The Boeing 314 Clipper was a long-range flying boat produced by the Boeing Airplane Company between 1938 and 1941 and is comparable to the British Short S.26. One of the largest aircraft of the time, it used the massive wing of Boeing’s earlier XB-15 bomber prototype to achieve the range necessary for flights across the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Twelve Clippers were built for Pan Am, three of which were sold to BOAC in 1941 before delivery.
Equally critical to the 314's success was the proficiency of its Pan Am flight crews, who were extremely skilled at long-distance, over-water flight operations and navigation. For training, many of the transpacific flights carried a second crew.[7] Only the very best and most experienced flight crews were assigned Boeing 314 flying boat duty. Before coming aboard, all Pan Am captains as well as first and second officers had thousands of hours of flight time in other seaplanes and flying boats. Rigorous training in dead reckoning, timed turns, judging drift from sea current, astral navigation, and radio navigation were conducted. In conditions of poor or no visibility, pilots sometimes made successful landings at fogged-in harbors by landing out to sea, then taxiing the Clipper into port.[8]
After the war, several Clippers were returned to Pan American hands. However, even before hostilities had ended, the Clipper had become obsolete. The introduction of long-range airliners such as the Lockheed Constellation and Douglas DC-4, together with a prodigious wartime runway construction program, made the flying boat all but obsolete. The new landplanes were relatively easy to fly, and did not require the extensive pilot training programs required for seaplane operations. One of the 314's most experienced pilots said, We were indeed glad to change to DC-4s and I argued daily for eliminating all flying boats. The landplanes were much safer. No one in the operations department... had any idea of the hazards of flying boat operations. The main problem now was lack of the very high level of experience and competence required of seaplane pilots [11]
The last 314 to be retired in 1946, the California Clipper NC18602, had accumulated more than a million flight miles.[12] Of the 12 Boeing 314 Clippers built, three were lost to accidents, although only one of those resulted in fatalities with 24 fatalities among passengers and crew aboard the Yankee Clipper NC18603 in a landing accident at Lisbon, Portugal, on February 22, 1943.[13] The 314 was removed from scheduled service in 1946 and the seven serviceable B-314s were purchased by a start-up airline called New World Airways, although they sat for long time on San Diego's Lindbergh Field before all were eventually sold for scrap in 1950. The last of the fleet, the Anzac Clipper NC18611(A) was resold and scrapped in late 1951 in Baltimore, Maryland.
