50 Fun Facts About Boeing 737

How do Boeing 737 fuselages built in Wichita, Kansas, reach the assembly line in Washington state?

By rail: the complete body of each 737 crosses half the country on a freight train. In 2014 a derailment in Montana sent several fuselages tumbling down a riverbank.

The unmarked 737s of Janet, a secretive US government airline in Las Vegas, fly workers to which famous site?

Area 51 is the best-known stop for the red-striped jets, which also serve the Tonopah Test Range. The Janet nickname is said to come from the wife of a CIA officer who ran the base.

What happened to Aloha Airlines Flight 243, a Boeing 737 over Hawaii in 1988, before it landed safely on Maui?

The roof tore off: an 18-foot section of the upper cabin peeled away at 24,000 feet. Poor maintenance and metal fatigue were blamed, and the captain could see blue sky where the ceiling had been.

Where did TACA Flight 110, a Boeing 737 that lost both engines in a thunderstorm near New Orleans, land safely?

On a grass levee beside a canal, where the powerless jet glided down with only minor injuries aboard. After an engine change it took off again from a nearby road.

In which African city did GSG 9 commandos storm the hijacked Boeing 737 Landshut in 1977 and free the hostages?

Mogadishu, Somalia, was the last stop for a holiday flight hijacked five days earlier on the way home from Mallorca. The raid freed all the passengers.

Which US agency bought the very first Boeing 737 ever built and kept it flying for three decades?

NASA took delivery of the prototype in 1973 and retired it in 2003. The first 737 now sits in Seattle's Museum of Flight, the last surviving 737-100.

Which European airline was the first outside America to launch a new Boeing jet when it introduced the 737?

Lufthansa ordered 21 of the jets in 1965, after Boeing promised the project would not be cancelled. The German airline flew the type for almost half a century, retiring its last in 2016.

Why do the engines of the 737 Classic have a flattened underside, nicknamed the hamster pouch?

To clear the tarmac: the 737 rides so low that the bigger CFM56 engine of the 1980s would not fit beneath the wing. Engineers moved its accessories to the sides and flattened the intake.

What do the dark circles visible on the belly of a Boeing 737 in flight turn out to be?

Uncovered tires: the 737's main gear folds into the belly without full doors, so the wheels stay in the airstream. Hub caps smooth them, and flying without the caps is forbidden.

Which emergency feature of many larger airliners has never been fitted to any Boeing 737?

A fuel dump system was never fitted: the first 737s were too small to need one, and adding it later would have cost too much weight. An overweight landing means an inspection before the jet flies again.

Which city beside Lake Washington is home to the main Boeing factory for 737 final assembly?

Renton's plant stands on land reclaimed when the lake was lowered in 1916, and rolled out the first 707 in 1957. New 737s make a short hop to Boeing Field in Seattle for painting.

Which European jet family overtook the Boeing 737 in 2019 as the most-ordered airliner in history?

Airbus A320 orders passed the 737's in October 2019, while the MAX was grounded worldwide. The 737 held on to its lead in deliveries until 2025.

Which Dallas-based low-cost airline, long the 737's biggest operator, received the 5,000th example in 2006?

Southwest flies nothing but 737s, and was the launch customer for both the 737-500 and the 737-700. Its first 737-300 is now a museum piece in its home city.

Which European budget airline ordered the 737 MAX 200, a high-density version built to squeeze in up to 200 seats?

Ryanair first signed for the type in 2014 and later raised its order to 210 jets. Its cabins hold 197 seats, which takes an extra pair of exit doors.

Which airline's 737 MAX 9 lost a door plug minutes after takeoff from Portland, Oregon, in January 2024?

Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 landed safely with a hole in its side and only minor injuries aboard. Four bolts meant to hold the panel had never been refitted at the factory.

Into which icy river did Air Florida Flight 90, a Boeing 737, plunge moments after takeoff in a 1982 snowstorm?

The Potomac closed over the jet after it struck Washington's 14th Street Bridge. A bystander, Lenny Skutnik, dived into the ice-choked water to pull a survivor ashore.

Which US Navy submarine-hunting jet, armed with torpedoes, is built on the airframe of the Boeing 737-800?

P-8 Poseidon crews took over from the propeller-driven P-3 Orion, in service since 1962. The jet carries its weapons in a bay behind the wing and also flies with India, Britain and Norway.

Which country's air force was the first customer for the E-7 Wedgetail, a Boeing 737 with a radar fin on its back?

Australia named the project after its native wedge-tailed eagle. The jet's first operational sortie was the 2014 search for missing Flight MH370.

The US Air Force's T-43, a Boeing 737-200 nicknamed the Flying Classroom, taught which aircrew specialists?

Navigators learned their trade aboard the T-43, which crews shortened to Gator. The 1971 order came when 737 sales had collapsed, and it is credited with saving the program.

Which flight-control software on the 737 MAX, known by four letters, played a role in both fatal crashes?

MCAS, the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, pushed the nose down on faulty sensor data. Pilots had not been told it existed before the first crash.

Which engine maker built the JT8D turbofans that powered the original Boeing 737-100 and 737-200?

Pratt & Whitney adapted the JT8D from a military turbojet, the J52. Every 737 model launched since 1980 has used quieter, thriftier CFM engines instead.

CFM International, maker of 737 engines since the 1980s, pairs General Electric with a partner from which country?

France is home to Safran, formerly Snecma, which builds the fan and low-pressure turbine. The venture went five years without an order and was two weeks from being dissolved in 1979.

Where did the first Boeing 737 design sketches place the engines before Joe Sutter moved them under the wings?

At the tail, on the aft fuselage, was the early plan. Moving the engines under the wings lightened the structure and made room for six seats in a row.

What nickname is given to the small extra panes above the main windshield on older Boeing 737 cockpits?

Eyebrow windows came from the 707 and gave crews a wider view. Pilots often stuffed them with newspaper to block the sun, and Boeing dropped them in 2004.

Boeing sold a 737-200 Unpaved Strip Kit, with a deflector on the nose gear, for remote runways surfaced with what?

Gravel thrown up by the nose gear could wreck an engine, so the kit added a deflector and a vortex dissipator ahead of each intake. Arctic operators flew kitted jets into the 2020s.

Which prehistoric nickname do aviation fans give the original Boeing 737-100 and 737-200 models?

Jurassic is the joking label for the 1960s originals. Around fifty were in service in 2023, a high number for so early a jetliner.

Which US airline's wish for more seats led Boeing to stretch the first 737 design into the longer 737-200?

United ordered 40 of the stretched jets in April 1965 and put the first into service from Chicago to Grand Rapids. Airlines so preferred the longer model that only 30 of the short 737-100 were built.

Which curved sword gives its name to the split winglets fitted to many Boeing 737s from 2014?

Scimitar winglets came from Aviation Partners, the Seattle firm behind the earlier blended design. They trim a jet's thirst by up to 5.5%, against 3.3% for the older kind.

Instead of fly-by-wire electronics, what carries a pilot's commands to the control surfaces of a Boeing 737?

Steel cables run through the fuselage and wings to hydraulic boosters. If the hydraulics fail, the pilots' own muscle moves the elevators and ailerons through small tabs.

Which country's aviation regulator was the first to ground the Boeing 737 MAX, a day after the second fatal crash?

China acted on March 11, 2019, and it mattered: its airlines flew 96 of the jets, more than any other country's.

Into which sea did Lion Air Flight 610, the first Boeing 737 MAX to crash, fall after leaving Jakarta in 2018?

Java Sea waters closed over the jet 11 minutes into a domestic hop, killing all 189 aboard. It was the first of two disasters that led to the type's worldwide grounding.

Which African airline's Flight 302 was the second Boeing 737 MAX to crash, triggering a worldwide grounding?

Ethiopian Airlines lost the jet six minutes after it left Addis Ababa, on a route so popular with UN staff that it was nicknamed the UN shuttle.

Gol, the first airline to return the Boeing 737 MAX to passenger service in 2020, is from which country?

Brazil's Gol flew the comeback on December 9, 2020, three weeks after US regulators lifted their ban. The jet had been barred from carrying passengers for some 20 months.

A British Midland 737 crashed beside which motorway near Kegworth in 1989 after the wrong engine was shut down?

The M1 embankment stopped the jet just short of the East Midlands runway. By luck no vehicles were on that stretch, and soldiers driving past helped with the rescue.

At which English airport did a 1985 engine fire on a British Airtours 737 lead to sweeping cabin-safety reforms?

Manchester's disaster brought fire-resistant seat covers, floor lighting and roomier rows beside emergency exits to airliners worldwide. The jet had been bound for Corfu.

A jammed valve driving which control surface caused the 1994 crash of USAir Flight 427, a 737, near Pittsburgh?

The rudder swung hard over, opposite to the pilots' commands, and rolled the jet into a dive. The inquiry ran for more than four and a half years, at the time the longest in NTSB history.

What incapacitated the crew of Helios Flight 522, a 737 that flew on autopilot until it crashed near Athens?

Lack of oxygen overcame those aboard after a pressurization switch was left on manual following a maintenance check. Greek F-16s were scrambled to look into the silent cockpit.

Which Boeing chief executive lost his job in December 2019 as the 737 MAX crisis deepened?

Dennis Muilenburg had publicly insisted the jet was safe, even phoning the US president to say so before the grounding. Board chairman Dave Calhoun took over the following month.

The software blamed for both Boeing 737 MAX crashes acted on false readings from a single sensor measuring what?

Angle of attack is the tilt of the wing against the oncoming air. When one vane wrongly reported it as too high, the software trimmed the nose down, again and again.

Which US agency was among the last regulators to ground the Boeing 737 MAX after the second crash in 2019?

The FAA was among the last to act, after first saying there was no reason to. It approved the jet's return in November 2020, subject to repairs and new pilot training.

Which WWII bomber was built at the Lake Washington factory that later became home to Boeing 737 assembly?

B-29 Superfortress bombers, 1,119 of them, rolled out of the plant during the war. It closed in 1946, and Boeing reopened it in 1949 to build the C-97 transport, years before its first jets.

Which rear-engined twinjet, later stretched into the MD-80, was the Boeing 737's main rival in its early years?

Douglas DC-9 jets first flew in February 1965, the same month Boeing launched the 737. The latecomer answered with a wider cabin, seating six abreast against its rivals' five.

To which Scottish city did a Boeing 737 MAX ecoDemonstrator fly from Seattle in 2021 for the COP26 climate summit?

Glasgow hosted the UN conference, and the test jet flew there on a blend containing sustainable alternatives to kerosene. It later joined an airline's fleet as a normal 737.

What name did Boeing give the 737 cabin redesign of 2010, with sculpted sidewalls and LED mood lighting?

Sky Interior cabins add bigger pivoting bins and more headroom, and Flydubai took the first one in late 2010. The 737 MAX kept the same look.

The first 737 borrowed about 60% of its structure and systems from which earlier three-engined jetliner?

Boeing 727 parts, above all the fuselage, were reused to catch rivals that were years ahead. The cabin cross-section goes back further, to the 707 of the 1950s.

A Lion Air 737 hit the sea just short of the runway on which holiday island in 2013, with everyone surviving?

Bali's seawall was about a kilometre away when the jet struck the water. All 108 people aboard survived, and a go-around attempt was judged to have come too late.

The large cockpit displays of the 737 MAX were borrowed from which newer wide-body airliner?

Boeing 787 screens, four of them from Rockwell Collins, replaced the six smaller panels of the previous 737 generation. Almost everything else was kept familiar so pilots could switch easily.

Which anti-ship missile is carried by the US Navy's maritime patrol jet based on the Boeing 737?

Harpoon missiles arm the jet alongside torpedoes carried in a bay behind the wing. It can also drop sonobuoys and work with the Triton surveillance drone.

Which US Commerce Secretary died in 1996 when an Air Force CT-43, a military Boeing 737, crashed in Croatia?

Ron Brown and 34 others were aboard the jet, a former trainer converted into an executive transport and based at Ramstein in Germany.

What name does the US Navy give its C-40A transport, a military version of the Boeing 737-700?

Clipper is official only for the Navy's jets; the Air Force's C-40s have no name at all. The type replaced the C-9B Skytrain II and can carry seats, cargo or a mix of both.