If you want to see a living piece of aviation's golden age, look up at Frankfurt. D-ABYT, Lufthansa's Boeing 747-8 painted in a 1970s blue-and-white retro livery with a dark blue cheatline and black nose cone, is one of the world's last active passenger jumbo jets — and it barely touches the ground.

Writers at Simple Flying tracked the aircraft over a continuous 72-hour window from October 12 to 15, and the schedule was relentless: five intercontinental sectors and roughly 50 airborne hours in under three days. The run started at Frankfurt with an 8 hour 39 minute hop to Chicago O'Hare, followed by an overnight return leg of just over seven hours. After a brief stop at home, the jet flew 11 hours to Mexico City, turned around in a few hours, and flew back. The finale? LH510 to Buenos Aires Ezeiza — a 12 hour 52 minute marathon crossing the equator, landing on the morning of October 15. Turnarounds as short as four hours mean cleaning, catering, fuelling and maintenance checks all happen at once.

The plane itself is a treat. Delivered in March 2015 and named Köln, it wears a livery honouring Lufthansa's first 747-100s and -200s: off-white upper fuselage, cobalt cheatline, and the yellow-and-blue crane on the tail. Inside is thoroughly modern — four classes, with first class tucked in the nose, business class on both decks, and hidden crew rest areas above the cabin for those ultra-long sectors.

Why is Lufthansa still flying quad-jets when British Airways, KLM, Qantas and United have retired theirs? Partly slots: at congested hubs like Frankfurt and O'Hare you can't just add flights, so a high-capacity jumbo maximises revenue per slot. Partly cargo: the 747-8's huge belly hold earns freight revenue that offsets the extra fuel burn of its four GEnx-2B67 engines. That dual passenger-plus-cargo model keeps it profitable on routes to South America and Asia, where premium demand and freight volumes are both strong. Lufthansa operates 17 of these aircraft, all delivered between 2012 and 2015, and is retrofitting them with the new Allegris business class — a handy buffer against the industry's chronic delivery delays for new twinjets.

For travellers, that means you can still book a genuine jumbo jet experience: Frankfurt to Buenos Aires, Chicago or Mexico City, with first class in the nose of a retro-painted Queen of the Skies. Spotter or passenger, catching D-ABYT on short final is worth the effort. Just don't expect it to sit still — the trackers show it's already off on the next rotation.

Simple Flying