Jumbo Jet Says Goodbye By Drawing A Massive 747 Outline Over The Sky

The mighty queen of the sky is becoming a less frequent sight at airports around the world. Boeing’s 747 aircraft was a masterpiece of engineering and widely seen as the beginning of mass travel in the 1960s. Over 1000 airframes have been delivered across all variants of the plane and the aircraft was widely seen as the flagship of many major fleets in the 1980s and 1990s.

With the dawn of more fuel-efficient twin-engined jets such as the 777 and more recently the 787 and Airbus’ a350, the need for gas-guzzling four-engined aircraft has hit the buffers. Many airlines now favour smaller and more fuel-efficient planes, and with advancements in technology, transatlantic and transpacific flights no longer require four engines for the case of rare emergencies.

The slow decline of the jumbo jet has been much to the disappointment of aviation enthusiasts around the world, as the aircraft remains such a beautiful feat of engineering. The aircraft will remain in the sky’s for many years to come, albeit as a much more rare sight, with the most recent version, the 747-8 still having many more years to fly.

Airlines such as British Airways, who run the largest remaining passenger fleet of 747s still intend to operate theirs until 2024. Recent airlines that have waved goodbye to their last jumbo jets have paid tribute in various ways. United Airlines flew the double-decker aircraft on the Sam Francisco to Honolulu route as a farewell flight to recreate their first route for the plane. Qantas also sold special tickets for a round trip flight on their final 747, but the Israeli carrier El Al has now gone one step further.

The national carrier celebrated the fact that the last flight from Rome to Tel Aviv landed more than 90 minutes late because the pilot decided to fly the route of a massive 747 outline over the Mediterranean.

Complete with wings and engines, this could even be seen as impressive art when tracking the flight on flight radar.

FlightRadar24 posted updated screenshots of the aircraft after it dropped to 10,000 feet and drew an intricate, if not perfect, outline of the flying equipment itself.

Some of the sharp turns on the outline look like they would have been exhilarating or terrifying dependent on one’s level of comfort to flying.

El Al has been in the process of replacing older aircraft in their fleet with more modern Boeing 787 aircraft for their long-haul routes. The “humpback” aircraft has found itself an afterlife with cargo operators in recent years. The largest remaining passenger operators of the jet include British Airways, Lufthansa, Korean Air and China Airlines.