||707 Full Text||
|While the De Havilland Comet made its first flight in 1949, it was the Boeing 707 that really accelerated the age of the jet transport. It was a radical design with a 35-degree swept wing and pylon mounted engines. It was a vast improvement over the Comet. It cruised at 550 mph, 100 more than the Comet 2, and could carry up to 189 tourist class passengers while the Comet 4 was limited to a maximum of 119 passengers as a special charter configuration. However, the airlines were late in ordering, because they needed to make a return on their piston planes in service, so the first 29 aircraft were produced as KC-135A tanker transports for the Air Force. Read More ...|
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