Tag: 747

View All Tags

/ / / / /

Break Out the Crayons and Create Your Own 747 Livery

April 24, 2013 at 8:39 AM | by | Comments (0)

We’ve seen various contests here and there dedicated to airline and airplane liveries, but now there’s a way to play graphic designer anytime and anywhere. Boeing has fired up a pretty neat addition to their website, and they welcome one and all to slap some paint onto the side of a 747-8.

You get a blank slate jumbo jet, and then you’re welcome to rotate it this way and that way to get your livery just right. Boeing has loaded a few different paintbrushes, stamps, and designs, so there are plenty of options from which to choose. There’s a whole bunch of colors, and you can even change up the background. Unfortunately you can’t upload your own logos and photos, so you won’t be able to stick your face onto the belly of the plane.

more ›

/ / / / /

Video Interlude: One Jumbo Art Project for One Jumbo British Airways Jet

April 22, 2013 at 12:32 PM | by | Comments (0)

Even though British Airways is champing at the bit to get their hands on the superjumbo Airbus A380, they aren't so quick to forget the original jumbo—the Boeing 747.

Just last week, the airline gathered together some creative employees and cleared a space in a hangar to generate a massive mural made up of the many thousand items which go on each BA 747 aircraft before it heads up into the skies. This are the soft products of the service, and they aren't anything minor: "With a combined weight of 6,120 kg, the items have to be unloaded and re-loaded before every take-off."

Now consider that each 747 on its own is made up of nearly 6 million pieces, and we're talking Puzz 3D, extra difficult edition for sure.

more ›

/ / / / / / / / / /

Check Out the 747 the San Francisco 49ers Flew to the Super Bowl

January 28, 2013 at 11:24 AM | by | Comments (0)

It sure wasn't a lazy Sunday yesterday for the San Francisco 49ers as the football team packed up and headed down to San Jose Airport to board their ride to Super Bowl XLVII in New Orleans. That ride? Oh, it was just a chartered Delta Boeing 747.

more ›

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / /

Frankfurt Airport's New A-Plus Concourse: A Super Home for Superjumbos

Where: Frankfurt International Airport, Frankfurt, Germany
November 19, 2012 at 11:04 AM | by | Comments (0)

Last month, Lufthansa opened the brand-spanking-new A-Plus Concourse at Germany's Frankfurt International Airport. Why's it so special? Well, among other things, it's directly designed for the biggest, baddest airplanes out there. We're talking A340s, 747s, 747-8is, and the almighty A380. This week, we'll take you inside and all around this place through which some 6 million travelers will journey each year.

If you're an airport whose tarmac is already crawling with superjumbos and you're about to add another 6 million passengers per year, what do you need? The answer: Lots and lots of space. German efficiency. An airline with enough mega planes and super long routes to keep the place hopping. So there you go. The answer is Frankfurt and its hometown airline, Lufthansa.

Speaking of German efficiency, let's talk tech. For passengers, Pier A-Plus boasts self-scan boarding gates, which are awesome if you hate waiting in lines. For operations, the addition of A-Plus means Frankfurt International has the world's largest airport baggage handling system. All of this becomes more and more important with each day, as Frankfurt looks to have a whopping 90 million travelers annually by 2020, up from 56 million in 2011. And those flyers will be stepping into FRA from more and more superjumbo aircraft.

more ›

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / /

Inside Frankfurt Airport's Completely New A-Plus Concourse: Six Million Travelers Can't Be Wrong

Where: Frankfurt International Airport, Frankfurt, Germany
November 16, 2012 at 1:42 PM | by | Comment (1)

Last month, Lufthansa opened the brand-spanking-new A-Plus Concourse at Germany's Frankfurt International Airport. Why's it so special? Well, among other things, it's directly designed for the biggest, baddest airplanes out there. We're talking A340s, 747s, 747-8is, and the almighty A380. This week, we'll take you inside and all around this place through which some 6 million travelers will journey each year.

0500 hours.

The seatbelt sign is on and traytables are up and locked. The Lufthansa Airbus A380 named "Tokio" is on final approach to Frankfurt International and we're inside.

Seat 15K.

It's a window, upper deck, right over the hulking wing of this superjumbo. Looking out, the airport on the horizon glows with the fluorescence of its millions of lights, pre-dawn. Usually we're not super anxious to leave a plane to experience the airport, but Frankfurt is an exception.

Wheels down.

Turning off onto the taxiway, we can already spot the many Lufthansa crane logos that adorn each Star Alliance gate. It's pretty obvious who rules this coop.

Rounding a corner, the A380 aims for its new home on the ground—a long, sleek concourse with gates and facilities designed for its massive dimensions. Whereas the plane squeezes itself into other airports, like buttoning pants two sizes too small, here it finds Frankfurt's just-opened A-Plus Concourse is tailor-made with breathing room. Once we've parked, three jetbridges stretch out to welcome over 500 passengers into these fresh digs.

more ›

/ / / / / / /

Space Shuttle 'Endeavour' Waves Goodbye to Houston for the Last Time

September 20, 2012 at 10:08 AM | by | Comments (0)

Houston, Texas isn't in the best mood today. After all, around sunrise this morning "Space City" lost what it should have kept: the NASA Space Shuttle Endeavour, which departed for the last time from Houston's Ellington Field, en route to its final resting place in Los Angeles. The Endeavour first hit the sky in 1992, flying 25 times, with 123 million miles in space and 4,700 circles around Earth.

It won't be a direct flight to LA for the Endeavour, atop its modified Boeing 747 carrier plane; it's booked to stop at Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso, Texas, before heading to NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center in California. Then, tomorrow, the journey in the skies completes at LAX Airport before the shuttle takes to the streets in October.

more ›

/ / / / / / /

This Totally Exists: Sightseeing Flights Over Antarctica in a 747

Where: Antarctica
September 17, 2012 at 11:02 AM | by | Comments (0)

For those jet-setters who've ticked off a healthy slew of bucket list destinations, we applaud you. It is quite the accomplishment to have been almost everywhere. Still, we just added a new destination to our own list and we think you may want in. You see, for the first time in 33 years, commercial trips from New Zealand to Antarctica have, once again, become a possibility.

There's a reason they ended in the first place, however; a tourist flight crashed in 1979 and proved fatal for all aboard. It's been long enough for airplanes and navigation and all sorts of other technology to improve and so, this upcoming February, sightseeing flights to the polar cap will once again become a normal departure from NZ. The day trip will see a chartered Qantas Boeing 747 take off from Auckland and travel due south to fly over the ice mass.

more ›

/ / / / / / /

Did You Know? Cedar Point Once Had a Boeing 747-Theme Roller Coaster

September 11, 2012 at 11:02 AM | by | Comments (2)

Fun fact: fun facts are awesome. Whether you're trying to chat up a flight attendant or simply love learning something cool, we've got some tidbits to share. So all this week, we'll be squeezing our mindgrapes to bring you some awesome, random travel factoids.

Fact: Cedar Point Amusement Park used to have a Boeing 747-themed roller coaster named "Jumbo Jet."

It's the late 1970s at a theme park in Ohio, but this isn't just any theme park; it's Cedar Point. This park, on a peninsula sticking out into Lake Erie, celebrates over 100 years of fun, with five roller coasters at the time: Blue Streak, Wildcat, Cedar Creek Mine Ride, Corkscrew and Jumbo Jet. Three of those five still exist and the losers are—you guessed it—Wildcat and the very similar Jumbo Jet.

more ›

/ / / / / / / /

A Little Secret to Sampling Qantas International Business Class

Where: Australia
September 11, 2012 at 8:32 AM | by | Comments (0)

Flying Business Class on any airline is certainly a treat, especially when it's part of an international journey. If you have ever priced it out —even just for giggles—it is, in truth, likely still hella expensive. Qantas has a little solution to this problem: fly an internationally configured Boeing 747 between Brisbane and Sydney.

All in all, flying time just over 60 minutes, so you might question if it's worth bothering to try Business for an hour. The flight is QF8 and it takes off from Dallas and makes it way over to Australia, but since the head winds are bit stronger when going west, it has to stop in Brisbane to fill its belly full of fuel and continue on to Sydney. Qantas makes the stop a little more financially viable by picking up some passengers who need to head to "big smoke." Like us.

more ›

/ / / / / / / /

Kennedy Space Center Will Make Some Money Off the Space Shuttle 'Endeavour' Yet

September 7, 2012 at 12:26 PM | by | Comments (0)


Enterprise, not Endeavour, atop NASA's 747

September 20. Mark that in your iCal for your next chance at NASA shuttle-spotting as the Endeavour mounts NASA's specially configured Boeing 747 for the cross-country trip to the shuttle's final resting place in Los Angeles.

We've already filled you in on what's going down for the parade through the streets of LA on October 12, but Cape Canaveral isn't about to let the opportunity for extra cash pass by almost two weeks earlier.

Whereas standing street-side will be free in LA, Florida's Space Coast is selling tickets for a viewing of the flyaway, and they're not cheap...

more ›

/ / / / / / / / / / /

The Newbie Traveler Takes His First Flight in a Boeing 747

August 17, 2012 at 11:09 AM | by | Comments (0)

What would your life be like if you hadn't yet traveled to Europe? If you'd spent years reading travel novels and fantasizing over guidebooks, but hadn't made the big leap? This is the case for Andy Miles, who in his late twenties just embarked on a trip to hit most of the cities for the first time. He's walking us through the emotions and observations of a true Newbie Traveler.

Here's the truth: I'm not really such a Newbie Traveler anymore. A few days ago I realized that I may have been more places than some people who consider themselves world travelers. All told, I've been to the UK, France, Mexico, Switzerland, Italy, Czech Republic, Germany, the Netherlands, and Belgium. Oh, and also the United States, but that doesn't really count.

There are some specific things I did on this trip which I had never done before, all aiding in the end feeling that I'm officially an international traveler now. Here's a couple, for example:

more ›

/ / / / / / /

Watch Iron Maiden's Lead Singer Fly a Boeing 747-8 (Kinda)

August 13, 2012 at 5:55 PM | by | Comments (0)

Look, it's Monday. Do we just want to spend the rest of the day watching a rocker rock-out (in a slightly different way) within a Boeing 747-8 flight simulator, and otherwise talk about how flying is "like breathing, really; it's one of the most essential things?"

Heck yes.

Our fascination with Iron Maiden lead singer (and licensed commercial pilot) Bruce Dickinson actually began when we discovered he jets around in a Boeing 757 custom-painted with the band's logo (and a badass tail). Then he considered saving an Icelandic LCC, and we were intrigued. Doesn't he have, like, rock concerts to play or something?

Happily Dickinson indulges both his passions, for music and aviation, and this earned him a sweet little visit to Boeing's HQ outside Seattle. Check out the resulting video below:

more ›

Use of this Site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement (effective 3/21/12) and Privacy Policy (effective 3/21/12). © Condé Nast. Your California Privacy Rights. All rights reserved. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast.
Ad Choices