Slashdot Mirror
The Flying Giant Is 40 Years Old
Ponca City, We love you writes "Four decades ago, Boeing's prototype 747 took to the skies over Washington State for a 75-minute flight that helped bring cheap airline travel to millions of people and would remain the world's largest commercial aircraft for 37 years until the advent of the double-decker Airbus A380. What made the 747 unique was that it was the first 'wide body' aircraft with more than one aisle — a big step towards reducing the sense of traveling in a narrow tube, and inducing a sense more equivalent to flying in a large room with high ceilings. But back in the 1960s, convincing people that the 747 would fly was a tough call. Joe Sutter, the director of engineering on the project, even spent an hour with Charles Lindbergh, going over all the data to prove that the jumbo would not flip over or become unstable at high speeds. Boeing has sold more than 1,400 jumbos in the past four decades, worth, at today's prices, more than $350 billion and although we might complain of traveling in 'cattle class' we have the 747 to thank for being able to do so at affordable prices."
FYI,
Standard cruise on a 747 is .85 Mach (567MPH) and a 777 is .84 Mach (560MPH).
Both of these planes are capable of much greater speeds, the limiting factor..... the sound barrier. They are not designed for the shock wave build up such speeds will generate.
If you were watching the NatGeo special on Air Force One, you'd of saw the interview with the Air Cap F-16 pilot who had to radio AF1 to actually slow down so he could limit his fuel burn. AF1 was cruising at .90 Mach at the time.
Don't think for a second these lumbering giants can't get up and move... Those cruise speeds are chosen for maximum efficiency and to limit air frame fatigue.
That was Tex Johnston and he actually did it twice.
The Boeing President was so mad at Tex, that he didn't speak to him for years. This barrel roll was done in front of potential buyers, which did impress them.
Remember that a commercial airplane is not designed for aerobatic maneuvers. Which means Tex had to maintain a 1G downward force during the roll to ensure fuel stayed in the bottom of the tanks.
The President was mad because the Company bet the future on the 707. If it didn't sell (and/or if Tex crashed), then the Company would have folded.
The same thing was true with the 747, the Company bet the farm on this one too. It is such a big investment of capital, that there is no room for failure.
Uhm, what? Lets have a look at the 'entirely new' aircraft to have been launched in the past 20 years:
1. Airbus A330. Fantastic success, sold over 1,000 airframes and continues to sell well.
2. Boeing 777. Fantastic success, sold over 1,000 airframes and continues to sell well.
3. Airbus A380. Debatable, yet to be seen.
4. Boeing 787. Fantastic success, yet to fly, sold over 900 airframes to date.
5. Airbus A350XWB. Fantastic success, still 4 years to EIS, sold over 450 airframes to date.
Clean sheet designs are still massively profitable.
The earliest use on UseNet was 1990, and the earliest mention in the New York Times is 1999. So I'm fairly certain Galen was the first inventor.
Nevertheless, since that first flight, the 747 has fulfilled the faith of its designers and has led to reductions in air fares, opening up air travel to many in a way that was previously unimaginable
The 747 was developed for the airline business before the Airline Deregulation Act signed into law by Jimmy Carter. Before that, it was profitable for the airlines to operate under the "hub and spoke" business model: condense a bunch of folks going to a certain destination at a hub and then send them all at once to said destination. Which worked at the time because because all the airlines had to follow Federal rules; which, by the way, the airlines really miss those Government regulations.
Now, the way to be profitabile in the air ravel business is smaller fuel efficient aircraft with schedules more like trucks: Atlanta to Fort Lauderdale to Tampa to New Orleans to Atlanta again - for example. Not get a bunch of people to go to Fort Lauderdale from Atlanta and go back. My point? Big jets for anything other than long haul (Ocean crossings) are not worth it. The 380 is not going to have the market Airbus thought it would have.
New York to San Francisco? Please. The airline that runs the most flights between those cities is going to get the lucrative business travellers; not the airline that has a slightly cheaper fare that runs once a day, at most. Those once a day airlines are going to get the tourist business and you know what those flights are going to be like for a 380: 2 hours to board because the tourists have to figure out where aisle '34' is and where seat 'H' is. And then they have to figure out where they're going to put their trunk that should be checked. Then they'll argue with the stewardess about how this is a carry on, while their little brat is screaming because they couldn't get their French Fries from McDonald's. Then the .....
In the meantime, rich fat cat Wall street Banker Federal Welfare receiver has his own jet and just sails over to San Francisco. Then the SOB has the nerve to comment on how your suit is wrinkled and how your tired and absent minded. ....
747s have broken the sound barrier on at least two occasions. One was during certification, and a second during a in-flight screw up on China Airlines 006. (Powered descent).
Both airframes survived.
I think they could change this if they took a different approach to those on vacation - specifically creating routes for vacationers and everything they expect. Get them started on their vacation early by providing them with large seats, good food, good movies. For the commuter or typical traveler they could offer a more traditional approach.
But imagine you want to fly to Japan from NYC. That's quite a long flight. Why not offer people on holiday the option to pamper themselves while flying? Give them a more leisurely route, better service, and better seating. Think a "cruise line" in the air. I bet people like myself would opt for it over the "sardine can to Asia" and be willing to spend the money on it. Sure I can fly first class now, but this whole everyone is the same approach is the past, we need more niche airlines that cater to specifics. I feel like a piece of cattle when flying, like somehow I'm not the consumer anymore and I'm just at the whim of the airline/FAA/TSA/various global agencies. It's become a "privilege".
BTW, I love to fly. So much I decided to learn how to fly and get my own private pilot's license. But I hate flying the airlines. It's not the same. One is a chore, the other is an experience everyone should try at least once.
It depends.
A 747 can't cruise on 2 engines - it needs at least 3 (depending on which two are left it probably could hobble back to a controlled landing after quickly dumping fuel - more of a powered glide than flight). So, a double engine failure on a 747 isn't really much better than a double engine failure on a 777.
Now, what was an issue prior to ETOPS was how long the jet could run on one engine. Prior to ETOPS a 777 could only reliably run on one engine for a short time - plenty to land if you were near an airport, but it wasn't designed to cruise for an hour or two. A 747 could run on three engines for a long time.
The issue is that jet engines become less reliable at their max rated speed. At cruise those engines might be running at 90-94% N1. If you lose an engine, even at the reduced cruising speed that remaining engine might be running closer to 100%. And at the reduced speed it takes longer to get to an airport. With three engines losing 25% of thrust isn't as big a hit on the remaining engines as losing 50% of thrust is.
However, being that a 747 still needs 3 engines to stay aloft I'm not sure that it becomes any safer than a 777 on an engine-out scenario. If anything I'd say that the 3 remaining engines are 3X as likely to fail as the 1 engine on the 777 - all things being equal.
In any case, those big planes are just way too heavy to control with engine power. On a glide their decent rates are very high so pulling off a landing without engines is a heroic matter indeed. Pulling it off in water is near-miraculous.
You are right, but only because the French and the Brit Govs wrote off the development costs.
"Concorde flew regular transatlantic flights from London Heathrow (British Airways) and Paris Charles de Gaulle (Air France) to New York JFK and Washington Dulles, profitably flying these routes at record speeds, in less than half the time of other airliners."
However:
"With only 20 aircraft ultimately built, the costly development phase represented a substantial economic loss. Additionally, Air France and British Airways were subsidised by their governments to buy the aircraft.
Wikipedia, of course, so it must be true.
But they *do*. It's called first class! I know people who *do* pamper themselves when flying to their vacations, and it's a wonderful way to fly - but it's not for everyone, or indeed even a large portion of the traveling public.
I think you're suggesting that the cost of first class be lowered - and perhaps it can, I'm certainly not privy to the finances of major airlines. I would like to point out, though, that most people I know only consider spending good money on *the vacation*, and not the means of getting there. I don't know about you guys in the US, but up here in Canada we have "vacation airlines" that service only popular vacation routes, and completely redefine "cattle class" (in the bad way). Consumers are clearly more about cheap than comfort, and unfortunately the airlines are giving them precisely what they want.