Chuck Stagliano has been a member of Il Cenacolo since 1992. A native of Tarrytown New York, he graduated from Roanoke College with a degree in English literature before entering the US Navy flight training program. He spent six years as a Naval Aviator, making two extended cruises on carriers to the Pacific and South China Sea during the conflict in Viet Nam. Following the Navy he joined PanAm as a pilot and was there on the last day of operations in 1991. Subsequently, he joined Atlas Air as a 747 captain.
Today Chuck will be saluting a special date in PanAm's history, the 75th anniversary of the very first China Clipper flight from San Francisco and recounting the story of one of the most famous China Clipper flights of all, the saga of Clipper 18602. When Pearl Harbor was attacked on December 7, 1941, Clipper 18602 was in the Pacific. They could not return to Hawaii so, following orders from Headquarters, the crew made its way around the world to New York. It took a month. It had never been done before. They had no navigation charts, no fuel, no money and no support. They were nearly shot down by friendly fire twice. They made a takeoff from a river in Africa that would terrify Indiana Jones. Chuck will tell their story as part of the history that began on San Francisco Bay on that day in November 1935.
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