It's nice to see flight test engineers having some fun once in a while.

The Boeing 747-8 is making its longest flight to date as part of its extended operations testing. The airplane left Paine Field north of Seattle early this morning and isn't expected back until near midnight.

The airplane will follow a flight path over the United States that resembles the number 747. The flight, more than 9,300 miles long, involves a very long list of waypoints and reporting points to complete the skywriting. According to Jon Ostrower over at Flightblogger, the flight path is the maximum endurance flight for the 747-8 program.

As of 2:05 p.m. PDT, the 747-8 was flying 477 knots at 38,000 feet over eastern New Mexico. Other than a small diversion over central Nevada, the "handwriting" is pretty good, though a little squiggly. But we're not going to criticize the penmanship involved in writing with a jumbo jet.

The 747-8 is the newest version of Boeing's iconic jumbo jet and features new wings, engines and a host of other improvements to increase efficiency. The first 747-8 is expected to be delivered to Cargolux later this year.

Image: Flightaware.com