A map shows the remote Pacific island where Amelia Earhart is thought to have ended her ill-fated attempt to fly around the world nearly 90 years ago, as researchers arrive onshore to investigate a suspected wreck that could finally reveal the fate of the pioneering aviator and her missing plane. The 17-person expedition backed by Purdue University are at Nikumaroro, an uninhabited coral atoll in the Republic of Kiribati, to investigate a submerged object that researchers believe could be part of Earhart's Lockheed Electra 10E aircraft. The object, known as the “Taraia Object,” appears in satellite imagery of the island's lagoon.
Its elongated shape has led researchers to suspect it could be the fuselage and tail of Earhart's missing plane. The team from Purdue University and the Archaeological Legacy Institute (ALI) arrived on Monday after a five-day, 830-nautical-mile voyage across the South Pacific. Researchers plan to use sonar, magnetometers and other archaeological techniques to examine the object and determine what lies beneath the sediment.
If the object is confirmed to be part of Earhart's aircraft, it could provide crucial evidence about what happened during her final flight in July 1937. On Tuesday, the team used chainsaws and machetes to clear an overgrown path to the island's lagoon, established staging areas and began assessing the research site, researchers told Newsweek. They encountered at least four of the island's giant, meat-eating coconut crabs on the way but reported they posed "no threat to the operation." Members also walked the sandspit on the Taraia Peninsula to look for artifacts, while the maritime archaeology team examined conditions on the lagoon floor ahead of fieldwork scheduled to begin Wednesday.
Richard Pettigrew told Newsweek previously in an exclusive interview. There’s an object visible in the Nikumaroro lagoon. Everything that we see indicates it’s very possible, perhaps even likely, that this is what remains of Amelia Earhart’s aircraft.” Earhart disappeared on July 2, 1937, while attempting to become the first woman to fly around the world along the equator.
Her journey had begun in Oakland, California, in May 1937. Accompanied by navigator Fred Noonan, she traveled eastward across the United States before heading through the Caribbean, South America, Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia and Australia. By the end of June, the pair had reached Lae, New Guinea, in what is now Papua New Guinea.
Their next destination was Howland Island, a tiny, remote Pacific island where they planned to refuel before continuing their journey. The flight from Lae to Howland was one of the most challenging legs of the journey, covering approximately 2,550 miles over open ocean. Earhart and Noonan took off from Lae on July 2.
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