-southwest of Mendoza, and about 50mi (80km) east of Santiagofound the wreckage of a Rolls-Royce Merlin aircraft engine, along with twisted pieces of metal and shreds of clothing, in the Tupungato Glacier at an elevation of 15,000ft (4,600m). As mentioned previously, the standard morse code for a distress signal is SOS, which is much easier and quicker to communicate than STENDEC. Very good writeup! Already a member? The word simply has no meaning in any language, not even in Morse code. / - /. Moreover, operators at the time only referred to aircraft by their registration code, which in Star Dusts case was G-AGWH., Acronym Theory However, the mystery of the final radio message remains. which is identical - although with different spacings - to EC. And similarly why would an operator say ETA LATE when he had only Sometimes These Enigmas Never Decipher. With the word not existing in international morse code, or any spoken language at the time, interpreting STENDEC has led to many varying theories. by John . . Another expose from ProPublica propublica.org Bonnie Martin kept the bleeding secret for as long as she could. Listener Feedback: Provisos, Addenda, and Quid Pro Quos - Skeptoid They were in a remarkable state of preservation; freeze-dried by icy winds, the remains had not suffered bacteriological decay. Ball lightning doesn't happen very often, so it hasn't been recorded under natural conditions. Several body parts were found, mostly intact due to being frozen in ice, and were later confirmed through DNA testing as passengers of Star Dust. [8], Star Dust left Buenos Aires at 1:46 pm on 2 August. This button leads to the main index of LGF Pages, our user-submitted articles. These included suggestions that the radio operator, possibly suffering from hypoxia, had scrambled the word "DESCENT" (of which "STENDEC" is an anagram); that "STENDEC" may have been the initials of some obscure phrase or that the airport radio operator had misheard the Morse code transmission despite it reportedly having been repeated multiple times. The Theory [11] The head of BSAA, Air Vice Marshal Don Bennett, personally directed an unsuccessful five-day search. The Star Dust Mystery Damn Interesting 1 Pan Am Flight 7 Morse allows a maximum of four dots and dashes in any letter, narrowing the possibility for mistakes. Discussion The STENDEC Puzzle Ever since BSAA Avro Lancastrian Star Dust vanished on a flight from Buenos Aires to Santiago, the ending of its final transmission - STENDEC - has continued to puzzle experts and amateurs alike. ATLANTA (AP) The woman flying out of Philadelphias airport last year remembered to pack snacks, prescription medicine and a cellphone in her handbag. between the letters). some similarities both in Morse code and English /- /.-/ .-./ -../ ..-/ / - (Stardust) For other uses, see, Discovery of wreckage and reconstruction of the crash, "Pilot finally cleared over mystery of 1947 mountain plane disaster", "Aircraft operated by British South American Airways", "DNA clues reveal 55-year-old secrets behind crash of the Star Dust", "Vanished: 1947 Official Accident Report", "I Am Alive: The Crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571", Ministry of Civil Aviation official report on the accident, 1948, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1947_BSAA_Avro_Lancastrian_Star_Dust_accident&oldid=1142432641, This page was last edited on 2 March 2023, at 10:00. From this time In January 2000, they located the site and began recovering debris. In Mendoza, one startling picture published in the city's newspapers aroused particular curiosity. As it turns out, STENDEC is an anagram of the word descent. One popular theory is that the crew, flying at 24,000 feet in an unpressurized aircraft, suffered from hypoxia. On July 3, a rancher at Roswell, New Mexico, claimed to have found a UFO crash site with four alien bodies. of mystery, confusion and intrigue ever since. That was / -.. / . STENDEC Solved (Mystery message from 1947 Andes plane crash) In fact, the omission of the dot in the original transmission was not an error. that a radio operator would resort to convoluted messages based It has to be this one in my opinion. If not V, then the first letters might have been EIN, or IAR, but these combinations lead nowhere. And if there was any meaning to it, it wasnt in regards to the crash. made with the control tower at Santiago. Vanished: The Plane That Disappeared "Stardust tank empty no diesel expected crash" Four letter ICAO codes for airports had Martin Colwell's theory on the mystery "STENDEC" Another noticeable similarity is that the word STENDEC has some resemblance to the word STARDUST, and perhaps Harmer misspelled the name of the aircraft in morse code. operator to scramble the message. [5] The passengers were one woman and five men of Palestinian, Swiss, German and British nationality. Before this message a series of entirely routine messages had been So apparently the mystery hasn't been solved, because I don't see anything in the article suggesting anyone understands what Stendec meant. A WGBH-Boston NOVA: Vanished (2001) program about the crash commented: Some of the six passengers on board seemed to have stepped straight out of an Agatha Christie novel. They included a Palestinian businessman with a sizable diamond sewn into the lining of his jacket; a German migr, Marta Limpert, returning to Chile with the ashes of her dead husband; and a British courier carrying diplomatic correspondence. At around 5:41pm, after transmitting routine communications to the plane as usual, the control tower at Los Cerrillos Airport in Santiago received this morse code message from Stardust: Perplexed by the final word in the telegram, the Chilean operator requested Stardusts radio officer, Dennis Harmer, to relay the message back to him, only to hear the same word, STENDEC, repeated loud and clearly twice in succession. reception of the signal was loud and clear but that it was given They included Palestinian, Swiss, German and British passengers, a diplomatic courier and the crew: the pilot Reginald Cooke, 44; first officer Norman Hilton Cooke, 39; radiotelegraph operator Dennis Harmer, 27; second officer Donald Checklin, 27; and Iris Evans. that Morse transmissions were closing down. Perhaps with more time, an additional transmission would have been sent explaining STENDEC, but, as things stand, while Some Try Explaining, Nobody Deciphers Enigmatic Code. The STENDEC mystery, referring to the cryptic message sent by a Lancastrian airliner before it vanished in the Andes, is a staple of the UFO culture. Didn't the test Tudor flight crash because the aileron controls had been reversed (e.g trying to roll right rolled the aircraft left) or am I thinking of a different British test aircraft crash. The Army unit also discovered that the wheels on the plane were in an upward position, so the crew had not attempted an emergency landing. Grand Duchess Anastasia (with her arm around her brother) is shown with the rest of the Russian royal family in 1913. Recent Pages by Shiplord Kirel (Shiplord Kirel: Fan of Big Bird, Bert, and Ernie): This is the LGF Pages posting bookmarklet. But what was Jon Stewart asks when we will have enough guns -- watch to the end to watch him absolutely stick the landing. [15] During the final portion of Star Dust's flight, heavy clouds would have blocked visibility of the ground. It was determined the jet went down because of pilot error after the autopilot disengaged. - / . Tragically, that wasn't the last disaster in which Bennett and the Tudor were involved. this correspondent conceded that "the last bit may be a bit muddled"). Christie could have made something of this, but the passengers were quite unwilling and unwitting victims. up sign. It was concluded that, being his first Trans-Andean flight in command, and in view of the weather conditions, Cook should not have crossed via the direct route, and despite the absence of a wreckage, the plane likely perished somewhere along the snowy peaks of the Andes Mountains. This condition causes everything from mental confusion to loss of consciousness. / -. Their discovery revived. Once again, no distress signal was received. NOVA Online | Vanished! | Solve the Mystery of STENDEC This theory is an easy one to break apart. [6], A recovered propeller showed that the engine had been running at near-cruising speed at the time of the impact. ntskeptics.org The "STENDEC mystery," referring to the cryptic message sent by a Lancastrian airliner before it vanished in the Andes, is a staple of the UFO culture. the operator use a calling up sign in the middle of his message? Theories include everything from sabotage to aliens. Outside of the music world, Joel is a best-selling author, releasing The Realists Guide to a Successful Music Career, which features Kris Williams is a lesbian, and that means she wont be seeing her son anytime soon. STENDEC was corrupted into Stendek and became the name of a Spanish It was also, as OP says, unpressurized, so that passengers as well as crew had to breathe supplemental oxygen through masks while above 15,000 feet. People all over the world had reported hundreds of flying saucer sightings during the last two weeks of June 1947. Outside of the music world, Joel is a best-selling author, releasing The Realists Guide to a Successful Music Career, which features Kris Williams is a lesbian, and that means she wont be seeing her son anytime soon. The unit had to finish quickly. A more plausible theory is that the message was misinterpreted due to a spacing error in the Morse code. The crash was a result of controlled descent into terrain. STENDEC and STAR DUST are coded similarly in both English and Morse code, causing some to theorize that Harmer sent one when he actually meant the other. The Chilean operator wasn't able to read the airport code and prosign sign off as merely procedural.Possibly having English as a second language, he just wasn't sure what he was hearing. Miracle in the Andes is an excellent book by the way. "Santiago tower message now descending entering cloud" (or "Santiago Explanations based in Morse code The captain, Reginald Cook, was an experienced former Royal Air Force pilot with combat experience during the Second World War, as were his first officer, Norman Hilton Cook, and second officer, Donald Checklin. NOVA Online | Vanished! | Theories (Feb. 8, 2001) - PBS Los Cerrillos airport Santiago was given was SCTI. Bennett, commander of the Royal Air Force's [Pathfinders](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathfinder_(RAF) during the Second World War -- it developed an unenviable record for unexplained disappearances of its airliners in flight. Dennis Harmer at 17:41 on 2nd August 1947. sent one final message in Morse code which was picked up by the STENDEC - Solved?! Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. I remember him in his RAF uniform during the war. A common example of this would be SOS, which is the internationally recognised distress signal in morse code to call for help. Thanks SK. . Variations suggested that the crew might have been suffering from Adding to the mystery, two Avro 691 Lancastrian aircraft had crashed during the previous seventeen months. - / . [21], The simplest explanation put forward to date is that the spacing of the rapidly sent message was misheard or sloppily sent. The most likely reality is that sending STENDEC was a mistake of some sort by Star Dusts radio operator. The message was repeated-STENDEC, then transmitted a third time. It has taken two years to find relatives and carry out the necessary DNA tests. Her sisters, boyfriend and sons knew nothing of her illness until suddenly, during a family gathering in October 2018 at a diner in Reading The Online Photographer lead me to this article. Other explanations for the appearance A Pilot's Last Words: "STENDEC" - Plane & Pilot Magazine Iris Evans, who had previously served in the Women's Royal Naval Service ("Wrens") as a chief petty officer, was the flight attendant. The Stardust incident involved British South American Airways G-AGWH.