Have We Found Amelia?

Submitted by Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger

University of Oklahoma researchers are conducting DNA testing on bone fragments found on a remote and deserted Pacific Island to determine if they belong to Amelia Earhart.  Earhart and navigator, Fred Noonan, were lost on July 2, 1937, attempting a trans-global fight aboard the Electra. A massive search involving the U.S. Navy revealed nothing but weak or unintelligible signals presumably from the Electra were received. Now we may know why.

The unlucky pair may have crash landed on Nikumaroro Island surviving long enough to make a camp. In 2007 several personal items belonging to Earhart were discovered by the researchers. They have returned several times but only found the bone chips on the most recent trip. The fragments are being compared to DNA samples provided by the Earhart family.

Nikumaroro Island (formerly Gardner Island), is part of the Phoenix Islands, Kiribati, in the western Pacific Ocean. It is a remote, elongated, triangular coral atoll with profuse vegetation and a large central marine lagoon. It is about      1,800 thousand limes from Hawaii. In a sad irony,  British survey parties began arriving in 1938 at Nikumaroro, by which time she and Noonan may have succumbed to injuries, starvation or disease.

The expedition is being led by  International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery which comprises of a band of aviation enthusiasts based in Delaware.

Source: Thaindian News

Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger