TRE

CONCORDE
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
Les Avions d'aujourd'hui
Nathan, le Monde en poche, [1990]
Hispano<uiza, le futur a sa légende
le cherche midi éditeur [1993] — translated in English
with the cooperation of Gérard Guyot
Le Tour du monde en 48 heures, Airbus À 340 World Ranger
le cherche midi éditeur [1993] — translated in English
AI Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of
the Copyright owner or the Centre Français d'Exploitation du Droit de Copie. Any
unauthorised reproduction will constitute a breach of Copyright Law leading to
prosecution under the French Penal Code.
© le cherche midi éditeur, 1996.
MICHEL POLACCO
CONCOR
TRANSLATED BY
ALASDAIR REYNOLDS
« CIELS DU MONDE » COLLECTION
UNDER GÉRARD MAOUI
le cherche midi éditeur
23 rue du Cherche-Midi 75006 Paris
Det at
This book is dedicated to all the engineers, technicians and pilois who contrbuted
to the making of Concorde and
have kept it flying for over twenty years.
Special thanks are due to André Turcat, who kindly accepted to read over the
manuscrit, and to Claude Delorme
with whom | made my first roundthe-world tip on Concorde in 1992.
MP
‘Man discovers his true nature when he pits himself against seemingly insumountable
obstacles."
‘In the same way the aeroplane, in the service of the airlines, confronts him with
all his most
primitive fears."
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Terre des hommes
Mach as a measurement of speed.
Named after the Austrian physicist and philosopher
Ernst Mach, (1838-1916).
the Mach number is the ratio of the air speed of an aircraft
to the velocity of sound under given conditions. The speed
of sound varies as a function of temperature which itself
varies as a function of altitude.
Mach 1
at the standard air temperature of 15°C at ground level:
563mph.
at a stratospheric temperature of -56°C: 625mph.
Mach 2
The normal cruising speed of Concorde in the stratosphere:
1346mph.
Mach-meter
Speedometer showing Mach number, or air speed relative
to that of the sound.
Stratosphere
Layer of the earth's atmosphere at an altitude beween
49 000 - 164 000 fi.
Speeds
Subsonic: 0 - Mach 0.8
Transonic: Mach 0.8 - Mach 1.2
Supersonic: Mach 1.2 - Mach 5
Orbit speed: 17 713mph
Gravitational break-through: 24 860mph
INTRODUCTION
F3 and yet somehow old fashioned, Concorde
is imbued with a paradoxical quality that has, from the
moment of ils conception in the early ilties, continued
o inspire emotion. No other aircraft has provoked
such controversy. Venerated or vilified, it consistently hit
he headlines of the world's press. Wherever it went,
the appearance of Concorde became a media event
which left no-one indifferent.
For over twentyive years hundreds of passengers have
egularly own on Concorde at altitudes of 50-60
housand feet at more than twice the speed of sound.
Wearing neither oxygen masks nor "G'suits, they travel
in conditions of comfort and luxury that are the envy of
ighter pilots and astronauts - the only other human
beings capable of flving at supersonic speeds.
n a lifetime of flying a fighter pilot in an F15, a MIG,
a lomado or a Mirage 2000 would accumulate only
a few dozen hours of supersonic flight at MACH 1 or
MACH 2, that is at over 625 miles per hour! Many of
Concorde's regular passengers, however, and, o
course, the crews log far more hours than that, and
most Concorde light crews and cabin crews can
claim three or four thousand hours of supersonic fligh
around the world.
Exceptional in terms of speed, Concorde is equally
exceptional in terms of aesthetics. Long and elegant
with a vast surface of subtly-formed delta wing,
whether on the ground or in flight the aircraft is as
gracelul as an Angekfish or a Mana ray in the depths
of the sea. With its unique diooping nose lowered it
resembles nothing so much as a huge long-necked bird
as it takes-off or lands.
Concorde was conceived just as commercial aviation
‘discovered" jets, propellorless airliners with greater
speed and longer range but making more noise
and having higher fuel consumption than their
predecessors. Comet, Caravelle, Boeing 707 and
Douglas DC-8 were the pioneers of the new jet age
and never was it imagined that commercial airliners
would evén approach the speed of sound.
And yet, and yet; nothing seemed impossible at such a
time of rapid technological progress. Further, faster,
higher: the eternal quest, while ocean liners still
steamed accross the seas and only the rich could
contemplate air travel which, even for them, was still a
ong and tiring experience. In a world only just
ecovering from the Second World War, in a Europe
whose wounds were still fresh, an indomitable
technological ambition was born - to design and
market the first supersonic civil airliner in the world.
l'Exceptional in terms of speed, Concorde is equally
exceptional in terms of aesthetics".
1- Concorde was designed for trans-Atlantic routes
and specificall to link the capitals of Europe with
New York. Manhattan is now less than three and
a half hours from Paris or London and the route has
been Hown with exemplary punctuality for 20 years.
Opposite page - À Concorde take-off or landing
is always an event and every time it is announced
at a new destination there are always crowds to see it.
Only the prototypes left smoke trails behind them.
The photographer was positioned amongst
the runway lights beneath the approach path.
À FLGHT ON CONCORDE
1 Anglo-French Concorde
was designed specifically for the
trans-Alantic route and the ideal
destination, by virtue of its distance
from Europe and the high volume
of passenger traffic, was New
York. During the early days of
supersonic passenger travel, however, the United States of America
remained closed to it and the destinaions served by the new aircraft
remained somewhat exotic. The
first services were from Europe to
Brazil, Venezuela, Bahrain, a Gulf
emirate and Singapore.
Today Concorde is allowed to fly
into the United States and New
York is the only destination having
a regular Concorde service and
operated from Paris by Air France and from London
by British Airways, it is even possible to make the
round trip within the day. Leaving Paris at 1 1.00am a
passenger would arrive in New York at 08.45am
local time: by taking the return flight at O1.00pm he
would be back in Paris at 11.45pm the same day.
From London, leaving at 10.30am the passenger
would arrive in New York at 09.20am local time and,
by caïching the retum flight at 01.45pm, would be
home at 10.25pm that evening. Bearing in mind the
one hour time difference between London and Paris,
the flight duration from either city to New Vork is about
the same, that is between 3 hours 15 minutes and 3 hours
30 minutes.
At the altitude at which Concorde flies the winds are
generally quite strong but since flight times are relatively short the schedule
rarely varies more than about
5 minutes. The winds on the Paris-New York leg are
the least favourable and the record for this sector
stands at 3 hours 18 minutes, [flown in 1981 by
Capt. Chanoine for Air France]. The ultimate record
for the shortest time is held by British Airways for a
New York-london sector flown in 1980 in 2 hours 59
minutes.
Concorde passengers are treated to a personal service at checkin with simplified
boarding procedures,
private waiting lounge and first class service. Once
on board, the cabin is less spacious than that of the
first class cabin in a subsonic aircraft, but comfort is
relative and the flight time never exceeds four hours.
Seat allocation is, of course, undertaken before
embarkation and, by virtue of the small number of
passengers, (maximum 100), is rapid.
To look after the passengers a full crew complement
consists of six cabin staff, two pilots and a flight engin
eer, all of whom extend /a welcome with a smile
reflecting their pride in being part of the supersonic
experience. Naturally, except for extremely rare occar
sions, Concorde is always on time. Dispatch reliability
is practically 100% and the aircraft does not wait for
late passengers. The whole supersonic fleet, Air France
=
1 - Only Concorde can take-off at such rocketlike
angles, powered by its four Rolls-Royce-SNECMA
engines equipped with afterburners. Adding 25%
more power, re-heat acts like a fifth engine used
for take-off and transonic acceleration. Concorde
immodesily shows-of its belly where can be identified
the engine nacelles. On the trailing edge of the wing
are the "elevons" which act as both as flaps,
elevators and ailerons.
2 - One of the finest paintings of Concorde:
"Concorde F-BVFA" by Jacques Monory,
{from “The Fine Aris of Flying” collection, 1987).
A FUGHT ON CONCORDE
and British Airways, is regulany relurbished and there
exists a Concorde style consisting of pastel colours,
subtle lighting and wide, comforiable seats. The latier
are somewhat surprising in the context of îhe narrow,
fighierike fuselage.
Once on board, here is the programme. The iake-of,
at 225mph takes about 25 seconds to lift the 185
tonnes aircrañ into the air! This is achieved using “afterburn”, a system normally
only used on military jets to
increase engine thrust, and consisting of injecting fuel
into the hot exhaust of the engine and re:igniting fhe
mixture. The effect is that of having two jet engines,
one behind the ofher, increasing the power output by
25% and there is no doubt about when it is applied,
he noise level increases and fhe increased fhrust is
easily felt. As in all aircraït, one's seatbelt should be
fastened on iake-off but even ignoring this rule there is
lle point in atemptng to get up from the seat, it will
be found to be impossible. The acceleration, alihough
smooth, is progressive and powerul and for a short
time the passenger is held back the seat by the force.
Suddenly, the sound level drops and there is a slight
sensation of gravily as the afterbum is cut off and the
thrust reduces. On a much smaller scale, fhis is similar
to the sensations experienced by a Navy pilot as his
fighier is catapulted off an aïrcraftcarrier, although he
would be subjected 4 or 5 ‘G' raïher than the 0.5 'G'
in Concorde. [(G being equal to the force of terrestial
gravity].
F the iake-off is from a coastal airport such as New
York, Lisbon or Rio, or in proximity to a desert region,
the pilot can immediately accelerate up to Mach 1,
then to Mach 2 at the cruising altitude of between 50
and 60 fhousand feet. If not, then he must be patient in
order not fo generate a supersonic “bang” over inhabited areas. Neveriheless,
Concorde is still considerably
faster than conventional airliners and a "Mach-meter is
installed on the forward cabin bulk-head for the benefit
of he passengers.
Mach 0.95, Mach 0.98, nearly 68/mph; this is the
“anssonic’ phase of the flight, considerably above ihe
subsonic speed of about 531mph and almost at‘the
speed of sound. Concorde is ihe only commercial jet
capable of this, being specially designed not only for
speed but to withstand the aerodynamic effects of
supersonic shock waves.
To acceleraie through the sound barrier, ihe pilot must
relight he afterburner. This is preceded by the noise of
the pumps transferring fuel to he forward tanks io trim
he aircrañt. Although now a common technique found
on oïher aircraft such as Airbus types, Concorde was
the first to incorporate fhis ingenious method of weight
À FUGHT ON CONCORDE
distribution in order to improve aerodynamic performance. Às the Mach-meier reading
approaches 0.95M
and with the fuel transfer process completed, the flight
engineer signals to the pilot that all's clear to ‘go
through ihe barrier'and in tum receives the order to "’relight the burners”. With
an almost imperceptible “kick”,
the aircraft accelerates briskly.
Faster than the speed of sound!
Mach 0.991 something must happen; a noise, a
shock? Mach 1.01, and nothing happens. No noise,
no shock but sometimes the sound of enthusiastic passengers applauding. The perfect
aircraft, thrusting
through the air like a shark through the water and leaving its own noise and
turbulence behind, such is its
speed. Over the ocean, 35 000 feet below, a double
“bang may be heard by any fishermen who might be
out but only once in any one place since Concorde
“tows” ils sonic boom along behind it as a constant
noise throughout the supersonic phase of flight.
At Mach 1.7 the aircraft has accelerated sufficiently
for the re-heat io be cut, alihough at fulHthrottle the
speed will continue to increase beyond Mach 2. Since
the speed of sound has already been passed there is
no furiher sonic sound effect and no other sensation
except that of the pleasure of being aboard Concorde.
From now on ihe cruising speed varies consiantly as a
function of the outside temperature; a degree or two
less and the speed increases, a degree or two more
and it will decrease. At such speeds the friction of the
air passing over the siruciure generates enough heat to
raise the temperature of the fuselage and wing skin io
127°C1 IF this happens then the pilot or the autopilot
system reduces power io slow the aircraft and allow
the skin temperature to drop below fhis limit. The speed
reduction is, however, relative since cruising speed is
always around Mach 2.
Flying in a structure that can attain a temperature of
127°C gives rise to a ceriain number of specifically
observable phenomena. For example, the windows
will be found to be warm to the touch and, if condensation forms belween the two
panes of the double-glazing, the moisture will be seen io boil. This is a
relatively rare phenomena but it has been observed. In
contrast, the outside air temperature at such altitudes is
around -55°C.
Às for the aircraf itself, it gets physically longer during
the flight, for like any metallic structure, it expands or
contacts as a function of its temperature. At 127°C
Concorde will have lengihened by between 6 and 7
inches! Just imagine the engineering problems to be
overcome by incorporating special fastenings and joints
in he struclure in order that it can consianily expand
and retract and yet maintain its structural integrity, fight
after flight, without breaking up. In this respeci.
Concorde is absolutely unique. Whilst seated at he
rear of the cabin during turbulence, (relatively rare
at 50 000 fee}, by observing the cabin aisle floor
it will be seen to move with a wave-like motion,
an
ND
1 - Seats installed on prototypes 001 and 002
for the first passengers. On this aircraft the windows
are both wider and higher than on production aircraf.
2 - Once Concorde has reached supersonic cruising
speed the passengers are entitled to a certificate
verifying their status as supersonic travellers.
This is the certificate given to the author on the
occasion of a flight chartered by the Hispano-Suiza
aero club. lt was also the occasion of Captain Girard's
last command before retirement: it is his signature
on the document.
À FIGHT ON CONCORDE
demonstating the flexibility of the structure. Like the prover:
bial bamboo, it "bends belore the wind but does not break”.
Without having been to the elite flying schools like Top
Gun, Boscombe Down or the Ecole de l'Air in France,
the passenger is, nevertheless, flying at Mach 2 and
with a glass in his hand, a magazine to read and, perhaps, a companion to chat
with.
As soon as cruising altitude has been reached, on
board service begins: aperitif, gourmet menu, fine
French wines, all served from porcelaine and crystal;
an urhurried but efficient service for there is little time
to waste during a journey on Concorde. Looking
through the tiny windows at high altitude, the sky is a
deeper blue and it is even possible to discem the curvature of the earth. Concorde
alone has enabled thousands of men and women to live the experience and
on the first flight the crew will sign a certificate to commemorate their breaking
the sound barrier.
On the flight deck the pilots and flight engineer are
relaxed but vigilant, for a supersonic flight is very
demanding. Things happen more quickly. The course
must be checked more frequently and communications
with air traffic control occur at shorter intervals. Not
long after reaching cruising speed comes preparation
for descent and the approach for landing. This phase
of the flight needs some planning in order to slow
down to subsonic speed before overilying inhabited
areas, for Concorde is forbidden to emit its sonic bang
over densly populated land.
On the vast instrument panel are couniless dials and
indicators to be monitored, especially by the flight
engineer, and in Concorde's cockpit there is a constant
movement of needles and flickering of lamps as the instruments signal the condition
of the aircraft to the
crew. Speed, which varies with outside temperature;
engine thrust; altitude, which varies according to
atmospheric pressure; fuel flow; cabin pressure; etc.,
etc. In addition, Concorde constantly gains altitude
during cruise as the fuel is used up and the aircraft
becomes lighter and, in the process, gains power in
relation to its mass and so flies higher.
“Faster than the sun" is no exaggeration in describing
Concorde. The earth, as we know, rotates about its
axis and at the same time revolves around the sun
creating, by its axial rotation, the phenomena of day
and night. The speed of this rotation, one complete
revolution in 24 hours, gives a relative speed to the
sun of 1 158mph. At Mach 2, however, Concorde Îlies
much faster at around 1375mph and a passenger
taking-off from Europe for the United States in the early
morning would, therefore, see 1wo sunrises and one
sunset in the same day. The first sunrise would be the
normal" one upon getting up in the morning then,
aboard Concorde the sun will be overtaken by the aircraft, the sky will darken and
the sun set behind it. As
speed reduces and the destination approaches the
phenomenon is reversed, he sun will catch up again
and by overtaking the aircraft will rise again in New
York, the arrival taking place in the early moming at
day-break. On the occasion of Concorde's first speed
record attempt the Air France passengers didn't experience night at all, as the sun
never set for them.
À muted pumping sound comes from below the cabin
floor indicating that the remaining fuel is being transferred forward into the main
tanks to trim the aircraft for
the descent and the return to subsonic flight. This procedure, similar to that of a
submarine transferring ballast, predicts the imminent arrival at the destination.
The crew can further reduce speed during the descent
phase by deploying the engine thrustreversers in flight,
a procedure only previously authorised on the Douglas
DC:8 and BAC Trident. rehe Aou ReEdIG A 1 4 VU Star
PU. GRR R>
À FIGHT ON CONCORDE
Only the reading on the cabin Mach-meter indicates the reducing speed since there
is no particular
sensation involved in the transition from supersonic
to subsonic flight. Below Mach 1 Concorde
becomes a normal airliner, only faster. The pilot
retracts the aerodynamic windscreen fairing and
then droops the long nose of the aircraft by 12
degrees for the approach and landing. [Only 5
degrees of droop are necessary for take-off). Lined
up with the runway, Concorde is now flying at only
187mph and the Mach-meter no longer displays its
numbers as the cabin crew prepare for landing. For
them the flight, although relatively short, is a tiring
one, for not only are they kept busy but Concorde
cruises in a nose-up attitude which means that the
cabin floor has a marked gradient up which they
must manoeuvre their service trolleys or down which
they must brake them.
Eu
The solution to missing a flight.
lt is not unusual for Concorde to be hired-out for various
reasons, or chartered by private individuals as are business
jets; and sometimes the individual concerned is a very
important person. On January 27th, 1993,
a Saudi-Arabian prince and his entourage, in all fifteen
people, was due to fly to New York from Paris
on the 1 1am Air France Concorde flight, AF 002,
leaving Roissy-Charles de Gaulle. This is the regularly
scheduled daily departure from Paris. That day, however,
there were strikes in Paris with a number of public
demonstrations which blocked the roads. At 11 o'clock the
prince, a regular Concorde passenger, was still far from
the airport impatient with frustration. Using his mobile
telephone, the prince called Air France Customer Services
and less than fifteen minutes later a special Concorde flight
had been arranged for take-off at 1pm, (giving him enough
time to get to the airport]. The price of the service was
calculated at one million, three hundred thousand Francs
{approximately 260 000 dollars}. If the reaction of Air
France had been fast, they still had to find a crew for the
reserve aircraft; and thus it was that Captain Grandjean
and the flight enginer, Claude Poulain, took their places in
the cockpit without their customary uniforms. They had both
been off duty when they were co-opted for the job and only
the co-pilot, Jean Marcot, was correctly dressed complete
with gold braid. Fortunately, owing to the small number of
passengers, only four cabin staff were needed; they were
Alain Meyrat, Louise Ouet, Didier Camus and Christine
Camus.
But the story does not stop there. Once on board,
the prince asked Louise Ouet to serve him a Fernet-Branca.
In France this unusual licorice-flavoured drink is considered
as a liver tonic rather than an aperitif. "1 don't suppose you
have any of that on board", taunted the prince goodumourdly. Louise asked him to
wait just a few minutes and
immediately senthe steward running to the airport dutyfree shop to obtain a bottle
of the disgusting mixture.
Shortly after Mach 2 was reached, an astonished prince
thanked them: "You must be the only airline in the world to
serve such a drink."
What's the Concorde crews' favorite joke?
Q. Why is there no film shown on board Concorde?
À. Because at supersonic speed the passengers would see
the picture but wouldn't hear the soundl
In fact, no film is shown on board Concorde due to the
short duration of the lights.
se
CONCORDE
NOUS SOMMES HEUREUX DE CERTIFIER QUE
WE ARE PLEASED TO CERTIFY THAT
À PASSÉ LE MUR DU SON À BORD DE CONCORDE
BROKE THE SOUND BARRIER ON BOARD THE CONCORDE
LE COMMANDANT DE BORD Ê. Pa CAPTAIN
Ÿ 4/1
ERIC'CELERIER
2 AO RTS
LE PRÉSIDENT
CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD
À FLGHT ON CONCORDE
foncorde offers higher speed When the aircraft is trimmed nose-up for the landing,
UE the angle of incidence is such that when seated at oard is particularly refined.
gned like a supersonic fighter, the rear of the cabin the cockpit floor is at the
pas:
inconvenience in layout Sondes Ve lee
mpensated by the high degree ou Ÿ | | |
ofessionalism of the cabin sta, Concorde lands like a fighter and, as soon as the |
rl isti isi fligh ; RFO ER En main wheels touch the ground, the nose gently
falls :. The cutlery on board
corde was specially designed forward on to the nose gear which signals the engar
> classy but of light weight | Rte gement of reversethrust on the engines before
the 1| atering avoids such things >ups and sauces which tend pilot applies the
brakes to retard the aircralt, all in
Îl under the high rat ; RTS enT the space of a few seconds. In spite of the fact
that it celeration and take-off angle.
takes-off, flies and lands so much faster, Concorde |
oncorde!s cockpit uses the same runways as any Airbus, Boein modates two pilots and
a flight Eu bus, Boe JS
neer. Designed at the 1
nning of the ‘sixties, it appears |
"busy" with 200 dials, 200
hes and 100 indicator lights.
e are two additional seats
lable for visitors, inspectors
pernumary crew members.
ite of its old-fashioned
>arance this cockpit is still
nly one in which the crew fly
ach 2 without "G'' suit.
eturning to Paris from New
in 3hrs 20mins on may 2 1st,
7, Concorde flies past a replica
harles Lindbergh's Spirit
int Louis, the first aircraft to fly
stop across the Atlantic sixty
s earlier. After paying homage
ancestor, the Concorde,
tered by the Aero-Club
rance, flew on land at
y-Charles de Gaulle.
disc brakes to absorb temperatures up
heating.
Thus the passenger arrives in New Vo
Douglas. The scale of events, however, is more
impressive and Concorde is equipped with carbon
to 400°C and
res which automatically deflate in the event of ovek, ready for a
day of work or leisure. An Atlantic crossing that took
the American, Charles Lindbergh 33 h
and the Frenchmen, Costes and Be
rs SO minutes,
lonte, 37 hrs
against the winds in the opposite direc
just 3 hrs 30 minutes. À recordè No,
Concorde flight!
ion, has taken
just a regular
W-YORK.AF -06+ 4 - Another historic photo: invited by Air France,
Maurice Bellonte checks-in for the first commercia Concorde flight to New York on
November 22nd 1977. Maurice Bellonte was Dieudonné Costes
navigator on their trans-Atlantic crossing from
Paris to New York undertaken against the wind
in 37hrs in 1930.
5 - Concorde, "close bosom friend of the maturin sun". Faster in Hight that the sun
around the earth it takes advantage of the sun's warm light to be sloff to
advantage.
ivited to a retrospective airshow, Concorde
es an appearance over the runway
oulommiers aerodrome, near Paris.
osite - Designed long and thin like a fighier
erodynamic efficiency, 203 feet long
9 feet 2 inches in diameter, Concorde has the
e fuselage cross-section as the Caravelle.
rms of space it bears little resemblence
e newer wide-bodies.
1900:
THE SUPERSONIC RACE
dE first practical application to be found for the
embryonic aviation industry was in military service
during the First World War. There followed an era of
stunt flying and record-breaking and then, later still,
were introduced the first commercial services initially
destined for mail delivery. Finally, towards the end of
the ‘thirties, as safety and reliability improved, true commercial airlines became
firmly established and aviators
and passengers were no longer at the mercy of capricious weather or limited by the
hours of daylight.
Navigation improved and night fVing became common
place, although for long distances over water flying
boats were considered to be a prudent compromise.
I was the era of the "Sky Clippers”.
The most important period of devel
opment in the history of civil aviation, however, was that immediately
following the Second World War.
As part of the war effort the
Americans developed and produced more and more sophisticated
aircraft that were tumed out in their
tens of thousands. Military aircraft
of all types including fighters, but
especially big bombers and troop
transports, were sent to all the theatres of combat
around the world. Across the Atlantic and Pacific
Oceans were established veritable air bridges to
supply men and materials and this experience,
together with the newly developed technologies,
provided a firm foundation for the future of aviation.
At the end of the war the Americans gave away or
auctioned off all these now surplus aircraft which, in
spite of taikwheel landing gear and piston engines,
were modern and reliable like the famous Douglas DC-3
or Dakotas, to give them their military nomenclature.
These surplus Dakotas were to be found, at some time
or another, in just about every aiïrline in the world, including those of countries
behind what was to become
known as the Iron Curiain.
Towards the end of the Second World War a techno
logical revolution in engine design had taken place in
the form of he jet engine. Hardly beyond the prototype
stage, this astonishingly powerul new power plant first
equipped the British Meteor and the German Me 262.
Developed to produce higher and higher thrust output
and greater and greater reliability, the turbo jet immediately began to replace the
piston engine for new
fighter aircraît types. Simultaneously, in Great Britain,
the first commercial jetliner was taking form: the
De Havilland Comet first flew in 1949 and entered
service in 1952.
First on the scene, the Comet introduced civil aviation
to the jet age but was also to serve as guinear-pig in
ironing out problems hitherto inexperienced in previous
aircraft types. The new jets flew much faster but also at
much higher aliitudes than their forebears, necessitating
much greater cabin pressurisation. The constant cycles
of pressurisation and depressurisation of high flying
aircralt, together with accoustic vibration from the
engines installed at the Wing roots, was to contribute
[
fatigue stress and, eventually, catastrophic rupture of the
uselage structure on fWwo occasions.
The British design offices put in a tremendous effort in
investigating and understanding the causes of the probem and fheir experience was
to serve the whole industry for the future. Since then, all airframes undergo
stringent fatigue and vibration tests, their useful life
being not only calculated in terms of flight hours, but in
LE7
el
CT
27 FONÉDRDE Nowadays main gear
f/ 27 4 À/ HISPANO-SUIZA
HISPANO-SULZA —— DIVISION DE LA SNECMA - rue du Capitaine Guynemer 92-Bois-Colombes
(France)
the number of pressurisation cycles calcul
ated for and beyond a hypothetical inservice life.
Aircraft cabins are pressurised and depressurised during every flight made, since
at
high altitude the air is rarefied and atmospheric pressure reduced. For passengers
and crews to survive in such conditions
even for a few hours they would have to
breathe oxygen and wear ‘spacessuits" to
simulate normal atmospheric pressure at
ground level. Such is the case for the pilots
of highlying military aircraft. In civil airliners, however, the cabin is "pumped-
up'
using air pressure from the engine turbines
in order to maintain an atmosphere similar
lo that of ground level. Referredto as the
"cabin altitude", an airliner flying at around
35 000 feet would be pressurised to an
Q = osphere equivalent to that at a height of 5000-6500
feet depending on the aircraft type, and which is consid
erably = higher than that at which the aircraft is flying.
Thus the air in the cabin is more dense and with sufficient oxygen for a
comloïtable flight but the effect on an
aircrafts structure is to weaken it by being continually
subjected to such stress, hence the Comet's
tragic experience. The phenomena of such stress is
now welHknown and measures are taken to counteract
it; indeed, alter incorporating the necessary modificar
tions, the Comet continued in service as the Mark IV for
civil use and as the Nimrod with the Fleet Air Arm o =
the Royal Nawy. lt was to lead the way for the introduction of the Caravelle in
France, the Boeing 707 and
Douglas DC-8 and DC-9 in the U.S.A., and the
Tupolev T-104 in the USSR.
Fast and efficient, jet aircraït certainly improved air services and progressively
replaced the liners that had for
merly ruled the ocean waves for neaïly a century. The
ast regular maritime services barely saw fhe nineteen six:
n ies but they were not the only victims of the technological
evolution, the jet age also rendered obsolete some magnift
cent piston-engined airliners too. The Douglas DC:4,
DC6 and DC7, the lockheed Constellation and particuarly the Super Constellation,
the queen of the Aïlantic,
were refired_ and sent to the breakers: in he case of the
atter, aller only three years in service.
1947, Yeager breaks the sound barrier
Each step forward brings the horizon of technology closer and in 1947 Chuck Veager
brought it closer in his
Bell X1, Glamorous Glennis, [named after his wite], by
breaking the sound barrier for the first time. Twenty five
years later Yeager was to be an enthusiastic Concorde
passenger.
From that point on progress was rapid and by 1956
all new fighter aircraft were capable of supersonic
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
speedk, it was the threshold of a new era in which i
was hoped that supersonic flight would become the
norm in civil aviation. Engineers on both sides of the
Channel applied themselves to projects that they were
quite incapable of costing or marketing, and both the
management and the unions of aircraft manufacturers
in France and the United Kingdom lobbied their
respective governments, according to Henri Ziegler,
expresident of Sud Aviation, [later to become the
Société Nationale Aerospatiale in 1970]. It was
hoped that this would inject new life into the aircratt
industry in both countries.
In 1958, Roland Glavany was the first French pilot to
attain Mach 2 in sustained horizontal flight aboard a
Dassault Mirage Ill. Three days later, André Turcat raised the speed to Mach 2.05
with a Nord Aviation
Giiflon Il and then went on to beat the European speed
record at Mach 2.18 the following year. The ability to
fly at over wice the speed of sound was, by now, well
established and André Turcat, the recordbreaker, ! was
L o become the pilot chosen for Concorde's maiden
flight from Toulouse ten years later.
n this record-breaking year of 1959, a number of
supersonic aircraft projects were under study in Europe.
n France, Sud-Aviation, in association with Marce
Dassault, enviseaged the development of a supersonic
"Super Caravelle" as the successor to the twin engined
airliner that had been such a notable commercial suc
cess, especially in the United States. In Britain, two
separate projects existed simultaneously, one at
Hawker Siddely and the other at Bristol Aircraft. These
iWo companies were later to amalgamate to become
ihe British Aircraft Corporation [BAC] and later, British
Aerospace. lt was in the midst of this diverse activi
that the first tentative contacts were made between the
French and British industries. The technical problems to
be overcome and the high costs involved in the project
were such that it was sensible to consider a cooperat
ive programme in order to concentrate resources and
spread the cost. Engine technology was further ad-
{ vanced, for example, in Britain so there was no point in
the French going over the same ground. Thus was the
idea bo in what seemed to be a climate of political
will and available technology.
1,3, 4 & 5 - During the development stage Concorde
was subjected to numerous wind-tunnel tests during
which many design concepts were tried out, including the addition of "moustaches"
similar to those of the
soviet Tu-144.
2 - All of the sub-contractors that participated
in the concorde programme advertised the fact
vigourously. This is a Hispano-Suiza advertisment
for landing gear that appeared in an English languag publication.
20
1 & 2 - Concorde provided cartoonists with an endless
source of subject matter. These two paintings by
Philippe Mitschké illustrate the language difficulties
encountered and the environmental nuisance of which
he super-sonic aircraft was accused,.
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
Franco-British cooperation
To conclude an agreement for such a huge project
would constitute an amazing political and industrial
achievement and, to many, it seemed an impossible
dream. Was such cooperation really possible between
two nations as different in attitude as the British and the
French? Initially, engineers from both countries met to
carry out a feasibility study and examine the implications
of a cooperative programme. Exactly what kind of air
craft was to be built at what cost and in what sort of
time-frame? In December 1961, at the end of a series
of long and difficult discussions, Lucien Servanty, the
chief engineer of the French team, and W]J. Strang, his
British counterpart, came to an agreement on a project
that would lead to the production of two aircraft. These
would be a mediumange and a long-range model.
The French considered that the former, with a range of
1250-1875 miles, would be the more redlistic project
in view of the time and financial constraints. In addition
it was thought that 1he announcement of the long-range
version would be seen by the Americans as a declaration of war on the U.S aviation
industry and which
would be detrimental to the sales of the Caravelle in the
US. It should be remembered that at the time the
Americans accounted for a 90% market share of jet aircraft sales around the world.
As for the British, they quite
clearly saw the possibility of a trans’Alantic aircraft at an
early stage but the project would, of course, be more
difficult to achieve and more cosily. From a purely technological point of view
these men were visionaries, for
even if fhe projects were to be considerably modified
over the following years, the design that was eventually
to emerge was, on a larger scale, that of Concorde.
While all of his was going on and in parallel, discussions were taking place at a
political level. The French
President, Charles de Gaulle and Harold MacWillan,
the British Prime Minister, pressed their respective
govemments to conclude the agreement as rapidly as
possible. At that time the question of Britain's entry into
the Common Market was under debate but de Gaulle
opposed the move on the grounds that the British economy was not heaïhly enough. À
grandiose AngloFrench project, therelore, represented a ‘free ticket”, [or
at least one at half price], to get on board the Common
Market train. The French, too, saw that it would lead to
an eventual raprochement, however the British were in
for a surprise.
Putting political considerations above all others, the
final Anglo-French agreement was signed in London on
November 29h, 1962. The new supersonic aircraft
would be a joint venture between Sud-Aviation and the
British Aircraft Corporation, [BAC], the engines would
be British Olympus 593% developed in 1950 for the
Canberra bomber and subsequently up-dated by the
wo associated engine manufacturers, SNECMA and
Bristol Siddeley. Design responsibility, like the costs,
would be equally split between the partners "fifty-ifty'
and a government comittee would supervise the programme with the technical
directorship alternating
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
every {wo years between a Frenchman and a Briton.
The first flight was scheduled for 1967 and the agreement did not allow for either
of the partners to pull out
of the project.
The bi-partate management of the programme was
soon to provoke numerous difficulties: nevertheless, at
the time, both parties were full of enthusiasm. The
Franco-British alliance and the anticipated competition
to challenge the American monopoly only added to the
hope that a flourishing new aviation industry would be
bom in Europe. In addition, the British were hopelul
that he agreement would weaken de Gaulle's resistance to their application to join
the Common Market.
All was well with the world: the sky was blue, the road
was straight and everything in the garden, [for the
moment), was lovely. Not for long, however.
The deception was to come only six weeks later in
London, on January 14h, 1963. General de Gaulle,
during one of his rare press conferences, solemnly
rejected the British application to the Common Market
whilst at the same time claiming credit for the joint
agreement on Concorde. The British political and
industrial establishment was, understandably, extremely
annoyed over such duplicity and, on the political front,
relations were to become strained. In addition to the
technical and industrial problems, the alternating
management structure, the complexity of the government supervisony committee and
the partners’ lack of
experience in working together, the general atmosphere
of suspicion could only add to the overall difficulties.
Às if this were not enough, in spite of the economies
ND
3 - In addition to the two prototypes, two other
airframes were used for fatigue and vibration tests
at both Toulouse and Farnborough.
Here we see static testing being undertaken at CEAT,
the Centre d'Essais Aeronautiques de Toulouse.
4 - In every Concorde there are 150 miles of wiring.
This is the first British prototype, 002, at Filton.
| ND |
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
1 - One of fhe first prototypes takes shape; due to roll.
out of the assembly line in December 1967.
enviseaged by the original amalgamation, the agreement stipulated that there would
be a production line in
each country, each responsible not only for both test
and production aircraft but light test programmes 100.
Such are the political vanities that must be assuaged
and which somewhat obscured the original objective of
building a supersonic aircraft capable of sustained
flight at twice the speed of sound.
On either side of the Channel plans were being drawn
and structures and subrassemblies put together by the
pariners responsible for their respective contributions.
The British worked in pounds, feet and inches; the
French in kilogrammes, metres and centimetres.
Temperatures in Britain were in Fahrenheit and in
France they were in Centigrade. On one side of the
Channel pressures were measured in millibars and on
the ofher in inches of mercury; elc.etc. In 1965, when
the first fuselage section arrived in Toulouse from Filton
for final assembly, the technicians and production workers had to be particularly
carelul when confronted by
tolerances of tenths of a millimetre or fractions of an
inch. In spite of the language barrier, [yet another practical obstacle}, the whole
worklorce showed remarkable enfhusiasm and determination and both French
and British worked unceasingly to overcome fhe not
inconsiderable technical, adminsistrative and relational
problems involved.
Concord or Concorde
Notwithstanding the technical difficulties inherent in he
project, one of the most difficult questions to be resol
ved was that of the name that should be carried by the
new supersonic aircraft. Should it be a French name or
an English one The discussions which took place on
this point of detail were both protracted and emotional,
each pariner puting forward numerous suggestions but
without concensus until, finally, Timothy Clark, the ter
vear old son of the BAC Commercial Director, provided
a solution. His suggestion was "Concord', a word
expressing the symbolism of both determination and
opfimism and, at fhe same time, fhe spirit of cooper
ation between the partners and fheir respective nations
so often ot loggerheadés in fhe past.
There remained, however, the questions of spelling.
Should there be an ‘e’ at the end of he name or not2
In the Queen's English, Concord is written without an
‘e’ but, according to l'Académie Française, fhe ‘e' js
indispensible. The debate went on for some years and,
for a time, the respective prototypes each carried a dif
ferent spelling of the name. Finally, in 1967, at fhe
oficial rolkout of the first French prototype in Toulouse,
he British contingent gayÿe an unexpected demonstration of fheir apocryphal sense
of “fairplay”. The British
Minister for Technology, Anthony Wedgewood Benn,
announced, somewhoat tongue-in-cheek, that Concorde
would be spelt "à la Française”: "Britain, like France,
has a great stake in Concorde. Our years of cooper
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24
1 - A Avro Vulcan bomber was used as a flying test:
bed for the Olympus engines. The Concorde test pilots
could thus train to fly with the engine before the
prototype Was ready for the air.
2- The production lines on either side of the Channel
were geared-up to make the 80 Concordes that were
ordered. Beyond the pre-series aircraft in the
foreground are the production models.
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
BRSTOL suDEEY, SES SNECMA
OLYMPUS
the space race”, an even more ambitious project set in
a context of even more dramatic political jousting; that
of Capitalists versus Communists. The objective was to
realise one of man's oldest dreams - to put a human
being on the moon; an objective now considered attainable since the Russians had
launched the first Sputnik
and sent Yuri Gagarin into orbit. In spite of the enormous investment that it
represented over and above the
space programme, the prospect of a supersonic airliner
was far too tempting a political coup for the Russians to
ignore. Not only that, but the Soviet Union reasoned
that since they were ahead in the "space race” they
should, equally, be the first to complete a supersonic
airliner.
The Americans, on the other hand, were much more
pragmatic. They were already the world's biggest producer of civil aircraft and
leaders in the everexpanding
air transport business, with the biggest private airlines
in existence such as TWA and Pan Am. The Americans
evidently considered that they had nothing to prove in
this domain, especially since brand new Boeing 707
and Douglas DC:8 jets had just replaced the Lockheed
Constellations and Super Constellations.
Following the medium range Comet and Caravelle
from the European manufacturers, both Boeing and
MacDonnell Douglas had brought out long-range
jetliners, although the Boeing 707 was still a bit short
of range at that time. The early models were still ob- De)
liged to stop, either at Gander in Newfoundland or
Shannon in Ireland, when crossing the North Allantic.
Nevertheless, it was not long before these new aircraft
were to be found in practically every major airline
around the world at no matter what cost. The American
manufacturers had recenily invested if expensive prod
uction tooling and the performance of later models and
derivatives improved considerably. Why, therelore,
would one want to take-on yet another cosily manufact
uring programme? Would the airines be prepared to
invest in the purchase of another new aircralt at a time
when the latest developments were so fast becoming
obsolete by the speed of progresse
Designs for even bigger aircraft were already on the
drawing board and it was remembered that the Super
Constellations had been supplanted by the new jets
only three years after being put into service; would history, then, repeat itself?
But could the United States
stand by and waïch the Europeans, and particularly the
Russians, undertake the challenge which they might, in
the end, carry through to victory£ The Federal
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
Government finally decided that it had to enter the fray
and credit was voted for the project on June Sth,
1963, President Kennedy himself announcing the gor
ahead for the Americans SST, [Super Sonic Transport.
"An essential objective for a strong nation with its sights
set on the future”, were the terms used in his address to
the Air Academy in Colorado Springs. lronically, this
spectacular announcement came only two days after
Pan Am, the biggest airline in the westem word, decided to take up options for six
Concordes.
l was a stategic gamble for the Americans, intended to
reassure themselves of their industrial monopoly.
Concorde was due to enter service in the early ‘seven
ties but the Americans were thinking more along the
lines of bigger aircraft as the natural development: was
this the right way to go? Would it not be better to go for
much faster aircrait instead? Kennedy managed to get
approval for a development budget of one thousand mil
lion dollars to be spread over a period of six years:
75% of it would come from the Federal Administration
and 25% would be contibuted by private industry that
could expect to get some return on the
investment, at least in terms of scientific
and technological spin of.
The American President, actively supported by the U.S. Federal Aviation
Administration [FA], was motivated by a
number of considerations. These were to
maintain American technological leadership, demonstrate the positive
accomplishments possible in a free-market democracy and
create employment. lt was also considered that the
United Siates would benefit from their experience in the
field of supersonic military aircraft, the B-58 and B-70
bombers on which several million dollars had been
spent, but bombers were going out of fashion in favour
of intercontinental ballistic missiles.
The Superpowers' Programmes
The Federal Government put out a call for tender for
the SST in 1965 and which resulted in two projects
being offered. The first of these came from Lockheed,
who proposed an aircrat derived from a military
design and having a delta wing similar to that of
Concorde. The alternative was proposed by Boeing
and was a much more ambifious project and, consequently, much more cosily.
Nevertheless, it was the
Boeing design that was chosen in 1967 by Lyndon
Johnson, by then the successor to Kennedy as President
of the United States of America. The project was
designated simply as the SST as it had, by now,
become popularly known. This aircraft would be a
long-range transport with a speed of up to Mach 2.7,
(much faster than Concordel, and an alkup weight of
300 tonnes. With a length of 315 feet and a range of
4062 miles nonstop, it would carry 200 passengers
and the first flight was scheduled for March 31st,
1972 at the latest.
3 - Even if in proportion the engines seem small, there
is still room for a man to sit comfortably in the jet pipe
to work.
20
1 - Atthe end of Concorde's jet pipes are the
thrustreverser half-shells used to slow the aircraft
on landing; they could also be used in flight for rapid
deceleration.
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
Meanwhile, in the USSR, the famous Andreï Tupolev
was given the responsibility of designing the Russian
supersonic transport, the Tu-144. With a range of 4062
miles non-stop and a speed of Mach 2.4, the Tu-144
would have a passenger configuration of 140 seats
and, right from the outset, the Russians announced that
4 heir aircrait would be the firstever supersonic airliner to
fly. Belore Concorde and, o f course, belore the
American SST. In fact, the Russian air transport system,
argely domestic and autocratically administered behind
4 he lron Curtain, had no real practical requirement for
an ultra-fast commercial aircraft; their entry into the com
pelition was purely political. In the westen world the
situation was entirely different, there was stiff competition
amongst the international airlines and speed was a
contributing factor in gaining market share, not to men
tion in suslaining the aircraft manufacturing industry.
Facts and Figures
The expectation of technological spin-off from the project
was dhiven largely by the fact that a supersonic civil aircraft programme was a
completely new venture. lt was
probably feasible but the details of how it should be
achieved and with what means were still unknown. The
private industry sector was most enthusiastic since it was
oplimistically believed that money would be made avail
able for research and development for such an ambitious programme. The contractors
would, obviousl,
have to tackle a number of welHknown technical problems and certainly many more
sofar unimagined,.
— Pressurisation. For optimum performance the new
supersonic airliners would fly at much higher altitudes
4 4 han was previously the norm, air conditioning and
ra pressurisation system were, therefore, of some impor:
tance. Cabin pressure would be higher and the luseage structure, consequently,
would have to be stronger,
but strength generally implies weight and this was undesirable. New solutions had
to be found and one suggestion was the elimination of cabin windows from the
design, although the idea was quickly abandoned
since it was considered unacceptable in terms of passenger perception.
— Temperaiure. For a normal aircraît flying at 33 000
feet the outside air temperature is around -30°C and
the passage of the structure through the air at 531mph
results in only a very small rise in temperature at the
re point of friction. For a supersonic aircraft at high alt
ide at Mach 2, however, the increased friction result a
in much higher temperatures and, alfhough the outside
air temperature may be as low as -55°C or worse, the
aircraf's skin will heat up to 120°C or 130°C. For the
same aircraft flying at Mach 3, the temperature will rise
to 315'C ! The whole siructure of the aircraft and everything within it are subject
to enormous temperature
variations throughout the different phases of flight, from
intense cold to excessive heat a number of times in succession. These cyclic
variations in temperature imply
physical changes that take place in the materials
concerned; expansion and contraction as well as
changes of state in the condition of the fuel in the tanks,
hydraulic fluid in the pipes, sealants in the joints, etc.
The materials used in aircraft construction at that time,
essentially aluminium alloys, steel, rubber, glass, etc.
were not suficiently sophisticated to be able to withstand such temperature
variations without suffering degradation and premature ageing, so new solution had
to
be found. New light alloys, high tensile steel, hardened
glass and new insultating materials, the relative pertormance of which all had to
be established as a function
of the design-speed of the aircraft. The use of titanium
was one solution and was adopted by both Boeing
and Tupolev but the cost was prohibitive. In 1965 the
price of a kilogramme of titanium was around 9
pounds sterling, or ten times the cost of conventional
metals and it was largely for this reason that the AngloFrench project enviseaged a
maximum speed of only
Mach 2.7, which was already virtually space travel
— Power Plants. The engines had to have enough
power lor take-off from normal airport runways and to
enable economic subsonic flight as well as sustaining
supersonic cruise speeds for three hours or more. To
achieve this it was necessary to equip them with a system of postcombustion, or re-
heat, similar to that used
on military Fighters. This would be used during take-off
and during acceleration up to supersonic speeds. Since
he power output of the engines specified for Concorde
was limited, it was essential to reduce the weight of the
aircraft by any means possible and considerable
weight saving was achieved using lightweight mat
erials in the cabin interior. Seats, carpet, baggage
racks, galleys and even the crockery and cutlery used
on board were all subjected to the weight-saving
programme. {The stainless steel cutlery, elegant
but weighty, specified by both Air France and
British Airways for their meal services were a
constant source of worry to the weight specialists].
— Structural Features. Other solutions had to be found
for the dozens of other technical problems involved in
he design: the mechanism to operate the drooping
nose, for example. With their fighterlike delta wings
the new aircraft, Concorde and the lu-144 at least,
would take-off and land in an attitude of much higher
incidence than their predecessors, and their long point
ed nose cones would obscure the
pilots view of the runway. Hence the
incorporation of the drooping nose into
the design, a feature first applied to a
British experimental military aircraft
some years earlier and which enable
the pilos vision to be improved whilst
maintaining the aerodynamic qualities
of the fuselage for the rest of the flight.
— Wamings' and Alarms. In a supersonic aircraft these need some thought,
for at twice the speed of sound the
2 - The cockpit, which was state-ofthe-art for its time,
was designed to conform to contemporary airlines
cockpits so as not to confuse commercial pilots.
There were nevertheless 200 dials to be monitored
by only three pairs of eyes.
3 - Right from the start of the programme the Concorde
pilots from the customer airlines trained on available
supersonic aircraft. Here, Pierre Dudal of Air France
signes-off after a flight in a Mirage Ill
1 - André Turcat and Brian Trubshaw, the two flight test
chiefs, cast an expert eye over the underside of one of
the prototypes.
2 - To prevent accidents during the ground-roll tests the
Toulouse runway was equipped with a safety net.
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
crew have a lot less time to react to any anomaly. New
ultra-sensitive alarm systems must be incorporated into
the aircraft and relayed to the cockpit.
— Flight Controls. Electronic flight control systems are of
great importance in both facilitating the work of the
flight crew and improving flight safety. Concorde was
the first ever civil aircraft in which electronic computer
controlled fight systems were incorporated.
— landing Gear. Concorde would be subjected to the
same rigorous stresses upon take-off and landing as a
military fighter, only with a greater mass. With these
higher take-off and landing speeds, wheels, tyres and
brakes would, therefore, need to withstand much great
er punishment than a normal aircraft. The absorption of
such Kinetic energy gives a much higher risk of brake
fires and tyre bursts, a factor which must be taken into
account. Originally specified at 18/4lbs, the brake
designs for Concorde also necessitated a weight
saving programme.
- Air traffic Control. In addition to all the physical
considerations in manuf acuring a supersonic aircraft,
the arival of Concorde also gave rise to questions conceming the logistic operation
of the new ultræ-fast airliner. In
spite of a much higher flight level, Concorde flights stil
had to be integrated into the normal pattern of air tratfic control. And so on, and
so on. À seemingly interminable list of problems to be overcome, innovations to
be incorporated and procedures to be perfected bet
ween 1965 and 1970, whether the project were
European, Russian or American.
Planning for the Prototypes
The design teams put themselves to the task with a will
and the various difficulties encountered were met with
determination. In Europe, a major issue was that of the
power plants, for the aircralt as designed was tending
to get bigger and bigger. SNECMA and Rolls Royce,
(the latter having taken over from BristoSiddeley], were
having greater and greater difficulty in obtaining the
power output required of the engines as BAC and
SNECMA experienced delays in refining the complicaed variable air — intakes and the
jet pipes required for
the 17.4 tonnes of thrust under re-heat. However, notwithstanding the various
technical and political holdups, the project steadily went forward: although it now
seemed evident that the first flight of 001, the
Concorde prototype, would not be likely to take place
in 1968 as expected but, more likely, in 1969. The
announcement of the delay provoked a number of cit
cisms from both sides of the Channel, particularly since
the airintake and jet pipe dilemma meant that the first
IWo aircrah, prototypes 001 and 002, would probably
not immediately be capable of supersonic speeds and
cerainly not capable of Mach 2. lt was of little consequence. The Americans had
begun what was a much
more complex programme some way behind the
European team and as for the Russians, they were not
considered a serious commercial threat. Besides, practically nothing was known of
the Russian aircraft which
remained a secret behind the Iron Curtain. On
December 11th, 1967, amid general festivities in
Toulouse, the first of the Concorde prototypes was com
pleted. At last a real aircraft, which made a refreshing
change from the fullsized-mockups shown up until then
at the Le Bourget and Farnborough airshows.
Registered FWTSS, the brandnew aircraft was present
ed to the press and an admiring public at a rollout
ceremony in the presence of French and British
Ministers and government officials. At first sight the aircraft was elegant and
original in appearance: so much
so that it led André Turcat, the French Chief Test Pilot
and opposite number of the Briton, Brian Trubshaw, to
declare that even after having worked for years on the
aircraft that he would eventually fly, and that after
having seen it being built piece by piece, he had never
realised that it could look so good. lt was love at first
sight and a good omen, for had not the famous aircraft
engineer Marcel Dassault once said, "For an aircraft to
fly well, it must first look right"2.
Another prototype was soon to roll off the British production line followed by a
pre-production aircraft from
each of the wo partners. These pre-production aircraft
would be more like the production series models since
they would benefit from all the modifications and refinements resulting from the
prototype test programmes.
N'002, registered G-BSST, left the production line on
September 121h, 1968. Almost identical to 001, there
was, however, a detail which distinguished it from its
French sister ship; the name Concorde’ was written in
large letters across the broad blue band painted on the
tail fin. Although the programme had been further
delayed by industrial action in 1968 and 1969, the
first flight was now well within sight.
Preparing for the First Flight
In accordance with the joint agreement, the partners’
respective teams had worked in parallel since 1963 on
the preparations for the first flight. In France, André
Turcat, a test pilot and holder of a number of speed
records, was recruited to direct the test programme. He
was put at he head of an experienced group of men
such as Jean Franchi, Jacques Guignard, Henri Perrier,
Jean Pinet and Michel Rétif: all pilots or engineers,
some of whom, like Gilbert Deter, were recruited from
the Centre d'Essais en Vol (CEV/. In the British camp the
directorship of their light test programme was conferred
on the very capable Brian Trubshaw with John
Cochrane as his assistant. The first object of their joint
deliberations was the conception of a fulHlight simulator
incorporating back-projected imaging on the cockpit
windscreen and which would quickly become operational in Toulouse. À second
simulator would be installed:
at Fillon. The simulator constituted a technological revolution in terms of flight
training, for it enabled pilots to
gain "ying' experience on an aircraft type without ever
having left the ground.
The engineers worked together with their respective
design offices in order to examine and perfect every
aspect of he complex aircraft systems, while the pilots
continued training on fast jets, the supersonic military
fighters and bombers. In France the aircraft used
were Mirage Ill and IV and in Britain the prototype
BAC-221. They were also required to gain experience
on heavier, civil aircraft such as Comet IV, the
Caravelle and even Boeing 70/5 in the Air France and
British Airways fleets.
Static test airframes identical to the production
Concordes were installed in both Farnborough and
3 & 4 - The safety net was, itself, tested but was never
needed during the development programme.
30
1 - Henri Perrier at the post he occupied for all
of the ground-roll tests.
ge
) AI
nr tra E mmnnremen np pate ce von mpn amer 1,
AETT a) K PISPEE AN di) M
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
Toulouse to undergo intensive structural testing in order
4 lo ascertain their characteristics in the extreme condlice life. Twisted, bent,
heated, cooled,
ib
n
tions of servi
pressurised, vibrated and stretched, these ‘Victims' were
subjected believeable punishment for years until
they had si
(==
mulated three times the normal life cycle of a
real aircrak. Meanwhile in Britain, using a Avro Wlcan
bomber as a testbed, the various versions of the
Olympus engines and their complicated air-intakes
underwent trials. The objective of the test was to slow
down the air entering the engine from Mach 2 to only
312mph, even though the aircraft would be {lying at
supersonic speeds.
At Toulouse Blagnac airport a new runway was built to
accomodate Concorde. Equipped with a safety barrier,
he new runway was longer and would withstand hear
vier aircraït than the single runway previously available.
This considerable investment,
attributed to the Concorde
budget, would be of great
benefit to Toulouse, and long
belore the first flight would be
used for ‘groundolk', high speed
taxing manoeuvres designed
to test the reaction of the flight
controls, the engine thrust and
braking performance of the air4 craft on both wet and dry runway pavements. Dozens
of
his kind would be
made befor
tests of —
e the new aircratt
finally took to the air and,
even if the prototype differed
somewhat from the production series, every conceivable
fault would be simulated during the runway tests under
he most rigourous safety precautions.
Amongst the thousands of French and British firms that
cooperated on the Concorde programme, HispanoSuiza, who with Messier were
responsible for the landing gear, designed a remote-controlled safety net
capable of stopping the test aircrait at speeds of
125mph. With great courage, Gilbert Deer tested this
device in 1968 at the controls of a Caravelle travelling
ot 112mph and which was efficiently arrested by the
4 safety net. At least it was now known that in the event
of an emergency during the Concorde tests a catastrophic accident would be avoided.
With the same philosophy, two emergency parachutes
were installed in the tail of the flight test aircrait to slow
the aircraft on landing or to enable the pilots to regain
control if the limits were exceeded during the more dangerous but necessary tests.
During the test programme there was developed in
Europe a telemetry system that enabled real time transmission of data from the test
aircraït to the test centre.
The supersonic aircraft had to fly a considerable dlistance from its base during
testing in order that the sonic
bang did not occur over densely populated areas. In
addition, at twice the speed of sound, 25 miles per
minutes, its cruising speed}, 625mph of distance represented only half an hour of
flight time. The telemetny system enabled direct contact during each test flight
via a
transmission network which sent data from both the
British and French test aircraft to the powerlul computers
at the test centres. These then processed the masses of
information in real time. The system could also be used
to feed back information to fhe flight crew to represented,
n fact, a foretaste of the Intemet. Today, such procedures seem elementary but
during the ‘sixties they were
revolutionary and provided a great deal of réassurance
to the flight test crews during operations. They were also
reassuring to both he private industries and the govern-
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
ments that had gambled so heavily on Concorde in-sofar as tangible results could be
seen. Such was the acti
vity at Fillon and Toulouse, the respective homes of the
British Aircraft Corporation and Sud Aviation, but of
what was going on in Russia there was absolutely no
information available. The lron Curtain remained drawn.
The American supersonic design concept had initially
incorporated variable wing geometry, but such were the
difficulties involved that the Boeing engineers finally
decided that they were insurmountable without incurring
unacceptable cost and weight penalties. In 1969, therefore, variable geometry was
abandoned in favour of a
"double delta” wing shape similar to both Concorde
and the Tupolev T-144. As far as Concorde was
concerned, such was the overall harmony of the design
that it would be relerredto as a "Gothic-delta” shape
rather than a double-delta. Geometry and aesthetics
had successfully come together.
Concorde's First Flight - Following Tupolev
The daie for Concorde's maiden flight had been set tor
the begining of 1969, but an event was to take place
that added some piquancy to the competition. On
December 31st, 1968, the prototype T-144 tookoff
successfully from Joukovski, near Moscow and flew for
30 minutes. The Russians had scored the first point and
had something extra to celebrate on New Year's Eve.
"We have been the leaders in both civil aviation and
space flight for the last thirhy years. We told the world
that the Tupolev would fly before Concorde and weve
done it, boasted Andreï Tupolev. Nothing could stop
the Russians, who had been instructed to ensure that the
-144 would fly before the end of 1968 in order to upstage Concorde. lt was an act
of political determin Q
tion but the aircraft was, in reality, hardly read =
December 31st, however, was a symbolic date in spit o
of poor weather. Using an imaginative method of clearing the air by dispersing
silver iodide in the clouds from
an aircraf, the Russians were able to improve visibility
just sufficiently for the aircraft to make its first Hight and
so satishy the pride of those in the Kremlin.
Concorde's maiden flight was approaching but the prototypes on each side of the
Channel had still not been
equipped with their engines. Hastily installed when they
finally arrived from England, they were tested and check:
ed in time for Bernard Dufour, then Director of the
Toulouse factory, to officially had over the first prototype, 001, to the Flight
Test Department on December
2/1h, 1968. As agreed in the original partners’
contract, the French prototype would be the first to fly
followed by the British one a few weeks later.
There had been so much discussion and argumen
about the political, technical and financial difficulties
surrounding the Concorde project that the long-awaited
first flight was bound to excite much attention. À first
4 flight, however, is not a routine operation nor is i
S s © 6,
CA ñ LL At LL HT
2 - An old-fashioned cockpit for such an ultra-modern
aircraf.
1 - Brian Trubshaw would fly the British prototype,
002, a month after the French O01's first fight.
2 - The French test flight crew in front of prototype 001
after its first flight. From left to right: André Turcat,
Jacques Guignard, Henri Perrier and Michel Rétif.
without some risk, and the attendant decisions involved
are the direct responsibility of the test pilots. In the case
of Concorde, however, considerable pressure was
being applied by both the media and the political
lobby. The Russians had already flown their prototype,
which only served to stir up passions in France, Britain
and the U.S.A. The subjects under scrutiny did not
include environmental issues, although they soon
would; it was mainly the cost of the project, already tripled in Europe and doubled
in the U.S., that were of
concern. In Russia, of course, such financial arithmetic
was irrelevant. |t was, therefore, essential that
Concorde should fly in order to reassure the taxpayers
on either side of the Channel that their
money had been put to good use and
the project had not merely spawned a
"paper aeroplane”.
Everything was, at last, ready on
February 28th, 1969 and the British
and French engineers and pilots gave
the go-ahead. The press were on tenter
hooks but bad weather postponed the
flight as it had for Russians. Toulouse
was enveloped in fog for three days
and the media, assembled in force, had
to curb their impatience. In the early
morning of March 2nd, the fog was still
thick and the atmosphere was full of sarcastic quips
concerning an aircraft that was delayed by such banal
circumstances as bad weather. The delay, natural,
played upon the nerves of the test crews but it was out
of the question to attempt the flight in such conditions,
for a first flight is not merely a media event, the technical feedback is vital.
Concorde would be accompanr
ied by a chase aircraft that would film and observe the
comportment of he supersonic airliner in flight in order
to physically verify that the instrument readings corresponded with reality. lt
should be remembered that the
Concorde prototype was not equipped at this stage
with systems such as autoland that would be incorporated later into the production
aircraf, and would distinguish it as being one of the first long-range aircraft
capable of blind landings. And so the waiting continved. [One result of this
frustating situation was that henceforth the press would never again be invited to
Toulouse
to Witness the first flight of a new aircraft type, particularly those of the
Airbus family]. At last, in the early
afternoon of March 2nd, a light breeze began to disperse the fog and André Turcat
made the decision to
procede with the flight. Beside the runway were Henri
Ziegler, President of Sud Aviation, and Sir George
Edwards, President of the British Aircraft Corporation.
There was also that day a large crowd of curious spectators and employees from the
aircraft and equipment
manufacturers and, of course, Brian Trubshaw, the
British Chief Test Pilot. In a few weeks it would be his
turn to fly Concorde 002 from Filton in England.
On board 001 the flight test crew took their places in
the cockpit: André Turcat in command in the lefthand
seat and Jacques Guignard at his right as co-pilot. Just
behind them sat Michel Rétif, the flight test engineer,
and further back, in what would normally be the passenger cabin, were 12 tonnes of
computers, recorders
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
and test equipment. Henri Perrier, the flight test navigator, was installed before
an instument panel crowded
with dials. AÏl four men had on their orange or light
blue overalls and were wearing crash-helmets and
parachutes according to standard safety procedures. À
special haïch had been provided in the fuselage for
emergency evacuation in he event of loss of control at
altitude. Now began the laborious verification of the
prelight checkdist: in front of the pilots and flight engineer were 200 dials, 200
warning lights and 100
switches. As the engines were started, an alarm sounded in he cockpit; did this
mean another delaye
I was probably only a faulty sensor rather than a
serious fault but it had to be checked. Was this a bad
omen and would there be other systems failures2 Finally
just after three o‘clock, the aircraft was deemed ready
by its captain and the engines were started, the flight
controls manoeuvred and the assembled crowd held
their breath. Concorde taxied on to the runway, the
engines were run up and less than 30 seconds later the
brand new aircraft was airborne. That memorable date
was March 2nd, 1969 and the time was 03.38pm.
as Concorde flew for the first time in front of press and
television cameras and reporters relayed their impressions live across the air.
What a moving and unique
experience as the great, hawklike aircraft with its long,
imposing nose climbed into the sky over La Ville Rose,
the "Pink City” of Toulouse. On this occasion neither the
drooping nose nor the landing gear were raised as
Turcat decided not to risk any manoeuvre that might
jeopardise the landing. The results of a landing-gear
failure on the first flight did not bear thinking about. As
Concorde flew out of sight, closely accompanied by
the Meteor chase aircraf, constantly watching and fil
ming it, he omboard test equipment was already recording some three thousand
parameters, some of which
were being relayed back to the test centre in real time.
In the same way that mission control would monitor an
astronaufs every heartbeat, the spectators monitored
the very pulse of the Anglo-French endeavour.
After a number of circuits at low speed, some acceleration tests up to 312mph
followed by a series of turns,
the aircraft was taken up to 10 000 feet and then
retumed to Blagnac airport where thousands of spectators, their necks craned
towards the sky, awaited the
touch-down. Concorde made its approach
at the characteristically high angle of incidence,
almost as if it was reluctant to retum to earth: its long
nose thrusting proudly forward. André Turcat and his
crew brought the plane down with a smoothness
appropriate to an aircraft on which the combined
hopes of iwo nations rested. The first flight, which
33
3 & 4 - Unlike the production aircraft, the Concorde
prototypes used a braking parachute to slow down
on landing.
34
1 - Shorily after its first Aight, concorde flew over Paris
for the benefit of the citizens. lt is seen here over the
Isle de la Cité.
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
lasted just 27 minutes, was an overwhelming success.
By the fime the aircraft had taxiedin to he ramp, the
spectators were already there. Turcat, his companions
at his side, waved from the top of the airstairs to the
cheering crowd belore calmly descending to take his
place at a podium installed for the occasion, and from
which would give his first
impressions of the flight. He
seemed, in fact, somewhat
bemused himself by the few
minutes that it had taken to
achieve an exploit that had
been awaited with such impar
tience and apprehension. "As
you see", he declared, ‘the
aircraf flies. Not only that but
it Îlies very well. We have
practised for this moment
repeatedl, so it is less of an achievement in itself than
a new point of depariure in a continuing programme
tht will demand a great deal of effort in perfecting this
wonderlul aircraft during the years before passengers
will be able to fly on it." Turcat ended his address by
concluding that, “the aircrait is everything that was
expected of it”. Finally, with an expression of the fraternit inherent in the world
of aerospace, Turcat paid
homage to another daring project: “in the joy and satisfaction of our success, we
should not forget our
American colleagues who will, tomorrow, leave the
earth on board Apollo IX.
This was a curteous tribute to the three astronauts,
James McDivit, Dave Scott and Rusty Schweickarten,
who would take-off on March 3rd on a mission preparatory to the first moon-landing.
The purpose of the
Apollo IX fight was lo test he command module in terrest
ial orbit; the service module and the landing module of
the ‘space train” that would, eventually, land on the
moon. Marked by the sign of technology, 1969 saw
the dream realised when the two Americans, Neil
Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin set foot where no man had
ever been before — on the surface of the moon.
That evening and the following day, the headlines of
the world's press were given over to the exploits of
Turcat and Concorde: past difficulties were forgotten, |
the Franco-British Concorde had regained credibility.
One month later, on April 9th, Brian Trubshaw, the
British ‘Turcal”, and his crew of five took-off from Filton
on board G-BSST, Concorde 002 on its maiden flight.
I was an equally important moment for the Queen and
her loyal subjects.
The British test flight centre was located at Fairford, not
far from Filton, and it was there that Trubshaw landed
the aircraft. 002's test programme would henceforth be
directed from here, for the Filton runway was consid
ered to be too short. ‘lt was an uneventiul flight", declar
ed Trubshaw with typical British aplomb in front of the
exited crowd that awaited the return of the aireratt. Ît
would be another seven years before Concorde would
enter commercial service, in the meantime, however, it
had to achieve supersonic flight.
Towards the Sound Barrier
On June Sth, 1969, Tupolev announced that his prototype L-144 had broken the sound
barrier only six
months after its maiden flight. The Russians were still
ahead of the competition as he race continued. The
two Concorde prototypes were making regular flights
and completing all the required tests and more, such
wos the level of new technology incorporated into the
design. It was essential, however, that speeds of
Mach 1 and Mach 2 should be achieved without
delay although aircraft 001 and 002 were incapable
of doing so. Their engines, or at last the airinlets that
controlled them, were not yet fully operational.
Nevertheless, no time was wasted as numerous ground
tests, vibration tests, wind-tunnel tests and aerodynamic
calculations had still to be carried out. What litle experience of supersonic
flight was available had shown that
going through the sound barrier was generally accompanied by enormous strain on the
flight controls resulting in unpleasant vibration, as though the aircraft retused
to take fhe vital step. Some early prototypes in
Russia and the U.S. had even broken up in flight. I was
no longer a time for heroics and the engineers concerned proceded methodically and,
with scientific exactitude, took their time to solve the problem.
At last, the new test engines were delivered to Toulouse
by RollsRoyce, although still equipped with fixed airintakes. Once checkedrout,
they were fited to the aircraft which underwent a particularly careful preparation
for fight. At 1 1.23am on October 1st, 1969, this time
with Jean Pinet at the controls, the 130 tonnes aircraft
broke the sound barrier over the Gulf of Gascony.
Gilbert Defer, in the accompanying Mirage Ill, called
out over the radio, "Hey, everyone, l've got Mach 1 on
ji (l the clock!" "Us too”, replied Pinet, who then accelerated
io Mach 1.05 just to make sure he had passed the
speed of sound. Before returning to Toulouse, and as
part of the days programme, Jean Pinet suddenly shutdown one engine. This was a
test designed to ensure
that no harm would come to a supersonic airliner in the
Fà event of loss of engine power. lt was a risky manoeuvre
and two B-58 bomber prototypes had been lost in the
USA. os a result of engine failure during supersonic
test flights. lt was essential to discover how Concorde
would behave in similar circumstances. The results were
excellent and shortly afterwards Concorde attained
speeds up to Mach 1.5 with no difficulty. Back in
Toulouse, two fiters climbed up a ladder and impaled
Concorde o0f à .
a placard on Concorde’s long, swordish-ike proboscis:
he placard depicted a brick wall with a hole in the
middle — the sound barrier.
On May 26th, 1970, the Tu-144 exceeded Mach 2.
The Russians were still ahead of the game and it wasn't
until its 101st flight on November Ath, the same year,
that the Anglo-French aircraft, in its tum, achieved a
speed twice that of sound. The event was preceded by
numerous preparatory flights conducted in Britain by
Brian Trubshaw and his colleagues with aircraft 002.
During the historic Mach 2 flight André Turcat and Jean
Franchi deliberately extinguished first one then a
second of Concorde's engines. To their delight, even
Wilh 1wo engines on the same side of the aircraft extinquished, Concorde remained
{ully manoeuvrable. The
whole programme had gone well: the first flight of each
of the prototypes, the speed milestones of Mach 1 and
Mach 2 in France and Britain, all had been carried
through smoothly, scientifically and without haste.
Concorde's 17 Prospective Customers
On June Sih, 1963, PanAm had taken-up six options
for the new airliner and which were the first orders out
2 - "The hole in the wall": Concorde had broken
the barrier.
3 - The crew that first broke the sound barrier
in Concorde. From left to right: Henri Perrier,
Jean Pinet, André Turcat and Michel Rétif.
4- À parachute was also installed for use in case
of difficult during particularly risky tests. Although
it was never needed during the spin-recovery tests,
it still had to be tried-out in flight.
30 1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
of a total of 24. Pan-Am, the biggest airline in the western world and who had been
a launch customer for
the Boeing 707, wanted to be the first to offer its customers the luxury of a
supersonic jet. The American airline opened the door for 17 others to follow. lt
was
inconceivable to order the Soviet aircraft, of which
nothing was known, and the only other alternative, the
American SST being built by Boeing, would not be
available until 1975, long after Concorde. The SST,
in spite of the fact that it had still not flown, had never
theless filled an order book with 124 options.
Concorde was thus practically certain to enter service
with TWA, Continental Airlines, Qantas, MEA,
American Airlines, Braniff, Lufthansa, United Airlines,
Air Canada, Sabena, Japan Airlines, Air France,
BOAC {which would, by amalgamation with BEA,
become British Airways}, lran Air, Air India and even
CAAC, the authority responsible for air transport in
mainland China.
Difficult Times
IF the majority of the technical difficulties seem to have
been solved, it was certainly not the case for the economic ones. Concorde was
proving extremely expensive: much more expensive than expected and each
escalation of the budget provoked an outcry on both
sides of the Channel by its opponents. The cost of the
project, estimated in 1962 at one hundred million
pounds sterling between the iwo partner nations, had
already tipled. Raw materials and salary increases as
well as extended research and development costs
engendered by delays to the programme continued to
add up. The take-off weight of the aircralt too continved to increase from the
initial 100 tonnes envisaged
to nearly twice that for the production specification.
This was indispensible if the conditions of the original
contract were to be {uliled; that was to carry 128
passengers over 3/50 miles at Mach 2
A its entry into service in 1976, Concorde had cost
1.2 billion pounds sterling between the two partners
which, even at a constant value, meant that the initial
estimate had been multiplied by a factor of five. It
began to look extremely doubt{l if the supersonic airliner would ever be a
commercial success. Not only that,
but would it be available in time to win sufficient market share at that inflated
price2 During the ‘sixties, the
first commercial jets had cleared the way for air transport for the masses and all
manufacturers, in anticipation of the imminent growth in traffic, had begun
designing bigger, more modem, wide-body transports.
These new widebodied aircraft gradually found their
way into the Îleets of the major airlines. Three models
were of American manufacture; the three-engined
Lockheed 1-1017 Tristar and Douglas DC-10, and the
fourengined Boeing 747, the popularly named Jumbo
Jet. The later had made its maiden flight wo months
before Concorde and entered commercial service the
following year. In Europe the French, together with the
Germans and the Spanish, had launched the first
Airbus A3008B in 1968. The British were not, initially,
part of the international consortium constituted as
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
Airbus Industries, although some private companies
such as Hawker Siddeley Aviation joinedin as sub
contractors. Some years later, when HawkerSiddeley
had become the nationalised British Aircraft
Corporation, and in a more favourable political climate, the British were to become
one of the three
major shareholding partners of the Airbus Industries
consortium. These manufacturers were not offering
high speed air transport but economy, and in the face
of these new wide-bodies which were quieter, more
fueefficient and costeffective, Concorde appeared to
be disadvantaged. lt became obvious that a
Concorde would cost about 30% more to purchase
that a Boeing 747 and could only carry 128 passengers versus 350, [at that time].
Speed, therefore,
was its only advantage. Furthermore, a new spectre
arose to plague it: Concorde was accused of being
a polluter.
Since the emergence of the ecological lobby in 1968,
environmental conciousness was becoming more and
more accute; to such an extent, in fact, that in
November 1970, a submission was made to the U.S.
Senate calling for legal measures to be taken to forbid
supersonic aircraft lying over land and subjecting the
population to their supersonic bang. The bang was
ipso facto an intrinsic part of supersonic flight. Research
undertaken during the ‘sixties had provided no solution
lo the problem even though in 1964 a B-58 bomber
had made a series of tests over Oklahoma City. Over a
number of months there had been generated one thousand two hundred bangs, which
provoked numerous
protests and a retrenchment behind inflexible principles.
From that time on the debate was incessant, and from
1968 opposition stiffened when American aviation
experts predicted that 20 years later, by 1990, there
would be 1660 SSTs flying around the world; 1200
Boeings; 300 Concordes and 100 Tupolev 1445.
Was it not enough to have to put up with military
jets which already made too much noise?
In addition to the arrival on the scene of high-volume
air transport and the ecologist movement, it was also
the era of the ‘fuel crisis”. Since the meeting in
Caracas in 1970 of OPEC, [the Organisation of
Petroleum Exporting Countries], oil prices had risen
incessantly and with them the cost of aviation fuel.
Alter the Yom Kippur War in 1974, the escalation
was continuous and exorbitant: from two dollars per
barrel in 1968, the price of oil rose to ten dollars in
1973. Worse than the actual price, there were real
fears for the future of the industrialised world, and in
1978 the price of oil reached 30 dollars per barrel.
The world's airlines, like everyone else, had their eyes
fixed on the oil price index; it was clear that the new
wide-bodies would represent a considerable fuel economy whereas to fly at twice the
speed of sound
would quadruple the fuel consumption per passenger.
I was a situation which gave the airlines much food
for thought. f a Douglas DC-10 bumed 75 tonnes of
fuel to cross the Atlantic with 300 passengers,
Concorde would burn just as much on the same route
with only 100 passengers.
1 - À historic meeting at Toulouse: Concorde 02
face-to-face with the first Airbus A300B shorily before
its first Fight. The era of wide-body air transport
had arrived.
2 - The flight engineer's post in the first British
prototype, Concorde 002.
38
1 - June 30th, 1973: the sun hidden in the shadow
of the moon during a total eclipse. The maximum
duration of a solar eclipse is between seven and eight
minutes, which greatly limits the potential for scientific
observation. By viewing the phenomena from a normal
aircraft an extra five minutes can be gained, by using
Concorde the observation period can be extended
by 70 minutes. On this occasion, over Africa,
prototype 001 was able to fly at the same speed
as that of the moon's shadow as it obscured the sun.
The observers were able to study the range
of the infra-red spectrum emitted, the dust content
of the rings around the solar corona and the corona itself.
2 - Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, then French Minister
of Finance, was the first VIP passenger on the
supersonic Concorde.
Opposite - No, this is not Concorde caught in a snow
storm at Toulouse or Fairford: exposure to extreme
meteorological conditions is part of the test
programme. "Hot and high! tests were carried out by
the British and "cold soak" tests by the French.
At Fairbanks, 5000 miles from Toulouse, the French
aircraft confronts freezing wind, ice, snow and
temperatures of -45°C in February, 1974.
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC
PASSENGERS
t was in this climate of uncertainty that the Concorde
flight tests continued and was undertaken the most
amazing and long:ived development programme ever
known in the history of civil aviation.
Concorde around the World
The Concorde test programme was, for example, three
times more extensive than that of the Boeing 747, a
new type of aircraft in its own right. À total of 5500
flight hours were undertaken in all latitudes over al
types of terrain and in all kinds of atmospheric conditions. Rain, ice and freezing
fog; wet runways, snow
packed runways in Alaska, high altitude runways in
Africa and arid deserts in the Middle East: Concorde
wos spared nothing during these tests.
I was during this period that it was discovered on a
flight over the Equator that the stratosphere, the upper
layer of the atmosphere enveloping the earth, was cold:
er above tropical areas. The average temperature at
65 000 feet is around -56°C, over the Equator is
descends to -85°C. Thus Concorde contributed to
scientific knowledge and, in 1973, three teams of
scientists from around the world embarked aboard the
prototype 001, transtormed into a flying laboratory, in
order to observe an eclipse of he sun. Concorde was
he ideal platform for the experiment because the
supersonic airdraft flew almost at the same speed as
the shadow of the moon and was thus able to keep up
with the eclipse caused by it passing in front of the
sun. An observer on the ground would only have been
able to record the eclipse for a period of seven
minutes; thanks to Concorde‘ flight over Africa, the
astronomers were able to keep the subject in sight for
75 minutes and so considerably enrich their know
ledge of the phenomena. Concorde 001 proudly carried the logo of the event, which
was painted on the
fuselage, until its retirement in October 1973, since
when it has been on exhibition in the Air and Space
Museum at Le Bourget, near Paris: the first civil airliner
to have exceeded twice the speed of sound.
The First VIPs
I goes without saying that the first passengers invited
to fly on Concorde would be those important people,
the politicians. In France, the first of these was Valéry
Giscard d'Estaing, in 1969 occupying the post of
Minister of Finance. The next passenger of note was
the French President of the Republic, Georges
Pompidou, who flew in Concorde to the Azores in
1971 to meet the American President Nixon, conside-
1 - The first supersonic flight for a President:
on May 7th, 1971, André Turcat brought Concorde
to Le Bourget airport to pick-up Georges Pompidou.
In the company of Henri Ziegler, M. Pompidou broke
the sound barrier over the Atlantic before landing
in Toulouse. In his memories, André Turcat recalls that
the President was "almost ai ease."
2 - Another view of Concorde in Alaska.
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
ring it appropriate to thus support the Anglo-French
supersonic project. After their meeting and before leaving the islands, Nixon paid
a surprise visit to the
European supersonic aircraft parked beside his own
Boeing /07, Air Force One, and which flew at more
than twice its speed. The Concorde crew was delighted by Nixon's friendly gesture.
Apart from these moments of relative relaxation or promotional activity, the flight
test programme continued
uninterrupted. The first wo prototypes had come to
the end of their uselul life and were retired to be
replaced by two pre-production aircraft. À little longer, a litle heavier and with
more powertul engines,
they were quite different from their predecessors
although still not to the specification of the production
aircraft that would, eventually, go into service.
These would be even more elegant, being six metres
longer, heavier still and fitted with the final, fully
developed versions of the engines. Both test pilots
and line pilots were to be unanimous in praising the per
formance and handling characteristics of the aircraft.
The maximum speed attained by the supersonic airliner
was achieved by John Cochrane, one of the British test
pilots, who managed to get it up to Mach 2.24. On
the French side, Mach 2.21 was the limit of their
experience and this speed was reached during a parti
cularly event{ul flights which marked the end of the
tests to explore the limits of the flight envelope. "On
that day, recalled Henri Perrier, ‘we had been up to
Mach 2.21 four times in succession, and each time
we experienced engine surge, with audible detonar
tions becoming predictable at the critical speed. In
every case, if power was reduced, everything returned
to normal". The explanation lay with the computer
controlled moveable engine airintakes, the key to successlul supersonic flight, and
which were not allowing
a sufiicient volume of air to enter the engines. At these
high speeds, the air mass was arriving at the intakes
faster than the engines could absorb it and it was thus
‘backingup’ in front of the engine like a sort of plug’
which tended to momentarily stifle combustion. Hence
the detonations or backiring which were in danger of
causing a flame-out, [the extinction of the engine]. It
was, therelore, essential to test this phenomenon at the
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
upper speed limits in order to ensure that in commercial service the aircraft could
fly at speeds in excess of
Mach 2 whilst maintaining the necessary margins of
security. Naturally, alarms and protection systems,
lincluding automatic thrust reduction] were incorporar
ted to ensure that in airline service, the aircraft would
not attain these extremes.
In addition to test flying, Concorde had to undergo a
oute-proving programme. This meant the simulation of
inservice operation to ensure that the aircraft was, in
fact, capable of doing what was expected of it in
terms of security and regulatory conformity once it had
been delivered to the airline. These demonstrations
were carried out using pilots from the customer airlines,
(in addition to a test pilot}, accompanied by observers
from the airworthiness authorities. The regulatory off:
icials represented the French DGAC, the British CAA
and the American FAA. Of course, the commercial airline pilots had also to undergo
training as for any new
aircraft type that they were likely to fly. Initially this
consisted of familiarisation with the systems and char
racteristics of the new supersonic aircraft, later they
would gain experience on the simulator at Toulouse or
Filton before finally flying the real thing.
The pilots were not the only ones to have to learn
about the new aircraft, it was also essential that the
maintenance personnel and cabin crew had a detailed
knowledge of the machine. Their experience could be
of great value in overcoming previously unimagined
problems, such as those encountered by a steward.
"We found out that the high rates of acceleration and
deceleration, as well as the high angle of incidence
adopted by the aircrat in flight, meant that any meals
involving sauces or creams tended to overflow and get
mixed together”. lt was recommended, therefore, that
meals served on Concorde, should avoid too much
sauce and not be too liquid.
41
3 - Concorde 002 over Singapore during its Far
East tour. This small Asian state was to become
on of the aircraf's most fervent supporters.
4 - Upon retirement the prototype 001 became
an exhibit in the air and Space Museum at Le Bourget
in October 1973. Visited every year by nearly
200 000 people, it also serves as a giant umbrella for
the visitors to the airshows. Exposed to the elements
for 22 years, 001 was refurbished in 1995.
5 - À surprise visit by the American President,
Richard Nixon, at the time of his meeting with
President Pompidou in the Azores in December 1971.
Henri Ziegler is seen here shaking hands with the
U.S. President, who deplored the fact that
the United States had abandonned their own
SST project.
1 - The British crew that undertook the route-proving
flighis in the Far East and the Pacific:
Captain E.C. (Mickey) Miles, Director of Operations
ot British airways, and John Cochrane [on the right},
Deputy Flight Test Director of British Aerospace.
2 - The first Concorde passengers were surprised that
there was no partitular sensation as they flew through
the sound barrier.
4 Passenger perception was also of great importance
and 50 "testpassengers' were recruited for their opinions. There was no difficulty
in finding them in large
number such were the lists of willing volunteers, and
on one occasion the Captain of a flight from
Heathrow was obliged to resort to pulling numbers
from a hat to select those required from the expectant
crowd. Over hundredks of hours of route-proving flights,
these priviledged and happy passengers flew at Mach
2 to such destinations as Singapore, Bahrain, Dakar,
Casablanca, Kuala hampur, Sydney, Melbourn,
Bombay, Caracas, Dallas, Rio, Bueno Aires, Boston
and Washington. In all, over 40 different countries
and areund 100 different airports. On one occasion,
in Australia, these passengers were caughtup in the
first anti- Concorde demonstration organised by environmental lobbyists.
During these demonstration flights the aircraft proudly
carried the names of/their respective manufacturers,
now known as British Aerospace and Aerospatiale,
due to various mergers and amalgamations], or the
liveries of the French and British airine customers, Air
France and British Airways. Apart from the Australian
incident, Concorde was welcomed by enthusiastic
crowds curious to see the aircraft which, in addition to
its intrisic charisma, was breaking world speed
records on almost every flight. Concorde was all that
was expected of it. lt was supersonic; it could excceed
twice the speed of sound; it had a range of 3750
miles and could cross the Aantic, and the passengers
suflered no ileffects from either the speed or altitude. |
could not be denied, however, that there was a
penalty to pay for such magnificence; Concorde was
as noisy as any ofher aircraft of the era.
America Abandons the SST
The intransigent opponents of supersonic aircraf, and
particularly of Concorde, felt themselves at a disadvantage as long as the Unites
States continued with
their SST project. The situation was to change
overnight on March 241h, 1971, one year after
Concorde‘ first flight, when the American Senate refused to vote further public
funds to Boeing and
General Electric. That auguste body thereby ratilied
he decision taken previously on March 18h by the
House of Representatives. The first SST prototype was
far from being finished and even then the range cal
culations were already seen to be inadequate. The
SST appeared to be a technical failure. Two days
later, on March 261h, 1971, 13 000 workers were
laid off by the contractors and the effects were to be
similarly felt by the numerous small suppliers to the
project.
"Concorde is condemned", jubilently declared JeanJacques Servan-chreiber, the most
virulent opponent
of the Franco-British project. For Concordes supporters
ie situation appeared disasterous: "We felt like crying
at the time”, recalled André Turcat, "for from then on
we were alone to fight the battle’. Concorde adver
saries could only multiply.
KL
How could such a disaster occur8 Boeing had encountered a number of technical
problems which, as for
their colleagues across the Alantic, were of a magnitude commensurate with the
grandeur of the ambition
involved. The financial implications proved too much
for the budget of one thousand million dollars, which
had already been overspend and which, clearly, was
still insufficient. The American SST suffered from the
same scale of cost escalation as Concorde and the
3 - Dallas, Texas was the first American airport visited
by Concorde 002. Here, the symbol of speed
is greeted by a Wells Fargo stage coach on September 20h, 1973. The curious
spectators were witness
to the fact that Concorde was nos noisier
than a conventional aircraft of the time and that
it made less smoke.
4 -IFthe New York Port authorities did their best
to prevent Concorde landing there, the American
trades unions protested against what they judged
a protectionist attitude: "Welcome Concorde,
New York needs you, you need New York".
44
1 - The second oil crisis was bad news for Concorde.
The Asahi Shinbun of June 30th, 1973, illustrated
the fact with humour.
2-In 1972, 17 airlines had taken option to buy
80 Concordes. In their regulation uniforms,
the hostesses of fifteen of them posed in front of
the aircraht. (QANTAS, BOAC, Air Canada, MEA,
Sabena, Air France, Continental, Eastern, Pan-Am,
Lufthansa, TWA, American, United, Braniff and
Japan Airlines). Air India and CAAC were absent.
727 = 1SËp
LS HET
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
project had started-out being more expensive in the
first place. Thus was abandoned a programme of
which 75% of the funding came from Federal funds.
From now on the Americans no longer had any reason
to defend the reputation of supersonic airliners and the
‘anti" lobby were left with only one target to attack
and nothing to distract them. Within the space of a
few months, Concorde was accused of just about
every vice imaginable. IF normal jets were polluters,
supersonics would be worse: they would destroy the
ozone layer: their supersonic bang would be insupportable to the population: the
noise of their engines on
take-off and landing would be intollerable to residents
in the neighbourhoodk of airports and, at a time when
oil resources were becoming scarce, they would
consume excessive quantities of fuel. On board, passengers would be asphyxiated by
ozone poisoning
and pregnant women would risk abortions! In adition
to all of this, Concorde was anti-democratic, being
reserved for an elite.
Having vanquished a number of formidable adversaries along the way so far, this
time the future really seemed bleak.
1973: A Difficult Year
1973 was marked by the Yom Kippur war and the
second oil crisis. The airlines were losing money as
overheads soared, particulalarly those in the U.S.A.
and PanAm, Concorde first prospective customer,
was beginning to have doubts about confirming its
options by the end of January. The contract stated
that the American airline had six months to make
up its mind after confirmation of purchase by Air
France and British Airways, and these two had
signed up the previous June; Time was running out. It
was a period of suspense for the French and British
airines, however, the bad news arrived during the
night of January 31st, when Pan-Am, whilst acknowledging Concorde's technical
prowess, cancelled
their options. TWA and America Airlines soon follow
ed Pan-Amss example as well as all the other U.S.
customers.
That same year, the American Senate forbade supersonic civil aircraft from flying
over United Sates territory. lt was a decision taken under pressure from the
environmental lobby and one which would be adopted by a number of ofher countries,
including France
and Great Britain, to general surprise. lt was ‘a vote
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
against science and technology", declared the
American Senator, Henry M. Jackson.
The Senate's decision was the first official act towards
condemning Concord in the U.S. Had American
industry supported the ecologists or been led by them?
In any case, it didn't make much difference. By
condemning Concorde the ecologists ensured that the
most highly industrialised nation in the word did not
risk being outrun in the field of aviation.
1973 was also a bad year for Tupolev and the inhabitants in the neighbourhood of Le
Bourget, near Paris,
where the Paris Airshow took place. In spite of the
co
opposition lobby, the general public showed great
interest and enthusiasm for supersonic airliners. In
1971 the early prototypes of both Concorde and the
Tupolev l-144 were at the airshow but only on static
display. Two years later, and for the first time ever, they
would both make demonstration flights to the public
every day. lt was, up to a point, a new chapter in the
manifestation of Western-Soviet rivalry and was
eagerly anticipated by the thousands of spectators at
the world's biggest airshow. Queueing daily to watch
the partisans of each type argued over which of the
two aircraft was the best.
This festive atmosphere, however, was soon to end on
June 3rd in a tragic accident. The Tupolev lu-144
broke up in flight during a demonstration and crashed
on Goussainville, a nearby village; the Soviet aircrait
disintegrating in the sky before the eyes of the spectators. AI seven members of
the crew were killed as well
as thirteen inhabitants of Goussainville, and a number
of people were injured and buildings destroyed. Was
it pilot error or mechanical failure that had caused the
accident® Probably both, according to the specialists,
but full details would never be known with certainty. In
spite of this dramatic setback, he Russians announced
that they would continue the development programme
of their supersonic aircrat.
In the months that followed, preparations for
Concorde’ entry into service continued, with the main
obstacle being America. Concorde seemed made for 4 ===
45 3 - Concorde landing at the Le Bourget Airshow
in 1973 with its competitor, the Tu-144,
in the background.
4 - Concorde 002 in India during a London-Melbourne demonstration flight in June
1972. The BahrainBombay sector was flown in 1hr 53mins and the
aircraft also stopped in Tokyo, Singapore, Tehran and Beirut during its tour. The
pilot was Brian Trubshaw.
46
1 - Athens, January 1973: Concorde over
the Acropolis. The aircraft was to return several times
and twenty years later was to carry the Olympic flame.
2 - An arist's impression of Concorde over
Rio de Janeiro clearly showing the Sugar loaf
Mountain and Corcovado's Christ.
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
the trans-Atlantic sevice between Europe and the
United States, where supersonic speed could be best
exploited. The general interdiction that prevented the
aircraft flying over inhabited areas meant that there
remained, for practical purposes, only the long-range
trans-oceanic routes open to it. |} was some consolar
tion to think that four fifhs of the planet was covered
by water or consisted of deserts.
With some scepticism the former customers one by
one cancelled their options, following the example of
he American airlines, until only the fwo national car
fiers of the parier countries, Air France and British
Airways, remained to share deliveries of he aircraft
now on the production line.
Waiting Lists
Às early as 1966, Concorde enthusiasts had been put
ting their names down for the first scheduled flight. The
waiting lists in both France and Britain were endless
and consisted not only of Europeans but of Americans
and Japanese too. There was still a long way to go,
however, before these prospective passengers were
able to buy their tickets. The aireraft had still to complete their certification
tests to the satisfaction of the
British an French airworthiness authorities, not to mention the Americans, [an
essential requirement}.
Condordes contractors had got aufhorisation from their
respective governments to complete only ten production
aircraft and undertake provisioning for six more, and
this was what was happening on each side of the
Channel. In view of the hazard encountered during the
previous months, the marketing effort had to start again
from scratch and Concorde would have to prove its
worth once in service. If it could be shown that it represented an advantage to its
French and British operators, perhaps ofhers would be convinced. They would
have to make up their minds fast, however, belore production ended and the
facilities closed down.
The Port of New York Authority
Being forbidden to overly most inhabited land masses
meant that the main advantage of he supersonic air:
iner was lost. Concorde, therefore, had to have
access to New York whilst not totally ignoring other
possible international routes. Of ihe 200 possible
long-range routes surveyed, only 40 of them exploit:
able by a supersonic transport would provde sufficient
firstclass traffic, Concorde’ principal clientele. Great
Britain and France, situated on the shores of the
Alantic, were in a privileged position. Other European
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
countries, however, were less fortunately placed: the
distances to be flown from them at subsonic speeds
before regaining the ocean were too great. The high
fuel consumption for such a large proportion of the
flight would negate the advantage of the supersonic
sector, for the aircraft was designed for optimum
performance at high speed. With a range of 4062
miles at a speed of Mach 2, including fuel reserves,
this did not enable it to fly from Frankturt, Munich or
Rome to New York with such long subsonic sectors
involved. Amongst other things, it was decided that
Concorde passengers would pay a premium over and
above the normal first class fare. This was calculated
on the basis that if Concorde fares were the same as
any other, then the supersonic service would draw highfare paying passengers away
from the "normal first
class services over which there was so much competition.
This was particularly true of the trans-Atlantic route and
could even destroy the market for first class tickets on
conventional aircraft, the Boeings Douglas’ and Airbus
types. Because of this there was heawy pressure from
inside the International Air Transport Association,
(IAA), whose members consisted of the major airlines,
to impose a 40% surcharge for Concorde tickets over
and above the normal first class tarif. Had this notion
been carried, then Concorde would have been inaccessible to the majority of
travellers, first class or ofherwise, and the British and French delegates fought
tooth
and nail to resist it. They succeeded in reducing the
premium to only 20% but even that meant that
Concorde would be an expensive luxury for an elite
number of passengers.
n the face of this decision some thought had to be
given as to how the service would be marketed.
nstead of the usual two or three class layout, it was
decided that there would only be one particularly luxurious first class - Concorde
class. Although there was
ess space in the supersonic airliner than in a normal
jet, owing to the narrow, streamlined fuselage, the service offered would be
particularly refined. In the end,
in order to accomodate wider seats, the passenger
configuration was reduced from 128 to 100, which
Q so made it lighter and more fuel-efficient.
> lof this was fine in theory but in order to guarantee
its survival it was essential that Concorde get authorisation to land on US.
territory. À reluctant Federal
Administration had, however, been putting obstacles in
the way since 1973 and this was to continue up until
n/ — ; /
47
3 - Concorde 002 being flown over Sydney
in Australia by a British crew.
4 - Henri Ziegler making a presentation to Braniff
in Dallas. Although the airline didn't buy Concorde,
they leased some from British Airways and Air France.
+
"& = L., Ÿ
- Role
l
48
MINISTÈRE DES TRANSPORTS S'E MM C'RYÉ AURIIEANT
NT I L'AANNAIRANDINO GTV
A
NE R:ASL
GË
RÉPUBLIQUE FRANÇAISE
e
CERTIFICAT
DE NAVIGABILITÉ DE TYPE
Numéro: ___7E
Par le présent Certificat étsbli à la demande des Sociétés
LAS, et BA
fie que les uérorefs du (des) pets) définition, leur cémstruetion, leurs que ements
de avigabllé français applicables ins définies des la fiche de ravigesllité
de l'Arrété du 6 saptembre 1967 relaif aux est valable dns les condiions fixées par
ledit Arrêté
Marque: _GCNCORDE
Tipes : 1
1 Version, 101 Approuvd le 9_Octobre 1975
h Décesbre 1975
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
1977. In the face of such prevarication the two
Concorde operators had to look elsewhere to find
employment for the six supersonic aircraft that they
were about to receive and so they tumed to less intransigent countries.
There were a number of these prepared to authorise
if not supersonic overdlight rights, at least the use of
their airports: Canada, South America, Africa and
Asia all offered possibilities. It remained only to evar
luate the commercial potential of the available
roules.
Air France decided to fly the Paris — Rio de Janeiro
route with a stopover in Dakar on the way to Brazil;
the time taken, including the stopover, would be less
than seven hours compared to 12 hours for a normal
jet. The French airline also enviseaged ParisCaracas, in Venezuela, via the Azores:
this fight
would only take six hours as the route — proving programme had demonstrated.
British Airways, for their
part, decided to open a service between London
and Bahrein, in the Persian Gulf; this would be a
direct flight taking 6hrs 45mins. lt was also proposed
to fly on to Singapore or even Melbourne, in
Australia. As for the United States, that would have
lo wait.
Environmental Friendly Concorde
Before going into service Concorde and the other
supersonic airlines were the butt of the wildest imaginings of an ignorant public.
So called "experts" in all
fields predicted such disasters as the passengers al
being killed by the high pressure induced by supersonic fight; or that they would
be asphyxiated or affected by radiation. l was even suggested that the new
aircraft would fly at such altitudes that they would be
destroyed through encounters with meteorites. lt was
equally foreseen that Concorde would be responsible for destruction of the ozone
layer that protected
the “earth from the sun's dangerous radiation. Of
course, the constant supersonic bangs, together with
the deafening noise of the high-powered engines,
would make normal life impossible. The critics were
relentless as always when they felt threatened by
innovation. |
was as if there has been a giant step backwards
into a technologically primitive era before the advent
of railways. At the beginning of the last century a
French physicist, Arago, had declared that, ‘in tunnels, railway passengers would
be inconvenienced
4 È
TAGR
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
by perspiration and they would be attained by pleurisy, fluxes and catarrh”. In
1847, after the abdication
of Napolean Ill, Adolphe Thiers, the head of the provisional government, considered
railways, "playthings
with no future”. And in 1829 the Goveror of New
York, Martin Van Buren, wrote to President Jackson,
“Railroad cars are pulled at the enormous speed of
15 miles per hour by steam-engines that threaten the
lives of the passengers, set fire to the crops, stampede the cattle and frighten
women and children”. In
England too, the opponents of the first railway line
between Manchester and Liverpool had been adament that, women would have mis-
carriages if they travelled by train and that in the fields beside the rail
ways cows' milk would dry up and hens would
cease to lay”. There are many ofher examples of the
fear engendered by innovative ideas but perhaps the
most telling was exemplified by the declaration made
by an eminent scientist in 1903, the American
astronomer, Newcomb who, shortly before the
Wright brothers’ first flight, [although subsequent to
Clément Ader's tentative hop}, stated: 'Aerial flight
presents insurmuntable problems that will never be
overcome by man’.
One of the criticisms levelled at Concorde was that it
was anti- democratic: "Why should vast fortunes be
spent simply to enable Americans millionaires to
cross the Atlantic 2” asked its detractors. Henri
Ziegler's reply was no less pertinent. Evoking the
Soviet Tu-144 he riposted, "Do you think that the
Russians’ only objective is to satisty American millionaires too 2” it was in this
context of passionate
debate that pilots, engineers and technicians attempted to show that Concorde was
nothing more than a
normal, if high performance, aircraft. First of all, the
ozone layer was in no more danger than from other
aircraft; next, if passengers were ever exposed to
radiation then it was in infinitely small quatities and
in any case, since Concorde was faster, the exposure was reduced.
The subject of the supersonic bang was less easily
disposedof. In order to reassure the critics, rigorous
operational procedures were established for every
route enviseaged: Concorde would only accelerate
lo supersonic speed once it had left inhabited areas,
over the sea or desert areas. Tests in both Great
Britain and France had revealed that the anticipation
of a noise was in fact more disturbing than the noise
itself. On several occasions, after the cancellation of
previously-announced test flights, complaints were
registered from the public. Conversely, ur-scheduled
flights carried out without prior warning elicited no
reaction. Nevertheless, special procedures were inst
gated in zones where the supersonic aircraft was
obliged to fly at low altitude in order to limit, as far
as possible, the nuisance caused by engine noise,
especially during take-off. These regulations were
applied uniquely to Concorde whilst hundreds of
DC-8 and Boeing 70/5 of an earlier and noisier
generation flew with impunity.
1 & 2 - A lineup of the first British and French
Concordes: the nose of the production aircraft would be slimmer and more elegant.
3 - The certificat of Airworthiness, the "magic word"
allowing the aircraft to enter commercial service,
was issued joinily by the French and British authorities on October 9th, 1975, and
December 4th, 1975,
respectively.
4- Caracas; Rio; Washington: the Air France
and British Airways ticket offices proudly announce
their services.
0
1 - Concorde introduced a new concept of time.
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
The First Commercial Service
n October and November 1975, the French and
British airworthiness authorities respectively issued
hose indispensible official documents, the
Certificates of Airworthiness, authorising Concorde
o carry fare-paying passengers. lt was an emotiona
moment for all those who had laboured and fought
over the innumerable difficulties, technical, ethica
and philosophical, to bring the project to fruition. It
was the result of 5500 hours of test flying of which
2000 of them took place at supersonic speed: no
other aircrait in the world had ever been subjected to
so much testing and examination. Now it was up to
the remaining wo airlines to ensure its commercial
success and January 21st, 1976 would be the
magic date when services would begin as planned
between Paris and Rio and London and Bahrain.
Never had the term ‘flag-carrier' been so apily applied
to either airlines or airliners. These new aireraft really
were symbolic of the iwo countries that had conceived
them. Did they not represent the sumit of technical
achievement in the western world, the industrial and
intellectual potential of two nations? At last he critics
would be silenced: all those who had said that it was
impossible and who had tried to prevent it going forwr
ard and who had neaïly succeded. Not since the
allied victory in 1945 had Great Britain and France
had the opportunity to take such pride in mutual endeavour. In celebration of the
fact the aircrait were decorat
ed with the national flags of their respective countries,
painted in stylised form on the tail fin of each one. On
the long, slim fuselage, painted white to emphasise the
elegance of the supersonic airliners, the name of the
manufacturer from whose production line they had
emerged was the only visible inscription. The strains of
the Marseillaise and God Save the Queen filled the air.
At 11.40am on the day of the inaugural flight, the
passenger list for the British Airways Concorde depart
ing from Heathrow for Bahrain included a number of
celebrities, like the Duke of Kent, as well as farepaying passengers. The same
applied in the case of
the Air France flight from RoissyChaïles de Gaulle at
Paris, except that there it was already 12.40pm since
in the U.K. winter time was one hour behind the rest of
Europe. (Something else that had made life difficult for
the partners during their cooperation]. The ministers,
journalists and other dignilaries were in the minority,
however, for this was above all a commercial service
and the waiting list, begun ten years previously in anticipation, was already full
of the names of people from
all over the world who were ready to pay a high price
to get on board. The doyen of the Paris passengers
was Mme Aurélie Ouille, a "Toulousaine" of 82 years
of age, and her reservation had been confirmed since
1967. À connoisseur of great events and veteran of
numerous inaugural flights, she had been on board the
France on its first crossing of the Atlantic as well as
that of the Mermoz.
In London, a group of Japanese businessmen got on
board accompagnied by a compatriot, Mr. Tanaka
Shoji, who had made their bookings in 1966.
Another contented passenger was Chris English, an
American, [in spite of his name}, who was a messenger in the offices of the New
York Times, and amongst
he remaining passengers there were lialians, Swiss,
Germans and Spaniards — but no Russians!
On either side of the Channel, the two aircraft took-off
in front of a battery of TV cameras, and others would
cerfainly cover their arrival at their respective destinations. Radio reporters
gave live commentary on the
London-Bahrain flight, [undertaken in 3hrs 38mins insead of the usual 6hrs 1
5mins}, or the ParisRio service
from a French to a Brazilian summer in 6hrs 37mins.
In fact it was a litle over /hrs including the stopove
n in Dakar and such was the enthusiastic welcome by
the Senegalese President, Leopold Senghor, that :
overran the schedule]. Enthusiasm for Concorde was
unbounded in spite of the political obstacles that had
hreatened to clip its wings.
The era of supersonic air travel had arrived, and the
French Post Office commemorated the historic occar
sion of the inaugural flight by issuing a new postage
stamp designed by the celebrated aviation artists, Paul
Lengellé.
Twenty years later, to commemorate Concorde's entry
into service, another special flight was organised bet
ween Paris and Rio by the travel agent TMR. André
Turcat, who had flown the aircrat that day in 1969,
\\ Le ie
Al Ni A a
2 - The Air France sales office on the Champs-Elysées
in Paris displayed a huge Concorde cutout.
The colour scheme painted on the tail was to become
the airline's company logo.
3 - À postage stamp designed by Paul Lengellé,
an aviation artist, well known as "peintre de l'air".
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
1 - À rare colour photo of the Tu-144, shown here
on approach with its nose drooped and landing gear
down during the Paris airshow in 1973. After a second
accident in 1978 the programme was abandonned
and Tupolev put the last aircraft produced into
airworthy condition for use as a flying laboratory
for... Boeingl
2 - Sixteen production aircraft were manufactured
at Toulouse and Filton, but since all the export orders
were cancelled, the national airlines of the two partner
countries each took seven of them with two being
reserved as development aircraft by the constructors.
came out of retirement specially to take the controls
again for the benefit of one hundred privileged passengers.
The End of the Tu-144
Alfhough the first supersonic airliner to fly, the Tu-144
didn't go into commercial service until November 1st !
1977 and then with only 80 passengers aboard. The
"Concordsk/', as it was nicknamed, was a disappoint
ment lo its designers for, in spite of extensive modifications to ils engines, the
Tupolev would not maintain a
speed of Mach 2 without using re-heat. In addition, it
burned far too much fuel, which reduced its range. Put
into service with Aeroflot on December 261h, 1975, it
at first only carried freight and mail alfhough in 1977,
against the recommendations of its designers, appar
renly}, it was used for passenger services between
Moscow and AlmarAta, the capital of Kazakhstan. Six
months later no doubt as a result of the accident of
June 6th, 1978, Aeroflot withdrew the aircraft from
service although ofiicially the Tu-144 continued to {y
sporadically until 1982. The secrets of the Russian
"Condordski" remained firmly locked behind the Iron
Curain although 20 aircraft were built, 8 prototypes
and 12 production models. The end of the Soviet
supersonic project was not only a commercial failure
but a technological setback as well, and henceforth
Concorde remained the only supersonic airliner in ser-
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
vice in he world. With a liberality unusual until "prerestroika”, the Russians
hardly ever refused Concorde
navigation rights to fly over their territory.
Concorde and Espionage
Às soon as the Tupolev T-144 appeared, even as a
mockup at the 1963 Paris Airshow, the Russians were
suspected of espionage. Their new supersonic airliner
looked so much like that being built on either side of
he Channel that it was obvious that the Soviet designers had been inspired by
Europe hightechnology
project. The two aircraft looked disturbingly similar
whereas the American SST was obviously different.
From 1969 onwards, when both the European and
Russian prototypes were to be seen at international airshows, the suspicions
deepened and it was this that
gave rise to the Tupolev's nickname, "Concordski".
In fact, the similarity was mainly due to the nations
involved having simultaneously identified the same
objectives and which thereby suggested the same
technological solutions. It was, therelore, necessary
that both projects should have a delta wing- form for
speeds up to Mach 2; that they should both use
engines incorporating afterburn; that they should both
introduce novel C of G tim systems using fuel as bal
last: and that they should both find aerodynamic solutions such as the drooping
nose. There were very few
alternatives at the time. Nevertheless, there were
indeed some attempts at industrial espionage and a
number of agents working for the Eastem Block were
interogated, although it appears that they had not
been able to pass on vital information in time.
There were, however, some notable differences between Concorde and its Soviet
cousin. The later had
engines of different design and positioned closer to the
fuselage; the dynamics of the wing seemed less harmonious and there were the
addition of the "moustaches", the canard siabilisers on either side of the forward
fuselage. There were, no doubt oiher less visible
discrepancies.
Amongst other things, the Russian prototype was produced ahead of that of the
Anglo-French partners and
in any case, industrial espionage mosily consisted of
intelligence about the degree of technological progress of ones competitors; an
easier task for the
American allies of the Franco-British team and who
had official access to Filton and Toulouse via the FAA
during certification of the aircraït. From a commercial
point of view the Americans were curious to see how
far their European cousins had progressed and they
were particularly interested in the engine air-intake
experiments, the results of which they used in developing their SST.
Às for Andreï Tupolev, if he had fielded spies it was to
no avail, for history has proven that the information
that they might have brought back was either insufficient or wrongly interpreted.
3 - Like all aircraft in service, Concorde takes a shower
two or three times a year.
54
| - À Federal officer warily surveys the first two
supersonic aircraft to bring passengers from Europe
to Washington
Opposite page - The crew of the first commercial
Concorde flight from Paris to Rio de Janeiro on January
21st, 1976: Capt Pierre Chanoine [centre],
Captain Pierre Dudal {right}, and Flight Engineer
André Blanc.
CONCORDE IN SERVICE
= although it is now a generation old and flies
alongside much more recent aircrat, Concorde still
looks extremely modern. They were of solid
construction albeit only 20 of them were made: 4
prototypes and 16 production airctaft, of which the
four former are now on display in British and French
Museums.
The wo production aircraft were kept by the contractors
or use during an extended development programme
before, in their turn, being put on display to the public
at Toulouse and Filton.
The governments of the respective partners having
authorised expenditure on 16 production aircraft and
the majority of customers having cancelled their
options, all 14 remaining machines were destined for
Air France and British Airways. "Fiftyifty" as always,
they each took seven of them as and when they came
off the production line, and since there were no
further customers the assembly lines were shut down
as the last aircraft emerged.
Of these last wo supersonic airliners, that from th D
French facility first flew in 1978 and the British one i
1979,
In the meantime the two airlines continued their battle
_
for landing rights. After inaugurating the Rio and
Bahrain services on January 21st, 1976, Caracas,
Singapore and Melbourne were to follow whilst
awaiting the outcome of attempts lo gain access to
the U.S.A.
The U.S. Federal Administration finally accepted
Concorde in the spring of 1976 but immediately the
Port of New York Authority, PONYA, relused to admit
the aircraft and yet another rear-guard action had to
be fought in the courts and elsewhere in order to
prove that the supersonic airliner was not the pariah it
was made out to be.
While all this was going on a service had begun
between Europe and Washington DC, since
Washington-Dulles airgor was under the authority of
the American Federal Government. On May 24h,
both the British and French Concordes landed at
Dulles on their first scheduled services and the two
aircraft posed, noseto-nose in front of the airport
terminal for a photo-call.
srREa se pEUDe MAPPTEAS DENE nr 0
56
| - At Mach 2 there is just time for a good lunch
etween the Eiffel Tower and the Statue of Liberty.
) - November 22nd, 1977: New York at last! Once
gain, tWo Concordes arrive simultaneous from
urope, but the last obstacle in a long battle was over
ome too late for Concorde to be a commercial
UCCESS.
CONCORDE IN SERVICE
Eighteen months later on November 22nd, 1977,
New Vork opened at last but it was too late to save
the Concorde production line.
One may wonder at what might have been the
outcome had European airports refused entry to the
first long-range jets, the Boeing 7/07 and Douglas
DC:8, just as noisy and polluting as Concorde if not
more 50. Merely bureaucracy or was there a more
sinister motive to all the legal peregrinations? One
cannot but question the legitimacy of some of the
obstacles thrown up during this difficult time. One
thing is certain, however, the persistent prevarication
for years on end over issues that the Europeans
couldn't imagine would be so sensitive was fatal to
the Franco-British aircrat.
Nevertheless, the inauguration of services to
Washington and New York, the destination for which
Concorde had been designed, was the signal for
celebration.
Things, however, are never quite as simple as they
seem and a special take-off procedure, worked-out
by the test pilots in Toulouse, had to be adheredto
when leaving New York in order to satishy the Port
Authority with regard to noise regulations. In fact,
sensors were installed around the city with the object
of measuring noise levels and from November 22nd,
1977, on every flight the passengers were advised
of the manoeuvre which became a veritable ritual.
As soon as the landing gear had been retracted after
take-off the pilot banked the aircraft 25° and
immediately turned out over the ocean; a manoeuvre
rendered possible due to Concorde's remarkable
handling characteristics and an inaïtentive passenger
probably wouldn't even notice. The object was to
avoid flying over the inhabited zones neighbouring
the runwavy.
Another element of the take-off ritual consisted in an
air traffic supervisor in the control tower reading the
various sensors and announcing whether or not the
noise limits had been exceeded. lt was a rare
occurance if it happened at all; most of the sensors
didn't even register the aircraft as being different from
any other. For the Concorde pilots the ability
2
CONCORDE IN SERVICE
to maintain this relative quietness came to be
regarded with some pride as an example of their skill.
Gradually, New York became the centre of Concorde
operations for the two airlines since there was
insufficient trafic to and from other destinations by
virtue of the high ticketcost. With so few aircralt in
their respective fleets the British and French airlines
naturally preferred to operate them on the high-yield
route. The positive result of this decision was that the
two airlines have retumed a profit on their supersonic
services for the last ten years, and since 1982 the
North American routes were the only ones to be
maintained: British Airways was the last to operate
the Washington service. Nearly 20 years after
entering service and nearly 35 years after the initial
plans were drawn up, Concorde is still making money
for its operators, and for all its age in years, it
remains one of the most technically advanced aircrat
in the world.
The Braniff and Singapore Airlines' Operations
Braniff was at one time one of the bestknown airlines
in the United Siates: it was a Texan company with its
headquarters in Dallas, where Concorde had landed
SA
3 - After Rio, in January, came the inauguration
of the London/Paris-Washington route.
As a spectacular show the two aircraft few accross
the Atlantic in formation and landed together.
They then taxied-in to position themselves nose-to-nose
in front of the crowd, proudly bearing the colours
of the only two airlines in the world to offer
a supersonic service. lt was Mai 24th, 1976.
4 - À photo-montage for commercial purposes,
Concorde never flew in this livery. An American
registration number was the only indication that Braniff
operated BA and AF aircraft between Washington
and Dallas.
58
1 - Singapore Airlines was the only company other
than British Airways and Air France whose colours
were carried by Concorde. For one year Singapore
Aïrlines's pilots flew the aircraft between London
and Melbourne.
2 - Concorde seen from inside the jet pipe
of a sister aircraft.
on its very first visit to North America. Captivated by
the prestige offered by Concorde, the airline decided
to offer supersonic travel to ils customers but without
the necessity of acquiring the aircralt. Since the
supersonic flight crossed the Atlantic to Washington
anyway, why not simply continue the service on to
Dallas? lt couldn't be at supersonic speed but almost; it
would be the high subsonic cruising speed of which
only Concorde was capable.
Thus an agreement was made with Air France by
which, after landing at Washington, Concorde would
change its registration, its nationality and even its
ownership in order to conform to American law, and
Braniff pilots would then fly it on to Dallas and back
again to the Federal capital for the return trip to Paris.
This extension of the flight took place twice a week
under a Braniff flight number although the aircraft were
never painted in Braniff livery.
They were good times, according to Ken Larson, one
of the pilots on the service, and described by him in a
book of Concorde souvenirs. Ken Larson of Braniff
was one of the first American pilots qualified to fly
both Concorde and the Boeing 747; trained in
Toulouse like his colleagues, he
flew Concorde during the
months that Braniff operated the
Franco-British aircraft on the
internal American service. This
service began on January 121h !
1979, and ended only one
year later, for the time saved on the flight did not
make up for that lost during the stopovers nor the the
much higher costs involved than for the subsonic
aircraft that could, by then, fl direct. Nevertheless,
Braniff could boast that it was the only American
airline to operate Concorde.
Às for British Airways, they too had a similar :
agreement with Braniff as well as with Singapore
Airlines, together with whom they operated the
London-Singapore route, stopping in Bahrain. The
Singapore Airlines pilots flew the supersonic service
alternately with British Airways crews for a number of
months and SIA managed to get their company logo
painted on the tail of the Concordes that they
operated. Apart from British Airways and Air France,
they were the only other airline whose livery
was carried by the supersonic airliner. For Braniff
and Singapore Airlines, however, although their
enthusiastic operation of the aircraft had been positive
from a technical point of view, it was of short duration
due to its low profitability as a commercial undertaking.
In the early ‘eighties, the air transport business went
through another period of crisis, and a number of
American airlines ceased operation; Pan Am and
Braniff were amongst them.
To Mexico and Miami
In the colours of Air France, Concorde regularly flew
from France to Mexico with a stopover in
Washington and, later, in New Vork. By virtue of its
RMD
MR.
CONCORDE IN SERVICE 5speed across the Atlantic it saved a great deal of
time and for neaïly four years Mexico City was only
7hrs AOmins from Paris. However, since internationa
regulations made it impossible to pick up passengers
for Mexico in the United Siates, the yield was judged
insufficient and on November 1st, 1982, this route
too was discontinued. British Airways continued 3
some of its Washington flights onwards to Miami in
Florida, which seemed like a good idea considering 3 to 6 . - Concorde and its
Couturiers
There has always been a Concorde "style! and alwa) the constrainis D RU PE
PONERENNCESE defined according to famous designers and couturiers } Concorde could
take-off again from Washington To-day, Nina Ricci designs the hostess's uniforms
for Air France and Andrée Putman, the "high authorit over he ocean and IV
supersonic to Miami which of interior design, defines the cabin furnishings.
was also situated on the coast. The flight from The British Airways! cabin
interiors are the
responsability of Rumbold. London to Miami including the Washington stop took
less than seven hours: even so, the time saved
7e proved insufficient to compensate for the high ticke
price. The route simply wasn't profitable.
En
0)
| - For Concorde's 20th
nniversary Aerospatiale
ind British Aerospace
rganised a fête in Toulouse,
vhere the aircraft first flew in
March 1969. The students
rom the Toulouse Art School
jainted Concorde N° 1 for
he occasion in the colours of
he French Revolution in what
vas the bicentenial year of
1989.
» - Concorde veterans
jathered round a smokevreathed birthday cake.
\mongst them are Bill
trang, Gilbert Cormerie
nd, of course, the test pilots
\ndré Turcat and Brian
rubshaw. The national
Drchestra of the Capitole of
oulouse directed by Michel
lasson provided the Music.
Dpposite page - À pipe-band
eads the supersonic airliner
ut of the hangar on the
ccasion of the
20fh anniversary
f the British Concorde
>rototype.
CONCORDE TODAY
Sn the beginning of the nineteen eighties, the
only regular scheduled Concorde services on a daily
basis were from Europe to New York or Washington.
Seven days a week they crossed the Atlantic in either
direction with exemplary punctuality; two flights daily
operated by British Airways and one by Air France
until British Airways gave up the Washington service
in 1994. Now only the New Vork service remains.
Considerable marketing efforts are made to entice
passengers on to the supersonic service at a ticket
price of around 2360 pounds sterling. Although
both operators do offer concessionary fares, the
target market for Concorde is the regular first or
business class traveller, the habitué of Espace 180
ER
ospatiaie Aou.
or Espace 127 on Air France; First or Club for
British Airways. Such has been the success of the
operation that gradually a regular clientele has been
built up in spite of premium price and the necessity
to transit through Paris or London. In Germany, for
instance, 75% of the high yield tickets sold by Air
France are for Concorde lights. Scheduled services,
however, are not the only way to travel by
Concorde: tourists, inveterate globe-trotters, former
steam-ship passengers, aviation enthusiasts, conference organisers and travel
agents are all potential
customers. Concorde is probably the only civil airliner that can be hired simply
for the pleasure of
flying on it and for the experience of supersonic
luxury. it is also used as a promotional experience
by businesses who wish to impress or reward their
most important clients.
Flights of Fancy
Two travel agents currently organise supersonic excursions on Concorde; they are
Club Prestige
International, in France, and Goodwood Travel lid,
in the U.K. For a reasonable price they will arrange
short circuits out over the Atlantic Ocean or the
Channel at Mach 1 or Mach 2 to enable the curious
to taste a few minutes of the Concorde experience.
For an hour or so these happy people can sample
one of the most wonderful feats of European engineering technology and do what the
early pioneers of
aviation had never even dreamed of doing. Those
nues dela mérliee
1 & 2 - À gift should always be elegantly wrappedl
Above, with the London Philarmonic Orchestra.
3 & 6 - The image of Concorde helped sel! all kinds
of products, from Breitling watches to Vegetaline.
4 - The cover of a Sotheby's catalogue for the sale
of Concorde archive material.
5 - Concorde advertising in the Japanese press.
INSTRUMENTS FOR PROFESSIONALS
t Muséum
that can show their signed certificates authenticating
their experience form an elite band. And all for
around 395 pounds sterling.
Concorde crews are only too pleased to talk in
detail about their aircralt, in English or in French, and
to welcome their passengers aboard with particular
courtesy. Sometimes there may be a lecturer on
board, an extest pilot or airline pilot with a few
thousand hours of Concorde experience, who will
explain the characteristics and features of the
aircraft.
In addition to these flights of fancy", the travel
agents that regularly charter the aircraft with its Air
France or British Airways crews offer roundthe-world
tips for tourists. There are more than 200 of such
voyages leaving from France or the U.K. and
Concorde often flies to the Mediterranean, Asia, the
major Russian cities, South America or the Pacific
Islands. In 1987 it even touched down on Easter
Island, an experience that it is confidently expected
lo repeat.
Both British Airways and Air France keep a reserve
aircraft in New Vork as a backup to the regular Îleet
but also used for charter operations from the U.S. Air
France has already made nine roundthe-word flights
on behalf of the Saint Louis [Missouri] based travel
agency, INTRAV, and British Airways has done at
least the same number.
The American clientel, always avid for new experience, are particularly proud of
being able to claim
that they have flown on Concorde and it was an
American lawyer, Donald L. Pevsner of Miami,
President of Concorde Spirit Tours, who organised
and financed the two roundthe-world speed record
aïtempts in 1992 and 1995; [respectively westward
and eastwardl.
Vecerauine
CONCORDE TODAY 03
: . : ; 7 & 8 - Two Concorde models decorated by the À regular client of both
airline operators, it was Air famous artists Chagall and Miré. France that Pevsner
chose for these rather special flights.
; 9 & 10- i dF t least Much appreciated by the passengers, these charter D ones
three of the countries that issued telephone cards operations represent a
relatively important business depicting Concorde. These rare item are now sought Re
by collectors. activity, and a number of other travel agents such as 7 D'Ais
TMR, in France, Superlative Travel, in the UK. 11 - Concorde served to decorate the
wrapping paper
; of Spanish es. American Express, Cunard and Kuoni occasionally We
offer Concorde flights 12 - Souvenir medallion and pilatelic display issued
on the occasion of the first commercial flight,
January 21st, 1976. Concorde in Art and Public Relations
Às a model, Concorde has served as inspiration to a
great number of artists and designers in advertising
and public relations. Used to add romance or prestige to whatever goods or services
it is applied, the
image of Concorde has adorned telephone cards
from France to Singapore and Japan; wine labe Ca ,
orange boxes, lottery tickets and banknotes; televi- EAN U7
sion commercials and bil-boards. Painters and sculpiors like Juan Mird and Marc
Chagall have equally
been inspired by the sleek, supersonic aircraft.
Photographers in their thousands have captured its
image in their lenses and toy-makers and souvenir
manufacturers have copied it all around the world.
Concorde, faster and more elegant than any other
airliner, is an irresistable public relations vehicle and
media subject. Concorde fascinates; and a flight on
board combines both pleasure and status and provides an excellent way in which to
show appreciation to loyal or prestigeous customers.
The European Ariane Espace company regularly 10
offers its customers trips on Concorde to Kourou, in
French Guyana; they are a discerning public when it
comes fo high technology, especially since the object
of these flighis is to transport them to the Ariane
launch-site in order to witness the rockels carry their
satelites into space. Ariane rockets account for 50% 12
64
1 & 2 - In November 1988 the Rolls Royce owners
club chartered a Concorde so that its members could
experience supersonic flight at Mach 2.
Twenty Rolls Royce and Bentley cars form a guard
of honour before the aircraft that transported
their drivers. The most prestigious aircraft was
in the appropriate company of the most prestigious
automobiles.
3 -In 1991 the Olympic flame was carried from
Athens to Paris on board Concorde. For reasons
of safety a flight engineer, Jean-Louis Masselin,
was delegated to look after the flame during the flight.
CONCORDE TODAY
of the world-wide market for commercial satelite
launch vehicles, with a dozen or so missions carrying
around 20 satelites per year into orbit. Every one of
these missions constitutes an important event both for
the satelite manufacturer and the end user, and the
use of Concorde in this context adds a further dimension of efficiency to the
operation. The supersonic
aircraft ‘s high speed means that the spectators need
only leave for Kourou at the last minute, after all the
preparations and the meteorological conditions are
satisfactory and the launch vehicle is certain to
depart. Such was the case for the launch of Arabsat,
the first joint Middle Eastem satelite project, when
Aerospatiale, the satelite manufacturer and one of
the original contractors chartered a Concorde to take
the 22 Ministers of the Arab League, [including the
PLO representatives), to witness the satelite launch.
The notable success of putting into orbit the “Little
Attificial Moon”, together with the demonstration of
Concorde's exceptional performance, considerably
enhanced the reputation of European technological
prowess.
Concorde further captured the imagination of the
public in December 1991 when, from Athens, it
brought the Olympic flame to France for the opening
of the Winter Games. Any other aircraft would have
gone un-noticed, with Concorde it hit the headlines.
Concorde's VIPs
For the United Kingdom, Concorde represented,
essentially, an industrial project; the political aspect
was only relative to the country's relationship with
France in the context of their application to joint the
European Common Market. If there was a question
of national pride it was not in a political sense as
was the case in France, simply a technical challenge
the success of which could only rellect favourably on.
the reputation of the country's engineers, techicians,
pilots and contractors.
For the French, on the other hand, Concorde represented the greater glory of
France. It was a symbol
closely connected to the political image of General
de Gaulle, former head of the Free French during
CONCORDE TODAY
London,
pation
ore the
governn
at the ti
flew on
inherent
before
he did
the Second World War, and who led, albeit from
the Resistance movement against the occur
of his country. Eventually becoming the
French President, one of his objectives was to rescountry's pride in itself;
Concorde, with its
charisma, represented an ideal symbol of
hat lost pride. The Concorde programme was thus
strongly supported by the Head of Siate and his
ent, a fact that was to be made quite clear
me when the British Government considered
pulling-out of the project. In spite of the strenvous
efforts that he put into supporting it, de Gaulle never
the aircraft for he left office in 1969, just
he first prototype was ready to fly, although
visit the Toulouse production line as did
Queen Elizabeth the one at Filton. It was de Gaulle's
4 - The Royal Canadian Mounted Police guard
the special Concorde that brought the VIP visitors
to the inaugural ceremony of the new Montreal
Mirabel Airport in October 1975.
où
1 - À presidential visit to Réunion by François
Mitterrand in Feb 1988. Of all French Presidents
so-far, Mitterrand was the most frequent user of
Concorde for official visits to far-away territories;
particularly to Polynesia, [for the nuclear tests
in 1987), and French Guinea [for the launch of
the Ariane rocket).
2 & 3 - The Pope flew from Réunion to Lusaka
on Concorde in May 1989 during an episcopal visit,
kissing the ground on arrival, a usual.
successor, Georges Pompidou, who had the honnour of being the first supersonic
President, followed
by Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, François Mitterrand
and Jacques Chirac.
The governments of both partner countries, at some
time or other, were introduced to supersonic flight on
board Concorde and some members even flew it on
regular scheduled services. In Britain, however,
neither the Queen nor the Prime Minister ever consid
ered it essential to systematically use Concorde on
official visits, although it did happen more than once.
In October 1977, Queen Elizabeth Il specified the
supersonic aircraft on Royal Flight RF 5276 to
D
Barbados and it was used on three other occasions
to the Middle East. In 1976, the Prime Minister,
James Callaghan, travelled on a special Concorde
flight to the Porto Rico Summit Conference and to the
U.S.A: and Canada in March 1977. Margaret
Thatcher, in her turn, made her first supersonic
Concorde flight in July 1986 on a visit to Vancouver
in Canada. In 1985 British Airways invited Britain's
favourite ‘Royal, the Queen Mother, to Bermuda on
the occasion of her birthday.
In contrast to the British, the French were much more
frequent users of their Concorde Îleet for the benefit
of their Presidents and Prime Ministers on official
business. Their motifs were quite legitimate; as a symbol of national and European
pride and achièvement, Concorde should be shown-off to the world as
often as possible. Heads of Siaie and government
ministers thus became ambassadors for the aviation
industry that had produced these unique aircraft, and
CONCORDE TODAY
they were even referred-to without irony as
Concorde's "commercial travellers". President
Pompidou used the aircraft on two such trips including that to the’ Azores under
the command of Jean
Franchi and during which he was to meet the
President of the United States, Richard Nixon.
In 1975 Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, flown by André
Turcat, took Concorde to Kinshasa to meet President
Mobutu of Zaïre. On this occasion Concorde crossed the Equator only 3 hrs 08 mins
after leaving the
ground at Paris-Orly airport. For the American
Bicentennial celebrations, in 1976, the same
President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, naturally, few to
the United Siates on Concorde. Dubbed the fastest
President in the world, he visited Washington,
Philadelphia, Houston and New-Orleans. At every city
the Americans, who still refused Concorde commercial
landing rights, applauded the supersonic aircraft with
an ovation and fhe Press commented without animosiy. Such were the crowds assembled
at each airport
lo see the European aviation phenomenon that some
witty reporters went as far as to suggest that president
4 & 5 - The working lounge installed on board
Concorde for presidential use; there is even
a photocopier connected to the aircraf's electrical
system. À presidential bedroom with two beds
is also available for long voyages
6 - The Queen Mother in the cockpit of the Concorde
that brought her back from Bermuda on her birthday
visit.
08 CONCORDE TODAY
1 - The Concorde that featured in the shock-horror film
"Airport 80". In spite of a cast of wellknown actors
like Alain Delon, the film was grotesque.
2 - As prime Minister of France, Raymond Barre
was one Concorde's VIP passengers.
3 - Às the Frenche Prime Minister Jacques Chirac
during a visit to New Caledonia in 1987. Since being
elected President of France, Jacques Chirac has not
been keen to use Concorde: no-doubt for reasons of
economy.
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing had organised these manifestations in advance. In the
years that followed
Valéry Giscard d'Estaing was to use Concorde for
practically all of his long-range trips away from
France and the presidential Caravelle, inherited from
General de Gaulle, was given away to the Musée
de l'Air et de l'Espace, [the Air and Space Museum),
while the special equipment used on board Air
France Boeing 70/5 during presidential flights was
relegated to the back of a storage hangar. In
exchange, Air France designed a new bedroom,
lounge and facilities that could be installed in
Concorde and which has been used for every French
presidential flight since.
Francois Mitterrand was the head of State that used
Concorde the most, partly because he held office fo
the record period of 14 years, [two full terms}, but
also because he enjoyed the Concorde experience.
Generally he was assigned the same crew who were
made available upon request, as well as a specialist
radio operator from the government service in order
that he could remain in permanent contact with his
administration. the later was considered indispensible for the Head of Siate of one
of the five Nuclear
Powers. Mitterrand's successor, Jacques Chirac, flew
on Concorde when he was the French Prime Minister
but since his election to higher office, no doubt for
reasons of economy, he has seldom used the aircraf.
Another Prime Minister, Raymond Barre, had the distinction of making a live radio
broadcast from on
board Concorde, as did President Pompidou.
Many other worldfamous personalities have flown on
Concorde and perhaps the most notable was the
Shah of lran who flew the aircraft himself. lran Air
had, in 1973, nearly ordered the supersonic airliner
and it was the Shah of lran himself, a competent
commercial pilot, who undertook the flight trials. The
Pope JeanPaul || also Îlew on Concorde in 1989
between La Réunion and Lusaka during an episcopal
visit and it was considered quite an event.
CONCORDE TODAY
I was the first time a Pope had travelled faster than
the sound of the bells of St Peter'sl
Prince Philip, Princess Margaret, Prime Minister
Edward Heath, Her Royal Highness Princess Anne
and Capt. Mark Phillips, and many other personalities 100 numerous to mention, also
sampled supersonic flight on Concorde.
Captain Chemel 's Diary
IF certain pilots found the transition from an older
technology aircraft to the more modern, from piston
engine to turbine, propellor to jet engines, or from
electro-mechanical instrumentation to ‘glass cockpits'
and digital flight controls, this was never apparently
the case with Concorde. All of the crews that flew it
were impressed by the contrast existing between the
aircrafs advanced performance and its traditional,
even rustic, construction. Amongst them, Edouard
Chemel has never hidden his astonishment.
À former Concorde Chief Pilot with Air France,
Chemel has logged over 22 000 flight hours of
which more than 2000 were at the controls of the
Franco-British supersonic airliner. Married to an air
hostess, brother of a pilot and father to two more, he
was President Miterrand's favourite pilot. Selftought,
he began his aviation career as a ground-based
radio operator, passing his pilot's license in 1955 4
before climbing the ladder of seniority to become a
Concorde captain via Caravelle, Super
Constellation, Boeing 707 and 747
The result of his passion for aviation and Concorde
in particular has led to his home becoming an Al
Baba's cave where are assembled just about every
object imaginable connected with Concorde: books,
souvenirs, stamps, postcardk, manuscripis, plans,
paintings, models, etc. 5
There are very few collectors either in France or the
United Kingdom who can boast such an extensive
range of exhibits.
Thanks to Concorde, Captain Chemel has met a
great variety of interesting personalities and has a
number of anecdotes to recount. "On the Paris-New
York service some passengers have made the journey
up
la
n 0 500 times and we know almost all of the regur4 = ravellers. Some always sit in
the same seat, like
4 Rostropovitch, who always reserves the two lefthand
7 seats in the first row: one for him and one for his
cello. He always says that he is uncomfortable if
separated by more than five centimetres from his instrument'.
"Orson Welles always reserved the two last seat rows
of the forward cabins. He always preferred
Concorde as it enabled him to travel "dry". Orson
Welles was a big man and, due to the narrowness
Enveloppe philatélique transportée à bord du Vol
ÿ &:
Le Cdt de Bord
R, MACHAVOINE
Monsieur Jacques CHIRAC Premier Ministre se rend en NOUVELLE-CALEDONIE £ 0] PARIS -
NOUMEA
Vol AF 200 F. du 16 au 17 Septembre 1987 Concorde FBVEB
Commandants : CHEMEL - MACHAVOINE
EE Monsieur Laurent Fabius Preniler Ministre de la République Française
Jacques CHIRAC
se rend en Polynésie Française en Concord:
du 23 au 25 octobre 1985
Tir nucléaire français "HERO* du 24 octobre 1985
Vol du 23:101985 - AP 900 F « avion F.BVPB + PARIS 12 h 00 POINTE A FITRA 16h 10
Temps. Gmt POINTE À PITRE 17 h 22 LIMA 20 h 25
4,10,1985 + AT 900 K - avion FBVEB + LIMA 22 hi 09, MURUROA 1lh 58 ÉD 3 MURUROA 3 h
06 HAO)3 h 47
,10,1985 - AF 900 E - avion FBYFB + HAO 6 h 10 LIMA 10 h 01 RE Cu Re DIMA 11 h 29
POINTE À PITRE 14 h 21
POINTE À PITRE 15 h 37 PARIS 19 h440
Equipages MM Ferry, Delorme, Faviez, Bocquet
MM. Legales, Chambrier, Cappoen (GDG - FTP - pG)
69 4 - À first day cover". for philatelists issued
for Jacques Chirac's visit to New Caledonia
in September 1987.
5 - Another commemorative issue for stamp collectors;
this time for the visit of French Prime Minister,
Laurent Fabius, to Mururoa in 1985 during the HERO
nuclear tests.
Pi philatélique voyagé
À bord du Concorde
2200 km/h - 18000 m altitude
70
1 - Capt Edouard Chemel, President Miterrand's
favourite pilot and one of Concorde's most fervent
enthusiasts.
2 - À twenty dollar note issued by the Singapore bank.
3 & 4 - 646 postage stamps have been issued with
Concorde as part of the design; some appearing
as a series having different face-values like those
of Malaysia, the first Concorde stamps to be printed
in 1965. Some also paid homage to General
de Gaulle, without whom Concorde would
not have existed.
5 - À Concorde lottery ticket.
6 - One of the only two stamps to feature the Tupolev
Tu-144, Concorde!s unfortunate competitor.
7 - The certificate issued to Pope Jean-Paul Il on his
supersonic flight aboard production aircraft N° 3,
F-BTSC, on May 2nd, 1989.
7 MALAVSIA
CONCORDE TODAY
of the fuselage, the toilets on board were very cramped. The famous actor found it
difficult to use them
and consequently drank very little during the flight
as a precaution: compared to normal long-range
flights those on Concorde were, reassuringly for him,
of short durationl".
‘Elizabeth Taylor prelerred to sit at the back of the
aircrat. She was a nervous air traveller and perhaps
she thought that in the event of an accident there was
a greater chance of survival if seated at the back.
Michael Jackson too had an obvious aversion to air
travel and always chose Concorde so that the flight
would be as short as possible. As for Henry
Kissinger, he always sat in the fifth row and never ate
anything while he was on board."
‘President Giscard d'Estaing always took the trouble
to come into the cockpit; the technical aspect of the
flight interested him and | got to know him quite well.
He used to ask questions about flying instruction and
enquired about my children's progress”.
‘President Mobutu of Zaïre was an unconditional
enthusiast of Concorde which he chartered for official visit. | had never been to
Hong Kong and |
believe that it was to please me that just before | retired he specified the
aircraft for an official visit there.
Landing rights were extremely difficult to obtain
usually but, as a Head of State, he had no trouble”.
Concorde's speed is such that it is practically unaflected by winds at its high
cruise altitude and so it
has the advantage of being one of the rare aircrait
that's arrival time can be guaranteed to the minute.
François Mitterrand very much appreciated this and
on the occasion of the Tokyo Summit, where he was
due to meet President Reagan, we touched-down 30
seconds before the time that | had announced.
Reagan was 12 minutes late and welcoming officials
had to wait for him. Concorde was then the envy of
the Japanese.
There was a period during these flighis for President
Mitterrand when the aircraft was systematically subjected to a series of mysterious
break-downs. Every
time we left the ramp the brake warning alarm went
off. It did, in fact, make us loose time and on several
occasions we even changed aircraft which, understandobly, irritated the President.
Gaby Aupetit, an Air
France mechanic who had no time for magic or the
supernatural, finally found the cause of the incident.
For presidential lights two black boxes" were installed for encoding the radio
messages sent from the
President's aircraft back to the Élysée: following a
constitutional procedure, the government stalf radio
operator.on board sent back a brief message to indicate that the President had left
French territory or was
NÉRAL CHARLES DE GAULLE
CONCORDE TODAY ll
Lesheires
TERRES EME FRANÇAISES lsontrisqué.-is ont gagne
on his way back from a foreign country. lt was the
electronics incorporated in the "scramblers" that inter
c
fered with our alarm system and all was put right by
installing an additional resistor that cost virtually ARTE ua EE
nothing". ms
One of Captain Chemel's most ammusing annec- : DZ
dotes shows how far some people will go in their 4 on
nfhusiasm for the unusual. "After the return flight that LS RCE sNGSS | neo en:
brought the Queen Mother back from her tip to the Re Concorde in philately Corcor
de
LONDON -— SINGAPORE INAUGURAL FLIGHT
Bermudas, a maintenance mechanic, [who shall
remain nameless), removed the toilet seat and took it To celebrate the arrival of
Concorde 646 postage
. : CONCOR: LAL stamps, including 306 commemorative full-sheets,
home after substituting another one. He kept the sou- ue were issued by 76
countries around the world. de naiih pride 2 TR A A LT 2 only à 1 te LONDSL-
SENGAPARE À In addition hundreds of special pos-marks were used
as a souvenir of notable events during the life of the humble mechanic but l've got
the Queen Mother's aircraft. Malaysia was the first country to issue throne'
Concorde stamps on August 30th, 1965; Egypt was ; j & next on January 2nd, 1966,
although contemporary Edouard Chemel no longer flies Concorde excepi catalogues
described their Concorde as a Comet by : : occasionally mistake. The first British
stamp dates from 1969, was during conference or promotional es sie one of an air-
mail series. Twelve other countries printed flights; however, he retains
unforgetiable memories Concorde stamps in 1969, which was the year
of the aircraft's first fight.
Both France and the New Hebrides had made
preparation to issue stamps to commemorate the first
of his Concorde years. ‘lt was a wonderful time,
every day was different; there were always special
ee light original! led in F 19 i flights of one sort or another which implicated a
fig HIT EEE un de son spite of the delay the New Hebrides issued theirs more or
less P personal relationship P with the P passen- anywoy yway because the high g
level of humidity y in the
gers”. He is A EE ES region rendered them perishable. Hence Concorde
i stamps were in circulation from October 91h, 1968,
British associations devoted to Concorde enthu- and became a rarity since the
aircraft hadn't lown.
In F tamp inscribed "First flight 1968" siasts: the Concorde Study Circle in Great
Britain, Dh SES Ci wos
ready for issue in February that year and the postal
the Association des Anciens Navigants Concorde, authorities destroyed the printed
stock; however, some
: Sr : months later a number of these stamps appeared ÎThe Ex-Concorde Pilots
Association], in France as Le Ph Me Hu in dealers' circles, ingenious collectors
having been
able to obtain a sheet or two of the originals.
The value of these stamps to-day can reach
3300 pounds sterling each.
The Tupolev Tu-144 had to wait until 1969 before
it was honoured with a stamp issued by Bulgaria and
by the Soviet Union in December the same year.
Hote 7 72 CA 7. C2 fes Prulr
_MENOBEX_ NONETUT, ONMPARCS HE HA CHNY
CSOMX MYCKYNOE, À HA CHNY CBOETO PASYMA”
LS ax ANSE de] en nu HE Mmones TT ee LEA En
aReRance y , AZ
72
1 - Concorde in formation with the "Patrouille
de France" during an airshow organised in France
by the wellknown pilot and restorer of aircraf,
Jean Salis.
2 - Returning from the Indian Ocean, Concorde
is escorted over Djibouti at Mach 2 by Mirages
of the French Air Force.
CONCORDE TODAY
well as Promouvoir Concorde, a French society
dedicated to reuniting former crews and supporters
of the supersonic airliner. The former Chief
Concorde pilot is also president of the Association
Internationale d'Aérophilatélie et de Cartographie
Concorde, the AIACC, [International Concorde
Aerophilately and Post Card Society, a small club
that caters for all those around the world that have
an interest in Concorde.
Technical Incidents and Considerations
In 25 years of commercial technical service
Concorde has, like any other aircraft, had its share
of technical incidents, and those that caused the most
inconvenience were not necessarily the most speclacular. In any case, they have
been fairly few and
far between, since both British Airways and Air
France have been able to maintain a dispatch reliability of around 95%, which is
comparable to other,
more modern, airliners.
Sometimes, in conditions of high temperature in the
stratosphere, [above 49 000 feet}, Concorde is
unable to attain Mach 2: this is not a technical
problem but is caused by natural phenomena and is
of litle consequence. Under those particular conditions the speed of sound rises
too, but Concorde's
relative or ground speed remains the same, which is
all that matters.
Being the very first commercial airliner to be equipped with electrically signaled
flight controls it would
be legitimate to be concerned about electrical supply
failure, however traditional mechanical backup systems ensure that the Concorde
remains controlable
under any circumstances.
Concorde takes-off fully loaded at 156mph requiring
a take-off roll of 8200 - 9840 feet, depending on
the altitude and the prevailing temperature of the airport. In 1989, during an
official visit to Quito in
Peru, where the runway is at an altitude of 8200 feet
with very high daytime temperatures, it was impossible for Concorde to take-off
again. The air was too
“thin”, providing less lift and less engine thrust at the
time of day that the President wanted to depart. The
pilot would have had to extend his take-off run long
enough to attain a take-off speed of 28 1mph instead
of the normal 225 and the tyres would have oveheated, risking a blow-out and
perhaps more than
spectacular consequences.
Twice during 1989 the press printed headlines about
Concorde incidents: "Concorde loses parts in fight",
was an example. lt was true that retumning from New
York in October, an Air France Concorde lost a skin
panel from a landing gear door and earlier, in April,
a British Airways ainerdft had lost a piece of its ru
der in Australia.
One question frequently asked concerns the ageing
process of a machine like Concorde. There is, however, nothing to be feared for
Concorde, by virtue of
is specialised nature, is one of the most closely moniTRAS DoneADLNr veÎ
CONCORDE TODAY
tored aircrait fling, having no less than 515 000
inspection points in its maintenance programme.
There are, nevertheless, some elements that require
attention: the adhesives used to assemble some composite materials have shown signs
of deterioration.
This is not a serious problem and does not affect the
safety of the aircrat. New adhesives are substituted
and these secondary structural elements of composite
materials are subjected to additional inspection procedures. Normal subsonic
aircraît regularly loose
small parts without it even being mentioned in the
news.
In 1989 again the press reported another incident;
a cabin window had cracked in flight. Again there
were headlines, "Concorde is getting old". Of
course it was but there was, and is, plenty of life left
in it yet.
Other aircralt, old and new, have experienced similar incidents and on Concorde the
risks are reduced
by virtue of the extremely small windows; 1614
square feet of window surface compared to three
times that for other aircraft. In any case, they are
triple-glazed, having one outer and two inner panes
and, in spite of the agitation by the press, there was
never any danger.
Both the aircraft and its windows had been subjected to long and rigourous testing
from the very
beginning of Concorde operations. lt had been
decided that, because it flew twice as high as other
aircraft, or-condition monitoring would be applied
and no anomalies relative to cabin pressurisation
would be tolerated.
À the very suspicion of a technical problem of this
order the aircraft would descend to a lower altitude
and return to its base, if the latter were to be closer
than the destination.
Tests had shown that even in the highly unlikely event
of a window really breaking, something never experienced in 25 year’ service, it
would take 45
seconds for the cabin pressure to fall from that of its
normal equivalent cabin altitude of 5000 feet. After
45 seconds, the cabin altitude would be maintained
at an equivalent 13 100 feet by the four enginedriven pressure pumps. In the
meantime, the pilot
would have immediately begin to descend to a level
of 33 000-39 400 feet where, if necessary, the aircraft could remain; this being
perhaps uncomfortable
but not lifethreatening. At worst, passengers could
use the omboard oxygen masks and in fact, even
with two broken windows, the passengers lives
would not be in danger.
Of course, there are minor, routine problems almost
every day: bird strikes or ingestion through the
engines; punctures; brake overheating; computer
glitches; etc, etc. Built at a time when little was
known of supersonic commercial operations,
Concorde is, according to its operators, extremely
robust. Most of its systems were over-engineered and
there are back-up facilities: in this respect, in spite
of its unique status, Concorde is just like any other
aircrait.
3 - On the dials Concorde doesn't always reach Mach 24 -The feminine touch for
Concorde
In a profession where women are relatively rare,
a female pilot made supersonic aviation history
in 1993. After a six month training period, 39 years
old Barbara Harmer became the first woman
to be qualified as a Concorde pilot for British Airways. "ve finally achieved a
life-long ambition’
she declared on March 25th, 1993 as she took
her place in the right-hand seat for her first
London-New York Concorde duty. Barbara Hamer had already qualified on Douglas DC-10
and BAC 111
aircraft types.
DUR
74
1-In 1973 Concorde was used to study a solar
eclipse and during the night of April 14fh-15th, 1986,
on a flight from New York, 100 passengers were able
to view Halley's comet from flight AF 4158 from on
board Concorde F-BVFA.
Opposite page - One of the projects on the drawingboard at Aerospatiale as a
successor to Concorde.
À four-engined design, it also has "canard winglet
on the forward fuselage.
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC
AÏR TRANSPORT
Bi Airways uses six of its seven Concordes
although due to maintenance requirements there are
generally only five of them in service at any one time.
Beyond the Year 2000
Air France has only kept a total of six of its aircratt
intact: live are in regular commercial or charter
service, the sixth is grounded and serves as a source
of spares although it can be put back in {lying
condition if necessary. The seventh aircraft, by no
means the oldest, was completely dismaniled and its
vital elements are used to maintain the remaining fleet
in active service. Considering that only a small number
of aircraft were built and that the production lines have
been closed for nearly twenty years, oblaining spares
is extremely cosily. Replacement parts have to be
made to order in very small quantities and so
cannibalising other aircraît is common practice, even
though there is a finite limit to what is available.
In order to maintain regular commercial services, the
two Concorde operators need at least four aircraft
each in serviceable condition: so the original manufacturers, Aerospatiale and
British Aerospace must
provide technical support for the whole fleet. This
includes not only spares provisioning, but also the
definition and incorporation of modifications which
may be required to improve their performance or
conform to new regulations.
For example, in order to comply with recent U.S.
regulations concerning anticollison measures, the
venerable supersonics had to be equipped with
TCAS" systems. Once again, the relatively small
number of units involved means that modification costs
are high.
State-oHhe-art technology at the time of Concorde's
construction meant that auto-pilot and inertial
navigation systems are now a generation removed
from to-day's standards, and this equipment will shortly
be replaced with mor modem systems that will
enable the aircraft to keep flying into the next century.
The same applies to the complicated computers
controlling the engine air-intakes, one of the secrets of
supersonic performance, as well as to many other
electrically or electronically controlled systems.
1 - The European supersonic project studied by British
Aerospace, Aerospatiale and Deutsch Aerspace would
carry 280 passengers over 6250 miles at Mach 2.
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
Supersonic airiners fly a lot less than classic
commercial types, due to the small number of routes
being operated. Concorde accumulates around 1000
flight hours per year compared to around 3000 for a
normal airliner, and most of them over the Aïlantic, the
only regular scheduled service. In fact, the whole
Concorde fleet has accumulated a total of 200 000
flight hours at a rate of about 700 per month over 240
flights.
However, the maintenance inspectors and structural
engineers monitoring the aircrafl's ageing process note
that Concorde is supprisingly resistant, youth{ul', even.
The frequent changes in temperature. and pressure
to which it is subjected have had no ellect on the
airframe, fuselage or wings, and the degree of
corrosion encountered is less than that of other aircrait
types. The latter phenomenon is thought to be due to the
fact that Concorde flies in the stratosphere where the air
is relatively dry and that the outer skin of the aircraft
heats up due to the friction of the air at supersonic
speeds, thus dispelling corrosioninducing moisture.
Based upon the analysis of extensive maintenance
data provided by the manufacturers, the French and
British airworthiness authorities will soon be requested
to extend Concorde's Certificate of Airworthiness. The
airworthy life of the aircraft, fixed originally at 6700
flight cycles and 22 000 flight hours, will be extended
to 8500 cycles. Even so, it will not be until 1977 that
a Concorde will reach the number of 6700 fights, the
first to do so being a British Airways aircraft. This
suggests that at the present rate of use the Concorde
Îleet can keep flying up until the year 2010 or 2015,
than the British.
Apart from the foregoing technical constraints,
Concorde's service life will depend upon the
cost factor and customer satisfaction. For the
moment, however, they are profitable for both
Air France and British Airways and contribute
considerably to the prestige of the two airlines;
which is why it is planned to continue using
them into the next century. There will come a
day, however, when, inevitably, they will be
retired and relegated to being museum exhibits.
Life after Concorde
What happens after Concorde is retiredè Has it a
successor? lt is a legitimate question if supremacy of
supersonic civil aviation is to be maintained into the
21st century. And will the eventual successor or
successors be available/belore Concorde disappears?
The experts in the Re acces
be made as soon as possible in view of the estimated
ten year development programme necessary, but to
make that decision, a number of vital questions must
be answered.
especially the French aircraft that are less heavily used
! |i
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
1} Will there be a demand for supersonic air travel in
the next century£
2} ls the technology available to-day sufficiently
advanced to ensure the longevity required of such a
forward-hinking projecte
3] Are there contractors and/or governments with
sufficient investment funds available?
4} Will the necessary technology involved be able to
satisly increasingly stringent environmental legislation?
What kind of market?
Market forecasts undertaken on both sides of the
Alantic as well as in Asia predict a steady increase
in passenger air travel of the order of 6% per year, on
average, over the next 20 years. This will result in
three times the number of passengers in 2020
compared to the present day, that is nearly
4000 million. Routes to Asia from the West Coast of
the United Siates have followed those of the North
Alantic in terms of rapid development and it is
3
estimated that today 7/5 milion passengers are
carried on trans-Atlantic, trans-Pacific or transcontinental routes suitable for
supersonic operations.
By 2025, this number will rise to 275 million, four
times as many.
Supersonic aircrait are uselul on long-range routes
over 2800 miles with high passenger demand.
To-day, normal subsonic airliners regularly make nonstop flights of twelve or
fourteen hours and which
represents considerable progress in convenience for
passengers, but it is still a long time to spend in an
aircrat. According to a study undertaken by
Aerospatiale, 200 of the 800 routes of 2800 miles
or more will be accessible to supersonic long-range
airliners: 70% of them accross the Pacific or the
Alantic and 30% in South-East Asia and Australia, for
example between Japan and New-Zealand.
There remains the question of cost; the higher the cost
of building and operating a future supersonic aircratt,
2 - Using CAD [Computer Advanced Design],
systems it is possible to explore the design features
and characteristics of prototypes ad infinitum.
78
1 - À vitrual SST superimposed on a photo of a real
runway.
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
the higher will be the price of tickets and therefore the
less passengers susceptible to flying on it. Ultimately,
it would be impossible to make any profit from the
operation. AÏl this suggests that any new aircrait
would have to operate under a fare structure similar
or only slightly higher than on a normal airliner,
implying a two or three class layout with economy
class seais being only ten or twenty per cent more
expensive than normal. Of course, the economics
could also be affected by the degree of versatility
built into any new aircraft. Not withstanding the
impossibility of eliminating the supersonic bang,
which remains a natural phenomenon, a future
supersonic transport could, perhaps, be made for
both efficient supersonic and subsonic flight. In that
case it would no longer be restricted of flying over
water or uninhabited regions but be used on normal
overland services too.
Concorde was designed principally to fly at supersonic speeds, and alihough it can
also fly at high
subsonic speeds, in this configuration its fuel
consumption is high and fhe mission becomes
uneconomic. The versatile solution would obviously be.
ideal but would require a considerable step forward in
technology, particularly engine technology which, for
the moment, is out of reach or too cosily.
What kind of Aircraft?
Experience has shown that costs increase in direct
relationship to speed. In the past there have been
projects, the plans and models of which still exist, for
air transport vehicles that would achieve seven, ten or
even twenty-ive times the speed of sound, and these:
speeds are atlained and even passed by the space
shutiles.
Puting passengers into orbit, however, is another
matter altogether and not without risk, although it will
probably happen eventually. For the immediate future
and the next thirty years or so, it would seem that the
most likely feasible and economically viable project
will be a bigger version of Concorde, probably flying
ot similar speeds but having a far greater range. lt
seems possible to build such an aircrat that could fly
more than 6250 miles nonstop with 250-300
passengers in three classes. lt would weigh about
350 tonnes, {a little less than a Boeing 747), and its
cruise speed would be around Mach 2; the biggest
challenge being to ensure that the noise level and fuel
consumption were equivalent to those of he most
recent subsonic airliners. The ideal situation would
be to enable it to have the same range whether
flving at supersonic or subsonic speeds, making it an
economic proposition for both missions and enabling
it to fly routes over densely populated regions under
he restrictions imposed by the civilian authorities
lt has been estimated that there will be a demand for
more than 1500 aircrat of this type by the year 2025
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
and at their conference in Strasburg the Academie
Nationale de l'Air et de l'Espace suggested that 500
would be required by the turn of the century. Engineers
and designers are already at work as are the
marketing departments of the airlines, and as soon as
a coherent project is ready, provided all the conditions
are met, then the second generation of supersonic
airliners will launch a new era.
The Means
The cost estimates for the completion of a single new
production programme run to thousands of millions
dollars, with the investment necessary to produce
the first 500 aircraft being of the order of 125
housand million dollars. ls it reasonable to suppose
that a single country, or even wo, could invest such
vost sums at such high risk? Logic dictates that the
countries having major aviation contractors should
come togelher in association to undertake a commopn
programme of investment, research, development and
marketing. As yet there is no consensus but that is
probably what will have to happen to achieve the
objective.
Of course, one could imagine two competing
manufacturers with their respective associates in
Europe and the United Siates working in parallel, (for
their part, Boeing tend not to go in for cooperative
programmes, preferring sub-contractors}, but the
scenario is difficult to imagine.
Since 1989 the European, American, Russian and
Japanese industries have cooperated on feasibility
studies which, while cosily in their own right, open
up considerable perspectives in the domain of
employment and technology fallout. The future
supersonic aircraf programme would constitute a
‘technology driver, a technological gold-mine
particulary in the field of propulsion systems.
The Environment
Concorde was designed at a time when the influence
of powerful environmental lobying was still
unsuspected. lt was a time of technological and
scientific expansion and one in which the fruits of
progress were consumed with alacrity and litle pause
for thought; and in fact, a number of achievements
would have been impossible at the time without
accepting that they were dirty, noisy or otherwise
polluting. For want of tools or standards of
measurement, it was also true that pollution levels were
unknown or unheeded. At that time, populations
seemed less affected by such agression on their lives
and so seemed less concerned. That time is now over.
To-day, often thanks to Concorde, there are
sophisticated instruments capable of measuring
pollution levels and which enable an evaluation to be
made of the relative danger that aviation represents or
does not represent for the environment. This has
resulled in a number of concrete measures being
introduced in terms of prevention. For example, today's jet aircraft burn three
times less fuel and make 2 - Modern art or the effects of high technology:
who knows?
79
QoN 80
1-76 different countries issued postage stamps
to commemorate Concorde.
2 - Atthe end of the 'seventies, thanks to Concorde
Aerospatiale's engineers perfected the electrical
signalled flight controls for the new-generation Airbus
A320 and other members of the Airbus family.
Concorde was the very first civil airliner to have
"fly-by-wire" systems but when they were incorporated
into Airbus design these aircraft were fifteen years in
advance of their competitors. The photo shows the
l'minisstick" test rig installed in a Concorde cockpit.
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
ten times less noise than when their predecessors were
introduced. Hopelully, this situation will continue to
improve in the future and similar results be obtained for
the engines of supersonic transports.
The development of versatile aircraît types capable of
economic subsonic flight over inhabited areas would,
inevitably, be the solution to eliminating the
ne supersonic bang, but more precise navigation
systems, improved aerodynamics and special
procedures would also help to reduce its effect. Thus
the Îleet utilisation could be increased and the
economics improved.
Obviously, any new aircraft type would have to use
existing airport facilities and therefore respect the
severe noise restrictions imposed. In this case an
aircraft with a high rate of dimb would be an
advantage in-so-lar as its rapid ascent would reduce
exposure lo noise at ground level. An enormous effort
will be required of the engine manufacturers not only
4 o reduce noise but also to reduce emissions harmul to
he earth's ozone layer The faster an aircratt is
esuired to fly, the higher its altitude, and it is precisely
at around supersonic flight levels, 82 000-115 000
feet, that this essential layer of ozone exists to protect
the earth from dangerous solar rays.
Aircraft engine emissions are accused of destroying a
very small percentage of ozone, especially at high
a titude; opinions differ, however. Some experts even
5 ink that Concorde, at high altitude, is responsible for
producting ozone and since it is a delicate balance of
nature, that too would be deltrimental to the
atmosphere.
Whatever the truth of the matter, nitrous oxide (Nox,
the gaseous emissions from jet engines thought to be
responsible for ozone destruction, must be reduced.
The answer lies in improving engine combustionchamber design. Limiting the speed to
Mach 2 also
seems adviseable for the aircraft would fly at a lower
altitude than at the speed of Mach 2.25 proposed by
some designs.
In the meantime research continues and norms are
being defined by the numerous organisations in
Europe and the United States devoted to the
environment. Aircraft in regular airline service with Air
France, Lufthansa and others have been equipped with
measuring systems designed to analyse the fluctuation
of ozone and water vapour at high cruise altitudes; a
programme providing valuable data to scientists. In
spite of he arguments concerning the ozone layer, it is
still a subject of which little is known for certain by the
scientific community, such are the complex chemical
and physical reactions involved in the natural cycle of
ozone development.
Airbus profits from Concorde's experience
Any future supersonic aircraft represents for the
aviation industry a source of progress, offering in a
non-military context the possibility of a great step
forward in technology. Concorde was a typical
example and it remains for the British and the French
a formidable fling laboratory. The supersonic
programme mobilised 30 000 engineers, technicians
and workers of all kinds all of whom acquired
considerable experience in both technology and
production methods. lt must be added that both
pariners also experienced some hardlearnt lessons
from their complex and sometimes stormy_ relationship
during the setting-up of {he Concorde programme. The
result was a much smoother structure of four
cooperaling partners in the creation of the Airbus
Industrie consortium. In this system, [to evolve itself
eventually, decisions are easier to make and costs
contained.
© re
PAL MK, TOUL 1
TOTAL O8 a | 1 PL
Às for technology, the Concorde programme saw the
introduction of telemetry systems and innovative flight
test procedures which eliminated most of he dangers
inherent in critical tests. There was considerable
progress in the field of electronic equipment
miniaturisation, which greatly beneïitted the medical
profession in the domain of cardiac stimulators, or
pace-makers, and artificial limbs. Concorde also gave
rise to the ATEC [Automatic Test Equipment for
Concorde), systems marketed around the world by
Aerospatiale and even sold to Boeing. Their function is
to detect system faults, sometimes before the
consequences become apparent.
Concorde was the first civil aircraft in the world to be
equipped with electronic engine controls and, even
more significantly, the first one to have electrically
signalled flight controls.
This system, much appreciated by the Concorde flight
crews, is incorporated in an improved form in all the
Airbus models from the A320 onwards, and has
enabled the European Airbus Industrie consortium to
gain a considerable technological advance over its
competitors. The first American civil airliner to be
equipped with such a system is the Boeing 777, put
into service ten years after the A320: and of course,
all the new Airbus Industrie wide-bodies like the A330
and A340 use the system.
lH was also through Concorde that considerable
experience in air conditioning and cabin
pressurisation at high altitude was aquired, as well as
that of the ellects of extremes of high and low
temperature. Intertechnique, a supplier to the
Intertechnique: a Concorde success story
Quite a number of the thousands of small and
medium-size companies that worked
on the programme in France, Britain and elsewhere
owe their success to Concorde.
Intertechnique's responsibility was to develop
the supersonic aircrañ's fuel measuring
and metering system. Concord carries 24 200
gallons of fuel in 16 tanks of which 3 are used
for ballast tranfer; low meters, gauges and C of G
alculators must all function correctly whatever
the speed and altitude of the aircraf.
In order to monitor all this the flight engineer's
station has an entire instrument panel dedicated to
the fuel system and on which
the necessary information is displayed on twenty
or so indicators connected to 79 measuring devices
and 48 probes which activate the dials.
Overall responsibility for the fuel management
system was given to BAC {now British Aerospace],
who sub-contracted the work to Intertechnique.
This was the first time that the British pariner put
work out to a French company.
Based on the experience that they acquired,
Intertechnique has developed its expertise to such
an extent that it now provides fuel management
systems, air-conditioning systems, indicator and
electrical systems for most of the world's civil
aircraft including Airbus, Boeing and Douglas
types.
Their equipment is specified on the latest B 747
and B 777 aircraft and this enterprising French
company even supplies systems to Ilyushin and
Tupolev.
82
1 - Nature has decreed that generally only the most
graceful and elegant of forms have the necessary
aerodynamic qualities for high speed performance.
Concorde's successor will also be elegant, as this
viriual image of the European ERSP shows.
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
programme, pertected fuel gauging systems and the
fuel transfer system used to trim the aircraft in flight and
which is also incorporated into some Airbus models.
Great progress was made at the time in braking
technology with the introduction of SPAD, the first
differencial braking system, later to be wellknown by
car drivers as ABS: the carbon brakes developed for
Concorde by Dunlop permited a weight saving of
1212lbs per aircraft whilst functionning at extremely
high temperatures. Carbon brakes are now standard
equipment on all modern aircraït. Tyre performance
improvements and deflation detectors, essential for
Concorde operations, also now serve the automobile
industry.
Even new paints and adhesives were developed for
he AngloFrench supersonic airliner in order to resist
the extremes of high and low temperature encountered
during its regular operations, and production systems
too qdvanced during the project's lifetime.
One can cite numerically controlled machine tools,
chemical miling, electron beam welding, optical
measuring systems, high resistance honeycomb
structures and armoured glass windscreens, (currently
used on high-speed trains such as the TGV].
There were improvements in electronics and cockpit
ergonomics and in alarm systems which were
subsequently used to improve safety on the Ariane
rocket and by the French national electricity company,
EDF, in nuclear power stations. There were even
technology spinoffs for the housewile: teflon was
developed to coat the friction surfaces of mechanical
control linkages and is now used to coat he insides of
all kinds of cooking ustensils.
Concorde was thus responsible for the beginning of
cooperative ventures in European aviation; it enabled
new skills to be developed and ensured technology
transter into thousands small and mediumsized
companies. lt was the occasion for two European
nations to come closer together over a grandiose
project and thus represented a victory over nationalist
egoism; it also provoked a number of countries into
greater awareness of their environment. Îf the cost of
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
Concorde was high, the benefits that it brought were
manifold and amongst them can be counted the
success of the Airbus programme which can count
nearly 2000 orders from around the world for its
aircraft.
Europe beyond Concorde
First lown over twentyfive years ago and now in
service for over twenty years, Concorde still has no
rival, and only two countries in the world have
accumulated an experience that no computers or
laboratories can replace. It is inevitable, therefore,
that France and Great Britain would be included in a
new parinership if ever a worldwide work-sharing
project of this sort were to be undertaken. To this end
they are respectively engaged within a European
context in preparing a common programme that
would serve as the basis for future associations. For
Europe cannot aflord not to be involved in a
supersonic aircraft programme, locked as it is in
competition with the established American and
Russian aviation industries and with the emerging
ambitions of the developing Asian countries
becoming apparent. Through Airbus Industrie, ATR
and ofhers, Europe has in the last twentylive
years captured more than 30% of the world market in
he domain of aircraft manufacture. lt is an activity
that employs 350 000 people and supports 7000
companies and it is unthinkable that this experience
should not be deployed in the production of an
eventual successor to Concorde.
In 1990 the world's five most important aircrait
manufacturers got together as the ‘Big Five” in order to
investigate the feasibiliy of a future supersonic
transport. The five were Boeing, Mac Donnell
Douglas, Aerospatiale, British Aerospace and Daimler
Benz Aerospace, and they were
lo be joined in 1991 by Japan
Aircraft Industries, Tupolev and Alenia
of Italy to become the "Big Eight".
Their efforts were limited to noncommercial research.
The Europeans, (Aerospatiale, British
Aerospace and Daimler-Benz
Aerospace), signed an associative
agreement in 1994 to study a
potential supersonic aircraft, and it
was thought that this ERSP research
programme might form the basis of
international cooperation on a wider
scale. The engine manufacturers
SNECMA, Rolls Royce, MTU and
Fiat were also included in the
parinership. Aerospatidle also has
an independent bilateral agreement with Tupolev since
1990. |
As for the Americans, NASA has also initiated a
supersonic transport research programme involving all
of the American airframe and engine manufacturers.
Dubbed H$R, [High Speed Research}, three SR71
supersonic reconnaissance aircraft will be put back
into airworthy condition in order to participate in the
programme. Perhaps even more surprising, in 1994
Boeing made an agreement with the Russian
manufacturer, Tupolev, to lease three Tu-144s for flight
test purposes. This was the only possibilihy open to the
Americans: apart from Concorde, none of which
were available, there exists no other similar aircraft or
even prototype, and none in the United States. Eight
million dollars have already been paid to the Russians
to put one of the last W-144s currently stored at
Joukovski, near Moscow, into airworthy condition. À
2 - The European "Alliance" project which precede the ERSP and demontrates that
there is no shortage of ideas.
3 Another view of the AST, a European supersonic project.
| - Boeing's HSCT (High Speed Commercial Transport)
is little different from the Europen designs. The question
remains whether there will be one or several Concorde
successors: the high costs involved suggest the former.
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
great disappointment to its constructors, the Tu-144s
will at least be uselull as a flying laboratory for the
Americans and, simultaneously, for a new Russian
project the existence of which has come to light under
these circumstances. This is the lu-244, a design
similar in concept to the ideas of the Europeans and
Americans.
In addition to the HSR programme, Boeing, Mac
Donnell Douglas, Rockwell, Lockheed and Northrop-
" Grumman as well as the engine manufacturers Prat
and Whitney and General Electric are involved
together in the HSCT, [High Speed Commercia
Transport}, project under the auspices of NASA and
reasuringly supported by Federal funds. Clearly, an
extensive infrastructure is being set up in the United
States and it puis a new perspective on the
declaration in December 1995 by the head of
Boeing's civil aircraft division, then aged 52, and in
which he stated that the next generation of supersonic
airliners would not be flying before he retired.
In Japan, Kawasaki, Mitsubishi and Fuji have been
working since 1989 on plans for an advanced
supersonic transport. They too enviseage an aircraft
of around 360 tonnes and flying at Mach 2.2 with
250-300 passengers over a range of 6000-7000
miles. lt is significant that it is precisely in Asia that the
most rapid increase in air traffic is being witnessed
and fhat Japan provides the highest number of transPacific passengers to the U.S.A.
This would be an
opportunity for the Japanese to have a major share in
an important aerospace programme and although
they already cooperate with Boeing as subcontractors, they would certainly relish a
more
important role.
Thus in Europe, the U.S.A., Japan and Russia all the
most important aerospace contractors are at work
individually and in cooperative ventures that will one
day enable them to pool their resourses and
experience in order to produce a successor to
Concorde. As a function of the number and type of
projects launched, and according to their industrial
and financial potential, the participants will become
variously partners, associates or sub-contractors in
what is already a gamble of strategic importance in
terms of the industrial and economic future. The
European manufacturers, led by Aerospatidle, have
already identified projects that they are determinated
to promote, but one of the difficulties resides in the
different financing structures that exists on either side of
the Atlantic; European governments do not operate like
the American Federal Government does through an
PS SCCRE F| | 1
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
organisation such as NASA. Nevertheless, a method
Will have to be found without delay at the risk of being
outrun in a new race that has already begun.
Today Europe invests 15 million dollars per year in
research; the Japanese spend 60 million and the
American 200 million: the discrepancy is enormous
and in spite of its long experience, Europe must invest
more if it wishes to remain in the running. There is no
guarantee that the new aircraft will fly before 2005 or
2010 and there may even be a time during which
Concorde passengers, used to supersonic travel, may
have to revert to travelling on slower, traditional
airliners. Perhaps for the first time, history will go into
reverse.
Upon retirement, the Concorde feet will ultimately
join other famous aircraft as exhibits in the many
museums around the world that will be only too
pleased to have them.
À location has already been designated for
Concorde in the biggest aerospace museum in the
world, the National Air and Space Museum in
Washington DC, after Air France promised to give
one lo the Americans. À plaque recording the offer
has been placed in the museum in the meantime as
a gesture of good faih, and when the promise is
lulfilled it may be considered poetic justice that
Concorde has delinitively retired to a place of honour
after so many vicissitudes.
APPENDIX 1: TWO WORLD RECORDS
1 - Donald L. Pevsner, the most fanatical
American Concorde enthusiast
and organiser of the two roundthe-wolrd
flights for which the aircraft holds
the speed records.
After nearly twenty-ive years in service
Concorde took the roundthe-world speed
records for a commercial airliner with
passengers on board on two occasions:
from east to west in 1992 and from west
to east 1995.
These two records can only be beaten
by another Concorde or its successor
in the future. The initiator of this
spectacular and highly mediatised event
was Donald L.Pevsner, an American
Concorde enthusiast from Miami. Here is
the commentary broadcast by the author,
who participated in the first of the record
flights, and which gives an idea
of the atmosphere during such an exploit.
Flight AF 1492,
in the steps of Columbus
In a total of 32 hours and
49 minutes which included
23 hours ans 12 minutes flying
time and six stops, Concorde
flight AF1492 won the roundtheworld speed record following
in the footsteps of Christopher
Colombus in an eastwest
circumnavigation of the globe.
Lisbon, Monday October 1 21h,
1992: the time is OBhrs 1 Smins
OSsecs as Concorde F-BTSD,
MSN N°13, takes-off.
The aircrat is one of six
belonging to Air France and
is the lightest of the 14 production
aircraft manufactured
by Aerospatiale and
British Aerospace, weighing
950kgs less than the heaviest
produced. Paradoxically
this aircrah, the first supersonic
commercial airliner in the world
and designed in the early sixties,
is about to attempt a speed
record 23 years after its first
flight. Another paradox is the fact
that the Financing for the exercise
is being provided by
an American, in spite of the fact
that the Americans atempted
to destroy Concorde as
a commercially viable operation
in the nineteen seventies.
The man in question is Donald L.
Pevsner, an aviation lawyer and
creator of Concorde Spirit Tours.
He regularly organises
round#he-world tips for
the wealthy enthusiasts desirous
of belonging to the ranks
of Mach 2 passengers.
Chaïtering alternatively
the Air France or British Airways
Concordes, this time he has
chosen Air France for the
spectacular atempt.
1992 was the 500fh anniversary
of the discovery of the Americas
by Christopher Columbus; what
better way was there for the
Americans to honnour
his achievement than by making
the voyage again in a Supersonic
vessel and starting from Portugale
The Air France operations
department and the flight
navigators had elaborated a
route as near as possible to the
Equator so that the aircraft would,
in fact, fly a distance of more
han 25 000 miles.
They then identified potentiel
stopover locations as a function
of the aircralt's range and in
correlation with the prevailing
winds, temperatures, atmospheric
pressure and available runaway
lengths: hence the importance
of choosing the lightest machine
available. || was also essential
that Concorde should fly for
as long as possible at Mach 2,
which meant over water or desert
areas or with special derogation
to over{ly inhabited areas.
lt seemed possible that the record
could be broken in a journey
of six legs on condition that
multiple crews were available
and that facilities were installed
at stations that were not normally
setup for Concorde operations.
Maintenance technicians
and other specialists would
supplement the flight crew
on board in order to rapidly
diagnose any problems and
to repair any minor faults
that should occur. They would
also advise on flight levels,
bearing in mind that there
could be no exception
to the implementation
of the international regulations
governing the transport
of commercial passengers,
and which meant that any
incident that affected them,
however minor, might result
in the record attempt being
abandonned.
Six million francs, [approximately
79 000 pounds sterling today]
was required to finance
the operation and tickets for the
available places were sold for
657 pounds sterling ($ 23.800]
by Concorde Spirit Tours.
Fortyive Americans,
one German, one Briton and
a Frenchman paid for seats and,
with Air France covering
the slight deficit, the project
became reality. À number of other
passengers were invited along
as guest of the airline.
The previous record for
an eastwest journey stood
at 45 hours including stopovers,
held by an American Gulisteam
GAV, and the westward record
stood at 36 hours, held
by the same aircraft. lt appeared
to be possible to beat both these
records at once by making
the aïtempt in a eastwest
direction and by taking a route
that would be penalised both
by the prevailing winds and with
regard to the direction
of the earths rotation. An original
aspect to the voyage would
be that in this direction, the whole
circumnavigation of the earth
would take place without the sun
ever being seen to set.
The first of the six stops on the trail
of Christopher Columbus selected
afer the departure from Lisbon
was Santo-Domingo: thus was
the Atlantic crossed in a single
APPENDIX 1: TWO WORID RECORDS
step in a flight time of 3 hours
31 minutes and 23 seconds
according to the stop-waiches
on board. [In reality, Columbus
only discorvered Santo-Domingo
on his second voyage.]
Ofthe 96 tonnes of fuel needed
on board before take-off, there
remained sufiicient reserves
to suppose that another similar
flight would be possible.
IF necessary a diversion could
be made to the Azores.
The worst problems affecting
the record that could be imagined
were those involving
depressurisation, necessitating
low altitude flight at subsonic
speed, and an engine failure.
An airintake blockage or the
failure of a control computer and
its backup system would also
reduce the speed to no more than
Mach 1.4 and thereby reduce
the aireraffs range capabilit.
The sun was just rising
in Santo-Domingo as we
disembarked from the aircraft
while it reluelled and had the
cabin serviced. Two passengers
were served with a colourful
earlymorning cocktail as invited
guests and the simply curious
arrived to wilness our rapid
transit, while a fresh cabin crew
appeared to take over the aircraft
for the next leg. They were
there well in advance to avoid
any possible delay, for we had
already lost six minutes due
to high temperatures over
the Atlantic.
The stopover lasted a little more
than an hour and then, "Goodbye
Columbus’, as we made for
Acapulco in Mexico on a
southerly heading and then a
westerly one in order to fly as fast
as possible on this short leg that
lasted only 2 hours 18 minutes.
À new pilot and corpilot had
iaken over the controls since the
last leg, and with the change
of crew we had already begun
to ‘use up' our resources, and off:
duty flight crew members were
resting at the rear of the aircraft
where a special cabin had been
installed for them.
To maintain Mach 2, achieved
after ten minutes of flight,
we by-passed Jamaica and Cuba
and after an hour and a half
we left, Yucatan below on our left
at which point we returned
lo subsonic speed, having
no supersonic authorisation
over Mexico. Shortly before
passing south of Mexico City
at Mach 0.93 we saw
the summit of Popocatepell,
higher than MontBlanc, followed
2- An early morning stopover.
Captain Boyer, at the cockpit window,
is serenaded by a Mariachi band.
by a superb view of Acapulco
bay before landing at the airport
belore a curious crowd, happy
and smiling in spite of the early
morning hour. The sun was just
fising again, as a Mariachi band
serenaded us with their unhurried
ryfhms reminiscent of old "78"
records. There followed a similar
scenario to that which had taken
place at he previous stop,
as passengers disembarked and
the aircraft was made ready
again: ground crews busy,
reluelling completed and station
representatives negociating with
1 - The president of Air France welcomes
the crew back to Lisbon after the roundthe-world voyage.
airport "Ops" for the best
departure slot, as they had done
for the arrival. Then began the
third leg of the journey and the
most difficult. Only one possible
diversion airport existed between
Acapulco and Honolulu, that was
Los Angeles: the aircrait was
carrying a maximum fuel load
and the outside ground
temperature was high. lt was al
calculated, but the take-off ground
roll would be long.
I was on this flight that we most
leared something going wrong
but everything went well. The
Pacific Ocean was covered in
cloud, on the horizon were
billowing cumulo-nimbus and at
55 000 feet we passed above
them. Our aircraft constantly
gained altitude, a characteristic
of Condorde which occured as
APPENDKX 1: TWO WORID RECORDS
fuel was used up and the aircrait
became steadily lighter. In the
same way the speed varied as a
function of temperature and the
mach-meter oscillated between
Mach 1.99 and 2.03. Another
characteristic is the high
temperature of the aircraf's
external surface at the nose and
Wing leading edges particularly:
127% is the limit with an air
temperature of -60°C but we
never exceeded 1 10°C during
the record flight.
After a flight of 3 hours 26
minutes our Concorde made its
third stop in Honolulu where we
were welcomed by lovely vahiné
dancers: it was 10 o'clock in the
monming and already hot, [28°C|;
how exotic! For us, however, after
leaving Lisbon at 8am on a
winters morning, it was 3 o'clock
in the afternoon. In Honolulu we
changed cabin crews again and
the reserve flight crew took over
once more, then at the end of the
rapid technical stop it was
"Adieu" to the Hawaian islands as
we headed directly for the island
of Guam in the Mariana
archipelago, our fourth stop. The
flight lasted 3 hours and 22
minutes with a lot of water below,
bu
possibility of diverting to Wake
= here was always the
Island, half way accross,
especially as there was some
doubt concerning a cyclone still
active in the vicinity of the
Marianas. À meteorological
report over the HF radio set our
minds at rest and at the stopover
on the American base we were
able to ask questions about the
B-525 located there. Concorde
had already flown into Guam
during one of its promotional tours
but that had been a British
Airways aircraft.
Alls going well, the Pacific is
crossed in 3 hours and the fifth
stop is reached at Bangkok in
Thailand, after slowing down to
navigate round the peninsula of
Indo-China. The shower that
passengers were promised in
transit in a hotel under
immigration surveilance is not
going to be possible after all:
there's no time, even though we
are making good progress and
the delay on the first leg has been
made up. We are even ahead of
schedule. The stopover is,
nevertheless, a colourful one with
Thai dancers in attendance, but
there is no time to loose. The
flight on to Bahrain is the longest
yet, 4 hours 10 minutes in nowind conditions with 3 hours 52
minutes in the air. In order to fill
all the fuel tanks to maximum
capacity the passengers must be
embarked first, otherwise the
rearward weight distribution
would cause the nose to til
upwards off the ground and
Bangkok airport dæsn't have the
necessary counterweights.
After take-off, the accumulated
fatigue helps the passengers to
sleep for it is now 24 hours since
we left Lisbon and most of them
been awake of 30 hours or
more. No cabin service is
provided for this sector except a
light breaklast belore arrival.
The organiser himself, Donald L.
Pevsner, at last leaves the cockpit
where he had installed himself
since the beginning of the voyage
and tries to get some rest.
Our Concorde must now make a
long detour around India which
has ref used Supersonic overflight
rights, and so we 20 nautical
miles south of Sri Lanka before
heading back up towards the
Persian Gulf at nearly Mach 2
and towardks the sixth stop,
Bahrain; retuming to subsonic
speed over the Gulf. As on
previous occasions the same ritual
is observed as the aircrat is
cleaned and reluelled before
taking-off again in record time.
Even in this respect {during a
record flight} Concorde does not
go unnoticed. lt was to Bahrain
that the British Airways Concorde
made its first commercial flight.
Take-off again: the last, this time,
heading for Lisbon; another long
flight of 3 hours 42 minutes with
views from 59 000 feet of the
Saudi Arabian and Egyptian
deserts. From the ground
Concorde high speed relative to
other aircralt is clearly
discernable but the passengers
are asleep again for the most part
since they have now been on
board for nearly 28 hours. Apart
from one or 1Wo very minor
worries, everything is going well
and home is in sight still with a
lle time in hand.
Às we fly over the Mediterranean
those asleep are awakened from
their siesta, and above the sun
finally overtakes us benefiting
from our accumulated ground
time during the stopovers: it sels,
for us at last in Lisbon, but more
han wo hours after our arrival. lt
is not quite Spm as our faithful
Concorde completes its round:heworld journey to the applause of
all on board and the sound of
corks popping as Champagne is
served during the taxkin. Some
passengers and even crew
members are moved to tears by
APPENDIX 1: TWO WORLD RECORDS
the emotion, like Poulain, the
flight engineer who, his eyes
moist, observes that his retirement
in a few weeks time could not be
marked by a more appropriate
souvenir.
During the past 36 hours a few
warning lights had blinked in the
cockpit signalling a lazy
generator or a tired battery, there
had been two difficult engine
starts, one in Bankok, the other in
Bahrain, and computer had misbehaved: but that was all. Such
wos the aircraf's reliability during
the voyage that the day following
our return to France, ‘our’
Concorde took-off as usual from
Paris with a lull load of
passengers for New York as if
nothing had happened.
What an amazing aircraft is
Concorde. | had thought it
temperamental and complex,
rather like a fighter; difficult to fly
except by highly talented
specialists: in fact, as | can testily,
our pilots flew it with no more
difficulty than an Airbus or a
Boeing and with no more stress
involved. The busiest man seemed
to be the flight engineer who
does have a higher workload;
apart from that, one pushes the
throtlles forward and the only
difference is that at Mach O.85
Concorde continues to accelerate
smoothly up to Mach 1 and
Mach 2 where this supersonic
aircrat remains as easy to fly as
any other aircraft. Of course, this
is mainly due to the designers
who foresaw any difficulties and
built in secondary and tertiary
backup systems and engineered
the whole to withstand the most
testing conditions. This is what
gives the flight crew such absolute
confidence in their aircraft.
After 23 hours 12 minutes of
flight out of a block time of 32
hours 49 minutes including
stopovers, we had also beaten
anolher record: we had flow for
more than 20 hours at Mach 2,
4 and with a glass in our hands
to; enough to make fighter pilots
pale with envy. They are
condemned to be strapped into
their seais wearing
Grsuits, helmets and oxygen
masks before being obliged to
return to base with tanks empty
after only a few minutes at Mach
2. And the only "bang" that we
heard was the opening of
Champagne botlles.
Flight AF 1995
Three years after that record
flight, Concorde broke the record
for a circumnavigation of the
world in the opposite direction,
from west to east. The same
aircraft, FBTSD, the lightest in the
Îleet, left New York at 1 1.49am
on August 15fh, 1995, with two
of the previous record-breaking
crew on board. They were Jean
Marot and Jean Lombaït, co-pilot
and flight engineer, respectively,
and they became the only wo
people to hold two roundheworld speed records; just as Dick
Rutan and Jeana Yeager hold the
record since 1986 for a non-stop
round-he-world flight without
reluelling in their aircraft,
Voyager. This second historic
Concorde flight was also
undertaken on the initiative the
American lawyer, Donald L.
Pevsner, president of Concorde
Spirit Tours.
2 - Jean Marcot [below] who, together
With Pierre Lombart, holds the double
round-he-world speed record.
_ APPENDIX 2: THE WORLD RECORDHIOIDERS
East-west circumnavigation
AF 1492 October 12th - 13th, 1992
Operations manager: Delorme Claude, Concorde chief pilot.
Ê Fight captain: Jean Boyé.
Copilots: Eric Célérier, Patrick d'Haussy, Jean Marcot.
Flight engineers: Jean Escuyer, Jean Lombaït, Claude Poulain.
Ground mechanics: Laurens Jean-Pierre, Rémond Michel
and Jean-Luc Chabot.
Cabin crew:
Lisbon-Santo-Dominguo: chief purser, Geneviève Donval.
Hostesses: Caroline Flormoy, Béatrice Jacquet.
Stewards: Jean-Christian Degeorges, Claude Roussel,
Philippe ScotordiRinalai
Santo-Domingo-Honolulu: chief purser, Brian Ferguson.
Hostesses: Véronique Thomas, Pascale Jouassain, Maire-Claire Martin.
Stewards: Gérard Cieslak, Dominique Lhote.
Honolulu-Bangkok: chief purser, Philippe Alcaraz.
Hostesses: Christiane Burghes, Geneviève de Sutter, Brigitte Caillard.
Stewards: Robert Fleury, Gérard Toussaint.
BangkokLisbon: chief purser, Sylviane Bessières.
Hostesses: Michèle Cornebize, Louise Ouet.
Stewards: Stéphane Beline, Bruno Detchevery, Yves Dardaud.
Previous westward circumnavigation
Record held since June 14th, 1992, by Grumman Gulfstream G:4 flown
by allen E. Paulson, Gulistream programme director. Established during
June 12h - 14fh in 4Shrs 25mins 1Osecs with four stops:
depating//arriving Le Bourget Airshow and stopping at Edmonton,
Alberta [Canada}, Midway Island [Pacific Ocean}, Kota Kinabalu
(Malaysia) and Dubai (UAE).
Distance : 36 832,44 km.
Aufhenticated by the A..A.C.C.
The definition of a complete circumnavigation FAI a speed record flight must be
recorded over a
ofthe world is discribed as having passed distance equal to or more than that of
the tropical
through fwo points on opposite sides ofthe world parallels, that is 36 784,632 km.
The dossier
and in so doing have travelled a distance of must be prepared by the national aéro-
club of the
40 007,864 km [fhe distance around the polar paricipating crew, France,
GreatBritany,
meridian] or 40 075,017 |fhe distance around U.S.A., etc}, and be submitted to the
FAI
the equatorial parallel}. To be recognised by the {International Aeronoutic
Federation].
Statistics appertaining to the record flight of october 13th, 1992
Record time: 32 hrs 49 mins 03 secs (T1 + T2]
Total light time T1: 23 hrs 10 mins 44 secs
Total stopover time T2: 9 hrs 38 mins 19 secs
Flight sector times:
Average: 3 hrs 18 mins 07 secs
Minimum: Santo-Domingo - Acapulco, 2 hrs 17 mins 03 secs
Maximum: Bangkok-Bahrain, 3 hrs 52 mins 00 secs
Supersonic flight time:
Total: 18 hrs 29 mins 35 secs
Maximum sector: 3 hrs 01 mins 13 secs, Lisbon-Santo - Domingo
Minimum sector: 1 hrs 29 mins 40 secs, Santo-Domingo - Acapulco
Mach 2 time: 14 hrs 56 mins 51 secs
Stopover times:
Total: 9 hrs 38 mins 19 secs
Average: 1 hrs 16 mins 23 secs
Minimum: Santo-Domingo: 1 hrs 11 mins 40 secs
Maximum: Bangkok: 1 hrs 31 mins 18 secs
Taxi time:
Total: 1 hrs 46 mins
Minimum: 11 mins 33 secs: Acapulco
Maximum: 23 mins 16 secs: Honolulu
Lisbon: 16 mins 32 secs {not deducted)
Distance covered: 40 454 km
Speeds achieved:
In-flight average: 1 745,17 km/h
Average including stopovers: 1 232,64 km/h
Maximum sector: 1 822,09: Honolulu - Guam
Minimum sector: 1 646,52: Santo-Dominguo - Acapulco
Consumables :
Fuel: 506 000 kg, 632 500 litres +
Fuel/kilometre : 15,65 litres
Oil: 56 litres
Oil/hour: 2,4 litres (0,61 per engine}
The record was beaten by 12 hrs 36 mins 07 secs in spite of the distance being
greater by
3.621,56 km than the standard imposed and six stops being included instead of four.
The
eastward record was beaten by 05 hrs 19 mins 31 secs.
West-east circumnavigation
AF 1995 August 15th — 161h, 1995
APPENDIX 2: THE WORLD RECORD-HOLDERS
Operations manager: Michel Dupont, Concorde chief pilot.
Flight captain: Claude Hetu.
Copilots: Bernard Bachelet, Bernard Depouez, Jean Marcot.
Flight engineers: Claude Billerey, Jean Lombart,
Jean-Louis Masselin.
Ground mechanics: Philippe Navarre, Jean-Jacques Chillaud.
Cabin crew:
New York-Toulouse: chief purser, Dominique Wallois.
Hostesses: Nell Everete, Elisabeth Van den Brink, Nathalie Nicola.
Stewards: Philippe Jasselin, John Lynch.
Toulouse-Bangkok: chief purser, Philippe Ballereau.
Hostesses: Catherine Diebold, Nathalie Delahayes.
Stewards: Christian Caleyron, Alain Verschuere, Laurent d'Alterio.
Bangkok-Honolulu: chief purser, Serge Blanchong.
Hostesses: Hélène Rollando, Agnes Mathieux, ltalia Gambotto.
Stewards: Daniel Franques, Bruno Gremy.
Honolulu-New York : chief purser, Yannick Gougaud.
Hostesses: Carole Guerand, Caroline Cadier, Dominique de Cambiaire.
Stewards: Pierre Gambini, Jean-Pierre Petro.
Previous eastward circumnavigation
Record held since February 271h, 1988, by Grumman Gulistream G:4,
N440GA, ‘Pursuit of Perfection", flown by Allen E. Paulson, Gulfstream
programme director.
Established during February 26th — 271h in 36 hrs 08 mins 34 sec with
four stops: departing/arriving Houston [Texas] and stopping at Shannon
(Irlande}, Dubaï [UAË), Taipei [Taiwan] and Maui (Hawaï).
Distance : 37 093,10 km.
Statistics appertaining to the record flight of August 15th, 1995
Record time: 31 hrs 27 mins 49 secs (T1 + T2]
Total flight time T1: 22 hrs 39 mins 21 secs
Total stopover time T2: 8 hrs 48 mins 28 secs
Flight sector time:
Average: 3 hrs 14 mins 11 secs
Minimum: Acapulco New York 2 hrs 42 mins 04 secs
Maximum: Dubaï Bangkok 3 hrs 37 mins 51 secs
Supersonic fight time:
Total: 18 hrs 40 mins 08 secs
Maximum sector: 2 hrs 59 mins 16 s Honolulu - Acapulco
Minimum sector: O1 hrs 53 mins 17 secs
Mach 2 time: 15 hrs 10 mins 41 secs
Stopover time:
Total: 08 hrs 48 mins 28 secs
Average: 1 hrs 15 mins 03 secs
Minimum: Guam : 1 hrs 10 mins 07 secs
Maximum: Honolulu : 1 hrs 46 mins 38 secs
Taxi time:
Total: 1 hrs 35 mins
Minimum: 11 mins 55 secs à Toulouse
Maximum: 24 mins 10 secs à Honolulu
New York: 25 mins 55 secs {non deducted)
Distance covered: 40 630 km
Speed achieved:
Inlight average: 1 793,23 km/h
Average including stopover: 1 291,35 km/h
Maximum sector: 1 878,26 km/h: New York - Toulouse
Minimum sector: 1 679,51 km/h: Dubaï - Bangkok
Consumables:
Fuel: 21 640 kg, 652 050 litres
Fuel/kilometre: 16,04 litres
Oil: 56 litres
Oil/hour: 2,4 litres (0,61 per engine)
The record was beaten by 04 hrs 40 mins 45 s in spite of the distance greater than
3536,90 km
and 6 stops instead of 4. Concorde! record was beaten by O1 hrs 21mins 14 secs.
The holder of both records is the thirteenth
Concorde FBTSD, MSN N° 213, which
first few on June 26th, 1978, registered FWJAM. Still un-sold by September 18h,
1978, along with MSN 215 (F-BVFF), it was
one of the three aircraft that was sold-off
three days later by the Minister of Transport
for the symbolic sum of one franc, on
September 21st. It thus joined the Air France
fleet on May 9th, 1980, shortly followed by
its bo sisters-in-adversity. After such an
inauspiscious beginning, however, it was to
have a brilliant career, even flying to Dallas
under the American registration number
N94SD for Braniff. On departing from Lisbon
in 1992 it was in peak condition, having
accumulated only 8429 flight hours; and
When it left New York in 1995 it was, if
anything, better with 10 010 flight hours in
its log-book. Like all those born under the
sign of Cancer, it could have been attributed
the qualities of confidence, reason and
perspicacity but it was not for these qualities
that it Was chosen. F-BTSD had the best
performance because it was the lightest
Concorde built. Weighing 77 473 tonnes
and 210 g as it came of maintenance on
March 15th, 1989, it was lighter by 930kg
and 790g than the heaviest production aircraft,
F-BTSC. lt was thereby the most fuel efficient
00, having above 400-500 litres more
reserve fuel left at the end of the record fight.
Prototypes
DOI FWTSS
002 GBSST
Pré-production A/C
101 GAXDN
102 FWTSA
Production A/C
201 FWTSB
202
203 FWTSC
204
205
206
207
213 FWJAM
214 GBKW
215 FWAN
216 G-BFKX
REGISTRATION
F-WTSS
G-BSST
G-AXDN
F-WTSA
FWTSB
G-BBDG
F-BTSC
G-BOAC
F-BVFA
G-BOAA
F-BVFB
G-BOAB
F-BVFC
G-BOAD
F-BVFD
G-BOAE
F-BTSD
G-BOAG
F-BVFF
G-BOAF
APPENDIX 3:
CONCORDE FLEET STATUS
FIRST FLIGHT
2.3.1969
9.4.1969
17.12.1971
10.1.1973
ON21973
13.2.1974
JMM97S
27.2.1975
25.10.1975
SAMIQ7S
6.3.1976
18.5.1976
9.,7.1976
25.8.1976
10.2.1977
1722011077
20.0.1978
21.4.1978
20.12.1978
20.4.1979
LAST FLIGHT
19.10.1973
4.3.1976
20.8.1977
20.5.1976
27,9 1982
STATUS
Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace. Le Bourget Paris (F]
Yeovilton Air Museum [GB]
Duxford Air Museum [GB]
On display at Paris Orly (F]
On display at Toulouse (f]
Property of Académie Nationale de l'Air
et de l'Espace.
On display at Filton (GB)
In service
In service
In service
In service
In service
In seryice
n service
n service
Broken up for spares (F]
n service
n service /
2 roundtheworld records
In service
In service
In service
APPENDIX 4: VITAL STATISTICS
Commercial passengers transported_ 21.1.1976 - 21.1.1996
{all aidines|: 3,7 million
Total accumulated flight hours: over 200 000
Total distance covered: over 350 million km
Number of airports visited: 240 in over 100 countries
Flight crew compliment: 2 pilots, 1 flight engineer
Cabin crew compliment: 6 flight attendants
Power plants: 4 RollsRoyce-SNECMA, Olympus 593 Mark 610
Thrust rating: 17,4 tonnes each with re-heat
Cruise speed: 2350 km/h [36 km per minute at Mach 2]
Take-off. 3 600 mètres
Landing: 2 200 mètres
Take-off speed: 360km/h [200 Kts]
DIMENSIONS
Landing speed: 240 km/h [130 Kts]
Maximum range: 6500 km
Wing span: 25,56 metres
Wing surface area: 358 square metres
Overall length: 62,10 metres
Fuselage diameter: 2,87 metres
Overall height: 12,19 metres
Freight volume: 19,4 cubic metres
Empty weight: 79 tonnes
Maximum take-oif weight: 185 tonnes
Maximum landing weight: 1 11 tonnes
Fuel capacity: 119 280 lies, 95 tonnes
Total payload: 11,5 tonnes
Maximum cruise altitude: 18 000 metres
FUEL TRANSFER
= = CX
2,87 m <— 18 m{59# 1 in —+ PAS in) + | su L— 3,33 m (10 ft 11 in]
qe
; LL
7,70 m (25 #3 in)
Re
+ 62,10 m (203 #9 in) >
THE DROOP NOSE AND VISOR
Take-of and subsonic cruise Supersonic Hight
{nose drooped 5° - visor stowed). {nose raised — visor raised).
ue
Subsonic cruise
{nose raised — visor stowed).
Approach / landing and taxi
{nose fully dropped — visor stowed).
ni res ele
Rearward transfer - Transsonic acceleration
Ballast position for rapid deceleration
US ALL Sr
Forward transfer - End of cruise
—_
Forward position for prolonged subsonic cruise
EN Main tanks BE Bclosttonks
94
ACKNOWIEDGMENTS
André Turcat, former Director, Flight Test Dept., Aerospatiale; Isabelle
Sabourault, photo research; Catherine Bouriquet: Dominique Neveu,
former President of he AIACC [Association Internationale d'Aérophilatélie et de
Cartophilie Concorde}; Jacqueline Chabridon, Frank Debouck,
Gilbert Gauthier, Air France; Jean Lasserre of the Air France museum and the SNPL
magazine, lcare; Roger Guigui; Patrice Kreis, André Bloch,
Gilles Patri, Olivier Adam, Bernard Keller, Aerospatiale, France; David J.
Charlton, British Aerospace Airbus Limited. G.B.; Air France, British Airways,
Aerospatiale, British Aerospace, SNECMA, Rolls Royce: Marylène Vanier, former Chief
Hostess, Air France;
Pierre Chanoine, former Chief Concorde Pilot, Air France; Fernand Andréani, former
Air France Concorde pilot and Président of the APCOS,;
General Siflre, director of the Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace; Stephane Nicolaÿ,
the Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace; Gérard David, Intertechnique:
Anne Lacourlie, René Moreau, Hispano-Suiza; Édouard Chemel; Joseph Robin.
CRÉDITS PHOTOS /DOCUMENTS
Aerospaiiole 20 MIS AS MO M2027005 D ST AMEN 38 ANA AS AS AO AA MS ES OMS AS AGO
MOD OM OST 10)
77,78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85 - Aerospatiale magazine : 30, 32, 41, 56 — À. F.
P. : 68 — Air France, Philippe Boulze : 1, 4/5, 6/7, 7, 8,9, 11, 12,
14, 15, 31, 36, 43, 53, 59, 62, 64/65, 67, 77, 105 - Bernard Auquier : 62, 63, 69,
70, 71, 77 - British Aerospace : 14, 17, 23, 29, 33, 37, 76 - British
Airways : 42, 56/57, 59, 61, 62, 67, 73 - CEAT, Centre d'essais aéronautiques de
Toulouse/DGA, Délégation générale pour l'armement, France : 19, 21, 23 - Gamma : 88
-
CIRI.C. : 66 — Michel Isaac/Air et Cosmos : 73 — Hispano=Suiza :18 - Musée Air
France/SNPL/review lcare : 27, 29, 38, 40, 42, 44, 45, 49, 51, 55, 57, 59,
64 - Musée de l'Air : 57, 21 — Rémy Pourot : 26 - SIPA press : 66 - Private
collection of the author.
INTRODUCTION
À FIGHT ON CONCORDE
Faster than the speed of soundl
1960: THE SUPERSONIC RACE
1947: Yeager breaks the sound barrier
Franco-British cooperation
Concord ou Concorde
Ofher programmes
The superpowers' programmes
Facts and Figures
Planning for the prototypes
Preparing for the first Hight
Concorde"s first flight — following Tupolev
Towards the sound barrier
Concorde's prospective customers
Difficult times
THE FIRST SUPERSONIC PASSENGERS
Concorde around the world
The first VIPs
America abandons the SST
1973: a difficult year
Waiting lists
The port of New York Authority
Environmentall} friendly Concorde
The first commercial service
The end of the Iu-144
Concorde and espionage
CONCORDE IN SERVICE
Braniff and Singapore Airlines’ operations
To Mexico and Miami
CONCORDE TO-DAY
Flights of Fancy
Concorde in Art and public relations
Concorde s VIPs
Captain Chemel's diary
Technical incidents and considerations
THE FUTURE OF SUPERSONIC AIR TRANSPORT
Beyond the year 2000
Lite after Concorde
What kind of market?
What kind of aircraft£
The means?
The environnemente
Airbus profits from Concorde's experience
Europe beyond Concorde
APPENDICES
Appendix |: Two world records
Flight AF 1492 in the steps of Colombus
Flight AF 1995
Appendix 2: The world record holders
Appendix 3: Concorde fleet statistics
Appendix 4: Vital statistics
Bibliography
54
1
58
60
60
03
04
09
22
74
74
76
77
78
79
79
80
83
80
80
80
89
90
0)
93
96
BIBLOGRAPHY
MAGAZINES:
AAAÂF, review of the Association Aéronautique et Astonautique de France.
AEROSPATIALE Magazine.
Air et Cosmos, Aviation Magazine.
Aviation et Pilote.
Aviation Week.
Concorde 001, Lettre du Musée de l'Air et de l'Espace.
Concorde INFO, review of the association Promouvoir Concorde.
Dépêche du Midi [la].
Documentations constructeurs.
Flight magazine.
Interavia
MACH magazine of the Association Intemationale d'Aérophilatélie
et de Cartophilie Concorde.
Pégase, review of the Association des amis du musée de l'Air et de l'Espace.
Pionniers du ciel, review of the association Les Vieilles Tiges
Science et vie, magazine.
FULL LENGTH WORKS:
Académie de l'Air et de l'Espace, 1991, Recommandations sur l'avion
de transport haute vitesse.
Birlles Philip, Concorde, Modern Civil Aircrah 2, 1984.
Bombeau Bernard, Les Années Bourget de 1909 à nos jours,
La Sirène, 1993.
Calvert Brian, Flying Concorde, Aïrlife Ed, 1989,
Chemel Édouard, Chronique de l'Aviation, éd. Chroniques.
Costello John & Hughes Terry, The intemational race for supersonic
passenger transport, Angus and Robertson publishers Concorde, 1976.
Demaizières Louis, collection de documents confiés à l'auteur, 1993.
Denarié Paul, L'Aventure de Concorde, Les Presses noires 1969.
GIFAS, l'Industrie aéronautique et spatiale française, 1985.
Klopfstein Gilbert, L'air et l'avion, DGAC/ITA. 1995.
Larson Ken, lo fly the Concorde, Tab Books Inc, 1982.
Le Moel Jean-Paul, Concorde raconte, éd. Nouveau Reporter, 1994.
Le Vol supersonique, care, the SNPL.' review
Manel Jean-Pierre, La Grande Aventure de Concorde, Solar, 1969.
Monory Jacques, le Concorde F.BVFA. Peinture de l'artiste. 1987.
Morisset Jacques, Concorde, Diagrammes du monde n° 141,
nov. 1968.
Perrier Henri, various conferences on Concorde, project,
fly tests and in-service experience.
Petit Edmond, Nouvelle Histoire mondiale de l'aviation,
Albin Michel.
Poisson-Quinton, ONERA, articles on aerodynamic research
and tomorow aircraft (1965).
SudAviation, Concorde, notices techniques, 1966.
Turcat André, Concorde, essais et batailles, Stock, 1977.
Ziegler Henri, La Grande Aventure de Concorde, Grasset, 1976.
+
Printed in France for
le cherche midi éditeur
Design: Marie-Claire du Cailar
with the cooperation of Pierre Boutavant
Registration of copyright: January 1996
Publisher number: 448
ISBN 2-862/74-448-4
1 # Û
Far s
ne te
CONCORDE
There is only one supersonic airliner in the word today in regular commercial
service
capable of fiying one hundred or so passengers at a speed of Mach 2, that is at
nearly 1440 miles per hour. That airliner is Concorde, the result of a Franco-
British, cooperative manufaciuring programme launched in 1962. lt made its maiden
flight in 1969, the year that Neil Armstrong landed on the moon, and after
overcoming innumerable technical, economic and, particularly political
difficulties, went inio aïdine service on January 21st, 1976. Concorde introduced
its operators, British Airways and Air France, and îhe world at large io the era of
supersonic passenger travel. À considerable technical achievemeni, Concorde is
still fying iweniy years later and is he only supersonic aircraft of its kind still
in existence: the American SSF project being abandoned and he Russian Tupolev 144
being premaiurely withdrawn from service. Today, neaïty four million passengers
have flown on Concorde and by doing so can claim that they are, or at least have
been, somme of ihe fastest people in the word. This book recounis ihe history of
this amazing aircraft from its very beginning, when it was only an embryonic idea
in the minds of its designers on each side of he Channél, right up to the present
day. The story is one of adventure and ambition and is peppered with interesting
anecdoies and, of course, as yet it is a story with no end.
Michel Polacco is a journalist and pilot who has, for many years, been ihe aviation
correspondent for France Inter and France Info. He holds professional fixedwing and
helicopter qualifications and in 1992, broadcast “live” from on board the Concorde
that beat the speed record for a roundihe- world trip by a civil airliner. On the
ground and in the air, he has been a passionaïe follower of Concorde along with all
those who have been, and still are, involved with the world's only supersonic civil
airliner.
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