“Result is not what we hoped for”

The South Carolina-based deep-sea explorer who came across what he believes was Amelia Earhart’s long-lost plane in the Pacific Ocean has now confirmed that his once-promising discovery was just a rock.

Tony Romeo and his Deep Sea Vision team – which captured a sonar image of an aircraft-shaped object in the Pacific Ocean during a three-month expedition to search for Earhart’s Lockheed 10-E Electra – confirmed on Friday that new solar images revealed the possible breakthrough was simply an aircraft-shaped rock formation .

“Although this result is not what we had hoped for, we are continuing our search for another 30 days to cover over 1,500 square nautical miles,” said Romeo, a pilot and former U.S. Air Force intelligence officer who used it to pay for all of his commercial real estate sold his search, said in a statement.

“The global response to our initial discovery has been truly inspiring, a testament to Amelia and the appeal of her incredible story.”

The aviation pioneer, a household name at the time, disappeared in 1937 on a record-breaking trip around the world with her flight navigator Fred Noonan.

The pair set off from Lae, Papua New Guinea, with plans to refuel on Howland Island before continuing their journey to Honolulu and their final destination of Oakland, California, but faced strong headwinds in Lae, when Earhart’s radio transmissions finally stopped.

The U.S. Navy and Coast Guard conducted a 16-day search for the missing duo without success and Earhart was officially declared dead on January 5, 1939.

Despite many attempts and millions of dollars spent over nine decades, neither Earhart’s remains nor the wreckage of her plane were ever found.

Romeo was convinced that he, along with his two brothers, both pilots, would solve the 87-year-old’s puzzling puzzle that previous adventurers had failed to do by selling the assets of his Charleston-area real estate company for his $11 million -Expedition to start in the Pacific Ocean.

The 16-person trip departed in September 2023 from Tarawa, Kirbati, a port near Howland Island, and the team’s unmanned submersible scanned 5,200 square miles of seabed.

After about a month, it captured a blurry image of a plane-like object more than 16,000 feet below the surface within 100 miles of Howland Island, causing excitement around the world, although skeptical sonar experts said the images were too blurry to be seen to confirm that it was Earhart’s plane.

Romeo’s latest findings came after his crew set out on a second expedition to capture high-resolution sonar images of the plane-shaped object, he said in his statement.

But it was just a pile of rocks, not Earhart’s plane.

Romeo said his company remains committed to searching for Earhart’s debris despite the disappointing results, the statement said.

Additional reporting by Katherine Donlevy