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<v Speaker 1>Now scoot up closer to the fire, friend.

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<v Speaker 2>It's burning down to the embers and the air is

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<v Speaker 2>starting to carry a chill that settles right into your marrow.

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<v Speaker 2>Now we just got done talking about the monsters that

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<v Speaker 2>walk among us in the crowded city streets, but now,

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<v Speaker 2>now I want you to cast your mind out to

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<v Speaker 2>the places where there's not any streets at all.

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<v Speaker 1>I want you to think about the ocean.

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<v Speaker 2>Now the woods are deep and the mountains are high,

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<v Speaker 2>but the Pacific Ocean, well, the Pacific is a whole

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<v Speaker 2>different kind of hungry, my friend. It's a vast blue

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<v Speaker 2>desert that goes on forever, full of cold currents and

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<v Speaker 2>depths that have never seen the light of the sun.

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<v Speaker 2>It's a lonely place to be. And back in the

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<v Speaker 2>summer of 1937, it swallowed up America's sweetest darling, leaving

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<v Speaker 2>behind nothing but static on the radio and a ghost

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<v Speaker 2>story that we've been whispering out for nearly a century.

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<v Speaker 1>Let's talk about the.

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<v Speaker 2>Silver bird and the girl with the tousled hair who

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<v Speaker 2>flew it straight into the great unknown. Let's talk about

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<v Speaker 2>Miss Amelia Earhart. Now, folks back then, they called her

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<v Speaker 2>Lady Lindy. She had a smile that could disarm a

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<v Speaker 2>bank robber and the kind of restless spirit that just

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<v Speaker 2>couldn't abide keeping her feet on the ground. She had

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<v Speaker 2>already crossed the Atlantic, already put her name in the

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<v Speaker 2>history books. But Amelia, she wanted more. She wanted to

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<v Speaker 2>put a belt around the waist of the whole wide world.

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<v Speaker 2>She wanted to circumnavigate the globe following the sweltering line

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<v Speaker 2>of the equator. Her chariot, it was a Lockheed Model

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<v Speaker 2>10E Electra. To hear the old-timers tell it, That plane

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<v Speaker 2>was a beautiful thing. All gleaming steel and roaring twin

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<v Speaker 2>engines built to punch through the clouds like a silver bullet.

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<v Speaker 2>But a pilot, no matter how brave, needs a guide

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<v Speaker 2>when they're up there in the empty sky. Sitting in

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<v Speaker 2>the back, hunched over his charts with a pencil and

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<v Speaker 2>a sextant, was a fellow named Fred Noonan.

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<v Speaker 1>Now Fred, he was a master navigator.

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<v Speaker 2>He was the kind of man who could look at

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<v Speaker 2>the scattering of stars in the pitch black night and

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<v Speaker 2>tell you exactly where you were on God's green earth. But,

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<v Speaker 2>Fred had his demons too. He was known to find

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<v Speaker 2>the bottom of a whiskey glass just a little too often. Still,

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<v Speaker 2>Amelia trusted him with her life. Together, they set out

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<v Speaker 2>to conquer the sky. And for a while, it seemed

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<v Speaker 2>like they were going to do just that. They flew

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<v Speaker 2>over the jungles of South America, across the scorched earth

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<v Speaker 2>of Africa, and all the way to the edges of

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<v Speaker 2>the East Indies. But the ocean was waiting for them.

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<v Speaker 2>The ocean is always waiting. Now, it was July 2nd, 1937.

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<v Speaker 2>Amelia and Fred took off from Lye, New Guinea, heavy

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<v Speaker 2>with fuel and flying directly into the rising sun.

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<v Speaker 1>Their destination? Howland Island.

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<v Speaker 2>Now, listen to me closely here, because you need to

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<v Speaker 2>understand the sheer terrifying madness of this plan. Now, Howland

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<v Speaker 2>Island isn't some sprawling paradise.

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<v Speaker 1>Oh no.

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<v Speaker 2>It's a flat scrap of coral and sand, barely a

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<v Speaker 2>mile and a half long, sitting right in the middle

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<v Speaker 2>of nowhere. Hitting Howland from New Guinea is like trying

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<v Speaker 2>to shoot a single firefly with a BB gun from

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<v Speaker 2>a mile away, in the pitch dark. If your math

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<v Speaker 2>is off even by a fraction of a degree, you

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<v Speaker 2>don't just miss the island, you miss the whole world.

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<v Speaker 2>You fly over endless water until your engines sputter, cough,

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<v Speaker 2>and die.

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<v Speaker 1>So down there on the water, the U.S.

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<v Speaker 2>Coast Guard cutter Itasca was anchored near Howland, waiting to

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<v Speaker 2>guide Amelia in. They had their radios tuned, sending out

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<v Speaker 2>smoke signals, waiting to hear that silver bird come roaring

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<v Speaker 2>out of the clouds.

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<v Speaker 1>But, up in the sky, things were going wrong. The

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<v Speaker 1>weather turned foul.

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<v Speaker 2>Heavy clouds rolled in, thick and gray, blanketing the ocean

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<v Speaker 2>and hiding the stars. Fred Noonan, the man who navigated

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<v Speaker 2>by the heavens, was suddenly blind. They were flying on

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<v Speaker 2>instruments alone, roaring through the fog, deafened by the drone

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<v Speaker 2>of their own engines, completely cut off from the rest

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<v Speaker 2>of humanity. Now, imagine the claustrophobia of that cockpit, friend.

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<v Speaker 2>Just you, the rattle of the dials, the heavy smell

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<v Speaker 2>of aviation fuel, and the creeping cold realization that you

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<v Speaker 2>don't have any idea where you are. Now down on

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<v Speaker 2>the Itasca, the radio operators sat with their headphones pressed

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<v Speaker 2>tight to their ears, listening to the crackle of static.

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<v Speaker 2>And then, cutting through the void, came her voice. Quote,

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<v Speaker 2>KHAQQ calling Itasca, we must be on you, but we

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<v Speaker 2>cannot see you. The gas is running low.

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<v Speaker 1>Been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying

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<v Speaker 1>at 1,000 feet. End quote.

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<v Speaker 2>Now, her voice wasn't the calm, confident drawl the aviation

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<v Speaker 2>hero of the newspapers loved.

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<v Speaker 1>It was tight.

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<v Speaker 2>It was frantic. The Itasca tried to reply. They tapped

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<v Speaker 2>out Morse code. They spoke into their microphones. They blasted

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<v Speaker 2>their ship's boilers to make a pillar of black smoke.

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<v Speaker 2>But Amelia couldn't hear them, couldn't see them. It was

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<v Speaker 2>a one-way mirror of sound. She was screaming out into

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<v Speaker 2>the dark, and all she heard back was silence. Now,

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<v Speaker 2>can you imagine the terror of those final hours? watching

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<v Speaker 2>the fuel gauges tick down millimeter by millimeter, staring out

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<v Speaker 2>the rain-streaked windshield, praying to see a scrap of land,

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<v Speaker 2>but seeing nothing but the cold gray waves stretching out

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<v Speaker 2>in every direction, waiting to swallow you whole. Her final

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<v Speaker 2>confirmed transmission came in.

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<v Speaker 1>At 8.43 in the morning.

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<v Speaker 2>Quote, We are on the line 157337. We are running

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<v Speaker 2>on line north and south.

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<v Speaker 1>End quote. And then, nothing.

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<v Speaker 2>The radio crackle was static, and the Pacific Ocean reclaimed

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<v Speaker 2>its terrible silence. The most famous woman in the world,

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<v Speaker 2>and her silver plane, and her navigator, had just vanished

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<v Speaker 2>like a blown-out candle. Now, the government sent out battleships

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<v Speaker 2>and aircraft carriers. They scoured hundreds of thousands of square

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<v Speaker 2>miles of ocean, burning through millions of dollars. But the

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<v Speaker 2>sea keeps its secrets. They never found a rivet, a propeller,

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<v Speaker 2>or a bone. Folks have spent the last 80 plus

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<v Speaker 2>years trying to solve this riddle. Some say the plane

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<v Speaker 2>just ran out of gas and hit the water, sinking

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<v Speaker 2>to the crushing depths where no sunlight has ever touched.

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<v Speaker 2>A quick, violent end swallowed by the deep. Others whisper

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<v Speaker 2>darker tales. They say Amelia and Fred were blown off

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<v Speaker 2>course and captured by the Japanese military, then taken away

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<v Speaker 2>to a secret prison camp on Saipan where they were

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<v Speaker 2>executed as spies and buried in unmarked graves. Their names

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<v Speaker 2>scrubbed from the earth. But there's one other theory that'll

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<v Speaker 2>really keep you awake at night, friend. Some folks reckon

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<v Speaker 2>she didn't crash into the open ocean. Oh, no. They

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<v Speaker 2>think she managed to put that crippled plane down on

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<v Speaker 2>the jagged coral reef of a desolate, uninhabited spit of land, Nikumaroro. Now,

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<v Speaker 2>imagine surviving the crash, only to realize you're entirely alone,

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<v Speaker 2>a thousand miles from salvation. The water's gone, the radio's dead,

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<v Speaker 2>and you're not alone on the island. Nuku Mororo is

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<v Speaker 2>crawling with coconut crabs, monstrous armored things the size of

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<v Speaker 2>small dogs with claws strong enough to snap bone and

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<v Speaker 2>an appetite for meat. They hunt at night, clicking and

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<v Speaker 2>clattering over the coral. Decades later, expeditions found an old shoe,

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<v Speaker 2>a piece of plexiglass, and a jar of freckle cream

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<v Speaker 2>out on that lonely atoll. They even found some bones once,

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<v Speaker 2>but they got lost in the shuffle of history before

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<v Speaker 2>anyone could say for sure whose they were. So, what

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<v Speaker 2>happened to Lady Lindy? Did she drown in the cold dark?

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<v Speaker 2>Did she die facing a firing squad? Or, more frighteningly,

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<v Speaker 2>did she spend her last nights huddled on a coral reef,

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<v Speaker 2>listening to the clicking of the crabs as the tide

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<v Speaker 2>slowly pulled her silver plane beneath the waves? Now, we

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<v Speaker 2>may never know, friends, but the next time you look

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<v Speaker 2>up at a cloudy night sky or look out across

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<v Speaker 2>the endless ocean, just remember that the world is a

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<v Speaker 2>whole lot bigger than us. And sometimes, It just opens

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<v Speaker 2>its jaws and takes whatever it wants.