Researchers from Purdue are nearing a remote Pacific isle to find Amelia Earhart's plane, and dodging huge hunting crabs that can lift a 10-year-old.
The Taraia Object expedition left October 2 with researchers from Purdue University, Purdue’s Archaeological Legacy Institute, and the Purdue Research Foundation. They expected to reach Nikumaroro, a remote island controlled by Kiribati, by October 12.
Their target is the Lockheed Electra 10-E that carried famed aviator Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan. The pair vanished in 1937 while trying to become the first to fly around the world at the Equator. USA TODAY detailed the team's push into thick vegetation, rats, and the island's most memorable residents: giant meat-eating coconut crabs.
Steve Schultz, senior vice president and general counsel at Purdue University and a member of the expedition, made the operational reality plain in an email through the university.
"The coconut crabs are one of the reasons we’re leaving the island every night before sundown."
These are not ordinary shoreline scavengers. The London Museum of Natural History calls coconut crabs "bird-eating behemoths" that thrive on isolated tropical islands. Their scientific name is Birgus latro.
The museum states their leg span reaches up to a meter, more than three feet. They live as long as 60 years. And they pack serious power.
Museum descriptions label them "absurdly large, land-dwelling, bird-hunting crustaceans" with "incredible grip strength" that lets them "lift objects the weight of a 10-year-old child." For scale, the Monterey Bay Aquarium notes the Japanese spider crab can stretch 12 feet from claw to claw. Nikumaroro's crabs are smaller but still formidable enough to dictate the search schedule.
Communication has been difficult while the team remains en route. The plan is simple and non-negotiable: work the island by day, leave before sundown, and give the crabs the night.
The crab hazard ties directly into one long-running theory about Earhart's fate. A 2013 Smithsonian Magazine piece drew on reporting from the now-defunct Environmental Graffiti site to lay out the case.
That account described a partial skeleton found on the island in 1940 that matched Earhart's description. It then pointed to the crabs as a possible final factor.
"In 1940, researchers discovered a fraction of a skeleton on the island that matched the description of Amelia Earhart. Now, even more interesting clues are arising that seem to substantiate the idea that this is where she met her demise. The most compelling hypothesis currently under consideration is that coconut crabs overwhelmed her where she lay."
The same material recounted a 2007 field test. Researchers placed a small pig carcass on the island to check the theory. Coconut crabs quickly removed and scattered the bones.
Under that hypothesis, Earhart and Noonan crash-landed the Electra in a lagoon on Nikumaroro. Blood and the smell of distress then drew the crabs. Nothing in the current reporting confirms the skeleton as Earhart's or proves the crabs finished the story. It remains a hypothesis the new team will work around, not one it has settled.
Purdue has kept public interest alive with a podcast series on Earhart and the search for her plane. The university sits in Indiana; its researchers now find themselves on one of the Pacific's lonelier dots, measuring progress against the clock and the crabs' habits.
No expedition findings have been reported while the team is still moving. The full roster beyond the named Purdue groups and Schultz has not been detailed. What is clear is the daily rhythm they intend to keep once ashore: daylight search, sundown withdrawal.
Earhart remains one of the 20th century's great American heroes. Nearly nine decades after she and Noonan disappeared, another American team is still willing to cross an ocean, clear brush, and sleep elsewhere so the crabs can have the dark. That persistence is the point.
