Lae Airfield crane above the aircraft. The Lae airport is probably best remembered for being the point of departure in July 1937 for Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan on their flight to Howland Island. Earhart's plane disappeared near Howland Island some 19 hours after departing Lae airport. Lae Airfield Lae Airfield is a former World War II airfield and later, civilian airport located at Lae, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. The airport was closed in the 1980s, in favour of Lae Nadzab Airport, which was able to accommodate larger jet aircraft. The airport was known as Lae Drome or Lae Aerodrome
Coffee production in Papua New Guinea the 1980s profoundly affected many coffee plantation owners who incurred debts they could not pay off, with the result that many were made redundant. From 1986, a number of cases of coffee rust, caused by "Hemileia vastatrix", also affected some parts of Papua New Guinea which had previously been free of the disease. The coffee industry in Papua New Guinea reached a peak in 1998 when it accounted for about 38% of the country's non-mineral exports and 13% of total exports. Between 1995 and 1998, coffee production contributed to 42% of the revenue of country's total agricultural exports. Since then