In short:
An object researchers thought could be Amelia Earhart's plane wreckage has been identified as a clump of trees.
uncertain
researchers → think → trees
An expedition hoped to shed light on satellite imagery from 2020 showing what was thought to be the plane she disappeared in.
Explorers say the adventure was still "worthwhile" despite coming up empty-handed.
asserted
adventure → hop → 2020
One of aviation's most enduring mysteries remains unsolved after an object thought to be the wreckage of famed US aviator Amelia Earhart's plane turned out to be washed-up trees.
asserted
object → remain → plane
US-based explorers set out on a $900,000 expedition to Kiribati in the South Pacific this month seeking to conclusively solve one of aviation's most enduring mysteries.
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explorers → base → mysteries
Earhart was hoping to become the first woman to fly around the world before her 1937 disappearance.
asserted
Earhart → hop → disappearance
Researchers hoped to learn whether a multi-pronged object detected by 2020 satellite imagery in a lagoon on one of Kiribati's tiny islands was a remnant of her long-lost Lockheed Electra 10-E airplane.
asserted
object → hop → airplane
The finding would have decisively proven theories that Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan crash-landed and perished on or near the coral-ringed atoll.
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Earhart → prove → atoll
Backed by private donors and Indiana's Purdue University, the team spent a week on the island before concluding the "visual anomaly" picked up by satellite "was likely a collection of large trees", an expedition statement said.
"Unfortunately, we weren't able to find that smoking gun," Purdue researcher Steve Schultz said in a video message from the Kiribati island of Nikumaroro.
asserted
Schultz → back → Nikumaroro
Quoting Earhart, he added: "You know, Amelia herself said, 'Adventure is worthwhile in itself.'
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Adventure → quote → itself
Much of the debris had fragmented and washed away, leaving a smaller Y-shaped segment.
asserted
Much → fragment → segment
Its "carbonate veneer" produced a reflective surface suggestive of metal, the team said in a statement.
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team → produce → statement
Two previous attempts to locate the wreckage in the ocean around Nikumaroro also proved fruitless, while a plane-shaped sonar image captured elsewhere on the sea floor turned out to be a pile of rocks.
asserted
image → locate → rocks
The Electra aircraft was last seen taking off from Papua New Guinea on July 2, 1937.
asserted
aircraft → see → July
Radio contact was lost the next day after Earhart reported "gas is running low", followed by her final known transmission giving her navigational position.
asserted
gas → lose → position
Castaway hypothesis 'remains very strong'
asserted
hypothesis → remain → ?
The disappearance spawned one of the largest air-sea searches ever undertaken and remains one of the great unsolved mysteries of the 20th century.
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disappearance → spawn → century
Expedition leader Richard Pettigrew, head of the Archaeological Legacy Institute of Eugene, said evidence supporting the "castaway hypothesis", suggesting Earhart and Noonan died while marooned on Nikumaroro, remained "very strong".
asserted
Earhart → say → Nikumaroro
He cited evidence collected by veteran Earhart explorer Ric Gillespie, including multiple distress calls picked up in the days after she vanished with bearings that converge on Nikumaroro, and a 2018 forensic analysis of human bones recovered on the island in 1940 showing they belonged to a woman of Earhart's build and stature.
asserted
they → cite → build
Mr Gillespie's investigation also encompassed artefacts dating to the 1930s found on the island such as a woman's shoe, a compact case, a freckle cream jar and medicine vial, as well as remnants of a jackknife like one Earhart carried on the plane.
asserted
Earhart → encompass → plane
An object appearing to be the Electra's landing gear can also be seen in a photograph of the island's shoreline taken months after Earhart vanished.
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Earhart → appear → shoreline
A number of other artefacts were uncovered by this month's Purdue expedition, including a 76-centimetre-long steel tube found in the lagoon.
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number → uncover → lagoon
Mr Gillespie believes the plane has been lost to history, eventually swept by tides and carried into the sea to sink and break apart in the surf.
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plane → believe → surf
The US government's official view has long been that the plane ran out of fuel and crashed at sea near its refuelling destination of Howland Island, about 640 kilometres north-west of Nikumaroro.
asserted
plane → run → Nikumaroro
The Aporia
