Joe Sutter, who guided creation of the Boeing 747, has died
The 747 is an amazing engineering achievement. Even more than that, it&#x27;s an amazing business achievement. The 747 was an &quot;all in&quot;, &quot;bet the company&quot; program for Boeing. It took many, many years for the company to break even on its investment, but after that the 747 was a money-making machine for Boeing and for the airlines. When I worked at Boeing in the early 80&#x27;s, every time a 747 rolled off the assembly line a gigantic paycheck went into the company. (Just walking down the assembly line in the Everett plant was more fun (for me, as an aero nerd) than an E-ticket ride.)<p>Airlines loved the 747, because it was a money-making machine for them, too. Nobody could compete with the 747 for decades.<p>The 747 provided the technology and the money to develop the 757, 767, etc.