Researchers believe they have found a plane belonging to the legendary Amelia Earhart

Nearly a century later, the wreckage of American aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart may have been found at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, according to a marine research company that released a sonar image.

North American company Deep Sea Vision (DSV) said on Tuesday that the image was obtained after an extensive search in the area west of Howland Island, an uninhabited reef lost in the middle of the Pacific Ocean between Australia and Hawaii.

Amelia Earhart took off with her navigator Fred Noonan on May 20, 1937, from Oakland, California, to become the first woman to fly around the world, five years after she became the first woman to sail solo across the Atlantic.

But the two disappeared on July 2 after taking off from Lae, Papua New Guinea, for a grueling 4,000-kilometre flight. They were supposed to refuel at Howland Island, but never made it there.

The disappearance has remained one of the most intriguing mysteries in aviation history, spawning dozens of books, films and more or less far-fetched theories.

The prevailing hypothesis is that Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan ran into fuel shortages and abandoned their twin-engine Lockheed L-10 Electra near Howland Island.

According to DSV, the image captured by the company’s underwater robot “reveals contours consistent with the unique twin tails and wingspan.” [do modelo] his legendary plane.”

“We always thought she would have done everything possible to try to land the aircraft smoothly, and the signature of the aircraft we see on the sonar image suggests that was the case,” DSV chief Tony Romeo said in a statement.

The company says it spent 90 days exploring 13,500 km² of the ocean floor and wants to keep the exact location of the discovery secret for now.