Full simulator view
A full view of the cockpit section in its new Australian home.
Photo coming soonTeam Covey presents
The Jumbo Project
A new Team Covey aviation project is taking shape. Watch each stage unfold through video releases and behind-the-scenes posts.
From airliner to simulator
The story we are preserving
The Jumbo Project is bringing a genuine Boeing 747-400 flight deck back to life in Australia. Its supplied history identifies the cockpit as JA8961—ANA’s final passenger 747—and the team is checking the surviving paperwork as part of the restoration.
Provenance in progress. JA8961’s airline history is well documented. The simulator was supplied with this identity, and its original registration records are among the material now being catalogued by the project team.
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011993–2014
JA8961 in airline service
JA8961 was an ANA Boeing 747-481D built for Japan’s high-frequency domestic network. Registered in May 1993, the aircraft’s distinctive domestic configuration omitted winglets and was strengthened for repeated short-haul cycles.
On 31 March 2014, JA8961 operated ANA’s final scheduled 747 passenger service: NH126 from Naha to Tokyo Haneda. It closed more than three decades of ANA Jumbo operations with the aircraft that had carried generations of travellers across Japan.
- Aircraft
- Boeing 747-481D
- Serial
- 25644 / line 975
- ANA service
- 1993–2014
- Final service
- NH126, Naha–Haneda
JA8961 departs Tokyo Haneda in September 2013. Photo: Alec Wilson / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0. Resized and converted to WebP. 
JA8961 on approach to Tokyo Haneda in January 2010. Photo: Yamaguchi Yoshiaki / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0. Resized and converted to WebP. JA8961’s flight deck in service Archive image wanted. We have not found a reusable photograph verified as this exact cockpit, so this space is reserved until permission is secured. -
02The simulator story
A second life in Texas
At the end of the donor aircraft’s flying life, Universal Asset Management (UAM) dismantled the 747 at its aircraft recycling facility in Tupelo, Mississippi. The cockpit section was separated from the airframe and preserved rather than being lost with the rest of the aircraft.
The flight deck was then restored as a highly detailed simulator built around original Boeing 747-400 equipment. It later lived in an aircraft hangar and then a warehouse in Austin, Texas, with its switches, lights and controls interfaced to Aerowinx PSX.
Team Covey acquired the simulator in May 2026. The flight deck was carefully decommissioned and dismantled over seven days, then loaded into a 40-foot high-cube container for the journey to Australia. Reassembly is the next chapter.
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Tupelo, Mississippi
Preserved during dismantling
UAM removed the genuine flight deck while recycling the donor 747.
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Texas, USA
Restored as a simulator
OEM hardware brought back to life around a detailed software model.
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Australia, 2026
The Jumbo Project
Rebuilding the cockpit for a new home, a new team and WorldFlight.
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Tupelo, Mississippi
Preserved during dismantling
The restoration today
This chapter is still being written
Current restoration photographs will appear here as the rebuild progresses.
The flight deck today
A wide view of the panels, seats and original controls.
Photo coming soonRestoration details
Wiring, hardware and the work happening behind the panels.
Photo coming soonHistory sources: ANA, Japanese aircraft registration records, ANA’s retirement-tour release, and UAM’s Tupelo disassembly archive. Simulator journey details are from The Jumbo Project’s own published record.