For a moment, it seemed the mystery of Amelia Earhart’s disappearance had been solved.
A sonar image earlier this year appeared to show an airplane resting on the sea floor 100 miles from Howland Island, where the pilot was due to refuel on her 1937 attempt circumnavigate the world.
She would have been the first woman to do so, but after leaving New Guinea on July 2, she vanished along with navigator Fred Noonan and their twin-engine Lockheed Electra.
Even after the multimillion dollar search was called off and the pair were declared dead, the mystery endured.
It’s inspired numerous expeditions to Pacific Ocean islands where Earhart, 39, may have tried to land. Deep Sea Vision took a different approach.
Using an underwater drone, the ocean exploration company scanned 5,200 square miles of the ocean floor.
Then they found something – a cross-shaped object, with what could look like a plane’s tail and wings – 16,000 feet beneath the surface.
It ‘could be the legendary American aviator’s Lockheed 10-E Electra’, Deep Sea Vision announced on Instagram.
The sonar image, captured 100 miles west of Howland, appeared to confirm one of the more popular theories, that she crashed after running out of fuel searching for an island too tiny to find in the vastness of the ocean.
‘We always felt that she would have made every attempt to land the aircraft gently on the water’, CEO Tony Romeo said.
‘And the aircraft signature that we see in the sonar image suggests that may be the case.
‘We’re thrilled to have made this discovery at the tail end of our expedition, and we plan to bring closure to a great American story.’
It turned out to be be a bunch of rocks.
An update shared on Instagram this month said: ‘After 11 months the waiting has finally ended and unfortunately our target was not Amelia’s Electra 10E (just a natural rock formation).
‘As we speak DSV continues to search – now clearing almost 7700 square miles.
‘The plot thickens with still no evidence of her disappearance ever found.’
A day later, the company shared another post of a branded t-shirt with the words: ‘We find rocks.’
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