Happy 40th, 747!

The Jumbo Jet hits the big four-oh today.

The first 747 was rolled out before the assembled press in Everett on this day in 1968, though it didn't actually take wing for another four months. I snapped this photo of that same plane about ten years ago, as it sat forlornly at Boeing Field, stripped of its jets. It has since been restored and is now displayed as part of Boeing's Museum of Flight.

I've never actually flown on one, but whenever I see one of these behemoths taxiing across the tarmac, I still marvel that they do indeed get off the ground.

Official site.