Plane spotting: Boeing 777

The Boeing 777 entered service on 15 May 1995, making its first commercial flight from our very own London Heathrow to Dulles in Washington on 7 June 1995.

Commonly referred to as the “Triple Seven”, the Boeing 777 is a long range, twin-engine, widebody commercial airliner that has a typical 3-class capacity of 301 to 368 passengers, with a range of 5,240 to 8,555 nautical miles.

It’s the world’s largest twinjet plane.

United Airlines was the first airline to order 777 aircraft in October 1990.

Now, more than 60 airlines operate one or more kinds of the Boeing 777.

Of these airlines, Emirates has the most in its fleet: more than 100 of them are in service or on order. Other airlines that operate a large number of 777s include United Airlines, American Airlines, Air France and Cathay Pacific.

Since the 777 was first delivered, the world’s 777 fleet has flown more than 1.25 million flights.

In 1997 a Malaysia Airlines 777-200ER broke the great circle ‘distance without landing’ record for an airliner, flying eastward from Seattle to Kuala Lumpur, a distance of 10,823 nautical miles (20,044 km), in 21 hours and 23 minutes.

The Boeing 777 was the first Boeing aircraft with fly-by-wire controls: semi-automatic, computer-regulated flight control systems that replaced mechanical flight controls with an electronic interface.

The 777 was the world’s first 100% digitally designed aircraft: Boeing had been using CAD as part of their design process for many years before the 777, but the company had never fully developed a commercial aircraft solely by using computers until the 777.

In a brand-new move for aircraft design, the Boeing 777 was designed collaboratively incorporating ideas from eight major airlines: All Nippon Airways, American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Delta Air Lines, Japan Airlines, Qantas and United Airlines. They were led by Boeing’s director of engineering, Alan Mulally, and were known collectively as the “Working Together” group.

Boeing is currently working around the clock to complete the 777X, a new variant of the 777 that is expected to shake up the commercial aviation industry.

The Boeing 777X will be 10% more fuel efficient than competing jets of a similar size.

The smallest variant of the 777X currently measures between 210 and 242 feet long.

The 777Z’s 777-9 variant supports up to 426 passengers and has a maximum range of 7,285 nautical miles.

One of the most notable features of the 777X will be its folding wingtips. It will be the first commercial jet to have folding wingtips which will impriove the manouvreability on runways and increase efficiency during flight.

The 777X represents a significant step in Boeing commercial jet production, but will come at a price: according to the manufacturing giant’s website. the 777-8 variant currently costs $410.2 million (about £350m), while the larger 777-9 variant costs $442.2 million (about £370m).