Boeing to build braced-wing airliner, shooting for 30% efficiency gain
When you burn as much fuel as an airline does, a single-digit fuel efficiency tweak adds up to massive savings. Take the drag-reducing Aeroshark film Swiss Airlines has stuck all over its 12 Boeing 777s – it delivers a 1% efficiency gain, and as a result, over just 12 aircraft, Swiss expects to use 4,800 tonnes less jet fuel every year, saving nearly half a million dollars per year, per plane at today's prices. That'd be closer to half a billion a year for an operator like American Airlines, closing in on 1,000 planes in…