Several years ago, I started hearing about a man making his way through the Amelia Earhart/Fred Noonan disappearance case. What caught my attention wasn’t just his research—it was the way his name kept coming up.

From the moment I became involved in this story, I’ve been drawn to the lesser-known nuances that make up the towering mystery of Amelia Earhart. As I got to know people in the field, one name surfaced repeatedly. No matter the theory, no matter the angle, everyone seemed to be talking about the same guy. He’s written books, published papers, and contributed to nearly every version of this story—including his appearance on Vanished: Amelia Earhart, where he explored a well-known collection of bones discovered on Nikumaroro. That discovery, made by British colonial officer Gerald Gallagher, remains one of the most hotly debated pieces of evidence in this case. Were those bones the final remains of Amelia and Fred, stranded castaways on a remote Pacific island? Or is the truth something else entirely?

When I looked into his work, I immediately understood why he was so widely respected. He doesn’t care about being right. He thinks bigger. His neutrality has allowed him to move freely across this story, collaborating with some of the most prominent figures in the investigation—people who sit in opposing camps, defending starkly different theories.

How does someone do that? How do you keep an open mind in a case that seems determined to pull you down an endless rabbit hole? Tonight, we find out. It’s time to open your ears and your mind. We’re making stops on Nikumaroro, Orona, and Buka—by way of St. Paul, Minnesota.

Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. This is Kenton Spading.

A Lost Sailor or Amelia Earhart? Lost Norwich City Crewmen: Potential Sources of the Human Remains Discovered on Gardner Island (now Nikumaroro Island) in 1940 @ Academia.edu

St. Paul employee part of team searching for Amelia Earhart @ US Army Corps of Engineers

Amelia Earhart's Shoes: Is the Mystery Solved? @ Amazon

Vanished: Amelia Earhart "Left for Dead" (Part Two) @ Spotify

The Chater Report @ TIGHAR's Official Website 

If you’ve ever heard me guest on other podcasts or in media of any kind, you’ve heard the story of how this podcast all started for me. But just in case you haven’t, here it is. The Chasing Earhart project (which this podcast is a part of) officially launched in 2017. But nine years before that, I started what I often refer to as the pre-research phase - a part of the project that lasted a little bit longer than the time we’ve been public. During that time, I made a list of 25 original guests that I felt I needed to convince to come on board and help me tell the most robust version of this story that, at that time, I felt I could. When we decided to go public, I began sending out emails, making cold calls and trying to pull strings as a nobody with no experience and no recognizability in relation to the case. 

I contacted everyone on my list with basically the same request. Come on my show, talk to me about your research and give me an opportunity to give you a platform that I felt would end up being unique once we gained some traction. Of all the people I reached out to, perhaps one man stood out more than most when it came to his approach and his notoriety in the case. He’s a decorated archaeologist with one of the most impressive resumes that I’ve ever seen. And we had a connection through the University of California Riverside, from which he earned his PhD in anthropology in 1976. In his teens, he organized the Society for California Archaeology and he’s the former senior Archaeologist for the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, better known to this audience by its famous acronym TIGHAR. 

He’s authored countless papers, written a pair of books - both fiction and non fiction and is perhaps the most well versed authority on the island of Nikumaroro. He was also the very first guest I ever featured on this podcast, over seven years ago. When I reached out to him initially, I remember telling my wife that we’d likely never hear back. After all, what business did someone like me have, in having a conversation with a man of his stature for a case I was so fascinated by? To my surprise, he said yes and we went on to have what is still the most listened to episode of this entire podcast. 

Since then, he’s gone on to guest on the show a couple more times, and he was also the first guest I asked to appear on our Chasing Earhart Discussion panel in Atchison, Kansas in 2018. When I came calling again for Vanished, he was in, and he gave some of the most important testimony that, that series has ever seen. I owe a lot to him. And tonight, after six years away from the show, he’s returned to catch up with me in what I’m referring to as a career retrospective when it comes to his involvement in the Amelia Earhart/Fred Noonan disappearance case. I didn’t know it when I started this rebrand 25 episodes ago, but coming full circle has become a dominating theme throughout. Tonight, in perhaps one of the most special conversations I’ve had on this show, I welcome him back into the fold to discuss his thoughts on castaway, and gain some surprising insight into his feelings on the case to be made for Nikumaroro. He’s one of the most highly respected people in his industry and his name will forever be synonymous with Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan. Listen to the following conversation closely - you’re all about to learn something valuable. And I hope you take it to heart. Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. From Silver Spring, Maryland, this is Dr. Tom King.

"The Continuing Search for Amelia Earhart: An Interview with Tom King" @ The Archaeology Channel

Amelia Earhart Unrescued @ Amazon 

Amelia Earhart's Shoes: Is the Mystery Solved? @ Amazon

Thirteen Bones @ Amazon

Amelia Earhart on Nikumaroro: A Summary of the Evidence @ Academia.org

Castaway: A Conversation with Dr. Tom King @ Chasing Earhart

Niku IX Recap: A Conversation with Dr. Tom King & Andrew McKenna @ Chasing Earhart

Amelia Earhart Unrescued: A Conversation with Dr. Tom King @ Chasing Earhart

In 2021, I had a conversation with brothers Mike and Robert Ashmore regarding a highly curious satellite image they’d discovered in a lagoon on an island that’s gotten a lot of play in this Earhart investigation over the years. It’s been some time since that interview and the wheels of this case turn slowly……but they do turn. 

Tonight, in a follow up to that episode, I welcome a man that has been on my radar for years, and over those years, we’ve talked off and on about him being a project guest but we wanted to wait until just the right moment for him to make his debut. Fortunately, now is that moment, and we owe it to that conversation with the Ashmore brothers from over 3 years ago. That satellite image they stumbled across? Now has a name and a true blue expedition out to Nikumaroro to investigate it. It’s called the Taraia object. 

He’s been named dropped for years by multiple guests. Tonight, one of the most decorated archeologists we've ever had on the show makes his Chasing Earhart debut to discuss a brand new expedition out to a very familiar place with an entirely new goal. 

This case has a way of bringing things full circle, and boy are we completing one of those tonight. 

Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. From Eugene Oregon by way of the Archeology Channel, this is Dr. Richard Pettigrew.

"New Expedition Hopes to Find Amelia Earhart's Plane" @ Inside Edition on YouTube

"Oregon archaeologist to embark on expedition to find Amelia Earhart’s long-lost plane" @ The NY Post

"The Last Flight: Local Organization Searching for Amelia Earhart" @ KLCC

"The Continuing Search for Amelia Earhart: An Interview with Tom King" @ The Archaeology Channel

"The Road to Amelia: A Conversation with Mike & Robert Ashmore" @ Chasing Earhart

If you’ve ever attended the annual Amelia Earhart festival in Atchison Kansas, then you're familiar with an event that’s been a staple of that weekend every year since its inception. It’s called Breakfast with the Books. An event that brings Amelia Earhart authors to the town where the legend began to present their stories and discuss AE’s enduring legacy. A couple of years ago, while I was holding my event for Rabbit Hole, my next guest was there as a featured author for Breakfast with the Books in presentation of a story that we’ll be discussing tonight. 

She’s crafted one of the most clever ideas for a work of fiction that I’ve ever read and if you’re an Amelia Earhart fan, you’ll be absolutely thrilled at the way it’s presented and the attention she’s paid to all the little details that have helped make Earhart’s legend grow for almost 90 years. 

If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like for Amelia Earhart to meet Nancy Drew or Clue, get ready, because this is a mystery within a mystery, and it’s set in one of the most iconic Earhart landmarks in the entire world. Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. This is Kristin Gray and The Amelia Six.

The Amelia Six @ Amazon

Discover Amelia Earhart's Goggles @ Google Arts & Culture

In August of 2017, I helped introduce the world to a man that had been quietly working on an idea that could blow the wheels off the Amelia Earhart/Fred Noonan story. He’d recently put out a book via the Paragon Agency called Tracking Amelia Earhart: Her Flightpath to the End. I happened to know the publisher of that book, Doug Westfall, who I’d met just a few months earlier and it was at that meeting that I first learned of tonight’s guest.

Once I got his number, I gave him a call, and then I read that book. There aren’t too many moments in this whole thing that I can remember my exact thoughts at an exact point in time. But this one? I know because I wrote it down. A singular question. And here it is. “Why doesn’t everybody know about this?!”

At the end of tonight, you’ll know two things. One - we have an aircraft off the coast of Buka, sitting a little over 100 feet down with a remarkable set of similarities to the holy grail of aviation. That’s a fact. And it’s inescapable now. And two - we’re gonna go get it. And in doing so, we’re going to mount the most incredible cross theory expedition this case has ever seen. They do say it takes a village.

You’ve heard from everyone around him, some of the key names involved in Buka III, and you’ve even heard from some detractors who’ve certainly shared their skepticism on what’s become a very curious wreck site in an area of the world that nobody had ever looked in, until he started looking over 15 years ago.

Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. From Salisbury, Maryland, this is Bill Snavely.

Tracking Amelia Earhart: Her Flightpath to the End @ Specialbooks.com

Lost in Flight: Amelia Earhart Giving Cover as a Decoy for a Spy Plane @ Specialbooks.com

Tracking Amelia Earhart: Her Flightpath to the End @ Chasing Earhart

Buka III: Bill Snavely, Chris Williamson & the Dependable Engines Association @ Chasing Earhart

Nearly a year ago, the Amelia Earhart story was rocked by a mysterious and compelling sonar image produced by ocean exploration company Deep Sea Vision. The suspiciously plane-shaped image taken in an area out in the Pacific near Howland Island, rattled the case to its core, and forced a full investigative stop while the world anxiously awaited a confirmation. 

As history was potentially unfolding, I welcomed Deep Sea Vision’s CEO, Tony Romeo to the podcast in his Chasing Earhart debut - and we discussed the possibility of his find being the beginning of the end for the Amelia Earhart/Fred Noonan disappearance case. 

Well, you know how that goes. 

Tonight, 10 months after that episode was recorded, Tony returns to look back in retrospect on that conversation, and discuss the most recent developments in the deep ocean search for the holy grail of aviation. You know, people say this case is cursed. You think there’s something to that? 

Just when you think the investigation may be over, it throws us yet another curve ball and puts us all right back where we were before.

The plot thickens, indeed. Let’s get to work. Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. Fresh back from deep in the Pacific Ocean, this is Tony Romeo.

Is This Amelia Earhart’s Long-Lost Plane? @ The Wall Street Journal

Ocean exploration company's possible proof of Amelia Earhart's wrecked plane nearly vanished: report @ Fox News

Researchers Thought They Found Amelia Earhart’s Missing Plane. It Turned Out to Be a Plane-Shaped Pile of Rocks @ Smithsonian Magazine

The Beginning of the End: A Conversation with Tony Romeo @ Chasing Earhart

We’ve all been on a pretty incredible run lately. This little rebrand idea for the show I had about a year ago, was only supposed to be a couple of new episodes. Never in a million years did I think we’d still be going with more debuts, returning guests and new revelations. The last year has been one of the most tumultuous years in the history of this  Earhart game and I’ve learned that in this story, the twists and turns are never over.

There are very few people whom I consider to be giants in this case. And tonight’s guest is certainly no exception. He’s got dual master’s degrees in marine science and ocean engineering with a year of his education coming courtesy of Purdue University, interestingly enough and he’s used those degrees to go on to create perhaps the most impressive resume ocean exploration has ever seen. 

He worked with Jacque Cousteau on the search for the world famous Calypso, and was the operations manager for Bob Ballard’s historic Titanic discovery. And in 1999, he was also instrumental in the discovery of the Dakar - an Israeli submarine that had been missing without explanation for decades. Incidentally, that was the same year that Dana Timmer led the first deep ocean expedition in an attempt to locate Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan’s lost Electra which at that time, had been missing for 62 years. When they say it can’t be done - when they say it’s impossible, Tom Dettweiler says, “well, we’ll just see about that.” 

6 years after his debut on the show, he returns to us now to discuss the status of the white hot deep ocean search for Earhart & Noonan, the state of the case as a whole and to give us all a much needed dose of his legendary eternal optimism. And we could all use some of that right now. Fresh back from the Cook Islands in the South Pacific Ocean, this….is Tom Dettweiler.

The longer this rebrand goes, the more I continue to be surprised. Years ago, I reached out to a man that was a part of my original 25. He’s perhaps the most well known name in the entire Earhart case. Some people also consider him to be a bit of a polarizing figure. When I reached out, I was a nobody - I had no contacts, no experience except my own handful of years in pre-research and I had no expectations about receiving a response. To my surprise, he reached right back out and we began a dialogue.

We’ve had our differences over the years, but to his credit, and my surprise, he’s now returned to the show after a 6 year hiatus to discuss the case for the castaway hypothesis, and his new book that is being discussed as his swan song to the Amelia Earhart story. This is a sentence I thought I’d never utter on this show again.

Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. From TIGHAR HQ in Oxford PA, this is Ric Gillespie.

One More Good Flight: The Amelia Earhart Tragedy @ Amazon

Finding Amelia: The True Story of the Earhart Disappearance @ Amazon

Have We Really Found Amelia Earhart's Bones? @ The Guardian

Did Amelia Earhart land on Gardner Island? TIGHAR explains hypothesis in-depth | LiveNOW from FOX @ YouTube

Finding Amelia with Hard Facts and Sound Science - Ric Gillespie at NEAM @ YouTube

Post Loss Radio: A Conversation with Ric Gillespie @ Chasing Earhart

Over 15 years ago now, I sat down to make a list of dream participants for what would become the Chasing Earhart project. I came up with a list of 25 names and on that list was a man who’s been associated with the search for Amelia Earhart since the first deep ocean expedition for her took place in 1999. In fact, he’s the man who led that search almost 25 years ago. In that time, every search that's included the pacific ocean near Howland, has come calling - requesting consultation on their efforts in the potential discovery of the holy grail of aviation. He’s a pilot, navigator, sailor and adventurer. And he’s a giant in the story of the search for two missing aviators, lost to history.

Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. From Mission Bay San Diego, this is Dana Timmer.

An Exploration Team Believes They Found Amelia Earhart’s Missing Plane. Here’s Why @ Amelia Earhart's Official Website

Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea @ Amazon

In 2014, as this project was in pre-research, the world was fixated on an around the world flight that dominated the media and much of the aviation related conversation that year. Chief among the many reasons why was the pilot - a woman who shares a namesake with the biggest aviation icon to ever fly the skies. 

On July 11th, 2014 Amelia Rose Earhart completed her world flight without incident and touched down on the same runway in Oakland, Ca where her namesake departed 77 years earlier. 

In many ways, Amelia Mary Earhart got her second chance and returned home that day. It’s been 10 years since that historic world flight, and tonight an absolute force for aviation enters the conversation with a literal one in a million perspective. A woman that shares so many parallels, you’ll swear you’re hearing from a modern day counterpart for the biggest aviation icon of all time.

Welcome back to Chasing Earhart. This is Amelia Rose Earhart.

Learn to Love the Turbulence: “Flight lessons” on Becoming the Pilot in Command of Your Own Journey @ Amazon Signed Copies Here

2024 Amelia Earhart Pioneering Achievement Award Revealed @ Atchison Globe

Amelia Rose Earhart’s Flight Around the World and Into History @ Observer.com