A team of researchers has arrived at a remote, crab-infested island to inspect possible wreckage of the plane flown by famed aviator Amelia Earhart, who vanished in 1937.
The “mystery of what happened” to the pioneering Earhart has “captivated historians and conspiracy theorists for nearly 90 years”, said The Telegraph. Now, nearly 90 years later, one of aviation’s greatest mysteries might finally be solved.
Born in 1897, Earhart became passionate about flying and was determined to prove that women could achieve great things in aviation. In 1928 she became the first woman to cross the Atlantic by air as a passenger and in 1932 was the first woman (and just the second person) to make the journey solo and non-stop, completing the trip from Newfoundland to Ireland in 14 hours and 56 minutes.
Then, in 1937, she attempted to fly around the world with navigator Fred Noonan, but on 2 July they disappeared over the Pacific Ocean while travelling towards Howland Island. Despite extensive searches, neither they, nor their aircraft, were ever found.
The official explanation is that the plane suffered communication problems and ran out of fuel before crashing into the ocean, but some think that Earhart and Noonan “crash-landed on or near” a coral-ringed atoll and “perished as castaways there, hundreds of miles from their intended refuelling stop”, said Reuters. It is there that the new searches will be focused.
The researchers will work to locate an item that’s been named the Taraia Object, which some think may be the wreckage of Earhart’s twin-engine Lockheed Electra 10-E aeroplane. Yet sceptics doubt that it is an aircraft at all, with some believing that it’s simply a fallen tree.
Two previous attempts to locate the plane’s wreckage in the surrounding ocean “proved fruitless”, added Reuters. Whether this one is a success remains to be seen, but Earhart’s place in aviation history remains secure. |
