The Boeing Everett Factory in March 2008
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Location | Everett, Washington |
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Products | airplane assembly |
Employees | 30,000 |
Area | largest building in the world by volume at 13,385,378 m3 |
Owner(s) | Boeing |
The Boeing Everett Factory, in Everett, Washington, is an airplane assembly building owned by Boeing. Located on the northeast corner of Paine Field, it is the largest building in the world by volume at 13,385,378 m3 (472,370,319 cu ft) and covers 399,480 m2 (98.7 acres). It even has its own micro-climate. This is the factory where the wide-body Boeing 747, 767, 777, and 787 are assembled.
Plans for the factory were first announced in 1966 for it to be the site of the construction of the 747 after Boeing was awarded a $525 million contract from Pan American World Airways to build 25 747s. It purchased 780 acres north of the then little-used Paine Field, which was operated by the US Army in World War II. Boeing has had an Everett presence since 1943.
In 1968 it began offering factory tours with the first roll out of the 747. Over 150,000 people visit the Everett Site each year. The factory includes a BECU branch and several cafés. Across the airport to the west is The Boeing Store, a theater, and a Future of Flight Aviation Center, which runs the factory tour.
The Everett Factory employs over 30,000 people, including its own fire department, security team, daycare center and fitness center.
The Boeing 747 is a large-size, long-range wide-body four-engine jet airliner. The 747-8I, the current passenger variant in production, is capable of carrying 467 passengers in a typical 3-class configuration, has a range of 8,000 nmi (9,200 mi; 15,000 km) and a cruising speed Mach 0.855 (570 mph, 918 km/h, 495 kn). The Boeing 747 was one of the first wide-body aircraft to be produced and was the first jet to use a wide-body configuration for carrying passengers. Because of the vast size of the 747, the Boeing Everett Factory was designed and built to accommodate the assembly of these large planes as there was not enough room at the Boeing facilities in Seattle. Production of this aircraft began in 1967 and continues to this day.