Was Amelia Earhart's missing plane located? An ocean exploration company offers new clues

Has Amelia Earhart's missing plane finally been located? Are we close to solving one of the greatest mysteries of the 20th century?

An ocean exploration company based in South Carolina may have some clues.

The exploration company, Deep Sea Vision, said Sunday that it had captured a sonar image in the Pacific Ocean that "appears to be Earhart's Lockheed 10-E Electra" aircraft. Earhart and her aircraft disappeared 86 years ago in 1937.

Sharing a video of the search expedition on social media, the company said that it a 16-person crew "scanned more than 5,200 square miles of ocean floor" with the Kongsberg Discovery HUGIN 6000, "the most advanced unmanned underwater drone, before finding what could be the legendary American aviator’s Lockheed 10-E Electra".

Like a treasure hunt

“This is maybe the most exciting thing I’ll ever do in my life,” pilot and a former U.S. Air Force intelligence officer Tony Romeo told the Wall Street Journal. “I feel like a 10-year-old going on a treasure hunt.”

Romeo, who is based in Charleston, sold his commercial real-estate properties to raise the $11 million required for this mission.

The pilot and his team began their expedition in early September from Tarawa, Kiribati, a port near Howland Island in the central Pacific Ocean, according to WSJ. Using radio messages received by Itasca, the U.S. Coast Guard vessel stationed near Howland Island to assist with Earhart's landing and refueling, Romeo's team tried to understand Earhart’s strategy and route to determine where her aircraft was likely to have gone down.

Thirty days later, their state-of-the-art drone "captured a fuzzy sonar image of an object the size and shape of an airplane resting some 5,000 meters underwater within 100 miles of Howland Island."

However, the team only discovered the image in the drone's data about 90 days into the trip and they were unable to turn back to investigate further.

While Romeo is "optimistic" that the objects discovered are from Earhart's plane, he told The Post and Courier he's not "saying we definitely found her.” Romeo told the publication that he hopes to bring closure to a story that has enthralled people for generations.

The company is now planning to launch another expedition this year, with a camera, to search for more evidence, such as the plane’s tail number: NR16020, according to The Post and Courier.

How did Amelia Earhart die?Here’s what researchers think happened to the famed pilot.

'An iconic mystery':Why we're still trying to solve Amelia Earhart's disappearance

Who was Amelia Earhart?

Amelia Earhart was an American aviator who was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic and the first person to fly solo from Hawaii to the U.S. mainland. She also set several speed and altitude records.

When she disappeared in 1937, she was setting out to be the first woman to complete a circumnavigation flight around the globe. She was 39 years old when she disappeared and was declared legally dead.

Kansas:Atchison's Amelia Earhart Hangar Museum 4th in USA Today Reader's Choice Travel Awards

What happened to Amelia Earhart?

Earhart and her navigator, Fred Noonan, departed from Oakland, California on May 20, 1937, on a Lockheed Electra aircraft. According to the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, they made 29 additional stops, including their last known refuel stop in Lae, New Guinea on July 2 at 10 a.m. local time.

Earhart and Noonan were due on Howland Island – about 2,500 miles away from Lae – about 18 hours later. Coast Guard cutter Itasca was waiting with fuel and received intermittent voice messages from Earhart as her signal increased. But neither Earhart nor Noonan knew Morse code, so there was no two-way contact, according to the Smithsonian Institute’s analysis of government records.

It’s unclear if she ever heard any of the Itasca’s transmissions at all.

After losing contact, the Navy and Coast Guard searched about 250,000 square miles of ocean in search of Earhart and Noonan. The unsuccessful endeavors cost roughly $250,000 per day, Time reported at the time. Eighteen months after their disappearance, the Navy declared Earhart and Noonan legally dead and deduced that their plane had run out of fuel and crashed into the Pacific.

Today, many experts contend a combination of bad weather, and the long journey caused the plane’s downfall.

With ongoing searches and conspiracy theories galore, Earhart’s disappearance remains one of the great unsolved mysteries of the 20th century.

Contributing: Clare Mulroy, USA TODAY