The Sun Sets on the Boeing 747

The jumbo jet that shrank the globe is finally running out of runway, and Ian Bogost heads to the Arizona desert to watch it happen. Writing in the Atlantic, he visits Pinal Airpark, where Boeing 747s now line up not for takeoff but teardown—stripped of engines, sliced for scrap, and sometimes turned into souvenir tags and soda cans. Bogost uses that "boneyard" to rewind the plane's improbable arc: born from a failed military bid in the 1960s, so risky it could have sunk Boeing, the 747 instead became the glamorous workhorse of mass international travel, a flying building with cocktail lounges, piano bars, and ceilings high enough to stand tall in coach. "The 747 was once a symbol of American might, invention, progress, and populism," writes Bogost. "Now it embodies the decline of all of those values."

From there, the piece tracks how deregulation, fuel shocks, security fears, and consolidation turned air travel from a shared adventure to a cramped endurance test—and how the last 747 most Americans will ever see may be Air Force One, itself mired in Boeing's troubles and political symbolism. Bogost watches retired and stripped jumbos, absent of their former weight, tip backward on their landing gear, and observes that the "Queen of the Skies" is slipping into its "death rattle." For the full history, reporting, and argument, read Bogost's piece at the Atlantic.