EARHART SEA THEORY BACKED

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000200480002-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 19, 1999
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: July 14, 1967
• Content Type: NSPR

WAs'G1-QN .V?.
Sanitized - Approved For Rel eX:, l- f-DP
FOIAb3b
U.S. DECLASSIFIES FILE
nr~
a Ell Ehrt lea
Theory 3cke
By WILLIAM MINES
Star Staff Writer
tie over
meat file on Amelia Earha
tor
..
at .sc.
the slim aviatrix died,
after missing a tiny mid-Pacifi
landfall30 years ago this mont
The three-inch-thick file co
.
tains a report of radio traffi
from, Miss Earhart's twin-engin
plane for several hours prior t
its disappearance on the longes
planned round-the-world trip
ran out of gas between 40 an
1200 miles north of Howlan
Island.
Ilowlanl, a speck of tan
midway -between New Guinea
and ;Hawaii, wih the dogtination
for which Miss Earhart and
navigator Fred J. Noonan filed a
flight plan on July 2,1937. From
Lae, New Guinea, where they
took off that morning to How-
land is about as far as from New
York to Los Angeles.
The Coast Guard cutter Itas-
ca, assigned to "guard" Miss
Earhart's flight path in the mid.
Pacific, monitored the plane's
adio channels in the last hours
nd then instituted search.
,Cher signals received subse-
. ? _
cost Miss Earhart and Noona
their lives, although it is equaIl
would not have found them eve
if the effort had continue
undisturbed.
In any event, the Itasca'
report seems to torpedo a long
captured by the Japanese an
executed as spies on the islan
of 'Saipan. Saipan is about 3,00
miles from Howland Island.
"A , careful evaluation. of all
available data indicates that
Miss Earhart's plane landed. on
the sea to the northwest of
Howland Island," Capt. E. G.
Rifenburg, director of the Naval
Investigative Service said in a
recent letter to Sen, Walter F.
Mondale, D-Minn., sufiiih9afl2ing
the Earhart-Noonan case.
The Itasca log showed fre-
quent transmissions from the
lane beginning about 2i' hours
before "the last authentic
message" was received. This
vas at 8:55 a.m. Howland Island
ime July .2, while the plane,
unning low on gas, was beating
11 north-south course apparently
an effort to make a landfall.
Miss Earhart,' an 'accoin-
Fished pilot, and Noonan, one of
CPYRGHT
robable',splashdown area.:... r
Pined , to be a hoax - nay have
CPYRGHT
`CPYRGHT
CPYRGHT
the most experienced trap
Pacific navigators of the time
brought all their airmanshi
skills to bear in trying to rear
.the island. But bad weather th
night before seems to have cu
overly deeply into their gasolin
supply.
At 7:42 a.m. Miss Earhar
informed the Itasca that she ha
"30 minutes of gas remaining,'
but managed to nurse this
meager ration for about v/a
hours.
Radio signals from the plane
were received at their greatest
strength at 7:58 a.m., a little
less than one hour before the
end. Apparently the plane and
ship were closest together at
this time but neither observed
-the other.
The Itasca, a white ship about
300 feet tong, was laying a
smoke screen during the early
morning hours in an effort to
provide an easily visible marker
for . the plane. Because visibility
Wag ideal to the south and east
of Howland but impaired by
clouds to the north and west,
Itasca 's skipper assumed that
the plane was northwest of the
island.
Lost as End Neared .
For all his skill as a naviga-
tor, Noonan was lost as the end
approached. The plane reported
at 6:4G and 7:42 a.m. that its
position was doubtful,
According to a letter clipped
to the newly released file, a'
"confidential" classification that
had stuck for 30 years 'was'
removed when the Federal
Bureau of Investigation and
State Department agreed to'
remove secrecy wraps from
certain pieces of correspon,
dente.
While reinforcing the "lost-at-
sea" theory, the file also con-
,tained some documents favoring
the "shot-as-spies" line. One of .
these quoted a native of Saipan
named Carlos Palacios as I having seen ~a woman, later to
iss Earhart.
In Palacios' words. the wom.'
hort, no make-up, slim girl.-
hree weeks short Of' her 39th
irthday when she vanished, had
boyish figure and wore her
air closely crooned. Some
emblance to the principal male
indberg.
Sanitized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-001