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."

Comments

A whole hour!

[MozeeToby]

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.

Wow, a whole hour devoted to analysing the plane's stability at high speeds? If that is correct, I'm amazed the plane flew at all.

Re:it might just be the culmination of transport

[Locke2005]

The 747 may very well be the peak of airplane technology, but for different reasons then you give. Quite simply, the development costs of bringing an entirely new aircraft to market have reached the point where it is no longer economically rewarding to do so. It is much cheaper to continue making incremental improvements to an existing design like the 747 than it is to design an entirely new aircraft from scratch. The technology exists to make a plane with more capacity and greater fuel economy than a 747, but the economic incentives to do that simply are not there. The design of the new Airbus wasn't driven by pure economics, but rather by massive subsidies from the British and French governments; it is still an open question whether huge development costs were actually worth it. Any private company would simply have ordered a 747 instead.