flightrider, i'm afraid you're incorrect there. BA regularly fly the 747-400 and the 777 from heathrow/gatwick to cardiff on empty ferry flights for maintenance using only captain and f/o.
One Captain I spoke to said that at 6000ft/min in the climb (and rising), they pulled all 4 throttles back and the thing was still going up like a rocket. He said that when you think about it if he had continued climbing at full power, it would've been going up at 100mph VERTICALLY!!!!!
