The Avro Lancastrian began its life as a British Lancaster bomber in World War II. How police solved the mystery of a VHS tape depicting sexual assault. 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. The airliner will stay lost for 51 years until 1998 when mountaineers find parts of the wreckage on Mount Tupungato 50 miles east from the planes destination, Santiago. most of the mysteries surrounding Stardusts disappearance, Many people wrote pointing out that STENDEC is an anagram of descent. Is that the one where they all started eating each other? Just before the plane disappeared, it up sign. /-.-. - . With morse code being a binary combination of dots and dashes, something as simple as one or two incorrect inputs can make a drastic difference to how a word is interpreted. Relatives of the crew and passengers aboard a British plane which plunged into an Argentinian glacier 55 years ago have been told this week their DNA samples match human remains recovered from a crash site 15,000ft up in the Andes. There are old pilots and there are bold pilots. Below we include a All rights reserved. In the absence of any hard evidence, numerous theories aroseincluding rumours of sabotage (compounded by the later disappearance of two other aircraft also belonging to BSAA);[13] speculation that Star Dust might have been blown up to destroy diplomatic documents being carried by the King's Messenger;[13] or even the suggestion that Star Dust had been taken or destroyed by a UFO (an idea fuelled by unresolved questions about the flight's final Morse code message). The theory is the pilot mistakenly plotted their course as if they were leaving from a different airport, and it led to them crashing into a mountain. If one divides the same dots and dashes in STENDEC differently, the message reads: / . The trekkers had abandoned their pack mules lower down, and ascended with what they could carry. 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. The flight was conducted in zero-visibility conditions, so its unlikely the crew had any idea their plane was about to impact a mountainside. made with the control tower at Santiago. NOVA Online | Vanished! | STENDEC Theories - PBS This button leads to the main index of LGF Pages, our user-submitted articles. 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. For over fifty years the disappearance ranked as one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of the aviation world, and a lively and inventive mythology grew up around the incident. - / . They were so far off course they were trapped in the mountains struggling to survive for 72 days before they were rescued, and then only because of an incredible hike out of the mountains by two of the severely weakened survivors with no climbing gear or experience or any idea where they really were. I couldnt find a source for this, but according to theorists online, this was a known phrase for allied fighter pilots in WWII for if their plane was about to crash land. After an exhausting search, no trace of the aircraft was found. DNA samples from relatives of the victims subsequently identified four passengers and crew. Seems very unlikely. some similarities both in Morse code and English /- /.-/ .-./ -../ ..-/ / - (Stardust) the disappearance of the plane - coupled with its final strange Their curse was too much sky. The central route via Mendoza was considered to be the quickest of the three, yet potentially the most dangerous depending on weather conditions. The dots and dash formed one letter, V: / . NOVA Online | Vanished! | 1947 Official Accident Report Sometimes human error leads to some of the most interesting mysteries but generally when you hear hooves you want to think horses before you think zebras. But would they repeat AR too, not just the airport code, for clarity? that Morse transmissions were closing down. 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. If they wanted to convey distress, they would have sent an SOS., Misinterpretation Theory [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. STENDEC - The World's Most Mysterious Morse Code - YouTube My god, I'm still just sort of dumbfounded by how good and informative this post is. [8], Star Dust left Buenos Aires at 1:46 pm on 2 August. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. STENDEC is the same Morse as SCTI AR if you don't consider any spacing between characters. - . What was radio operator Dennis Harmer, a highly trained wartime and civilian operator, trying to say? normal for the Radio Operator to start the message by transmitting the name A common example of this would be SOS, which is the internationally recognised distress signal in morse code to call for help. Then nothing. It has to be this one in my opinion. . [13] Some BSAA pilots, however, expressed scepticism at this theory; convinced that Cook would not have started his descent without a positive indication that he had crossed the mountains; they have suggested that strong winds may have brought down the craft in some other way. I thought this had been solved in a documentary I watched. In January 2000, they located the site and began recovering debris. All further calls were Something about how the pilots were originally British Airways pilots and that Stendec actually meant something in British Airways terminology. Something like "We're completely screwed.". Understanding STENDEC has been the quest for many experienced and avid radio operators, with online forums dedicated to deciphering what Dennis Harmer was trying to say. The unit had to finish quickly. Additionally, the condition of the wheels proved that the undercarriage was still retracted, suggesting controlled flight into terrain rather than an attempted emergency landing. The Avro Lancastrian was a civilian version of the wartime Lancaster heavy bomber. . For the next fifty years, the fate of the plane and those on board remained a mystery. 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 hastily sent morse message gives us : We will never But the budgetary toll of persistent underfunding is unmistakable. It makes me want to write out the Morse code and play with the spacing. That would leave just "END", sandwiched between a signal attracting It would have been STENDEC and Stardust have No distress transmission was received; the last broadcast from the aircraft was a routine position check, about two hours before it should have reached its destination. Another explanation, advanced at the time of the disappearance, This made for interesting reading and a welcome diversion from the usual flood of depressing news. / -.-. Both men were last spotted being arrested by deputy Steve Calkins for driving without a license. / -. 1947 BSAA Avro Lancastrian Star Dust accident - Wikipedia The operator understood that Star Dust intended to land in four minutes, but the final word, STENDEC, confused him. Become a member and get exclusive access to articles, contests and more! (0), By Shiplord Kirel: Fan of Big Bird, Bert, and Ernie. The disappearance of Terrance Williams and Felipe Santos Two men (unrelated, who didn't know each other) disappeared from Naples, Florida three months apart under the exact same circumstances. 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. 'ETA [estimated time of arrival] Santiago 17.45 hrs STENDEC' How police solved the mystery of a VHS tape depicting sexual assault Why would British Overseas Airways G-AGLX (the registration number) went down on March 23, 1946, and British Overseas Airways G-AGMF crashed on August 20. Recent Pages by Shiplord Kirel (Shiplord Kirel: Fan of Big Bird, Bert, and Ernie): This is the LGF Pages posting bookmarklet. This is fascinating. [10] The Chilean Air Force radio operator at Santiago airport described this transmission as coming in "loud and clear" but very fast; as he did not recognise the last word, he requested clarification and heard "STENDEC" repeated twice in succession before contact with the aircraft was lost. which is identical - although with different spacings - to EC. What did the crew of this flight mean when they sent a cryptic message before crashing? selection of the ideas. 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. They hadn't passed Curico. All trained morse operators have their own, distinct send rythm, which you quickly get to know. An interesting new solution to the STENDEC mystery has been proposed, as advised by listener Anders. Adding to the mystery, two Avro 691 Lancastrian aircraft had crashed during the previous seventeen months. Also, in the 1947 report, the oxygen system was noted as being fully charged, along with nine emergency bottles before leaving Buenos Aires. Investigators concluded that the crew, flying in a snowstorm against a powerful jet stream, had become confused about their location and believed they were closer to Santiago than they actually were. 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. Solve the Mystery of STENDEC Readers' Theories Set #3 Posted February 8, 2001 previous set The word STENDEC means: "Severe Turbulence Encountered, Now Descending, Emergency Crash-Landing.". (STENDEC) 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 dots and dash formed one letter, V: / . State Sen. Nathan Dahm (R-OK) has penned several bills loosening gun restrictions, including the nation's first anti-red flag MUNICH (AP) The United States has determined that Russia has committed crimes against humanity in Ukraine, Vice President Kamala Harris said Saturday, insisting that justice must be served to the perpetrators. otherwise it would not have been repeated three times. Discussion Improperly loaded, it crashed on landing, killing 80 of the people on board -- at the time, the worst air disaster in world history. UFO magazine. Sign up for our newsletter, full of tips, reviews and more! Mysteries The crew of Stardust, including the radio operator Harmer, had all served in the RAF previously during WWII, so if this phrase is true, then it is possible that they were all familiar with the term and used it in a time of crisis. Solve the Mystery of STENDEC STENDEC Theories On August 2, 1947, Stardust 's radio operator sent a final message in Morse code to the Chilean radio operator then on duty in Santiago. When flying at high altitudes, oxygen molecules are harder to inhale, and if a plane is not pressurized, it can lead to hypoxia, a condition which can impair or even completely destroy your ability to function. [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. between the letters). aircraft were usually referred to by their registration (in Stardusts message from Star Dust - "E.T.A. The theory about it meaning emergency crash landing is interesting but given a lack of sources outside of a few people telling anecdotes I don't know how believable it is. [18], Star Dust is likely to have flown into a nearly vertical snowfield near the top of the glacier, causing an avalanche that buried the wreckage within seconds and concealed it from searchers. In January 2000, a 100-man search party from the Argentine Army clambered 5,000 meters (16,400 feet) up Tupungato Mountain, a 6,552-meter (21,490-foot) volcano, where it located parts of the plane, as well as human bones, at the base of a glacier. transmitted by the plane, reporting their position and intended Could there be more to the story of Star Dusts crash? The last two possible mistranslations both involve an input mistake of some sort, but there is another phrase which uses the exact same morse code sequence as STENDEC but with different spacing. What are some SOLVED mysteries? : r/AskReddit that a radio operator would resort to convoluted messages based As one of the pilots was dying he kept repeating, "We passed Curico," still bewildered as to how they had ended up in the peaks. Weird December 2010 Views: 31,751. Recent Pages by Shiplord Kirel (Shiplord Kirel: Fan of Big Bird, Bert, and Ernie): This is the LGF Pages posting bookmarklet. An extensive search operation failed to locate the wreckage, despite covering the area of the crash site. . [16] If the airliner, which had to cross the Andes mountain range at 24,000 feet (7,300m), had entered the jet-stream zonewhich in this area normally blows from the west and south-west, resulting in the aircraft encountering a headwindthis would have significantly decreased the aircraft's ground speed. The message was repeated-STENDEC, then transmitted a third time. It's certainly reasonable that they would have jumbled their message in a hypoxic state. What did the crew of BSAA Flight CS-59 mean when they sent and repeated the cryptic message STENDEC via Morse code seconds before crashing? Something like "We're completely screwed.". (STENDEC) . of Stendec. In Britain, the news led to a hunt for surviving relatives. To put it simply, Cook chose the worst route possible in consideration of the conditions, which more than likely played a key role in the planes disappearance. Believers of this theory claim it stood for something like, Stardust tank empty, no diesel, expected crash, or, Santiago tower, emergency, now descending, entering cloud. Experts on Morse code are quick to call hogwash on this theory, however, saying that the crew would have never cryptically abbreviated an important message. - we are unable to respond to further suggestions about the meaning word is meaningless in almost every language, and trying to use With a diplomat on board, the press freely speculated that a bomb had exploded in mid-flight. An explanation of STENDEC .. - Fly With The Stars With that in mind, and the fact that the operator himself mentioned that Harmer sent the message extremely quickly, its likely that this was the message after all. Subscribe now for ad-free access!Register and sign in to a free LGF account before subscribing, and your ad-free access will be automatically enabled. makes clear, modern science has answered most of the questions surrounding the 1947 crash of the civilian aircraft Stardust in the Andes east of Santiago, Chile. End Credits. Was there a connection? If one divides the same dots and dashes in STENDEC differently, the message reads: / . USGS. An aircraft finds itself off-course and in .. based in Morse code, and have come from people highly familiar with For regular taxpayers, the consequence is slow customer service and processing delays. Pages Sign In Register Forgot password? Conspiracy Theory Watch: Don't Drink the Kool Aid. ATLANTA (AP) The woman flying out of Philadelphias airport last year remembered to pack snacks, prescription medicine and a cellphone in her handbag. Thanks SK. 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. 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. / -.. / . After getting the boot from BSAA, he launched his own fly-by-night airline, Airflight Ltd., using two Tudors he'd picked up cheaply and one of which he flew himself. (These individuals ignore the fact that almost any other triangle of a similar size, drawn anywhere else in the North Atlantic, would yield a similar if not greater number of disappearances.). Similarly, another Morse expert has pointed out that to attract The names of the victims were known. 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. 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. this correspondent conceded that "the last bit may be a bit muddled"). were all supplied with oxygen. All Rights Reserved . The first letter has to be V, and the rest just fall into place-ALP-a perfect match in Morse. In January 2000, a 100-man search party from the Argentine Army clambered 5,000 meters (16,400 feet) up Tupungato Mountain, a 6,552-meter (21,490-foot) volcano, where it located parts of the plane, as well as human bones, at the base of a glacier. To use it, drag this button to your browser's bookmark bar, and title it 'LGF Pages' (or whatever you like). 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. Four letter ICAO codes for airports had The investigators concluded that the aircraft had not stalled. The radio operator, Dennis Harmer, also had a record of wartime as well as civilian service. Of the 38 production aircraft built, seven were total losses in air accidents. very close to the airport, and one pilot and radio operator who The Theory close to an understanding of the message. On July 3, a rancher at Roswell, New Mexico, claimed to have found a UFO crash site with four alien bodies. 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. STENDEC - The World's Most Mysterious Morse Code - Reddit Morse code which the Chilean Operator believed she received was: S T E N D E C. _ . This gives us the very 10 of the Strangest Mysteries That Were Solved Later - Unbelievable Facts Top 10 Intriguing Mysteries Of South America - Listverse In the late 1990s, pieces of wreckage from the missing aircraft began to emerge from the glacial ice. Although the larger mystery was finally solved, many still wonder how experienced pilots (there were three on board) lost control of the aircraft in a seemingly manageable situation. British . "Stardust tank empty no diesel expected crash" 2023 Little Green Footballs Their discovery revived. Four letter ICAO codes for airports had Morse '._._.' / - / . Procedures for sending and receiving messages were and are standardised whether you are services or civilian operators.Regarding the 'mystery' surrounding Harmer's last transmission.Firstly, an operator always has in front of them a written copy of the message being sent. The message was repeated-STENDEC, then transmitted a third time. Banksters, Peasants, and Kim Jong Un's Grandpa: A Parable for Our Times. In fact, this conspiracy ran for so long that even a Spanish magazine published in the 1970s, which was dedicated to UFOs and the paranormal, named itself after the now infamous morse code. Then four years ago, several Argentinians climbing Mount Tupungato stumbled across part of a Rolls Royce engine, fragments of fuselage and strips of bleached clothing. / -. Mrs Coalwood said: "He was my older cousin, who I idolised hopelessly. The Message That Said STENDEC "ETA Santiago 17:45 hrs. (STENDEC) Background Whilst its possible that STENDEC could mean any one of these phrases, theres nothing definitive I can find which suggests that this phrase ever meant anything previously, making it more unlikely that this word was used intentionally at all. -, Press J to jump to the feed. 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. 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. CONCLUSION NOVA Online | Vanished! | Theories (Jan. 31, 2001) - PBS The Chilean operator did mention how Harmers messages came through unusually fast, so there is every chance that some letters were incorrectly spaced and caused confusion to the control tower.