The Boeing 747 begins its final descent • Hacker News Board

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#111

Post by ahartmetz » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 9:54 PM UTC

dingaling wrote: post #85

eastbound wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s beautiful because Boeing started, not with the smallest, but with the largest plane possible. Meanwhile Airbus started with Concorde, a completely orthogonal project to round up everyone’s identical patriotism, and both projects were absolutely beautiful in their own way!

> Meanwhile Airbus started with Concorde Oh gracious no, Airbus started with the utilitarian A300 widebody twin[1]. Concorde was Sud Aviation and BAC joint venture, nothing to do with Airbus which didn't even exist at that time. [1]The original A300A might have been interesting, having a fuselage as wide as the much later 777, but Airbus got cold feet and scaled it down to the dull and worthy A300B. Every Airbus wide…

Well. If you squint a little, Sud Aviation and BAC + others became Airbus. Airbus was first a consortium and then a proper successor (through a merger) to several European aircraft manufacturers. Sud Aviation's acquirer Aérospatiale was an initial member of the Airbus consortium and BAC's acquirer British Aerospace joined slightly later in 1979.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus#History has a diagram of all the predecessor companies.

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#112

Post by agumonkey » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 9:55 PM UTC

thesumofall wrote: post #9

It’s such a beautiful plane. Despite having worked for Airbus, the 747 triggers emotions for me that the A380 simply doesn’t. It represents an era of aerospace engineering that will not come back (in many cases probably for the better - but still!)

I'm just a layman, but somehow Airbus doesn't embody the airplane magic.. yet I'm very curious what this means to you. Any easy to grasp details you could describe ?

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#113

Post by KolmogorovComp » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 9:56 PM UTC

mjg59 wrote: post #101

GMoromisato wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious about this--wouldn't one expect more engines to be safer? Unless having more engines increases the chance of certain kinds of accidents? Like maybe the chance of an engine failure damaging the hull goes up with more engines? Not questioning the justification--I do believe it--I'm just curious about the details.

All else being equal, potentially - although as I mentioned there have been cases where one engine falling off a 4 engine aircraft hit another in the process. But ETOPS certification is based on it being demonstrated that engines are sufficiently reliable that the probability of an independent failure is incredibly unlikely, and also requires that operators have a stricter maintenance process. The only dual engine fa…

No, the highest risk for dual engine failure is bird strike.

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#114

Post by jquery » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 9:59 PM UTC

moojacob wrote: post #31

Didn’t read the full article but it starts with > The jet was perhaps the pinnacle of American engineering excellence. Its retirement signals an end to an era of American culture—and ambition. End of American ambition? SpaceX landing is rockets… today! That’s apples to apples also, both aerospace. In other fields we have literally taught computers how to talk.

The most interesting thing about SpaceX is how it convinced a lot of otherwise sober people that data centers in space was a $50 septillion addressable market. You might laugh and think I’m joking but a lot of people seriously fell for the nonsense in the public filing, which should’ve been a one way ticket to SEC jail.

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#115

Post by jquery » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 10:00 PM UTC

Leonard_of_Q wrote: post #50

moojacob wrote: post #31

Didn’t read the full article but it starts with > The jet was perhaps the pinnacle of American engineering excellence. Its retirement signals an end to an era of American culture—and ambition. End of American ambition? SpaceX landing is rockets… today! That’s apples to apples also, both aerospace. In other fields we have literally taught computers how to talk.

The Atlantic writes for its owners as well as its readership, both of whom consider it unsavoury to compliment their homeland without adding multiple caveats.

Considering who the current face of the country is and how we are acting on the world stage, it’s the least they can do.

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#116

Post by kkylin » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 10:04 PM UTC

zabzonk wrote: post #110

GMoromisato wrote: post #67

Anyone interested should read Joe Sutter's book, 747. Sutter was the lead engineer for the development of the 747 and he has some awesome stories. One interesting story is that Juan Trippe (CEO of PanAm) wanted Boeing to create a double-decker airplane. He was enamored with the idea of "ocean liners" cruising the sky. But Sutter (and other engineers) knew that it would be impossible to create what he wanted, so inste…

I hated the top deck when flying east from NY to London. The rising sun poured in every time a crew member opened the cockpit door, waking me up. Best seat for me was the single one in the lower deck at the very nose of the aircraft. The 747 was a great aircraft to fly in though. The tower of power effect on take-off really reassured you that you were going to get where you were going.

We got front lower deck seats once when I was a kid. My sister and I had extra open floor space for playing. It was great.

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#117

Post by grosswait » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 10:08 PM UTC

jquery wrote: post #114

moojacob wrote: post #31

Didn’t read the full article but it starts with > The jet was perhaps the pinnacle of American engineering excellence. Its retirement signals an end to an era of American culture—and ambition. End of American ambition? SpaceX landing is rockets… today! That’s apples to apples also, both aerospace. In other fields we have literally taught computers how to talk.

The most interesting thing about SpaceX is how it convinced a lot of otherwise sober people that data centers in space was a $50 septillion addressable market. You might laugh and think I’m joking but a lot of people seriously fell for the nonsense in the public filing, which should’ve been a one way ticket to SEC jail.

Let’s revisit this comment in 5 years. I’m not convinced HN critics know more about this than SpaceX does.

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#118

Post by hdgvhicv » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 10:10 PM UTC

zabzonk wrote: post #110

GMoromisato wrote: post #67

Anyone interested should read Joe Sutter's book, 747. Sutter was the lead engineer for the development of the 747 and he has some awesome stories. One interesting story is that Juan Trippe (CEO of PanAm) wanted Boeing to create a double-decker airplane. He was enamored with the idea of "ocean liners" cruising the sky. But Sutter (and other engineers) knew that it would be impossible to create what he wanted, so inste…

I hated the top deck when flying east from NY to London. The rising sun poured in every time a crew member opened the cockpit door, waking me up. Best seat for me was the single one in the lower deck at the very nose of the aircraft. The 747 was a great aircraft to fly in though. The tower of power effect on take-off really reassured you that you were going to get where you were going.

BA used to fly the on the Moscow to London route once a day. I remeber vividly the late night a320 flight was cancelled and we were stuck in the lounge until the early morning flight about 6 hours later.

Somewhere over the North Sea I decided to give the on board phone a go, and it worked. A early call to let my wife know I’d made it (there were only a few seats left on the morning flight and 180 passengers to fit on).

Next time I flew it the phones weren’t working, and it wasn’t long until they’d all been removed, so I’m glad I got to tick that off my list.

Likely my last 747 flight ever was far less salubrious. I was supposed to be flying Toronto to jfk to Heathrow, but the Toronto flight was cancelled and I got downgraded to economy and put on a 747 to Amsterdam.

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#119

Post by throw-the-towel » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 10:15 PM UTC

jquery wrote: post #115

Leonard_of_Q wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Atlantic writes for its owners as well as its readership, both of whom consider it unsavoury to compliment their homeland without adding multiple caveats.

Considering who the current face of the country is and how we are acting on the world stage, it’s the least they can do.

How is this kind of ritual flagellation supposed to mitigate Trump though?

Re: The Boeing 747 begins its final descent

#120

Post by dcrazy » Sun, Jun 28, 2026, 10:19 PM UTC

jquery wrote: post #115

Leonard_of_Q wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Atlantic writes for its owners as well as its readership, both of whom consider it unsavoury to compliment their homeland without adding multiple caveats.

Considering who the current face of the country is and how we are acting on the world stage, it’s the least they can do.

This is why the right gets away with saying liberals hate America. Because as long as there is anything to criticize about America (which there always will be), some people simply cannot make a single truly positive statement about America, or even things that happened in or came from America.

Slate is even worse than The Atlantic in this regard.