CONFIRMED85% CONFIDENCEHistoryLink.org[3] and the Museum of Flight both date the maiden flight to June 7, 1938.
- Start
- Jun 7, 193890% CONFIDENCEfrom the source
Boeing Completes the Maiden Flight of Its Model 314 Clipper
Boeing's Model 314 Clipper flying boat made its 38-minute first flight over Puget Sound, piloted by test pilot Eddie Allen. The giant flying boat went on to open Pan Am's first non-stop transatlantic passenger service.
- The first Boeing Model 314 Clipper made its maiden flight on June 7, 1938, staying aloft over Puget Sound for 38 minutes[2][3]
- The pilot is named slightly differently by the two accounts - "test pilot Eddie Allen" in HistoryLink and "test pilot Edmund T. Allen" in Wikipedia - and the flight identified insufficient rudder control[2][3]
- There was no prototype: the production aircraft NX-18601 was launched into the Duwamish Waterway from Boeing's Plant 1 and towed to Elliott Bay, its wingspan barely clearing the bridge supports even turned diagonally, with taxiing trials beginning 3 June when Allen found it too lightly loaded[2][3]
- The aircraft came out of Pan American's February 1936 design competition - against Douglas, Consolidated, Martin and Sikorsky - for a 10,000 lb payload, minimum 2,400-mile range and 150 mph cruise at 10,000 ft[2]
- Boeing first decided not to bid until engineer Wellwood E. Beall drafted a design reusing the XB-15 bomber's wing with Wright R-2600 Twin Cyclone engines giving 50% more power than the XB-15's 850 hp units, at an estimated 40,000 lb weight and a 152 ft wingspan; Pan American awarded a $4.8 million contract on July 21, 1936 for six aircraft with an option for six more, and Boeing missed the delivery date by 13 months[2]
- Production figures agree on twelve built, with nine going to Pan Am; the type entered service in 1939 and was retired in 1951, the last surviving Clipper being scrapped that year after wartime service and obsolescence against faster postwar airliners[2][3]
- It was the first aircraft to carry a sitting American president, flying FDR to the Casablanca Conference in 1943[2]
- The same day as the maiden flight, the Douglas DC-4E prototype also flew for the first time, in southern California[3]
Notable features
- Dornier-style sponsons on the lower hull stabilised the flying boat on the water, served as a boarding platform and, with an aerofoil shape, added lift in flight[2]
- A Free Documentary episode calls it "the biggest airplane of the nineteen hundred thirties and the first to take passengers non-stop from the USA to Europe", "a gigantic floating body as a fuselage, combined with state-of-the-art wings from a military experimental aircraft", with a range of 5,900 km and a maximum speed of 320 km/h[1]
- Its cabin had "spacious sections with luxurious chairs as seats, a dining room in which the stewards serve a six course menu and even a honey moon suite", which with its engineering "make the B 314 famous all over the world"[1]
- Its Wright Twin Cyclone engines were the first to use 100-octane gasoline in commercial service, and the wings were thick enough for a crawlspace through which a flight engineer could service engines in flight; 431 in-flight engine repairs were made between June 1939 and June 1941[2]
- The 314A version carried a crew of 10 to 16 and 68 day or 36 sleeping passengers; it was 106 ft long with a 152 ft wingspan, weighed 84,000 lb gross, had four 1,600 hp Wright GR2600A2A radials, and reached 210 mph with a normal range of 3,685 mi[2]
References 385% CONFIDENCE
The first entry is always the pin's source. Overall confidence is a weighted average of how firmly each reference supports the start and end times used above; a reference counts half as much for every 180 days older than the newest.
- [1]90%youtube.com/watch?v=ZlQXDLpzrhwyoutube.com· Posted Sep 15, 2026· Starts Jun 7, 1938 ✓· 33% of score
HistoryLink.org[3] and the Museum of Flight both date the maiden flight to June 7, 1938.
- [2]75%Boeing 314 Clipperen.wikipedia.org· Added Sep 15, 2026· 33% of score
Corroborates the June 7, 1938 maiden flight date and details.[1]
- [3]90%First Boeing Clipper, Model 314, lifts off from Elliott Bay on maiden flight on June 7, 1938historylink.org· Added Sep 15, 2026· 33% of score
Primary regional history source dating the first flight to June 7, 1938.[1]
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