Boeing delivered its final B747. The manufacturer held a special ceremony at Everett-Paine Field (WA), which was joined by thousands of people, including current and former Boeing employees, suppliers and representatives of the airline accepting the final Jumbo Jet, Atlas Air. The aircraft in question is N863GT (67150), a B747-8F.
On the right-hand side the aircraft is wearing the full Atlas Air-livery, including a small sticker of Joe Sutter, the engineering manager and father of the B747-programme. The left-hand side of the aircraft is wearing Apex Logistics-titles, which is a subsidiary of Kuehne+Nagel, the company Atlas Air is operating this and another B747-8F for.
During the ceremony, the president and CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes said the delivery and hand-over of the final B747 to Atlas Air was very fitting as the airline is nowadays the largest operator of the aircraft, having 58 in the fleet.
Boeing has built B747s for 54 years, producing a total of 1,574 aircraft. Since the introduction of the original B747-100, Boeing has continued to develop and improve the design. Overall, the manufacturer produced 205 B747-100s, 45 B747SPs, 393 B747-200s, 81 B747-300s, 694 B747-400s, and 153 B747-8s.
