We first heard of Amelia Rose Earhart — whose parents named her after a distant, and famous, relative — a few years ago, when she flew across the country in a Cirrus, re-tracing a famous flight by the original Amelia. This week at EAA AirVenture, Earhart announced that she plans to circle the globe in a Pilatus PC-12 NG, tracing (to some degree) the famous last flight of her namesake. In the last few years, Earhart, who works as a TV news announcer in Denver, has started the Fly With Amelia Foundation to provide flight scholarships to young women and offer programs to teach people about aviation and inspire them to fly. The round-the-world flight, sponsored by Pilatus and Jeppesen, is planned for June 2014.
Earhart and her co-pilot, Patrick Carter, will log more than 100 hours on the flight, and have planned 14 stops along the way. The flight will launch from Oakland, Calif. — the same place where the original Earhart began her final flight — and will return there about two weeks later. The PC-12 used on the flight will be modified to permit nonstop legs of up to 2,200 nm, for the leg between Oakland and Hawaii.
