Lost – Rachel Hartigan

Another screen provided a closer view: bedrock and coral rubble occasionally obscured by a flurry of marine snow. “We’re looking for colors that aren’t natural to the background,” said Ballard, as he stared intently at the screens from his perch in the back row. On the first night, they found wreckage: items that looked like a propeller, a boiler, a crankshaft, and much more.

But all were from the Norwich City. It wasn’t what Ballard was looking for, but it answered an important question: How deep could the plane go? The Norwich City debris clustered at depths between 100 to 300 meters. “Anything of similar mass—part of a plane or part of a ship—would have been sliding downslope in that zone,” explained expedition leader Allison Fundis, a former teacher whose superhuman ability to maintain her equanimity made her the perfect counterpoint to Ballard’s relentlessness.

“We’re really focusing on that zone with the ROV dives.” When the pilots did spot something, their reactions tended to be muted. During one watch, a tube-shaped metallic object hove into view. The Hercules pilot murmured, “It looks anthropogenic. Should I pick it up?” The answer was yes. After a moment of hesitation, Hercules stretched out its arm, very slowly closed its pincers around the tube, and delicately placed the item into a white storage container on its side.

What was it? The answer would have to wait until the ROVs were recovered and the box could be opened, which wouldn’t be until the next day. It wasn’t part of Earhart’s plane. Instead, it appeared to be a piece of oceanographic equipment—a sign that other explorers had been here before Ballard. Ballard shrugged off false alarms, especially early in the search. “We did this for nine days with the Titanic,” he said. Over the course of the expedition, which lasted 12 days, Ballard sent the ship five times around Nikumaroro to map with multibeam sonar.

He sent the ASV around the island twice to map the shallower areas close to the reef. He sent drones flying over the island to peer into the water where the surf breaks over the reef. He sent Argus into deeper water to do side-scan sonar. And he sent both Argus and Hercules around the island to search for airplane wreckage with their cameras. “We did the whole enchilada,” says Ballard.

“That’s total coverage.” What he learned is that Nikumaroro is a tiny island at the peak of a massive seamount. It drops to the ocean floor in a series of steep cliffs and ramps—most dramatically in the primary search zone. And as with a mountain’s streams, chutes funnel debris down the slopes. Those chutes collect wreckage. Hercules and Argus combed the chutes from top to bottom. Below the Norwich City, the ROVs illuminated propellers, boilers, and other bits of ship for the watching science team.

Published by National Geographic Partners, LLC 1145 17th Street NW Washington, DC 20036 Copyright © 2026 Rachel Hartigan. All rights reserved. Reproduction of the whole or any part of the contents without written permission from the publisher is prohibited. NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC and Yellow Border Design are trademarks of the National Geographic Society, used under license. See here for text permissions. Since 1888, the National Geographic Society has funded more than 15,000 research, conservation, education, technology, and storytelling projects around the world.

National Geographic Partners distributes a portion of the funds it receives from your purchase to National Geographic Society to support their mission to illuminate and protect the wonder of our world. Get closer to National Geographic Explorers and photographers, and connect with our global community. Join us today at nationalgeographic.org/joinus For rights or permissions inquiries, please contact National Geographic Books Subsidiary Rights: [email protected] Interior design: Nicole M. Roberts Cover design: Pete Garceau Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4262-2254-2 eBook ISBN: 978-1-4262-2552-9 The authorized representative in the EU for product safety and compliance is Disney Trading B.V., Asterweg 15S, 1031 HL, Amsterdam, The Netherlands email: [email protected] OceanofPDF.com TITLE PAGE COPYRIGHT DEDICATION EPIGRAPH PROLOGUE CHAPTER ONE 1937: DISAPPEARANCE CHAPTER TWO 1897–1908: “IT’S JUST LIKE FLYING!”

CHAPTER THREE CAPTURED: JOSEPHINE’S STORY CHAPTER FOUR 1908–16: “GREAT STRAIN AND ANXIETY” CHAPTER FIVE CAPTURED: “IT SOUNDED LIKE TRUTH” CHAPTER SIX 1918–20: “GETTING EVERYTHING I CAN” CHAPTER SEVEN CAPTURED: “EARHART HOUNDS” CHAPTER EIGHT 1920–24: “I WANT TO FLY!” CHAPTER NINE CASTAWAY: THE DESERTED ISLAND CHAPTER TEN 1924–28: “A CONSUMING VOCATION” CHAPTER ELEVEN CASTAWAY: TIGHAR BRINGS IN THE DOGS CHAPTER TWELVE 1928: FLIGHT OF THE FRIENDSHIP CHAPTER THIRTEEN CASTAWAY: WHERE’S THE PLANE?

CHAPTER FOURTEEN 1928–32: “AIR-MINDED” CHAPTER FIFTEEN CASTAWAY: BONES CHAPTER SIXTEEN 1932: “BECAUSE I WANTED TO” CHAPTER SEVENTEEN SANK: THE LONGS’ LONG QUEST CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 1932–37: “CLEAR THINKING, ENERGY, AND VISION!” CHAPTER NINETEEN SANK: “WHERE THE ELECTRA WILL NOT BE FOUND” CHAPTER TWENTY SANK: A DISCOVERY?

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: 544624d848c4b1c2
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 11,617,494 bytes (11.079 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• ISBN: 9781426222542, 9781426225529
• Pages: 312
• Language: English (en)

Reading & Word Statistics

• Estimated Reading Time: 482.01 minutes
• Total Words: 96,403
• Total Characters: 579,704
• Average Words per Page: 308.98
• Average Characters per Page: 1858.03

Most Frequent Words

amelia (675), earhart (459), one (326), plane (253), flight (230), said (214), first (204), time (183), island (173), didn’t (167), she’d (154), new (153), two (152), long (147), later (138), earhart’s (138), world (133), george (128), radio (128), day (127), noonan (125), found (119), air (118), search (117), made (116), they’d (115), flying (112), people (111), electra (106), like (105), wrote (104), years (101), wasn’t (101), back (101), told (99), also (99), he’d (99), pacific (95), many (93), national (93), bones (92), howland (92), japanese (89), com (88), miles (88), islands (86), much (86), took (85), three (84), thought (84), next (84), around (83), war (82), women (80), knew (80), woman (80), pilot (80), aviation (80), amelia’s (80), tighar (79), never (79), even (78), well (78), get (77), life (77), saipan (77), last (77), now (76), see (75), fly (73), putnam (73), goerner (73), line (72), nikumaroro (72), know (72), make (72), muriel (72), across (71), way (71), days (70), went (70), home (69), july (68), amy (67), itasca (66), ship (65), wanted (63), away (63), mother (63), take (63), family (63), work (63), left (63), team (63), another (62), ocean (61), came (61), water (60), expedition (60), four (59).

PDF Download