"Keith Willshaw" wrote:
| "Brett" wrote in message
| ...
| wrote:
| | A number of posts mentioned that 747s are capable of in-flight
| | refueling. Is this correct for 'all' 747s or just the particular
| | military versions (E-4) & AF1? I suspect it would be unusual to
see a
| | civilian 747 doing so.
|
| At a cost greater than $19 a gallon I don't believe any airline
would
| even consider it an option.
|
|
|
| Today the limit with most civil aircraft is crew endurance anyway

"crew endurance" - they can carry relief crews, the limit would be what
the "cattle in the back" are willing to endure.

| but in times gone by it has been used for civil aircraft. In 1939
| an Imperial Airways flying boat operated non stop across the
| North Atlantic being refuelled in mid air by a converted Harrow
| bomber operated by Flight Refuelling Ltd.

And within a month of the demonstration Britain was at war, Imperial
Airways had been nationalized and the service was used for high priority
passengers/cargo where "cost" was not a major consideration.