In 1965, Joe Sutter’s Boeing team began shaping the 747 around a future they thought would belong to supersonic jets, lifting the cockpit onto a hump so the nose could open for cargo once the giant subsonic passenger plane had outlived its brief moment (opens in new tab)

Joe Sutter’s Boeing team began shaping the 747 around a future they thought would pass it by: a supersonic age in which the huge, slower jumbo would eventually make its real living as a freighter. That assumption is why the cockpit sits on a hump. By lifting the flight deck above the main deck, Boeing […]