An underwater exploration team led by a former United States Air Force intelligence officer and pilot claims to have solved one of modern aviation’s most enduring mysteries: the whereabouts of Amelia Earhart’s plane, which disappeared over the Pacific in 1937.
What did the team find?
Last year, Tony Romeo, CEO of Deep Sea Vision, embarked on a $11 million expedition that required scouring across the Pacific Ocean and employing sonar technology. He may have discovered what could be the key to solving the decades-long mystery surrounding the famed pilot’s disappearance.
The 16-person team from the corporation based in the US state of South Carolina produced an image in December that they believe shows the wreckage of Earhart’s plane. Between September and December of last year, researchers searched over 13,468 square kilometers of ocean floor to capture this image.
After reviewing sonar data in December, Romeo’s team discovered a striking image of Earhart’s twin-engine Lockheed 10-E Electra.
The photograph was shot approximately 161 kilometers from Howland Island, an isolated island located nearly halfway between Hawaii and Australia.
Although the photograph is grainy, the CEO of Deep Sea Vision believes it is Earhart’s plane because of its distinctive appearance. “Well, you’d be hard-pressed to convince me that’s anything but an aircraft, for one, and two, that it’s not Amelia’s aircraft,” he told NBC News.
He went on to say, “There are no other known crashes in the area, and certainly not of that era in that kind of design with the tail that you see clearly in the image.”
Romeo’s team will conduct additional investigations to ascertain whether the site is indeed a long-lost aircraft. The team has been employing a Kongsberg Discovery HUGIN 6000, the most advanced unmanned underwater drone, according to the company’s Instagram post.
The underwater drone is made by the Norwegian company Kongsberg. According to the Wall Street Journal, a photograph of the alleged wreck was discovered 5,000 meters underwater.
About deep-sea exploration
Romeo, a real estate investor from South Carolina, sold his firm in 2023 to fund his search for Earhart’s plane wreckage.
In July 1937, the famed pilot who was the first female aviator to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean was meant to land on Howland Island for refueling, but she never arrived.
Earhart and her navigator were last heard from after they left Lae, New Guinea, and the mystery surrounding her fate and strong speculation has remained a source of fascination for decades.
“This is maybe the most exciting thing I’ll ever do in my life. I feel like a 10-year-old going on a treasure hunt,” Romeo told the WSJ.