# Boeing officially ending 747 production



## Trogdor (Jul 30, 2020)

In an announcement that comes as no surprise to anyone who’s been following the trend of commercial aviation sales over the past few years, Boeing has announced they are officially ending 747 production in 2022.









The 747 jumbo jet ushered in the modern era of air travel, but it won't be around for the industry's recovery — Boeing will cease production in 2022


Boeing said it will end production of the famous 747 jumbojet as the coronavirus pandemic decimates demand for air travel and new planes.




www.businessinsider.com





While COVID-19 has decimated the commercial aviation industry, the 747 was struggling even before this. They hadn’t sold a passenger version of the plane in several years, and their orders for the cargo variant were dwindling. In fact, the contractor who made major portions of the 747 fuselage, Triumph Group, started auctioning off significant parts of its production line several months ago, including machinery critical to building the plane. This was seen by many as an indicator that the plane was basically done for as restarting the line elsewhere would be costly, and sales prospects low (current production rates are around 0.5 planes per month, basically too low to be profitable even with everything intact).

So we come to the end of an era. Most major passenger carriers had already retired the type anyway, and of the few that hadn’t, most of them basically pulled the plug over the last few months with the pandemic. It’s unknown at this point how many passenger versions will re-enter service, and for how long. That all, of course, depends on the recovery of long-haul international travel, which is truly anyone’s guess at this point. It’s entirely possible that few, if any, will return to carrying passengers as they are large and expensive to operate, and by the time the market does recover, too much time will have passed and much newer, more efficient planes will have piled up waiting for a customer to take delivery.


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## Ziv (Jul 30, 2020)

My Aunt worked in the HR department of Boeing back in the 1960's. She said it was heart breaking to give nearly every employee severance notice in 1968 as Boeing sufferered through the lean years after they bet the farm on the 747 and before the first orders started to deliver. There was a famous billboard that stated, "Would the last person to leave Seattle please turn out the lights" that summed up what people thought.
But Boeing was right and the jumbo jets ruled the roost for years. But now both the 747 and the A-380 are on their way out the door.


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## PVD (Jul 30, 2020)

They were crushed by the cancellation of the SST project back then, also.


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## Devil's Advocate (Jul 30, 2020)

The 747 was a sidelined freighter with no obvious passenger role when first introduced. Imagine if Honda went from selling early motorcycle designs to betting the farm on the world's first eighteen wheel semi and having failed to secure a trucking company contract decided to sell their massive tractor-trailer as a passenger bus with lounges and bars. That's the level of hope (and desperation) the 747 represented when introduced. Pan Am saved Boeing by ordering a fleet of 747's despite having never sold anywhere near that many seats per flight in the past. Rather than being laughed off and ignored dozens of other operators followed suit and ordered their own fleets to compete with Pan Am. For decades the 747 held the fastest (conventional) cruising speed and lowest seat-mile costs in the industry. Against the odds the 747 managed to create a low cost long haul jet travel market two or three decades ahead of schedule.


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## Trogdor (Jul 30, 2020)

Devil's Advocate said:


> The 747 was a sidelined freighter with no obvious passenger role when first introduced. Imagine if Honda went from selling early motorcycle designs to betting the farm on the world's first eighteen wheel semi and having failed to secure a trucking company contract decided to sell their massive tractor-trailer as a passenger bus with lounges and bars. Against all odds an operator named Pan Am agrees to buy a fleet of these converted trucks and increase available seat miles by an order of magnitude. Rather than being laughed off and ignored dozens of other bus companies follow suit and buy their own fleets to compete with Pan Am. That's the level of hope (and desperation) the 747 represented when introduced.



The 747 was built around a Pan Am request (technically, Pan Am wanted a double-decker, but Boeing engineers saw too many problems with going tall so they went wide instead), so I don’t know how it’s “against all odds” that Pan Am bought them.


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## Devil's Advocate (Jul 30, 2020)

Trogdor said:


> The 747 was built around a Pan Am request (technically, Pan Am wanted a double-decker, but Boeing engineers saw too many problems with going tall so they went wide instead), so I don’t know how it’s “against all odds” that Pan Am bought them.


Pan Am was a large operator for the time but buying a fleet of 747's in the 707 era was a huge risk. The 747 program was intended to be supported by a government freighter contract and having failed to secure one was most likely doomed to irrelevance if Pan Am was the only customer. Although considered a smashing success today the original 747 succeeded in part because dozens of foreign flag carriers were willing to risk unrecoverable debt to follow Pan Am's vision of a vast and sudden increase in jet travel. In the end everything worked out for everyone involved but it's sobering to consider how close Boeing came to permanent financial ruin back then. Emirates was a Pan Am style booster for the A380 and yet that program likely failed to break-even for Airbus.


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## Trogdor (Jul 30, 2020)

Devil's Advocate said:


> Pan Am was a large operator for the time but buying a fleet of 747's in the 707 era was a huge risk. The 747 program was intended to be supported by a government freighter contract and having failed to secure one was most likely doomed to irrelevance if Pan Am was the only customer. Although considered a smashing success today the original 747 succeeded in part because dozens of foreign flag carriers were willing to risk unrecoverable debt to follow Pan Am's vision of a vast and sudden increase in jet travel. In the end everything worked out for everyone involved but it's sobering to consider how close Boeing came to permanent financial ruin back then. Emirates was a Pan Am style booster for the A380 and yet that program likely failed to break-even for Airbus.



The 747 was not born from the freighter contract (I assume you’re referring to the C-5 which went to Lockheed). It was designed from the start as a passenger plane, with consideration for cargo capabilities as well.

The only thing the 747 had in common with Boeing’s proposed C-5 design was the use of high-bypass turbofan engines. The rest of the plane was entirely different.


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## Michigan Mom (Jul 31, 2020)

Surprised it's taken this long, with carriers avoiding 4 and even 3 engines when they can.
It's the end of an era, to be sure. A magnificent, reliable and simply breathtakingly beautiful aircraft.


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## retrotimewarp (Aug 1, 2020)

Imagine landing one of these beasts at a provincial airport with poor weather and even poorer communications, and then imagine being decimated by another one of these brutes flown by an irritated pilot who has run out of patience. And there you have it... the world's worst aviation disaster.


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## ehbowen (Aug 1, 2020)

retrotimewarp said:


> Imagine landing one of these beasts at a provincial airport with poor weather and even poorer communications, and then imagine being decimated by another one of these brutes flown by an irritated pilot who has run out of patience. And there you have it... the world's worst aviation disaster.


It certainly didn't help that the KLM crew didn't use standard phrases for communications. If they had clearly announced, "KLM rolling" on the radio, the controller would probably have screamed for them to stop right away.


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## Ziv (Aug 1, 2020)

Sometimes the 747 was both cargo and passenger. I used to ride Eva Air out of Bangkok and Tokyo and the 747 we rode on was only passenger from seat 22 (?) forward. Everything behind seat 22 was walled off and was cargo pallets, or so it appeared from the tractors that were loading the aircraft when we boarded. On my favorite flight, I sat forward in the nose, main level, where the curvature of the nose had me pointing about 10 or 12 degrees toward the interior of the aircraft. When I put my cheek on the window I could see partway down the runway.
Very cool aircraft, always excellent service.


Trogdor said:


> The 747 was not born from the freighter contract (I assume you’re referring to the C-5 which went to Lockheed). It was designed from the start as a passenger plane, with consideration for cargo capabilities as well.


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## jiml (Aug 1, 2020)

Ziv said:


> Sometimes the 747 was both cargo and passenger. I used to ride Eva Air out of Bangkok and Tokyo and the 747 we rode on was only passenger from seat 22 (?) forward. Everything behind seat 22 was walled off and was cargo pallets, or so it appeared from the tractors that were loading the aircraft when we boarded. On my favorite flight, I sat forward in the nose, main level, where the curvature of the nose had me pointing about 10 or 12 degrees toward the interior of the aircraft. When I put my cheek on the window I could see partway down the runway.
> Very cool aircraft, always excellent service.


The 747 Combi. Both KLM and Air Canada had several as well.


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## Trogdor (Aug 1, 2020)

Ziv said:


> On my favorite flight, I sat forward in the nose, main level, where the curvature of the nose had me pointing about 10 or 12 degrees toward the interior of the aircraft. When I put my cheek on the window I could see partway down the runway.



I got the chance to sit in the nose section a couple of times as well.

The first time was about 5 years ago on a UA flight from NRT to SFO. I booked economy, and used miles to upgrade to business because I wanted to sit in the upper deck. Due to some irregular operations involving another delayed flight, my ticket had to be reissued. Somehow, in the process, it caused my upgrade to drop out. I pointed this out to the agent that did the rebooking, so she went back in and did whatever she did, and, instead of winding up in J upstairs, I was given a boarding pass for 3A instead.

Worthwhile trade.

A couple of years later, I did finally get my upper deck experience (on both UA and Thai on the same trip; followed later on by an upper deck 747-8 flight on Lufthansa two years ago).


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## snaebyllej (Aug 1, 2020)

jiml said:


> The 747 Combi. Both KLM and Air Canada had several as well.


Flew one of the KLM ones back in 2000. The forward cabin was divided down the middle, with our coach section on the left side (3-2). Don't know if it was 1st class on the right side, or what. From my pictures I'd say that it was PH-BUK , which was the last one in service for KLM and is now in a Dutch aviation museum/theme park.








Boeing 747 Jumbo Jet - Aviodrome


Grijp deze exclusieve kans: een kijkje in een Boeing 747 Jumbo Jet bij Luchtvaartmuseum Aviodrome! Je ontdekt ruimtes die normaal gesloten blijven.




www.aviodrome.nl





Last October I spent a day in Anchorage. It was worth being there just to see all of the cargo 747s flying in and out.


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## railiner (Aug 1, 2020)

Ziv said:


> I sat forward in the nose, main level, where the curvature of the nose had me pointing about 10 or 12 degrees toward the interior of the aircraft. When I put my cheek on the window I could see partway down the runway.


My first 747 flight, taken just for that purpose, was on Canadian Pacific, from Montreal to Toronto, the shortest 747 flight I could find. And because I wanted to try what you did, I booked seat 1A. I pressed my face hard against the first window, but I could not get much of a forward view, mainly account of the space between the innermost and outermost pane. 
Later on, I flew one on ANA, and they had a forward facing camera showing the takeoff and landing on the screens.


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## PVD (Aug 1, 2020)

TWA JFK to LAX, different era. The 47 was the new flagship everyone wanted to fly it. United, TWA, and American all had JFK to LAX at noon. My parents were on United, but the travel agent put me on TWA because there was a single cheap seat. I always had a chance once to fly on a JFK to SFO 747-SP. Markedly shorter, but a taller tail. Apparently, it went on from SFO to Hong Kong, and it was pretty cheap NY to SFO ($99). Before the later generations of very long range aircraft, that was the only wide-body that could fly certain legs like NY to Tehran, or NY to Tokyo...


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## PVD (Aug 1, 2020)

Coach lounges on planes! First class lounge up the spiral staircase. American had a small piano. Long gone way of flying....


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## railiner (Aug 1, 2020)

PVD said:


> Coach lounges on planes! First class lounge up the spiral staircase. American had a small piano. Long gone way of flying....


Remember this ad?


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## Maglev (Aug 1, 2020)

Growing up in Hawaii, I flew United 747's many times. The first time was in 1973, from Honolulu to Boston with a stop in San Francisco. The coach lounge was great--I spent most of my time there. They were only nine seats across at first in coach, in a 3-4-2 arrangement. On that flight, we tried to land three times in the fog in Boston then were re-routed to New York.


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## Asher (Aug 2, 2020)

My wife flying in the 1st Class nose section thought that a door in the very front must be the cockpit, during the flight it was opened, she was flabbergasted when she realized it was a storage closet.


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## basketmaker (Aug 2, 2020)

Ziv said:


> My Aunt worked in the HR department of Boeing back in the 1960's. She said it was heart breaking to give nearly every employee severance notice in 1968 as Boeing sufferered through the lean years after they bet the farm on the 747 and before the first orders started to deliver. There was a famous billboard that stated, "Would the last person to leave Seattle please turn out the lights" that summed up what people thought.
> But Boeing was right and the jumbo jets ruled the roost for years. But now both the 747 and the A-380 are on their way out the door.


I remember the billboard photo in all the newspapers back then. Such a shame the "Queen Of The Sky" is relinquishing her throne.


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## Palmland (Aug 3, 2020)

My one and only 747 trip was courtesy of British Air. i read a BA newspaper (remember them) ad for a contest on a business trip on US Air. Enter and you could win! Sure enough a few weeks later I got a call that I won a trip to London and 5 days lodging. That was first place. The grand prize winner was on our flight and won a trip to Africa and a safari. There was a big celebration at the Orlando airport and we were given choice BC seats (this was in early 90’s before lie flat seats). What great service and a memorable flight. We extended our stay another week armed with Brit Rail passes. Many flights since never came close to the service on that remarkable airplane.


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## Devil's Advocate (Aug 4, 2020)

Ziv said:


> Sometimes the 747 was both cargo and passenger.





jiml said:


> The 747 Combi.



The 747 Combi was a versatile but flawed design.





railiner said:


> I pressed my face hard against the first window, but I could not get much of a forward view, mainly account of the space between the innermost and outermost pane.


Your experience mirrors my own. I flew the 742, 743, & 744 variants and so far as I could tell any claims of actual forward viewing were little more than myths and misunderstandings. Maybe the 741 was different or the view was specific to aircraft with missing or misaligned components.



Trogdor said:


> The 747 was not born from the freighter contract (I assume you’re referring to the C-5 which went to Lockheed). It was designed from the start as a passenger plane, with consideration for cargo capabilities as well. The only thing the 747 had in common with Boeing’s proposed C-5 design was the use of high-bypass turbofan engines. The rest of the plane was entirely different.


So Boeing was convinced that it made good economic sense to leapfrog from a 707/737 sized passenger airliner straight to a design several times that size with no infrastructure, no proven market, and no government contract in the era of mandated routes and regulated fares based on the hopeful whims of a single passenger airline? If that's true then it paints Boeing's management in an even worse light. What I was told is that the original program was indeed chasing the same contract that became Lockheed's C-5 Galaxy. In that role even a massive aircraft program could be fully funded with or without any passenger airlines willing to buy an enormous airplane that would be difficult to fill reliably and that many commercial airports would struggle to service. In this version most of Boeing's design money was already spent and banking the company's future on Juan Trippe’s fever dream was a solution of last resort that went on to pay massive dividends few would have predicted prior to deregulation. It's still not ideal but at least this version provides a rational cover story for how they ended up with such a disjointed product line before it was eventually fleshed out with the 757 and 767.


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## Palmetto (Aug 4, 2020)

Had a ride in one DFW-LHR last December. Rode backwards in Business Class, a first. Had a nice view of the wing and two engines.


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## Brian Battuello (Aug 4, 2020)

My memory is a bit fuzzy, but when I was about 25 my company sent me from SFO to LAX once a month to check some computer reports before they were sent to the branches. I got back to LAX and my flight was cancelled. Corporate travel talked to the airline and they put me in a Pan Am first class (upstairs) seat on a 747 that had just come from Hawaii and was finishing the day in SFO. There wasn't anyone I recognized, but plenty of nice suits and outfits. I sat quietly and tried to see how many drinks I could fit into 45 minutes.


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## PVD (Aug 4, 2020)

Weird stuff can happen. Most NY to Boston traffic was the Eastern Shuttle out of LaGuardia, but there was a late afternoon (5pm?) on American, that closed a loop placing a DC-10 at Logan for a busy route the next morning. On arrival at JFK, the DC-10 was taken o/o/s for a maintenance issue. Needing a widebody for early AM in Boston, they swapped in a 747. A normally empty plane now looked like a scene from a ghost flight movie...Nothing as profound as that since, an A320/319 swap on UA, and a 767 to 757 swap on TWA when the 67 had to return to LAX because of unresolvable maintenance issues. The 57 was new to TW they had just put them into service. But in those cases, the same folks can fly them as the original planes.


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## Trogdor (Aug 4, 2020)

Devil's Advocate said:


> So Boeing was convinced that it made good economic sense to leapfrog from a 707/737 sized passenger airliner straight to a design several times that size with no infrastructure, no proven market, and no government contract in the era of mandated routes and regulated fares based on the hopeful whims of a single passenger airline? If that's true then it paints Boeing's management in an even worse light. What I was told is that the original program was indeed chasing the same contract that became Lockheed's C-5 Galaxy. In that role even a massive aircraft program could be fully funded with or without any passenger airlines willing to buy an enormous airplane that would be difficult to fill reliably and that many commercial airports would struggle to service. In this version most of Boeing's design money was already spent and banking the company's future on Juan Trippe’s fever dream was a solution of last resort that went on to pay massive dividends few would have predicted prior to deregulation. It's still not ideal but at least this version provides a rational cover story for how they ended up with such a disjointed product line before it was eventually fleshed out with the 757 and 767.



Boeing was more inclined to take risks back then, and yes, they were very responsive to Pan Am's desires, for better or worse. The company was also largely run by engineers back then, vs. the corporate finance folks who run it today.

As the late Joe Sutter, the engineer who led the development of the jet, wrote in his book "747":


> Time and again there appears in print the logical but false assumption that Boeing took its losing military C-5 bid and revamped it as the commercial 747. In fact, the 747 would be an entirely original design that owes nothing to the C-5.


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## Metra Electric Rider (Aug 4, 2020)

I remember reading recently (after obsessive watching of Pan Am makes the going great commercials) that the 747 struggled at first (or rather, the airlines did) due to a too large increase in passenger space and a recession which cut into transatlantic travel. 

I know I've been on a 747, but can't remember much - probably Chicago-Denver, possible Continental (mom didn't fly in the 70's & 80's so it was Vega, then Honda, work truck, Amtrak or Cunard/Polish Line for us - so this would have been a ski trip with my dad). And of course I've been on the MSI 747 mock-up many a time!


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## trainman74 (Aug 4, 2020)

I flew 747s a couple times in my life, most recently on United to Australia (and back) in 2009. They hadn’t been upgraded with the latest audio/lvisual hardware (movies were still on screens at the front of the cabin), and there was a couple inches less legroom in Economy Plus than on other models in United’s fleet. I’m sure I would have felt much better if I’d been in first class (or even business class).


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## Devil's Advocate (Aug 4, 2020)

trainman74 said:


> I flew 747s a couple times in my life, most recently on United to Australia (and back) in 2009. They hadn’t been upgraded with the latest audio/lvisual hardware (movies were still on screens at the front of the cabin), and there was a couple inches less legroom in Economy Plus than on other models in United’s fleet. I’m sure I would have felt much better if I’d been in first class (or even business class).


You'd feel better but you might also feel ripped off having paid for a premium long haul seat that was unable to lie flat. Boarding a tired 747 with a wobbly and washed out projection screen, armrest ashtrays, ancient water spigots, and air-pipe headphones was a blast from the past that amused me for about thirty minutes. After that the only lasting benefit the 747 had over newer long haul designs was a quieter ride and faster cruising speed.


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## ehbowen (Aug 4, 2020)

Devil's Advocate said:


> So Boeing was convinced that it made good economic sense to leapfrog from a 707/737 sized passenger airliner straight to a design several times that size with no infrastructure, no proven market, and no government contract in the era of mandated routes and regulated fares based on the hopeful whims of a single passenger airline? If that's true then it paints Boeing's management in an even worse light. What I was told is that the original program was indeed chasing the same contract that became Lockheed's C-5 Galaxy. In that role even a massive aircraft program could be fully funded with or without any passenger airlines willing to buy an enormous airplane that would be difficult to fill reliably and that many commercial airports would struggle to service. In this version most of Boeing's design money was already spent and banking the company's future on Juan Trippe’s fever dream was a solution of last resort that went on to pay massive dividends few would have predicted prior to deregulation. It's still not ideal but at least this version provides a rational cover story for how they ended up with such a disjointed product line before it was eventually fleshed out with the 757 and 767.



While the 747 may not have been an outgrowth (at least, a direct outgrowth) of the C-5 _contract_, it was indeed designed to be the "ultimate" air _freighter_. Remember, back in the day the passenger plans were all based around the 2707, Boeing's swing-wing SST design, which seemed to have a lock on first place in the government-subsidized SST race. But Pan Am was indeed demanding something (much) larger than the 707, and it was not feasible to 'stretch' that airframe due to original design limitations of the landing gear placement. As long as Boeing was designing an all-new airframe, and one which (looked!) like it faced a service life of only a few short years in passenger service before being supplanted by the SST, it made sense to optimize it for the air-freight role...which is why 747s were designed with a cross-section which could accommodate four cargo containers in the freight mode.

It wasn't until the 747 design was well along that the SST program (actually, the SST program's government subsidy) fell apart. And while Boeing's management may well deserve criticism, keep in mind that at the time Lockheed, Douglas, and Convair all had thriving passenger programs (and in fact were all Boeing's rivals for the SST contract). What happened to them?


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## PVD (Aug 4, 2020)

For Convair, they were late to the dance with their inferior 880 and 990 offerings, that finished them off as a plane builder, but they subcontracted building fuselage sections for others. Mostly sold off by parent GD to Dougls and Lockheed. Douglas did pretty well in narrow body, but stumbled with the DC-10. Lockheed built a decent airplane with the L-1011, Rolls Royce slowed them up with the RB-211 issues, so they played second fiddle to Douglas and they split a market segment that could have profitable for one. Douglas and Lockheed threw in the towel on developing anything new commercial, with the exception of some DC-9/MD 80 derivatives, but both lived on successfully on the military side. Douglas built some pretty good military stuff F-15, C-17, F-18 (still sells), Now Lockheed-Martin remains formidable, and of course Douglas is part of Boeing.


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## Ziv (Aug 5, 2020)

My experience was that you could see about 10 or 12 degrees further forward/down the runway than you could on a regular airliner window. I couldn't see the far end of the runway, but I could see further forward than you could in a standard window. It wasn't earthshaking but it was kind of cool. I really enjoyed the take off and landing. The rest of the flight didn't seem that different.
The article and the video below show that you really can see further forward in seat 1A than you can normally. I don't remember being able to see the end of the runway like the video shows, but I could see further down the runway than usual. It was a thrill, though, not just being in a 747 but having a better view than normal as well!








Living the Dream: Flying Seat 1A on a 747 - AirlineReporter


We enjoy the one-of-a-kind view from the front row of the iconic Boeing 747-400, which will soon be gone from US-based airlines' fleets.




www.airlinereporter.com








Devil's Advocate said:


> The 747 Combi was a versatile but flawed design.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## Dakota 400 (Aug 5, 2020)

PVD said:


> Douglas did pretty well in narrow body, but stumbled with the DC-10. Lockheed built a decent airplane with the L-1011, Rolls Royce slowed them up with the RB-211 issues, so they played second fiddle to Douglas and they split a market segment



What was wrong with the DC-10 and the L-1011? I flew on both of them. The L-1011 flight was on TWA. The DC-10 flights were on United.


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## jiml (Aug 5, 2020)

There's a really good documentary on YouTube which references the engine issue that delayed the introduction of the L-1011 and allowed the DC-10 to capture the 3-engine jumbo market. Otherwise it was a very good airplane - just not enough airlines bought it.


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## PVD (Aug 5, 2020)

The prior post hits on the L-1011, which was late to the market (thank you Roll Royce) I flew on Eastern, Delta, TWA, and an L-1011 shorty (-500) with Pan Am. I always liked it. An early Eastern flight JFK-MIA to attend my Uncles's funeral blew an engine on takeoff, (sounded like we dragged tin cans, and we returned to JFK. I was a kid, and though it was cool for fire trucks to be lined up. They put us on another plane that had just come in as soon as they could get it catered and fueled. DC-10's had a few different issues early on that shook peoples confidence, cargo doors, engine falling off, engine disintegrating, common thread being the layout of the control and hydraulic systems. I won't weigh in on its overall record over time, but some of its accidents were among the highest fatality totals. I guess UA 232 Sioux City would be the last famous one.


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## jiml (Aug 5, 2020)

PVD said:


> The prior post hits on the L-1011, which was late to the market (thank you Roll Royce) I flew on Eastern, Delta, TWA, and an L-1011 shorty (-500) with Pan Am. I always liked it. An early Eastern flight JFK-MIA to attend my Uncles's funeral blew an engine on takeoff, (sounded like we dragged tin cans, and we returned to JFK. I was a kid, and though it was cool for fire trucks to be lined up. They put us on another plane that had just come in as soon as they could get it catered and fueled. DC-10's had a few different issues early on that shook peoples confidence, cargo doors, engine falling off, engine disintegrating, common thread being the layout of the control and hydraulic systems. I won't weigh in on its overall record over time, but some of its accidents were among the highest fatality totals. I guess UA 232 Sioux City would be the last famous one.


AA191 at O'hare also comes to mind. Although not the direct fault of the plane, a lot of people wouldn't fly them after that. One more 737MAX incident and it's going to have the same reputation.


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## PVD (Aug 5, 2020)

It was the 3rd high fatality crash in relatively short succession, and led to the temporary grounding of the aircraft, which people remember more than the fact that that accident was eventually found not to be primarily an aircraft issue.


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## Devil's Advocate (Aug 5, 2020)

Dakota 400 said:


> What was wrong with the DC-10 and the L-1011?


With the DC-10 I would say a defective cargo door and compromised control redundancy. There was also a narrower margin for error on takeoff and landing compared to other widebody designs. These issues were eventually fixed (after media uproar and regulatory intervention) but the L-1011 was a more mature aircraft at launch with fewer safety flaws despite a more complicated design. Unfortunately it was held back for reasons beyond Lockheed's control, eventually leading to severe financial losses and a permanent exit from the commercial airliner market. Even the "winning" DC-10 was unable to survive ETOPS.


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## Bob Dylan (Aug 5, 2020)

jiml said:


> AA191 at O'hare also comes to mind. Although not the direct fault of the plane, a lot of people wouldn't fly them after that. One more 737MAX incident and it's going to have the same reputation.


After that disaster, as you said, people quit flying on them which was good for me as a frequent flyer. 

I almost always got upgraded to FC when I flew on DC-10s!


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## railiner (Aug 5, 2020)

What I found interesting, was when PanAm purchased National, and IIRC, became the first airline to fly both L-1011's and DC-10's, from National's fleet.
Later, when UAL bought PanAm's Pacific Division, it was a strange sight, indeed to see TriStars's in United's livery....








File:United Airlines Lockheed L-1011 TriStar 500 (??) (10265800834).jpg - Wikimedia Commons







commons.wikimedia.org


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## ehbowen (Aug 6, 2020)

I can only remember one TriStar trip...in 1983 I was coming home from Nuclear Power School in Orlando on Delta to spend a week's leave in Houston. The plane was ready, the passengers were ready, but...no crew. They were stranded in Chicago by a massive winter storm! About two hours behind schedule a 727 crew arrived for what was supposed to be a later flight. Delta said, "Congratulations, you've been promoted!" and combined both plane loads of passengers on the larger airplane (Yes, I'm sure that the 727 pilots were qualified and current on the L-1011). But in the shuffle my luggage was misdirected, and it didn't arrive in Houston until three days later. BTW, that winter storm made it all the way to Houston...we had sub-freezing temperatures that whole week and I had to suffer through it with only my Navy Ike jacket....


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## Trogdor (Aug 6, 2020)

railiner said:


> What I found interesting, was when PanAm purchased National, and IIRC, became the first airline to fly both L-1011's and DC-10's, from National's fleet.



Delta flew DC10s in the early 1970s while waiting for the L1011’s problems to be ironed out.


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## railiner (Aug 6, 2020)

Trogdor said:


> Delta flew DC10s in the early 1970s while waiting for the L1011’s problems to be ironed out.


I never knew that, thanks for the correction....


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## PVD (Aug 6, 2020)

N601DA, N602DA, N603DA, N604DA, and N605DA. What happened was a bit odd, Delta sort of knew they were not likely to stay, so they sold them to United, and then leased them back for a couple of years.


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## jis (Aug 6, 2020)

I have flown around the world on 747s on one of my trips to India in my student days. JFK - LHR - DEL by Air India 747 (Emperor Kanishka which was later blown up over the Atlantic Ocean).

DEL - HKG - NRT on a PA 747
NRT - JFK on a PA 747-SP

The return trip on PA was because of a screwup at Air India which they resolved by endorsing my non-endorseable ticket to Pan Am who by then had seat availability to JFK only eastbound from India.

I have also flown on 747s of United numerous times (including Mileage Plus upgrades to First several times, in the days when they served Champagne and Caviar upon boarding) and Sabena at least once, and of course British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Thai Airways and Singapore Airlines a few times too. One of the Virgin Atlantic flights was JFK - LHR a few days after 9-11. There were about 12 of us on the flight. All were comp upgraded to Upper Class with the rear of the plane flying empty. The next segment LHR - CCU on BA 777 was completely full, and I was in their then Y+ product, which was actually quite nice.

The 747 was a wonderful plane and made Boeing quite a bit of money after almost bankrupting them. All good things do come to end at some point. One could say that to some extent it is the 777 that spelled doom for the 747.


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## jiml (Aug 6, 2020)

The 747-SP was a fascinating airplane, remaining in service with AA longer than others in the family. While attending a seminar at their headquarters in Dallas, I was lucky enough to score a scale model of one - which still has a special place in my collection.


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## PVD (Aug 6, 2020)

The 2 SP at AA came over from TWA in the buyout. and lasted about 10 years longer than the other 747s at AA Wild guess is they had a particular route that they fit well, since large airlines usually hate to have oddballs. Expensive for lots of reasons...


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## Devil's Advocate (Aug 6, 2020)

The 747-SP was an unusual aircraft with a condensed profile that further accentuated an already unique airframe. From a technical perspective the SP model was an impressive long haul airliner for the time, but to my eyes the toy-like proportions looked kind of clumsy compared to the rest of the fleet. I never flew an SP myself but was able to see one up close after it underwent heavy maintenance. Although none of the 747's were attractive to me I did get used to them over time, whereas the SP never quite grew on me.


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## jiml (Aug 6, 2020)

PVD said:


> The 2 SP at AA came over from TWA in the buyout. and lasted about 10 years longer than the other 747s at AA Wild guess is they had a particular route that they fit well, since large airlines usually hate to have oddballs. Expensive for lots of reasons...


I think you're half-right. They (601 and 602) were indeed purchased from TWA, however it was several years before the buyout/merger. They initially flew DFW-NRT - a route too long for AA's DC-10's, then were moved to JFK-LHR when the MD-11's arrived, until their retirement in 92-ish?


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## Dakota 400 (Aug 6, 2020)

jiml said:


> AA191 at O'hare also comes to mind.



I do remember that accident. I recall there was a MLB baseball player who was a passenger on that flight. I don't recall his name, though.


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## PVD (Aug 6, 2020)

Yup, I didn't correspond the dates of the re-registration with the buyout, which was quite a bit later. Looks like one of them may have been titled to some leasing companies before it became AA owned.


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## trainman74 (Aug 6, 2020)

For quite a while, Delta had an L-1011 flight that went Tampa-Atlanta-London Gatwick (and return) -- I wound up on the domestic leg at least a couple times, connecting to or from other Delta flights. While boarding in Tampa, you could see the cargo handlers loading box after box of tropical fish.


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## PVD (Aug 6, 2020)

There is a McDonalds on Rockaway Blvd across from many of the cargo terminals (bldg 79)at JFK. One of my last jobs before retiring was working on a renovation of a large cargo building. So I drive over to pick up lunch, and there is a pickup truck from a cargo handler loaded with boxes of tropical fish. It was about 10 degrees out, all I could think of was the phrase "this isn't going to end well" Delta had a fair number of the -500 tristars that were a little shorter, but had upgraded engines, and quite a bit of extra range. Wouldn't be surprised if it was on that route.


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