Air France Stops Flying Boeing 747
Air France has stopped operating its Boeing 747 fleet. The last flight between Mexico City and Paris marks the end of an era in aviation history. Almost 30,000 people tried to get a ticket for the final flight. Air France launched its first 747 between Paris and New York in 1970. The airline is now replacing its jumbo jets with modern Boeing 777s.
Boeing's 747 became the most popular plane to fly the skies in the last decades. It could carry almost 500 passengers to faraway destinations. Many people travelled on their first holidays aboard the 747.
For over 35 years the Boeing 747 was the biggest passenger plane in the world. In 2007, the Airbus 380 took its place as the plane with the largest seating capacity.
Many carriers have announced they will do the same as Air France and phase out their fleet of ageing 747s within the next decade. Today's new planes are more modern and fuel efficient.
However, there are still a large number of jumbo jets in the fleets of major European airlines. British Airways still has 41 in operation and recently announced that it will retrofit 18 of its carriers. KLM and Lufthansa both have over 30 747s still in operation.
Older pilots are disappointed at losing the 747 because it was a plane that really took skills to fly. Today's planes are mostly operated by computers, with pilots having little else to do but monitor the instruments.
When Boeing introduced its 747, airports could not handle the giant plane. New runways had to be built and airport terminals redesigned to cope with so many passengers at one time. But the 747 opened the way for mass tourism around the world.
Related Topics
- Boeing 747 - Four Decades of the Jumbo Jet
- Airbus A-380 - The Largest Plane in the World
- Air Force One - A Special Plane for the American President
- Air France Flight 447 – An Airplane That Fell From The Sky
- Pilot - A Dream Job?
- Airports
- Tourism
Words
- ageing = getting older
- announce = to say something officially
- aviation = the world of flying
- disappointed = sad, because something does not happen the way you would like it to
- era = period of time
- carrier = airline
- cope = deal with
- decade = ten years
- destination = place where you want to travel
- final = last
- fleet = group of planes that belong to one airline
- fuel = oil, coal or gas that is turned into a liquid that can fly a plane, car, ship etc..
- fuel efficient = the engines burn less fuel, so that it becomes cheaper to operate the plane
- handle = deal with
- however = but
- introduce = start flying
- launch = start flying
- little else = not much
- major = important , big
- mark = to show that something will change
- mass tourism = when many people all over the world travel to certain places
- monitor = watch carefully
- operate = here: fly
- phase out = here: slowly take out older planes out of operation and replace them with newer planes
- popular = much liked
- recently = a short time ago
- redesign = plan and build in a new way
- replace = here: to use a new airplane
- retrofit = to make an airplane better by putting new parts into it
- runway = area where planes take off and land
- seating capacity = the number of passengers a plane can carry
- skill = being able to do something well because you have learned and practiced it