EXCITEMENT over a distant photo apparently showing Amelia Earhart, her navigator and the wreck of her aircraft is unwarranted, an expert says, pointing to her final pleas for help on radio as the only conclusive evidence indicating her fate.

At the centre of the fresh frenzy is a faded black-and-white archival photo of what appears to be a Western woman sitting on a dock in the Japanese-occupied Marshall Islands.

Some say it’s the famous missing aviator, Amelia Earhart.

They point to an outline of a nearby man as being similar to that of her co-pilot, Fred Noonan. And then there’s the apparent wreckage of an aircraft tied to the back of a nearby ship ... which the seemingly despondent woman is looking towards.

The pioneer aviator’s fate has been a source of fascination since she vanished over the central Pacific Ocean while attempting to become the first woman to circumnavigate the globe in 1937.

THEORIES AND CONSPIRACIES

It was the morning of July 2, 1937, when Earhart failed to land at a refuelling station on Howland Island, just north of the equator, near the Gilbert Islands.

Historians agree her Lockheed Electra likely ran out of fuel and crashed into the Pacific Ocean.

But that’s where the common ground tends to end.

All agree that the aircraft navigation technology and techniques of the 1930s were rudimentary. So it is by no means impossible Earhart may have wandered far off track.

But no proven wreckage has been found. And a myriad of subsequent sightings have all been unconfirmed.

Some say the pair crashed near Papua New Guinea. Others say Earhart was actually a spy who was returned to the United States upon the end of WWII and lived out the remainder of her life in anonymity.

The strongest evidence is Earhart fell just short of her destination. It comes from the US navy Coast Guard cutter Itasca, which was stationed near her refuelling point at Howland Island. The ship recorded what it described as ‘very strong’ signals from Earhart’s aircraft as it sought the pinprick of land in the vast Pacific Ocean.

Earhart was heard by the cutter at 7.42am local time: “We must be on you, but cannot see you — but gas is running low. Have been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying at 1000 feet.”

An hour later, the cutter heard: “We are on the line 157 337. We will repeat this message. We will repeat this on 6210 kilocycles. Wait.”

Subsequent transmissions were detected, but they were indecipherable.

Even the conclusiveness of these records have been challenged: Earlier this year, a conference of the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery argued they had evidence of radio distress calls made days after the aircraft failed to arrive — indicating Earhart had successfully beached on a reef at Nikumaroro.

But one often overlooked account appears to have surfaced in the 1960s, with the publication of the book The Search for Amelia Earhart, by Fred Goerner. In it Marshall Island locals told tales of an aircraft crash landing, with Earhart and Noonan surviving.

They also detail what happened next: The pair were said to have been detained by the Japanese, worried they may have seen evidence of preparations for war, and shipped off the island.

TANTALISING FIND

Retired US Treasury agent Les Kinney is one of many amateur sleuths fascinated by Amelia.

He has spent more than a decade chasing new clues and was among those who found fragments attributed to Earhart’s Electra on Mili atoll in the Marshall Islands two years ago.

His documentary, Amelia Earhart: The Lost Evidence , is due to screen on the History Channel in the US soon.

Kinney argues Earhart survived her aircraft’s demise, and the Marshall Islanders’ tales are true.

He’s pinning his argument on a misplaced US ‘spy’ photo he found in the US National Archives.

“It was misfiled,” he says. “That’s the only reason I was able to find it.”

It shows a tall western looking man with a receding hairline. There’s also what appears to be a short-haired woman, sitting on the edge of the pier with her back turned to the camera.

Their vague profiles are similar to those of Noonan and Earhart.

In the background is a Japanese cargo ship, identified by the documentary as the military transport Koshu Maru, with what is speculated to be the shining wreckage of Earhart’s Lockheed Electra sitting on a barge tied to its stern.

Kinney believes the photo was taken by a ‘operative’ working for the US Office of Naval Intelligence on Jaluit Island in the Marshall Islands. The original archival stamps and annotations support this much, at least. Though it is not dated.

But Kinney argues it must be a pre-war image as the facility was flattened in 1943.

As such, it supports the longstanding Jaluit Island witness accounts asserting Earhart’s plane was seen to crash before the pair were taken away by the Japanese.

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Kinney states he has found other indications among US archives that the pair were then taken to Saipan where they were imprisoned by officials fearful they may have observed Japanese preparations for war.

Both Japanese and US archives say they have no records suggesting Earhart of Noonan were ever detained. But the History Channel documentary says it has documents that appears to contradict this statement.

It includes a file from the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations which “also includes a report, dated January 7, 1939, on information that Earhart was a prisoner in the Marshall Islands.”

AUTHENTICITY TESTED

The History Channel says the photo has been subjected to a series of tests to ensure its authenticity.

Digital forensic analyst Doug Carner was called in to check it for signs of manipulation. Another forensic analyst, facial expert Kent Gibson, gleaned what details he could from the distant outlines.

He ruled it was “very likely” the picture captures Earhart and Noonan.

But the Smithsonian Institution is not so certain.

Get the full story when #EarhartLostEvidence premieres this Sunday, July 9th at 9/8c on HISTORY. pic.twitter.com/lBdfpSQOF4 — HISTORY (@HISTORY) July 5, 2017

“I can’t really comment definitively on the photograph, and I don’t think [History investigators] can either,” curator at the aeronautics department at the National Air and Space Museum

Dorothy Cochrane says, noting that the image is “kind of a blurry photograph.”

Cochrane says the only tangible evidence was the interception of Earhart’s radio messages as she neared her destination — Howland Island

“We really have to be sure of what we’re saying is evidence, and saying what is real. We have to go with what we see the facts are, and that’s what the Coast Guard reported.”

“[Earhart] was a very famous person who literally disappeared off the face of the Earth,” she says. “We all would like to know, ultimately, what happened to her.