An Olympic Airways 747-212B, built in 1979. Edit: Actually a Cathay Pacific 747?
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The Boeing 747 is a monster of a plane: its wingspan is almost exactly twice as wide as a 737 or Airbus A320, and it's more than twice as long. From a distance, though, it's hard to appreciate just how big the 747 is; it's a textbook example of "these planes are small, and those planes are far away." Looking out from the airport departure lounge at the apron, you might occasionally see a 747 standing behind a smaller, short-haul jetliner and begin to realise just how big they are—but trust me, it isn't until you actually walk around and underneath a 747 that you truly understand their enormity.
A few weeks ago, I found myself at Bruntingthorpe Proving Ground, checking out Durham University's solar car. While the students were putting the finishing touches on their car, I decided to take my own vehicle for a spin. As I pelted around the track, and obtained some quite silly speeds on an IndyCar-like corner and then down the two-mile-long runway, I noticed that there were all sorts of old, dilapidated planes strewn about the airfield. Here an old RAF transport jet, there a smaller private plane. I even spotted a couple of legendary VC10s. But most of all, there were lots and lots of old 747s.
I didn't know it at the time (there was no one around to ask)—but after I got home and did some research, I found that Bruntingthorpe, in addition to being an automotive proving ground and private aerodrome, was also an aircraft graveyard. Not a huge boneyard like Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in the US, which stores thousands of aircraft in various stages of scrapping and cannibalism, but still more than enough to pique my inner nerdy-engineery interests.
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