Lady be Good, a B-24 in WWII did this. Flew by its base at night and crashed in the Libyan desert. Wasn’t found until 1958.
A French attempt just before Lindberg’s flight simply vanished.
Steve Fossett vanished in Nevada for months despite a furious, professional, well-funded and immense search effort.
Flight 19 5 bombers vanished off Florida.
The ocean is very very big. Its entirely possible this machine went deep out over the southern part of the Indian Ocean, ran out of fuel, crashed and sank. We simply may never know what happened.
Yes, the ocean is gigantic, and it is entirely possible that no trace will ever be found. We will just have to wait and see. If memory serves me right, there was a B-17 that crashed in the California mountains during World War 11, and was only found fairly recently. I remember seeing the story of the Lady be Good. I think they found 7 of the 8 bodies. I have been on some mountain roads in the Philippines, and I always thought if we went over the side, they would never find us.
Big plane, lots of fuel, big fire if flown into the ground.
If into the sea, parts and some bodies float. The black box has its own power and would be transmitting.