Trump Admin Declassifies Records Relating to Amelia Earhart’s Disappearance

One of the revelations that emerged from the documents was that a USCG vessel ’reported hearing [a] voice' days after the crash.

American aviator Amelia Earhart exits her aircraft at Derry, Ireland, after her solo transatlantic flight, in 1932. FPG/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Newly declassified records revealed how U.S. agencies responded to reports that Amelia Earhart’s plane sent distress signals days after the 39-year-old and her navigator, Fred Noonan, vanished over the Pacific Ocean on July 2, 1937, during her attempt to become the first female pilot to circumnavigate the world.

The 4,624-page release, declassified by the Trump administration on Nov. 14, included 53 wide-ranging PDF files, including two that are titled, in part, “Relating to the last flight and disappearance of Amelia Earhart.”

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The first document detailed Earhart’s final correspondence with the Itasca, a U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) vessel stationed at Howland Island—which lies approximately halfway between Hawaii and Australia—on the day she vanished.