Donald Trump announces to declassify aviation trailblazer Amelia Earhart's FBI documents: 'Such an interesting story'
Donald Trump has been making several head turns with many of his recent announcements. One of these announcements related to Amelia Earhart has made several conspiracy theorists elated, according to Popular Mechanics. The president, in his post on the social media platform Truth, claimed that the FBI file related to the aviator will soon be declassified. This post raised eyebrows, as for many years, her last flight and disappearance have haunted many people's minds. However, many are optimistic that the file will solve the mystery, but experts don't think it will have any new information related to it.
Who was Amelia Earhart?
Amelia Earhart was a female aviator who not only enhanced the international appeal of aviation but also inspired women to choose this profession, according to the National Women's History Museum. Born on July 24, 1897, in Atchison, Kansas, she got interested in flying when she met some aviators while working in a hospital during World War I. In 1920, she started taking flying lessons under female aviator Neta Snook. In 1922, she set the record for the highest altitude achieved by a woman aviator. Her life got pushed into the spotlight when publisher George Putnam and her later husband encouraged her to become the first woman to cross the Atlantic by plane. She did so as a passenger on June 17, 1928. After this event, her achievements as an aviator became the top headlines of newspapers worldwide.
Her last flight
In 1937, Earhart set out to achieve another record: to become the first woman to circumnavigate the world, according to the BBC. While pursuing this aim, she disappeared over the Pacific Ocean. To date, people have not found either her or her remains. Her navigator, Fred Noonan, also disappeared alongside her. Apparently, the pair were searching for a remote island called Howland Island, owned by the US, to refuel their aircraft. By then, she had already covered the area between Oakland, California, and Lae in Papua New Guinea with her twin-engine Electra plane. After the investigation, authorities claimed that her plane suffered communication problems due to which the pair was unable to ask for help in locating Howland Island. Ultimately, the plane must have run out of fuel and crashed in the ocean.
The catch is that no debris that can be regarded as Earhart's plane has been uncovered to this date. "She disappeared in the South Pacific while trying to become the first woman to fly around the World," Trump wrote. "Amelia made it almost three-quarters around the world before she suddenly, and without notice, vanished, never to be seen again." Several conspiracy theories are popular regarding Earhart's disappearance. Two of the most famous ones are that she was apprehended by Japanese forces or died while doing spy work for the US. Some believe that she crashed on or near the then-Japanese Marshall Islands, or that she survived and found herself on Nikumaroro Island near Kiribati, where she took her last breaths as a castaway.
Secrets locked in declassified files
Trump shared that the declassified files will include all government records of Amelia Earhart, her life, and her last trip. It is unclear how many classified records associated with Earhart are present with the government, according to CBS News. Del. Kimberlyn King-Hinds, a Republican, in July 2025, wrote a letter to Trump to release any such records. It is not the first time FBI documents related to Earhart have been released. It happened once in 1967, when the FBI released records that confirmed Earhart was not on a spy mission. It also claimed that she didn't land on Saipan, and neither was she apprehended by the Japanese from that island.
Certain experts believe that, similar to 1967, this set of documents will also not reveal anything. Jeff Morris, the project manager for Nauticos, a deep-sea exploration and historical research company, claimed that he has spent a long time digging through the National Archives, analyzing all the records associated with Earhart, but heard of nothing classified, especially related to her disappearance. He thinks that if anything, the records could reveal how US authorities in the past conducted their investigations, especially when their scope was international, like the disappearance of Earhart. As far as Earhart is concerned, there is a possibility that documents may put into the spotlight something from her personal life. Apart from these, nothing else should be expected from these files, as per experts.