On September 28, 1924, a triumphant roar echoed over Sand Point Airfield in Seattle, Washington, as U.S. Army Air Service aviators returned from the first successful aerial circumnavigation of the globe. Their arrival capped a grueling 175-day expedition that had officially begun from the same airfield on April 6.
Flying specially built, open-cockpit Douglas World Cruiser biplanes—named Seattle, Chicago, Boston, and New Orleans—the crews confronted bad weather, dense fog, forced landings, mechanical breakdowns, and vast stretches of ocean. The aircraft had interchangeable wheeled landing gear and pontoons, enabling operations from both rough airfields and remote harbors.
The original Seattle crashed in Alaska on April 30, though its crew survived. Later, the Boston was forced down in the North Atlantic; its crew was rescued, but the aircraft could not be saved. The Chicago and New Orleans completed the full round-the-world journey, while a replacement aircraft also joined them for the final return to Seattle. All eight original crew members survived the expedition.
Depending on the accounting method, the journey covered roughly 26,345 to 27,553 miles and required 371 hours and 11 minutes of flight time. The achievement demonstrated the practical potential of long-distance aviation and became a landmark in the development of American military and aerospace capability.
Image: Douglas Around the World Flight, 1924, via Wikimedia Commons; no known copyright restrictions.
