Man, Moment, Machine

Season 1, Episode 9: Howard Hughes and the Spruce Goose

Select Source

Howard Hughes takes on the challenge to build an enormous flying boat capable of airlifting 750 troops and war materiel as heavy as tanks across the Atlantic Ocean in support of the Allied war effort, thus avoiding the threat of German U-boats. The project becomes the focus of Hughes OCD. Even after the project is canceled by the military his company successfully builds and Hughes personally flies the prototype dubbed by its detractors as the spruce goose.