URI's Bob Ballard To Lead Search For Amelia Earhart's Plane

KINGSTON, RI — More than three decades after discovering the Titanic, the University of Rhode Island's Bob Ballard will lead an expedition for something far more elusive: the missing plane of Amelia Earhart. Ballard's search will be followed by National Geographic for a special documentary to premiere this fall.

Earhart went down in the water after leaving Papua New Guinea in 1937, on the second-to-last leg of her trip around the world. She and her navigator, Fred Noonan, were never seen again.

According to URI Today, Ballard and his crew will set out on August 7 from Samoa, heading to Nikumaroro, an uninhabited island that is part of Micronesia. National Geographic crews will document the entire expeditionfor a special two-hour documentary that will air on October 20.

Ballard is a researcher with the university's Center for Ocean Exploration. He is also the lead principal investigator of a new, $94 million institute that partners with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other institutions.

Read the full story from URI Today here.