This was published 4 years ago
A retiring British Airways 747 breaks record for shortest ever jumbo flight
The British Airways 747 that is being retired.Credit: Wikimedia Commons
A retiring British Airways 747 may have cracked a record; the shortest ever jumbo flight.
BA9172 left Cardiff Airport in Wales on Monday morning, and landed just over six kilometres later at an RAF airbase in St Athan.
It took off at 11.09am and landed safely at 11.18am. The trip included a small detour due to an easterly wind, reports Simply Flying.
The 747, with the registration G-CIVG, is being decommissioned. It was delivered in 1995 and is one of the oldest in BA's fleet. The airline is aiming to retire the model by 2024.
A British Airways spokesperson told The Independent: "As part of our £6.5 billion (NZ$13 billion) customer investment, we are receiving 73 brand new aircraft over the next five years including our new Airbus A350 and Boeing 787.
"As we are receiving these new aircraft we're retiring our long-serving ones after many years of flying our customers around the world."
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