oeing plans revolutionary super jumbo-jet
     LOS ANGELES (Reuter) -- In the year 2020 you might fly from New
 York to Tokyo enjoying a breathtaking view in an 800-seat plane that
 looks more like a stealth bomber than a jumbo jet.
     With passenger air traffic expected to triple in the next 20
 years, engineers have begun the long, difficult tests to see if they
 can build a super jumbo jet.
     It is called the Blended-Wing-Body (BWB) and would carry more
 than double the passengers of a Boeing 747, making the traditional
 cigar-shaped airplane a thing of the past.
     The double-decker plane with a wing span of 289 feet, almost the
 length of an American football field, looks like something out of
 Star Trek, but its concept carries on a dream that dates back more
 than half a century.
                 The flying wing predecessor
    Aviation pioneer Jack Northrop died in 1981 taking his dream of a
 flying-wing aircraft to his grave.  Northrop had worked on flying
 wing designs since the 1940s, but by the time of his death his
 design had not made it into service.
     With the introduction of Douglas Aircraft's groundbreaking DC-3
 plane in 1936, the cigar-shaped design became the industry standard
 for commercial aircraft. While Boeing Co. and Douglas refined the
 conventional aircraft, Northrop Aircraft pioneered the flying wing.
      By 1941, the Army Air Force ordered two models of Northrop's
 XB-35 flying wings and in 1946 test flights began.  For the next
 seven years, Northrop produced various versions of its flying wing
 designs for the military, but the program was scrapped in 1953.
     Decades later, the essence of those early designs became the
 inspiration for Northrop's B-2 stealth bomber, which used its flying
 wing design to avoid radar detection and became the most feared
 bomber in the world. The bat-like B-2 went into service in 1994,
 capable of flying from the United States to any country in the world
 in a matter of hours.
                        Back to the future
     Now, with the BWB aircraft being jointly developed by NASA,
 Boeing and four universities across the country, the airplanes of
 the future may look more like the stealth bomber than like current
 passenger jets.
     "Myself and the rest of the team members are so excited we can
 hardly stand it," said Robert Liebech, Boeing's program manager for
 the project.
     In July, a 17-foot model of the BWB completed a remotely piloted
 test flight in California, adding to designers' confidence that the
 aircraft will enter service by 2020.
     Work on the blended-wing concept, which Liebech said builds and
 improves on Northrop's flying wing, began in 1992 with a contract
 of just $90,000 from NASA to evaluate designs for the airplane of
 the future. By 1994 the project was put on a solid footing with a
 three-year grant of about $3 million.
     "My own feeling is that this will become a real airplane,"
 Liebeck said.
                     New design, not technology
     The simplicity of the design, which requires significantly fewer
 parts, means it would cost less to make than conventional aircraft.
 The BWB would be more environmentally friendly and burn 30 percent
 less fuel than conventional planes. That should translate into lower
 airfares for passengers.
     Further adding to the case of the new plane is that it can be
 built entirely from existing materials such as aluminum.
     "The only thing new in the airplane is the configuration," Lie-
 beck said.
     "It's not dependant on any new technology."
     Liebeck said the cost of developing the plane would be no more
 than that of a new conventional model. His design can use existing
 runways and could have a variety of sizes ranging from as few as 300
 passengers up to 800 passengers.
                        No common ground on need
       Industry experts are split on the need for a new design.
     "This has not been an industry where you have been able to intro-
 duce revolutions and get rid of all the old stuff," said Cai Von
 Rumohr, aerospace analyst at Cowen & Co.  "This is not like the
 (computer) industry where things move a lot faster."
     Paul Nisbet of equity research firm JSA Research disagrees.
     "When the technology in current aircraft becomes antiquated,
 there will be a need for bigger and better aircraft," Nisbet said.
 "I don't think there's much question about that."
     Boeing and its European competitor Airbus Industrie have public-
 ly disagreed on the need for a super jumbo-jet. Airbus is planning
 to develop the A3XX, a long-range, double-decker jumbo jet that
 could seat between 500 and 600 passengers.
     Analysts estimate the cost to develop the A3XX could run as high
 as $15 billion. Boeing has shelved its plans to develop a stretch
 version of its 747 model, saying the cost is unjustified under cur-
 rent market conditions. Boeing's 747-400 is the largest airliner in
 service, seating up to 425.
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