On this day in conspiracies

At about 8:38 p.m. a Piper PA-32R-301 Saratoga II, registration N9253N, piloted by John F. Kennedy Jr. departs Essex County Airport in Caldwell, New Jersey, bound for Martha's Vineyard and then Hyannis, Massachusetts. Aboard are Kennedy, his wife Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and her sister Lauren Bessette, travelling to a family wedding. Night visual conditions prevail, but the air is hazy and there is little moonlight over the water.

Physicists Daniel Caton and Lee Hawkins of Appalachian State University, after years of automated camera monitoring, report capturing lights over the ridge simultaneously on two time-lapse cameras. Caton, who has spent roughly a decade on the question, floats ball lightning as a tentative candidate but states plainly that the cause is not known.

The coup collapses by dawn. Around 250 people are killed and more than 2,000 wounded. The government immediately blames Gulen's movement, which it labels the 'Fethullah Terrorist Organization' (FETO), and begins mass detentions. Within days, tens of thousands are arrested or dismissed.

The Intercept and other outlets report that at least seven of the Colombian suspects had received US military training, and that the men were recruited via WhatsApp on the promise of roughly $3,000 a month, some believing they were hired to protect Haitian officials rather than to kill the president.

Netflix releases the three-part documentary “Amy Bradley Is Missing,” drawing large new audiences to the case. In the following weeks the FBI raises its reward and reports renewed tips; the family and others add further reward offers.

In a prime-time national address, the president releases documents his administration declassified on the 2020 and 2018 elections and alleges that China compromised some 220 million voter-registration files between 2020 and 2023. The released materials do not allege that any votes were changed or machines hacked; reporting notes they largely restate long-known, theoretical vulnerabilities, and that much voter-registration data is already public. Opponents warn the goal is to pre-emptively delegitimize the 2026 midterms rather than to present new evidence.