Amelia Earhart’s great-nephew says footage of ‘crashed plane’ on ocean floor where she vanished is most promising lead in history of search for vanished aviator

Amelia Earhart’s great-nephew said sonar images of a crashed plane suspected of belonging to the vanished aviator is the ‘most promising lead’ yet in the decades-long search. 

Bram Kleppner said in the 87-year hunt for the pioneer, his family have never seen more encouraging evidence of her whereabouts.

‘We feel like this is more likely than anything that’s come up… The image they got does look like a plane, and it is in about the right place where Amelia would’ve crashed,’ he told Fox News. 

Earhart and her Lockheed 10-E Electra vanished at the height of her fame in 1937 as she attempted to become the first woman to circumnavigate the globe, leading generations of aviation fans to speculate wildly over her disappearance.

But three weeks ago, the search took its ‘promising’ turn as former US Air Force intelligence officer Tony Romeo captured stunning sonar images that he believes show Earhart’s Electra on the Pacific Ocean floor. 

The images were found within a 100-mile radius of Earhart’s intended destination, Howland Island, a remote island over 3,700 miles northeast of Australia. 

Amelia Earhart, seen with the Lockheed Electra plane she vanished in, disappeared at the height of her fame in 1937 as she attempted to become the first woman to circumnavigate the globe

Weeks ago, the search for the aviator took its most ‘promising’ turn yet after a researcher managed to take a sonar image of an aircraft-shaped object on the ocean floor 

The images were taken around 100 miles from Howland Island, north of the Polynesian islands of Fiji and Samoa 

Bram Kleppner, the great-nephew of the pioneer, said the discovery came after his family essentially gave up hope of answers, but the images are ‘more likely than anything that’s come up’ before 

Before the potential discovery, which Romeo has said he is ‘certain’ is Earhart, Kleppner said he and his family had all-but given up hope.

‘There have been many, many searches, and really, not a single shred of evidence has ever turned up,’ he said.

‘I would say we have learned not to expect anything from these searches.’ 

He said Romeo even tracked down the last remaining member of his family who met Earhart, his 92-year-old mother, to tell her about the upcoming expedition.

‘I really appreciate the fact that he actually made the courtesy to our family to track down my mother, which is not easy to do, and reached out to her,’ Kleppner said. His mother was six-years-old when Earhart vanished. 

Without much expectation, Kleppner said he spoke with Romeo before he embarked on the mission to the expansive Pacific Ocean area near Howland Island – north of the Polynesian islands of Fiji and Samoa. 

But for 89 days of the 90-day voyage, it appeared the mission wouldn’t turn up anything, until Romeo captured the breathtaking sonar images as the journey neared its end. 

Scouring the ocean floor around 100 miles from Howland Island, which was Earhart’s intended destination, the images saw a grainy, plane-shaped object on the seabed. 

Kleppner’s skepticism was partly relieved after Romeo took the images to experts, with institutions including the Smithsonian confirming his strong belief that it may be Earhart’s plane.

Earhart was flying a Lockheed Model 10 Electra when the plane vanished on July 2, 1937. In the last in-flight radio message heard by Itasca, Earhart said: ‘We are on the line 157 337 …. We are running on line north and south.’ The numbers 157 and 337 refer to compass headings – 157° and 337° – and describe a line that passes through the intended destination, Howland Island.

Earhart was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean in 1932

Earhart’s disappearance is a mystery that has spawned decades of searches and conspiracy theories

He said it was a staggering twist after her family long believed they would never find an answer to the mystery.

The aviator’s great nephew said his family have always believed she aimed for Howland Island, but mis-navigated and ran out of fuel, leading her to crash into the ocean.

‘They had to cross 2,500 miles of ocean. They’d been flying for a lot of hours. It’s a tiny island, and a miss in navigation by less than two degrees in either direction puts you more than 100 miles off land,’ Kleppner said.

‘That’s a pretty big area (around Howland Island), and you’re searching at the bottom of very deep water looking for a pretty small plane.

‘All these people searched all these places, and no one has ever found a thing.’ 

Romeo is not the first to launch trips in an attempt to locate the missing plane, half a dozen adventurers an enthusiasts have spent millions on the unsolved mystery.

Expeditions were launched in 1999, 2002, 2006, 2009 and 2017.

The missions collectively cost at least $13 million when adjusted for inflation, the Wall Street Journal estimated.

‘It’s the only thing in my career that I’ve ever looked for and not found,’ said Tom Dettweiler, a sonar expert who participated in two of the searches and was part of the team that found the Titanic off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada, in 1985.

Earhart was flying a Lockheed Model 10 Electra with navigator Fred Noonan (right) when their plane vanished near Howland Island

Romeo spent $11 million to fund the trip and buy the high-tech gear needed for the search including an underwater ‘Hugin’ drone manufactured by the Norwegian company Kongsberg. 

The expedition launched in in early September from Tarawa, Kiribati, a port near Howland Island, with a 16-person crew aboard a research vessel.

In outings that lasted 36 hours each, the unmanned submersible scanned 5,200 square miles of ocean floor – eventually leading to the fuzzy images that sparked a media storm online. 

Romeo is now planning a return exhibition to get better images of the mysterious object. 

‘This is maybe the most exciting thing I’ll ever do in my life,’ Romeo told the Wall Street Journal.

‘I feel like a 10-year-old going on a treasure hunt.’

‘For her to go missing was just unthinkable,’ Romeo said.

Adding: ‘Imagine Taylor Swift just disappearing today.’