Posted on 10/13/2026 3:51:13 PM PDT by Red Badger
A team of researchers appears to be closer than ever in the search for Amelia Earhart’s plane and remains, a mystery that has captivated the world for decades.
Earhart and flight engineer Fred Noonan disappeared 89 years ago during an attempt to fly across the world.
Earhart and Noonan took off from Miami, Florida, in May 1937. On July 2, 1937, Earhart and Noonan were supposed to stop at Howland Island in the Pacific Ocean to refuel but encountered difficulties and transmitted messages saying, “Gas is running low. We are flying at 1,000 feet,” and “Wait.”
Now, researchers from Purdue University have reached a remote island in the Pacific Ocean, where they believe Earhart and Noonan's plane is in a shallow lagoon.
"Well, it's in a very difficult spot to find. We think that it's underneath sediment, which is below the water of the lagoon,” Rick Pettigrew, executive director of the Archaeological Legacy Institute, told ABC News. “We think that that location was deeper at that moment. It was subsequently covered up by sediment, kind of like a shipwreck on the beach."
Researchers honed in on the isolated atoll in the Pacific Ocean, which is about 230 miles away from the nearest inhabited land. They believe the image of the lost plane was only noticed in 2020 because Tropical Cyclone Pam had shifted the sand in 2015 and exposed it.
Purdue University and Archaeological Legacy Institute researchers set off from the island of Tarawa on Oct. 7 for the six-day voyage to Nikumaroro Island.
Half of the team will traverse the jungle on foot and the other half of the team will sail around the island in their ongoing search. They will have to face challenges as they go, including the island's coconut crabs, meat-eating crustaceans that can grow up to 3 feet tall and weigh nearly 10 pounds.
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The Island of Fat Crabs
I always though they were on two separate planes. Hmmm...why did I think that....
. They will have to face challenges as they go, including the island’s coconut crabs, meat-eating crustaceans that can grow up to 3 feet tall and weigh nearly 10 pounds.
https://allthatsinteresting.com/coconut-crab
Those who have been pinched by a coconut crab say it hurts like “eternal hell.”
And no butter.....
They can climb tall trees and grab birds for lunch. Bet they’d be resistive to steaming!
Hope she’s okay
: Did coconut crabs eat Amelia Earhart?
In 1940, researchers found a fractured skeleton on Nikumaroro Island that had been torn apart. It’s believed that this may have been the body of Amelia Earhart — the famous female aviator who disappeared somewhere over the Pacific Ocean in 1937. And if that body indeed belonged to Earhart, then some experts think she may have been consumed by coconut crabs.
This story ranks up there with Noah’s Ark. They know where it is, everything points to it being there, they’re gonna go there. They get there, but they can’t get to the area, the weather is bad, the crabs are a challenge, it’s always something!
Unless they discover more evidence, I’m not sure the search “narrows”. We’ll see.
For real??
An excellent version of the movie on youtube, i liked it as a kid.
Attack of the Crab Monsters (1957) [Full Movie] 🎥— Roger Corman’s Atomic-Age Sci-Fi Creature Classic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCQI8DKM3lE
DID NOT REALIZE THEY STARTED IN MIAMI...
WHY NOT START IN LOS ANGELES?????
Love Screamin’ Jay Hawkins!
Post 10.....

This ^^^ is the 2020 image all the hubbub is about. If you close one eye and squint with the other, it sort of looks like it might be a bad sketch of a balsawood airplane.
It takes a pretty rich imagination to look at that photo and see the real deal, below:

The monocoque fuselage has none of its distinctive taper. Same for the wings.
Because of the monocoque structure, if the fuselage were to break up, it almost certainly would be cross-wise rather than length-wise. (I've seen enough crashed DC-3s to know the truth of that).
Where did the engine mounts go? I can understand the nacelles vanishing but the engine mounts are massive. That and the undercarriage for the landing gear are the two most sturdy-built parts of the airplane, and there's no sign of either of them them.
The fuel tanks (which are in the wings, 160 gallons each) are the most corrosion-resistant structures on the plane, but there's no sign of them either.
This is nothing but some guys looking to get famous and wrangle a tax-deductible vacation in the tropics in the process.
WHY NOT START IN LOS ANGELES?????
I thought the movie was a little slow, but Pamela Duncan... Grrrr. She was even better in Corman’s The Undead.
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