By Fabienne Faur
Seventy-five years after Amelia Earhart disappeared over the Pacific, a research team is setting off July 2 with high hopes of resolving the mystery surrounding the pioneering aviatrix.
For the tenth time in 23 years, the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) will set off for Nikumaroro island in Kiribati to establish whether Earhart survived the apparent crash of her aircraft. "This time, we'll be searching for debris from the aircraft."
Earhart vanished on July 2, 1937 at age 39 with navigator Fred Noonan during the final stage of an ambitious round-the-world flight along the equator in a twin-engine Lockheed Electra.
The holder of several aeronautical records, including the first woman to cross the Atlantic by air, Earhart had set off from New Guinea to refuel at Howland Island for a final long-distance hop to California. In what turned out to be her final radio message, she declared she was unable to find Howland and that fuel was running low.
Several search-and-rescue missions ordered by then-president Franklin Roosevelt turned up no trace of Earhart or Noonan, who were eventually presumed dead at sea.
Conspiracy theories flourished. One contended that Earhart was held by Japanese imperial forces as a spy. Another claimed she completed her flight, but changed her identity and settled in New Jersey.
