EVERETT – Thirty-seven years ago, people wondered whether the 747 would ever get off the ground, legendary Boeing Co. engineer Joe Sutter said.
Kevin Nortz / The Herald
Boeing industrial engineer Brandon Lynde signs his name to a poster of the new 747-8 at Tuesday’s launch party at the company’s Everett plant. “It’s kind of exciting having a new plane come here,” he said.
On Tuesday, the question was whether it will ever stop flying.
“This is just the first step,” said Kourosh Hadi, Boeing’s product development chief. The 747, he said, “just has a lot of capability left.”
Sutter, who officially retired in 1986, came back to Everett on Tuesday for a celebration of the launch of Boeing’s newest version of the jumbo jet, the 747-8. Hailed as the father of the 747, Sutter said he lobbied hard for Boeing to upgrade his baby.
“I pressed for it quite hard,” he said. “I felt the airplane had a great future.”
Kevin Nortz / The Herald
Boeing formally launched the 747-8, which incorporates new engines and other technology developed for the 787, in November with orders from two freight airlines, Cargolux of Luxembourg and Nippon Cargo Airlines of Japan.
The passenger version will be stretched to carry 450 passengers – 35 more than the current 747-400 – and it will have a redesigned interior.
The 747-8 is “going to blow people away as a passenger aircraft,” 747 program manager Jeff Peace said.
It wasn’t so long ago that pundits were calling the 747 a dinosaur, a white elephant, the Queen of the Skies ready to abdicate her crown. The company proposed a series of 747 upgrades, all of which were rejected by airlines.
That made Tuesday’s celebration of the launch of the 747-8 all the more sweet, Boeing executives said.
“We’ve tried in the past and never found a solution for us and our customers,” said Dan Becker, Boeing vice president in charge of the 747 program.
But the new plane, he continued, “is going to be a world beater, and I’m proud to say we’re going to build the 747 for years to come.”
Cargolux senior vice president Eyjo Hauksson praised the 747-8. It “is truly the cargo airplane, and it sets the world standard,” he said.
The new plane will allow Cargolux to carry 140 tons of freight, compared with 85 tons it carried on its first 747-200 freighters, and it will use less fuel, Hauksson said.
The initial orders came from cargo carriers, but Peace expects orders for the passenger version “sometime next year.”
“We’re talking with a bunch of the passenger airlines right now,” he said.
Germany’s Lufthansa is one of them. The airline’s chief executive, Wolfgang Mayrhuber, told trade magazine Air Transport World on Monday that Lufthansa “will look seriously” at the plane, which might be a perfect fit between the airline’s 325-seat A340-600s and its 555-seat A380s.
The 747-8 has the advantage of being an industry icon that has earned the trust of passengers, as well as lots of money for airlines, Peace said.
“This is the airplane we always remember our first trip on,” he said. “It has a trust and aura and love.”
Sutter said he and his team knew they had a great airplane design back in the 1960s, but they had no idea it would still be flying into the 21st century. “Nobody can predict the future as far as that.”
Sutter said his “fond wish” is to be on hand for the rollout ceremony for the 747-8, likely to be sometime in late 2008.
In the meantime, the 84-year-old, who officially retired from Boeing in 1986, is likely to keep advising his successors on how best to rebuild his baby.
“Joe calls me every week to make sure I’m doing right on his airplane,” Hadi said. “He’s still one of the best minds among designers in the world.”
Reporter Bryan Corliss: 425-339-3454 or corliss@heraldnet.com.
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