This was almost certainly drawn out by hand, waypoints (lat/lon) and turns were plotted and then inputed into the flight management computer, and there is a good chance the plane just flew itself as told. Although given it was flown at such a lower altitude below 15k feed near Moses Lake (which is where Boeing does a ton of testing at that airport) it's possible the pilots hand flew this by following a pre-plotted ma…
They could also just spoof the ADS-B data right?
Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
151–160 of 421 posts
Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#152Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#153Any flight buffs know the estimated cost of doing something like that? I’m all for having fun, and I love that they spent the money to do it
Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is this tradition even new? Drawing things in the sky seems to be a well established aviation tradition.
> Drawing things in the sky seems to be a well established aviation tradition Not really... This level of high-precision and publicly-available flight tracking is pretty new.
The precision we see in this route is fairly new, but, especially on proving flights for new aircraft, which needed hours and hours of flight time and would take off and land at the same airport, and even before the public could see it on a website, filing flight plans that contained (much cruder) drawings of "747" or otherwise certainly exist.
Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#155Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#156Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#157Makes me think of the famous "707 Barrel Roll" story from its initial testing: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/60-years-ago-the-f... “You know that. Now we know that. But just don’t do it anymore.” Edit: forgot the barrel roll was on a 707 - not a 747
there's film of Tex Johnston's Dash-80 barrel roll https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaA7kPfC5Hk many years later, Boeing Chief Test Pilot John Cashman stated that just before he piloted the maiden flight of the Boeing 777 on Jun. 12, 1994, his last instructions from then Boeing President Phil Condit were “No rolls”. -- anecdote from https://theaviationgeekclub.com/that-time-tex-johnston-barre... I wonder why "the suit…
Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#158The question in my mind is, what replaces the 747, and is it safe? Looks like 777X is going to replace 747. Does the 777X have the same design flaws as the 737 MAX, namely larger engine, positioned forward in way that destabilizes the airframe?
Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
A single plane has less of an ability to " Destro The Environment " than a Single Politician.
While that's true that no individual action matters, it's also true that our individual actions taken as a whole has an impact on the world, and because of that, we must treat individual actions as though they had the impact of collective actions.
For example by making electric vehicles attractive Tesla did more for the environment than possibly any single company ever by causing the shift to EVs in the general populace’s psyche.
Alternatively by doing things like banning plastic straws you instead get malicious compliance and dislike for the policies. That will never change things in a positive direction in the long term.
Re: Easter egg in flight path of last 747 delivery flight
#160https://flightaware.com/live/flight/GTI747/history/20230201/...
There's probably a similar function for flightradar24 as well but I don't know how to find it there.