HOWLAND ISLAND

coral atoll, unincorporated territory of the United States. It lies in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, 1,650 miles (2,650 km) southwest of Honolulu. The atoll rises to 20 feet (6 m), is 1.5 miles (2.4 km) long by 0.5 mile (0.8 km) wide and has a land area of less than 0.6 square miles (1.6 square km). Its central basin indicates the existence of a former lagoon. Sighted in 1842 by American whalers and named for one of the first sailors to sight it, Howland was claimed in 1857, along with nearby Baker Island, by the United States under the Guano Act of 1856. The atoll's guano deposits are now exhausted. It was colonized from Hawaii in 1935 and placed under the administration of the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1936, and it served as a stop for planes flying between Hawaii and Australia. On July 2, 1937, the noted American aviator Amelia Earhart and her navigator, Fredrick J. Noonan, were lost near Howland after having stopped at Lae, Papua New Guinea. There are no permanent inhabitants on the atoll.