Delta bids fond farewell to 747 fleet
When Delta Air Lines Flight 158 landed in Detroit on Tuesday afternoon, it marked the end of an era in U.S. aviation.
The arrival from Seoul goes down in the record books as the last regularly scheduled Boeing 747 to be operated by a U.S. passenger airline. Delta had been the final one still using the plane for passenger flights.
That doesn’t mean the 747 will completely disappear from American skies. Some U.S. cargo carriers still use the jet, as do a handful of foreign airlines that fly to U.S. airports. Even Delta’s dwindling fleet of 747s will fly a few more times, pressed into duty for charter flights for another two weeks.
But now, for the first time since Boeing’s iconic 747 debuted with Pan Am in 1970, no U.S. passenger airline is using the aircraft as part of its regular schedule. Aside from Delta, United Airlines had been the only other U.S. carrier still using the 747 for passenger service. But United ended its 747 flying in the fall, sending its last model of the jet to the salvage yard after a splashy retro-themed farewell flight from San Francisco to Honolulu on Nov. 7.
The moves by Delta and United mirror a broader global trend, with airlines phasing out older four-engine jets such as the 747 in favor of newer, more efficient two-engine aircraft such as Boeing’s 787 “Dreamliner.”
While Boeing has sold more than 1,500 models of the jet since its debut, the successful line is coming to an end. Sales for the newest version of the jet, the 747-8 Intercontinental and a corresponding freighter version, have been slow for years. Even Boeing has acknowledged the 747s future appeal as a passenger jet is limited.
At Delta, the company is paying homage to the aircraft that has become known as the “Queen of the Skies” by flying one of its last remaining models on a farewell tour. The flights were open to airline employees and retirees, and a handful of seats were offered to frequent-fliers willing to bid airline miles for the experience.
The first stop of that tour came Monday, when that Delta 747 touched down in Everett, Wash., at the same Boeing factory where it rolled off the assembly line in 1999.
A throng of Boeing employees braved rainy conditions to cheer the jet as it passed through one last time.