US

Amelia Earhart Mystery Solved? Okla. Lab Testing Bones Found on Pacific Island

After three small human bone fragments and other long-abandoned articles  were found on an uninhabited island in the South Pacific by a group dedicated to finding Amelia Earhart’s historic aircraft, speculation began to circulate Thursday as to whether the mystery surrounding the infamous disappearance of the world’s most famous female pilot may finally be laid to rest. The Associated Press reports that those tiny bones are now being studied in hopes of extracting DNA:

“There’s no guarantee,” said Ric Gillespie, director of the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery in Delaware. “You only have to say you have a bone that may be human and may be linked to Earhart and people get excited. But it is true that if they can get DNA, and if they can match it to Amelia Earhart’s DNA, that’s pretty good.”

Lab officials said test results could take weeks or months.

The remains turned up in May and June at what seemed to be an abandoned campsite near where native work crews found skeletal remains in 1940. The pieces appear to be from a cervical bone, a neck bone and a finger.

But Gillespie offered a word of caution: The fragments could be from a turtle. They were found near a hollowed-out turtle shell that might have been used to collect rainwater, but there were no other turtle parts nearby.

“This site tells the story of how someone or some people attempted to live as castaways,” Gillespie said Friday in an interview. Bird and fish carcasses nearby suggested they were prepared and eaten by Westerners.

“These fish weren’t eaten like Pacific Islanders” eat fish, he said. …

Millions of dollars have been spent to figure out what happened to Earhart, who was legally declared dead by a California court in early 1939. Theories have included the official version — that her twin-engine Electra ran out of gas and crashed at sea — as well as the absurd, such as abduction by aliens, and Earhart living in New Jersey under an alias.

The island lays on the course Earhart planned to follow from Lae, New Guinea, to Howland Island where she and navigator Fred Noonan had planned to refuel.  “It looks like she could have landed successfully on the reef surrounding the island,” Gillespie says.  Gillespie and others who have studied Earhart’s historic aviation career and last-known facts of her life believe she and Noonan may have survived on the island and lived for some time on scant food and rainwater.

In the last seven decades, the island has produced suggestive evidence, including human bones and sextant found just three years after Earhart vanished.  Those remains, however, were lost before the advent of DNA technology could identify them.

As Gillespie and other wait with bated breath, the University of Oklahoma’s Molecular Anthropology Laboratory will try and extract DNA from the bone fragments to compare to genetic material donated by an Earhart family member.

Comments (71)

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  • TheBees
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 11:44am

    @sparkysatool, shut the f@#k up!!!!

    Report Post »  
  • Bad Thunder
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 11:09am

    the odds are about the same that it’s Jimmy Hoffa…………..

    Report Post »  
  • sapper
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 10:32am

    @sparkyspool

    Regardless of what you heard, the towers did NOT come down in a manner consistent with a controlled demolition. I‘ve seen lot’s of stuff on TV about this but it’s BS.

    I was a combat engineer in the Army. My job was combat construction and demolition. We built roads, bridges, airfields and basically anything that needed to be built. We also blasted tank ditches, bridges, roads, airfields and basically anything that needed destroying. This included imploding buildings and controlled drops on bridges, radio towers and such. So I have a bit more knowledge and practical experience that most people. Bearing in mind I’ve actually put my knowledge and experience to use in combat. I look at the video of the towers coming down, watch the documentaries that claim a controlled demo and I call BS on them. They did not come down in such a manner. Frankly, in a controlled demo of a building like that it is normal for a good demo team to bring it down with little damage to surrounding buildings. Also, if it were controlled there would have been timed, multiple blasts on key support columns throughout the building. Doing something like that takes a lot of time and planning. The way the top of the building came down is consistent with the damage the planes did. Anyone who says different is a lunatic or a liar.

    Report Post »  
    • Dustoff
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:18pm

      As a firefighter. I just detest these 911 truthers (jerks)

      Report Post » Dustoff  
  • DHLC
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 10:26am

    4/15/08 – Posted by Wayne Green, WWII Submariner

    Amelia
    PBS recently aired a show on Amelia Earhart. One of my ham friends, John Suslo KI4CUI, sent me a copy. It was well done…until it came to her last flight.
    By a curious set of circumstances I know the real story. It started back around 1929, when Amelia kept her Lockheed at my dad’s airport in Camden (NJ), where it served as the airport for Philadelphia, just across the river. This was back during prohibition and, since many of the pilots liked to drink, dad had a bar in the basement of our house in nearby Pennsauken. Amelia had dinner with us a couple times. And a frequent visitor was Bob Wemple, a mechanic. He was a short, sandy-haired chap with a waxed mustache and a limp.
    Amelia was part owner, with Tommy Luddington, of Luddington Airlines. This was the first regular airline serving New York, Philadelphia and Washington DC. “Every hour on the hour,” was their motto.
    Dad, who had done a survey for the Department of Commerce of the airports all around the country, designed, built and managed Central Airport. He had private pilot’s license #73 and commercial license #89.
    Next we moved to Washington, where dad was the passenger and cargo manager for Luddington Airlines. Then, in 1934, when Eastern Air Transport bought Luddington, we moved to Brooklyn, moving in with my mother’s folks while dad got busy starting Marine Airlines, a seaplane service to fly between Manhattan and downtown Boston.
    I still remember the day in 1936 when her mechanic, Bob Wemple, came out for dinner. He told me about his work on Amelia’s plane in preparation for her coming around-the-world trip.
    He said the whole purpose of the trip was for her to take pictures of the Japanese installation at Truk Island. That President Roosevelt, who had earlier been the Secretary of the Navy, had asked her to do this. The Navy was worried about what was going on there. So Bob’s work was to install a camera, more powerful engines and extra wing tanks so she would be able to fly from Lae, New Guinea, to Howland Island by way of Truk in the same time as she normally would have made it with the original engines flying directly to Howland.
    Radio communications was rather primitive in those days, so she and her navigator, Fred Noonan, managed to miss Howland. Having flown over the Pacific, I know how difficult it can be to see a small island.
    On my trip around the world in 1966 I flew from New Zealand to New Caledonia, Fiji, Samoa, and Tahiti, so I got a good deal of Pacific flying done.
    Okay, now cut to 1944, in the middle of WWII. I’m on a submarine and we get two-weeks at a rest camp on one of the islands of the Majuro Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Two weeks of swimming, poker, drinking gilly (distilled torpedo alcohol), and playing baseball while the USS Gilmore, a submarine tender, refitted our boat.
    I rigged a Momson Lung so I could dive around the coral reef. But the most amazing thing was when some natives visited and claimed that seven years earlier a plane landed on a beach with a woman pilot and a man navigator. The man was hurt in the landing. They said that a few days later a Japanese ship came and took the two people and the plane to Saipan.
    Well, it made sense. If you look at a map of the Pacific you’ll see that if they’d flown west toward the Caroline Islands, which are few and far between, they might have missed. But by flying northwest toward the Marshalls, which are all over the place, they had a better chance.
    The U.S. not wanting to admit that the most famous woman in the world had been a spy, covered that whole business up. The Japanese, not wanting to admit they’d captured and killed the most famous woman in the world, shut up too.
    When we stopped off for a couple days at Saipan the natives confirmed that Amelia, Fred and their plane had indeed been there.
    Cut to 1966, when Fred Goerner’s The Search for Amelia Earhart was published. Despite every effort of the Navy to make things difficult, he had the story right, including the Japanese killing Amelia and the Americans burning her plane and the hanger it was kept in when they took Saipan.
    When I wrote about this in my 73 magazine I heard from Bob Townsley W6RDR, a good friend of Goerner’s. He said my information was most helpful for his and Fred Goerner’s return to the Marshalls to check out details. http://www.waynegreen.com/wayne/news-archive_2008.html

    Report Post »  
    • SignPainterGuy
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 1:05pm

      Very interesting story – thanks ! And before I go on, thank you for your service !

      I watched a doc. a few months ago that mirrored much of your version; that Emilia and her navigator were on a spy mission for the US. The ending was different though. This version posited that the mission was successful and that Emilia was given a new ID and lived out her remaining yrs. in NJ. The author gave a compelling picture overlap display that was remarkable !

      I tend to give more credence to your version, you were there for much of it and the Islander`s and Japanese` stories that overlap well (jive)… While compelling, the doc. I saw just added more to the confusion and something else to make you go..HHHMMMMMM !

      Report Post »  
    • Rowgue
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 1:22pm

      Great story, but it’s hard to believe. I don’t doubt that scenario could have played out. It’s just as likely as any other. But it’s hard to believe the author just by pure coincidence happened to know her personally, knew all the details of her planned flight, just happened to be on the crew that stumbled onto her supposed landing site, and was privy to information from both the american and japanese governments that nobody since has been able to verify.

      It sounds dramatic and compelling, but you just can’t keep that kind of secret for this long. There would have been far too many people involved. The first rule of conspiracy theories is the more people that are supposedly involved with keeping the conspiracy secret the less likely the theory reflects reality.

      Report Post »  
    • NeoFan
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 2:11pm

      Gotta admire those Japanese. They can really keep a secret.

      Report Post »  
    • Petunia
      Posted on December 19, 2010 at 1:43am

      It seems that this information should be easy enough to get with the freedom of information act. Some one should have records of Amelia spying. And there is no reason to keep something like that secret for 100 years.

      Maybe she is a star on the wall at the CIA.

      I sort of like that idea.

      How old is the CIA, probably not old enough for Amelia.

      If the DNA matches up… what does that do to this story?

      Report Post »  
  • TulsaYeeHaw
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 10:14am

    Wow, she was ugly.

    Report Post »  
  • ranger2103
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 8:35am

    this sounda like a story from cracked.com. the only difference is that cracked says this information was discovered in 1940

    Report Post »  
  • leo346
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 8:25am

    A great mystery of our time .

    Report Post »  
  • Candice Lynn
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 8:00am

    Norman, Oklahoma… small world linked.

    Report Post » Candice Lynn  
  • UPSETVET
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 7:28am

    The future DNA testing of some bone “fragments” found on a deserted Pacific island sounds pretty much like a long shot that it‘s Emelia Earhart’s remains. One of the guys heading up the project said the fragments, “may be from a turtle”. That doesn’t sound too hopeful to me. If they suspect her plane landed sfaely in the water near the island wouldn‘t it be easier and more likely to find the ’remains” of Earhart’s plane than it would be to find her “remains”? Sounds like to me it‘s just another far fetched project that’s trying to justify it‘s existnce to it’s financiers. Leave Emelia wherever she’s at and keep her legacy alive.

    Report Post »  
  • Gonzo
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 6:39am

    Nothing against Earhart but‘ I’ve never understood the fasination with finding her bones. A lot of people have been lost at sea and never found. It doesn’t seem so mysterious.

    Report Post » Gonzo  
    • bookofwisdom
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 10:38am

      I’m with you on that. I know she was the first female pilot, but spending millions of dollars to find her bones sounds ridiculous to me. Wish someone would pay me to search for her bones. I’d start in my back yard. :<) May God Bless.

      Report Post » bookofwisdom  
    • PatriotDaze
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 11:02am

      It was God’s will.

      Report Post » PatriotDaze  
  • red penny
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 5:37am

    While we’re serching,I’d like to know whatever happened to that party animal Spuds McKenzie? Does anyone know?

    Report Post »  
  • burnteye86
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 5:33am

    Didn’t someone make some luggage once, called Amelia Earhart luggage?

    Report Post » burnteye86  
  • klemmp
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 3:17am

    Wish it was her. God bless y’all fer the funny ass comments. Light hearted humor makes me happy.

    Report Post »  
    • EnlightenedinGA
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 7:07am

      I agree with you about the humor. It’s the best part of the comments section.

      Report Post »  
  • New-American-Saviors
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 2:54am

    So how much is this costing me ?

    Report Post »  
  • Lee Ann
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 2:41am

    I think it may be Jimmy Hoffa….. I mean it really, reallly could be right??

    Report Post »  
    • RepubliCorp
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 3:13am

      Insiders told me he became ALPO (Beef Flavor) ……so he might be in your back yard

      Report Post » RepubliCorp  
  • GoingBeck
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 1:10am

    They’ll be wondering for decades the same about
    where the hell is Jane Fonda. She was from such
    a nice family. What the hell happened to Jane Fonda?

    Report Post »  
    • uncleherbert
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 11:19am

      Jane has been left in the dust bin of life, wish she stayed in Hanoi with her commie friends, either way she is not missed here!

      Report Post » uncleherbert  
  • paperpushermj
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:53am

    I hope it is her and her navigator so they can be brought home to lay at rest with her and his loved ones.

    Report Post » paperpushermj  
  • Avi8or
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:38am

    Hmm…. What’s better in this case? To remain a legend forever, or to have solid proof of where you met your end? Hard to say.

    Report Post » Avi8or  
    • MeteoricLimbo
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 7:07pm

      @ a v 8 er…closure for the family would be a godsend I would think

      Report Post » MeteoricLimbo  
  • TONYFROMNY
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:24am

    That UFO is being pilotted by Jimmy Hoffa, with DB Cooper as a co- pilot.

    Report Post »  
  • Dash Riprock
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:23am

    “The World Famous Female Pilot,” says M.K. Think she would have said in the same manner referring to Charles Lindbergh as the “The World Famous Male Pilot?” Ms. Kelly has a bit of a girl power bias happening I hate to say.

    Report Post » Dash Riprock  
  • NoRoomForSocialismHere
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:19am

    Indeed lower than the bottom of Davy Jones gear locker

    On msdnc today (12-17, 2010) Joe Madison from Sirrus XM radio, appeared on the ed show, you know the one that yells like they were on a podium in Germany, Russia, Italy, China, Venezuela, Speakers Chair and other similar commie venues.

    Madison said: “…our side of the media”, good to hear them admit it from time to time

    I saw the show on Amelia, I quess on the History channel which is a Socialist channel as well. It must be fun to take donations from the wealthy to cruise the world doing the things you like.

    Report Post »  
    • Deutscher
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 4:24am

      Germany is NOT a commie venue. Check your facts my friend

      Report Post »  
  • Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:08am

    I hope this is her, it would be nice to lay her remains to rest in a proper way. She was a great american and a wonderful rolemodel.

    Report Post » Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra  
    • ADMIRAL747
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:15am

      All jokes aside, I agree 100%. Just a bit skeptical.

      Report Post »  
    • Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:20am

      I am to skeptical, there have been numerous finds, mostly downed WWII pilots.

      Report Post » Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra  
    • starznbarz
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 7:50am

      O.K. , took me a few minutes -“ strangers uniting to defeat a common enemy” gotta love the internet. good screen name. http://www.starznbarz.com

      Report Post » starznbarz  
    • knightEknight
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 8:29am

      If it is her, then the plane can’t be too far away. They could probably find the plane in less time than it would take to get the DNA results back. I remain skeptical.

      Report Post »  
    • catholicvoter
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 10:53am

      Amelia lost like birth certificate of Obama, Face red eyes black, sails unfurreled.

      Report Post » catholicvoter  
    • WhiteFang
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 6:01pm

      knightEknight,

      Yes, find the plane or at least a remnant of it. “the plane, the plane!”

      Report Post » WhiteFang  
    • Exennium
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 9:25pm

      Your username is my favorite episode of Star Trek, Next Generation. I loved that show and that episode. As for Amelia, yes, I hope she and the mystery can be put to rest. However, it’s sad to think she and Noonan were alive and well on this island waiting to be rescued and no one ever came.

      Report Post »  
  • ADMIRAL747
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:04am

    Is Al Capone’s vault on that island?

    Report Post »  
  • komponist-ZAH
    Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:03am

    I think she’s living with Elvis on the UFO that has the Bigfoot clan onboard.

    Report Post »  
  • Capt_Spalding
    Posted on December 17, 2010 at 11:58pm

    I hear they MAY have also found MSDNC’s ratings… but I’m guessing the Ameila Earhart bones are a much safer bet.

    Report Post » Capt_Spalding  
    • boxofpens
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:02am

      I think you’re probably right.

      Report Post » boxofpens  
    • RepubliCorp
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 2:54am

      Yet another case of the crabs

      Report Post » RepubliCorp  
    • DVT
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 3:35am

      LOL Nice!

      Report Post »  
    • Reagan/Demint.deciple
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 7:20am

      uumm!! how much is all of this costing? and am I paying for any of it ?

      Report Post » one years food ration like glenn says  
    • Sparkyspool
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 9:32am

      Don’t use the money to investigate the twin towers as to why they all fell into there footprint. Like a controlled demolition!

       
    • phxcon
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 10:14am

      4 bloodhounds, and a bomb sniffing robot couldn’t find their ratings.

      Report Post »  
    • storm8259
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 12:23pm

      Capt, I appreciate you liking my image or maybe just Groucho, but be a lil more original without the cropping.

      Report Post » storm8259  
    • Rowgue
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 1:03pm

      @REAGAN/DEMINT

      Yes you are paying for it with government grant money.

      Report Post »  
    • racialcoward
      Posted on December 18, 2010 at 10:27pm

      TRUE STORY IS SHE OVER FLEW SAIPAN THAT JAPAN HAD FORTIFIED IN VIOLATION OF US AGREEMENTS.

      She was spotted and shot down by Japanese fighters. She was captured by Japanese military but died of injuries.

      Report Post »  
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