Page 28 - April 2015 Volume 9, Number 4

As was Bill Odom’s flight, Captain Pat Boling’s journey across the Pacific Ocean in 1958 was sponsored by the Beech Aircraft Corporation. Boling flew the Beechcraft J-35 “Philippine Bonanza” nonstop from Manila, Philippines, to Pendleton, Ore., setting a world record and easily exceeding Odom’s flight of eight years before. In 1960, the Bonanza and its next pilot, Peter Gluckmann, were lost at sea while attempting to fly nonstop from Tokyo to the United States. (EDWARD H. PHILLIPS COLLECTION AND TEXTRON AVIATION)
failed to reach New Jersey, but he had achieved one of his goals – he took the record away from the Russians. In addition, the flight marked the first crossing from Hawaii to the U.S. mainland by a light airplane. The Bonanza had flown a great circle distance of 2,406 miles although total distance in the air was 2,900 miles.
Undaunted, Odom began preparations for a second attempt to reach Teterboro from Hawaii. Two months later at 12:04 a.m. (Honolulu time) on March 6, the Model 35, dubbed “Waikiki Beech,” took off again from Runway 8 at Hickam Field after a takeoff run of only 2,400 feet. The airplane weighed 3,858 pounds (compared to 2,650 pounds for a stock A35) with full fuel and oil tanks. Despite a nearly 50 percent increase in maximum gross weight, the Waikiki Beech managed to climb at 400 feet per minute and was soon cruising comfortably above the Pacific. Accompanying the Beechcraft for the first 900 miles was a Boeing B-17 air/sea rescue aircraft operated by the Hawaiian Sea Frontier, conducting a part of its normal patrol route.
More than nine hours later, Odom reported by radio that he was overflying the weather ship “Red Head
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Fox,” but he soon learned from radio contact with San Francisco that rough weather lie ahead on his route. As a result, Bill detoured 100 miles south, but as he skirted around the southern edge of the storms had to revert to instrument flying for about one hour. Eventually, he cleared the worst weather and continued eastward toward the West Coast, 450 miles away. Soon after he was joined by a U.S. Coast Guard Martin PBM that rode “shotgun” on the Beechcraft until it flew over San Francisco’s famous Golden Gate Bridge at 4:51 p.m., Eastern Standard Time.
The hardest and most dangerous phase of the flight was history. The 2,474 miles across open ocean had been navigated in slightly more than 16 hours. During that time, the E-185 engine had consumed 128 of the 288 gallons on board, leaving 160 gallons of avgas available to reach New Jersey. As the flight progressed eastward over the Sierra Mountains, Odom was forced to change course well to the north to avoid more storms. The detour took him over northern California into Oregon, then into Idaho, but the storms were one step ahead of the Waikiki Beech. Odom strapped on his oxygen mask, went on instruments and climbed the Beechcraft to 16,000 feet. Finally, after a busy night dealing with bad weather, Odom and the monoplane emerged over Nebraska in the early morning hours.
As the sun rose in the eastern sky, the long trek was drawing ever closer to its destination. Fortunately, the weather cooperated and the remaining hours went by
APRIL 2015