Posted on 10/06/2025 8:55:49 AM PDT by Red Badger
Researchers from Purdue University are set to travel to the South Pacific to determine if a "visual anomaly" on a remote island is the wreck of Amelia Earhart's lost plane, saying there is "very strong" evidence the object is the iconic aviator's aircraft.
Earhart was attempting to become the first female pilot to circle the world when she and navigator Fred Noonan disappeared over the Pacific Ocean on July 2, 1937. Earhart, Noonan and their plane, an Electra 10E, were never found. Recently, President Trump ordered records related to Earhart be declassified.
In 2020, researchers looking at satellite imagery identified a "visual anomaly" known as the Taraia Object in a lagoon on Nikumaroro, a small island in Kiribati about halfway between Australia and Hawaii, according to a news release from Purdue University. Nikumaroro is about 400 miles southeast of Howland Island, Earhart and Noonan's planned destination.
The underwater object has been visible in photos dating back to 1938, the year after Earhart and Noonan disappeared.
A team of researchers from Purdue University, the Purdue Research Foundation and the Archaeological Legacy Institute will travel to Nikumaroro to inspect the object in November. The team will first take photos and videos of the site, then use magnetometers and sonar devices to scan the area. Then, the item will be dredged and lifted from the water so researchers can attempt to identify it.
A mystery 88 years in the making! 🔎
Purdue joins the Archaeological Legacy Institute in a South Pacific expedition to search for Amelia Earhart’s missing Lockheed Electra airplane. https://t.co/WqEEWi6XwA
— Purdue University (@LifeAtPurdue) October 1, 2025 Theories have abounded about Earhart and Noonan's fates since their disappearance. One theory suggests that Earhart landed on Nikumaroro and was marooned on the island before her death. The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, a nonprofit organization based in Pennsylvania, has collected evidence it says supports the theory. Richard Pettigrew, the executive director of the Archaeological Legacy Institute, said that the expedition offers a chance to find "smoking-gun proof" that confirms the theory.
''We gathered up many more satellite images, did historical research, found other imagery that relates to it," Pettrigrew said. "We're going to go look and identify it. And if we're right, we'll in fact identify the lost Electra. We could be wrong but I think the evidence is very, very strong that this is, in fact what it is.''
However, Ric Gillespie, executive director of the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, has expressed skepticism. "We've looked there in that spot, and there's nothing there," he told NBC News in July.
Steve Schultz, a Purdue senior vice president and the university's general counsel, will be a field assistant on the expedition. He said that if the object is identified as Earhart's plane, the university hopes it can transport the plane home. Earhart worked at Purdue University for two years in the 1930s, and the Purdue Research Foundation originally paid for the airplane that Earhart flew, the school said. She planned to return the craft to the university after her trip around the world.
"A successful identification would be the first step toward fulfilling Amelia's original plan to return the Electra to West Lafayette after her historic flight," Schultz said in the news release.
Last year, an expedition team captured a sonar image in the Pacific Ocean that appeared to resemble Earhart's plane resting at the bottom of the sea. It turned out to be a rock formation.
The answer is out there.....................
Wouldn’t it be a scream if they dug this up and found Jimmy Hoffa.
CC
This has gotten into the realm of stupid.
It will be found sooner or later..................
He’s sealed in concrete in a 55 gallon drum in the bottom of the Great Bahama Canyon...............3 miles deep..............
I would imagine that there is classified stuff that when it’s examined…they shake their heads and think,”I have no idea why this is classified.”
Having never worked with classified material, is there a “reason sheet” attached which explains the status?
Plane found in lagoon. Wasn’t that an episode of Gilligan’s Island?
NOT FUNNY, PAL
I HAVE BEEN DRIVING FOR 69 YEARS...
OVER 1 MILLION MILES-—
NO ACCIDENTS-—
LAST TICKET IN 1998-—
PUT OVER 444,000 MILES ON ONE VEHICLE-1965 to 1984 or so
CURRENT VEHICLES :
OVER 250,000 of 348,000 on 1 ton truck-1986 to current-—MOSTLY TOWING HORSES
OVER 170,000 of 225,000 on station wagon-1981 to current
Pics or it didn’t happen.
That was my question when I read about them being released. Unless she was on some government mission in 1937. The FBI was around, but the CIA wasn't.
No, that was a Soviet Space capsule, and later a Silent Film era trunk full of Hollywood costumes and movie film, and a outrigger canoe full of headhunters, and a yacht owned by Zsa Zsa Gabor, and a shipping crate full of radioactive seeds, and a motorboat with a mad scientist and a South American Dictator in exile......
That's classified. :)
Oh jeez, not this chit again.
They have found her plane more times than Kamal Harris found a cogent answer to questions like “how are you today?” And “which way is up?”
Same old song!
She disappeared on July 2, 1937. Elvis was born January 8, 1935.
He was 2.
I think I’ve seen the movie. She was on a secret mission for Franklin, or maybe Eleanor, Roosevelt to spy on the Japanese! Naturally, this was highly classified.
On the other hand, this could be what’s left of the balloon on Mysterious Island and the Nautilus is not far away!
Coffers are getting empty and need replenishment. Let’s see who we can sucker this time.
The real problem is that there is hardly anyone left alive who would remember Amelia or eould care.
🤣I think I missed that movie!!
I’ll believe it when they produce good evidence. We’ve all heard this story many times about Amelia Earhart specifically.
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