The crash of the French Concorde in 2000 led me to investigate the history of this supersonic

commercial aircraft. I was surprised to learn that the Concorde’s story began in 1956. On
November 5th of that year the Supersonic Transport Aircraft Committee (STAC) was founded
to study the feasibility of building a supersonic airliner. It wasn’t until 1959 that they
recommended design studies for 2 supersonic airliners.

The first discussions between The British Aircraft Corporation and Sud Aviation of France
took place in 1961. In September 1962 French President Charles de Gaulle made a plea for
cooperation as the building of a supersonic aircraft would be too costly for either country to
finance alone.

The British Minister of Aviation and the French ambassador signed a preliminary agreement
for cooperation. The treaty stated that Britain and France would share equally in both the
costs of production and the profits from future sales. Four companies would get the contracts
for work on the SST. The British Aircraft Corporation and Sud Aviation would build the
airframe. Bristol Siddeley (Britain) and SNECMA (France) would manufacture the Olympus
593 jet engines.

In 1964, a management group was organized between the two governments. BAC (England)
and Aerospatiale (France) would build the airframe, and Rolls Royce and SNECMA (France)
would make the jet engines. These companies signed hundreds of contracts with suppliers
from Britain, France and the USA. A “mini concord” made its first experimental flight in
France on May 1. The spelling became the French “Concorde”, with Britain saying that the
“e” stood for England, Europe and Excellence. This was a government financed and managed
program.

In September 1965, work began on the production airframe. Final assembly of the British
prototype began in 1966. The following year the first prototype was presented in Toulouse,
France. In 1968 the first supersonic airliner to fly was not British of French. The Tupolev Tu-
144 took off from a runway near where it was built, in Zhukovski, USSR. The French and
British were painstakingly building, rebuilding and testing theirs. Funding was a hot electoral
issue in England and was halted for a few months by the new Labor government.

On March 2nd 1969, The French Concorde 001 made its first take off run and on April 9th,
the 002 in England first flew. Both aircraft were displayed at the Paris Air Show that year. By
October the French model had made 45 test flights, reaching a speed of Mach 1 on October 1.
In February 1970 the Olympus 593 engine made a test run and ran continuously for 300
hours, the equivalent of 100 Trans-Atlantic SST flights. Residents of London voiced the first
complaints about noise in September when Concorde 002 landed at Heathrow airport.

The first pre-production aircraft rolled out of the hangar at Filton, England on the 20th of
September 1971. In December the US Federal Aviation Agency (FAA) announced that
Concorde was within American airport noise limits. The next year the British Concorde made
a 45,000-mile sales tour of twelve countries and China indicated her intention to purchase two
of them. BOAC of England ordered five and Air France requisitioned four. The jet had yet to
be proved but intense testing and re-design was ongoing.

In June 1973 the Soviet Tupolev Tu-144, at the Paris Air Show, crashed killing 14 people, 6
aboard the aircraft and 8 on the ground. The pilot of the Tu-144 appeared to maneuver in
order to avoid hitting a Mirage jet, lost a wing and broke apart. The first production model of
the Concorde 201 made a flight in France and reached a speed of Mach 1.57.

In a contest reminiscent of the old horse vs. car days, the French Concorde was pitted against
a 747 in 1974. The conventional 747 left Boston’s Logan Airport en route to Paris at the same
time as the Concorde left Paris’ Orly for Boston. The Concorde landed in Paris, spent 68
minutes on the ground, and returned to Boston 11 minutes ahead of the 747. The production
and testing of the SST was exceedingly costly for France and England. Because the
companies were government financed it was a political issue too. A decision was made by
Harold Wilson and Valery Giscard d'Estaing to continue the program but limit production to
16 aircraft. All of the US airline companies that had originally expressed interest in
purchasing the Concorde had decided not to.

In 1975 the fourth production type aircraft Concorde 204 made two return flights from
London to Gander, Newfoundland in a single day. British Airways and Air France started
taking reservations for scheduled service to Bahrain and Rio de Janeiro starting the following
January. By the 21st of January 1977 the Concorde had been in service for one year and had
carried over 45,000 paying passengers. On the 50th anniversary of Charles Lindbergh's flight
in the 'Spirit of St Louis' from New York to Paris, a Concorde flew the same route in 3 hours
44 minutes. Lindbergh's time was 33 hours 29 minutes. In April 1979 the last production
Concorde 216 was completed.

By 1982 the Concorde had been in service for 6 years and The British Industry and Trade
Committee was concerned with the mounting costs of the Concorde program. The British
government informed British Airways that they were no longer willing to fund manufacturers
Rolls Royce and British Aerospace. British Airways responded that they would investigate the
possibility of running the program for profit. On January 1, 1983 the Concorde made the
fastest ever time from New York to London at 2 hrs. 56 min. In 1984 British Airways took
over responsibility for funding Concorde's British manufacturers.

Aside from a few rudder problems and cracked external windows in the early 1990’s the
Concorde proved to be the most reliable airliner ever put into service. Cracks were discovered
in the wings of a few planes in July 2000 but the cracks were deemed not critical. On July
25th, 2000 Air France Concorde F-BTSC crashed in Paris killing all 109 passengers and crew
and 4 on the ground.