Boeing 747 doors and emergency exits

Each side of the 747’s main deck carries five big floor-level plug doors — ten Type A passenger exits in all. Later stretched-upper-deck models add their own exit pair up top, and a hatch over the cockpit gives the flight crew a path out.

Key facts
Main-deck doors	Five per side (1 through 5) — ten Type A exits
Slides	Slide/rafts at doors 1, 2, 4 and 5 each side; overwing slides for wing-area seats
Upper deck	The -300/-400 stretched upper deck adds its own exit pair
Crew escape	Flight-crew hatch over the cockpit

Certification limits a Type A exit (a floor-level opening of at least 42 × 72 in) to 110 seats. Ten of them is what lets a 747 legally carry 500 or more passengers.

Emergency hardware includes escape slides or slide/rafts on each side at doors 1, 2, 4 and 5, plus off-wing overwing escape slides for passengers seated near the wing — a configuration maintained from the 1969 original through the -2/300 stretch.

Sources

• Boeing 747 emergency evacuation diagram — Code 7700
• Type A exit definition (14 CFR 25.807) — US Government Publishing Office
• 747 slide/raft airworthiness directive — US Federal Register