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Sunday 22 June 2014

Concorde

The world’s first supersonic airliner, the Anglo-French Concorde, had its initial test flight from Toulouse on March 2, 1969, piloted by André Turcat, and first broke the sound barrier later that year on October 1st.

Inspired by delta-winged nuclear bombers, the Concorde was made by the French company Aérospatiale and the British company British Aircraft Corporation.

Concorde made its first non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, from Washington to Paris on September 26, 1973 in record-breaking time. It flew at an average speed of 954 mph and halved the flight time to 212 minutes.

Scheduled flights began on January 21, 1976 on the London–Bahrain and Paris–Rio (via Dakar) routes, A scheduled service from Paris and London to New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport began on November 22, 1977.


Flying from London to New York by Concorde, due to the time zones crossed, you could arrive two hours before you leave.

The Concorde flew so fast, if you left London (or Paris) in the evening flying west towards New York, to the passengers in the plane, the sun would actually appear to begin rising again shortly after reaching cruising speed. The plane flew faster than the Earth's rotation.

The Concorde could burn up to two tonnes of fuel just to taxi to the runway, however once at Mach 2 it was the most fuel efficient engine ever built.

The average age of a Concorde passenger was 43 — and 43 per cent were chairmen or senior managers.

In 1982 a passenger could have enjoyed a one-day visit on the supersonic jet to the Egyptian pyramids for £780 — marketed as the most expensive day trip in the world.

 "British Airways Concorde G-BOAC 03" by Eduard Marmet -Commons Wikipedia

Some people did not like the sonic booms caused by Concorde flying faster than the speed of sound. At different times, Concorde was not allowed to fly over certain countries because of this.

While taking off on July 25, 2000, en route from Paris to New York City, Air France Concorde Flight 4590 ran over debris on the runway, blowing a tyre and puncturing a fuel tank, leading to fire and engine failure. The aircraft crashed in Gonesse, France killing all 100 passengers and nine crew members, as well as four people on the ground. It was the only fatal Concorde accident during its 27-year operational history.

The DC-10 involved, By aeroprints.com, Wikipedia Commons

The Concorde makes its final commercial passenger flight from New York JFK to London Heathrow on October 24, 2003.

Concorde flew so high passengers received twice the dose of radiation from flying in a conventional aircraft, which was believed to increase cancer risk. The flight deck contained a radiometer so they could descend in case of a solar storm.

The TU-144 was the Soviet supersonic passenger jet to rival the Anglo-French Concorde. At the Paris Air Show in 1973, Russian pilot Mikhail Koslov was said to have boasted at a reception that he would outfly Concorde. Instead, he crashed, killing six crew and eight people on the ground. A second one was built but was only ever used to transport mail.

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