NavList:

[references this thread of posts from 2009 by Gary LaPook and Paul Hirose]

Jon Myhre in his book Discovery of Flight-19 mentions both the 91 and 97 degree bearings and though I don't remember the exact reasoning for both, there is a nice chart in the book giving all the specifications for Navigational Problem 1. including magnetic deviations. I too find it interesting that they would be expected to fly the 91 degree azimuth to Great Isaac Cay and not the SS Sapona.  Since it was a dead reckoning exercise and there were no clocks in the students planes, they were evidently expected just to head due South West from the island waypoint. Or can you see the wreck at 1000 feet from that distance of four or five miles?  Though I am not a pilot nor do I have the in depth navigation knowledge I would think that the 97 degree Azimuth would have taken them straight into the bombing target and they would navigate by site back to the lighthouse and the 91 T course to finish that leg.  Either way I agree the island would be a man made feature used to navigate back to the origianal course.  In the end I would love to see someone GPS the flight path along side a standard compass of the time in flight.  Since that area has an agonic line that seems to fluctuate to apoint where at times there is no magnetic declination it would be interesting to compare and contrast the findings to those of 1945.