Military expert casts doubt on Earhart photo claims

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/...UeO?li=BBnb7Kz

A Marshall Islands-based military expert has cast further doubt on claims that a
blurry photograph shows famed US aviatrix Amelia Earhart alive in the territory
in 1937.

The fate of the legendary American and her navigator Fred Noonan during their
round-the-world flight is one of aviation's greatest mysteries, and has
fascinated historians for decades.

Earhart and Noonan vanished on July 2, 1937 after taking off from Lae, Papua New
Guinea, and the prevailing belief is that they ran out of fuel and ditched their
twin-engine Lockheed Electra in the Pacific Ocean near remote Howland Island.

But a documentary being aired on the History Channel -- "Amelia Earhart: The
Lost Evidence" -- claims to have unearthed a beguiling new clue about what
happened to the pair.

The program suggests that Earhart, who was seeking to become the first woman
flier to circumnavigate the globe, and Noonan may have survived and been taken
prisoner by Japanese forces.

It cites a blurry black-and-white photograph discovered in the National Archives
in Washington, purportedly showing the pair in the Marshall Islands after their
capture.

But military expert Matthew B. Holly​ told AFP the photo appeared to have
been taken about a decade earlier.

"From the Marshallese visual background, lack of Japanese flags flying on any
vessels but one, and the age configuration of the steam-driven steel vessels,
the photo is closer to the late 1920s or early 1930s, not anywhere near 1937,"
he told AFP.

Holly, an American living in Majuro, has spent decades identifying the locations
of lost US aircraft and the identities of American servicemen killed in action
in the western Pacific nation.

He added that by January 1937 the Japanese had closed most of Micronesia to
foreign vessels, "including Marshallese commerce, which is obviously flourishing
in this photo.

"Additionally, there are no Japanese sailors to be seen."

There is no dispute that the photo shows the dock at Jabor Island in Jaluit
Atoll, which was the headquarters for Japan's administration of the Marshall
Islands between World War I and World War II.

During the 1920s and early 1930s, Japanese businesses flourished on Jaluit,
purchasing copra -- dried coconut flesh used to make coconut oil -- from
Marshall Islanders.

But The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR), which has
spent decades trying to figure out what happened to Earhart and Noonan, also
disputes that they are the pair in the photo.

Executive director Richard Gillespie previously told AFP the photo was
"laughable" as a piece of evidence.

"This is just a picture of some people on Jaluit wharf," he said. "Where are the
Japanese? Where are the soldiers?"

Marshall Islanders have also claimed over the years that Earhart and Noonan
survived an emergency landing and were captured by the Japanese.

Two years ago, American investigators additionally said they had located parts
of Earhart's plane on Mili Atoll in the Marshall Islands.

But Holly maintained it was unlikely the photo was taken in 1937.

"Generally, there would be a series of photos in the same folder which could
have also time-dated the photo," Holly said.

"There is no date of 1937 associated with this photo."




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