The mystery of aviator Amelia Earhart's disappearance has been subject of countless investigations, theories, searches and television documentaries.
But bones and artifacts found on a Pacific island has led some investigators to believe aviation's first pioneering female hero lived as a castaway and later died after crashing her Lockheed Electra into the ocean.
Earhart took off from Lae, now in Papua New Guinea, in an attempt to be the first person to fly around the world in 1937. She was never seen or heard from again.
A massive search failed to turn up any evidence of a crash, or debris in the ocean.
A story appearing in The Vancouver Sun says members of the U.S.-based group The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery have evidence suggesting Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan made it safely to Nikumaroro Island in Kiribati.
The group has carried out 10 expeditions to the island over the last 22 years, finding three small bone fragments earlier this year.
The bones may belong to a human finger, although they could also be from a turtle, which is why they've been sent to Oklahoma University for DNA testing.
Backing up the group's theory are artifacts members found that date from the 1930s, including a woman's make-up compact, broken mirror and small U.S.-made bottles.
"We have every reason to believe that this is the site where Amelia Earhart lived and died as a castaway," says the group's executive director Rick Gillespie.
Other theories over the years have suggested Earhart was eaten by cannibals on Howland Island, captured by the Japanese as a spy and that she returned to the United States after a secret mission and assumed a new identity.
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