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I'm flying at about 35,000 ft and headed to Wilmington, Delaware to interview an expert on the disappearance of Amelia Earhart. On one of the last legs of her transworld flight, Earhart was supposed to travel 2,500 mi from Lae, Papua New Guinea to tiny Howland Island in the middle of the South Pacific. But she never reached her destination and vanished without a trace. Or so we all thought. On May 21st, 1937, Amelia Earhart departs Oakland, California in an audacious attempt to be the first woman in history to circumnavigate the globe. Over 21 days and 25,000 mi, Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, make stops along the top of South America before crossing Central Africa, the Middle
East, India, and Southeast Asia. Finally, she lands in Papua New Guinea. It was here, on July 2nd, 1937, in this very spot, that a fuel-heavy Lockheed Electra plane gained momentum and took off into the blue for the very last time. Whole world was watching and that shiny Lockheed Electra would have come right down here, taken off right over the Pacific, never to be seen again. I don't know, for me as someone who loves Earhart, who really has been obsessed with her for a long time, to be here in this spot is kind of I don't know, emotional.
It's kind of a powerful place. With only 7,000 mi left to go, it's easy to imagine the excitement she must have felt at being in the home stretch. But she still had to face her most difficult challenge, crossing the immense Pacific Ocean. Amelia's next stop is Howland Island, about 2,500 mi and 18 long hours away. Howland is merely a speck in the vast South Pacific Ocean, but the plane must land and refuel for the final onward flights to Honolulu and Oakland. Earhart transmits one of her last radio messages to the United States Coast Guard ship Itasca, which is stationed offshore to help guide her to the island.
We must be on you but cannot see you. Have been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying at 1,000 ft. The Itasca receives the transmission, but Amelia apparently can't hear the Coast Guard's response. Her radio is likely damaged. Soon after, Earhart, her navigator Fred Noonan, and the Electra disappear. The only evidence here in Lae of that historic flight is this, a weathered and by the looks of it mostly forgotten memorial to a woman whose daring adventure still soars in our imaginations. Locals believe that unidentified underwater wreckage off the coast of Rabaul may in fact be the missing Electra. After grabbing a set of wheels, I'm rumbling my way over to where Rabaul
used to be. Back on the ground headed over to old Rabaul or what's left of it. That is an active volcano named Vulcan. Still active, very much alive, very dangerous. This is one of two very pissed off looking volcanoes that loom over Rabaul, but it's twin brother Tavurvur is the one to keep an eye on. In 1937, an eruption killed more than 500 people and less than a month before my arrival, it decided to wake up again. As I approach the crater and the coordinates of old Rabaul, it might seem like I'm in the wrong spot, but the town is here. I'm just driving on top of it.
Peeking up from the ash are the ghostly remains of an entire city destroyed by the volcanoes in 1994. Motels, nightclubs, banks, entire city streets, gone. It's a little unnerving to think that this volcano could erupt again at any moment. Well, nobody said that looking for Earhart was going to be easy or safe, but I'm pressing on. Next stop here is to meet with a guy named Rod, a dive expert and a World War II historian, and he knows more about downed aircraft in these parts of the waters than anybody. Recently, local divers reported seeing wreckage off of
Rabaul that they believe looks like the Electra. To check out the report, I make my way down to the harbor, which is today home to a listing collection of ghost ships decimated by the volcano. But amidst the waterlogged fleet are a few seaworthy vessels, one of which is captained by Rod Pierce. Hey, how are you? You rush? Josh, good day. Yeah. Yeah, nice to meet you. Yeah, pleasure. So, I hear you're the man in the know about airplane wrecks. Yes, yes. Been researching them since the '70s, and there's a lot of them here. There's from World War II, there's over 500 in the Gazelle area alone.
How do you locate these wrecks? With sonar, and that will draw you an outline of wreck or whatever you're looking for. The only way to know is to go out, investigate it, and see what we can find. We head out to sea to search the coordinates where divers claim to see a wreck matching the Electra. To scan the 48 square mile harbor, Rod busts out the heavy artillery. Rod, walk me through this. This looks like a missile. Okay, this is toy fish, capable of picking up a nipple on a mermaid, but it will do the job, I can assure you.
I'm just hoping for the nipple on the mermaid at this point. Okay, Rod, here we go. She's gone. All right. Keep it going. Okay, she's out. Let's see what she sees. With the sonar in the water, the search begins. We're scanning a largely unexplored area near where the divers reported seeing a wreck. Lockheed only produced 147 Model 10 Electras. Only four ever visited Papua New Guinea, and three are accounted for. So, if Rod and I find an Electra in this harbor, it's Earhart's. This is kind of a waiting game now.
We've got this side scan sonar in the water which is going to get behind the boat, and it's just giving us a beautiful image of the ocean floor, and we're just kind of going back and forth eliminating each sector as we go through it, and looking for wreckage while we go. The harbor is 8 mi long and 6 mi wide, and slowly but surely we're scanning every inch of it. Hey Josh, do you know how to make tea? Cup of tea coming up. And I want it before Christmas. Aye. It's like I'm with Quint from Jaws.
Oh, for a splash of rum. I got the kettle on. Let's see what we got here. Peanut butter, Okay, cup of tea coming up. Thanks, mate. Cheers, mate. All right, I'm headed back to my station. Not the manliest mug. Oh, Rod, I GOT A PLANE. ROD, I GOT A PLANE FOR SURE. COME HERE. LOOK AT THAT. That's a plane. Right? Yeah, that is definitely a plane. Great. That's amazing. One wing's buried in the sand. Or missing. We'll put the anchor down.
Let's do it. That's a plane. Let's get wet. Based on the sonar reading, there could be a wreck scattered beneath the boat, and we descend into the murky depths to investigate. I'm coming up on almost 60 ft down here. Pretty murky conditions. Visibility is not very good. Definitely see something. Seeing something in the darkness there. Definitely a shape. Definitely an airplane. Look at that. Unbelievable. This plane looks like it's in pretty bad shape. Yeah, all the signs are awfully hard to Rod and I scour the wreck to look for any identifying markers, but the plane is badly mangled.
What type of aircraft do you think we're looking at here? The touch pad condition is hard to tell. The cockpit in the Electra had a wide field of view, but short narrow windows. The cockpit area here looks like a much more open design. Let's get around to the front here and see if we can get into the cockpit area at all. Cockpit area. Looks like an American plane. Single engine or twin? It's hard to tell. I would have to guess single engine.
TBF Avenger. Based on the configuration, Rod believes that this is a Grumman TBF Avenger, an Allied torpedo bomber that proved indispensable in defeating the Japanese. This is where the cockpit should be. But it's just about covered over. I'm trying to stand lightly, trying not to disturb anything too much in here. See if we can see anything. Very dark in here. I think we have human remains here. We have a bone down here. Looks like there may be human remains in the cockpit still.
Shockingly, it appears the three-person crew are still trapped in the cockpit. That's certainly remains. Certainly. How many crew would have been aboard this type of plane do you think? This was the same the NC-14. I'm thinking three. Want to leave this and tag it for further analysis. Certainly don't want to disturb what's in here. Okay. Let's do that. Let's make our way back to the surface and continue from there. The plane and the soldiers inside are likely either from New Zealand or the United States. Even though this isn't the Electra, it's a major find. Since
Rod and his team can now begin the important work of identifying the servicemen who died here and having these heroes repatriated home. Perhaps in time, this will bring closure to someone searching for these missing pilots. Exploring a new culture is always an eye-opening experience and Suva is no exception. Like seeing these authentic Fijian recliners. I like your chairs. Do you mind? May I? Oh, this is very nice. Oh, yeah. You guys got it all figured out here. Are you guys working right now?
I am. Yeah, you are. I may working later. This is not allowed here. You're not allowed to drink beer when you're working. Are you allowed to sit in a wheelbarrow? I'm in town to meet with Netani Delaibatiki, the editor-in-chief of the Fiji Sun. His paper recently published a new report on the missing bones that came to Fiji from Nikumaroro, where Earhart may have perished. According to the article, a Dr. Kenneth Gilchrist, the former head of the Fiji Medical School, may have been in possession of the bones. The doctor has passed away, but three Fijian employees were named as beneficiaries in his will. All three men
have also died, and investigators believe that the box of bones may have been inherited by one of their family members. There was three Fijians who were close to the doctor, and apparently they have knowledge of the box. The mystery is which one got the box. Two of the men's families have already been interviewed, and neither have the bones. The third man's son has yet to be found. If I can find him and the box, DNA testing could prove whether the bones are the remains of Earhart or her navigator. We heard that one of the three people live in Navala. The remote village.
Navala? Navala village, on the western side of Fiji. With no time to lose, I'm heading to the village to investigate. Since I'll be showing up uninvited, it's important that I don't go empty-handed. So, I'm heading to the market to pick up a gift. We got spices, we got beans, we got whatever that is. Since I'm not seeing any Starbucks cards or vanilla scented candles, I decide to go with a Fijian classic. Kava. You have lots of kava. Yeah. I need to buy some. The roots of the kava plant are mashed and turned into an intoxicating sedative that's wildly popular in this part of the world. Uh how much is it?
35 a kilo. 35 a kilo? Yeah. Sounds like a fair price. Yeah. I don't know how much kava is supposed to cost, so I trust you. Okay, I'll take a kilo. Do you drink kava? Yeah. Does he drink kava? No. No, he doesn't like it? No. It's an acquired taste. Look at that. That looks amazing. Look at the quality of this thing. Thank you. Bye. With my offering in hand, I'm starting my journey to the village. I'm hopeful to find the man who may be in possession of the missing bones.
Here, in Fiji's rugged back country, may be the answers to one of the world's greatest unsolved mysteries. Is that This is it? This is your childhood home? the home. Does it look the same? Um a little overgrown with shrubs and things like that, but um the house looks exactly the same. All right. Well, here we go. So, this is where it happened. This is the entry. Right there. Okay, so 13-year-old boy, you decide you're going to go into that crawl space.
Yep. I got into that, crawled under the house, and there it was, this box. Do you think anybody has been under here since 1968? By the looks of things, no. The box of bones that John found in 1968 was strikingly similar to the one that went missing decades before. If there are any more remains buried under this house, they very well could be Earhart's. I'm not thrilled about poking around under an old house looking for Earhart's bones in the dark, but I've come this far, and there's no way I'm turning back now. Where under here did you find box?
Right in there, where that timber stump is. I see it, yeah, about halfway back. That's great. And it was just sitting there, or it was buried? It was sitting there. So, if you get there, that's where the box was. Well, that seems like that's our spot to start digging around. Here we go. So, please, just caution as you go through. Uh Okay. So John, you're talking about that post there? Correct.
Right in the middle of the house. If I find any money under here, I keep it, right? It doesn't look like anyone's really been down here in the past 40 years. I found a button. Looks like a button off a piece of clothing. This is the first thing I've really found down here that looks from the human world. Lots of broken bits of pottery, some glass. Looks like a child's marble. Yeah, we used to play with those things in the younger days. You lost your marbles, John. Okay, John, I'm pushing over toward the area where you found the box.
Oh boy, there has got to be a better way to make a living. Is it this beam right here, this small one? You're right there. That's it. That's Okay. So this was where the box was. A lot of coral down here. It must have when they were building the house used this as part of the landfill. John? Yeah. Just making sure you didn't go home. When you found the box, Yes. did they go through the underside of this house with a fine tooth comb? No, I just wanted to get rid of the box. But the police didn't come down here. No. You would think after they found this box filled with bones they would have come down here and done a more thorough search, but I don't see anything around
there other than a lot of dirt and some of this coral. I got a bone down here. For sure. A big piece of bone. I don't know if it's human or not, but this is definitely bone. Wow. That is a bone. I mean, that looks like a human bone to me. Another one? Part of a vertebrae? My goodness. More? In a million years I didn't think I was going to actually find bones under this house, but I'm looking at a handful of them right here, and I've just barely scratching the surface. Amazing. There's more down here. There's more I mean, there's a skeleton down here.
There's a There's bits of bone all over the place down here. More bones. I mean, what is that from? I It's everywhere I look. I mean, I'm I'm I'm putting a skeleton together down here. It might be time to call the police department and come over here and take a look cuz a couple of them could be human. I don't know. Oh my goodness. Well, there's more under the house, John. Vertebrae. This obviously This could be a chicken bone, something much smaller. This could be a cow bone, but this I mean, things like this I don't know. That could be human.
We assume that what was in the box was all that there was. And for a 13-year-old kid, you never want to go back in to find out if there's anything else. The bones that I found under the house transformed our television production into a criminal investigation. After lengthy questioning at the police station, the Fiji CSI unit has bagged the evidence for review, and I've got no choice but to head back to my hotel for a much-needed shower. The next morning, I returned to the scene of the crime, only to find more investigators crawling under the house.
Hazmat suits. Why didn't I think of that? The police tape says it all. The case is now out of my hands, and I'm told that analysis and DNA testing could take months. However, the lab has already confirmed that at least one of the bones is human. A revelation that turns out to be front-page news. As I make my way back to the airport to bring my expedition to a close, I have a lot to reflect on. The shocking discovery of human remains beneath John Gray's house is a genuinely newsworthy lead in the search for the Queen of the Skies. In addition, the potential identification of the aluminum panel from the island of Nikumaroro makes it tempting to conclude that Earhart did indeed crash on or around the remote island.
But much of the evidence, though hugely compelling, is still circumstantial. Until her bones or the full wreckage of the Electra is identified, no one can say for certain. Back in Papua New Guinea, the overgrown World War II wreckage that we found in the jungle and the eerie wrecks beneath the waves are, in a sense, every bit as important as Earhart's plane. After all, pilots went missing, lives were lost. My hope is that the bones from the sunken Allied plane can be identified and repatriated home for the burial they deserve.
