Suva is the capital of Fiji and its major port city, situated on the southeast coast of Viti Levu island in Rewa Province. As of the 2017 census, the city proper had a population of approximately 93,970, with a broader metropolitan area of around 185,913 — making it the political, economic, and cultural hub of both Fiji and much of the South Pacific. The colonial administration of British Pacific territories was transferred here in 1882, following the relocation of Fiji's capital from the earlier settlement of Levuka. Gates described it on camera as "a bustling and cosmopolitan town with a laid-back island charm" — but his reason for coming was anything but leisurely. Suva was reportedly the last known destination of bones recovered from the remote Pacific atoll of Nikumaroro in 1940, bones that may have belonged to Amelia Earhart or her navigator Fred Noonan and have since vanished from institutional records.
Fiji's colonial capital is relocated from Levuka to Suva due to geographical limitations of the former site.
Full administrative transfer of the colonial government to Suva is completed.
Bones discovered on Nikumaroro by colonial officer Gerald Gallagher are shipped to Fiji for analysis and subsequently disappear from official records.
Gates arrives in Suva during S01E01 of Expedition Unknown to investigate the fate of the missing Nikumaroro remains.
The story of the Nikumaroro bones is one of the most tantalizing threads in the long search for Amelia Earhart. Colonial officer Gerald Gallagher discovered a partial skeleton on the atoll in 1940, and the remains were sent to Fiji for medical analysis. The bones were examined at the time and then effectively vanished from the official record — an absence that has fueled decades of speculation about what they might have proven, or what someone may have wanted kept quiet.
Nemani Delaibatiki, editor in chief of the Fiji Sun, pointed Gates toward the theory that the bones had passed through the hands of Dr. Kenneth Gilchrist, the former head of the Fiji Medical School. The trail, according to Delaibatiki's reporting, led to three Fijian employees named in Gilchrist's will — all of whom have since died — and possibly to their surviving family members. This is the kind of archival detective work that defines the Earhart cold case: not dramatic excavation, but the slow untangling of bureaucratic and personal histories.
Mainstream researchers and historians have long acknowledged that the Nikumaroro hypothesis — that Earhart and Noonan landed on the uninhabited atoll and eventually perished there — is among the more evidence-supported theories about the pair's disappearance. The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) has conducted multiple expeditions to Nikumaroro. The question of what the 1940 bones actually represented, and where they went, remains genuinely unresolved within the research community.
Gates' Suva investigation did not produce the bones or offer a definitive answer. What the episode contributed was a credible documentary trail — names, a newspaper report, and a living witness (John Grey, who recalled as a boy finding a box of bones under his house) — that kept the search alive and pointed toward a specific, traceable lead in the village of Navala. Whether that lead ultimately bore fruit is something the episode explores without claiming to resolve.
Suva's colonial capital status dates to 1882, when the British administration was formally transferred from Levuka — Fiji's earlier main European settlement — due to Levuka's restrictive geography.
The combined urban population of Suva and its neighboring towns (Lami, Nasinu, and Nausori) is around 330,000, representing over a third of Fiji's entire national population.
Suva is considered by many regional observers to be the economic and cultural capital of the South Pacific, hosting numerous international agencies, diplomatic missions, and regional corporate headquarters.
The Fiji Sun's reporting on the missing Nikumaroro bones — bones that may have been examined at the Fiji Medical School — is what drew Gates to Suva, connecting this modern Pacific capital to one of aviation history's most enduring mysteries.
Suva is generally accessible to international visitors, with Nausori Airport serving the city and Nadi International Airport located roughly 200 kilometers to the northwest on Viti Levu. The city center offers a mix of colonial-era architecture, markets, and cultural institutions including the Fiji Museum, which holds artifacts relevant to the country's colonial history. Visitors should check current travel advisories and entry requirements before planning a trip.
Suva itself is the nearest major city; the next largest urban center is the Nadi area, approximately 200 kilometers to the northwest.
Fiji's dry season, roughly May through October, is generally considered the most comfortable time to visit Suva, with lower humidity and reduced rainfall. The wet season from November through April brings heavier rains and the possibility of tropical cyclones.
Indian Ocean
The broader search for Amelia Earhart spans the Pacific and Indian Ocean regions, connecting Suva's cold-case bone trail to the wider oceanic disappearance mystery Gates investigates across multiple episodes.
Australian Outback
Gates' Earhart investigation required traversing remote Pacific terrain similar to the isolated landscapes explored in the Australian Outback episode, with both involving the hunt for missing persons across vast, under-documented wilderness.
Cambodia National Museum, Phnom Penh
The Cambodia National Museum episode similarly involves Gates tracing colonial-era artifacts and records through institutional archives, paralleling his archival detective work through Fiji's medical and newspaper records in Suva.
Historical data sourced from Wikipedia