Viral Photo Of Spacious Cabin Not Of Pan Am 747’s Economy Class In The 1960s

Claim 

An image of a luxurious plane cabin, claiming it to be the economy class of a Pan Am (Pan American World Airways) 747 flight in the 1960s.

The archived versions of the tweets can be seen here, here and here.

Fact check

Newschecker first ran a reverse image search of the viral photo, which led us to this write-up, titled “The Unexpected Success of the Boeing 747”, in a website called Works That Work.

We saw a coloured version of the viral photograph, which stated that the photo was of a prototype. Its caption read, “Boeing 747, interior mockup. A full-scale mock-up of the interior of the 747’s passenger model. Boeing initially expected to sell only about four hundred 747 passenger planes and designed them for easy conversion into cargo carriers. When the passenger seats are removed the fuselage can accommodate containers stacked two units wide, two units high and two or three ranks deep. Boeing has since sold more than one and a half thousand 747s. (Photo courtesy of the Boeing Company)”

Taking a cue from this, we ran a keyword search for “Boeing 747 interior mock-up”, which led us to this photo in Getty Images, similar to the viral image.

According to the photo’s caption, translated from French, it was clicked from the 28th Paris Air Show In Le Bourget 1969. “On Boeing 747, passengers seated in one of the plane’s living rooms, in tourist class,” read the caption.

We learnt that the biennial Paris Air Show, held in Le Bourget Airport, is a world-class event for aerospace professionals and lovers, which brings together all the players in this global industry around the latest technological innovations. The show reportedly includes displays of aircrafts, spacecrafts, satellites, aircraft engines, aerospace power-plant, airborne equipment and systems, cabin interiors, tools and software, composite materials, transport, services, airport equipment and services.

We also looked up Boeing’s website and found the image, described as a mock-up of a 747-100 Cabin

We then ran a keyword search for “Pan Am 747”, which led us to this article in Simple Flying, stating that December 12, 1969 was when Pan American World Airways took on its first unit of the Boeing 747 to become the first airline to enter service with the jumbo. “Pan Am introduced the 747-100 on January 22nd, 1970,” read the article, confirming that there was no Pan Am 747 flight in the 1960s. A video (the narrator talks about the economy cabin at the 2:18 mark) from the Pan Am’s Historical Foundation’s website showed that the cabin was not as spacious as seen in the viral image.

Result: Partly False

If you liked this and want to read more such fact checks then click here.

If you would like us to fact-check a claim, give feedback, or lodge a complaint, WhatsApp us at 9999499044 or email us at checkthis@newschecker.in. You can also visit the Contact Us page and fill out the form.