Amelia Mary Earhart (English Amelia Mary Earhart, July 24, 1897 - missing July 2, 1937) - American aviator, one of the first female pilots, the first woman to fly over the Atlantic Ocean. She was also known as an orator, writer, journalist and popularizer of aviation.
Amelia was an excellent rider since childhood, she swam, played tennis and shot from a 22-caliber rifle donated by her father. She learned to read at the age of four and from an early age absorbed a wide variety of literature, but her books about great discoveries and adventures were especially attracted. As a result, despite her belonging to the "weaker sex", among the children from neighboring streets, Amelia became a recognized leader and ringleader. Her grades in school were almost always excellent, especially in science, history and geography.
For some time, Earhart studied physics, chemistry and medicine at Columbia University, as well as French classical literature (she knew four foreign languages).
Her first instructor was Anita (Neta) Snook, one of the few women pilots in those years. A used Curtiss JN-4 was used for training. Neta noted the naturalness of the new student, who felt calm and confident in the cockpit; however, she also noted some of her penchant for adventurism - several times she had to intervene in control, preventing Amelia from trying to fly under the wires of a power line passing near the airfield when landing.
Interesting Facts:
* In the modern United States, Amelia Earhart is still a well-known and popular national heroine and role model. In recent decades, on average, 4 new books about Earhart have been published in the United States every year, not counting photo albums and books for children. Several films, documentaries and feature films have been made about her. A few years ago, an initiative group of congressmen introduced the issue of installing a monument to Amelia Earhart in the building of the Washington Capitol, where meetings of the US Congress are held; On January 21, 2003, the American media reported that the adoption of an appropriate decision, in the future, was practically ensured.
* In Earhart's hometown of Atchison, Kansas, the Amelia Earhart Festival is held each year, attracting up to 50,000 guests. The standard program of the festival includes demonstration flights with aerobatics, open-air country music concerts, fireworks, and an open day at the Amelia Earhart House Museum, which since 1971 has been officially included in the Register of Historic Landmarks of National Importance of the United States. Earhart is often mentioned in the works of musicians such as Joni Mitchell, Patti Smith, Heather Nova.
* Amelia Earhart was one of the main characters in the science fiction film Night at the Museum 2 (2009), where she was played by actress Amy Adams.
* In 2009, Mira Nair's biopic Amelia was released, starring Hilary Swank.
*Amelia's baby skin was used in Episode 2 (Moai Better Blues) Season 2 and Episode 2 (The Tomb of Sammun-Mak) Season 3 of Sam & Max.
In childhood
Los Angeles, 1928
Amelia Earhart and Neta Snook who taught her
The Mayor of Southampton, Mrs. Foster Welsh, greets Amelia Earhart. 1928
Amelia Earhart and US President Herbert Hoover. 1932
And she started this business on a grand scale: to fly across the Atlantic not on a single-engine plane,
and on a three-engine, on such heavy machines over long distances, then they had not yet flown.
However, the ambitious plans of the newly-minted feminist made rich and high-ranking relatives clutch their heads.
However, I liked the idea. They began to look for another performer, who, in the event of sad circumstances, has nothing to lose.
The choice fell on Amelia Earhart, a modest social worker in Boston who
work time on his single-engine aircraft is not one thousand kilometers.
The fact that the girl had no experience in driving heavy machines did not particularly bother anyone.
When an intercontinental flight becomes a symbol of gender equality, such trifles are no longer up to the mark.
Amelia was declared the commander of the crew. She spent twenty hours in the air, in her own words, in the role of a bag of potatoes. The car was driven by men.
However, the fame received in advance spurred the pilot.
In the future, Amelia Earhart will make many flights alone, and across the North Atlantic too,
until one day during a round-the-world flight it disappears from the radio forever.
"She was a pilot from birth - with a natural and unmistakable sense of the aircraft."
(General Wade).
The first round-the-world flight by a woman was coming to an end. On July 4, 1937, the Lockheed Electra aircraft, piloted by Earhart and navigator Fred Hoonan, was supposed to make the last landing of this flight in Oakland (USA).
Two days earlier, on July 2, A.E. (as her friends called her) and her navigator looked hopefully into the sky over the airfield on the small Pacific island of Lee. The sky, clear for the first time in the past week, promised them a speedy return home.
Howland Island is ahead, 4730 km to it. Behind Florida - Brazil - Africa - India. Everything superfluous has been sacrificed for fuel reserves. 3028 liters of gasoline, 265 liters of oil, a minimum of food and water, a rubber boat, a pistol, parachutes and a rocket launcher.
As they said later, the onboard chronometer bothered Hunan. The chronometer lied, a little, but lied. What was needed was absolute precision. A one-degree miscalculation at that distance would take the aircraft 45 miles away from the target. The flight, like all flights of this kind, was very difficult and unusual, and this Lee-Howland segment was the longest. Finding an island a little more than half a kilometer wide and 3 kilometers long is a difficult task even for such an experienced navigator as Hunan.
July 2 at 10.00 "Lockheed-Electra" started, starting the penultimate, giant jump to the target.
Amelia Mary Earhart was born July 24, 1897 in Atchison, Kansas, the son of lawyer Edwin Earhart. Edwin's wife, Amy, was the daughter of a local judge. Amelia was the eldest child in the family; a second daughter, Muriel, was born two and a half years later.From an early age, the Earhart sisters enjoyed an unusual freedom for that time to choose interests, friends and entertainment. Amelia was an excellent rider since childhood, she swam, played tennis and shot from a 22-caliber rifle donated by her father. She learned to read at the age of four and from an early age absorbed a wide variety of literature, but her books about great discoveries and adventures were especially attracted. As a result, despite her belonging to the "weaker sex", among the children from neighboring streets, Amelia became a recognized leader and ringleader. Her grades in school were almost always excellent, especially in science, history and geography. At the age of 10, Amelia saw an airplane for the first time, but at that moment she did not have much interest in it. She later described it as "a piece of rusty wire and wood, not at all interesting."
On Christmas Day 1917, when she arrived in Toronto to visit her younger sister, Amelia saw seriously wounded soldiers on the street who had arrived from the fronts of the First World War. The impression was so strong that instead of returning to school, she enrolled in an accelerated nursing course and went to work in a military hospital. By the end of the war, the accumulated experience persuaded her to devote her life to medicine. However, there was a military airfield not far from the hospital, and after visiting several air shows, Amelia became interested in aviation, which subsequently changed her fate.
The Lockheed Vega 5b aircraft that Amelia Earhart is said to have flown
Seven hours later, the Coast Guard cutter Itasca, which was waiting for the plane at Howland, received a radio confirmation from San Francisco that Earhart's plane had taken off from Lee. The commander of the Itasca went on the air: "Earhart, we listen to you every 15th and 45th minutes of the hour. We transmit weather and heading every half hour and hour."
At 01:12 the boat's radio operator reported back to San Francisco that they still hadn't received anything from Earhart, and continued to relay the weather and heading. Meanwhile, the whole world was reading newspapers that described in great detail the biography of the great pilot Amelia Earhart. She was born on July 24, 1897 in the family of a lawyer. Her love for airplanes came to her during the First World War. A.E. was a nurse in a hospital near the airfield. The charm of the small, still clumsy aircraft of those times was too strong. She was able to understand the spirit of the courageous profession of a pilot. Many young people in those years raved about aviation, Amelia decided to learn how to fly.
Shortly before the round-the-world flight, Earhart wrote that for a long time she had two of her biggest desires: to be the first woman in a transatlantic flight (at least as a passenger) and the first woman pilot to cross the Atlantic. Both of her wishes came true. In June 1928, she flew in a flying boat (sitting next to the pilot!) from the USA to England. Four years later, on May 20, 1932, she, already alone, repeated the same route and landed in Londonderry 13 and a half hours later. A.E. was, obviously, a record holder by vocation. She made non-stop flights from Mexico City to New York and from California to the Hawaiian Islands, which at that time was a very difficult task. She was the first to reach 19,000 feet. In short, she became the most famous female pilot in the world. If Amelia Earhart said that the Laks aviation fire extinguisher system is the most reliable, then, firstly, it was true, and secondly, there simply could not be better advertising ...
So, the night of 2 to 3 July 1937. 2 hours 45 minutes. Amelia Earhart's voice broke the silence for the first time in twelve hours: "Cloudy... The weather is bad... Headwind."
"Itasca" asked A.E. switch to Morse key. Not a sound in reply. 3.45. Earhart's voice is in the headphones: "I'm calling Itasca, I'm calling Itasca, listen to me in an hour and a half ..."
This radiogram and all subsequent ones were not completely deciphered. 7.42. A very tired, interrupted voice of A.E .: "I'm calling Itasca. We are somewhere nearby, but we don't see you. Fuel is only for thirty minutes. We'll try to reach you by radio, 300 meters high."
After 16 minutes, "I'm calling Itasca, we're above you, but we can't see the weight..." Itasca gave a long series of radiograms. A little later: Itasca, we hear you, but not enough to establish ... (direction? ..) "The last minutes of the Lockheed Electra flight were going on. The chances of the crew's life were calculated as follows: 4730 km, 18 hours. from the moment of departure, fuel was left for 30 minutes a hundred miles from Howland ...
8.45. Amelia Earhart is heard for the last time, she screams in a broken voice: "Our course is 157-337, I repeat ... I repeat ... It is blowing north ... south."
The first act of the tragedy ended, the second began.
The commander of the Itasca expected that, perhaps, empty fuel tanks would keep the Lockheed Electra afloat for about an hour. A seaplane was called. Newspapers published testimonies of radio operators and radio amateurs who heard the voice of A.E. last.
By July 7, US Navy ships and aircraft had surveyed 100,000 square miles of ocean. Despite the participation of the aircraft carrier Lexington, neither pilots nor even traces of the disaster were found.
This event shocked the world, which followed for a month every movement of the heroic woman who was the first to travel around the world.
In a hopeless article, almost an obituary, in Flight magazine it is written: “It is impossible to imagine that pilots who crashed in the tropics are doomed to a slow death. It is better to hope that from the moment the Elektra’s tanks were empty , the end came very quickly and their torment was not long."
This is all that was known about the life and death of Amelia Earhart in July 1937. A quarter of a century later, the fate of A.E. became interested again. Rumors and gossip surfaced that circulated around the death of the pilot back in 1937. Suspicions arose that Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan did not die in a plane crash. There was an assumption that the crew of the dead aircraft was performing a special reconnaissance mission. Having suffered an accident, they fell into the hands of the Japanese; those, apparently, were aware of the true goals of the round-the-world flight ...
In 1960, the search for a needle in a haystack began. In this case, the haystack was all of Micronesia. Plane wreckage found in Saipan harbor It was assumed that these were parts of a twin-engine and Lockheed Electra, "on which Earhart flew. But these were pieces of the skin of a Japanese fighter. In 1964, human skeletons were found there. Pilots? Anthropologists answered in the negative - the skeletons belong to Micronesians. People were interviewed who said that "they knew or thought they knew something about the plane crash. It was possible to establish something like this: Earhart flew from Leah not on the route that the whole world knew about. Instead of flying directly to Howland, she headed north, through the center The task of A.E. was, apparently, this - to clarify the location of Japanese airfields and naval supply bases in that part of the ocean, which had caused concern to the United States since the 1930s. It was known that Japanese intelligence on the eve of aggressive of the war intensively planted her agents and prepared landing sites for aircraft and ammunition depots on the Pacific islands.It also turned out that her aircraft had been converted, To be sure, the engines, which developed speeds up to 315 km per hour, were replaced by more powerful ones.
Having completed the task, A.E. lay down on a course to Howland. Somewhere halfway to the target, the plane hit a tropical storm. (By the way, the captain of the Itasca claimed that the weather was excellent in the Howland area on July 4!) Having lost orientation, the Lockheed Electra went first to the east, then to the north. If you calculate the speed of the aircraft and fuel reserves, it turns out that the disaster occurred somewhere off the coast of Mili Atoll in the southeast of the Marshall Islands. From there, Earhart radioed "SOS". Some radio operators heard the signals of the dying aircraft around this time and in this region of the ocean.
It is also known that twelve days later a Japanese fishing schooner found some people. Local residents claim that the Japanese took two European men on a seaplane to about. Jaluit (Amelia was in overalls, maybe hence "two men?"). There is an assumption that at the end of his odyssey, A.E. and her navigator ended up on Saipan at the headquarters of the Japanese armed forces in the Pacific. Moreover, one journalist managed to find a resident of Saipan who claimed that he had seen a woman and a man among the Japanese whites and that the woman allegedly died of an illness, and the man was executed - beheaded - in August 1937, that is, about a month after departure. Two Marines who participated in the landing on Saipan were interviewed. They said that in 1944 they took part in the exhumation of the corpses of American soldiers and officers who died during the assault. Among the corpses were found a man and a woman in flight suits, but without insignia. The corpses of the pilots were immediately handed over to representatives of the Army Institute of Pathology. The sailors got the impression that the pathologists seemed to be waiting for these two corpses.
Here is what became known about the death of Amelia Earhart after the Second World War. Unfortunately, the only reliable thing in this system of facts and conjectures is the death of A.E. Officials in America and Japan remain silent about this rather strange and tragic story. The only person who spoke at all was Admiral Chester Nimitz. In March 1965, he suggested (again a guess!) that Earhart and her navigator may have made an emergency landing in the Marshall Islands and been captured by the Japanese... The Pathfinder's Martyrology differs from all other martyrologies in one feature. Against the names of people who sacrificed themselves to the discovery of new paths, there is only one date - the year of birth ... The year of death is unknown, or instead of the day of death - a question mark. The data on A. Earhart in this list looks like this: Amelia Earhart 07/24/1897-07/3/1937 (?).
The mystery, the unusual nature of the death of these people always entails many attempts to somehow interpret, explain the circumstances of the tragedies.
When investigating the causes of the death of Amelia Earhart, one can abandon or almost abandon the usual, usually groundless, speculations and, using the available facts, recreate the whole picture. Naturally, it is impossible to assert that the reliability of our conclusions is one hundred percent. And still...
The penultimate stage of the round-the-world flight of Fr. Lee - oh Howland - 5400 km in a straight line. Assuming that Earhart flew in a roundabout way along the route of Fr. Lee - oh Truk (2250 km), about. Truk - Mili Atoll (2520 km), Mili Atoll - about. Howland (1380 km), then the total distance will be 6150 km.
Amelia Earhart at the Lockheed L-10 E Electra NR 16020 c. 1937
As you know, the plane stayed in the air for eighteen and a half hours, flying 4730 km. So, its average ground speed was 256 km/h.
In this case, following a direct, official route, the aircraft would land on the water 670 km from Howland Island, outside the 500 x 500 km square where aircraft from the aircraft carrier Lexington were looking for it.
When flying along the route about. Lee - oh Truk - Mili Atoll - about. Howland would have to land on Mile (2250 + 2520 = 4770 km). According to some reports, Earhart's aircraft was converted. Two engines, 420 hp each each, were replaced by motors of 550 hp. This made it possible to increase the speed by 9%, the load by 19% and the ceiling by 28%. The calculation of the flight range at the cruising speed of the converted aircraft 1.09 x 305 x 18.5 = 6150 km, although it coincides with the length of the circuit, but without taking into account ground speed (corrections for wind, etc.) is incorrect.
It is known that Amelia Earhart went on the air for the first time 12 hours after the start. How to explain such a long silence? In sports flight, it would seem that radio communication is absolutely necessary, because you can always find out the "place" of the aircraft and correct its flight. Therefore, it is easiest to assume that A.E. avoided radio communications, fearing to be found by the Japanese. During these 12 hours the plane flew 256 x 12 = 3072 km. On the route published in the newspapers, the radio transmission would begin over the ocean at the 160th meridian, in the second case, at Truk Island, that is, immediately after completing the task, which, apparently, should have been reported by a radiogram (most likely encrypted) .
Late departure - 10 a.m. can be explained by the need to be in the area of the Caroline Islands before sunset, when, due to side lighting, unmasking shadows appear, which are necessary for aerial photography.
From Earhart's last radiogram, it follows that the plane was heading 157-337 to about. Howland is on the SSO (South-South-East), i.e. almost perpendicular to the official route.
So, the version that Amelia Earhart performed a special task is similar to the truth. Further secrecy and official refusal to confirm or deny various rumors and testimonies of real and imaginary eyewitnesses also reinforce this assumption. There is no doubt that if the plane was found in the air over the Caroline Islands, the Japanese tried to "remove" unnecessary witnesses to their military preparations. One might think that Lockheed-Electra was spotted immediately after the first radiogram, its course was set, and an order was given to intercept ... In any case, while engaged in aerial reconnaissance, the famous pilot and her navigator, as civilians, fell under the charge of espionage with all the ensuing consequences. Therefore, the question "Who knows the truth about Amelia Earhart?" the answer must be sought in the archives of the American and Japanese secret services. fav
Amelia Earhart became an aviation legend during her lifetime, and her disappearance is one of the mysteries of the century. What happened in July 37th? How did the pilot die? The search for answers dragged on for 80 years. In 2018, anthropologist Richard Jantz said: The truth has been established.
Amelia Earhart met the 30s at the zenith of fame. She has already broken many records, including becoming the first female pilot to fly across the Atlantic Ocean. And she set herself a new grandiose task - to make a round-the-world flight along the longest route. The pilot had to overcome the route of 29 thousand miles (46 thousand km).
Purdue University in Indiana had just presented Earhart with the latest twin-engine monoplane, the Lockheed Electra L-10E. On June 1, 1937, she, along with navigator Fred Noonan, took off from Miami. The pilots successfully covered most of the route, setting several world records. The Pacific Ocean lay ahead.
On July 2, Amelia and Fred left Lae, New Guinea and headed for Howland Island in the central Pacific. Officials, the press, and a Coast Guard ship were waiting for them there.
Communication with the aircraft was unstable, and then completely interrupted.
When, according to the calculations of those meeting, the fuel on board the Earhart should have run out, the search began. However, the operation involving the aircraft carrier Lexington and the battleship Colorado did not bring results. Neither Earhart, nor Noonan, nor the monoplane were ever found.
Although the pilots were officially declared dead in 1939, enthusiasts continued to search and build theories for a long time. Three main versions have developed over the years.
Doom scenarios
She drowned
This is the most obvious assumption. Earhart and Noonan were unable to find the tiny island after an 18-hour flight, they ran out of fuel and the plane crashed into the ocean. True, it is difficult to confirm this version: the entire ocean floor, whatever one may say, cannot be searched.
Nikumaroro Atoll
Perhaps the plane landed on another island. In 1940, the British explored Nikumaroro Atoll (400 km from Howland) and found skeletal fragments there. And also a few things that, in theory, could belong to Earhart and Noonan: a woman's shoe, an antique sextant (Navigational measuring tool. - Ed.) and a flask of Benedictine liqueur. This version is firmly held by the non-profit organization TIGHAR (The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery), which is investigating the disappearance of aircraft.
It's all Japanese
There is a version that the Americans landed somewhere more or less safely, but they were captured by the Japanese. This view is shared by journalist Mike Campbell, who wrote a biography of Earhart. He suggests that the pilots were mistaken for American spies and killed in prison.
There are also more exotic theories. For example, that Earhart was tired of everything, and she secretly returned to the United States, where she lived under a different name.
Or let's say that she stayed in Japan and worked on an English-language propaganda radio channel under the pseudonym Tokyo Rose. But the main heavyweights in the historical ring are still the three versions listed above.
Remains from Nikumaroro
Skeleton fragments from Nikumaroro Atoll (13 units: skull, parts of bones of legs and arms) were examined in the same 40th year. They were sent to the Fiji Islands, where Dr. Hoodless, director of the Fiji Central Medical Institute, concluded that the remains belonged to a stout, short, middle-aged man.
Unfortunately, over time, in the same place in Fiji, the bones managed to be lost or thrown away (and along with the sextant).
Dr. Hoodless was probably unaware that the remains may have belonged to a famous pilot. Therefore, he did not care about the safety of the “find” for a future, more advanced examination.
Maybe he didn't even consider "it could be a woman".
All we have left is his measurements. And hope the doctor didn't make them a left heel.
In 1998, Hoodless's recordings got into TIGHAR. Experts checked his measurements and came to the conclusion: the bones still belonged to a woman, taller than average. Just like that and was Earhart.
In 2015, opponents of this version seemed to prove again that the remains were male. But University of Tennessee anthropology professor Richard Yants, who was part of the TIGHAR team back in 1998, was not satisfied with the refutation. In January 2018, his work titled Amelia Earhart and the Nikumaroro Bones - A 1941 Analysis versus Modern Quantitative Techniques was published in the journal Forensic Anthropology (“Forensic Anthropology.” - Ed.) published by the University of Florida.
99% match
So what did he include in his work? First, the professor consulted with historical costume experts. They studied Earhart's clothes and specified the girth of her waist and the length of her legs along the trousers.
Secondly, Janz took the data from the driver's license and pilot's license (this, of course, was done before). He picked up a photograph of Earhart (where she holds a can of oil in her hand), which can more or less accurately determine the length of the two bones of her hand. The scientist rechecked the methods of determining the height used by Hoodless in Fiji, and came to the conclusion that they were significantly outdated. Modern research gives different results.
Most importantly, he ran the bone data through Fordisc. This is a platform for anthropologists (of which Janz himself is a co-author) that can compare the entered data with a sample of people who lived at the same time, and determine gender, origin and physique from the skeleton.
In Earhart's case, the sample included 2,700 Americans who died in the mid-20th century. The program showed that the bones matched 99% of the measurements of one Earhart.
In closing, Janz stated: "Until definitive evidence is provided that the remains are not those of Amelia Earhart, the most compelling conclusion is that they are hers."
And now we can assume how the life of the great pilot ended. Nikumaroro is a tiny uninhabited island overgrown with palm trees. Due to constant droughts, it is unsuitable for life. Earhart could survive on the island for weeks (perhaps months) before dying on its southeast coast.
Alas, her own words, spoken to the press before the last flight, turned out to be prophetic: “Soon records will cease to be the main engine of progress in the aviation industry, and the main person in aviation is no longer a dashing daredevil pilot, but a well-trained aeronautical engineer.”
For which she was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. Distinguished Flying Cross) . She wrote several best-selling books about her flying and was instrumental in the formation of the Ninety-Nine, an organization of women pilots, and was elected its first President.
In 1935, Earhart joined the aviation department of Purdue University as a visiting faculty member. In this position, she sought to attract more women to the aviation industry and advise them on their careers. She was also a member of the Women's National Party and an early supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment.
In 1937, while trying to fly around the world in a twin-engine light transport and passenger aircraft, the Lockheed Model 10 Electra (Eng. Lockheed Model 10 Electra), which was funded by Purdue University, Earhart went missing in the central Pacific near Howland Island. The fascination with her life, career, and details of her disappearance continues to this day.
early years
Amelia Earhart as a child
Amelia Mary Earhart was born July 24, 1897 in Atchison, Kansas, the son of lawyer Edwin Earhart. Edwin's wife, Amy, was the daughter of a local judge. Amelia was the eldest child in the family; a second daughter, Muriel, was born two and a half years later.
From an early age, the Earhart sisters enjoyed an unusual freedom for that time to choose interests, friends and entertainment. Amelia was an excellent rider since childhood, she swam, played tennis and shot from a 22-caliber rifle donated by her father. She learned to read at the age of four and from an early age absorbed a wide variety of literature, but her books about great discoveries and adventures were especially attracted. As a result, despite her belonging to the "weaker sex", among the children from neighboring streets, Amelia became a recognized leader and ringleader. Her grades in school were almost always excellent, especially in science, history and geography. At the age of 10, Amelia saw an airplane for the first time, but at that moment she did not have much interest in it. She later described it as "a piece of rusty wire and wood, not at all interesting."
Over time, the family's financial situation worsened; Edwin Earhart began to drink heavily, which gradually ruined his career as a lawyer. In search of a new job, the family moved several times - first to Des Moines (Iowa), then to St. Paul (Minnesota). By the time the family had to experience real poverty, when the dresses for the growing daughters were sewn from old window curtains ... As a result, Amy, having taken her daughters, moved to relatives in Chicago. Nevertheless, in the fall of 1916, using the money received under the will, her mother sent Amelia to the elite Ogontz School in Pennsylvania.
Marriage
In early 1931, Amelia Earhart accepted the marriage proposal of her "press agent" and business partner, George Putnam, who by this time had divorced his first wife. An exceptionally quiet and family marriage ceremony took place on February 7, 1931, at Putnam's mother's small home in Connecticut; none of the reporters was admitted to it, and two days later the newlyweds returned to their work. According to most friends and relatives, their marriage was successful and was organized on the principles of equal partnership and cooperation that Amelia professed. However, some of the journalists unfamiliar with the family tended to describe it as a "marriage of convenience". This version, however, was refuted in 2002, when the personal correspondence of Earhart and Putnam, including their love letters, was transferred to the museum of the University of Purdue (Indiana), until then kept in a private family archive.
Career zenith: achievements, fame, social activities
In the spring of 1931, Earhart masters an autogyro as one of the first female pilots; in April, she set a new world altitude record on it - 18,451 feet. At the turn of the 1920s and 1930s, autogyros were actively advertised as an inexpensive, safer and, in the future, mass alternative to airplanes. In reality, however, the first samples of gyroplanes were famous for their high accident rate, especially during takeoff and landing. Pitcairn's gyroplane demonstrator - repeatedly damaged, crashed and restored - was dubbed "Black Marie" by the pilots at the company, since none of them managed to fly on this device for at least a few hours without accidents and incidents. The general opinion of the pilots who got acquainted with the machine developed quickly and stated that, "probably, the maximum time that anyone can safely fly on such an apparatus is no more than 10 hours."
Nevertheless, in the spring of 1931, Earhart became the first female pilot to cross the entire United States in a Pitcairn PS-A2 autogyro; net flight time was 150 hours, with 76 refueling landings (required about every 2 hours). At the same time, the entire route from east to west was not marked by a single accident. Problems, however, "overtook" her on the way back. In Abilene, Texas, during takeoff, a “dust devil” appeared in the path of an autogyro - a small dust whirlwind that suddenly appears - a specific natural phenomenon characteristic of these places. Due to the sudden rarefaction of the air, the device, which had just picked up speed and left the ground, fell on it from a height of several meters and completely collapsed. In this case, however, Earhart was not even injured. The next day, the factory pilot brought a new gyroplane from the Pitcairn factory and the pilot continued her journey east.
1932 - Solo flights across the Atlantic
The following year, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to compete in the famous trans-American Bendix race. The 1933 race was marked by a series of severe accidents and catastrophes with the death of pilots and aircraft. Earhart was one of the few participants who managed to complete the entire route, and before the end of the race she could claim first place. However, the materiel failed - a malfunction in the engine led to severe overheating, and then the vibration destroyed the fastening of the upper entrance hatch of the cab; the air current tore off the hatch, the cover of which almost demolished the keel of the aircraft. As a result, Earhart came third.
A few days later, Earhart broke her own record last year on the trans-American route, setting a new record flight time of 17 hours 7 minutes 30 seconds. At the same time, shortly before the completion of the flight, vibration and air flow again destroyed the fastening of the upper entrance hatch of the cockpit, and the last 75 miles - before landing - Earhart flew the plane with one hand (the other had to hold the hatch cover over her head, since if she had been torn off, she could to damage or demolish the keel of the aircraft).
A. Earhart next to his Vega 5b c. 1935
Mysterious disappearances. Mysticism, secrets, clues Dmitrieva Natalia Yurievna
Amelia Earhart
Amelia Earhart
More than 75 years have passed since the inexplicable disappearance of the legendary American female pilot Amelia Earhart, and interest in this strange and confusing story does not fade away, just like interest in the very personality of this amazing woman.
When a woman becomes an aviator, that in itself is admirable. Amelia was not just one of the female pilots, but an outstanding aviator, with outstanding achievements and records, thanks to which her name entered the world history of aviation. She was the first in the world to fly solo from Hawaii to California and across the Atlantic Ocean. Already at the very beginning of her aviation career, in 1922, Amelia set her first world altitude record, climbing 4300 m. Her name did not leave the front pages of newspapers.
It is not surprising that such a passion for the sky inspired Amelia to more and more new exploits. She could not stop there and was always eager to break other people's records. Therefore, when the famous American pilot Willie Post flew around the globe in 1932, Amelia Earhart set out to make an air trip around the world as well. She had been preparing for this flight for five years. And so, in 1937, she finally made up her mind. This flight was to be her last great record, after which Amelia intended to leave the big aviation and devote herself to training young pilots at the aviation department of Purdue University.
The course was supposed to lie along the equator - this is the longest round-the-world route. The whole world watched the flight with bated breath. Amelia Earhart and her navigator, experienced aviator Fred Noonan, flew a Lockheed Electra twin-engine airplane.
At that time it was one of the most advanced aircraft. The flight was carried out with stops for refueling. It was almost completed - there were only three legs left: from Papua New Guinea to Howland Island in the Pacific Ocean, then from it to Honolulu and, finally, from there to Oakland (California), where the flight was supposed to end.
The flight to Howland Island turned out to be fatal. The US Marine Itasca, which was helping to direct their flight, received on July 2, 1937, the last radio message indicating the aircraft's coordinates. From it followed that "Lockheed Electra" is already very close to the destination. After that, the pilots made several attempts to establish voice communication with the commander of the vessel. But it could not be done. The antenna on board the aircraft may have failed. Howland Island was only a few miles away when communication with the airplane was lost and it was lost to sight. What prevented the crew of the airplane from landing could not be established.
Of course, all possible measures were immediately taken to search for the missing aircraft and its crew. But it was not possible to establish their whereabouts. After a meticulous two-week search, it was announced that the plane and those on board, Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan, were missing at sea. The official version of what happened was that the plane ran out of fuel and fell into the water. The crew members were declared dead.
But such search results did not satisfy the aviation community. After some time, an initiative group was formed, which included prominent aviation historians and experienced pilots. This group, which exists and continues its research to this day, is called TIGHAR (International Aviation Historical Truth Retrieval Group). For decades, TIGHAR has been searching for traces of the aircraft and crew members, repeatedly sending expeditions to the Pacific Ocean.
In the course of the research, a version was put forward that due to some inconsistencies in the map and a communication breakdown, Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan lost their course. They mistakenly went not to Howland, but to another island, now called Nikumaroro, located 650 km to the south. It was assumed that they even managed to land, but the aircraft was badly damaged and could no longer take to the air.
Amelia and Fred themselves survived and spent their last days leading the life of Robinsons on the island.
It is impossible to say with certainty that all the finds found on Nikumaroro could only belong to the crashed pilots. The island was not uninhabited, it was inhabited by a small number of natives. In addition, pearl divers came there every year.
This version has been carefully studied not only by the TIGHAR group itself, but also by many historians and archaeologists. The latter recognized it as unscientific. However, TIGHAR provided numerous proofs that they were right.
Here are some of their arguments.
1. After the disappearance, Amelia sent radio signals for another 5 days, coming from the square in which the island of Nikumaroro was located. This suggests that the airplane did not fall to the bottom of the ocean, but was on land, albeit damaged.
2. In 1940, parts of a female skeleton were found on the island near the traces of a fire. The remains of eaten birds and turtles lay around. The skeleton was sent for examination, but the pathologist concluded that these were the remains of one of the natives who sometimes sailed to the island from neighboring inhabited islands.
3. The result of the examination did not satisfy the members of the TIGHAR group, they organized an expedition to Nikumaroro. At the site of the alleged parking lot, they found a woman's shoe, a cosmetic bag, broken lotion bottles, a broken penknife.
It seems strange in this story that all the finds can only be attributed to Amelia Earhart. But there is no trace of Fred Noonan being on the island. The wreckage of the airplane was also not found.
The researchers suggest that it could have been washed away by tidal waves into the sea. To establish this fact, it is necessary to undertake a new expedition, which is what the members of the TIGHAR group are planning to do in the near future. Their last expedition took place in 2012, the year of the seventy-fifth anniversary of the mysterious disappearance of Amelia Earhart and her navigator.
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