Municipal Airport to Wheeler Army Airfield on Oahu in 25 hours and 50 minutes. An earlier attempt in 1925 had ended in failure for two Navy PN-9 seaplanes; one of the aircraft, commanded by Commander John Rodgers, ran out of fuel several hundred miles short of Hawaii and sailed to Kauai over the next nine days. Ernie Smith and Captain C.H. Carter had arrived in Oakland earlier to attempt to parallel the Maitland/Hegenberger flight in the City of Oakland, a small Travel Air 5000 civilian monoplane, but due to mechanical difficulties, took off two hours after Maitland, and returned with a broken windshield. Unlike Lindbergh's purpose-built Spirit of St. Louis, City of Oakland had been serving as a mail carrier for Pacific Air Transport. According to Smith, Carter threatened to dump the gas after the windshield was lost, forcing the plane's return shortly after takeoff. Carter quit after the record was lost, but Smith hired Emory Bronte as a navigator, and took off again on July 14. Upon running out of fuel 26 hours and 36 minutes later, they crash-landed in a thorn tree on Molokai. Dole disqualified the successful June and July flights from his prizes because they had not followed his rules. The Air Corps flight had been planned months prior to the prize announcement and had no intent to land other than at Wheeler. By July 22, the starting and ending points had not been set. San Francisco began developing its new municipal airport, Mills Field, in anticipation that it could entice pilots into choosing it as the origin; the initial planned destination was John Rodgers Airport near Honolulu. Contestants draw positions The first official entrant, announced on June 28, was Arthur C. Goebel. Another early entrant was Dick Grace, who shipped his plane to San Francisco shortly after he crashed his Cruzair, forcing him to abandon a Kauai to San Francisco attempt in June. At the time, both Grace and Goebel were better known as founding members of the Thirteen Flying Black Cats, nicknamed the "Suicide Squadron", a Hollywood stunt pilot association started in 1922; that group's exploits were dramatized in the 1932 film The Lost Squadron. The two stuntmen were quickly joined by other contestants as the August 2 entry deadline approached. Fourteen official and four unofficial entrants were announced on August 3; Grace was not part of the group. The draw for starting position