Peter:
Those BOAC Rolls Royce 707's were certainly fantastic aircraft. Those engines really screamed when taking off. BOAC flew them ORD-LHR back during the late 60's. I remember seeing them when I used to spend afternoons at the airport dreaming of the future....
I am positive that they rattled houses all along their takeoff path. But with that Navy Blue, Silver and Gold livery, they were very beautiful aircraft.
SDLee:
BTW, the 707 used in the movie Airport later crashed on final approach into Sao Paulo several years later killing the crew.
Another thing I had heard from an old pilot was that in the scene when the 707 is making it's emergency landing almost turned into an accident. In the book the plane lands safely, but when they filmed the scene of the 707 skidding down the runway and the plane starts turning to the left, the plane being filmed was actually skidding itself and almost wiped out the crew filming the movie! So they rewrote the script to accomodate that great footage!
Since the plane was leased from Flying Tigers, Flying Tigers supplied the flight crews for the flying scenes.
The only article I have read about the movie Airport was the same TV Guide article you mentioned in your post. Most airlines have mock ups of aircraft like that for their F/A training programs. Only the ones that are really used are fully enclosed rather than having a side missing so the camera can get the shots. Also most training simulators can be filled up with fake smoke to simulate reduced visibility. They can also light up certain windows and doors to simulate fires outside the aircraft.
