AIRWAYS INTERVIEW Ron Marasco publicity in Everett , inside the biggest building in the world . There was nothing in the building then but , in the corner , coming through a door , the first thing I saw was this mockup , it was full scale . They didn ’ t have the entire wings , but they had the fuselage and parts of the wings , a full-scale 747 model . I mean , we are from New York and we are used to big things , but “ holy shit ” was probably the most common comment .
What sparked it ?
Imagine coming through a door , never having seen anything like this , and walking in and seeing this . The 747 was not something that involved developing on paper , then sending the plans to the factory and manufacturing it . They used this mockup to actually develop the required materials and the fuselage . It was made of a combination of wood and aluminum . That was our first introduction to the scale of this project . You can look at all the diagrams and the pictures , but that really doesn ’ t give you a sense of all of this , until you actually see the physical model . After that , we ’ d be out there every day and became more accustomed to it . Assembly started , and they began to push all these airplanes out on the flight line .
What happened next to these first aircraft ?
They were still modifying them . Pan Am had three of its 747s in the certification program , where they were doing the flying . Boeing flew our aircraft for rejected takeoffs . They were beating the hell out of these 747s we were ultimately going to get . Under the best of circumstances , this was going to be a hell of a challenge .
The early days weren ’ t easy , why ?
The great initial problem with the 747 was the engines . The aircraft flew for the first time in February 1969 , and we took the first delivery in December of the same year . That was the wildest period of time , and I was very young , running the operation and trying to keep my job , and thinking about how the f--- we ’ d be going to maintain this thing .
Was it smooth running , at that time , within Boeing ’ s giant Everett factory ?
The manufacturing was absolutely chaotic , when the aircraft came out of production , they had no engines and a lot of them had no landing gears . The flight line outside the hangars in Everett was just loaded with unfinished airplanes . When they began to fly them , all these problems came out . They had to incorporate all the necessary changes on the flight line and then go back and incorporate them on the assembly line . This was crazy and they had hundreds and hundreds of people working on the flight line .
And , against the odds , they desperately wanted to get a 747 to the Paris Airshow in the summer of 1969 . They hadn ’ t flown this airplane around much , it hadn ’ t been certified and , when they finally , barely got it to do its first transatlantic flight to Paris , they didn ’ t know if they had four good engines to get it there until just before sending the aircraft off .
What do you remember of the certification process ?
In December 1969 , an aircraft that had been flying in Seattle came into New York JFK flown by Pan Am Pilots , that was going to be the airplane both for the Boeing 747 type certificate and also for certification at Pan Am . At the time , our 747 hangars were just being built , so work was often done outside . After arrival , we had to take it to the gate so they could put equipment on it .
Nobody had been checked out on taxiing the 747 , as there was no simulator , but we had read all the instruction manuals . I , as General Manager 747 maintenance , and two other managers of my team were given the 747 . Then , the Assistant 747 Chief Pilot , who had flown the airplane in , checked me out on taxiing the 747 to the gate .
You were one of the first people in the world to command a 747 , at least on the ground , how did that happen ?
Yes , I was in the Captain ’ s seat and the Pan Am Pilot was in the right seat . I had taxied a lot of 707s before but , boy , this thing was of a different magnitude . He had to show me how to correctly judge looking out from a 747 cockpit , as you sit up pretty high above ground , with the nosewheel behind you , so I followed the taxi line . The four of us were in the cockpit and we taxied to the gate . Everybody at the airport was following us because no one had ever seen anything like this .
That ride was my checkout . When we arrived , I was qualified to taxi a 747 .
What happened next ?
The aircraft was at the gate for three or four hours and the Pilot had left . Then we needed to take it back to the hangar . I sat in the Pilot ’ s seat , my colleague in the co-Pilot ’ s one , and the other guy at the flight engineers panel . The three of us , rookies that we were , taxied the airplane back .
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