Oregon-based archaeologists have discovered Amelia Earhart's long-missing plane and are attempting to solve the mysterious 88-year-old mystery surrounding her and aviation navigator Fred Noonan's disappearance. is a scientist.
Dr. Richard Pettigrew, executive director of the Institute of Archeology and Heritage Studies in Eugene, has assembled a team to launch an expedition this summer to the remote island of Nikumaroro in the Western Pacific Ocean to find Earhart's Lockheed 10-E Electra. .
After years of acquiring and analyzing satellite, video and drone imagery, Pettigrew discovered a metallic, reflective visual object called the Talaia Object on the north shore of Nikumaroro Lagoon along the Talaia Peninsula. We believe the anomaly is in the body and tail of the missing aircraft.
“I am familiar with the frustrating history of the decades-long search for Earhart and Noonan,” Pettigrew said. Mr. Pettigrew had previously participated in the expedition to Nikumaroro, where Earhart is believed to have crash-landed and died.
“As a professional archaeologist, I am very cautious when considering evidence for or against such an important hypothesis.”
A well-known pioneering female aviator of her time disappeared along with her flight navigator Noonan during what would have been a record-setting trip around the world in 1937.
The pair left Lae, Papua New Guinea, with plans to refuel at Howland Island before continuing their journey to Honolulu and their final destination in Oakland, California, but faced strong headwinds in Lae. Earhart's radio communications eventually went silent.
Conducted by the US Navy and Coast Guard 16 days search A search for the missing duo was unsuccessful, and Earhart was officially declared dead on January 5, 1939.
Despite multiple attempts over 90 years and millions of dollars spent, neither Earhart's body nor the remains of the plane have been found, and the latest attempt by Tony Romeo and his deep-sea vision team to The $1 million expedition plan was debunked in November.
Romero, a South Carolina-based deep-sea explorer, captured sonar images of an aircraft-shaped object in the Pacific Ocean believed to be Earhart's plane, but later confirmed to be a rock.
One popular theory about her disappearance is that Earhart died as a castaway after landing in a plane on a remote coral atoll in the western Pacific Ocean. Pettigrew hopes to disprove this hypothesis with “strong and multifaceted” evidence.
Pettigrew theorizes that Earhart landed on a reef plain northwest of Nikumororo, and the plane sank along the Talaia Peninsula, eventually becoming buried and covered by water-filled sediment.
His team offered no explanation for Earhart and Noonan's deaths.
Mr Pettigrew said the suspected aircraft was virtually invisible until it was spotted by a rainstorm in 2015, then gradually faded in outline and unrecognizable over the years, but it was found in very shallow water. He said he remained in the area.
The archaeologist cited subsequent research that identified what could be the same object near the same location in an aerial photograph taken by the New Zealand Army in 1938.
“After following TIGHAR’s Nikumaroro research for decades and going to the field with them in 2017, even though there was no absolute confirmation in the form of DNA or clear evidence of the missing Electra, , I have come to have great respect for the Nikumaroro hypothesis,” Pettigrew added.
“Now, testing the Thalia object may finally give us absolute certainty about that. Someone will have to go there and investigate, but we can get the necessary financial support.” That's exactly what I'm planning to do.”
His archaeological team hopes to go to the island in August.
