Some Facts
The 737 has been continuously manufactured by Boeing since 1967 with 7,457 aircraft delivered and 3,044 orders yet to be fulfilled as of January 2013. Thats 10501 Boeing 737 to date!
The 737 is operated by more than 500 airlines, flying to 1,200 destinations in 190 countries. With over 10,000 aircraft ordered, over 7,000 delivered, and over 4,500 still in service, at any given time there are on average 1,250 airborne worldwide. On average, somewhere in the world, a 737 takes off or lands every five seconds.
Since entering service in 1968, the 737 has carried over 12 billion passengers over 120 billion km (65 billion nm), and has accumulated more than 296 million hours in the air.
The 737 represents more than 25% of the worldwide fleet of large commercial jet airliners (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737)
Links
- lyrics of “Where have all the flowers gone?” – where have all the boeings gone?
- aircraft boneyards
- Chris Jordan depicts one million plastic cups, the amount used on airline flights within the USA every 6 hours.
- Michel Lotito, the man who ate an airplane …
The situation background…
Nantes is the Green Capital of Europe 2013.
A title won for its efforts to reduce air pollution and CO2 emissions, its high quality and well-managed public transport system and its biodiversity across 3,366 hectares of green spaces including several Natura 2000 zones which guarantee the protection of nature in these areas.
Nantes has a population of 590 000 inhabitants. It is a culturally vibrant and growing city.
Nantes Atlantique Airport, located 8 km to the south-west of the city center. It serves the city and surrounding areas. It is the biggest airport in western France, and links Nantes to several French and European cities, as well as Montreal in Canada and some north African cities.
The airport project at Notre-Dame-des-Landes was first launched as a concept in the mid-1960s but very little progress was made. In the late 1990s it was forecasted that passenger traffic at the existing Nantes-Atlantique would soon reach full capacity. Thus 30 years after its initial conception, as the current airport reached saturation, it was decided to build a new replacement airport at Notre-Dame-des-Landes, 30 km to the north-west of Nantes
The €580 million project was approved in February 2008, with construction expected to start in 2012 and an opening date in 2015. However, the decision to build a new airport is on hold after being met with fierce opposition and the debate continues to rage locally and across France with some appeals against it being taken up at a European level.