The Boeing 747, one of the world’s most recognizable aircraft, was the first wide body jet built and revolutionized air transportion.  When it was introduced in 1970, it carried twice as many passengers as then current airliners.  It’s cavernous cargo capacity brought airfreight into the realm of financial feasability.  During it’s development it was designed to be easily converted to cargo hauling because the conventional wisdom of the day was that subsonic aircraft like the 747 would soon be rendered obsolete as passenger liners due to the imminent introduction of supersonic airliners.  The predicted proliferation of the supersonics never materialized – the lone SST, the Concorde, has come and gone.  Boeing expected to sell 400;  As of April 2014, 1487 have been built with another 51 on order.  The “Queen of the Skies” still reigns.

I am awed by the fact that a machine this large can fly – it can have a takeoff weight nearly one million pounds, and a range of over 9,000 miles!  Amazing!  Click here for tons of pictures.  Here are some clips of the bird in action – enjoy!