Boeing 747

The 747 is safe to fly today, but its overall record is clearly weaker than that of modern widebodies such as the 777, A330 or A350. Most of the damage was done long ago. Sixteen fatal accidents count against it, and all of them happened between 1974 and 2002. The 747-400s and 747-8s you can still book account for only two of the 16: Singapore Airlines 006 in 2000 and a turbulence death in 1996.

What the 747 is and where you fly on it

The 747 first flew in 1969 and entered service with Pan Am in 1970. It was the first widebody airliner, with four engines and the upper-deck hump that made it famous. Models include the 747-100, -200 and short-bodied SP, the 747-300, the 747-400 of 1989 (with a two-pilot glass cockpit) and the 747-8, the last version. Boeing built 1,574 and delivered the last one, a freighter, in 2023.

About 400 are still flying, mostly as freighters. If you fly on a passenger 747 today it will most likely be with Lufthansa, which flies both the 747-400 and the 747-8. The early 747s were Gen 2 jets with analogue cockpits and three-person crews; the 747-400 and -8 belong to the next generation, as our methodology explains.

What the accidents changed

Many 747 crashes led to rules that now protect every airliner.

• Tenerife, 27 March 1977. A KLM 747 began its take-off in fog without clearance and hit a Pan Am 747 on the runway. 248 of 248 on the KLM aircraft and 335 of 396 on the Pan Am aircraft died. It drove standard radio phrasing and crew resource management training, which teaches junior pilots to challenge captains.
• Japan Air Lines 123, 12 August 1985. A rear pressure bulkhead repaired incorrectly after a tail strikeTail strikeWhen the tail of an aircraft touches the runway during take-off or landing, usually because the nose was raised too far or too early.More in the glossary years earlier burst in flight and took out all four hydraulic systems. 520 of 524 died.
• TWA 800, 17 July 1996. The centre fuel tank exploded after take-off from New York. All 230 died. US rules now require systems that cut fuel tank flammability on many airliners.
• China Airlines 611, 25 May 2002. Metal fatigue grew from a poor repair made 22 years earlier, and the aircraft broke up over the Taiwan Strait. All 225 died.

Other counted crashes include Lufthansa 540 at Nairobi in 1974 (59 of 157, the first fatal 747 accident), Air India 855 off Bombay in 1978 (213), Avianca 011 near Madrid in 1983 (181), South African Airways 295 after a cargo fire in 1987 (159), United 811 after a cargo door opened in flight in 1989 (9), the mid-air collision of Saudi Arabian 763 near Delhi in 1996 (312), Korean Air 801 at Guam in 1997 (228) and Singapore Airlines 006, which took off from a closed runway at Taipei in 2000 (83). Some counted events are small, such as single deaths in turbulence in 1996 and 1997.

What is left out

Several of the worst 747 losses were acts of violence, not accidents: Air India 182 (bomb, 1985, 329 dead), KAL 007 (shot down, 1983, 269), Pan Am 103 (bomb over Lockerbie, 1988, 259) and the 1986 hijacking of Pan Am 73 at Karachi. We exclude these, as well as cargo crashes such as El Al 1862, which hit apartment blocks in Amsterdam in 1992, and UPS 6 at Dubai in 2010.

How to tell if you are on one

Flight apps show the ICAO code: B741, B742 and B743 for the early models, B74S for the SP, B74R and B74D for short-range Japanese versions, B744 for the 747-400 and B748 for the 747-8. You will almost always see B744 or B748.

If you want to fly a 747 before it disappears, Lufthansa is your best bet, and the record of those later models gives no reason to avoid it.