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The Boeing NLA, or New Large Airplane, was a 1990s concept for an all-new quadjet airliner in the 500+ seat market. With a proposed size somewhat larger than the 747, it was a similar concept to the McDonnell Douglas MD-12 and later
The goal of the NLA project was to create an airplane capable of traveling primarily long-haul routes and carrying vast amounts of passengers or cargo. At the time of design,
The Boeing NLA, or New Large Airplane, was a 1990s concept for an all-new quadjet airliner in the 500+ seat market. With a proposed size somewhat larger than the 747, it was a similar concept to the McDonnell Douglas MD-12 and later Airbus A380
The Airbus A380 is a very large wide-body airliner, developed and produced by Airbus until 2021. It is the world's largest passenger airliner and the only full-length double-deck jet airliner.
Airbus studies started in 1988, and the pr ...
. In 1993, Boeing chose not to pursue development of this concept, focusing instead on the Boeing 747-500X and -600X, and then on the 747X and 747X Stretch, and subsequently on the Boeing 747-8
The Boeing 747-8 is the final series of the large, long-range wide-body airliners in the Boeing 747 family from Boeing Commercial Airplanes. It is the largest model variant of the 747 and Boeing's largest aircraft overall.
Following the intro ...
. The project names for this proposal were NLA and Boeing 763-246C.
History
The Boeing New Large Airplane was one of several projects proposed byBoeing
The Boeing Company, or simply Boeing (), is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product support s ...
in the late 20th century as ways to compete with its rival Airbus
Airbus SE ( ; ; ; ) is a Pan-European aerospace corporation. The company's primary business is the design and manufacturing of commercial aircraft but it also has separate Airbus Defence and Space, defence and space and Airbus Helicopters, he ...
. The Airbus A380 project began to be publicized in 1990 in order to try and turn the commercial aviation market away from the then very prevalent Boeing 747. Boeing sought to combat this and began working up designs for the NLA in the early 1990s, with a projected service entry date of before 2000 in order to beat the Airbus A380.
The goal of the NLA project was to create an airplane capable of traveling primarily long-haul routes and carrying vast amounts of passengers or cargo. At the time of design, ETOPS
The Extended-range Twin-engine Operations Performance Standards (ETOPS) () are safety standards set by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) for Twinjet, twin-engine commercial passenger aircraft operations. They are a safety measu ...
had not been introduced, and twinjet aircraft were not considered suitable for transpacific flights, so the NLA was designed with a four-jet layout (two on each wing), much like the 747 and the A380. It was designed to fly long-haul, high-demand flights such as Sydney
Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...
to Dubai
Dubai (Help:IPA/English, /duːˈbaɪ/ Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''doo-BYE''; Modern Standard Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic: ; Emirati Arabic, Emirati Arabic: , Romanization of Arabic, romanized: Help:IPA/English, /diˈbej/) is the Lis ...
or London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
to New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
New York may also refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* ...
, taking from 8 to 14 hours. With the goal of beating its competitors based on sheer passenger volume, the NLA design was to have included a full-length two deck configuration. This would have allowed for 600–1000 passengers (depending on airline and class seating configurations), about 50 more passengers than the A380 per configuration.
However, after only a few years of working on the project, Boeing decided that the NLA model was unsustainable with the way the commercial aviation market was trending. Instead of larger, higher capacity aircraft with the ability to make long hub-to-hub routes in a single go, Boeing decided the future was in smaller, more direct flights. As a result, they cancelled the NLA project.
Specifications (NLA, as designed)
Source: ''Seattle Post-Intelligencer''See also
References
Abandoned civil aircraft projects of the United States NLA Quadjets {{aero-1990s-stub