Her flight turned out to be most meaningful for children. “A lot of schools used it as a teaching tool, about women in history and aviation,” she says. She also spoke to plenty of reporters and photographers – and that, she says, “was exhausting. The part I liked least was the celebrity of the flight. I feel terrible for movie stars.”
What did she love most? Flying in an open-air cockpit, “it highlighted for me how impressive and diverse our country is. How lucky we are to have so much freedom…it made me very proud to be an American. And made me see how gutsy foolish I was to attack such an adventure in such an unreliable plane!” (For safety, Carlene was followed by another plane carrying parts and supplies.)
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