China Clipper flight departure site when Sikorsky S-42 "Samoan Clipper" exploded over Samoa in January, 1938. "Hawaii Clipper" disappeared westbound from Guam to Manila in July, 1938. There were unsubstantiated rumors of Japanese involvement, similar to those arising from the disappearance of Amelia Earhart a year earlier. Earhart's navigator, Fred Noonan, had been navigator aboard "China Clipper" during the initial airmail flight. Boeing 314 flying boats "Honolulu Clipper" (NC18601) and "California Clipper" (NC18602) joined the surviving Martin M-130s in 1939, and "Pacific Clipper" (NC18609) and "Anzac Clipper" (NC18611) extended service to New Zealand and Australia in 1941. "Philippine Clipper" returned to Wake when it received
Fred Noonan 10E that she had purchased with funds donated by Purdue University. She planned to circumnavigate the globe at equatorial latitudes. Although this aircraft was of an advanced type for its time, and was dubbed a "flying laboratory" by the press, little real science was planned. The world was already crisscrossed by commercial airline routes (many of which Noonan himself had first navigated and mapped), and the flight is now regarded by some as an adventurous publicity stunt for Earhart's gathering public attention for her next book. Noonan was probably attracted to this project because Earhart's mass market fame would almost