Expedition Seeks Amelia Earhart's Plane on Remote Pacific Island
Researchers are investigating a suspected aircraft wreckage in the hope of solving the decades-old mystery of the pioneering aviator's disappearance.
A team of researchers from the U.S.-based Archaeological Legacy Institute (ALI) and Purdue University are en route to Nikumaroro Island in the Pacific Ocean, aiming to investigate what they believe could be the wreckage of aviator Amelia Earhart's plane.
The expedition hopes to solve the mystery of Earhart's disappearance in 1937, when she vanished while attempting to circumnavigate the globe. Decades of speculation have followed her fate.
The researchers are currently halfway to the remote island aboard the Marin Mainiku, a vessel operated by the Kiribati National Shipping Line. They departed Kiribati's capital on Wednesday for the 830-mile journey.
Their objective is to examine an object first identified in satellite imagery in 2020 as the "Taraia Object." This object has been confirmed to be visible in aerial photography of the area dating back to 1938, according to Purdue University.
Upon arrival, the team will need to navigate a reef gap created by the British in 1963, the last time the island was inhabited. "Finding Amelia Earhart's Electra aircraft would be the discovery of a lifetime," said Richard Pettigrew, head of the ALI and the expedition lead.
Earhart, a pioneering aviator, was attempting to become the first woman to complete a circumnavigational flight of the globe when she disappeared.
A map showing the Pacific Ocean, with relative locations of the US, Japan, Howland Island, and Nikumaroro Island.
