The Mighty 747. Australia's Queen Of The Skies

The Mighty 747. Australia’s Queen of the Skies has just been published and with permission, we reproduce the review from former Qantas pilot Owen Zupp.

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The final Boeing 747 has been delivered from Boeing’s Everett facility in the United States to Atlas Air, the world's largest operator of the jumbo.

In an era of inbuilt obsolescence and short shelf lives, the Boeing 747 found the key to longevity with more than 1,500 being built over more than half a century. Within their numbers were a series of ever-growing models with specialised variants that took telescopes into the stratosphere, carried the US President and even piggy-backed the Space Shuttle.

However, beyond its statistics and impressive history lay something more than its metal and muscle. The Boeing 747 struck a chord around the globe with all who came into contact with her. The four-engined jet the democratised air travel was synonymous with the making of memories and for those pilots, engineers and crew on the other side of the fence, it was both a reliable steed and an engineering marvel.

In his recently released book, “The Mighty 747. Australia’s Queen of the Skies.” by Jim Eames, the story of Qantas’s long association with the aircraft is described in detail. In a career as an aviation writer dating back to the 1960s, Eames has also served as ministerial press secretary and a senior executive with Qantas. Hence his ability to offer an insightful and contemporary view into the process that saw the 747 come to serve Qantas for a shade under half a century.

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In telling the tale, Eames visits the immense undertaking in bringing the Boeing 747 under the watchful eye of the “Father of the 747”, Joe Suttor. Beyond the engineering challenges, Eames also examines the workings within Qantas to bring the revolutionary aircraft into its fleet as an early adopter. He was also well-positioned to understand the political nuances in the government of the decision to equip the national carrier.

Eames relates the evolution of the 747 through its service in Qantas from the upper deck lounges to the SP (Special Performance) variant and beyond. He does so, not solely through relating a timeline and data but through anecdotes of those who lived the experience. Pilots, cabin crew, engineers and executives are all included to offer their perspectives. Some stories are humourous and all are informative, each adding a piece to a half-century puzzle.

The Boeing 747 carried the “Flying Kangaroo” from Oshkosh to Antarctica and from the cyclone-struck Darwin to the sound of gunfire in Mogadishu. And along the way, it broke records for uplifting passengers and non-stop flights. However, “The Mighty 747” is not a book about runways and rivets alone, it is about the people that made the aircraft mighty and therein lies the real soul of Australia’s “Queen of the Skies”.