Searching for Amelia: The plane truth

The aviation world’s greatest mystery may be on the cusp of being solved.

And a Dubai-based man might be the one to do it.

Another attempt

Helicopter maintenance engineer Chris Hicks, 45, is preparing for yet another attempt – possibly his last – to find the aircraft of celebrated American aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart, who disappeared over the central Pacific Ocean days before her 40th birthday.

More than 70 years have gone by since the fateful afternoon of July 2, 1937 when Earhart took off in a twin-engine Lockheed Electra along with navigator Fred Noonan for a circumnavigational flight of the globe, only to disappear from the radar forever.

The fascination surrounding Earhart’s life and the disappearance of her plane – which prompted the most extensive (and expensive) search over water and air in naval history – continues to this day.

"Amelia Earhart is to aviation what the Titanic is to shipping. While the Titanic has been found, Amelia’s disappearance remains a big mystery. Finding her plane is the ultimate goal of my life," said Hicks, who hails from Australia and works for Dubai-based helicopter company Aerogulf.

Hunting wreckages

Hicks counts hunting for World War II airplane wreckages among his hobbies.

"For some people, the idea of spending one’s time and money looking for the wreckage of an airplane in the middle of nowhere would appear foolhardy. But for me, it’s a passion. I am hooked on to it, and try as hard as I might, I just can’t get it off my mind," he said.

Even the disappointments of six previous efforts are not enough to dissuade Hicks, who feels he might get lucky the seventh time around.

"I am pinning my hope on fresh evidence that narrows down the search area to just 15 square kilometres.

"I reckon we have a realistic chance of finding the plane, but since the place is covered in dense forest we’ll have to use a magnetometer (see bubble) on the helicopter and fly in a grid pattern so that we can detect any ferrous metal lying in the area."

Hiring a magnetometer costs over Dh1.5 million, an amount that’s way beyond Hicks’ budget. He is seeking corporate funding to help him fulfil his dream. "I can set off on the mission only if I get someone to raise this amount," he said.

Finding a sponsor

Finding a corporate house to sponsor the costly expedition is no less daunting a task than finding Amelia’s plane, but Hicks is not willing to give up. Not yet.

The question now remains: will Hicks and his motley group be able to unravel the aviation mystery that has confounded people for more than seven decades now?

Well, as they say, only time will tell…

Mystery woman

The disappearance of Amelia Earhart has spawned many conspiracy theories. Many unconfirmed sightings of Earhart have been reported and many theories abound. Some theories suggest that she was on a spy mission authorised by US President Roosevelt and was captured. Others claim that she was captured by the Japanese. In 1961 it was thought that the bones of Earhart and Noonan had been found in Saipan, but the bones turned out to be those of Saipan natives.

Amelia Earhart: The journey that would end it all

Born on July 24, 1897, in Kansas, USA, Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly across the Atlantic in 1928.

In 1937, as Earhart neared her 40th birthday, she was ready for a monumental – and final – challenge: to be the first woman to fly around the world.

On June 1, Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan departed from Miami and began the 46,671-kilometre journey.

By June 29, when they landed in Lae, New Guinea, all but 11,265 kilometres had been completed.

Frequently inaccurate maps had made navigation difficult, and their next hop – Howland Island, located 4,113 kilometres from Lae in the mid-Pacific – was by far the most challenging. At 12.30pm on July 2, the pair took off for the island.

Last message

Despite favourable weather reports, they flew into overcast skies and intermittent rain showers. Earhart failed to report at the next scheduled time, and afterwards her radio transmissions were faint. At 7.42am the ship Itasca picked up the message, "We must be on you, but we cannot see you. Fuel is running low. We are flying at 1,000 feet."

The ship tried to respond, but the plane’s radio did not seem to pick up the transmission.

At 8.45am Earhart reported: "We are running north and south." Nothing further was ever heard from Earhart after that.

The passion... and the pain

Over the past 13 years, Chris Hicks has led half a dozen search missions into the deep jungles of Papua New Guinea looking for clues that could lead to the discovery of Amelia Earhart’s Lockheed Electra.

Each expedition, typically two weeks long, sets him back by Dh15,000. Yet it’s not so much the financial aspect but the dangers that such outings entail that has his wife Danielle worried no end. "I appreciate what he’s doing, but at the same time I also fear for his life," she said.

But the father of five, who remains cut off from the rest of the world as he combs forests and wades through crocodile-infested waters, surviving only on canned food and biscuits, doesn’t worry much "We are so consumed by our passion that we hardly have time to think about these things. In any case, it’s not the snakes and reptiles, but the mosquitoes that bother us most. There are millions and millions of them and they keep coming at you all the time," he said. A minimum of four people are required for these trips, which also involve them being dropped from a helicopter. Each person carries about 38kg of rations and other essentials.

In most cases the volunteers are as passionate as Hicks. One such individual was Dubai–based Australian Rodney Cochrane who died a few years back. His son Mathew now accompanies Hicks on his expeditions.

YOU SPEAK

• Do you feel Chris Hicks will nail the mystery?
• What drives people like Hicks and Earhart?
• Which, according to you, are the top three unsolved mysteries of our times?

Tell us what you think. Write to us at news@alnisrmedia.com