When Amelia Earhart disappeared during her attempt to become the first woman to circumnavigate the globe by air, many presumed her dead.

In the decades since, a slew of people have taken up the challenge to figure out what really happened to the pilot.

Now, a professor at the University of Tennessee thinks he has it all figured out, reports The Telegraph.

A new forensic study conducted by prof Richard L. Jantz concluded that “bones found on a remote Pacific island are most likely those of the lost aviator”.

You see that phrase, “most likely”? Well, the reasoning is going to frustrate you:

[A] new study by the professor at the University of Tennessee has concluded that bones found on the island of Nikumaroro three years after her disappearance are those of the missing pilot.

The bones were initially ruled out as those of Earhart after a first examination concluded they were male.

Professor Jantz has argued that forensic techniques were not fully developed at the time and that the bone measurements closely match Earhart’s records.

He said: “The only documented person to whom they may belong is Amelia Earhart.”

At the time of her disappearance the 39-year-old was trying to reach Hawaii before completing her journey onto California:

And Jantz’s conclusion is still just a theory:

As bones have since been lost, Professor Jantz, an expert in forensic anthropology at the University of Tennessee, used the bone measurements taken by Hoodless and compared them with what is known of Earhart’s body type.

Professor Jantz used Earhart’s driver’s and pilot’s licence records and photos of the aviator to piece together her bone measurements.

Summing up the process, he said: “If the skeleton were available, it would presumably be a relatively straightforward task to make a positive identification, or a definitive exclusion.

“Unfortunately, all we have are the meager data in Hoodless’s report and a premortem record gleaned from photographs and clothing.

“From the information available, we can at least provide an assessment of how well the bones fit what we can reconstruct of Amelia Earhart.”

How exhausting.

[source:telegraph]