A 747 El Al flight from Rome to Tel Aviv pays tribute to the aircraft model, which was retired from the Israeli fleet on November 3, 2019 (screen capture: Flight Radar)
Swerving and banking over the Mediterranean, an El Al 747-400 jumbo jet made its last ever flight for Israel’s national carrier by diverting from its flight path to trace a silhouette of itself in the sky.
The Rome to Tel Aviv flight was the last by the airline to use the 747-400, which has now been officially retired by El Al.
The flight altered its path near Cyprus, in a previously planned stunt, to trace the outline and make it visible on flight tracking websites.
Dubbed the “Queen of the Skies,” the 747-400 model was in use for nearly five decades by Israel’s national airline, notably in its airlifting of Ethiopian Jews to Israel during Operation Solomon.
New Ethiopian immigrants boarding an aircraft en route from Addis Ababa to Israel during Operation Solomon, 1991. (Natan Alpert/GPO)
In May 1991, during the operation, the aircraft shattered the still-unmatched world record for most passengers to be transported on a single plane, when some 1,088 were crammed on board a 747 from Addis Ababa to Tel Aviv.
Get The Times of Israel's Daily Editionby email and never miss our top stories
El Al announced earlier this year it would phase out the 747 in favor of the more fuel-efficient Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners, after 48 years of service.
Help us report truthfully on social media
As a multimedia journalist, my job is to take the quality, fact-based journalism produced by The Times of Israel newsroom and make it accessible across every platform — from Instagram posts to podcasts to short-form videos.
This is how many, especially young people, consume news these days. But misinformation is rampant on social media. Our team at ToI produces accurate, responsible short-form reporting on Israel and the Jewish world.
If you believe in the importance of factual social media journalism, please consider joining our reader support group, The Times of Israel Community. Your financial support is essential to sustain responsible multimedia reporting.
We’re really pleased that you’ve read X Times of Israel articles in the past month.
That’s why we started the Times of Israel - to provide discerning readers like you with must-read coverage of Israel and the Jewish world.
So now we have a request. Unlike other news outlets, we haven’t put up a paywall. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community.
For as little as $6 a month you can help support our quality journalism while enjoying The Times of Israel AD-FREE, as well as accessing exclusive content available only to Times of Israel Community members.
Thank you, David Horovitz, Founding Editor of The Times of Israel
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on Google
