Boeing 747

The “Jumbo Jet“ at the Technik Museum Speyer is the only one of this type stationed at a location other than an airfield, and also the only specimen ever that has been dismantled and reassembled. In spring of 2002 it was possible to get one of these huge widebodied aircraft from Lufthansa for our exhibition of airplanes. The transport of this giant of the airs to Speyer was one of the greatest challenges ever encountered by the Museum so far. The first leg from Frankfurt to the airport Karlsruhe / Baden-Baden could still be managed on wing. Upon an expert dismantling of the craft the second leg started by loading the separate parts. The greatest problem was the transport of the gigantic fuselage with a length of a round 70 meters. With huge cranes it was hoisted upon a special transporter, transferred to the NATO ramp in Söllingen, loaded onto a heavy-goods pontoon and brought on the Rhine to a natural harbour near Speyer. From there the journey continued once more by land. Ten thousands of onlookers lined t he closed off roads. It took the heavy-goods transport about two hours to manage the five kilometres distance to the Technik Museum Speyer. In months of efforts the aircraft was then reassembled and mounted in flightposition on a huge tubular-steel scaffolding designed by our structural engineer, Dipl. Ing. Reinhold Hildebrandt of Mühlacker. The entire inside of the craft, and even one of the wings are accessible for the visitors. Part of the inside lining has been removed to give an impression of the design of a wide-bodied aircraft of this kind (see the picture bottom left). We wish to take this opportunity to convey our sincere gratitude to the Deutsche Lufhansa AG and the City of Speyer both of whom made it possible for us to present the “Jumbo Jet“ in this way, and to make it accessible for viewing. We have taken this event as an occasion to convey the honorary membership in our Museum Society to the Deutsche Lufthansa AG.

Source: The big Museumsbook