They thought they’d found Amelia Earhart’s long lost plane but it turned out to be a bunch of rocks

The hunt for Amelia Earhart plane's last resting spot has taken a melodramatic twist aft searchers who claimed to person recovered the craft were looking astatine a stone enactment instead

In January, the famed aviator's 1937 clang tract was thought to person been discovered successful the Pacific Ocean. But now, marine robotics steadfast Deep Sea Vision (DSV) said that imagery from an underwater drone deployed during its expedition was, successful fact, a "natural stone formation".

"After 11 months, the waiting has yet ended, and unfortunately, our people was not Amelia's Electra 10E," the institution said, referring to her twin-engine Lockheed Electra.

The sonar representation of what appeared to beryllium a cross-shaped object, not dissimilar an aircraft, sparked excitement erstwhile the institution announced that Earhart's level was "believed to beryllium found." The representation was taken astir 100 miles from Howland Island, halfway betwixt Australia and Hawaii, and a portion of Earhart's itinerary arsenic she attempted to go the archetypal pistillate aviator to circumnavigate the globe.

She and her navigator, Fred Noonan, were expected to refuel connected Howland successful July 1937 but ne'er arrived. Earhart was declared dormant 2 years aboriginal aft the US concluded she had crashed determination successful the Pacific Ocean, and her remains were ne'er found. While the representation was blurry, Tony Romeo, a erstwhile US Air Force quality serviceman and the CEO of DSV, believed it was her aircraft, fixed its unsocial shape.

"This is possibly the astir breathtaking happening I'll ever bash successful my life. I consciousness similar a ten-year-old going connected a treasure hunt," helium said. The explorer and 2 of his brothers, each pilots, were driven by the anticipation of utilizing their flying skills to assistance lick "the cleanable riddle". "We ever felt that a radical of pilots were the ones that are going to lick this and not the mariners," helium said.

Deep Sea Vision utilized an unmanned submersible to scan 5,200 quadrate miles of water floor. On analysing the data, helium said: "You'd beryllium hard-pressed to person maine that's thing but an aircraft, for one, and two, that it's not Amelia's aircraft. There's nary different known crashes successful the area, and surely not of that epoch successful that benignant of plan with the process that you spot intelligibly successful the image."

He added: "I deliberation myself that it is the large enigma of each time. Certainly the astir enduring aviation enigma of each time." Despite the company's disappointment, they are continuing the hunt. They said: "As we speak, DSV continues to hunt - present clearing astir 7700 quadrate miles... the crippled thickens with inactive nary grounds of her disappearance ever found... fto america cognize what you deliberation - did she tally retired of state adjacent Howland Island?”