The world’s only truly commercially operated supersonic transport aircraft, developed during the 1960s in the first Anglo-French collaborative aviation programme.
The Concorde story began on 5th November 1956, when the British Government established the Supersonic Transport Aircraft Committee, to study the feasibility of building a supersonic airliner. The British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) and Sud Aviation (later to become Aerospatiale) were already working on their own preliminary designs, when in 1962, French President Charles de Gaulle made a plea for co-operation, as building a supersonic aircraft would be too costly for either nation to finance alone. On 26th November the British and French Governments signed a preliminary agreement for co-operation.
In 1964, a management group was established and it was agreed that BAC and Aerospatiale would design and build the airframe and Rolls Royce and SNECMA would build the engines.
Construction of two prototypes began in February 1965: 001 built by Aerospatiale in Toulouse and, 002, by BAC at Filton, Bristol. Concorde 001 was completed first and made its first flight on the 2nd March 1969 and first went supersonic later that year on the 1st October. The British Concorde, 002, first flew on 9th April 1969. As the flight test programme progressed both Concordes embarked on sales campaigns across the world and soon orders began to flood in. By the early 1970s, more than 70 aircraft had been ordered and prospects were looking good for further sales. However, the 1973 oil crisis, a spectacular crash of the competing Tupolev Tu-144 at the Paris Air Show plus environmental concerns such as the sonic boom, take-off noise and pollution, all took their toll, and orders dwindled to just a handful. Eventually only British Airways and Air France brought and operated Concorde. A total of only 20 Concordes were eventually built between 1966 and 1979.
The first schedule Concorde services started on 21st January 1976, with British Airways flying a London to Bahrain route and Air France flying between Paris and Rio Janeiro. But it was the lucrative North Atlantic routes that both airlines were trying to achieve. Fierce opposition in North America, from Government and environmentalist mainly, had ensured that Concorde was banned from all USA airports. Following much legal wrangling finally both British Airways and Air France were granted permission to operate scheduled services into New York’s John F. Kennedy airport. These services began on 22nd November 1977 and continued to October 2003.
On 10th April 2003, British Airways and Air France announced that Concorde would be retired later that year. Air France concluded Concorde operations on the 3rd June with its final flight from New York. British Airways continued operations until late October, when it too, flew its final flight from New York on 24th October 2003, so ending 27 years of supersonic operations.
All the Concorde aircraft have found new homes with museums across the world.
