Earhart search on remote atoll

MILI ATOLL – A further search for clues of the whereabouts of aviator Amelia Earhart’s plane has taken place on a remote atoll in the Marshall Islands.

Amelia Research Incorporated led visits to Mili Atoll last year and discovered a small aluminium cover plate and a circular metal dust cover from a landing-gear wheel assembly that experts say is from Earhart’s plane.

The pioneer aviator disappeared over the Pacific in 1937 in her twin-engine Lockheed Electra and the mystery has baffled experts ever since.

But The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery has a competing theory, saying it has found proof that Earhart went down at Nikumaroro Atoll in neighbouring Kiribati.

The Marshall Islands President Christopher Loeak says he believes Earhart’s plane crash-landed in Mili.

The Ohio-based Parker Aerospace is sponsoring the latest search on Mili Atoll.

The group left Sunday morning for Mili and expects to be there for about a week.