Total Persons on Board:
Two - Amelia Earhart and Frederick J. Noonan
When:
July 2, 1937
Weather:
Clear to partly cloudy
Flight Route:
Around the world. Starting in Oakland, California to Miami,
Florida, across the
Caribbean to South America, then across the South Atlantic to Africa. Flying
over the Sahara, continue around the tip of Arabia and on up to India. From
there, across the sub-continent and down though Southeast Asia, through what was
then the Netherlands East Indies, to northern Australia and finally eastward to
Lae, New Guinea. Then a 2,500 mile flight to Howland Island, a small coral
outcropping in mid-Pacific where a runway had been carved out and the Coast
Guard cutter Itasca was waiting to refuel the Lockheed for the flight to
Hawaii. From there she continue on to Oakland to complete the world flight.
Area Believed Crashed:
South Pacific - It has been determined that the plane went down some 35-100
miles from Howland Island. A life raft was stowed on board but no trace has ever
been found the raft. Some experts felt that the empty fuel tanks could keep the
plane afloat for a period of time.
Reason for flight:
Set out to be the first person to circle the globe by air close to the
equator.
Type Plane:
Twin-engined Lockheed Model 10E Special "Electra" with added fuel
tanks.
Search efforts:
President Roosevelt authorized a search of 9 naval ships and 66 aircraft at
an estimated cost of over $4 million. On July 18 the search was abandoned by
ships in the Howland area. George Putnam (her husband) continued to seek help in
the search, but by October he too abandoned all hope of finding them alive.
Controversy:
Perhaps no other missing person in history has had as many theories and
sighting as Earhart has. Among them are:
- Amelia was on a spy mission authorized by President
Roosevelt and was captured.
- She purposely dove her plane into the Pacific
- She was captured by the Japanese and forced to
broadcast to American GI's as "Tokyo Rose" during WWII
- She lived for years on an island in the South
Pacific with a native fisherman
- In 1961 it was thought that the bones of Amelia and
Noonan had been found on Saipan, but they turned out to be those of
Saipan natives.
- The TV series Star Trek "Voyager" had an episode
in which Earhart (and Fred Noonan) had been kidnapped and
placed on a planet many light years away and worshiped as one of the
"37s," a group of 20th Century humans who were placed in suspended animation
on the planet.
The latest effort to solve the mystery is the "Earhart
Project," an investigation launched in 1988 by The International
Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) to conclusively solve
the mystery of Amelia Earhart's disappearance.
Click here
to read the FBI file regarding her disappearance and TIGHAR's findings
Click here for
more info on the current search efforts
Click
here for more background and history
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