Searchers from Purdue and the Archaeological Legacy Institute stay on their vessel overnight while examining Nikumaroro for signs of the 1937 Earhart flight. Coconut crabs emerge after dark in numbers that make camping on the remote Pacific atoll impractical. Adults span three feet, weigh ten pounds, climb trees, crack coconuts with powerful pincers, and hunt rats plus seabirds.

A 12-gauge riot shotgun using birdshot or buckshot plus a nine-millimeter pistol would stop the armored animals at close range without precise aiming. Survivors of a crash landing would have lacked firearms against the persistent nocturnal predators.